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Written Question
Assessments
Wednesday 31st January 2024

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of allowing open book examinations for (a) English literature and (b) other subjects.

Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)

This is a matter for the Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation (Ofqual). The department has asked its Chief Regulator, Sir Ian Bauckham CBE, to write to the hon. Member for Hull West and Hessle and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.


Written Question
Pupils: Visual Impairment
Thursday 23rd November 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department has plans to take steps to ensure pupils with vision impairment can access transcriptions of accessible notation in (a) braille and (b) large print.

Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)

Under the Children and Families Act 2014, mainstream schools must use their best endeavours to make sure a child or young person who has Special Educational Needs, including visual impairment, gets the special educational provision they need.

All schools have duties under the Equality Act 2010 towards individual disabled children and young people. They must make reasonable adjustments, including the provision of auxiliary aids and services for disabled children, to prevent them being put at a substantial disadvantage.

To teach a class of pupils with sensory impairments, a teacher is required to hold the relevant mandatory qualification in sensory impairment (MQSI). Teachers working in an advisory role to support these pupils should also hold the appropriate qualification. The MQSI provides sensory impairment teachers with the specialist expertise needed to ensure pupils with a visual impairment are supported effectively, including modifying, producing and adapting teaching and learning materials in an appropriate medium, such as braille or enlarged/modified text, to make them accessible and training to others in how this is done.


Written Question
Pupils: Absenteeism
Thursday 23rd November 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing an appeals process for parents and carers fined for taking their child out of school during term time.

Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)

Where a child is registered at a school, regular attendance is vital for their attainment, wellbeing and long-term development. The department is clear that parents should do everything they can to ensure that their child is in school every day. The law entitles every child of compulsory school age to receive an efficient, full-time education, and it is the legal responsibility of every parent to ensure their child receives that education either by attendance at a school or otherwise than at a school.

Where parents choose to register their child at a school, the law places a duty on the parents to ensure their child of compulsory school age attends school regularly. If parents fail to do this, they may be guilty of an offence and be issued a penalty notice or prosecuted. A parent has no right of appeal against a penalty notice. The penalty notice offers the parent the opportunity to avoid any conviction for the offence if it is paid in full and on time. If the penalty is not paid in full and on time, the local authority must decide either to prosecute the parent for the original offence or withdraw the notice.

If the local authority decides to prosecute, the parent and the local authority will have the opportunity to present their case to the court. The court will then make a decision based on the representations made.


Written Question
Financial Services: Curriculum
Thursday 16th November 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of including personal financial education as a subject in the National Curriculum.

Answered by Robert Halfon

Financial education already forms a compulsory part of the National Curriculum for mathematics at Key Stages 1 to 4 and citizenship at Key Stages 3 and 4, which together cover important financial topics including personal budgeting, saving for the future, managing credit and debt, and calculating interest. The National Curriculum is compulsory for maintained schools. Academies must teach a broad and balanced curriculum, including mathematics.

My right hon. Friend, the Prime Minister recently announced more funding for secondary mathematics, and that mathematics will be studied by all 16 to 18 year olds as part of the new Advanced British Standard qualification.

As with all aspects of the curriculum, schools have flexibility over how they deliver financial education, so they can develop an integrated approach that is sensitive to the needs and background of their pupils.

There is a wide range of support for financial education. The Money and Pensions Service has published guidance, setting out how schools can improve the financial education they deliver, and signposting to services and resources that can help. The guidance is available at: https://maps.org.uk/en/publications/research/2021/financial-education-guidance-for-primary-and-secondary-schools-in-england.

Talk Money Week, which is running from 6 to 10 November, is focused on this year’s campaign ‘Do One Thing’ to help improve financial wellbeing. The Talk Money Week 2023 Toolkit for Schools includes a dedicated pack of information and resources to help schools promote the financial wellbeing of their pupils and students, during Talk Money Week and beyond. The toolkit is available at: https://maps.org.uk/en/our-work/talk-money-week#Download-the-Toolkit-for-Schools.

The Department’s national network of 40 Maths Hubs also supports schools to improve their mathematics teaching, including financial content in the mathematics curriculum, based on best practice from East Asia.

The Oak National Academy, which became an independent Arm’s Length Body in September 2022, will provide adaptable, optional and free support for schools to reduce teacher workload and enable schools to provide a high quality curriculum. New Oak curriculum materials, including for mathematics, will start to be available from autumn 2023, with full curriculum packages available by summer 2024. Oak’s next phase of procurement of curriculum resources is expected to launch in late 2023 and will include citizenship.


Written Question
Relationships and Sex Education
Monday 11th September 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she plans to consult parents as part of the consultation of statutory guidance on relationships education, relationships and sex education and health education.

Answered by Nick Gibb

All parents will have an opportunity to present their views as part of the public consultation on revised guidance due to be launched in the autumn of this year.

In developing revised guidance for consultation, the Department asked a range of stakeholders, including a number of groups representing parents, to share evidence about areas of the guidance they would like to see strengthened.

Parents have also been invited to contribute their views directly in roundtables with Ministers, focusing on key topics such as suicide prevention and teaching materials for relationships, sex and health education.


Written Question
Education: Publications
Tuesday 4th July 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has had recent discussions with the publishers of educational resources on the matter of commercial content licensing.

Answered by Nick Gibb

The Secretary of State for Education has not had any discussions with the publishers of educational resources on the matter of commercial content licensing.

