Anneliese Midgley

The Hospitality Sector Council’s Terms of Reference is publicly available, outlining that membership is by invitation only and is subject to final agreement by DBT Ministers in consultation with the joint chairs. Members are selected to provide a breadth of knowledge and experience across the hospitality sector and Government. All members are selected in a personal capacity and will be expected to speak for their areas of expertise rather than the specific interests of their organisation.

Membership is reviewed by DBT, and it may be amended to take account of changing priorities in the sector to ensure appropriate representation and expertise is maintained.

The latest statistics for the number of households in fuel poverty in parliamentary constituencies in England, can be found in the published sub-regional fuel poverty Official Statistics, in Table 4: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/fuel-poverty-statistics.

Statistics on households required to spend more than 10% of their household income on energy bills are not available at the sub-regional level. The latest statistics at a national level can be found in the published fuel poverty trends statistics, in Table 20: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/fuel-poverty-trends-2024

Local authorities have a statutory duty to secure, so far as is reasonably practicable, sufficient provision of educational and recreational leisure-time activities for young people. In September 2023 DCMS published updated statutory guidance to support local authorities’ understanding of the existing duty and how to deliver it. Alongside this, DCMS funds a Peer Review programme for local authorities to learn from each other about the best approaches to youth service provision.

This government has also committed to co-producing a new National Youth Strategy, which is an opportunity to move away from one-size-fits all approaches from central government, bringing power back to young people and their communities and rebuilding a thriving and sustainable sector. We plan to publish the Strategy in the summer.

High and rising school standards, with excellent foundations in reading, writing and mathematics, are at the heart of the government’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity. Through the Plan for Change, we will give children the best start in life, and that means providing them with an excellent foundation in the core subjects.

Since the right hon. Ruth Kelly, as a previous Secretary of State for Education and Skills, accepted the recommendations of the Rose Report in 2006, England has made significant progress in the teaching of early reading, especially phonics.

The department has introduced a range of measures to support early reading and help increase the proportion of pupils meeting the expected standard in the year 1 phonics screening check.

In July 2024, we announced that funded support for the 11,100 schools registered for the Nuffield Early Language Intervention (NELI) programme would continue for academic year 2024/25. NELI is an evidence-based programme targeting reception-aged children needing extra support with their speech and language development and is proven to help them make four months of additional progress, seven months for those eligible for free school meals.

Further, the English hubs school-to-school support programme is dedicated to improving the teaching of reading, with a focus on phonics, early language development and reading for pleasure. So far, the department has invested over £90 million in the programme, with funding continuing and £23 million committed for academic year 2024/25 to support this work. Knowsley’s nearest English Hub is St John Vianney English Hub.

The government’s reading framework also provides guidance on improving the teaching of reading from reception to key stage 3, including guidance on how to help pupils who need more support to learn to read proficiently.

This government is determined to tackle the generational challenge of school absence, which is a fundamental barrier to learning and life chances. Missing school regularly is harmful to a child’s attainment, safety and physical and mental health, which limits their opportunity to succeed. There is evidence that more students are attending school this year compared to last, thanks to the sector’s efforts, although around 1.6 million children remain persistently absent and miss 10% or more of lessons. In Knowsley, 27% of all pupils were persistently absent in the 2022/2023 academic year. At primary level, the rate of persistent absence is 21.6%, which is an improvement from 21.8% last year. At secondary level the rate of persistent absence is 36.3%, which represents an improvement from 40.9% last year.

The department has set out clear expectations of local authorities and schools in the ‘Working together to improve school attendance’ guidance, which was made statutory on 19 August 2024. This guidance can be found here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66bf300da44f1c4c23e5bd1b/Working_together_to_improve_school_attendance_-_August_2024.pdf.

The guidance promotes a 'support first' approach and sets out clear expectations on how schools, trusts, local authorities and wider services should work together and with families to address attendance barriers and provide the right support, including where a pupil is not attending due to special educational needs.

