Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to (a) increase awareness of (i) domestic violence and (ii) sexual exploitation and (b) promote positive relationship education.
Answered by Nick Gibb
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many child (a) psychologists and (b) psychiatrists completed training in each of the last 10 years.
Answered by Nick Gibb
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment he has made of Roots of Empathy classroom practices as a means of promoting social and emotional learning.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government has made no specific assessment of the Roots of Empathy programme. It is important that schools have the freedom to decide which programmes are most appropriate and best meet the needs of their pupils, drawing on an evidence base of effective practice.
Good mental health and wellbeing, including the social and emotional development of children and young people, are a priority for the Government. The Department is committed through its education reforms to ensuring that all children, regardless of background, are prepared to succeed in adult life. Schools and colleges have an important role to play in supporting the mental health and wellbeing of their pupils, through ensuring a supportive school ethos which fosters a strong sense of community, and enables engagement and success by all.
The Department is making relationships education compulsory for all primary pupils, relationships and sex education (RSE) compulsory for all secondary pupils and health education compulsory for all pupils in primary and secondary state-funded schools. The subjects are designed to foster positive, respectful relationships. In health education, there is a strong focus on mental wellbeing. The Department is putting in place a programme of support for schools as they introduce the new subjects, and this will include helping schools to identify evidence-based programmes and high quality teaching resources.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Written Statement of 8 July 2019, Children’s health and wellbeing in schools, HCWS 1695, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of introducing a compulsory healthy schools rating scheme.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Our healthy schools rating scheme is designed to recognise and encourage schools’ contributions to pupils’ health and wellbeing. It celebrates the positive actions that schools are taking in terms of healthy eating and physical activity and aims to help schools identify useful next steps in their provision.
The government stated in the first chapter of the Childhood Obesity Plan that this will be a voluntary scheme. We do not believe that it is appropriate to introduce a new compulsory duty on schools in this area.
The scheme focuses on 4 overarching areas that we believe are important to children’s healthy living (food education, school food standards, participation in physical education and active travel to school). We welcome feedback to help us improve the scheme during its first year.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, on how many occasions his Department has received representations from the UK Statistics Authority on his Department's presentation and use of statistics in each year since 2010.
Answered by Anne Milton
Details on interventions by the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA) are published in the correspondence[1], publications[2], and issues log[3] sections of their website since 2010.
The UKSA’s Office for Statistics Regulation also carry out regular assessments and systemic reviews, details of which can also be found on the UKSA’s website[4].
In September 2018, the UKSA published the first annual summary of its interventions for the financial year 2017/18[5]. The report for 2018/19 will be published in the autumn.
[1] https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/correspondence-list/.
[2] https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/publications-list/.
[3] https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/reports-and-correspondence/issues-log/.
[4] https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/osr/.
[5] https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/publication/annual-casework-review-20172018/.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment he has made of level of public awareness of the 30 hours free childcare programme in each income decile in England.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
This government is committed to helping working families with accessible, affordable childcare and offers a broad range of childcare support.
The department measures awareness via the annual Childcare and Early Years Survey of Parents, the most recent data published as Official Statistics in December 2018: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/childcare-and-early-years-survey-of-parents-2018.
This data will be collected in 2019 via the same survey and published as Official Statistics in December 2019.
Table 3.1, attached, summarises awareness of the 30 hours policy among families with children aged 0-4 years in England, broken down by various family characteristics such as family income.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many civil servants in his Department have been seconded to (a) the Department for Exiting the European Union and (b) the Department for International Trade in each of the last three years.
Answered by Anne Milton
The Civil Service is focused on delivering the government’s most pressing priorities, and this includes departments sharing staff and working together on joint projects.
Since January 2019, the department has been part of a coordinated resourcing exercise across the Civil Service to support preparations for leaving the EU without a deal. As part of this exercise, the department seconded 2 people to the Department for Exiting the European Union and 1 person to the Department for International Trade.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will publish the dates on which he has met with ministers or officials from the (a) Department for Work and Pensions, and (b) Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy on the Opportunity Areas Programme in the last two years; and what the outcomes of each of those meetings were.
Answered by Anne Milton
My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education met my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions on 27 March 2019 to discuss the progress of the Opportunity Areas programme, amongst other matters. Across our 12 Opportunity Areas, the department is enabling a range of partners including Local Enterprise Partnerships, through work with the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy, job centres, and through work with the Department for Work and Pensions, to help teachers remove barriers to learning and boost aspiration, for the most disadvantaged pupils and parents.