Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Answer of 26 October 2023 to Question 203895 Teachers: Recruitment, what estimate her Department has made of the (a) number and (b) proportion of new teacher sign ups that is attributable to the Get Into Teaching advertising campaign.
Answered by Damian Hinds
Several methods are used to assess the Get Into Teaching campaign’s impact. They include regular brand tracking studies and other market research; econometric modelling to identify and quantify the factors affecting sign ups to the Get Into Teaching service; analysis of the flow of candidates between Get Into Teaching and the Find and Apply services; and tracking of site traffic to the Get Into Teaching website.
The teaching recruitment campaign tracks a number of behavioural and attitudinal metrics to give a rounded picture of campaign impact.
Key Performance Indicators for the teaching recruitment campaign are the consideration of teaching as a career amongst our target audience and the number of new, unique sign-ups to the Get Into Teaching service. The campaign also measures the proportion of sign-ups attributed to the advertising campaign, through econometric modelling. Recent econometric analysis shows that in July 2023, 42% of sign-ups to the Get Into Teaching website were attributable to paid advertising.
There are many factors affecting the number of teachers recruited in any given recruitment cycle, including levels of financial support, predicted demand for new teachers, the size of pool of new graduates and other economic factors.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to monitor unregistered schools.
Answered by Damian Hinds
Unregistered schools are settings that operate as an independent school without having registered with the department. It is a criminal offence under section 96 of the Education and Skills 2008 Act for a person to operate an unregistered independent school. Where the department finds evidence that a school is operating unlawfully, the department will seek to take action by working with Ofsted, the police and the Crown Prosecution Service as necessary.
Since those responsible for conducting unregistered schools are committing an offence, they do not generally inform the department about the school’s operation, it is therefore not possible to monitor such settings.
However, the department and Ofsted continue to investigate any setting where there is evidence to suggest that an unregistered independent school is operating. Ofsted has powers under section 97 of the Education and Skills Act 2008 that allows for unannounced inspections of settings believed to be operating in breach of the registration requirement.
Ofsted publishes statistics on the number and outcomes of investigations carried out into unregistered schools. Statistics published for the period 1 January 2016 to 31 August 2023, show that 767 inspections of suspected unregistered independent schools took place. Joint work between the department and Ofsted has led to 180 of these settings changing their provision to no longer operate unlawfully, in breach of the 2008 Act. In that time six successful prosecutions have been brought against those responsible for conducting illegal settings.
More information and a link to the Education and Skills Act 2008 can be found here: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2008/25/contents.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to tackle bullying in schools.
Answered by Damian Hinds
The government has sent a clear message to schools that bullying, for whatever reason, is unacceptable. Bullying can have a devastating effect on individuals, harm their education and have serious and lasting consequences for their mental health.
All schools are legally required to have a behaviour policy with measures to prevent all forms of bullying. Schools have the freedom to develop their own anti-bullying strategies that are appropriate to their environment and are held to account by Ofsted.
The department is providing over £3 million of funding, between 10 August 2021 and 31 March 2024, to five anti-bullying organisations to support schools to tackle bullying. This includes projects targeting bullying of particular groups, such as those who are victims of hate-related bullying and homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying.
In November 2018, the department published ‘Educate Against Hate’, a self-review and signposting tool to support schools to develop a whole-school approach which promotes respect and discipline. This can combat bullying, harassment and prejudice of any kind, including sexual bullying and sexual harassment. It will help schools to identify the various elements that make up a whole school approach, consider gaps in their current practice, and get further support. ‘Educate Against Hate’ is available at: https://www.educateagainsthate.com/school-leaders/?filter=guidance-and-training-school-leaders.
The department is also making sure that all children in England will learn about respectful relationships, in person and online, as part of new mandatory relationships, sex and health education (RSHE). These subjects are designed to give pupils the knowledge they need to lead happy, safe and healthy lives, as well as to foster respect for other people and for difference. RSHE also includes teaching about online safety and harms.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of two hours of wraparound care for reception age children.
