Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of support given by local authorities for children who have a parent in prison.
Answered by David Johnston
‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ (2018) sets out local areas’ responsibilities to provide support and services. It highlights dependent children of imprisoned parents as a cohort which practitioners should be particularly aware of and provide appropriate needs-based advice and support where needed. Ofsted is responsible for assessing the performance of children’s social care services delivered by local authorities.
Our ambition is for every family to receive the right support, at the right time. In ‘Stable Homes, Built on Love’, the department outlined the strategy for whole system reform, including family help, which will provide effective and intensive support to any family facing significant challenges.
Prison Mother and Baby Units Admission Boards must be in receipt of a Children’s Services assessment in order to facilitate a Board. Every assessment by a social worker should reflect children’s needs within their family and community context, which would include taking account of a parent being in prison. These children’s circumstances vary considerably and therefore local agencies are best placed to determine what support is needed whether early help, statutory social care services, or support for other needs such as mental health.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of support for children of people in prison.
Answered by David Johnston
‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ (2018) sets out local areas’ responsibilities to provide support and services. It highlights dependent children of imprisoned parents as a cohort which practitioners should be particularly aware of and provide appropriate needs-based advice and support where needed. Ofsted is responsible for assessing the performance of children’s social care services delivered by local authorities.
Our ambition is for every family to receive the right support, at the right time. In ‘Stable Homes, Built on Love’, the department outlined the strategy for whole system reform, including family help, which will provide effective and intensive support to any family facing significant challenges.
Prison Mother and Baby Units Admission Boards must be in receipt of a Children’s Services assessment in order to facilitate a Board. Every assessment by a social worker should reflect children’s needs within their family and community context, which would include taking account of a parent being in prison. These children’s circumstances vary considerably and therefore local agencies are best placed to determine what support is needed whether early help, statutory social care services, or support for other needs such as mental health.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, when she plans to respond to the letter from Irise International of 26 May 2023 on period poverty.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Shadow Minister (Equalities)
I can confirm that a response has been sent to the letter dated 26 May 2023 from Irise International.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the impact of Outer London pay scales on (a) recruitment and (b) retention of teachers in (i) the London Borough of Hounslow and (ii) Outer London.
Answered by Nick Gibb
This Government is concentrating funding in the teaching profession with school funding in 2024/25 due to reach its highest level in history per pupil, and in real terms, as measured by the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
The Department implemented in full the School Teachers’ Review Body’s (STRB) recommendations for the 2022/23 academic year of an 8.9% pay rise for early career teachers outside London, and a 5% pay rise for experienced teachers. This is the highest pay award in 30 years.
This uplift raised starting salaries to over £32,400 in Outer London, including Hounslow. The Department hopes that further rises next academic year will see starting salaries reach £30,000 in all areas of England, ensuring that they are competitive relative to alternative professional graduate starting salaries.
Decisions on pay ranges and allowances, such as the London pay scales, are based on recommendations by the STRB, the independent body that advises on teachers’ pay and conditions. This year’s written evidence to the STRB sets out the Government’s thinking on pay awards this year, detailing how these need to strike a careful balance between recognising the vital importance of public sector workers, whilst not increasing the country’s debt further or exacerbating inflation. The evidence includes an assessment of recruitment and retention trends broken down geographically, including for areas such as Outer London. The final pay award decisions for the 2023/24 academic year will be determined later this year.
The Department announced a financial incentives package of up to £181 million for those starting Initial Teacher Training in the 2023/24 academic year, a £52 million increase on the last cycle. The Department is providing bursaries worth up to £27,000 and scholarships worth up to £29,000 to encourage trainees to apply to train in key secondary subjects such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computing.
The Department also provides a Levelling Up Premium worth up to £3,000 annually for mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computing teachers in the first five years of their careers who work in disadvantaged schools nationally, including within Education Investment Areas. The eligibility criteria and list of eligible schools is on GOV.UK at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/levelling-up-premium-payments-for-teachers.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department has carried out an impact assessment on the impact of Outer London pay scales on teacher recruitment.
