Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to help young people with an Education, Health and Care Plan to find work.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department is committed to providing all young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) with good opportunities to allow them to transition from education into a fulfilling adult life.
On 2 March 2023, we published the SEND and Alternative Provision (AP) Improvement Plan, in response to the SEND and AP Green Paper published in March 2022. This outlines the government’s mission for the SEND and AP system to fulfil children and young people’s potential, build parents’ trust, and provide financial sustainability.
In the Improvement Plan, the department committed to developing good practice guidance to support consistent, timely, high-quality transitions for children and young people with SEND and in AP. This will ultimately look at transitions between all stages of education and will focus initially on transitions into and out of post-16 settings, including into employment.
We are also supporting the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to develop and pilot an Adjustments Passport that will help to smooth the transition into employment and support people changing jobs.
Schools and colleges are expected to develop and improve their careers provision for young people in line with the world-class Gatsby Benchmarks, addressing the individual needs of each pupil, and seeking to raise the career aspirations of students with SEND.
Supported internships are a study programme for young people aged 16 to 24 who have an education, health and care (EHC) plan, want to move into employment and need extra support to do so. All young people completing a supported internship have an EHC plan. We are investing approximately £18 million until 2025 to build capacity in the Supported Internships Programme and support more young people with EHC plans into employment.
The department also wants to ensure people of all ages and backgrounds can undertake apprenticeships that offer excellent career development and progression opportunities. In recent years, we have seen an improved representation of learners who have declared a Learning Difficulty or Disability (LDD) starting apprenticeships. We have improved our ‘Find an Apprenticeship’ service to allow people to identify Disability Confident Employers offering opportunities. Training providers will conduct an assessment for people with an LDD to identify if they require a reasonable adjustment to undertake and continue with their apprenticeship.
To ensure that employers are supported to create new apprenticeship opportunities, the department provides targeted financial support directly to training providers to help remove barriers for people with a LDD. Employers could receive £1,000 towards the costs of workplace support when they take on an apprentice aged 16-18 or 19-25 with an EHC plan, as well as help to cover the extra costs working individuals may have because of their disability, through the DWP’s Access to Work scheme.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what percentage of young people with Education, Health and Care Plans are in employment within six months of leaving education.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Key stage 4 destination measures published by the department show the activity of young people in the academic year after leaving key stage 4 (usually aged 16), including pupils with an education, health and care (EHC) plan. The latest data for state-funded mainstream and special schools shows that 1.5% of pupils with an EHC plan had a sustained employment destination after leaving key stage 4 in 2020, compared with 3.4% of pupils with special educational needs (SEN) support and 2.3% of pupils with no identified SEN.
The attached table includes data on employment destinations as well as other types of activity (education, apprenticeships, not sustained, unknown).
Destination data is also published for students that reached the end of 16 to 18 study in 2020, but it does not include a specific breakdown by EHC plan. In this data, information on SEN eligibility status is based on data recorded by state-funded mainstream schools during 16 to 18 study only, and does not cover the entire cohort of young people studying at post-16, which includes further education colleges. This data is available here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/9ffa5c63-983f-43fd-8160-08daf87133b7.
Sustained participation in employment was counted if there was some participation in at least 5 of the 6 months between October and March of the 2020/21 academic year.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure that schools do not off-roll pupils.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Off-rolling (the practice of removing a pupil from the school roll without using a permanent exclusion, when the removal is primarily in the best interests of the school, rather than the best interests of the pupil) is unlawful and unacceptable in any form and we continue to work with Ofsted to tackle it.
Ofsted considers the records of children taken off roll and their characteristics and strengthened the focus on this in the revised framework in September 2019. Where inspectors find off-rolling, this will always be addressed in the inspection report and, where appropriate, could lead to a school’s leadership being judged inadequate.
A pupil’s name can lawfully be deleted from the admission register on the grounds prescribed in Regulation 8 of the Education (Pupil Registration) (England) Regulations 2006 as amended. All schools must notify the local authority when a pupil’s name is to be deleted from the admission register under any of the grounds prescribed in Regulation 8 as soon as the ground for removal is met and no later than the time at which the pupil’s name is removed from the register.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what percentage of school exclusions in the last five years were of children with Special Educational Needs.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department publishes figures on the proportion of pupils permanently excluded or suspended from schools in England. The most recent full academic year figures, covering academic years up to 2020/21, can be found here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/permanent-and-fixed-period-exclusions-in-england/2020-21. The table attached shows the proportion of permanent exclusions and suspensions at state-funded schools which were of pupils who had special educational needs.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what was the total budget for education in England in each year from (1) 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2022, and (2) 1 April 2022 to 31 December 2022.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The Department’s resource and capital budgets from the 2015/16 to 2022/23 financial years are set out in the table below.