Answered by David Johnston
In the Spring Budget 2023, my right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced a transformative set of childcare reforms aimed at increasing labour market participation. This included the largest ever investment in childcare, including expansions of early years entitlements and wraparound childcare.
The government is investing £289 million in a new wraparound childcare programme to support local authorities to work with primary schools and providers, including childminders, to set up and deliver more wraparound childcare before and after school in the term time. The government’s ambition is for all parents of primary school children, including reception age children, to be able to access childcare in their local area from 8am to 6pm when they need it.
Parents should expect to see an expansion in the availability of wraparound care from September 2024, with every parent who needs it able to access term-time wraparound childcare by September 2026. Programme funding allocations for local authorities were announced on 27 October 2023.
As part of the programme, local authorities will make an assessment of the supply and demand of wraparound care in their areas to ensure that there is adequate provision for the needs of parents.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what data their Department holds on the (a) number and (b) total cost of replacing (i) laptops, (ii) mobile phones, (iii) memory sticks and (iv) external hard drives that have been (A) lost and (B) stolen in the last year.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The following table includes the number of lost / stolen devices in the Department for Education in the last year, as per our corporate IT asset register.
| 1 Nov 2022 to 31 Oct 2023 | Unit Replacement Cost | Total Replacement Cost |
Laptops | 57 | £960.66 | £54,757.62 |
Mac’s | 3 | £2,084.00 | £6,252.00 |
Mobile phones | 73 | £314.00 | £22,922.00 |
Memory sticks | 10 | £100.00 | £1,000.00 |
External Hard Drives | 0 | n/a | £0 |
All Departmental IT is fully security encrypted. The Departmental security unit records and investigates each reported loss from the Department. If appropriate, the police are invited to undertake further inquiries. Any mobile device reported as lost is immediately and remotely deactivated and the contents deleted. The user account on any laptop reported as lost is immediately and remotely locked. There has been no data loss or compromise as a result of these losses.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much her Department spent on advertising for teacher recruitment in each of the last five years.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The below table sets out total Departmental spend for teacher recruitment advertising campaigns for the past five financial years.
| Get Into Teaching Advertising: Financial Year Spend |
2022/23 | £13,157,484.38 |
2021/22 | £12,255,612.85 |
2020/21 | £11,848,725.34 |
2019/20 | £12,776,070.54 |
2018/19 | £12,773,706.55 |
The objectives of the teaching advertising campaign are to raise the status of teaching and contribute to overall Initial Teacher Training (ITT) numbers. Due to the long candidate journey from initial consideration through to applying for, and starting ITT, several methods are used to assess campaign impact. They include regular brand tracking studies and other market research such as:
Key performance indicators for the teaching recruitment campaign are consideration of teaching as a career amongst the Department’s target audience and the number of new, unique sign-ups to the Get Into Teaching service. The campaign also measures the proportion of sign-ups attributed to the advertising campaign, through econometric modelling and the proportion of ITT applicants who have interacted with the Get Into Teaching service.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what sum her Department spent on the recruitment of teachers in each of the past five years.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Department funds a range of initiatives to support Initial Teacher Training (ITT) recruitment.
The Department has announced a financial incentives package worth up to £181 million for those starting initial ITT in the 2023/24 academic year. 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.
As well as bursaries and scholarships, the ITT financial incentives budget includes grant funding for salaried ITT courses.