Answered by Nick Gibb
This Government is concentrating funding in the teaching profession with school funding in 2024/25 due to reach its highest level in history per pupil, and in real terms, as measured by the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
The Department implemented in full the School Teachers’ Review Body’s (STRB) recommendations for the 2022/23 academic year of an 8.9% pay rise for early career teachers outside London, and a 5% pay rise for experienced teachers. This is the highest pay award in 30 years.
This uplift raised starting salaries to over £32,400 in Outer London, including Hounslow. The Department hopes that further rises next academic year will see starting salaries reach £30,000 in all areas of England, ensuring that they are competitive relative to alternative professional graduate starting salaries.
Decisions on pay ranges and allowances, such as the London pay scales, are based on recommendations by the STRB, the independent body that advises on teachers’ pay and conditions. This year’s written evidence to the STRB sets out the Government’s thinking on pay awards this year, detailing how these need to strike a careful balance between recognising the vital importance of public sector workers, whilst not increasing the country’s debt further or exacerbating inflation. The evidence includes an assessment of recruitment and retention trends broken down geographically, including for areas such as Outer London. The final pay award decisions for the 2023/24 academic year will be determined later this year.
The Department announced a financial incentives package of up to £181 million for those starting Initial Teacher Training in the 2023/24 academic year, a £52 million increase on the last cycle. The Department is providing bursaries worth up to £27,000 and scholarships worth up to £29,000 to encourage trainees to apply to train in key secondary subjects such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computing.
The Department also provides a Levelling Up Premium worth up to £3,000 annually for mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computing teachers in the first five years of their careers who work in disadvantaged schools nationally, including within Education Investment Areas. The eligibility criteria and list of eligible schools is on GOV.UK at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/levelling-up-premium-payments-for-teachers.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she has taken to provide support for (a) primary and (b) secondary schools in London which have seen an increase in the number of pupils who are asylum seekers since 2021.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government is committed to providing a world class education system for all pupils and has invested significantly in education to achieve that.
All pupils, regardless of immigration status, are entitled to education between the ages of 5 to 16 and are free to apply for a school place at any time.
Asylum seeker pupils attract funding to their school in the same way as all other pupils. This is allocated through the schools National Funding Formula. In April 2022, the Department also permanently extended free school meal (FSM) and pupil premium eligibility to include pupils in households with no recourse to public funds, which includes children of asylum seekers. This approach to funding ensures that asylum seeker pupils attract the same basic per pupil funding amount as other pupils and any additional funding related to asylum seeking pupils’ specific needs and characteristics, such as pupils eligible for FSM, pupils with English as an additional language, and socioeconomic disadvantage.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact on funding for colleges of the decision announced on 29 November by the Office for National Statistics to reclassify them as part of the public sector; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The department is working to provide reassurance, support and clarity to the sector.
The department is providing colleges with additional capital grant allocations totalling £150 million. Individual college allocations were published in December and will be paid from April. The full list is available at: https://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.publishing.service.gov.uk%2Fgovernment%2Fuploads%2Fsystem%2Fuploads%2Fattachment_data%2Ffile%2F1121488%2FAdditional_FE_capital_funding_allocations_2022_to_2023.ods&wdOrigin=BROWSELINK.
We are also bringing forward £300 million in payments from the 2023/24 financial year into the 2022/23 financial year to cover the shortfall that providers experience in February and March 2023. This means making additional payments to institutions in February and March.
The department has communicated to the sector how we will support and protect colleges, starting on 29 November with a letter to all accounting officers and details of the new consent process for new borrowing. The department appreciates the restrictions on commercial borrowing are challenging for colleges and is working to mitigate them.
The department is also working on options to support the delivery of capital projects by the sector. One of these options is a possible department-backed loans scheme for colleges that were intending to borrow commercially in order to fund a capital project.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether further education colleges are allowed access to borrowing from the Public Works Loan Board; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The Public Works Loan Board (PWLB) provides loans to local authorities, and other specified bodies, from the National Loans Fund, operating within a policy framework set by HM Treasury. This borrowing is for capital projects.
