Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many children are home-schooled in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England.
Answered by Robin Walker
The department does not collect data on the number of electively home-educated children as there is no statutory requirement for local authorities to maintain such a register. Such data as is currently collected is held by local authorities.
However, the government is committed to a form of a register for children not in school, which would include home educated children. This would improve data collection and sharing, as well as help local authorities undertake their existing duties and help safeguard all children who are in scope. We will set out further details on this in the government response to the children not in school consultation, which we will publish in the coming weeks.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many and what proportion of school leavers have participated in higher education in (i) Coventry North East constituency, (ii) Coventry, (iii) the West Midlands and (iv) England in each of the last five years.
Answered by Michelle Donelan
The department publishes the number and proportion of 15 year old students from state funded and special schools who entered Higher Education by age 19 over the past five years. This is shown in the table below.
Figures are not available at parliamentary constituency level.
Table 1: Number and proportion of 15 year old students from state funded and special schools who entered higher education by age 19 | ||||||
| 2015/16 | 2016/17 | 2017/18 | 2018/19 | 2019/20 | |
Coventry | HE Progression Rate | 39.6% | 40.5% | 40.7% | 41.4% | 41.7% |
Number of HE Students | 1,433 | 1,474 | 1,417 | 1,433 | 1,475 | |
West Midlands | HE Progression Rate | 40.3% | 40.5% | 41.5% | 41.9% | 42.1% |
Number of HE Students | 25,630 | 26,237 | 26,006 | 25,897 | 25,560 | |
England | HE Progression Rate | 40.7% | 41.2% | 42.2% | 42.5% | 43.1% |
Number of HE Students | 229,082 | 236,233 | 236,154 | 235,871 | 233,407 | |
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much funding his Department has allocated to schools in (a) Coventry North East constituency and (b) Coventry for building improvement programmes in each of the last five years.
Answered by Robin Walker
The department allocates condition funding each year to those responsible for school buildings to improve and maintain the condition of the school estate. Most condition funding allocations are calculated at a responsible body level and cannot be broken down to constituency level, as decisions on investment are often taken at a local level.
Schools and those responsible for school buildings receive condition funding through different routes depending on their size and type. The majority of condition funding is paid to responsible bodies through annual School Condition Allocations (SCA). Devolved Formula Capital (DFC) is also allocated for schools to spend on their own capital priorities.
The department has allocated over £20 million in condition funding to Coventry local authority since 2017 for maintained schools (see attached table). This includes SCA (and up to the 2019-20 financial year, funding paid via the local authority Voluntary Aided Programme for voluntary aided schools), and DFC. As part of this, in the 2018-19 financial year, additional funding was made available through the Healthy Pupils Capital Fund, as well as £400 million additional DFC. In the 2020-21 financial year, the government made an additional £560 million available for essential maintenance and upgrade projects. Coventry local authority’s share of additional funding has been included in figures in the table.
Large multi-academy trusts and large voluntary aided school bodies, also receive SCA funding to invest in schools for which they are responsible. These are not included in the figures as large academy trusts and voluntary aided school bodies will typically span local authority boundaries. A full breakdown of allocations can be found on GOV.UK.
Smaller trusts, voluntary aided schools and sixth form colleges that are not eligible for SCA can bid into the Condition Improvement Fund (CIF) each year. Over the last 5 years, there have been 3 successful CIF applications for eligible schools in the Coventry North East Constituency with a total funding award of £1.2 million. Over the same period, for Coventry overall there have been 38 successful CIF applications with a total funding award of £12.4 million.
For the Priority School Building Programme there have been two schools in the Coventry North-East constituency, and six schools in the Coventry Local Authority over the last five years. So far, there have not been any schools from the Coventry North East constituency within the new School Rebuilding Programme. However, four schools in the Coventry local authority area are included in the first 100 projects of the programme that have been announced to date.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that schools in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England do not have to reduce funding to learning to manage ongoing costs relating to the outbreak of covid-19.
Answered by Robin Walker
Teachers, school leaders, and pupils have made a huge contribution to the nation’s efforts to respond to the challenges arising from the COVID-19 outbreak, and the department is very grateful for their continued hard work. Throughout the COVID-19 outbreak, we have ensured that all schools continued to receive their core funding as normal, regardless of any periods of reduced attendance.
