Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment she has made of the adequacy of the accessibility of British Sign Language classes for parents of (a) deaf children and (b) children with hearing loss who are ineligible for grants under the adult education budget; and what alternative steps the Government is taking to help support those parents to learn how to communicate with their children.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero
The government has not assessed the accessibility of British Sign Language (BSL) classes for those who are ineligible for the adult education budget (AEB). However, the AEB targets a wide range of individuals, including, but not limited to, UK nationals, other non-UK nationals, certain EU nationals and their family members, and individuals with certain types of immigration status (such as refugee status and those with indefinite leave to remain) and some asylum seekers.
Funding is available through the AEB for qualifications in or focussing on BSL up to and including level 2. About 60% of the AEB has been devolved to Mayoral Combined Authorities and the Greater London Authority, who determine which provision to fund for learners who live in their areas. The Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) provides the remaining funding for learners who live in non-devolved areas, which includes St Ives Constituency.
ESFA funded AEB qualifications include, for example, the Level 1 Award in BSL which allows learners to communicate in BSL on a range of topics that involve simple, everyday language use, thereby giving them the basic skills and confidence in production and reception of BSL. It will depend on an individual’s circumstances as to whether they are entitled to free provision or expected to meet part of the cost, through co-funding. Where community learning providers offer BSL courses, those providers are responsible for determining the course fees, including levels of fee remission.
For parents learning BSL on an AEB funded course, there is also additional support available. The AEB provides funding to colleges and providers to help adult learners overcome barriers preventing them from accessing learning. Providers have discretion to help learners meet costs such as transport, accommodation, books, equipment, and childcare. Learning support funding also helps colleges and training providers to meet the additional needs of learners with learning difficulties and/or disabilities and the costs of reasonable adjustments, as set out in the Equality Act 2010.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of energy costs on the ability of schools to fund teacher pay rises.
Answered by Nick Gibb
This Government is committed to providing a world class education system for all children. The Autumn Statement announced an additional investment of £2 billion in each of the 2023/24 and 2024/25 academic years, above the totals announced at the Spending Review 2021. Total funding for both mainstream schools and high needs schools will total £58.8 billion in 2024/25. This is the highest ever level in real terms per pupil, as measured by the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
Of the £2 billion of additional funding announced in the Autumn Statement, £400 million will be allocated to local authorities’ high needs budgets, with a new condition placed on local authorities to ensure that a fair share of that will be passed directly to special schools and alternative provision. The remaining funding will be allocated to schools through the new Mainstream Schools Additional Grant (MSAG) and through boosting the pupil premium funding rates, which are increasing by 5% in 2023/24 compared to last year.
For mainstream schools, additional funding through the MSAG is worth an average 3.4%, or £192, per pupil in 2023/24. This is being provided on top of the allocations based on the national funding formula (NFF) announced in July 2022. An average primary school with 200 pupils will receive approximately £35,000 in additional funding through the new MSAG, and an average secondary school with 900 pupils will receive approximately £200,000. This will support schools to manage costs.
In March 2023, the Department made an offer on pay, conditions and workload to the education unions, as set out here: https://educationhub.blog.gov.uk/2023/03/28/teacher-strikes-latest-everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-teacher-pay-offer/.
This offer set out that, taking account of the most up to date assumptions for both energy prices and support staff pay for 2023/24, the Department has calculated that a 4% teacher pay award should be affordable within existing funding. The Government’s judgement of the affordability of teacher pay increases is, as usual, based on national figures which equate to the position for an average school. This assessment considers the impact of national level changes in energy prices, inflation and support staff pay for an average school to assess the affordability of teachers pay increases for schools. The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) assessed that the most recent teachers’ pay offer, if it had been accepted, would have meant school funding was still growing faster than costs.
Following unions’ rejection of the Government’s offer in March 2023, the independent School Teachers’ Review Body has submitted its recommendations to the Government on teacher pay for 2023/24, as part of the normal process. The Department will be considering the recommendations and will publish its response in the usual way.
