Peterborough education chief instructs schools to cap bubbles at 50 per cent capacity

The decision comes following a letter Mr Lewis addressed to parents last Friday (January 8) in which they were informed that guidance around who is permitted to attend school would be tightened.

Schools in Peterborough are now only required to admit vulnerable children those of ‘critical workers,’ which includes the health and social care, education, food production and public safety industries.

This was in response to a number of schools seeing higher numbers of pupils, whose parents are key workers, attending school than in the first national lockdown in March.

Mr Lewis said: “The Local Authority has, in collaboration with Public Health and the Department for Education, issued guidance to schools in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough on the opening of schools for Vulnerable and Critical Worker Children.

“Where possible, we have advised schools to keep the number of children attending schools as low as possible - with a cap of 50% attendance in bubbles - to ensure they remain safe spaces for staff and pupils alike, and to help minimise the transmission of COVID-19.

“Schools have to deliver both in school and remotely during this period of closure and this is placing significant pressure on staffing resources.”

Attendance figures, correct up to Monday (January 11) do, however, show that the percentage of children attending schools in Peterborough is lower than the rest of Cambridgeshire.

Figures released by Peterborough City Council show that of the 37,066 pupils on roll for schools under local authority control, 5,191 have regularly attended the site (14 percent). This figure rises to 15 percent when factoring in Cambridgeshire (12,613 of 81,585 pupils).

On site provision has been particularly high in primary and special schools though when compared to secondary and all-through schools. Around 21% of the city’s primary school children and 31% of the city’s children in special schools have received on site-provision, compared to just five percent in secondary and all-through schools.

The figures are broadly the same across Cambridgeshire with 22 percent of Primary and 32 percent of special school children receiving on-site provision.