The department recognises that some schools may be facing pressures this winter. In Spending Review 2021, we announced we are continuing to deliver year on year, real terms per pupil increases to school funding, investing a further £4.7 billion by the 2024-25 financial year for the core schools budget in England, over and above the Spending Review 2019 settlement for schools in 2022-23. This builds on the largest cash boost for schools in a decade provided at the Spending Review in 2019. This £4.7 billion includes a further £1.6 billion in the 2022-23 financial year, on top of the £2.4 billion increase over 2021-22 levels already announced as part of the 2019 spending round, meaning a year-on-year 5% real terms per pupil boost in 2022-23 financial year compared to 2021-22. This will rapidly give schools the resources they need to raise attainment, meet the cost of the Health and Social Care Levy, increase teacher pay and continue to rise to the challenges of COVID-19 response and recovery.
Schools in Coventry North East are attracting £98.4 million in total this year, a 2.5% cash increase, through the schools national funding formula. This reflects an increase of 2.4% in pupil-led funding compared to the 2020-21 financial year. School leaders have the flexibility to make their own decisions on how to prioritise their spending to invest in a range of resources and activities that will best support their staff and pupils.
In addition to the increase in core funding for schools, schools will receive a £1 billion recovery premium over the next two years to help those pupils most in need of support to catch up. This will help to deliver evidence-based approaches to support the most disadvantaged pupils, and means every school in England will have more money to support young people’s recovery from the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak.
This £1 billion comes on top of recovery interventions announced previously, including £1.5 billion investment in tutoring in schools and colleges, £400 million investment in expanding training opportunities in early years and schools settings, £950 million in flexible funding for schools, £200 million for summer schools, £17 million for early language support, and the opportunity for year 13 students to repeat their final year in the 2021-2022 academic year.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate he has made of the funding schools require in addition to their learning budgets to manage ongoing costs relating to covid-19 in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England.
Answered by Robin Walker
Teachers, school leaders, and pupils have made a huge contribution to the nation’s efforts to respond to the challenges arising from the COVID-19 outbreak, and the department is very grateful for their continued hard work. Throughout the COVID-19 outbreak, the department has ensured that all schools continued to receive their core funding as normal, regardless of any periods of reduced attendance.
The department recognises that some schools may be facing pressures this winter. However, this should be seen in the wider context of funding for schools. At the recent spending review, we announced we are continuing to deliver year on year, real terms per pupil increases to school funding, investing a further £4.7 billion in the core school budget by the 2024-25 financial year compared to previous plans.
This settlement includes a further £1.6 billion in the 2022-23 financial year, on top of the £2.4 billion increase over 2021-22 levels, already announced as part of the 2019 spending round, which will help the school sector respond to the pressures we know they are facing.
School leaders have the flexibility to make their own decisions on how to prioritise their spending to invest in a range of resources and activities that will best support their staff and pupils.
In addition to the increase in core funding for schools, schools will receive a £1 billion recovery premium over the next two years to help those pupils most in need of support to catch up. This will help to deliver evidence-based approaches to support the most disadvantaged pupils and means every school in England will have more money to support young people’s recovery from the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak.
This £1 billion comes on top of recovery interventions announced previously, including £1.5 billion investment in tutoring in schools and colleges, £400 million investment in expanding training opportunities in early years and schools settings, £950 million in flexible funding for schools, £200 million for summer schools, £17 million for early language support, and the opportunity for year 13 students to repeat their final year in the 2021-22 academic year.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment he has made of the trends in the number of apprenticeship starts in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England.
Answered by Michelle Donelan
Apprenticeships are more important than ever in helping businesses to recruit the right people and develop the skills they need as we build back better from the COVID-19 outbreak.
As part of the government’s Plan for Jobs, the department has created a strong incentive for employers across England to take on new apprentices. We have introduced a higher incentive payment of £3,000 for each new apprentice they recruit as a new employee between 1 April and 30 September 2021. We are also making a range of improvements to help more employers benefit from apprenticeships, including developing flexi-job apprenticeships, a £7 million flexi-job apprenticeships fund and making it easier for levy payers to transfer their levy funds to other businesses.
The number of apprenticeships starts for the Coventry North East constituency, Coventry, the West Midlands and England since May 2010, can be found in the table below.