The Government has announced that from April 2023, the Energy Bill Discount Scheme will mean eligible schools will receive a discount on high energy bills until 31 March 2024. This replaces the previous Energy Bill Relief Scheme which ran from October 2022 to 31 March 2023 and provided a price reduction, protecting schools from excessively high energy bills over the winter period.
In addition to the support for schools’ day to day running costs, as set out above, the Department allocated £500 million of additional capital funding in 2022/23 for schools, sixth form colleges, and Further Education (FE) colleges to help improve energy efficiency. This comprised £447 million for schools and sixth form colleges and £53 million for FE colleges to spend on capital improvements to buildings and facilities, prioritising works to improve energy efficiency. The Department has also published guidance for schools and colleges on steps for reducing energy use and small scale works to improve energy efficiency which can be implemented relatively quickly.
The Department recognises that every school’s circumstances are different, and where schools are in serious financial difficulty, they should contact their local authority or the Education and Skills Funding Agency.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of amounts of top-up funding for children with special educational needs and disabilities in Cornwall.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero
Local authorities are statutorily responsible for securing the special educational provision specified in a child or young person’s Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan.
It is for local authorities to assess the adequacy of amounts of top-up funding for children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities, in line with their statutory duties to secure the provision specified in the EHC plan.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of alternative provision placements in Cornwall; and what assessment he has made of the impact of the number of placements available on schools’ budgets.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero
The department recognises that the quality of Alternative Provision placements in Cornwall is variable, and is also aware of the pressures that the reduced number of places has on schools. The department is engaging closely with the local authority and trusts in the local area to increase standards through supporting and challenging specialist trusts to ensure they are consistently delivering high quality provision, and encouraging strong mainstream trusts to consider working in the specialist sector in order to diversify provision in the area over time.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the number of schools introducing (a) recruitment and (b) retention payments to encourage new teachers to work and existing teachers to stay at schools in Cornwall; and if she will make it her policy to reflect the potential need for such payments in area cost adjustments to the national funding formula.
Answered by Nick Gibb
There are now over 468,000 full time equivalent (FTE) teachers in state funded schools in England, which is an increase of 2,800 (less than 1%) since last year, and an increase of 27,000 (6%) since 2010.
The Department wants to ensure there are excellent teachers where they are most needed. The Department knows there is further to go to improve recruitment in some subjects.
In October 2022, the Department announced an Initial Teacher Training (ITT) financial incentives package worth up to £181 million for those starting ITT in 2023/24, which is a £52 million increase on 2022/23. The package includes bursaries worth £27,000 tax free and scholarships worth £29,000 tax free, to encourage talented trainees to teach in key subjects, such as physics, chemistry, and computing. More information on the financial incentives package can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/funding-initial-teacher-training-itt/funding-initial-teacher-training-itt-academic-year-2023-to-2024.
The Department is offering a Levelling Up Premium worth up to £3,000 tax free annually for mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computing teachers in the first five years of their careers who choose to work in disadvantaged schools, including in Education Investment Areas (EIA). As Cornwall is an EIA, eligible teachers in Cornwall receive the maximum payments available. More information is available at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/levelling-up-premium-payments-for-teachers.
These recruitment and retention incentives are funded centrally and paid directly by the Department to eligible teachers. As such, they are separate from the National Funding Formula.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the accessibility of British Sign Language classes for parents of (a) deaf children and (b) children with hearing loss who are (i) over the age of 23, (ii) not on a low income, (iii) not unemployed and (iv) ineligible for grants under the adult education budget.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The government has not assessed the accessibility of British Sign Language (BSL) classes for those who are ineligible for the Adult Education Budget (AEB).
