Schools need to stop changing the requirements for calculators every year because parents are being forced to buy expensive machines too often, CDA and SP parliamentarians say.

‘New calculators come on the market regularly, with all sorts of additional functions which are not necessary for good education,’ Christian Democrat MP Rene Peters said during a parliamentary debate on digitalisation and education.

‘In addition, they have to be switched off during exams. Manufacturers are getting rich but parents face unnecessary costs and it has to stop,’ he said.

For example, older pupils are required to have a graphing calculator, at a cost of some €110 each, only adding to the hundreds of euros parents have to spend on school equipment a year, the AD reported on Wednesday.

MPs and parents previously tried to place restrictions on the type of calculators schools required in September 2021 but the then-education minister Arie Slob said at the time it was too late to include the issue in a review of compulsory school costs