Financial advice expert Martin Lewis has accused the government of undermining his efforts to ensure England’s children are educated about mortgages and credit cards, saying schools are suffering from a “poverty” of financial education.
Speaking before the education select committee, Lewis said the campaign he led in 2014 to add financial topics to the national curriculum was successful but had achieved little in the decade since.
“Getting it into the curriculum is a Pyrrhic victory. In some ways, it’s counterproductive,” Lewis told MPs.
“We fought hard to get it into the national curriculum. We got it in the national curriculum in England. At that time, a lot of voluntary and private sector resources were mobilized. Then we changed the way schools were run – academies programmes, free School sports – all of which means they don’t have to follow the national curriculum.
“So the holy grail of trying to make this subject mandatory in every school, which is the purpose of getting into the curriculum, is self-defeating.”
Even schools that do want to teach the subject are hampered by a lack of resources and a failure to make the subject a high priority, Lewis said.
“Frankly, the amount of resources that the state and the government have put into it since then has been completely anemic and at a harmful level. So while I can’t say that I regret that we won the election at that time, I’m not sure that it does In any way that changed the game because the rules subsequently changed about what the national curriculum meant, I still think there is real poverty in financial education in the UK.
“A lot of this comes down to a lack of resources in schools or a lack of teacher training resources, and a lack of attention to already overstretched principals.”
Lewis said when financial education is taught in schools, the topics are divided into math and civics classes. He called on schools to appoint a financial education coordinator to ensure both areas are covered consistently.
The committee asked schools minister Damian Hinds whether the government would expand financial education in primary schools to teach younger children.
Hinds said there were “clearly” financial aspects to teaching maths in early childhood schools, but there were “further opportunities” to help teachers get better resources for the subject.
“I want there to be more financial education. I want kids to say they’ve memorized it and found it useful,” Hinds said.
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