Financial year | Resource Departmental Expenditure Limit, excluding depreciation (RDEL), £ billions | Capital Departmental Expenditure Limit (CDEL), £ billions |
2015/16 | 53 | 4.9 |
2016/17 | 60 | 6.0 |
2017/18 | 61 | 4.9 |
2018/19 | 62 | 5.5 |
2019/20 | 64 | 4.9 |
2020/21 | 69 | 5.4 |
2021/22 | 72 | 5.3 |
2022/23 | 77 | 6.4 |
Capital budgets vary between years, reflecting large capital programmes that spend at different rates across their lifetime and at different delivery stages.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether the digitising of Education, Health and Care Plans will be undertaken by one centralised supplier; and how the procurement process will work.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
In March 2022, the department published the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Green Paper, which sets out our proposals to ensure that every child and young person has their needs identified quickly and met consistently.
In the green paper, the department proposed to introduce a standardised and digitised Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan process and template to minimise bureaucracy, deliver consistency and improve the experiences for families and professionals.
The green paper consultation closed on 22 July 2022. We are currently reviewing the feedback received and using this, along with continued engagement with families, professionals, and other SEND system stakeholders, to inform the next stage of delivering improvements for children, young people and their families. This includes those steps set out on EHC Plans.
The department is committed to publishing a full response to the green paper in an improvement plan early this year. We will continue to support the system in the immediate term to deliver change and continue to improve the experience and outcomes for children and young people with SEND and those who need AP.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what their policy is regarding standardising Education, Health and Care Plans to improve standards.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
In March 2022, the department published the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Green Paper, which sets out our proposals to ensure that every child and young person has their needs identified quickly and met consistently.
In the green paper, the department proposed to introduce a standardised and digitised Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan process and template to minimise bureaucracy, deliver consistency and improve the experiences for families and professionals.
The green paper consultation closed on 22 July 2022. We are currently reviewing the feedback received and using this, along with continued engagement with families, professionals, and other SEND system stakeholders, to inform the next stage of delivering improvements for children, young people and their families. This includes those steps set out on EHC Plans.
The department is committed to publishing a full response to the green paper in an improvement plan early this year. We will continue to support the system in the immediate term to deliver change and continue to improve the experience and outcomes for children and young people with SEND and those who need AP.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government when the process of digitising Education, Health and Care Plans will commence; and whether they have undertaken an impact assessment of this approach.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
In March 2022, the department published the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Green Paper, which sets out our proposals to ensure that every child and young person has their needs identified quickly and met consistently.
In the green paper, the department proposed to introduce a standardised and digitised Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan process and template to minimise bureaucracy, deliver consistency and improve the experiences for families and professionals.
The green paper consultation closed on 22 July 2022. We are currently reviewing the feedback received and using this, along with continued engagement with families, professionals, and other SEND system stakeholders, to inform the next stage of delivering improvements for children, young people and their families. This includes those steps set out on EHC Plans.
The department is committed to publishing a full response to the green paper in an improvement plan early this year. We will continue to support the system in the immediate term to deliver change and continue to improve the experience and outcomes for children and young people with SEND and those who need AP.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what consideration they have given to including a module on self-care in the personal and social development curriculum taught in schools.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Education is a devolved matter, and the response outlines the information for England only.
The relationships and sex education (RSE) and health education statutory guidance clearly sets out the content that should be covered in the topics of basic first aid and health and prevention, at both primary and secondary school. The guidance is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/relationships-education-relationships-and-sex-education-rse-and-health-education. The subjects have been designed to build knowledge and support the development of pupils’ self-control and their ability to self-regulate, as well as providing strategies for doing so.
Health education covers aspects of self-care such as dental hygiene and personal hygiene. It also has a strong focus on mental wellbeing, including a recognition that mental wellbeing and physical health are linked. The aim is to give pupils the information they need to make good decisions about their own health and wellbeing, including self-care, and to recognise the early signs of mental wellbeing concerns, including common types of mental ill health.
To support schools to deliver this content effectively, the department has produced teacher training modules which are free to download from GOV.UK. These modules can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/teaching-about-relationships-sex-and-health#train-teachers-on-relationships-sex-and-health-education.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they will take to reinstate the Erasmus scheme for developing international educational opportunities in all schools in England.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
While the government fully recognises the benefits of international educational opportunities, the government has decided that it was not in the UK's interests to seek continuing participation in the Erasmus+ programme.
Under the Withdrawal Agreement negotiated with the EU, the UK will continue to participate fully in the 2014-2020 Erasmus+ and European Solidarity Corps programmes. This means that the projects successfully bid for during the current programmes will continue to receive EU funding for the full duration of the project, where certain projects may continue up to 2024.
The UK has introduced the Turing Scheme, a new international mobility scheme that has a global reach. The Turing Scheme provides funding for UK education providers and organisations in the schools, higher education, further education, vocational education, and training sectors to offer international opportunities across the world for their pupils, students, and learners. Funding has been allocated for over 41,000 individual placements to over 150 destinations across the 2021/2022 academic year.