Asked by: Mark Hendrick (Labour (Co-op) - Preston)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what capital and revenue funding allocations have been made to local authorities in Lancashire for a) primary schools, b) secondary schools and c) specialist school places over the next 2 years.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
Revenue funding through the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) for Lancashire in 2025/26 and 2026/27 financial years are presented in the table below. Funding for 2027/28 will be confirmed later this year.
Lancashire School Funding
Financial Year | 2025/26 | 2026/27 |
Overall DSG | £1,052,000,000 | £1,096,000,000 |
Mainstream primary Per Pupil | £5,627 | £5,939 |
Mainstream secondary Per Pupil | £7,088 | £7,440 |
High Needs Funding | £219 million | £235 million |
*Mainstream funding includes premises and excludes growth.
Local authorities meet the costs of special school places in their area through their high needs block funding in the DSG, with the total high needs funding for Lancashire set out above.
The methodology for the Inclusive Mainstream Fund was published on 25 March. This details distribution of the £400 million schools will receive in 2026/27 to prepare and deliver improved inclusion practice.
We have announced over £82 million of Basic Need capital grant funding to support Lancashire in creating mainstream school places needed due to forecasted growth in pupil numbers between May 2024 and September 2028. The £82 million will be paid across the 2023/24 to 2027/28 financial years.
In financial years 2025/26 and 2026/27, Lancashire has been allocated just under £19.7 million and just over £23.8 million respectively through High Needs Provision Capital Allocations.
Asked by: James Cleverly (Conservative - Braintree)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate her Department has made of the aggregate monetary level of Dedicated Schools Grant High Need deficits that will not be written off by central Government.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The department has set out plans to address these deficits up to the end of 2025/26, providing grants to cover 90% of each council’s deficit once they have produced and received approval for a strong plan to drive sustained action in accordance with our new system set out today in the Schools White Paper. This will help to improve outcomes for children and bring costs under control through effective early intervention, stopping needs from escalating. Asking authorities to contribute the remaining 10% reflects the shared responsibility we all have in delivering a system that provides value for money and supports better outcomes for children and young people.
For deficits that arise in 2026/27 and 2027/28, local authorities can expect that we will continue to take an appropriate and proportionate approach though it will not be unlimited. Future support will take into account local authorities' successful delivery of their approved Local SEND (special educational needs and disabilities) reform plan.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of capacity considerations in class sizes for Key Stage 1 and 2 in schools with high levels of SEND; and whether she will consider a needs‑weighted pupil cap to reflect the additional time and support required.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The School Standards and Framework Act 1998 limits the size of an infant class to 30 pupils per teacher. An infant class is one in which the majority of children will reach the age of 5, 6 or 7 during the school year, i.e. Reception, Year 1 and Year 2.
Through the reforms outlined in the Schools White Paper, we will ensure that children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) get the right support at every stage of their education.
We are also committed to supporting local areas to create high-quality places that are suitable to meet the needs of children and young people with SEND, by investing at least £3.7 billion in high needs capital funding between 2025/26 and 2029/30. This is to support local authorities to provide places for children and young people with SEND, or who require alternative provision, across early years settings, schools, and colleges.
As well as this, we are providing around £1.8 billion over the next three years for local area partnerships, including local authorities and Integrated Care Boards, to work together to develop a new ‘Experts at Hand’ offer. This is designed to strengthen the capability of mainstream education settings by providing access to professionals such as educational psychologists and speech and language or occupational therapists, providing earlier intervention and support for young people.
Asked by: Baroness Shawcross-Wolfson (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what additional funding schools and colleges will receive as a result of the announced special educational needs and disabilities reforms in (1) 2026–27, (2) 2027–28, (3) 2028–29, and (4) 2029–30.
Answered by Baroness Smith of Malvern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
In every year of this Parliament, core funding for schools and special educational needs and disabilities is expected to increase, subject to future spending reviews. The government is committed to prioritising early intervention and is making a major increase in investment, with £4 billion over the three years of the Spending Review. This will reverse the trend of late intervention and escalation in needs.
Within this total, the Inclusive Mainstream Fund will provide over £500 million per financial year, over three years, to schools, colleges and early years settings to develop and embed improved inclusion practice. On Wednesday 25 March, the department published methodology documents explaining how funding will be allocated for the Inclusive Mainstream Fund. Details on the funding for schools and mainstream 16-19 provision are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/inclusive-mainstream-fund-2026-to-2027. Details on the Inclusive Early Years Fund are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/inclusive-early-years-fund-2026-to-2027. Funding from 2029 to 2030 onwards is subject to future spending reviews.
