Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she is taking steps with Cabinet colleagues to help young people with special educational needs and disabilities to enter the workplace; and what steps the Government is taking to help ensure those young people have the opportunity to reach their full potential in the workforce.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero
The department is working across government to ensure that all young people, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), have access to a world-class education, supporting them to achieve positive outcomes.
With the right preparation and support, the majority of young people with SEND are capable of sustained, paid employment. All professionals working with them should share that presumption. They should provide the career advice and support that helps young people to develop the skills and experience, and achieve the qualifications, that they need to succeed in their careers.
The government is committed to supporting pathways to employment for disabled young people, including, for example, through strengthening the Supported Internship programme. The department is investing approximately £18 million until 2025 to build capacity in the Supported Internships Programme and support more young people with Education Health and Care plans into employment.
The department is supporting the Department for Work and Pensions to pilot an Adjustments Passport that will help to smooth the transition into employment and support people changing jobs, including people with SEND. The Adjustments Passport will capture the in-work support needs of the individual and empower them to have confident discussions about adjustments with employers.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans she has to help ensure that all teachers receive training to support students with dyspraxia in the classroom; and what steps she is taking to monitor the effectiveness of that training.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero
The Teachers’ Standards set clear expectations that teachers must understand the needs of all pupils, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). All trainees who achieve Qualified Teacher Status must demonstrate that they can adapt teaching to respond to the needs of all pupils, including those with SEND.
To support all teachers in meeting these standards, the department is implementing high-quality teacher training reforms which begin with initial teacher training and continue throughout career progression. These reforms are designed to ensure teachers have the skills to support all pupils to succeed, including those with SEND.
The Universal Services Programme, which began in May 2022, aims to reach 70% of schools and colleges and will help the school and further education workforce to identify and meet the needs of children and young people with SEND, earlier and more effectively. It will also help them to successfully prepare children and young people for adulthood, including employment.
The department is committed to gathering evidence about the implementation and impact of the reforms, to ensure that it provides the best support for new teachers entering the profession. To support this, we are working with the Education Endowment Foundation to ensure a comprehensive package of evaluation activity.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if her Department will take steps to help ensure that teachers are trained to deliver water safety education in the classroom.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Swimming and water safety is a compulsory part of the National Curriculum at Key Stages 1 and 2. There are no specific statutory requirements for secondary schools to provide swimming and water safety lessons. Compulsory health education requires that schools teach a sound understanding of risk and provide pupils with the knowledge necessary to make informed decisions on their wellbeing and health.
The Department is working in partnership with members of the National Water Safety Forum, in particular Royal Life Saving Society UK and Swim England to support schools to teach primary and secondary pupils important aspects of water safety.
This support includes online lessons on Oak National Academy and resources for pupils in Key Stages 1, 2 and 3, launched by the National Water Safety Forum, as part of the Royal Life Saving Society UK’s Drowning Prevention Week in July 2022.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if her Department will take steps to ensure that water safety education is included in the national curriculum for primary and secondary schools.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Swimming and water safety is a compulsory part of the National Curriculum at Key Stages 1 and 2. There are no specific statutory requirements for secondary schools to provide swimming and water safety lessons. Compulsory health education requires that schools teach a sound understanding of risk and provide pupils with the knowledge necessary to make informed decisions on their wellbeing and health.
The Department is working in partnership with members of the National Water Safety Forum, in particular Royal Life Saving Society UK and Swim England to support schools to teach primary and secondary pupils important aspects of water safety.
This support includes online lessons on Oak National Academy and resources for pupils in Key Stages 1, 2 and 3, launched by the National Water Safety Forum, as part of the Royal Life Saving Society UK’s Drowning Prevention Week in July 2022.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists' report, Building back better: Speech and language therapy services after covid-19 report, published 16 March 2021, what steps he is taking to ensure that support for pre-school children’s communication and language development is prioritised in education recovery plans.
Answered by Vicky Ford
As part of the government’s announcement on providing an additional £1.4 billion for education recovery, we announced a £153 million investment for high-quality professional development for early years practitioners. This includes new programmes focusing on key areas such as speech and language development, and physical and emotional development for the youngest children. This is in addition to £10 million for a pre-reception early language programme, and £17 million for the Nuffield Early Language Intervention, which improves the language skills of reception age children who need it most during the COVID-19 outbreak.
We have also been working in partnership with Public Health England and its partners (including the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists), the local government association and the Early Intervention Foundation to support local area health and early years partnerships (which includes schools, nurseries, and speech and language therapists) to work in a more integrated way and improve information flow to identify speech, language and communication needs as early as possible.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many (a) laptops and (b) home learning devices have been distributed to children in (i) England, (ii) the West Midlands and (iii) the Meriden constituency to support access to education during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government is investing over £400 million to support access to remote education and online social care services, by securing 1.3 million laptops and tablets for disadvantaged children and young people.
As of Monday 25 January, over 870,000 laptops and tablets had been delivered to schools, trusts and local authorities across England, who are responsible for distributing them onward to disadvantaged children and families.
Figures on the number of devices delivered, broken down by local authority and academy trust are available at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/laptops-and-tablets-data.
All schools, academy trusts and local authorities have now been given the opportunity to order devices. Laptops and tablets are owned by schools, trusts or local authorities to lend to children and young people who need them most during the current COVID-19 restrictions.
The Government is providing this significant injection of devices on top of an estimated 2.9 million laptops and tablets already owned by schools before the start of the COVID-19 outbreak. On 12 January 2021, we announced that we will be providing a further 300,000 devices over the course of this term.
We have also partnered with the UK’s leading mobile operators to provide free data for the academic year to help disadvantaged children get online. We are grateful to EE, O2 Smarty, Sky Mobile, Tesco Mobile, Three, Virgin Mobile, and Vodafone for their collaboration. We continue to invite a range of mobile network providers to support the offer. We have also delivered 54,000 4G wireless routers for pupil and care leavers without connection at home.