The AEB targets a wide range of individuals, including, but not limited to, UK nationals, other non-UK nationals, certain EU nationals and their family members, and individuals with certain types of immigration status (such as refugee status and those with indefinite leave to remain) and some asylum seekers. In areas where the AEB is devolved, it is for the Mayoral Combined Authority or Greater London Authority to decide how funding is spent. In the rest of the country, which includes the St Ives Constituency, the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) manages the AEB. Learners who are employed and earn above the low wage threshold can be co-funded to complete provision up to and including level 2, which includes some BSL qualifications, meaning that the government pays a 50% contribution to the course cost.
Apart from the statutory entitlements, it is for AEB providers to choose how they wish to prioritise funding within their AEB allocations. For these learners, the department suggests contacting the education provider regarding enrolment and payment processes.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of allowing parents to transfer free childcare allowances for the care of children currently ineligible for free childcare.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero
Parents can benefit from the government’s current range of childcare offers, which includes the free early education entitlements, as well as Tax-Free Childcare and Universal Credit Childcare.
The free early education entitlements apply to childcare places taken up by a child who is within the correct eligibility age range for each offer.
In addition to the entitlements, Tax-Free Childcare and Universal Credit Childcare can be used to pay costs associated with care of children in their early years, as well as those of school age.
Tax-Free Childcare is available for working parents of children aged 0-11, or up to 17 for eligible disabled children. This has the same income criteria as 30 hours free childcare and can be used to pay for childcare of children who fall within the eligible age range.
Low-income families who are in receipt of Universal Credit, and find that they are ineligible for Tax-Free Childcare, can have 85% of their childcare costs covered under the Universal Credit Childcare offer. This offer can be used to cover costs associated with childcare taken up at nurseries, preschools, after-school clubs, breakfast clubs, childminders, nannies and holiday clubs.
In the 2023 Spring Budget, the government announced a number of transformative reforms to childcare for parents, children, and the economy. This includes the expansion of the 30 hours free childcare offer where eligible working parents in England will be able to access 30 hours of free childcare per week for 38 weeks per year from when their child is 9 months old to when they start school.
Further information on the support available to parents can be found at: https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk/.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of expanding the eligibility for levelling-up premiums in Education Investment Areas to include teachers of (a) Design and Technology and (b) any other school subjects.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Levelling Up Premium is worth up to £3,000 tax-free annually for mathematics, physics, chemistry and computing teachers in the first five years of their careers who work in disadvantaged schools, including in Education Investment Areas. The payments are designed to incentivise the recruitment and retention of specialist teachers in these subjects, particularly in the schools where they are needed most.
It is targeted at these particular subjects because the department’s greatest priority is English Baccalaureate subjects which are experiencing teacher shortages. Offering financial incentives in these subjects supports teacher supply where schools are likely to devote the most teaching time.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will issue guidance to ensure that universities declare whether courses will be delivered (a) face-to-face or (b) virtually.
Answered by Andrea Jenkyns
The Competition and Markets Authority has published guidance for higher education providers, advising them on how to comply with consumer protection law.
This guidance sets out the ‘material information’ that prospective students should receive about the courses for which they are applying. This should include information about the number and type of contact hours that students can expect, including, for example, detail on the balance between teaching that is delivered face-to-face, as distinct from any teaching delivered online.
Asked by: Derek Thomas (Conservative - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to ensure access to education for children who suffer from functional neurological disorders.
Answered by Will Quince
The government is committed to pupils with medical conditions, including children who suffer from functional neurological disorders, being properly supported at school so that they have full access to education.
In 2014, the government introduced a new duty on schools to support pupils with all medical conditions and has published statutory guidance on this for schools and others. The guidance can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/supporting-pupils-at-school-with-medical-conditions--3.
The guidance does not specify which medical conditions should be supported in schools. Instead, it focuses on how to meet the needs of each individual child and how their medical condition impacts on school life.
All schools are required to identify and address the special educational needs of the pupils they support, and to use their best endeavours to make sure that a child or young person gets the support they need.