Asked by: Greg Mulholland (Liberal Democrat - Leeds North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the average hourly earnings were of her Department's (a) BME and (b) non-BME employees in (i) 2015 and (ii) 2016.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Department for Education pays annual salaries. These have been converted to hourly rates using the calculation ((Gross Basic Salary*FTE)/52)/Weekly hours:
| Mar-15 | Mar-16 |
BME | £19.22 | £19.32 |
Non-BME | £21.67 | £22.00 |
Asked by: Greg Mulholland (Liberal Democrat - Leeds North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many children in (a) Leeds North West constituency and (b) Leeds city region are eligible for 15 hours free childcare.
Answered by Sam Gyimah
All three- and four-year-olds are eligible for funded early education. In addition, two-year-olds are eligible for funded early education where their parents meet certain income and benefit related criteria[1].
The Department for Education does not publish data on eligibility at constituency or city-region level, however information can be found on take-up and eligibility for funded early education at local authority level in the Statistical First Release: Provision for children under five years of age in England: January 2015[2]
In January 2015 in Leeds local authority, 4,600 two-year-olds, 10,100 three-year-olds and 10,000 four-year-olds were eligible for funded early education[3].
[1] https://www.gov.uk/help-with-childcare-costs/free-childcare-and-education-for-2-to-4-year-olds
[2] https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/provision-for-children-under-5-years-of-age-january-2015
[3] Figures have been rounded to the nearest 100.
Asked by: Greg Mulholland (Liberal Democrat - Leeds North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what representations she has received from small childcare providers on her plans to increase free childcare entitlement to 30 hours per week and the ability of those providers to fund care places.
Answered by Sam Gyimah
The Department is consulting on key elements of the operation and delivery of the 30 hour extended free entitlement. This includes how the entitlement will be delivered, and how it will meet and be responsive to the needs of working parents. To date we have received over 1000 responses from a wide range of childcare providers, local authorities and provider organisations. We will use these views to inform our thinking as we move to delivering the 30 hours policy. The consultation is available at: https://consult.education.gov.uk/early-years-funding/childcare-free-entitlement
We know there are historical inconsistencies and inefficiencies with the current funding system for 3- and 4-year-olds. That is why we will introduce a national funding formula for early years so that funding is transparently and fairly matched to need and fairly distributed between different types of providers and different parts of the country.
Asked by: Greg Mulholland (Liberal Democrat - Leeds North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what representations she has received from local authorities on the ability of those authorities to fund an increase in free childcare entitlement to 30 hours per week.
Answered by Sam Gyimah
The Department is consulting on key elements of the operation and delivery of the 30 hour extended free entitlement. This includes how the entitlement will be delivered, and how it will meet and be responsive to the needs of working parents. To date we have received over 1000 responses from a wide range of childcare providers, local authorities and provider organisations. We will use these views to inform our thinking as we move to delivering the 30 hours policy. The consultation is available at: https://consult.education.gov.uk/early-years-funding/childcare-free-entitlement
We know there are historical inconsistencies and inefficiencies with the current funding system for 3- and 4-year-olds. That is why we will introduce a national funding formula for early years so that funding is transparently and fairly matched to need and fairly distributed between different types of providers and different parts of the country.
Asked by: Greg Mulholland (Liberal Democrat - Leeds North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to evaluate the pilot schemes on increasing free childcare entitlement to 30 hours per week.
Answered by Sam Gyimah
We are currently commissioning the evaluation of early implementation of 30 hours free childcare. An invitation to tender was published in May 2016 with a view to awarding the contract to a successful bidder by the end of June 2016.
The evaluation will focus on generating learning that can be used by Early Implementers and all local councils ahead of national implementation in September 2017.
Asked by: Greg Mulholland (Liberal Democrat - Leeds North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential financial effect on nurseries in deprived areas of her plans to increase the free childcare entitlement to 30 hours per week.
Answered by Sam Gyimah
The government conducted a 6 month long review of the cost of childcare provision in 2015 - the most in depth analysis of this market we have ever had, and was described by the National Audit Office as “thorough and wide-ranging”. This assessed the costs of different types of providers across the country, including nurseries in deprived areas. The review is available online at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/review-of-childcare-costs
Based on this information we announced at the 2015 Spending Review that the government would provide £300 million per year for a significant uplift to the average funding rates paid for the 2-, 3- and 4-year-old entitlements from 2017-18. Together with the funding announced at last summer’s Budget, we will be investing over £1 billion more per year by 2019-20 to fund our commitments on the entitlements.
We will also be introducing a national funding formula for the early years so that funding is transparently and fairly matched to need and fairly distributed between different types of providers and different parts of the country. We will be consulting on detailed proposals later this year.