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.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many people in the North-West have (a) applied for and (b) received compensation from Northern Rail for (i) delays and (ii) cancellations to services.
Answered by Andrew Jones
The Department does not hold this information. However, in January the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) published rail passenger compensation figures by train operating company (TOC) for the first time, which included the number of claims received and number of claims approved in each period for each TOC.
The figures can be found at: https://dataportal.orr.gov.uk/displayreport/report/html/efefea78-e211-48b1-9f5e-2b9de8792b0c
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will make an assessment of the cost to the economy of the North West of delays and cancellations by Northern Rail.
Answered by Elizabeth Truss
I am sorry for the impact that delays and cancellations on Northern Rail have had on passengers in the North West. We want passengers to receive the services that they have every right to expect. That is why the Government’s focus has been on enabling a return to stability for passengers and ensuring that those affected are properly compensated for the disruption.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will make it his policy to site any new railway station for Leigh in Wigan borough.
Answered by Andrew Jones
The Government’s policy is that it is for local authorities and Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) to determine the best way to meet local transport needs and take the first step in evaluating benefits and prioritising available resources. It would be for Greater Manchester Combined Authority and Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) to develop such plans and secure funding.
TfGM is currently carrying out work to evaluate the feasibility of potential new rail stations and Metrolink stops in Greater Manchester, with a view to developing more detailed plans for a small number of stations that are likely to deliver the greatest value for money. Further details can be found at https://tfgm.com/2040/delivery-plan-2020-2025
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the policies that social media companies employ to prevent the abuse of disabled people.
Answered by Margot James
DCMS hosted a Ministerial roundtable before Christmas with disability organisations to explore the issues faced by disabled people online and consult on the statutory social media code of practice. The forthcoming Online Harms White Paper will set out legislative measures to tackle the full range of online harms, including online abuse. We will continue to engage with the disabled community and other stakeholders as we develop our proposals.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, whether he discussed the abuse of disabled people online during his recent meeting with Mark Zuckerburg, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Facebook.
Answered by Jeremy Wright
We discussed a range of issues with a number of companies in the week beginning 18th February. As with all meetings held in my capacity as Secretary of State, full details, including minutes, are kept confidential, to allow full and frank discussions between parties.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 21 January 2019 to Question 209287 on NHS: Members' Constituency Work, when the NHS started to require hon. Members to have signed authority before replying to such Members on issues raised by constituents.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
As set out in the answer of 21 January 2019 to Question 209287, there has been no change in policy with regards to obtaining consent of a patient for the purposes of an inquiry or investigation.
Paragraph 24 of Schedule 1 to the Data Protection Act 2018 sets out the circumstances in which special categories of personal data, which would include health data, can be disclosed to Members of Parliament without the controller - here, the National Health Service body - having to obtain explicit consent from the data subject. This is discussed in the House of Commons Briefing Paper, Number 1,936 of 31 October 2018 ‘Data protection: constituency casework’ at the following link:
http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN01936/SN01936.pdf
However, it remains the responsibility of the National Health Service body to satisfy itself that there is a legal basis under the General Data Protection Regulation/Data Protection Act for processing patient information (i.e. disclosing and sharing it for the purposes of the investigation).
In the earlier answers to Questions 209287 and 208761, we said that a National Health Service body ‘must’ obtain the consent of the patient before disclosing patient information held by it in order to progress an inquiry from a Member of Parliament. There are circumstances in which a National Health Service body may provide patient information to a Member of Parliament without the Member evidencing the consent of the patient, so long as that information is provided in accordance with the requirements set out in paragraph 24 of Schedule 1 to the Data Protection Act 2018. We are arranging for the record to be corrected.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate she has made of the number of pension credit claimants in (a) Warrington, (b) Warrington North constituency and (c) the North West who have a partner of working age and will be affected by forthcoming changes to the rules on pension credit.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The changes the government announced on January 14 will ensure that the same work incentives will apply to the younger partner as apply to other people of the same age, and that taxpayer support is directed to where it is needed most.