It is now mandatory for every state school in England to share their daily attendance data with the department. Schools, local authorities and trusts can access this data through a secure, interactive dashboard which is maintained by the department, providing a seamless flow of data and allowing schools to target attendance interventions more effectively. Over 99% of state schools in England are sharing their daily data with the department.

The department recognises the importance of creating opportunities within the sector to share existing best practice on how to improve attendance. This is why we set up a network of 31 attendance hubs, which are supporting 13 schools in Knowsley. These hubs have offered support to 2000 primary, secondary and alternative provision schools in total, and shared their strategies and resources for improving attendance.

In addition to this work, the department also aims to improve the existing evidence on which interventions work to improve attendance. Over £17 million is being invested across two mentoring projects that will support at least 12,000 pupils in 15 areas. Knowsley is one of the areas where mentors have been providing support. These programmes will be evaluated and the effective practice shared with schools and local authorities nationally.

We are also strengthening our tools for faster and more effective school improvement by launching the new Regional Improvement for Standards and Excellence (RISE) teams. Supported by over £20 million, these teams will offer both mandatory targeted intervention for schools identified by Ofsted as needing to improve and a universal service, acting as a catalyst for a self-improving system for all schools. The RISE teams are now beginning work with the first group of schools eligible for the targeted, bespoke service, with additional schools to begin in April.

School attendance is also supported by broader investments, such as funded breakfast clubs across all primary schools, to ensure children start their day ready to learn. The department is working across government on plans to provide access to specialist mental health professionals in every school, new Young Futures hubs, including access to mental health support workers, and an additional 8,500 new mental health staff to treat children and adults. The department is also committed to introducing new annual Ofsted reviews focusing on safeguarding, attendance and off-rolling.

Schools can also allocate pupil premium funding, which has now increased to over £2.9 billion for the 2024/25 financial year, to support pupils with identified needs to attend school regularly.

This government is determined to tackle the generational challenge of school absence, which is a fundamental barrier to learning and life chances. Missing school regularly is harmful to a child’s attainment, safety and physical and mental health, which limits their opportunity to succeed. There is evidence that more students are attending school this year compared to last, thanks to the sector’s efforts, although around 1.6 million children remain persistently absent and miss 10% or more of lessons. In Knowsley, 27% of all pupils were persistently absent in the 2022/2023 academic year. At primary level, the rate of persistent absence is 21.6%, which is an improvement from 21.8% last year. At secondary level the rate of persistent absence is 36.3%, which represents an improvement from 40.9% last year.

The department has set out clear expectations of local authorities and schools in the ‘Working together to improve school attendance’ guidance, which was made statutory on 19 August 2024. This guidance can be found here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66bf300da44f1c4c23e5bd1b/Working_together_to_improve_school_attendance_-_August_2024.pdf.

The guidance promotes a 'support first' approach and sets out clear expectations on how schools, trusts, local authorities and wider services should work together and with families to address attendance barriers and provide the right support, including where a pupil is not attending due to special educational needs.

It is now mandatory for every state school in England to share their daily attendance data with the department. Schools, local authorities and trusts can access this data through a secure, interactive dashboard which is maintained by the department, providing a seamless flow of data and allowing schools to target attendance interventions more effectively. Over 99% of state schools in England are sharing their daily data with the department.

The department recognises the importance of creating opportunities within the sector to share existing best practice on how to improve attendance. This is why we set up a network of 31 attendance hubs, which are supporting 13 schools in Knowsley. These hubs have offered support to 2000 primary, secondary and alternative provision schools in total, and shared their strategies and resources for improving attendance.

In addition to this work, the department also aims to improve the existing evidence on which interventions work to improve attendance. Over £17 million is being invested across two mentoring projects that will support at least 12,000 pupils in 15 areas. Knowsley is one of the areas where mentors have been providing support. These programmes will be evaluated and the effective practice shared with schools and local authorities nationally.

