Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what progress she has made on providing 3,000 (a) new and (b) expanded school-based nurseries.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
In April 2025, the government announced the approval of 300 new school-based nurseries in the first round of funding. This initiative will create up to 6,000 new nursery places.
The department is now working closely with the sector to design the next phase of the programme, to roll out more new and expanded school-based nurseries.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many schools that initially applied for the breakfast clubs pilot scheme subsequently withdrew from that scheme.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The department had over 3,000 schools apply to be part of the early adopter scheme. As expected there was some movement in the schools taking part as we finalised the list of 750 before the launch of the scheme in April, but such change was minimal.
From the start of this term, the department is funding free breakfast clubs in 750 early adopter schools across England. The list of schools taking part in the breakfast clubs early adopter scheme can be found here: www.gov.uk/government/publications/breakfast-clubs-early-adopters-schools-in-the-scheme.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of introducing Cadet Forces into secondary schools within the state sector.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
Cadets can be an excellent opportunity for enrichment and welcomes the Ministry of Defence (MoD)-commissioned University of Northampton report which explores the benefits of a cadet unit in schools, which is available here: https://www.northampton.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/institute-for-social-innovation-and-impact-cadets-report-2025.pdf. Cadet Forces offer challenging and enjoyable activities for young people, preparing them to play an active part in the community while developing valuable life skills.
The department works jointly with MoD on the Cadet Expansion Programme, which was launched to establish new cadet units in English state secondary schools. We will continue to work with MoD as they implement the Strategic Defence Review’s recommendation to expand in-school and community-based Cadet Forces.
We will also work with MoD on the Strategic Defence Review’s recommendation to increase understanding of the Armed Forces in schools in a way that creates opportunities.
MoD will review existing support with us over the coming months and in consultation with teachers. Schools themselves are best placed to determine how to use this available support.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she plans to take to develop understanding of the armed forces among young people in schools.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
Cadets can be an excellent opportunity for enrichment and welcomes the Ministry of Defence (MoD)-commissioned University of Northampton report which explores the benefits of a cadet unit in schools, which is available here: https://www.northampton.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/institute-for-social-innovation-and-impact-cadets-report-2025.pdf. Cadet Forces offer challenging and enjoyable activities for young people, preparing them to play an active part in the community while developing valuable life skills.
The department works jointly with MoD on the Cadet Expansion Programme, which was launched to establish new cadet units in English state secondary schools. We will continue to work with MoD as they implement the Strategic Defence Review’s recommendation to expand in-school and community-based Cadet Forces.
We will also work with MoD on the Strategic Defence Review’s recommendation to increase understanding of the Armed Forces in schools in a way that creates opportunities.
MoD will review existing support with us over the coming months and in consultation with teachers. Schools themselves are best placed to determine how to use this available support.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much the Government has spent on contracts with temporary teaching agencies for staff at schools in Huntingdon constituency since 5 July 2024.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
Supply teachers make an important contribution to the smooth running of schools across the country by filling posts on a temporary basis and covering teacher absences.
Schools and local authorities are responsible for the recruitment of their supply teachers and there are currently various approaches to providing supply teachers, including using agencies. Therefore, the department does not hold contracts with temporary agencies for staff at schools and does not hold the data requested.
The department collects financial data from schools across England through the Consistent Financial Reporting framework for local authority maintained schools, and through the Academy Accounts Return for academies and multi-academy trusts. The Financial Benchmarking and Insights Tool reports on school and academy spend on supply teaching, including expenditure on agency supply teaching staff. This includes “costs paid to an agency for teaching staff that have been brought in to cover teacher absence”. The Tool can be accessed here: https://financial-benchmarking-and-insights-tool.education.gov.uk/data-sources.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
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 a levy on higher education provider income from international students.
Answered by Janet Daby
The immigration white paper sets out a series of measures that will achieve a reduction in net migration, while maintaining the UK’s globally competitive offer to international students and making a significant contribution to growth by boosting our skills base.
This includes the commitment to explore the introduction of a levy on higher education provider income from international students, with proceeds to be reinvested in the domestic higher education and skills system. We will set out more details around the levy in due course.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how she plans to use Immigration Skills Charge funding to (a) support skills funding for priority sectors and (b) upskill the domestic workforce.
Answered by Janet Daby
As set out in the Immigration White Paper, the government will increase the Immigration Skills Charge for the first time since its introduction, by 32% to bring the Immigration Skills Charge rates in line with inflation. Further details on how skills funding in future years will be allocated will be set out in due course, following the Spending Review on 11 June 2025.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 21 May 2025 to Question 52032 on Special Educational Needs: Finance, what information her Department holds on the amount of additional funding per pupil above £6,000 that was provided by Cambridgeshire County Council for pupils in mainstream schools in each of the last five years.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
The average additional high needs top-up funding amounts per pupil, covering the costs of pupils with special educational needs in Cambridgeshire mainstream maintained schools and academies, in excess of £6,000 per annum, are set out in the table below. This is from the latest available annual actual expenditure returns provided to the department by Cambridgeshire County Council, and the school census data. In this period, the number of children attracting top-up funding has grown from 1,600 to 2,900. As a result, it is likely that the severity of needs being addressed has changed over the period.
Average top-up funding expenditure per pupil in Cambridgeshire mainstream schools | Financial year 2019/20 | Financial year 2020/21 | Financial year 2021/22 | Financial year 2022/23 | Financial year 2023/24 |
Spend per pupil identified by schools as attracting high needs top-up funding | £10,300 | £8,700 | £8,900 | £8,900 | £9,100 |
To note:
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of the time taken for education, health and care plans on children not in school (a) nationally and (b) in Cambridgeshire.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
All pupils of compulsory school age are entitled to a full-time education. For those who would not get this at school because of illness, exclusion or other reasons, local authorities must arrange suitable alternative education.
Where a child may require an education, health and care (EHC) needs assessment, the department wants to ensure that these are progressed and, if an EHC plan is needed, it is issued promptly so that the child can access the support they need. EHC plans must be issued within 20 weeks of the needs assessment commencing.
The department works with local authorities that have issues with EHC plan timeliness, helping them to identify barriers and put in place an effective recovery plan, including securing specialist special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) adviser support where needed.
The department does not collect data specifically regarding the time taken by local authorities to issue an EHC plan for children who are not in school.
Data shows that in 2023, 64.9% of plans in Cambridgeshire were issued within 20 weeks and 2.6% of all new plans in Cambridgeshire were issued for children and young people who were ‘educated elsewhere’. This includes those who were not in school at the time.
Nationally, 50.3% of plans were issued within 20 weeks and 3.1% of all new EHC plans were issued for children and young people who were ‘educated elsewhere’ in 2023.
Data for 2024 will be published in June.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 20th May 2025 Question 51559 on Special Educational Needs: Cambridgeshire and with reference to the Permanent data table entitled Initial requests, assessments, discontinued plans, 20 week timeliness, mainstream to special transfers, mediation and tribunals, published on 13 May 2025, if she will publish the data for the number of (a) initial requests for an EHC plan, (b) initial requests for assessment - decision to assess and (c) children and young people assessed for whom an EHC plan was issued in (i) 2024 and (ii) 2025 to date.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
Publication of annual statistics on education, health and care plans follows the Code of Practice for Statistics. Details of publications, including those requested, can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/search/research-and-statistics?content_store_document_type=upcoming_statistics&organisations%5B%5D=department-for-education&order=updated-newest. Information for the 2025 calendar year will be collected early in 2026 and published later that year.