Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department is taking steps to help provide support to Palestinian university students with (a) injured and (b) deceased family in Gaza.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The best way to provide protection for vulnerable people in Gaza is an end to the fighting as soon as possible and the return of the hostages held by Hamas. That is why the government is calling for an immediate pause to get aid in and the hostages out, then progress towards a sustainable, permanent ceasefire, without a return to destruction, fighting and loss of life.
The UK is currently supporting non-governmental organisation and UN partners to deliver medical aid and care in the Gaza Strip. This includes support for primary healthcare, trauma and emergency care services, disease surveillance and outbreak response, and deployment of Emergency Medical Teams. The government is also exploring further options to help meet the medical needs of Palestinians.
Universities offer a range of dedicated support to their international students before they arrive in the UK, on arrival, and during their studies. This includes both pastoral care and financial support. If a student is experiencing difficulties, they should contact the university to discuss their circumstances. Universities have their own hardship funds to support students who are going through financial difficulties, and like domestic students, international students can apply to their provider to access these funds.
The department is also an active funder of the Higher Education Scholarships for Palestinians (HESPAL) programme. This programme, facilitated by the British Council, provides young academic staff with potential in universities in the Occupied Palestinian Territories with the opportunity to complete a Masters or PhD programme in the UK. There are currently fifteen HESPAL scholars in the UK, five of which are from Gaza. The British Council has met with UK university partners to discuss the best means of support for these scholars. These conversations have covered safeguarding issues, one-to-one support to scholars and both virtual and physical platforms to enable scholars to come together and support one another. Departmental officials continue to engage with the British Council to identify further support for current and former HESPAL students.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much funding was provided through the holiday activities and food programme to projects in Darlington in each year since it was introduced.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The department has invested more than £200 million a year in our holiday, activities and food (HAF) programme since 2021. Since 2022, the HAF programme has provided 10.7 million HAF days to children and young people in this country. The expansion of the programme year-on-year has meant a total of 5.4 million HAF days provided between Christmas 2022, Easter and summer 2023.
For the 2021 programme, Darlington were allocated £519,040 in total, which included £49,090 paid to them in the 2020/21 financial year to help with start-up costs, and a further £469,050 was allocated to them during the 2021/22 financial year.
For the 2022 programme, the department allocated £466,240, for 2023 the department allocated £468,150 and this year, the department has allocated a further £469,170, bringing the total to more than £1.9 million in Darlington since the programme began, ensuring thousands of children across Darlington local authority have benefitted from healthy meals and taking part in a range of enriching activities during the longer school holidays.
Asked by: Baroness Browning (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to address barriers to discharge from mental health inpatient units for autistic people and people with learning disabilities related to the provision of (1) suitable housing, and (2) social care support.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
On 26 January 2024, we published statutory guidance on discharge from mental health inpatient settings. This guidance sets out key principles for how National Health Service bodies and local authorities across adult and children’s services should work together to support people to be discharged from mental health inpatient services, including mental health inpatient services for people with a learning disability and for autistic people. This guidance states that strong links should be made with relevant community services prior to, and during, the person’s stay in hospital, and that this should include links in relation to meeting the person’s needs related to health, social care, education, housing, and any other individual needs.
In 2023/24, we are investing an additional £121 million to improve community support, as part of the NHS Long Term Plan. This includes funding for children and young people’s keyworkers. We continue to support the delivery of new supported housing by providing capital subsidies to providers, through the Care and Support Specialised Housing Fund and the Affordable Homes Programme in England. We have also made available up to £8.6 billion over this and next financial year, to support adult social care and discharge.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment she has made of the adequacy of the availability of placements at (a) specialist colleges and (b) residential specialist colleges for children with SEND (i) nationally and (ii) in North Yorkshire.
Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The statutory duty to provide sufficient school places, including for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), sits with local authorities. The ‘Children and Families Act 2014’ requires local authorities to keep the provision for children and young people with SEND under review (including its sufficiency), working with parents, young people, and providers.
The department allocates funding to support local authorities to meet this duty and has published over £1.5 billion of High Needs Provision Capital Allocations (HNPCA) for the 2022/23 and 2023/24 financial years. North Yorkshire has been allocated a total of nearly £8.5 million through HNPCA for financial years 2022/23 and 2023/24.
This funding can be used to deliver new places in mainstream and special schools, as well as other specialist settings, and to improve the suitability and accessibility of existing buildings. Local authorities can spend the funding across the 0 to 25 age range, including in special post-16 institutions or other further education settings. The need for investment across this age range will differ between different local authorities, dependent on local circumstances, and it is therefore for local authorities to determine how to best prioritise their available funding to address their local priorities.
Starting from Summer 2023 the department has, for the first time, collected data from local authorities on available capacity in special schools, SEND units and resourced provision, along with corresponding forecasts of demand for these places.
This data will help the department to effectively support local authorities to fulfil their statutory duty to provide sufficient specialist places.
The department anticipates this being an annual data collection, forming part of the existing School Capacity Survey.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the availability of (a) SEND and (b) alternative provision placements.
Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Local authorities are responsible for providing enough school places for children in their area.