The Department recently announced that the School Teachers’ Review Body’s recommendations for the 2023/24 pay award for teachers and head teachers have been accepted in full. This means that teachers and head teachers in maintained schools will receive a pay award of 6.5%. This is the highest pay award for teachers in over thirty years. The award also delivers the manifesto commitment of a minimum £30,000 starting salary for school teachers in all regions in England, with a pay award of up to 7.1% for new teachers outside London.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will take steps to respond to the report of the APPG on Youth Affairs entitled Empowering Youth for the Future of Work, published July 2023.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The department is aware of the APPG on Youth Affairs Report, Empowering Youth for the Future of Work. Much of the report covers important matters that match our aims and policies, such as ensuring education and training meet future skills needs, giving young people the opportunities to thrive, the value of work experience and careers advice, and the importance of apprenticeships.
The government is committed to creating a world-leading skills system that is employer-focused, high-quality and fit for the future. Departmental reforms are strengthening higher and further education to help more people get good jobs and upskill and retrain throughout their lives, and to improve national productivity and economic growth. The reforms are backed with an additional investment of £3.8 billion over the course of this Parliament to strengthen higher and further education.
The department has invested over £7 billion during the 2022/23 academic year, to ensure there was a place in education or training for every 16- to 18-year-old who wanted one.
The 2021 Spending Review made available an extra £1.6 billion in 2024/25 for 16-19 education compared with the 2021/22 financial year, which is the biggest increase in a decade.
In January 2023 the department announced a further £125 million funding available in 2023/24. In July further announcements were made of investments of £185 million in 2023/24 and £285 million in 2024/25 to help 16-19 providers address key priorities.
The department is investing over £90 million in the financial year 2023/24 to help young people and adults to get high-quality careers provision. The department is supporting schools and colleges, through the Careers & Enterprise Company, to make sustained progress in developing their careers programmes, in line with the Gatsby Benchmarks, which set out what good careers advice looks like. The department has strengthened legislation to ensure all secondary pupils have access to independent careers guidance and at least six encounters with providers of technical education or apprenticeships. Currently about two thirds (65%) of year 13 students have experiences of the workplace.
The department wants to support more young people to start and achieve apprenticeships that offer good earnings potential and career progression and funding for apprenticeships will be £2.7 billion by 2024/25. The department is also paying employers and providers £1,000 when they take on apprentices aged 16 to 18 and covering 100 per cent of the training cost for smaller employers when they take on these younger apprentices.
T Levels will also equip more young people with the skills, knowledge and experience to access skilled employment or further study. They represent a real shift in the quality of technical education and the department has invested significantly to support providers in their implementation. From September 2023 18 T Levels will be available, being delivered through nearly 300 providers across all regions of the country.
In 2021/2022 the department engaged closely with the Education Select Committee on Youth Unemployment which covered similar matters to the APPG report, providing evidence and a government response, which can be found at https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/506/youth-unemployment-committee/publications/.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will make it his policy to grant an exemption to siblings of UK nationals living in Europe and studying at UK universities prior to 1 January 2028 to allow them to qualify for (a) home fee status for university tuition and (b) student finance for courses starting after 1 January 2028.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The Education (Student Support) Regulations 2011 define a family member of a UK national as either the person's spouse or civil partner, direct descendants of the person, or the person's spouse or civil partner who are either under the age of 21, or dependants. There are no plans to amend this definition to include siblings.
UK nationals and their family members who were living in the European Economic Area (EEA) (excluding the UK and Gibraltar) or Switzerland on 31 December 2020, or who returned to live in the UK on or after 1 January 2018 following a period of ordinary residence in the EEA or Switzerland, continue to be eligible for home fee status, tuition fee loans and maintenance support for courses commencing before 1 January 2028. This measure was introduced so as to ensure a substantial transition period for those UK nationals who had moved to the EEA or Switzerland prior to the end of the transition period. The department has no plans to extend this period further.
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, which consultations published by their Department are awaiting a response; and when each of those responses (a) were initially planned to and (b) will be published.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Policy teams across the Department consult regularly during the policy development and implementation cycle.
Information is available on GOV.UK on all open and closed consultations published by the Department, including the closing date for open consultations and, where available, the Government response.
The Cabinet Office has published best practice ‘consultation principles’ for government departments.