'No deal' Brexit could divert DfE staff to other departments

Asked what preparations had been made following Theresa May's crushing commons defeat yesterday, Education Secretary Damian Hinds said DfE staff could be temporarily sent to work in higher priority areas of government.

Hinds told the education committee that there was a "cross-governmental question about making sure that if there were to be a no deal - for those functions which are truly mission critical in the very sharpest sense, that government clearly is able to deliver".

He added: "That does involve departments like ours being able to see who, if needed, we could release on a temporary basis, to support those departments."

Asked by Ben Bradley, Conservative MP for Mansfield in Nottinghamshire, whether that would involve civil servants being sent elsewhere to "fix" such problems Hinds replied: "On a temporary basis, absolutely, that's the reality of ‘no deal'."

Hinds added: "Across government, we would have to find resource to be able to make sure mission critical things for people's way of life - supply of food, medicines and so on - that absolutely those things are protected.

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The minister also referred to education-specific areas requiring preparations, such as people on university exchanges meaning "UK students who are enrolled in universities elsewhere in the European Union".

He said that preparations will have to be made and "we have been doing".