Asked by: Steve Double (Conservative - St Austell and Newquay)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent steps his Department has taken to ensure that information and support is provided on eating disorders for pupils in secondary schools.
Answered by Nick Gibb
To support schools the Government funds the PSHE Association to provide guidance to schools on how to teach pupils in all four key stages about mental health. The guidance includes age appropriate advice on teaching about eating disorders in secondary school.
The Government made a manifesto commitment that all pupils should learn about mental wellbeing and the mental health risks of the internet. The Department is currently conducting a thorough engagement process on the scope and content of Relationships Education and Relationships and Sex Education, and on the future status of Personal Social, Health and Economic Education. Decisions on further action to deliver the commitment will be made in the light of the outcome of the engagement process.
The Government has also funded information for school staff. MindEd is a free online portal that provides training for all adults working with children and young people about specific mental health problems. It includes specific information on eating disorders.
To improve access to specialist support for eating disorders, the Government has made available an additional £1.4 billion for children and young people’s mental health services. This includes £150 million specifically targeted at improving support for young people with eating disorders. The Government is also consulting on the green paper Transforming Children and Young People’s Mental Health Provision. It includes proposals for mental health support teams to provide more trained support for young people with mental health issues and to improve access to specialist support where it is needed.
Asked by: Steve Double (Conservative - St Austell and Newquay)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department has taken to improve support for children in Cornwall with special educational and disability needs.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The Children and Families Act 2014 provided significant support for children and young people with special educational needs, putting individuals and their families at the heart of the process. The transition period between the old and new systems will end in March 2018. We have put in place inspection arrangements to support local improvement, and ensure that services work effectively to identify and meet the individual’s needs. In July 2017, Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission conducted a joint inspection of the local area of Cornwall. Their report highlights many areas of good practice and a number of areas for development.
The department has provided local authorities with £252 million between 2014-15 and 2017-18 to support local authorities to embed the special educational needs and disability reforms as set out in the Children and Families Act 2014.
Asked by: Steve Double (Conservative - St Austell and Newquay)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate he has made of the overall increase in funding for Cornwall’s schools as a result of the implementation of the fair funding formula.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The introduction of the national funding formula in 2018-19 will allocate funding on the basis of the specific characteristics of every school and pupil.
Allocations for 2018-19 for each local authority were confirmed on 19 December 2017 and can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dedicated-schools-grant-dsg-2018-to-2019. The allocations take into account the latest pupil numbers from the October 2017 census. For Cornwall, the national funding formula means an increase in schools funding of 1.7% per pupil in 2018-19 and 2.7% in 2019-20.
Local authorities will continue to set their own local formulae which will determine individual schools’ budgets in their areas, in 2018-19 and 2019-20, in consultation with local schools.