We are also strengthening our tools for faster and more effective school improvement by launching the new Regional Improvement for Standards and Excellence (RISE) teams. Supported by over £20 million, these teams will offer both mandatory targeted intervention for schools identified by Ofsted as needing to improve and a universal service, acting as a catalyst for a self-improving system for all schools. The RISE teams are now beginning work with the first group of schools eligible for the targeted, bespoke service, with additional schools to begin in April.

School attendance is also supported by broader investments, such as funded breakfast clubs across all primary schools, to ensure children start their day ready to learn. The department is working across government on plans to provide access to specialist mental health professionals in every school, new Young Futures hubs, including access to mental health support workers, and an additional 8,500 new mental health staff to treat children and adults. The department is also committed to introducing new annual Ofsted reviews focusing on safeguarding, attendance and off-rolling.

Schools can also allocate pupil premium funding, which has now increased to over £2.9 billion for the 2024/25 financial year, to support pupils with identified needs to attend school regularly.

This government has a driving mission to break down the barriers to opportunity and end the link between background and success. Education is at the heart of this mission, ensuring all young people get the best start in life and are set-up to achieve and thrive.

This starts in the early years, ensuring that every child, including those in Knowsley, gets the best start in life and families are able to access the parenting support and high-quality early education and childcare they need to thrive. The government’s Plan for Change sets the ambition for a record number of children to start school ready to learn in 2028, and the department is taking steps through the expansion of government funded childcare, programmes to boost the quality of early education and care, and delivery of Family Hubs, including in Knowsley, to deliver on this ambition.

The department wants to drive high and rising standards for all children and young people, particularly the most disadvantaged, ensuring they have the knowledge, skills and support to thrive. The creation of Regional Improvement for Standards and Excellence (RISE) teams is a central part of our strategy to deliver high and rising standards across all schools.

RISE teams will work to create a school improvement system where all schools can navigate a path to improvement through a mix of both universal and targeted interventions. There is a wealth of excellence that exists in all parts of our school system and the new RISE teams will facilitate networking and sharing best practice, bringing together oversight and coordination of improvement programmes to empower and challenge schools to better access this support and learn from one another.

Since 2022, Knowsley has been one of department’s 24 Priority Areas. Priority Areas are areas of low attainment and high rates of disadvantage. The place-based programme aims to increase outcomes at key stage 2 and key stage 4 and has provided funding of up to £1.8 million for Knowsley schools.

Participation in the programme has been strong with nine Knowsley schools (six mainstream secondary and three alternative provision schools) taking part in the key stage 4 strand, and 50 primary schools engaging in the early years activity to improve outcomes in key stage 2. Work is currently underway to capture learning from the programme to ensure the sustainability of the work in Knowsley schools.

The department also continues to deliver a three-year attendance mentoring programme in areas of high levels of pupil absence, which includes Knowsley. The programme provides intensive one-to-one support to persistently or severely absent pupils, which covers those who currently miss more than 10% or 50% of their education respectively. All Knowsley secondary schools have engaged with the programme.

The pilot programme has already successfully supported pupils with a wide range of challenges, including low level anxiety, special educational needs, poor attitude to learning and complex family circumstances. The pilot evaluation showed improvements in individual pupils’ attendance, wellbeing, home routines and engagement at school.

It is vital that all young people have access to a range of post-16 educational options, including A levels and technical qualifications. The department recognises the concern about the lack of A level provision in Knowsley, and the reintroduction of A level provision in the borough is being considered as part of regular discussions by departmental officials with local post-16 providers on the topic of the educational offer available.

The department remains committed to increasing access to educational opportunities for children and young people in Knowsley by ensuring that they can access an inclusive and extensive educational offer that adds value and helps them to achieve their long-term career aspirations.

This government is determined to break down barriers to opportunity for all young people, essential to which is ensuring every young person has access to high-quality post-16 pathways.

It is vital that all young people have access to a range of post-16 educational options, including A levels and technical qualifications. The department recognises the concern about the lack of A level provision in Knowsley, and the reintroduction of A level provision in the borough is being considered as part of regular discussions by departmental officials with local post-16 providers on the topic of the educational offer available.

