Asked by: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help retain foster carers.
Answered by Janet Daby
As part of my right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s Transformation Fund announced in the Spring Statement and building on the £15 million investment in the Autumn Budget 2024, the department will provide an additional £25 million over two years, beginning in the 2026/27 and 2027/28 financial years, for foster care as part of Children’s Social Care Reform. We expect this funding to help recruit an additional 400 fostering families, provide better peer to peer support for foster carers, and ensure more children in care have stability through ensuring a foster care placement is available to them when needed.
Currently, there are ten fostering regional programmes active across England, collaborating with 64% of all local authorities to recruit, retain and support foster carers. The department plans to move towards full national roll-out in the next financial year. This supports retention and support for carers through the recruitment of short break foster carers, who provide high quality care for children while their usual foster carers take a break.
This programme also includes an expansion of ‘The Mockingbird Family Model’, an innovative evidence-based approach involving six to ten families grouped into a constellation around a hub home carer. Mockingbird includes peer support, respite and training. It was found to substantially improve retention by an independent evaluation, which showed that participating households were 82% less likely to deregister than households who did not participate.
The department also funds Fosterline, a free independent source of advice and support to current and prospective carers.
To improve retention, the department is also acting on areas that matter to foster carers. The allegations process is a key contributor to high levels of foster carer deregistration, and the department is committed to improving practice and guidance in this area. The department has also begun conversations with the sector about proposed changes to delegated authority, ensuring that all foster carers have delegated authority by default in relation to day-to-day parenting of the child in their care.
Financial support plays a role in retaining and supporting foster carers. The National Minimum Allowance (NMA) was introduced by the Labour government in 2007 and has kept pace with inflation over time. Current levels of the NMA have been uplifted by 3.55% for the 2025/2026 financial year and can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/support-for-foster-parents/help-with-the-cost-of-fostering.
Finally, we encourage fostering services to adopt the Fostering Network’s ‘Foster Carer Charter’, which sets out clear principles of what support should be available to foster carers.
Regarding ‘unsuccessful’ placements, the department publishes statistics for children looked after in England only, not Wales. Statistics for other countries in the UK are the responsibility of the devolved administrations.
The department does not collect information on whether placements for children looked after were successful or not. These placements can end for a wide range of reasons and there is no specific category recorded as an ‘unsuccessful placement’.
The latest information on the main reason for placement changes during the 2023/24 reporting year is published in the ‘Children looked after in England’ statistical release at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/c3ae926d-83e8-4ec9-3213-08dd6b9d125f.
Asked by: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment she has made of the adequacy of school buildings.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
Ensuring schools and colleges have the resources and buildings they need is a key part of our mission to break down barriers to opportunity and give every young person the best start in life.
Responsibility for keeping school buildings safe and well-maintained lies with the institutions and their responsible bodies - typically local authorities, academy trusts or voluntary aided school bodies. We support them by providing capital funding, delivering major rebuilding programmes and offering guidance and support.
Where the department is notified of a significant safety issue with a building that cannot be managed independently, the department considers additional advice and support on a case-by-case basis.
The department is working with expert groups, technical advisors and stakeholders to ensure we have an up-to-date understanding of future issues that could present themselves as the school and college estate ages. In addition to the ongoing Condition Data Collection 2, we have commissioned new research due to complete by spring 2026 which includes data analysis and field-work, with some in-depth surveys to better understand the performance of post-war education buildings.
At the Autumn Budget 2024, this government increased capital allocations to improve the condition of school buildings to £2.1 billion for 2025/26. This is £300 million more than this financial year. This is on top of targeted support for RAAC. This is part of £6.7 billion in capital overall for education in 2025/26.
We have committed £1.4 billion next year to support the current School Rebuilding Programme, which is rebuilding or significantly refurbishing buildings at 518 schools and sixth form colleges across England, prioritised on condition and safety.
We are committed to improving the condition of the estate through the department’s annual funding, the continuing School Rebuilding Programme and by fixing the problem of RAAC.
Asked by: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the average pupil-to-teacher ratio is in (a) Harrogate and Knaresborough constituency, (b) North Yorkshire and (c) nationally.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
Information on the school workforce, including the pupil to adult and pupil to teacher ratios at national, regional, local authority, parliamentary constituency (prior to 2023 boundary changes) and individual school level, is published in the ‘School workforce in England’ statistical publication, which is available here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-workforce-in-england.
In the 2023/24 academic year, which is the latest data available, the ratio of pupils to teachers (qualified and unqualified) in state-funded schools was 19.2 in Harrogate and Knaresborough constituency (2024 boundary), 18.0 in North Yorkshire local authority and 18.1 nationally in England.
Asked by: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of extending the funding period for the Harrogate College rebuild.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The Harrogate College project was awarded funding from the further education capital transformation fund (FE CTF), and the college capital loans scheme (CCLS), to improve the condition of the building. Under the terms of the FE CTF grant, projects needed to be completed by December 2024, and for the loan, final drawdowns were required by March 2025. We understand that the project will now not be able to meet these terms due to unforeseen planning delays.
The department’s capital funding for the 2025/26 financial year will be confirmed at the 30 October Budget. Capital funding beyond this period is subject to a multi-year spending review which will conclude in spring 2025.