Colleges cannot borrow from PWLB as this is considered beyond the PWLB’s remit.
The department has designed a package of measures to enable colleges to continue to invest in their estates.
The department is taking a number of steps to assist the sector with funding, including providing colleges with additional capital grant allocations totalling £150 million. Individual college allocations were published in December and will be paid from April. The full list is on GOV.UK at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/fe-capital-funding#additional-fe-capital-funding-for-the-2022-to-2023-financial-year.
The department is also bringing forward £300 million in payments from the 2023/2024 financial year into the 2022/2023 financial year to cover the shortfall that providers experience in February and March 2023. This means making additional payments to institutions in February and March.
The Department’s officials are working on options to support the delivery of capital projects by the sector. One of these options is a possible department-backed loans scheme for colleges that were intending to borrow commercially in order to fund a capital project.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 20 July 2022 to Question 37614 on Schools: Buildings, which schools in Brentford and Isleworth constituency had at least one construction element in (a) condition grade C and (b) condition grade D when that data was collated; and which of those schools (a) have already received funding from the School Rebuilding Programme and (b) are expected to receive funding from the School Rebuilding Programme in the next two years.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Condition Data Collection (CDC) is one of the largest and most comprehensive data collection programmes in the UK’s public sector. It collected data on the building condition of government funded schools in England. It provides a robust evidence base to enable the Department to target capital funding for maintaining and rebuilding school buildings.
The key, high level findings of the CDC programme were published in May 2021 in the ‘Condition of School Buildings Survey: Key Findings’ report. This is available at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/989912/Condition_of_School_Buildings_Survey_CDC1_-_key_findings_report.pdf.
Individual CDC reports have been shared with every school and their responsible body to use alongside their existing condition surveys to plan maintenance schedules and investment plans. The Department plans to publish detailed school level CDC data. The Department is still preparing the data and will publish it as soon as possible.
Well maintained, safe school buildings are a priority for the Department. Our funding is directed both to maintaining the condition of the school estate and rebuilding schools. The Department has allocated over £13 billion for improving the condition of schools since 2015, including £1.8 billion committed this financial year.
The ten year School Rebuilding Programme (SRP) is condition led. 400 of the 500 available places on the programme have been provisionally allocated. A list of these schools and the methodology used to select them is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/school-rebuilding-programme-schools-in-the-programme.
The following table shows the constituencies specified that have schools or colleges selected for the SRP:
Parliamentary constituency | Schools selected for SRP |
Wakefield | Ossett Academy and Sixth Form College, announced December 2022 |
Stockton North | St Joseph's Catholic Primary School, announced July 2021 St Paul's Catholic Primary School, announced July 2021 |
The 239 schools announced in December 2022 will enter delivery at a rate of approximately 50 per year, over a five year period from 2023. The Department is currently undertaking due diligence on these schools prior to scheduling them, with schools prioritised according to the condition of their buildings, readiness to proceed, and efficiency of delivery. The scope and funding for each project will be confirmed following detailed feasibility studies and condition surveys of buildings.
Where a school identifies significant safety issues with a building, that cannot be managed within local resources, the Department considers additional support on a case-by-case basis. This includes applications for Urgent Capital Support (UCS) from eligible institutions. Schools eligible for Condition Improvement Fund (CIF) can apply for UCS where there are urgent health and safety issues that threaten school closure and cannot wait until the next CIF bidding round.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to improve communications from her Department to (a) secondary schools and (b) boards of governors on changes to governors boards regulations.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government is committed to providing excellent communication with secondary schools and boards of governors across the UK. Through the ‘Get Information About Schools’ site on GOV.UK, schools and trusts are required to provide the Department with up-to-date contact details. The site is available at: https://www.get-information-schools.service.gov.uk/.
The Department uses this information to routinely inform governors of any changes that may affect them, such as changes to model articles. The Department issues a quarterly ‘Governance Update’ email, which is sent directly to over 100,000 individual governors, as well as being published on GOV.UK at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/school-governance-update.
Governor board regulations have not changed for maintained schools since 2016.