Written Question
Tuesday 24th March 2015
Asked by:
Nick de Bois (Conservative - Enfield North)
Question
to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 12 March 2015 to Question 226581, what support her Department provides to primary schools to ensure that the free school meals offered by those schools are healthy.
Answered by David Laws
The new School Food Standards came into force in January 2015 ensuring schools provide heathy meals throughout the week. The Department for Education provides guidance on the standards[1] and funds the implementation support service, including a menu checker service helping schools to provide hot, healthy menu choices for all their pupils. The School Food Plan website also provides a range of support and advice on providing healthy food in schools.[2]
[1] www.gov.uk/school-meals-healthy-eating-standards
[2] http://whatworkswell.schoolfoodplan.com/
Speech in Commons Chamber - Tue 24 Mar 2015
Lesser-taught languages
"I wish to express my disappointment at the fact that a number of exam bodies have decided to pull out of teaching GCSE and A-level for lesser-taught modern languages. It seems that from 2016 or 2017 we will lose a large number of what are referred to as lesser-known languages, …..."Nick de Bois - View Speech
View all Nick de Bois (Con - Enfield North) contributions to the debate on: Lesser-taught languages
Speech in Commons Chamber - Tue 24 Mar 2015
Lesser-taught languages
"I pay tribute to them for their ingenuity and their willingness to try to solve their problem. That points to something I would like to say about the diaspora a little later, but I applaud their entrepreneurial and, shall we say, Conservative instincts to try to find a solution for …..."Nick de Bois - View Speech
View all Nick de Bois (Con - Enfield North) contributions to the debate on: Lesser-taught languages
Speech in Commons Chamber - Tue 24 Mar 2015
Lesser-taught languages
"The hon. Lady makes an excellent point. Her work on the all-party group on modern languages champions the arguments for why we should engage with diasporas and capitalise on their contribution and their links, through the second and third generations, as well as making the teaching of these languages widely …..."Nick de Bois - View Speech
View all Nick de Bois (Con - Enfield North) contributions to the debate on: Lesser-taught languages
Speech in Commons Chamber - Tue 24 Mar 2015
Lesser-taught languages
"Indeed. With the best of efforts, many of these supplementary educational skills—the hon. Gentleman rightly talks highly of those in his constituency—are not going to deliver the modern language skills we need at A-level and GCSE level to take pupils on to other qualifications. They are complementary. I will talk …..."Nick de Bois - View Speech
View all Nick de Bois (Con - Enfield North) contributions to the debate on: Lesser-taught languages
Speech in Commons Chamber - Tue 24 Mar 2015
Lesser-taught languages
"My hon. Friend rightly makes a suggestion that I will be reinforcing to the Minister a little later. He is right. The Government’s job, and our job, is to lead. I know from questions I have tabled to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Department for Education …..."Nick de Bois - View Speech
View all Nick de Bois (Con - Enfield North) contributions to the debate on: Lesser-taught languages
Speech in Commons Chamber - Tue 24 Mar 2015
Lesser-taught languages
"I well take my hon. Friend’s point. I am blessed with a French name, but from the presumption that I speak French I recognise the constant disappointment of French-speaking people when I am limited to saying, “I am sorry, but I do not speak very good French”—in French, at least! …..."Nick de Bois - View Speech
View all Nick de Bois (Con - Enfield North) contributions to the debate on: Lesser-taught languages
Speech in Commons Chamber - Tue 24 Mar 2015
Lesser-taught languages
"I want to put it on record that that has been examined by many people, but it is nowhere near the standard that we require for A-level and it will not achieve the objective, for example, of helping someone get into a university with that qualification...."Nick de Bois - View Speech
View all Nick de Bois (Con - Enfield North) contributions to the debate on: Lesser-taught languages
Written Question
Tuesday 17th March 2015
Asked by:
Nick de Bois (Conservative - Enfield North)
Question
to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential effect of the decision by Oxford Cambridge and RSA not to redevelop GCSE and A Level Turkish on the ability of students to acquire skills in Turkish; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government has been clear that it wants to see all pupils provided with the opportunity to take a core set of academic subjects, including modern foreign languages. There are considerable benefits to learning a second language and the Government is keen to see the range of languages at GCSE and A level preserved. It is, however, up to Awarding Organisations to decide which languages they want to continue offering as reformed GCSEs and A levels.
Written Question
Thursday 12th March 2015
Asked by:
Nick de Bois (Conservative - Enfield North)
Question
to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what support her Department provides to primary schools to ensure that all infants take up the provision of free school meals.
Answered by David Laws
The Department for Education has provided substantial support to help schools deliver this policy. More than £1 billion of revenue funding is being provided to schools over two years on top of almost £175 million capital funding allocated this year to support them in improving their kitchen and dining facilities. The department has also allocated £22.5 million transitional funding in 2014-15 to help schools with 150 pupils or fewer to implement the policy. All this funding has been provided to ensure that the meals provided are of high quality, and particularly that all schools are able to offer hot meals.
The department has also set up an implementation support service, staffed by school food experts, which schools can contact for advice and support to help them to increase take-up of meals by their infant pupils.
Over 1.6 million infant pupils (85.2% of all infant pupils) took a free school meal on autumn census day in 2014. This is a rise of 1.3 million from the 0.3 million infant pupils who were estimated to have taken a free school meal in the January 2014 school census.