Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nigel Huddleston and Justine Greening(8 years ago)
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Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Education (Justine Greening)
May I, too, wish everybody in the House a happy Christmas?
The latest Ofsted figures show that there are now nearly 1.8 million more children being taught in good or outstanding schools than in 2010. Our Schools that Work for Everyone consultation has now ended, and we look forward to responding to that in due course. In the past few weeks, we have announced a £140 million strategic school improvement fund and published the next stage of the consultation on our national fairer funding formula for schools across England, which will finally bring an end to the historical postcode lottery on school funding. I also had the chance to see our excellent teacher exchange programme in Shanghai, China, earlier this month, as well as to visit many great schools in our own country.
Nigel Huddleston
Team GB gave an incredible performance at this year’s Rio Olympic games, bringing home 67 medals. One third of the medal winners went to private schools, compared with 7% of the population. What else are the Government doing to encourage even greater participation in sport in our state schools?
Justine Greening
Since 2013, we have provided over £600 million to primary schools through the primary PE and sport premium, which is steadily starting to make a difference. In fact, in independent research, schools reported an 84% increase in participation in extracurricular activities. But we know there is a lot more to do, which is why we have doubled the premium to £320 million a year from autumn 2017.
National Funding Formula: Schools/High Needs
Debate between Nigel Huddleston and Justine Greening(8 years, 1 month ago)
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Justine Greening
We said that we will continue to put around £2.5 billion into the pupil premium, which is separate from the additional funding that will be uplifted on top of core basic funding rates, as part of the consultation that we are setting out today. Both those things underline the fact that this Government are determined to ensure that our schools funding really supports children in some of the toughest parts of the country who are most likely not to come out of the schools system with the outcomes that we want for them to be able to fulfil their potential.
Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)
The people of Worcestershire will welcome this statement because funding per pupil is £1,000 lower there than in neighbouring areas. Does the Secretary of State recognise that not everybody who lives in the countryside lives in some kind of rural idyll and that there are pockets of poverty and deprivation right across our countryside, including in my constituency, so investing in our children’s futures based on need and fairness is absolutely the right move?
Justine Greening
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and that is why it is so important that we move to a sensible approach to how deprivation should be captured. It is also why we wanted to take a broader approach than using just those children eligible for free school meals. We did not want that cliff edge, so we will be looking at three components: existing eligibility for free school meals, children who have been eligible for free school meals over the past six years, which gives us a sense of the underlying need, and IDACI, an index that captures a broader definition of deprivation.