Students from Knowsley currently study A level provision in colleges in local surrounding boroughs. We understand that this necessity to travel can be a barrier to young people’s participation. Local authorities are responsible for putting in place transport arrangements to help young people aged 16 to 19 to access education or training, including those aged 19 to 24 with special educational needs.

The department remains committed to ensuring that young people have access to an inclusive and extensive educational offer that enables them to achieve and thrive. We will continue to keep this under review and make evidence-based decisions that ensure the best educational experience possible for Knowsley’s young people.

In November 2024 the number of 16 to 24 year olds in Knowsley was 655. The claimant count series counts the number of people claiming Jobseeker's Allowance plus those who claim Universal Credit and are required to seek work and be available for work.

Liverpool Mayoral Combined Authority was one of the eight trailblazer areas to test the Youth Guarantee announced in the Get Britain Working White Paper. The results from these trailblazers will help us to develop the most effective offer for all young people in England, including those in the Knowsley constituency.

The Youth Guarantee will be available to all young people aged 18-21, not just those on benefits. It will help young people to access education, training and employment support.

Local Jobcentres work closely with Knowsley Works, the Local Authority employability service, to promote Apprenticeships and Job Opportunities, as well as working in partnership to deliver employability support and events.

The Government is committed to supporting disabled people with their employment journey. We are delivering a range of initiatives in Knowsley and across Merseyside to support disabled people into work including support from Work Coaches and Disability Employment Advisers in Jobcentres and through Access to Work grants.

Disability Employment Advisers hold regular health-themed events in both Kirkby and Huyton Jobcentres, alongside partner organisations that support customers with managing health conditions and gaining skills. All events have a ‘quiet hour’, accessible for customers with Autism, special educational needs and mental health issues. Where health presents a barrier to employment, customers can benefit from additional time with a Work Coach.

Employers play a key role in increasing employment opportunities and supporting disabled people and those with health conditions to thrive as part of the workforce. Local employers attend Kirkby and Huyton Jobcentres each week, and over fifty Disability Confident employers joined an employment event in Merseyside recently, all with vacancies and over 400 customers attending. The department works closely with Knowsley Chamber with regular sessions delivered to employers on Disability Confident and Access to Work, supporting them with reasonable adjustments for new employees and helping to retain staff.

As part of a wider project across Liverpool City Region, we are collaborating with Knowsley Borough Council to support people with special educational needs, disabled young adults, their parents, schools and colleges across Merseyside, on the transition between education and employment. This includes ‘Meet the Employer Sessions’ in our Jobcentres, with information on jobs, training and apprenticeships.

We have close links with Knowsley Works who run a positive inclusion programme for customers with physical and mental health needs. For customers with addiction issues, we have close working with Individual Placement and Support who attend our Jobcentres to speak to customers and work with peer mentors to encourage them to make better choices.

Several programmes have been funded locally to support disabled people move closer to work in Knowsley, including ‘Stepping Forward’, counselling and support for those customers who struggle to leave the house due to physical and mental impairments, dyslexia support which includes assessment and one-to-one support to help customers gain and retain employment and autism support.

Statistics for the total number of people living in relative and absolute poverty are not available at a constituency level.

Statistics on the total number of people in living in relative and absolute poverty both before and after housing costs at regional level are published annually in the Households Below Average Income statistics Households below average income (HBAI) statistics - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab)

Statistics on the number of Children living in absolute and relative poverty per constituency are published annually in the “Children in low income families: local area statistics” publication and can be found in tabs “5_Relative_ParlC” and “6_Absolute_ParlC”. These are only produced on a before housing cost basis.

A link to these statistics can be found here: Children in low income families: local area statistics 2014 to 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

The Department has not made a specific funding allocation for preparing the National Cancer Plan. Further funding for cancer services will be considered as part of the upcoming spending review.

