Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what practical support there is to assist pupils with special educational needs and disabilities to learn a musical instrument at school.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
Our vision for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) is the same as that for all children and young people, namely that they are taught a broad and ambitious curriculum.
The department funds a national network of 120 Music Education Hubs who work with the majority of schools to deliver 4 core roles, one of which is to enable children from all backgrounds and every part of England to have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument. This includes children with SEND.
In addition, one of the programmes that the department partially funds with Arts Council England is Music for Youth. Working with the Music Education Hubs, this provides over 60,000 young people each year with free opportunities to perform and experience live music through nationwide festivals, concerts and tailored projects. This includes giving pupils with SEND opportunities to both perform and access performances they would not otherwise be able to.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what support they are providing for (1) secondary schools, (2) music hubs, and (3) national youth music organisations, to give young people opportunities to play in classical music ensembles and orchestras.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
All pupils should have access to an excellent, well-rounded education, and music education is central to this.
The government invested over £300 million of ring-fenced funding in music hubs in 2016-20, to ensure all children, whatever their background, have access to a high-quality music education, including learning to play musical instruments and having the opportunity to play and sing in ensembles.
On 3 January 2020, we announced a further £80 million investment in music hubs for 2020-21. Alongside this investment, charities that help young people learn about different styles of music are also set to receive a further £1 million to support the next generation of musicians. These programmes are In Harmony, National Youth Music Organisations (NYMOs) and Music for Youth.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment has been made of trends in the number of pupils learning lesser-played instruments such as the (1) bassoon, (2) French horn, and (3) double bass, through school music tuition.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
The government believes all pupils should have access to an excellent, well-rounded education and the arts and music are central to this.
The government does not hold information on individual school music tuition. However, music is included in the national curriculum and is compulsory in all maintained schools from the age of 5 to 14. Post-14, all pupils in maintained schools must be offered the opportunity to study at least one subject in the arts.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how they have been monitoring the effectiveness of measures set out in the guidance on helping children with special educational needs and disabilities to continue their education during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
The government is committed to supporting local authorities and their partners to ensure children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) continue their education during the COVID-19 outbreak.
We have published a range of guidance for education settings, local authorities, health commissioning bodies and families, and are monitoring the effectiveness of measures through:
We will continue to work with education settings, local authorities, health commissioning bodies and a range of stakeholders to keep the effectiveness of measures in our guidance under close review.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what responsibilities and duties schools have specifically towards pupils who develop eating disorders; and what assessment they have made of the effectiveness of support offered by schools to pupils with eating disorders.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
When carrying out duties to safeguard children and young people, schools must have due regard to the statutory guidance, ‘Keeping children safe in education’, which defines safeguarding and promotes the welfare of children. The guidance is available at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/keeping-children-safe-in-education--2.
Governing bodies of maintained schools, academies (except 16–19 academies) and pupil referral units are also subject to a duty to support pupils with medical conditions. In meeting the duty, schools must follow statutory guidance, which is available at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/supporting-pupils-at-school-with-medical-conditions--3.
The department’s mental health and behaviour advice includes information about how to identify pupils whose behaviour may be a result of an underlying mental health difficulty, linked to the SEND graduated response process, and provides guidance on how they can adapt their approaches to support these pupils with their individual needs.
It is vital that children and young people with eating disorders have access to effective specialist support. Through the NHS Long Term Plan, we are investing £2.3 billion a year into mental health services by 2023-24, which will see spending for children and young people’s mental health services growing faster than the overall spend on mental health, which will itself be growing faster than the overall NHS budget. The NHS Long Term Plan also makes a specific commitment to boost investment in children and young people’s eating disorder services over the five years of the plan.
Inpatient treatment should be a last resort, which is why the government announced in 2014 that it would invest £150 million to expand eating disorder community-based care. We are making good progress on this promise, and as a result 70 dedicated new or extended community services are now either open or in development.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of COVID-19 on the delivery of free schools in the pre-opening stage.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
We are monitoring closely the risk that construction delays caused by COVID-19 might impact on our capacity to deliver free schools, including special free schools, planning to open in September 2020.
Where delays are putting at risk completion of sites by September, we are agreeing appropriate mitigations, including alternative temporary accommodation.
We remain committed to opening all free schools due to open this September, as planned.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how COVID-19 is affecting the delivery of new special free schools; and what steps they are taking to mitigate this impact.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
We are monitoring closely the risk that construction delays caused by COVID-19 might impact on our capacity to deliver free schools, including special free schools, planning to open in September 2020.
Where delays are putting at risk completion of sites by September, we are agreeing appropriate mitigations, including alternative temporary accommodation.
We remain committed to opening all free schools due to open this September, as planned.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to protect teaching and non-teaching staff from COVID-19 when schools re-open.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
The school workforce is central to the country’s response to COVID-19 and we thank them wholeheartedly for their support at this difficult time.
As a result of the huge efforts everyone has made to adhere to strict social distancing measures, the transmission rate of coronavirus (COVID-19) has decreased. We therefore anticipate, with further progress, that we may be able, from the week commencing 1 June, to welcome back more children to early years, school and further education settings. We will only do this provided that the five key tests set by government justify the changes at the time.
A range of actions will be taken to prevent transmission of the virus, including protective measures to minimise contact and mixing. Public Health England is clear that if early years settings, schools and colleges implement these measures, and crucially if they are also applying regular hand washing, hygiene and cleaning measures and handling potential cases of the virus as per advice, then the risk of transmission will be lowered.
We have published guidance for education and childcare settings on how to implement protective measures, which is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-implementing-protective-measures-in-education-and-childcare-settings.
Access to testing is already available to essential workers, including all school staff.
These are rapidly developing circumstances. We continue to keep the situation under review and will keep Parliament updated accordingly.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Berridge on 13 March (HL2079), whether any regional workshops on the annual reviews of Education, Health and Care Plans have taken place so far in 2020; and if so, which local authorities have sent representatives.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
In February and March 2020, we delivered training on Annual Reviews of Education Health and Care Plans across the country. 11 out of 13 planned workshops were delivered. The remaining 2 workshops were postponed due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
A total of 98 local authorities attended the training events. The local authorities in attendance at the training events are listed in the attached table.
Asked by: Lord Lingfield (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure that, where local authorities have decided to place a child's Education Health Care Plan at a particular school, that the school has sufficient funds to make the provisions specified.
Answered by Baroness Berridge
For a child with an education, health and care (EHC) plan, the local authority is responsible for securing the provision specified in that plan, including making arrangements for the child to attend any school named in the plan.
A local authority is required to provide each mainstream (primary or secondary) school in its area with a budget that is sufficient for it to meet the additional costs of supporting all its pupils with special educational needs and disabilities, including those with EHC plans, with up to £6,000 per pupil, per annum. Where the costs of making the provision specified in an EHC plan exceed £6,000, the local authority responsible for securing the provision and placing the child in the school pays top-up funding to the school so that the school can make the necessary provision. This top-up funding comes from the local authority’s high needs budget. Nationally, high needs funding will increase by £780 million in the next financial year, up to £7.2 billion. This will be the largest year-on-year increase since the high needs funding block was created in 2013.
Similarly, where a pupil with an EHC plan attends a special school, the local authority responsible for the plan provides top-up funding in respect of the child, to enable the school to make the provision specified in the plan. The top-up funding for a special school is intended to contribute to the costs that exceed the total amount of place funding the special school receives, at £10,000 per place.