Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what financial support is available to young adult carers between the ages of 16 and 19 who are in further education; and what steps her Department takes to ensure equitable access to that support across regions.

The department is determined that all young carers get the support they need to succeed in all stages of education.

The department provides a range of financial support for students who need it to enable them to participate in further education. This includes free meals, bursaries to help with the cost of education, such as travel, books, equipment, and trips, plus support for childcare and residential costs where required.

In the 2023/24 academic year, over £160 million of bursary funding has been allocated to institutions to help disadvantaged 16 to 19 year olds with the costs of taking part in education. This is nearly 12% higher than published allocations for last year. The department has also made available around £20 million each year specifically to support students in defined vulnerable groups, for example those in care, care leavers and those supporting themselves in receipt of certain social security funds or benefits.

To ensure that the distribution of this funding around the regions matches the needs of young people, the department began moving to a new approach to allocate the fund from the 2020/21 academic year. This approach uses up to date disadvantage data and focusses more on the costs of travel to ensure that institutions get more Bursary Fund if their students are from more disadvantaged areas and/or travel a long way to attend. The 2023/24 academic year allocations fully reflect this new approach after its phasing in over several years.

Institutions decide which young people receive bursaries and determine the level of financial support they receive. They develop their own eligibility criteria for access to the discretionary bursary fund, including setting a household income threshold appropriate to their area and must publish information on this for students.