The National Cancer Plan will have patients at its heart and will cover the entirety of the cancer pathway, from referral and diagnosis to treatment and aftercare. It will seek to improve every aspect of cancer care to improve the experience and outcomes for people with cancer, including anyone with secondary and metastatic cancer. Our goal is to reduce the number of lives lost to cancer over the next ten years. On 4 February 2025, we launched a Call for Evidence, in which the views of people across the country will inform our plan to improve cancer care. Those who wish to share their views can do so on the new online platform. Further information is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/calls-for-evidence/shaping-the-national-cancer-plan

Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust is committed to improving timely access to Knowsley Paediatric Speech and Language Therapy. There are currently 115 children and young people awaiting their first appointment in Knowsley. 94% of these are within the 18-week waiting time standard, with the average wait time approximately eight weeks.

The trust continues to work with partners to reduce waiting times with children and young people being prioritised for follow up appointments based on clinical need, the level of clinical risk and we ensure they are waiting safely. The trust will also continue to work in partnership with partners and families to meet the speech, language and communication needs of children and young people in the most appropriate setting to their therapy needs and speech therapy goals.

Services for those with musculoskeletal (MSK) conditions, including arthritis, are commissioned locally by integrated care boards (ICBs). The Department expects MSK services to be fully incorporated into integrated care system planning and decision-making.

As announced in the Get Britain Working white paper, we are delivering the joint Department for Work and Pensions, the Department of Health and Social Care, and NHS England Getting It Right First-Time (GIRFT) MSK Community Delivery Programme. With a £3.5 million funding boost, the GIRFT teams will deploy their proven Further Faster model to work with ICB leaders to further reduce MSK community waiting times, including for those with arthritis, and improve data and metrics, and referral pathways to wider support services.

We will deliver an extra 40,000 operations, scans, and appointments per week during our first year in Government, as a first step in our commitment to ensuring patients can expect to be treated within 18 weeks. The Government announced £1.5 billion of new capital investment in the Autumn Budget, including investment for new diagnostic scanners and surgical hubs. This investment in scanners will build capacity for over 30,000 additional procedures and 1.25 million diagnostic tests as they come online.

To support health and care professionals in the early diagnosis and management of rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis, and in the provision of services for people living with arthritis, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence has published expert guidance for rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis, which are available, respectively, at the following two links:

https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng100

https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng226

The Department funds research into MSK conditions, including arthritis, through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). Through that route, the Department spent approximately £26.3 million on MSK research in 2023/24 and £79.2 million since 2019/20. In particular, the Leeds Biomedical Research Centre aims to improve treatment for osteoarthritis. The NIHR, in collaboration with Versus Arthritis, also funds a dedicated UK Musculoskeletal Translational Research Collaboration, aligning investment in MSK translational research and creating a United Kingdom-wide ambition and focus to drive cutting edge research and improve outcomes for patients.

The Department regularly monitors waiting lists for community services, including speech and language therapy, and is committed to reducing long waits and improving timely access to community health services, including for speech and language therapy services for children. Community health services, including speech and language therapy, are locally commissioned to enable systems to best meet the needs of their communities.

The United Kingdom faces significant health inequalities, with life expectancy varying widely across and within communities. The Government is committed to building a fairer Britain by tackling the structural inequalities that contribute to poor health, particularly for disadvantaged groups.

Existing initiatives to reduce inequalities in relation to health services in England include NHS England’s ‘Core 20 Plus 5’, which focuses on improving the five clinical areas at most need of accelerated improvement in the poorest 20 percent of the population, along with other underserved population groups identified at a local level, including groups that share protected characteristics, and socially excluded groups such as people experiencing homelessness.

The Office of Health Improvement and Disparities’ North West Regional Team provides system leadership for population health and reducing health inequalities across the North West. Across Cheshire and Merseyside, partners are working together as part of the All Together Fairer collaborative to improve health equity and the social determinants of health through measurable actions for each place to create a fairer, more equitable society.

