Rejected petition Abandon plans for pouches/lockers in schools, instead mandating "brick only"

The government should bring scrutiny to bear on the high profile movement to mandate the storing of smartphones, and, instead, make “brick only” schools a statutory requirement. A review of schools that have banned smartphones from the premises should be conducted, to see such polices in action.

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"Brick only" schools will allow children to transition from primary to secondary without investing in expensive digital devices that are causing immense harm. "Brick only" still allows for emergency communications. Location 'tiles' can be placed in bags.
Pouching smartphones, in contrast, normalises children owning smartphones, is very expensive and locks schools into 3rd party contracts that will be difficult to leave, embedding smartphone ownership long term. Such plans should be abandoned.

This petition was rejected

Why was this petition rejected?

It’s not clear what the petition is asking the UK Government or Parliament to do.

There are currently no reported Government plans to mandate the storing of smart phones and make "brick only" a statutory requirement for schools. The current non-statutory guidance says that schools may develop their own policies to implement a no phones in schools rule. The guidance suggests the following systems that could be adopted:

No mobile phones allowed on the school premises
Mobile phones handed in on arrival
Mobile phones kept in secure location, which pupils do not access throughout the school day
Pupils may keep their phones but they are “never used, seen or heard

You can find out more in this House of Commons Library note: https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-10241/

We could accept a petition calling for the Government to ban schools from storing mobile phones, if that's something that you'd like to see. You may wish to sign this petition:

We call on Government to urgently revise the mobile phone in schools guidance: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/726477

We only reject petitions that don’t meet the petition standards.

Date submitted 26 November 2025
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