Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many looked after children were placed in boarding schools for the latest year for which figures are available, broken down by age.
Answered by Baroness Barran
The department does not hold this information centrally. The department does hold information on the number of looked after children placed in residential schools. However, it is not possible to distinguish between boarding schools and other residential schools, such as residential special schools. Therefore, we are not able to provide the information requested overall or by age.
Figures on the overall number of looked after children in England placed in residential schools were published in the annual statistics release titled ‘Children looked after, including adoptions, 2021-22’. On 31 March 2022, there were 110 looked after children in these residential schools, which includes boarding schools and residential special schools. These annual statistics are available in the attached table.
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have implemented the recommendations of the Save the Children 2016 report The Lost Boys; and if not, whether they plan to do so.
Answered by Baroness Barran
The Lost Boys report recommended for the government to invest in the best early education and childcare provision.
Alongside setting high standards and requirements for all early years providers in the Early Years Foundation Stage framework, in March, the government announced the single biggest investment in childcare ever made in England, which means by 2027/28 this government expects to be spending more than £8 billion every year on the early years. This will result in an historic expansion of free childcare, with 15 free hours available for working parents of two-year-olds from April 2024, 15 free hours from nine months to the start of school available from September 2024, rising to 30 free hours from September 2025. From September, the hourly rates paid to providers to deliver free childcare for two-year-olds will increase by 30% from an average rate of £6 to £8. This represents a significant increase in funding for early years.
The government is also investing up to £180 million in workforce training, qualifications, expert guidance and targeted support for the early years sector, to support the learning and development of the youngest and most disadvantaged children. This includes the Professional Development Programme, phase 3, training up to 10,000 early years professionals and providing early years practitioners with training on communication and language, early mathematics and personal, social and emotional development.
Two-thirds of primary schools have benefitted from our investment in the Nuffield Early Language Intervention, improving the speech and language skills of an estimated 90,000 children in reception classes so far. Over 320,000 primary school children have been screened to identify those with language development difficulties. These children will receive targeted language support.
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, per their guidance note for completing HSA4 paper forms and guidance note for completing HSA4 electronic forms, whether or how follow-up care is provided in cases where (1) all medicine was administered in hospital or clinic, (2) one medicine was administered in hospital or clinic and one medicine was administered at the patient’s usual place of residence or home, and (3) all medicines were administered at the patient’s usual place of residence or home, so as to ensure that proper care is provided should any complications arise, and the appropriate reporting is undertaken.
Answered by Lord Markham
The Department’s Required Standard Operating Procedures for the approval of independent sector places for termination of pregnancy in England, which all independent abortion providers must comply with, sets out that all providers should have protocols in place to support women following an abortion procedure, whether medicines are administered in the home or other approved place.
Women should be informed as early as possible of the most common physical, emotional or psychological symptoms following an abortion, including after use of pills at home for early medical abortion. Information should also include what to do in an emergency situation as well as routine follow-up.
On discharge, women must be given a letter providing sufficient information about the procedure to allow another healthcare practitioner to manage any complications and/or ongoing care. A 24-hour dedicated support line which specialises in post-abortion support and care should be offered by the abortion provider.
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, per their guidance note for completing HSA4 paper forms, which states, "You must use this section to record any complications that occurred up until the time of discharge from the place of termination", and their guidance note for completing HSA4 electronic forms, which states, “You must select any complications that occurred up until the time of discharge from the place of termination”, whether or how complications are tracked in cases where one or both medicines were administered at the patient’s usual place of residence or home, so as to ensure that proper care is provided should any complications arise and the appropriate reporting is undertaken.
Answered by Lord Markham
Complications resulting from legal abortions in England and Wales are recorded on the HSA4 form until the patient has been discharged. For medical terminations where either both or the second stage was administered at the patient’s usual place of residence, complications are unlikely to be recorded on the HSA4 form after discharge. Complications are also recorded in other patient record systems such as Hospital Episodes Statistics, where the woman has attended a health service after being discharged.
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many care leavers were accepted onto undergraduate courses at higher education institutions in each of the last three years for which data are available, broken down by institution.
Answered by Baroness Barran
Data on applications, offers, and acceptances for care leavers by institution is not held by the department. This information may be available from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS).
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many care leavers were made offers to attend a higher education institution in each of the last three years for which data are available, broken down by individual institution.
Answered by Baroness Barran
Data on applications, offers, and acceptances for care leavers by institution is not held by the department. This information may be available from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS).
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many care leavers made applications to higher education institutions in each of the last three years for which data are available, broken down by individual institution.
Answered by Baroness Barran
Data on applications, offers, and acceptances for care leavers by institution is not held by the department. This information may be available from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS).
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many (1) looked-after children, and (2) care leavers, went on to Key Stage 5 in (a) the latest year for which figures are available, and (b) the three preceding years.
Answered by Baroness Barran
The department does not hold information on the numbers of all care leavers who went on to key stage 5. The department does hold and publish information on the activities of care leavers aged 17 to 21 who had been looked after by local authorities in England. This includes information on care leavers in education, but not specifically at key stage 5. The latest statistics are available at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/fast-track/1db542fc-b38b-4dd6-c132-08daa787e284.