Oak National Academy has been discussing third party content for its curriculum resources with publishers and other rights holders. The Department wants to support these discussions and has made contact with relevant publishers to this end, in order to support Oak’s aims to reduce teacher workload and improve pupil outcomes.


Written Question
Oak National Academy: Publications
Tuesday 4th July 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department has been involved in Oak National Academy's commercial content licensing discussions with publishers.

Answered by Nick Gibb

The Secretary of State for Education has not had any discussions with the publishers of educational resources on the matter of commercial content licensing.

Oak National Academy has been discussing third party content for its curriculum resources with publishers and other rights holders. The Department wants to support these discussions and has made contact with relevant publishers to this end, in order to support Oak’s aims to reduce teacher workload and improve pupil outcomes.


Written Question
Home Education
Friday 16th June 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential benefits of waiving exam fees for home-educated children.

Answered by Nick Gibb

The Government supports the right for parents to choose to home educate their children. By electing to home educate, parents or guardians also accept full responsibility for their child’s education, including any costs associated with their education and exams.

Some Local Authorities may provide assistance to home educating families, including for public examinations, but this is at their discretion.

The Department has begun a voluntary, termly collection of data from Local Authorities on elective home education, including details of the types of support Local Authorities are able to offer families. Our existing guidance for Local Authorities on home education sets out examples of the types of additional support authorities can offer. The guidance is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/elective-home-education.

The Department knows that many Local Authorities offer help in accessing free or discounted resources and facilities for home educating families, such as signposting to local groups and library schemes, as well as to curriculum resources. Through continuing data analysis, the Department will build a better understanding of the support offered, problems faced in accessing support and where more assistance should be targeted.

As part of its commitment to introducing statutory Local Authority registers for children not in school, the Department also remains committed to introducing a new duty on Local Authorities to provide support to home educating families, should they want it. This could, in theory, include examination support, as well as supporting parents to access curriculum resources. The Department will legislate for these Children Not in School measures at a suitable future opportunity to help Local Authorities to ensure that all children in their areas are receiving an appropriate education, regardless of where they are educated.


Written Question
Home Education
Friday 16th June 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment her Department has made of the adequacy of access to curricular resources for home-educated children.

Answered by Nick Gibb

The Government supports the right for parents to choose to home educate their children. By electing to home educate, parents or guardians also accept full responsibility for their child’s education, including any costs associated with their education and exams.

Some Local Authorities may provide assistance to home educating families, including for public examinations, but this is at their discretion.

The Department has begun a voluntary, termly collection of data from Local Authorities on elective home education, including details of the types of support Local Authorities are able to offer families. Our existing guidance for Local Authorities on home education sets out examples of the types of additional support authorities can offer. The guidance is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/elective-home-education.

The Department knows that many Local Authorities offer help in accessing free or discounted resources and facilities for home educating families, such as signposting to local groups and library schemes, as well as to curriculum resources. Through continuing data analysis, the Department will build a better understanding of the support offered, problems faced in accessing support and where more assistance should be targeted.

As part of its commitment to introducing statutory Local Authority registers for children not in school, the Department also remains committed to introducing a new duty on Local Authorities to provide support to home educating families, should they want it. This could, in theory, include examination support, as well as supporting parents to access curriculum resources. The Department will legislate for these Children Not in School measures at a suitable future opportunity to help Local Authorities to ensure that all children in their areas are receiving an appropriate education, regardless of where they are educated.


Written Question
Apprentices
Monday 13th March 2023

Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the report entitled The Recent Evolution of Apprenticeships, published by the Sutton Trust on 8 December 2022, what assessment she has made of consequences for her policies of the take-up of apprenticeships by (a) age and (b) socio-economic background of apprentices.

Answered by Robert Halfon

The table attached shows the take-up of apprenticeships by age and home deprivation level from 2017/18 to 2022/23.

The department wants to see more young people from disadvantaged backgrounds accessing higher and degree level apprenticeships as they are crucial in driving social mobility by boosting skills and improving earnings and career opportunities.

We are promoting apprenticeships to students of all backgrounds through our Apprenticeship Support & Knowledge programme. The department publishes the Higher and Degree apprenticeship vacancy listing twice a year, which will highlight over 350 vacancies across the country that are available for young people to apply for in 2023 and 2024. The link to the vacancy listing can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/higher-and-degree-apprenticeships.

The department wants to ensure apprenticeships are accessible for young people and is working with UCAS on the expansion of their apprenticeships service. From this autumn, young people will see more personalised options on UCAS, including apprenticeships. From autumn 2024, students will be able to apply for apprenticeships alongside an undergraduate degree application. This will help put technical and vocational education on an equal footing with traditional academic routes.

The department is also making up to £8 million available to higher education providers in the 2022/23 financial year to support them to grow their degree apprenticeship offers. We are also working with the Office for Students to improve access to and participation in higher and degree apprenticeships.

The department knows that small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are key in creating apprenticeship opportunities for those in disadvantaged areas and we have recently launched an SME pathfinder in four regions of the North of England to support employers to find and hire new apprentices at all levels.

The department provides additional funding to employers and training providers to support them to take on young apprentices aged 16 to18, and apprentices aged 19 to 24 that have an education, health and care plan or have been in care. Apprentices starting in August under the age of 25 that have been in local authority care can also claim a bursary of £3,000.

The department will continue to champion the Social Mobility Commission’s Apprenticeships Toolkit for employers, and work with some of the country’s most influential employers through the Apprenticeship Diversity Champions Network to set out how employers can better recruit and support apprentices from disadvantaged backgrounds.