Also on 25 March, we announced further details on the allocation of £860 million of high needs capital funding as part of the landmark £3.7 billion announced to deliver 60,000 more specialist places. This funding will drive a transformative expansion of inclusion bases across the country, as well as adaptations to improve the inclusivity and accessibility of mainstream settings as well as supporting special school place creation where needed.
Asked by: Alison Bennett (Liberal Democrat - Mid Sussex)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of, a) pupils recorded as young carers and, b) pupils not recorded as young carers were eligible for Free School Meals in the January school census returns for 2023 to 2025.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
The department holds data on young carers and pupils eligible for free school meals (FSM), which is published in the ‘Schools, pupils and characteristics’ publication. The most recent version was published in June 2025 and the next is scheduled for summer 2026.
Below is a table showing the proportion of pupils who are identified as young carers and known to be eligible for FSM, and the proportion of pupils who are not identified as young carers but are known to be eligible for FSM.
Year | Proportion of young carers known to be eligible for free schools meals (%) | Proportion of pupils not recorded as a young carer but known to be eligible for free school meals (%) |
2024/25 | 56.90 | 25.50 |
2023/24 | 56.80 | 24.40 |
2022/23 | 56.40 | 23.70 |
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to page 22 of her Department's consultation document entitled SEND Reform: Putting Children and Young People First, CP1509, how will mediation be used to resolve disputes more quickly.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
Research shows that mediation can reduce the likelihood of disputes escalating to appeals, enabling families and local authorities to work collaboratively to resolve disagreements more quickly and collaboratively.
We are engaging with a wide variety of stakeholders, including families, local authorities, representative groups and providers, to identify what more can be done to raise awareness of mediation, address the barriers to effective mediation and share best practice. As a first step, we intend to improve mediation through clearer national guidance for families and professionals, and by supporting improved local authority compliance with existing duties.
Where early resolution is not possible, the special educational needs and disabilities tribunal will continue to act as an important legal backstop for key decisions about education, health and care plans.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to paragraph 88 of the policy paper entitled UK Government Resilience Action Plan, published on 14 July 2025, how many meetings have been attended by civil servants within their Department in relation to the Home Defence Programme; which directorate in the Department owns the Departmental contribution to the Home Defence Programme; and what the job title is of the civil servant leading and cohering the Departmental contribution to the Home Defence Programme.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
The Resilience Action Plan sets out the government’s strategic approach to how we will strengthen our domestic resilience and invest to protect the nation. Officials from the department regularly attend meetings to discuss the implementation of the Resilience Action Plan as well as matters of national security and defence.
The department is actively supporting this work. Officials in the department are in regular discussions with the Ministry of Defence and other government departments about the critical role children and young people play.
Asked by: Helen Maguire (Liberal Democrat - Epsom and Ewell)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if her Department will review best practice guidance for play-based learning for five to seven year-olds.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
I refer the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell to the answer of 23 March 2026 to Question 117074.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many staff within her Department are reliant on a visa for employment.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
The department currently sponsors 28 individuals on a Skilled Worker visa through a Certificate of Sponsorship.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether safeguards will be introduced to help ensure that Individual Support Plans (ISPs) do not become resource‑led documents due to limited specialist provision.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) Code of Practice sets out that the provision made for pupils with special educational needs should be recorded accurately and kept up to date. As a result, many settings already keep records of the needs and provision required by children or young people with SEND and communicate these with parents.
The department is introducing a duty on settings to produce an individual support plan for every child or young person with SEND, ensuring help keeps pace with their development, prevents challenges from escalating, and reduces the risk of them disengaging from learning.
Additional funding through an Inclusive Mainstream Fund will be provided to early years, schools and colleges to boost the existing core funding for SEND, with over £500 million per year over the next three years. This funding, alongside their existing core funding, will help equip settings to invest in high-quality, adaptive teaching, targeted evidence-based support, inclusive pedagogy and decision-making, and create safe, calm and accessible learning environments for all. On 25 March, we published the guidance ‘Inclusive mainstream fund: best practice for schools’, which provides examples and case studies of how settings can use this funding to enhance support for children with SEND. The guidance is available at:
Our proposed reforms go further to support educators, with easier access to expert advice through Experts at Hand and evidence-based tools and resources through the National Inclusion Standards.