The department also publishes information on pupils who were at the end of key stage 4 in 2018/19 and reports on their destinations in the 2019/20 academic year. The figures show in 2019/20, 5,010 looked after children were in a sustained education destination in the year following the end of key stage 4. Of these, 2,910 were in further education, 860 were in a school sixth form or sixth form college and 1,240 were in some other form of education. They may not necessarily be studying key stage 5 learning aims. This data can be found at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/271af2fd-b022-402a-076f-08db29e96c41.
The latest information on attainment for looked after children is published here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/outcomes-for-children-in-need-including-children-looked-after-by-local-authorities-in-england.
Information on pupils who were at the end of key stage 4 in 2019/20 and their destinations in the 2020/21 academic year was published on 30 March 2023 on the GOV.UK website.
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the income gap between workers with special educational needs and disabilities and those without.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
A response to the noble Baroness’ Parliamentary Question of 28 February is attached.
The Baroness Eaton DBE BL
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PW
2 March 2023
Dear Lady Eaton,
As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking what assessment has been made of the income gap between workers with special educational needs and disabilities and those without (HL5984).
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) does not currently hold estimates of the total income gap specifically. However, the ONS has published relevant analysis on the average earnings of disabled and non-disabled employees in the UK.
The publication Disability pay gaps in the UK: 2021 [1] provides the latest available information from the Annual Population Survey (APS) comparing earnings of disabled and non-disabled employees up to 2021.
In 2021, disabled employees earnt an average (median) of £12.10 per hour and non-disabled employees £14.03 per hour, a difference of 13.8%. This difference has widened slightly since 2014 when disabled employees earnt an average 11.7% less than non-disabled employees.
This publication looks at the impact of some of the factors that may affect disabled employees pay such as their impairment type or severity. For example, in 2021 disabled employees with autism as their main impairment had a wider difference in average pay than disabled people with other types of main impairment, having an average pay 33.5% less than non-disabled employees. Disabled employees who were limited a lot in their day-to-day activities had a wider difference in average pay to non-disabled employees (19.9% less) than disabled employees whose day-to-day activities were limited a little (12.1% less).
This publication also shows that after controlling for the differences in personal characteristics such as age, where they live and occupation type, differences in average pay between disabled and non-disabled employees were narrower but persisted.
The largest narrowing was seen for disabled employees with autism as their main impairment, where the difference in average pay to non-disabled employees was estimated to be 9.9% after accounting for differences in personal and job characteristics between disabled and nondisabled employees, compared with 33.5% before doing so.
For further context, other ONS data, such as that published within Outcomes for disabled people in the UK: 20212 , provides the latest available information on outcomes for disabled people across a range of areas of life including employment, education, social participation, housing, well-being, loneliness and crime. We will of course take your question into account as we continue to produce analysis relevant to the experiences of disabled people, working to ensure that it is inclusive and highlights the experiences of different groups.
Yours sincerely,
Professor Sir Ian Diamond
[1] https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/disability/articles/disability paygapsintheuk/2021
[2] https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/disability/articles/outcome sfordisabledpeopleintheuk/2021
Asked by: Baroness Eaton (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they will take to ensure that teacher training includes, as standard, specific training on teaching young people with special educational needs and disabilities.
Answered by Baroness Barran
The Teachers’ Standards set clear expectations that teachers must understand the needs of all pupils, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). All trainees who achieve Qualified Teacher Status (QTS) must demonstrate that they can adapt teaching to respond to the needs of all pupils, including those with SEND.
Initial teacher training (ITT) courses must be designed so that teacher trainees can demonstrate that they meet all the Teachers' Standards at the appropriate level, including the requirement in Standard 5, that all teachers must have a clear understanding of the needs of all pupils.
To support all teachers to meet these standards, the Department has implemented high quality teacher training reforms which begin with ITT and continues into early career teaching, through to the reformed suite of leadership and specialist national professional qualifications (NPQ), ensuring that teachers have the skills to support all pupils to succeed, including those with SEND.
Since 2020 the Initial Teacher Training Core Content Framework (CCF) has included content on adapting teaching to the strengths and needs of all pupils, and since delivery started from 2021, the Early Career Framework has built on that learning for Early Career Teachers. These reforms support our ambition that all new teachers starting in the profession learn how to meet the needs of all pupils, including those with SEND.
On 2 March 2023, we published the SEND and Alternative Provision (AP) Improvement Plan in response to the Green Paper published in March last year. This outlines the department's mission for the SEND and AP system to fulfil children’s potential, build parents’ trust and provide financial sustainability. We are also building a confident expert workforce, training up to 5,000 new early years Special Educational Needs Co-ordinators (SENCos). Furthermore, an over 50% increase in high needs funding to over £10 billion by 2023-24, compared to £6.1 billion in 2018-19, will help children and young people with SEND in both special schools and mainstream schools receive the right support.
As part of that plan, the department will be conducting a review of the ITT Core Content Framework and Early Career Framework together this year, which will consider further opportunities to improve how the frameworks support new teachers to meet the needs of pupils with SEND.