Geographical area | Starts since May 2010 |
Coventry North East | 12,570 |
Coventry | 32,830 |
West Midlands | 572,920 |
England | 4,841,900 |
A more detailed breakdown by academic year can be found in the 'Supporting tables - Apprenticeship starts since May 2010 and 2015 by region, local authority and pcon' file that accompanies the apprenticeships and traineeships statistics August publication, found here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/apprenticeships-and-traineeships/2020-21#dataDownloads-1.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate his Department has made of the number of Sure Start centres that have (a) closed and (b) reduced the services they provide in (i) Coventry North East constituency, (ii) Coventry, (iii) the West Midlands and (iv) England since 2010.
Answered by Vicky Ford
Based on the information supplied by local authorities as of 31 August 2021, the attached table sets out the number of Sure Start children’s centres sites that have closed in Coventry North East constituency, Coventry, the West Midlands and England since 2010[1]. The Department does not routinely collect data on the services provided by children’s centres. This data is held at a local level.
[1] Source: This is based on information supplied by local authorities on the number of children’s centres in their area to Get Information about Schools (GIAS) database about the location of https://www.get-information-schools.service.gov.uk and internal management information held by the department as of 31 August 2021. These figures may be different to previous answers and could change again in future since local authorities may update their data at any time. The GIAS collects data on children’s centres that local authorities have closed on a permanent basis. It does not collect data on children’s centres that local authorities may have closed temporarily in response to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment he has made of the effect of the covid-19 outbreak on the early years sector in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England; and what steps his Department is taking to support that sector in those areas.
Answered by Vicky Ford
We have spent over £3.5 billion in each of the past three years on early education entitlements, and the government continues to support families with their childcare costs. My right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced on 25 November 2020 a £44 million investment for 2021-22, for local authorities (including Coventry and all other local authorities in the West Midlands) to increase hourly rates paid to childcare providers for the government’s free childcare entitlement offers.
For 2021-22, we have increased the hourly funding rates for all local authorities by 8p an hour for the two-year-old entitlement and, for the vast majority of areas, by 6p an hour for the three- and four-year-old entitlement. This will pay for a rate increase that is higher than the costs nurseries may face from the uplift to the national living wage in April.
We have also increased the minimum funding floor, meaning no council can receive less than £4.44 per hour for the three- and four-year-old entitlements.
Further, we are varying our approach to funding the early years sector over this financial year, to give local authorities and providers better certainty over their funding income during a period of continued uncertainty due to the COVID-19 outbreak. For the Spring term 2021, we provided top-up funding for authorities which could show rising demand for our free early education entitlements during that term after a period of national lockdown. For the next three terms, we will fund each authority based on attendance data they provide to us for each term. This will ensure that our funding aligns with attendance, which should provide the very welcome reassurance for providers that funding for the entitlements will be commensurate with up-to-date data.
We have liaised closely with all local authorities during the COVID-19 outbreak to monitor attendance and sufficiency of supply of childcare. We have not seen a significant number of parents unable to secure a childcare place, in this term or since early year settings re-opened fully on 1 June 2020. Across England as a whole, including for Coventry North East, Coventry and throughout the West Midlands, in situations where parents have been unable to temporarily secure a childcare place, for example due to their usual setting being temporarily closed due to COVID-19, this has been able to be quickly resolved locally and local authorities (including Coventry) are not reporting significant concerns about sufficiency of supply issues, and have not reported any significant concerns at any point during the COVID-19 outbreak.
All early years settings continue to benefit from a range of business support packages to help support them during these unprecedented times. Throughout the COVID-19 outbreak, the government has been supporting the early years sector by continuing to have access to a range of business support packages, such as the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (where settings have experienced a drop in either their income from parents or government), Business Rates Relief Nurseries Discount and support from the Recovery Loan Scheme. Further information regarding these business support packages is available at: https://www.gov.uk/coronavirus/business-support.
We know that findings from the Childcare and Early Years Provider and COVID-19 survey have shown that in November and December 2020, 74% of group-based providers have made use of the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme at any point.
We engage with local authorities on the accessibility of childcare on a regular basis and we continue to work with the early years sector to understand how they can best be supported to ensure that sufficient safe, appropriate, and affordable childcare is available for those returning to work now, and for all families who need it in the longer term.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment his Department has made of trends in the gap in attainment between students on free school meals and their peers in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (c) England in each of the last five years.
