Asked by: Joshua Reynolds (Liberal Democrat - Maidenhead)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps National Highways is taking to ensure the provision of timely and accurate physical diversion signage during planned and unplanned road closures.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
National Highways follows the standards GG903 and GG907 outlined in the Design Manual for Roads and Bridges (DMRB) for diversion routes for unplanned events and planned works and activities.
These standards require NH to coordinate with customers and local traffic authorities and to conduct Customer Audits and annual engagements. National Highways monitor diversion routes for unplanned events through the National Highways operational reporting team.
Asked by: Joshua Reynolds (Liberal Democrat - Maidenhead)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps her Department is taking to help ensure that National Highways' contractors adhere to reporting requirements when closing sections of the Strategic Road Network; and what data National Highways holds on contractor compliance with those requirements in the last 12 months.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
National Highways requires its contractors to inform National Highways’ Regional Operations Centres before closing any part of the SRN to allow appropriate signs, signals, and customer communications to be put in place.
In the financial year 24/25, over 90% of the overnight closures planned by early afternoon went ahead as expected. National Highways’ traffic monitoring systems allows them to verify the status of road closures in real time.
Asked by: Joshua Reynolds (Liberal Democrat - Maidenhead)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether National Highways is required to ensure that all planned and emergency road closures are integrated into live satellite navigation systems.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
There are no requirements for National Highways to ensure that all planned and emergency road closures are integrated into live satellite navigation.
However, National Highways publishes information detailing all its planned and emergency work closures. Where available these details are published in advance.
Asked by: Joshua Reynolds (Liberal Democrat - Maidenhead)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether a dedicated teacher retention strategy will be informed by evidence on teacher mental health and workplace wellbeing.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
A well supported, high-quality education workforce is critical to our mission to break down the barriers to opportunity for children and young people, which is why recruiting and retaining our expert teachers is at the heart of the government’s Plan for Change. Detailed plans on how we will recruit and retain more teachers in our 6,500 additional teachers delivery plan are available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/every-child-achieving-and-thriving.
We will promote best practice in workload and wellbeing management, including flexible working opportunities, and tackle the external pressures where schools are filling the gaps.
We will invest in a new programme that provides training, resources and peer support to help schools learn from each other, to normalise flexible working and manageable workloads. We will also invest £1 million additional funding each year for wellbeing support, providing up to 2,500 leaders annually with a safe and confidential space to develop new strategies to manage their resilience and capacity to thrive in their role.
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Asked by: Joshua Reynolds (Liberal Democrat - Maidenhead)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of changes to SEND funding on mainstream school budgets in Maidenhead.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
Nationally, mainstream school funding allocated through the dedicated schools grant (DSG) is increasing by 2.6% per pupil, from £6,608 in 2025/26 to £6,778 in 2026/27. This brings total funding for mainstream schools through the DSG schools block to £50.5 billion in 2026/27. This will support mainstream schools with ongoing costs and deliver an excellent education for all, including pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).
From 2026/27 onwards, we will provide £1.6 billion for a new Inclusive Mainstream Fund over three years.
We will provide more details on how this funding will be distributed in the coming weeks.
Asked by: Joshua Reynolds (Liberal Democrat - Maidenhead)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many directors with responsibility for human resources are employed across their department and its executive agencies; and how many of those directors hold professional HR qualifications from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development or equivalent professional bodies.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Organograms for the department, including senior civil service posts, are published on GOV.UK here: https://www.data.gov.uk/dataset/5a1f3831-86d6-4979-9164-99e982361ca4/organogram-department-for-education. The data sets out director-level roles and responsibilities across the core department, including for our Executive Agencies.
Information on the professional qualifications of individual employees is personal data, and it would not be appropriate to release this at an individual level. However, all directors appointed with responsibility for human resources would be expected to have the appropriate skills, experience and, where relevant, professional qualifications necessary to undertake the role effectively, including experience aligned with Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CPID) standards or equivalent professional bodies in line with requirements set out by the Government People Group.
Number of Directors with responsibility for human resources (HR) | Number of Directors delivering non-HR technical activity e.g. Shared Services | Number of Directors with CIPD membership |
Department for Education (including Executive Agencies) - 1 | Department for Education (including Executive Agencies) - 0 | Department for Education (including Executive Agencies) - N/D Headcount less than 5 |