A reflection on the House of Lords Making it Count: Numeracy for Life report
Karen McGuigan
Founder and CEO, Maths For Life Limited
REVIEW PAPER | 8 NOVEMBER 2026
When I submitted evidence to the House of Lords Numeracy for Life Committee earlier this year, I did so with considerable optimism. Maths For Life's evidence focused on the distinction between mathematics and numeracy, early foundations, maths anxiety, real-life application, alternative pathways, adult numeracy and the need to equip people with the mathematics they genuinely need for life.
I subsequently watched many of the oral evidence sessions, commenting on them as the inquiry developed, so I was genuinely looking forward to reading the Committee's final report.
Making it Count: Numeracy for Life, published on 3 November 2026, is comprehensive and ambitious. Its decision to consider numeracy throughout life, from early childhood to retirement, is particularly welcome.
The scale of the challenge it describes is striking. The proportion of adults with low numeracy in England fell from 25% to 14% between 2012 and 2023. Yet around 16 million adults still have low skills, with 8 million below the level expected of a nine-year-old. Crucially, although the number of low achievers has fallen, the skills of those remaining in the lowest-achieving group have not improved.
That final point should give us pause. If the next phase of numeracy policy is genuinely going to be about everyone, we must pay much greater attention to the learners for whom the conventional mathematics pathway has repeatedly failed. That includes children and young people with SEND and learning difficulties.
The report recognises these learners. My question is whether the system it envisages is yet sufficiently designed for them.
Numeracy is not simply mathematics made easier
One of the most important statements in the report comes remarkably early. The Committee describes the distinction between mathematics and numeracy as one between ‘knowledge and use, rather than difficulty and simplicity’. Mathematical knowledge provides tools to calculate, reason and generalise. Numeracy involves recognising when those tools are needed, deciding which are relevant, applying them in daily life and judging whether an answer is credible.
This closely reflects what we have argued through Maths For Life for years. Our submission described numeracy as encompassing number sense and operations, fractions, decimals and percentages, measure, shape and space, time, money, ratio, proportion and probability, interpreting data and reasoning. These are skills that underpin independent living, employment, health choices and financial wellbeing.
This distinction matters because an accessible route to applied numeracy must never be interpreted as giving some children a second-rate version of mathematics.
It is offering them something different: mathematics they can understand, transfer and use.
The missing question: what about learners whose trajectory is different?
The section of the report I kept returning to is paragraphs 86 to 89. The Committee recognises dyscalculia and mathematical learning difficulties and acknowledges that children can experience difficulty because of gaps in previous teaching, low confidence, anxiety, working-memory demands, language demands, SEND and dyscalculia. Importantly, it also acknowledges that educators cannot always distinguish between these causes and that different causes require different responses.
My concern is that this recognition needs to become much more central to what happens next. Dyscalculia is important, but it is not synonymous with SEND or mathematical learning difficulty.
There are learners with cognitive and developmental differences for whom an age-related curriculum trajectory will not simply be restored through intervention or ‘catch up’.
For these students, the question cannot always be: How do we get them back onto the same pathway? Sometimes it needs to be: What is the right mathematical pathway for this learner?
Imagine a Year 7 mathematics classroom. One pupil may be developing algebraic reasoning. Another may need to consolidate percentages. Another may still be developing a secure understanding of quantity. Chronologically they may be the same age. Mathematically, their next appropriate learning objectives may be very different.
A genuinely inclusive curriculum has to accommodate that reality. That is not lowering expectations. It is making expectations meaningful to the individual learner.
Raising the floor as well as the ceiling
There is much to celebrate in England's mathematical performance. The report notes that England rose from 27th in 2009 to 10th in the OECD school survey reported in 2026. But it also makes an important qualification: improvements have been driven largely by higher performers, while the skills of the lowest achievers have not improved.
There is, justifiably, considerable ambition in mathematics education to raise the ceiling. We need equal determination to raise the floor.
That means ensuring that the learner who may never achieve GCSE mathematics nevertheless leaves education able to understand quantities, manage money, use time, interpret information, make choices, recognise risk and navigate adult life with as much independence as possible.
That is not an argument against high-quality mathematics. It is an argument that mathematical ambition must look different for different learners.
We need diagnosis, not simply measurement
Another of the report's strongest themes is earlier identification. It highlights the absence of an equivalent to phonics screening for number sense. It also supports the Curriculum and Assessment Review's recommendation that a routine diagnostic assessment should be piloted in Year 8 to identify weaknesses before GCSE courses begin.
I support better diagnostic assessment. But we need to be clear about what we mean by diagnostic.
A score tells us where somebody sits. Diagnosis should help us understand why they are there.
A student apparently struggling with fractions may have an underlying issue with sharing, grouping, equality or mathematical language. A student struggling with percentages may be able to perform a calculation but fail to understand what that percentage means in an unfamiliar context.
Assessment therefore needs to expose foundations, understanding and misconceptions, rather than simply generating another number against which the learner can be ranked. For SEND learners in particular, this distinction is critical.
The early years opportunity is enormous
I particularly welcome the report's emphasis on early numeracy. It recommends that numeracy should be treated as equal to literacy in Government education policy; that parents should receive specific guidance on developing numeracy; that numeracy should form part of the core Best Start hub offer; and that more early-years practitioners should be funded to undertake maths leadership development.
The evidence behind this is compelling. The report cites Education Endowment Foundation findings that parental engagement adds at least five months' progress, and describes the powerful influence of parental attitudes on children's early relationship with mathematics.
This strongly echoes the evidence Maths For Life submitted to the Committee. Maths anxiety is not confined to pupils. Parents, teaching assistants, childminders and early-years practitioners can themselves carry negative experiences of mathematics into their interactions with children.