The changes will not affect mixed age couples who are entitled to Pension Credit and/or pension age Housing Benefit immediately before 15 May, unless their entitlement to both those benefits subsequently ends.
The number of future mixed age couples that are estimated to be affected by forthcoming changes is not available.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how much funding (a) in total and (b) per head of population has been allocated to transport infrastructure in each region in each of the last five years for which figures are available.
Answered by Jesse Norman
Figures on public sector expenditure at a regional level are part of the Government’s Country and Regional Analysis (CRA) statistics.
The latest CRA statistics, published by HM Treasury on 20th November 2018, include total public expenditure on transport per capita on a regional basis from 2013-14 up to 2017-18, and are published at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/country-and-regional-analysis.
The statistics include spend on transport by all public sector organisations including the Department for Transport, Local Authorities, Public Corporations (in the case of transport, this is mainly spend by London Underground) and other Government Departments including devolved administrations.
When comparing expenditure across regions a number of factors should be considered. For example, when expenditure is presented on a “per head of population”(or “per capita”) basis, it does not account for the pressure that large numbers of commuters and visitors from outside of a region can add to the transport networks. In addition, larger built-up areas tend to make greater use of mass public transport systems, though these will generate fares income which contributes to their operating costs.
Statistics for public sector capital expenditure by region are given in Table 1 below. Table 2 provides the equivalent statistics per capita. Capital expenditure has been used as a proxy for spending on infrastructure specifically, but may include some capital investment beyond transport infrastructure projects.
Table 1: Capital spending on all transport, by all public sector bodies (£millions nominal)
Region | 2013-14 | 2014-15 | 2015-161 | 2016-17 | 2017-18 |
East of England | 1,034 | 1,176 | 1,410 | 1,427 | 1,842 |
East Midlands | 597 | 746 | 795 | 664 | 743 |
London | 4,022 | 4,549 | 5,335 | 5,770 | 6,519 |
North East | 323 | 406 | 521 | 512 | 512 |
North West | 1,136 | 1,393 | 1,824 | 1,807 | 2,930 |
South East | 1,432 | 1,542 | 1,968 | 2,121 | 2,188 |
South West | 662 | 803 | 1,011 | 1,169 | 1,110 |
West Midlands | 804 | 1,087 | 1,329 | 1,311 | 1,783 |
Yorkshire and the Humber | 874 | 1,084 | 1,335 | 1,129 | 1,009 |
Northern Ireland | 242 | 261 | 162 | 310 | 295 |
Scotland | 1,345 | 1,459 | 1,473 | 1,717 | 1,986 |
Wales | 556 | 578 | 657 | 617 | 687 |
Table 2: Capital spending, on all transport, by all public sector bodies, per capita (£s nominal)
Region | 2013-14 | 2014-15 | 2015-161 | 2016-17 | 2017-18 |
East of England | 174 | 195 | 232 | 233 | 299 |
East Midlands | 130 | 161 | 170 | 140 | 156 |
London | 478 | 533 | 616 | 658 | 739 |
North East | 124 | 155 | 198 | 194 | 194 |
North West | 160 | 195 | 254 | 250 | 404 |
South East | 163 | 174 | 220 | 235 | 241 |
South West | 123 | 148 | 185 | 212 | 200 |
West Midlands | 142 | 190 | 231 | 226 | 304 |
Yorkshire and the Humber | 164 | 202 | 248 | 208 | 185 |
Northern Ireland | 132 | 142 | 87 | 166 | 158 |
Scotland | 253 | 273 | 274 | 318 | 366 |
Wales | 180 | 187 | 212 | 198 | 220 |
1Due to the reclassification of Network Rail into the public sector from 2015-16, care should be taken when making historical comparisons.
Source: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/country-and-regional-analysis-2017
Total capital expenditure is prone to large year-on-year fluctuations as major projects are completed and funding to new projects begins. Large transport projects tend to require large sums of capital expenditure during construction, but deliver benefits for many years into the future. Consideration of this must be given when making year-on-year comparisons.