Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate her Department has made of the cost of the amendments to the Digital Economy Bill on skills training on digital inclusion.

We are seeking to introduce a new statutory duty on the Secretary of State for Education through the Digital Economy Bill. This duty will ensure that in England when an adult aged 19 or over, who is considered to lack basic digital skills, studies for a relevant publicly-funded digital skills qualification, the individual will not be charged for that training. The costs will be met from the existing Adult Education Budget. The Adult Education Budget is £1.5bn in 2016-17, with indicative projections remaining at this level up to 2019-20.