Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many looked-after children there were in (a) Warrington, (b) the North West and (c) England in each of the last five years for which figures are available.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The latest information on the number of looked after children at 31 March 2018 for the last five years by local authority, region and for England can be found in table LAA1 in the statistical release ‘Children Looked After in England: Including Adoption: 2017 to 2018’ at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/children-looked-after-in-england-including-adoption-2017-to-2018.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment he has made of the financial sustainability of children's services in Warrington.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Funding for children’s services is made available through the Local Government Finance Settlement. We are in the final year of a multi-year settlement deal – worth over £200 billion in the 5 years to 2020.
At the Autumn Budget 2018, the government made £410 million available to local authorities, in 2019/20, for adult and children social care. The government also announced £84 million in targeted, evidence-based interventions which will transform services to reduce demand, saving money for local authorities but most importantly, improving the quality of services for our most vulnerable children.
The government will continue to work closely with the sector to consider long-term children’s services funding as part of the Spending Review.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much has been spent by each local authority in the North West on education appeals tribunals; and what the value was of costs awarded to applicants in each of the last five years.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Information on local authorities’ expenditure on the special educational needs and disability (SEND) tribunals or the costs awarded to applicants to the tribunal is not held centrally. The costs of SEND tribunals will vary depending on the type of the case being heard.
There is a route for parents to submit a request for a reimbursement of costs, but these costs would only be awarded where there is clear evidence of negligence on the part of the local authority.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to ensure the adequacy of high needs funding for schools; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Authorities are required to provide schools with sufficient funds to enable schools to meet the additional cost of pupils with special educational needs (SEN) and disabilities, up to £6,000. Top-up funding is then provided from local authorities high needs budgets. Nationally, high needs funding is £6 billion this year, and will total £6.3 billion in 2019-20. We recognise that local authorities are facing cost pressures, which is why we have allocated an additional £250 million across all local authorities, over this year and next year. This funding will help local authorities to manage their cost pressures. Funding for 2020-21 and beyond will be determined in the Spending Review.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate he has made of the average cost to schools of a pupil on an Education, Health and Care Plan .
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Local authorities are required to provide schools with sufficient funds to enable schools to meet the additional cost of pupils with special educational needs (SEN) and disabilities up to £6,000. When the costs of additional support required for a pupil with SEN exceed £6,000, the authority should also allocate additional top-up funding to cover the excess costs. This funding comes from the authority’s high needs budget. Nationally, high needs funding has risen from a total of £5 billion in 2013 to over £6 billion in 2018-19.
Local authorities recorded in their section 251 reports for 2017-18 that there was a combined spend of £2.3 billion on top-up funding in maintained schools and academies, and £1 billion in non-maintained and independent providers. This information can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/section-251-2017-to-2018#section-251-budget-data.
The great majority of pupils attracting top-up funding have an education, health and care (EHC) plan. In the calendar year 2017, there were 319,819 children and young people with active EHC plans.