One of the areas that is often key at election time are the policies relating to children and families. Among Labour’s pledges for the upcoming election is that every child will leave school confident in literacy and numeracy, two areas that can be crucial in most people future, both personally and in employment.

Pupils achieving an A to C grade in their GCSE’s is a priority for all schools, and Labour has specified that they expect at least 30% of pupils to achieve this in every school. Although no figures have been released, Labour have promised to increase child benefit and child tax credit. The Conservative Party are prioritising in part with attempting to raise the standard of teaching by raising the entry requirements for teacher training. An interesting point they have made is that they would make it easier for schools to use reasonable force to combat violence in schools, but what is meant by reasonable force is unclear.

They are also looking to reform the way children are taught and assessed. The Tories have continuously states the importance of family in society and have promised to help hard working families. The Liberal Democrats have promised to reduce class sizes and offer more one-to-one tuition by providing school with an extra £2.5 billion to achieve this. Like the Conservatives, the Lib Dem’s plan to change the child trust fund, but they would take it even further, by scrapping the Labour introduced scheme altogether.