The department supports local authorities to provide sufficient school places through capital funding and has published over £1.5 billion of High Needs Provision Capital Allocations for the 2022/23 and 2023/24 financial years. This funding is allocated to local authorities to support them to deliver new places and improve their existing provision for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) as well as those who require alternative provision (AP). This funding forms part of the department’s transformational investment of £2.6 billion in new high needs provision between 2022 and 2025 and is on top of its ongoing delivery of new special and AP free schools.
Last summer, the department began collecting data from local authorities on available capacity in special schools, SEND units and resourced provision, along with corresponding forecasts of demand for these places. This data will help the department to more effectively support local authorities to fulfil their statutory duty to provide sufficient specialist places.
High needs funding to help local authorities with the ongoing costs of provision for children and young people with complex SEND and those in AP is increasing to over £10.5 billion next year, which is an increase of over 60% from the 2019/20 allocations.
Asked by: Lord Touhig (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the National Autistic Society's Cullum Centres; and what consideration they have given to rolling out the Cullum model in mainstream schools across the country.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department works closely with the National Autistic Society (NAS) and is aware of the Cullum Centres and the evaluation currently being undertaken by Goldsmiths, University of London, but has made no assessments of the Centres to date. The department engages regularly with NAS and other autism stakeholders to understand the issues faced by autistic children and young people and to understand possible solutions.
The department supports local authorities to provide sufficient school places for all children, including autistic children, through capital funding. The department has published over £1.5 billion of High Needs Provision Capital Allocations for the 2022/23 and 2023/24 financial years. This funding is allocated to local authorities to support them to deliver new places and improve existing provision for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), including those with autism, or who require alternative provision (AP). This funding forms part of the department's transformational investment of £2.6 billion in new high needs provision between 2022 and 2025 and is on top of the department’s ongoing delivery of new special and AP free schools.
Reaching over 70% of schools and further education (FE) colleges, the Universal Services programme helps the school and FE workforce to identify and meet the needs of children and young people with SEND earlier and more effectively. The programme will also help the schools to successfully prepare children and young people for adulthood, including employment. Universal offers online training, professional development groups, bespoke school and college improvement projects, sector-led research, autism awareness training and an embedded focus on preparation for adulthood, including employer-led webinars for college staff. The programme commenced in May 2022 and runs until Spring 2025, with a budget of nearly £12 million.
The department has begun collecting data from local authorities on available capacity in special schools, SEND units and resourced provision, along with corresponding forecasts of demand for these places. This data will help the department to effectively support local authorities to fulfil their statutory duty to provide sufficient specialist places.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential (a) merits of implementing a mental health support team plus model in schools and (b) impact of such an approach on the mental wellbeing of children and young people.
Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
In December 2017, the government published a consultation to gather views on the proposals set out in its publication, ‘Transforming Children and Young People’s Mental Health Provision’. The green paper is available at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a823518e5274a2e87dc1b56/Transforming_children_and_young_people_s_mental_health_provision.pdf.
The government response to the consultation was published in July 2018: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5b583d30ed915d0b6985cc21/government-response-to-consultation-on-transforming-children-and-young-peoples-mental-health.pdf. It outlined a commitment to implement three core proposals that the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), NHS England, the Department for Education and Health Education England would jointly take forward, one of which was to establish new Mental Health Support Teams (MHSTs), working in or near schools and colleges. MHSTs add value to support that settings already have in place, and more broadly are part of a wider programme of mental health transformation set out in the NHS Long Term Plan.
As of 31 March 2023, MHSTs covered 35% of pupils in schools and learners in further education settings in England. We are extending coverage of MHSTs to an estimated 44% of pupils and learners by the end of this financial year, and at least 50% by the end of March 2025.
The Early Evaluation of the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Trailblazer programme, published by the National Institute for Health Research in February 2023, revealed substantial progress in MHST implementation, despite challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic. Although this was a process evaluation, early impacts include improved school and college staff knowledge and confidence in dealing with mental health issues, improved access to support for some groups, and improvements in partnership working. The study also found that the experiences of the majority of children and young people who had contact with an MHST were positive. The early evaluation is available here: https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/Documents/college-social-sciences/social-policy/BRACE/trailblazer.pdf.
Work is already underway with partners to ensure that learnings are used to inform current and future practice. Since the MHST Trailblazers became operational in 2018/19, the Education Mental Health Practitioner curriculum has been strengthened in response to feedback on needs such as learning disabilities and autism, challenging behaviour and support for parents. In addition, a new Senior Wellbeing Practitioner role was launched in 2023 to support widening the MHST skillset and career progression opportunities.
The department, together with partners, will continue to listen to feedback and a planned phase 2 longer-term outcome evaluation, to inform MHST roll out and drive improvements in evidence-based mental health and emotional wellbeing support for children and young people.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what fiscal steps she is taking to support (a) training programmes, (b) apprenticeships and (c) other efforts to promote (i) job creation and (ii) skills development in Bury South constituency.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The government is committed to creating a world leading skills system which is employer-focused, high quality and fit for the future. The government’s reforms are strengthening higher education (HE) and further education (FE) to help more people get good jobs and upskill and retrain throughout their lives, as well as to improve national productivity and economic growth. The government’s reforms are backed with an additional investment of £3.8 billion over the course of this Parliament to strengthen HE and FE.
