Justin Tomlinson – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Justin Tomlinson on 2014-06-17.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment his Department has made of the benefits of teaching emergency life-saving skills in schools.

Matthew Hancock

Emergency life-saving skills (ELS) can be taught as part of personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) education.

PSHE can help children develop essential social skills that evidence shows are important for children’s achievement across all subjects, and for their preparation for a healthy and active life.

Schools are encouraged to work with expert organisations to teach ELS, for example St John Ambulance who visited approximately 2000 schools in 2013. Their ‘Teach the Difference‘ website has over 7000 registered users, most of whom are teachers, and users downloaded over 16,000 first aid lesson plans in 2013.