Payment of grant and drawdown of loan funding is done in arrears, based on evidence of spend submitted by the college, so disbursement of the funding to colleges awarded grants through the FE CTF or loans through the CCLS does not begin until works start on their capital projects.
All bids to the FE CTF were assessed against a range of criteria, including whether they would support delivery of both national and local skills priorities, aligning with the local skills improvement plans.
Departmental officials have regular discussions with Luminate Education Group about their capital projects, including Harrogate College, to keep the department appraised of developments.
Asked by: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what discussions she has had with (a) local authorities and (b) other stakeholders on delays to the Harrogate College rebuild, in the context of the ongoing judicial review in relation to the planning application for that project.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The Harrogate College project was awarded funding from the further education capital transformation fund (FE CTF), and the college capital loans scheme (CCLS), to improve the condition of the building. Under the terms of the FE CTF grant, projects needed to be completed by December 2024, and for the loan, final drawdowns were required by March 2025. We understand that the project will now not be able to meet these terms due to unforeseen planning delays.
The department’s capital funding for the 2025/26 financial year will be confirmed at the 30 October Budget. Capital funding beyond this period is subject to a multi-year spending review which will conclude in spring 2025.
Payment of grant and drawdown of loan funding is done in arrears, based on evidence of spend submitted by the college, so disbursement of the funding to colleges awarded grants through the FE CTF or loans through the CCLS does not begin until works start on their capital projects.
All bids to the FE CTF were assessed against a range of criteria, including whether they would support delivery of both national and local skills priorities, aligning with the local skills improvement plans.
Departmental officials have regular discussions with Luminate Education Group about their capital projects, including Harrogate College, to keep the department appraised of developments.
Asked by: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if her Department will make an assessment of the potential impact of the Harrogate College rebuild on (a) skills development and (b) local employment opportunities.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The Harrogate College project was awarded funding from the further education capital transformation fund (FE CTF), and the college capital loans scheme (CCLS), to improve the condition of the building. Under the terms of the FE CTF grant, projects needed to be completed by December 2024, and for the loan, final drawdowns were required by March 2025. We understand that the project will now not be able to meet these terms due to unforeseen planning delays.
The department’s capital funding for the 2025/26 financial year will be confirmed at the 30 October Budget. Capital funding beyond this period is subject to a multi-year spending review which will conclude in spring 2025.
Payment of grant and drawdown of loan funding is done in arrears, based on evidence of spend submitted by the college, so disbursement of the funding to colleges awarded grants through the FE CTF or loans through the CCLS does not begin until works start on their capital projects.
All bids to the FE CTF were assessed against a range of criteria, including whether they would support delivery of both national and local skills priorities, aligning with the local skills improvement plans.
Departmental officials have regular discussions with Luminate Education Group about their capital projects, including Harrogate College, to keep the department appraised of developments.
Asked by: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what her planned timescale is for disbursing funding allocated to Harrogate College for the rebuild project.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The Harrogate College project was awarded funding from the further education capital transformation fund (FE CTF), and the college capital loans scheme (CCLS), to improve the condition of the building. Under the terms of the FE CTF grant, projects needed to be completed by December 2024, and for the loan, final drawdowns were required by March 2025. We understand that the project will now not be able to meet these terms due to unforeseen planning delays.
The department’s capital funding for the 2025/26 financial year will be confirmed at the 30 October Budget. Capital funding beyond this period is subject to a multi-year spending review which will conclude in spring 2025.
Payment of grant and drawdown of loan funding is done in arrears, based on evidence of spend submitted by the college, so disbursement of the funding to colleges awarded grants through the FE CTF or loans through the CCLS does not begin until works start on their capital projects.
All bids to the FE CTF were assessed against a range of criteria, including whether they would support delivery of both national and local skills priorities, aligning with the local skills improvement plans.
Departmental officials have regular discussions with Luminate Education Group about their capital projects, including Harrogate College, to keep the department appraised of developments.
Asked by: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how she plans to work with (a) colleges and (b) employers to ensure that there are sufficient high-quality placements for T Level study programmes.
Answered by Janet Daby
This government believes all young people and adults should have access to high-quality training that meets their needs and provides them with opportunities to thrive. T Levels are high-quality qualifications which provide young people with a firm foundation for their future. The industry placement of at least 315 hours (approximately 45 days) is a key part of T Levels and helps open the door into skilled employment, further study or a higher apprenticeship.
The department provides a programme of support for colleges and other T Level providers to help them to deliver high quality industry placements. This includes workshops, webinars, continuing professional development support and online guidance. Providers also receive £550 per industry placement student as part of their wider 16 to 19 funding allocation to support the costs of sourcing and setting up industry placements. Providers are also able to use their 16 to 19 bursary funding to support disadvantaged students to access placements.
The department is working to raise awareness of T Levels amongst employers, and the benefits of industry placements to their organisations’ talent pipelines. The department has launched the new Skills for Life “It all starts with skills” campaign. This national campaign underpins its activities to raise awareness of T Levels, with TV and cinema advertising tailored to young people and employers, alongside billboards and posters. The department also offers guidance, workshops and webinars to help employers understand the benefits of offering placements and how to do this successfully. Over 600 members of the T Level Ambassadors Network work across the country in their industries to champion T Levels and placements, via events, webinars and social media.
More information on the support available can be found at: https://support.tlevels.gov.uk/hc/en-gb and: https://employers.tlevels.gov.uk/hc/en-gb.