Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has assessed the potential merits of enabling local authorities to expand eligibility criteria for the Holiday Activities and Food programme to ensure that children who are (a) living in poverty and (b) do not qualify for free school meals can access the programme.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The holiday activities and food (HAF) programme supports disadvantaged children and their families with enriching activities, providing them with healthy food, helping them to learn new things, improving socialisation and benefitting their health and wellbeing during school holidays.
The HAF programme, although aimed at those children in receipt of benefits related free school meals (FSM), is not exclusively for them. As set out in the HAF guidance, while the majority of funding that local authorities receive should be used for holiday club places for children in receipt of FSM, local authorities have discretion to use up to 15% of their funding to provide free or subsidised holiday club places for children who are not in receipt of benefits-related FSM, but who the local authority believe could benefit from HAF provision. Local authorities are responsible for understanding the needs of the children and families in their area and ensuring that the programme reaches those who need it.
Funding beyond March 2026 will be determined in the next government spending review.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of enabling Holiday Activities and Food programme providers to make their programmes open access if they are located in areas of high deprivation.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The holiday activities and food (HAF) programme supports disadvantaged children and their families with enriching activities, providing them with healthy food, helping them to learn new things, improving socialisation and benefitting their health and wellbeing during school holidays.
The HAF programme, although aimed at those children in receipt of benefits related free school meals (FSM), is not exclusively for them. As set out in the HAF guidance, while the majority of funding that local authorities receive should be used for holiday club places for children in receipt of FSM, local authorities have discretion to use up to 15% of their funding to provide free or subsidised holiday club places for children who are not in receipt of benefits-related FSM, but who the local authority believe could benefit from HAF provision. Local authorities are responsible for understanding the needs of the children and families in their area and ensuring that the programme reaches those who need it.
Funding beyond March 2026 will be determined in the next government spending review.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what is her Department's policy on the renewal of the holiday activities food programme beyond the 2025-26 financial year.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The holiday activities and food (HAF) programme supports disadvantaged children and their families with enriching activities, providing them with healthy food, helping them to learn new things, improving socialisation and benefitting their health and wellbeing during school holidays.
The HAF programme, although aimed at those children in receipt of benefits related free school meals (FSM), is not exclusively for them. As set out in the HAF guidance, while the majority of funding that local authorities receive should be used for holiday club places for children in receipt of FSM, local authorities have discretion to use up to 15% of their funding to provide free or subsidised holiday club places for children who are not in receipt of benefits-related FSM, but who the local authority believe could benefit from HAF provision. Local authorities are responsible for understanding the needs of the children and families in their area and ensuring that the programme reaches those who need it.
Funding beyond March 2026 will be determined in the next government spending review.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, which listed places of worship have received grants under the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme in Truro and Falmouth constituency.
Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Reliable data from before 2022 is not available, but since August 2022, 16 listed places of worship have received awards to a total value of £126,888.95 through the grant scheme in the Truro and Falmouth constituency.
These were Truro Cathedral receiving £72,954.73; Portscatho United Church receiving £10,851.15; St John the Evangelist Church receiving £6,800.77; St Moran Church receiving £5,916.02; St Ladock Church, Ladock receiving £5,000.00; St Mawes Church receiving £4,166.00; The Parish Church of St Probus and St Grace receiving £4,492.00; St Just in Roseland Church receiving £3,739.70; Kenwyn Parish Church receiving £3,508.00; St Budock Church receiving £1,804.81; King Charles the Martyr Church receiving £1,744.10; St Symphorian Church receiving £1,847.00; St Gerrans receiving £1,656.53; All Saints Parish Church, Falmouth receiving £1,400.00; All Hallows Church Of St Kea receiving £662.03; and Penryn Methodist Church receiving £354.11.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how she plans to support listed places of worship with repairs and renovation after the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme ends.
Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Future Government spending is a matter for the 2025 Spending Review.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if she will take steps to prevent long leases from becoming assured shorthold tenancies.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
The Renters’ Rights Bill will abolish assured shorthold tenancies, so most private rented sector tenancies will be assured tenancies in future.
The Bill will also exclude leases over 21 years in length from the assured tenancy regime.
This will mean that long leases cannot be considered assured or assured shorthold tenancies once the Bill’s reforms have been brought into force.
This will close the ‘Tenancy Trap’, a problem for some leasehold-homeowners where their properties can be repossessed via the assured tenancy possession ground for rent arrears.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of increasing the qualifying earnings threshold for free school meals on levels of child poverty in (a) Truro and Falmouth constituency, (b) the south west and (c) England.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The government is committed to delivering an ambitious strategy to reduce child poverty by tackling the root causes and giving every child the best start in life. To support this, a new Ministerial taskforce has been set up to begin work on a Child Poverty Strategy, co-chaired by my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education and my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.
The continued provision of free school meals (FSM) to disadvantaged children also plays an important role in this. In total, this government spends around £1.5 billion annually on free lunches for 2.1 million school-age pupils under benefits-based FSM, and a further 1.3 million infant pupils under the universal infant free school meal scheme to ensure they receive a nutritious lunch. This includes 16,781 eligible pupils in Truro and Falmouth and 158,794 pupils in the South West.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that everyone entitled to NHS Healthy Start is registered to receive it.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) operates the Healthy Start scheme on behalf of the Department. Those eligible for Healthy Start must apply to the NHSBSA to receive Healthy Start payments.
All applicants, where they meet the eligibility criteria, must accept the terms and conditions of the Healthy Start prepaid card at the point of application. As the prepaid card is a financial product and cannot be issued without the applicant accepting these terms, the NHSBSA is not able to automatically provide eligible families with a prepaid card.
We remain open to all viable routes to improve uptake to ensure that as many eligible people as possible are accessing the scheme, to support their children with a healthy start in life.
In March 2025 Healthy Start supported over 359,000 people.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of registering eligible households for (a) free school meal and (b) NHS Healthy Start entitlements through the Universal Credit system.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
No such assessment has been made.
The Universal Credit system permits Department for Education to check eligibility for Free School Meals and Department of Health and Social Care to check a citizen’s entitlement to Healthy Start vouchers.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to support rural and regional universities to access funding.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Providers in rural and regional locations are important in supporting their local economies and driving the growth of skills in those areas.
Providers registered with the Office for Students (OfS) and in the ‘Approved (fee cap)’ category of registration, including those located in rural and regional areas, are allocated targeted grant funding through the Strategic Priorities Grant (SPG). The government provides this funding on an annual basis to support teaching and students in higher education, including expensive-to-deliver subjects, such as science and engineering and for students at risk of discontinuing their studies. Of the £1.4 billion recurrent funding distributed by the OfS for the 2024/25 academic year, more than two-thirds is being directed to support the provision of high-cost courses.
Falmouth University, which makes an important local and regional contribution, is in receipt of SPG funding for the 2024/25 academic year.