This additional funding will help providers such as those in Bury to deliver high quality education and training.
Bury College serves the Bury South constituency and received £25.3 million to deliver learning and skills training programmes in 2022/23 for 16 to18 year olds and apprentices for local employers. Bury College has also received capital investment of over £12 million since 2019.
Bury College offers a wide range of post-16 education and training from pre-entry level qualifications, A levels, T Levels, vocational courses at Levels 1 to 3, and apprenticeships in health and public services, business administration, engineering, retail and commercial enterprise, and education and training. It also has a University Centre and works in partnership with several local universities to deliver a range of HE courses at Higher National Diploma, Foundation Degree and Degree level to the local community. Bury College also receives funding for adult education programmes via Greater Manchester Combined Authority.
Bury College is a partner of the Greater Manchester Institute of Technology, led by The University of Salford, and has received £1.353 million of funding for refurbishments and specialist equipment in Heath Innovation, Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, Enterprise and Sports provision. Bury College will account for 25% of all learners at the Institute of Technology. This equates to approximately 200 learners in 2023/24.
The area is also served by Holy Cross College, a Catholic sixth form college, which received £12.89 million to deliver learning programmes for 16 to18 year olds in 2022/23. It delivers a largely academic Level 3 programme and a small Level 2 cohort. Holy Cross College has a University Centre delivering HE both through a direct contract with Office for Students and in partnership with Liverpool Hope University.
The department is increasing investment in the apprenticeships system in England to £2.7 billion by 2024/25 to support employers of all sizes and in all areas of the country, including Bury South, to grow their businesses with the skilled apprentices they need. Since 2010, there have been 11,380 apprenticeship starts in Bury South.
The department has introduced the Free Courses for Jobs scheme which enables eligible adults to gain a qualification for free. Residents in Bury can access provision in a range of sector subject areas delivered through colleges and training providers in the area.
In addition, the department has also introduced Skills Bootcamps, which are free, flexible courses of up to 16 weeks, giving people the opportunity to build up sector-specific skills and fast track to an interview with an employer. In each of the 2023/24 and 2024/25 financial years, the department has allocated £7.5 million to Greater Manchester Combined Authority to deliver Skills Bootcamps in the Greater Manchester area, including in Bury South via grant funding.
T Levels will equip more young people with the skills, knowledge and experience to access skilled employment or further study. From September 2023, 18 T Levels will be available and will be delivered through nearly 300 providers across all regions of the country. Bury college is delivering T Levels in business administration, legal, financial, and accounting, education and childcare, and health and engineering in 2023/24. The college intends to introduce further T Levels in catering and hospitality, construction and the built environment, creative and digital, and hair and beauty in 2024/25.
Asked by: Barry Sheerman (Labour (Co-op) - Huddersfield)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how much money from dormant funds has been transferred to (a) the National Lottery Community Fund and (b) non-profit organisations in the last 10 years.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Since the Dormant Asset Scheme’s inception in 2011, £982 million has been transferred to The National Lottery Community Fund to tackle financial exclusion and problem debt; break down barriers to work for young people; and invest in charities and social enterprises, particularly in more deprived areas. As of February 2024, £771 million has been apportioned to England.
Funding for the English portion is distributed through four independent organisations, to deliver the Scheme’s initiatives. These organisations draw down from their allocations annually, according to need. Up to and including the 2023/24 financial year, the Secretary of State has allocated the following sums in England:
Youth Futures Foundation has been allocated £125 million;
Fair4All Finance has been allocated £145 million;
Big Society Capital has been allocated £444 million; and
Access - The Foundation for Social Investment has been allocated £73 million.
These allocations include support for initiatives such as £15 million to expand the No Interest Loan Scheme to reach 69,000 more people and £15 million for the Building Futures Programme, supporting young people at risk of becoming not in employment, education or training.
Asked by: Barry Sheerman (Labour (Co-op) - Huddersfield)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what the value is of dormant funds transferred to (a) the National Lottery Community Fund and (b) other organisations in each of the last five years.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Since the Dormant Asset Scheme’s inception in 2011, £982 million has been transferred to The National Lottery Community Fund to tackle financial exclusion and problem debt; break down barriers to work for young people; and invest in charities and social enterprises, particularly in more deprived areas. As of February 2024, £771 million has been apportioned to England.
Funding for the English portion is distributed through four independent organisations, to deliver the Scheme’s initiatives. These organisations draw down from their allocations annually, according to need. Up to and including the 2023/24 financial year, the Secretary of State has allocated the following sums in England:
Youth Futures Foundation has been allocated £125 million;
Fair4All Finance has been allocated £145 million;
Big Society Capital has been allocated £444 million; and
Access - The Foundation for Social Investment has been allocated £73 million.
These allocations include support for initiatives such as £15 million to expand the No Interest Loan Scheme to reach 69,000 more people and £15 million for the Building Futures Programme, supporting young people at risk of becoming not in employment, education or training.