Knowsley is one of 75 local authorities with high levels of deprivation receiving funding to improve outcomes for families with babies as part of the approximately £300 million Family Hubs and Start for Life Programme.

As part of our Safer Streets Mission we will restore neighbourhood policing, with 13,000 additional police officers, PCSOs and special constables in neighbourhood policing roles across England and Wales. Every part of the country needs to benefit from this pledge, and of course that includes Knowsley.

The Home Office is working closely with policing to implement this Commitment and will announce its plans for the delivery of neighbourhood officers shortly.

Halving national levels of knife crime over the next decade is a key part of the Government’s mission to ensure the safety of our streets.

We will continue to support police forces, agencies and those who share our ambition to halve knife crime, to take actions that work most effectively in their local communities. As we do so, the Government will continue to draw on the best available evidence on both prevention and enforcement and will closely monitor trends in national and local levels of knife crime.

We have also created a new Young Futures programme which will include the setting up of Prevention Partnerships across England and Wales – to help areas intervene earlier to stop young people being drawn into crime. It is vital we have a system that can identify and support those young people who need it most.

Under the previous Government, Merseyside has received over £20m to develop its Violence Reduction Partnership (VRP) since 2019, with an additional £4.34m available this financial year. The Merseyside VRP works closely with a range of partners to deliver targeted preventative interventions. These include Hospital Navigators (youth workers based in A&E settings who engage young people at critical ‘teachable moments’ to steer them away from violence), whole family cognitive behavioural therapy programmes, social skills training, broader mentoring initiatives, and sports-based diversionary activities. This work includes targeted delivery in areas within Knowsley.

We recognise the valuable work and significant progress VRUs have made in understanding and preventing serious violence. The proposed Police Funding Settlement for 2025-26 includes £49.7m to ensure continuation of the Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) programme.

Tackling anti-social behaviour (ASB) is a top priority for this Government and a key part of our Safer Streets Mission.

The Government recently announced Respect Orders, which will be introduced in the forthcoming Crime and Policing Bill. Respect Orders can be applied for by police and local councils and are issued by the courts. They will enable courts to place wide-ranging restrictions on the behaviour of the most persistent and disruptive ASB offenders.

Breach will be a criminal offence meaning officers can arrest and take action quickly to disrupt ongoing ASB. Breaches will be heard in the criminal courts who will have a wide range of sentencing options, including community orders, unlimited fines and, for the most severe cases, up to two years’ imprisonment.

We will also put thousands of neighbourhood police and community support officers into local communities so that residents have a named officer they can turn to when things go wrong.

Tackling anti-social behaviour (ASB) is a top priority for this Government and a key part of our Safer Streets Mission.

The Government recently announced Respect Orders, which will be introduced in the forthcoming Crime and Policing Bill. Respect Orders can be applied for by police and local councils and are issued by the courts. They will enable courts to place wide-ranging restrictions on the behaviour of the most persistent and disruptive ASB offenders.

Breach will be a criminal offence meaning officers can arrest and take action quickly to disrupt ongoing ASB. Breaches will be heard in the criminal courts who will have a wide range of sentencing options, including community orders, unlimited fines and, for the most severe cases, up to two years’ imprisonment.

We will also put thousands of neighbourhood police and community support officers into local communities so that residents have a named officer they can turn to when things go wrong.

We have set out to halve violence against women and girls in a decade.

This will be achieved by drastically improving the police and wider criminal justice response, including a relentless pursuit of dangerous perpetrators and sustained support for victims.

The Ministry of Justice provides core funding to Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) to allocate at their discretion, based on their assessment of local need.

All decisions on funding after March 2025 will be subject to the next spending review.

I refer my hon Friend to the answer I gave to Question UIN 19554 on 18 December 2024.

My hon Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich has also agreed to meet with my hon Friend to discuss this matter.

I refer my hon Friend to the answer I gave to Question UIN 19554 on 18 December 2024.

My hon Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich has also agreed to meet with my hon Friend to discuss this matter.