Answered by Nick Gibb
At a national level, the Department monitors trends in the gap in attainment between disadvantaged pupils, defined as those eligible for free school meals at any point in the last 6 years, looked after children and those adopted from care, and others using the disadvantage gap index. The gap between disadvantaged pupils and others, measured using the disadvantage gap index, has narrowed by 13% at Key Stage 2 and 9% at Key Stage 4 between 2011 and 2019.
The disadvantage gap index is only calculated for England as a whole. The Department also publishes breakdowns by disadvantage status and free school meal status of several attainment measures at Key Stage 2 and Key Stage 4 at national, regional and local authority level. The data for Key Stage 2 is available through the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/statistics-key-stage-2. The data for Key Stage 4 is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/statistics-gcses-key-stage-4. The Department has not made any recent assessment of the trends in this data for Coventry or the West Midlands.
The Department is committed to supporting all disadvantaged pupils in England and has put in place several policy measures to help schools address any barriers to success that these pupils face. Since 2011, we have been providing extra funding, including £2.5 billion this financial year, through the pupil premium to boost the progress and attainment of their disadvantaged pupils.
To ensure schools have the tools to make effective use of this funding, the Department established the Education Endowment Foundation, which carries out research to produce guidance reports for schools, setting out how they can use the additional funding to best improve their disadvantaged pupils’ outcomes.
In addition to the pupil premium, we have announced over £3 billion of funding since June 2020 to support education recovery for children and young people in schools, colleges and nurseries. This will have a significant impact in closing gaps in attainment that have emerged. Recovery programmes have been designed to allow nurseries, schools and colleges the flexibility to support those pupils most in need, including the most disadvantaged. The Department has also expanded its reforms in two areas where the evidence is clear that investment will have a significant impact for disadvantaged children - high quality tutoring and teaching. This includes the Recovery Premium for the next academic year worth over £300 million, which is weighted so that schools with more disadvantaged pupils receive more funding. The £1.5 billion for tutoring will allow the Department to provide up to 100 million tutoring hours for children and young people in England by 2024, expanding high-quality tutoring nationally so that small group tuition is available to every child who needs help catching up.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the effect of the covid-19 outbreak on education outcomes in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Understanding the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on the attainment and progress of all students is a key research priority for the Government. We have commissioned an independent research and assessment agency to provide a baseline assessment of catch-up needs for pupils in schools in England and to monitor progress over the course of the year. This research is based on assessments that schools are already using over this academic year. Initial findings from the research were recently published on gov.uk: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/pupils-progress-in-the-2020-to-2021-academic-year-interim-report.
In reading, pupils in Years 3 to 9 in England were on average 1.6-2 months behind where we would expect them to be in Autumn 2020 in a 'normal' year. In Mathematics, pupils in Years 3 to 7 in England were on average around 3.2 months behind in Autumn 2020.
Once adjusted for historic differences in pupil progress, pupils in the West Midlands were on average around 1.6 months behind where we would expect them to be in Autumn 2020 in a ‘normal year’ in primary reading and on average around 2.1 months behind in secondary reading.
Due to small sample sizes, we are unable to produce robust regional estimates in Mathematics nor produce robust estimates at the local authority and constituency geographical levels.
The Government recognises school and college restrictions have had a substantial impact on children and young people’s education and is committed to helping pupils make up education lost due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
To address this challenge, my right hon. Friend, the Prime Minister committed to working with parents, teachers, and education providers to develop a long-term plan to help schools, colleges, and nurseries support pupils to make up their education over the course of this Parliament.
Sir Kevan Collins was appointed as Education Recovery Commissioner to advise on the development of the long-term recovery plan. Sir Kevan will engage with parents, pupils, and teachers in the development of this broader approach and review how evidence-based interventions can be used to address the impact the COVID-19 outbreak has had on education. Further details will be shared in due course.
£1.7 billion has been made available in funding to support education recovery. In June 2020, we announced a £1 billion catch-up package including a National Tutoring Programme and a Catch-up Premium for this academic year. In February 2021, we committed to further funding of £700 million to fund summer schools, expansion of our tutoring programmes and a Recovery Premium for next academic year. Funding will support pupils across early years settings, schools, and providers of 16-19 education.