Opinion with Zeena Rasheed

As a child, the Right Hon. Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson MP was an extra in Byker Grove. In November 2022's podcast Political Thinking, she talks passionately about education as transformational. On 14 August 2023 she tweeted: ‘The arts, creativity, drama, music: they must be available to every child, to us all.’ In her March 2022 speech for ASCL (Association for School and College Leaders) she challenged binary dogmatic thinking and said: ‘When take-up of the creative arts has plummeted, we need to ask questions about the balance in the curriculum […] Supporting children to develop the literacy and numeracy skills they need is central to education, and so is supporting them to become ambitious, creative, confident young people who enjoy music, arts, sport and culture.’