We cannot transform early mathematics without supporting the adults delivering it. Many of those adults do not identify themselves as ‘maths teachers’.
So, yes, invest in mathematical leadership. But also invest in mathematical confidence, language, conceptual understanding and real-life application across the wider workforce. I would specifically include teaching assistants and learning support staff. For many learners with SEND, these are the adults supporting a considerable proportion of their day-to-day mathematical learning.
A genuine alternative must not become a lesser alternative
Perhaps the most difficult debate concerns qualifications. The Committee heard several proposals for a clearer applied numeracy route, including an approach analogous to the relationship between English Language and English Literature, and a universal numeracy qualification analogous to a driving test. It also heard an important warning: an applied route must not become a lighter, lower-status qualification reserved for students deemed incapable of doing ‘real’ mathematics.
Applied mathematics should not become the poor relation of academic mathematics. But neither should fear of creating a two-tier system condemn every learner to the same pathway. The Committee itself concludes that GCSE mathematics does not meet every learner's needs.
The 2026 figures demonstrate the challenge. Nationally, 71.8% of 16-year-olds achieved grade 4 or above in GCSE mathematics. Among those resitting GCSE mathematics in 2026, only 15%, around one in seven, passed.
Repeating the same destination, assessment and teaching model is not necessarily opportunity. Sometimes it is simply repeated failure.
Importantly, the Committee recognises Functional Skills mathematics as a Level 2 alternative that may be more appropriate for some learners. It recommends that Government sets out when Functional Skills should be offered as a positive Level 2 destination rather than GCSE, alongside action to improve its recognition by employers and education providers.
We should stop viewing these pathways as rigid parallel tracks from which pupils cannot move. A learner might progress through Entry Levels, Functional Skills, GCSE mathematics or other applied routes at different stages. Pathways should be permeable. The appropriate destination should depend upon development, aspiration, need and readiness.
Inclusion must ultimately mean independence
For me, this is at the heart of the discussion.
Inclusion cannot simply be about accessing a curriculum. It must ultimately be about accessing life.
For one learner, calculating an abstract percentage independently may represent meaningful progress. For another, recognising a 25% discount and determining what they will actually pay could be transformational. For another, progress might mean selecting the appropriate money, reading a timetable, understanding how long they have until a bus arrives, comparing two prices or recognising that they have received the wrong change.
Correct answers matter. But independence matters too.
Success cannot sensibly be judged only by asking how close a learner came to the same endpoint as everybody else. We should also be asking: What can this learner now understand and do for themselves that they could not do before?
Numeracy in the age of AI
I was also pleased to see the Committee treating numeracy as a future-facing issue rather than simply an educational one. The report argues that as calculators, smartphones and AI undertake more routine computation, human numerical judgement becomes more important, not less. We still need to understand what calculation is required, interrogate assumptions and recognise when an answer does not look right. The Committee describes adult numeracy as part of digital literacy and resilience.
This directly echoes our original evidence. Technology can undertake calculation extraordinarily quickly. But without underlying mathematical and numerical understanding, we cannot effectively challenge its output.
In that sense, numeracy is increasingly becoming a form of protection. It helps us interrogate a percentage, challenge an AI-generated answer, understand health risk, consider financial information and recognise when numerical information is being presented misleadingly.
Maths For Life began from a very personal motivation for me: wanting my son, who has Down syndrome, to develop enough practical mathematical understanding to navigate adulthood with greater independence and reduced vulnerability. That motivation is also set out in the evidence I submitted to the Committee.
Does what we teach help someone navigate life more confidently, safely and independently?
So, where next?
The Committee makes 49 conclusions and recommendations spanning early childhood, school, post-16 education, adult numeracy and financial capability. Among them is a recommendation for a National Year of Numeracy, equivalent to the existing National Year of Reading.
I wholeheartedly support that ambition. But alongside the Committee’s recommendations, I would add five challenges for implementation:
1. Put SEND and learning difficulties at the centre of implementation, not at the margins.
2. Develop genuinely diagnostic assessment that identifies mathematical understanding, foundations and underlying gaps, rather than simply measuring attainment.
3. Develop the whole mathematical workforce, including teaching assistants, learning support staff, early-years practitioners and non-specialist teachers, with greater understanding of mathematical progression, language, anxiety and SEND.
4. Create respected, permeable mathematical pathways that allow learners to progress according to development and readiness rather than assuming one route and one destination for everyone.
5. Judge successful numeracy partly by application and independence, not solely by qualification outcomes or curriculum coverage.
I welcome this report. There is much within it that echoes the evidence Maths For Life submitted: numeracy as application; early foundations; parental confidence; earlier diagnosis; real-world mathematics; different post-16 routes; financial numeracy; adult learning; and the increasingly important role of mathematical judgement in an AI-enabled world.
My challenge is intended to be constructive. As Government considers its response, due on 3 January 2027, let us make certain that ‘numeracy for life’ really does mean numeracy for every life.
Because inclusion should not mean bringing everybody into the same mathematical journey. It should mean ensuring that everybody has a mathematical journey that takes them somewhere worthwhile.
Raise the ceiling, absolutely. But let’s raise the floor as well.
References
House of Lords Numeracy for Life Committee (2026). Making it Count: Numeracy for Life. HL Paper 67, Report of Session 2026–27. Published 3 November 2026.
McGuigan, K. / Maths For Life Limited (2026). Written evidence submitted to the House of Lords Numeracy for Life Committee. Evidence reference NUM0025.
Ofqual (2026). Qualification results in England: summer 2026. Updated 20 August 2026.
UK Parliament (2026). Numeracy for Life Committee: summary and publication information. Government response due 3 January 2027.