Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to (a) support children in foster care and (b) the work of foster carers (i) in South Norfolk constituency and (ii) nationally.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The government is committed to ensuring that every child in care grows up with the love, care and support they need to achieve and thrive. All foster carers receive the National Minimum Allowance (NMA) to cover the costs of looking after the children in their care. In the 2025/26 financial year, the NMA is being uplifted by 3.55%.
The government is supporting children in care by expanding the Mockingbird Family Model, which is an innovative evidence-based approach. Relationships are central to the design of the programme which involves six to ten satellite families grouped into a constellation around a hub home carer.
In South Norfolk, this is being delivered as part of the Foster East Recruitment Hub, which launched in 2024 and comprises 12 neighbouring local authorities, including Bedford, Central Bedfordshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Luton, Thurrock, Southend, Peterborough and Cambridgeshire.
Across England, ten fostering regional programmes are live, working with 64% of all local authorities to collaboratively recruit and retain foster carers who will provide loving homes, local to the children who need them. An additional £15 million was announced to support this programme in the budget and the department intends to move towards full national roll out in the next financial year. The department welcomes discussions with other local authorities about our national expansion plans.
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what proportion of the total Government budget to tackle homelessness was allocated to allocated to Norfolk County Council in this financial year.
Answered by Rushanara Ali - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
Homelessness funding across Norfolk is provided through allocations to Norwich, North Norfolk, King's Lynn & West Norfolk, South Norfolk & Broadland, and Breckland. Individual programme allocations for the 2024/25 financial year can be accessed using the following links:
Homelessness Prevention Grant (HPG)
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/homelessness-prevention-grant-2023-to-2025 (Collection)
Rough Sleeping Initiative (RSI)
Rough Sleeping Winter Pressures
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much additional funding her Department has allocated for special educational needs provision by Norfolk County Council since the Autumn Budget 2024.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
This government’s ambition is that all children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) or in alternative provision receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life.
Following the Autumn Budget, the department is providing an increase of almost £1 billion for high needs budgets in England in the 2025/26 financial year, bringing total high needs funding for children and young people with complex SEND to £11.9 billion. Of that total, Norfolk County Council is being allocated over £153 million through the high needs funding block of the dedicated schools grant (DSG), an increase of £11.1 million on this year’s DSG high needs block, calculated using the high needs national funding formula (NFF). This NFF allocation is an 8% increase per head of their 2 to 18-year-old population, on their equivalent 2024/25 NFF allocation.
As also announced at the Autumn Budget, the department is receiving compensation in recognition of the increase in national insurance contributions paid by schools and other state-funded SEND provision. That funding is additional to the £1 billion increase in high needs funding. Due to timing constraints, it will be provided as a separate grant, alongside the 2025/26 DSG for local authorities, and the department will provide further information on the allocations as soon as possible.
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help tackle the disparity in progress 8 attainment between students who (a) are and (b) are not eligible for free school meals (i) in South Norfolk constituency and (ii) nationally.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Too many children are held back by their background, with gaps between disadvantaged children and their peers opening early and widening throughout their education. These gaps are not acceptable, which is why the Opportunity Mission will break the link between young people’s background and their success by helping all children achieve and thrive wherever they are in the country.
High and rising standards in every school, delivered though excellent teaching and a shared, knowledge-rich and engaging curriculum, are at the heart of the mission. Great schools need great teachers, and the quality of teaching is the single most important in-school factor in improving outcomes for children, especially for those from disadvantaged backgrounds. That is why the department has moved quickly by beginning work to recruit 6,500 expert teachers and launching the Curriculum and Assessment Review that will look closely at the barriers which hold children back from the opportunities and life chances they deserve, in particular those who are socioeconomically disadvantaged or with special educational needs or disabilities.
New Regional Improvement for Standards and Excellence (RISE) teams will drive higher standards, supporting all state schools by facilitating networking, sharing best practice and enabling schools to better access support, and learn from one another, in addition to providing bespoke intervention packages to driving up outcomes where standards are slipping.
To further support disadvantaged children, pupil premium funding is allocated to schools to support the educational outcomes of disadvantaged pupils and is worth over £2.9 billion in the 2024/25 financial year.
Alongside this, in 2025/26, 10.6% (£5.1 billion) of the schools national funding formula (NFF) has been allocated through deprivation factors and 17.8% (£8.6 billion) has been allocated for additional needs overall. Furthermore, in 2025/26, on average, the most deprived schools have attracted the largest per pupil funding amounts through the schools NFF. This will help schools in their vital work to close attainment gaps and break down barriers to opportunity.
The department is also committed to offering free breakfast clubs in all state-funded schools with primary-aged pupils, ensuring every primary school child, no matter their circumstances, is well prepared for school. From April 2025, up to 750 early adopter schools will be funded to provide access to a free, universal breakfast club lasting at least 30 minutes that includes food.
More widely, my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education co-chairs the government’s Child Poverty Taskforce which will drive cross-government action on child poverty, starting with the development of an ambitious child poverty strategy, which will be published later this year.
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the average waiting time was in the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital emergency department in each of the last ten years.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The data is not available in the format requested. Provisional data for the median average time spent at National Health Service trust emergency departments is published by NHS England each month, and is available at the following link:
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many incidents of flooding have been reported in (a) South Norfolk constituency and (b) Norfolk in the last five years.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Lead Local Flood Authorities undertake formal investigations after significant floods and produce Section 19 reports, which include the number of properties affected. Not all floods require a Section 19 investigation. Criteria for investigation include the number of properties internally flooded, nature of flooding, frequency of flooding, and critical infrastructure affected.
Over the last five years, Norfolk County Council recorded over 900 reports of flooding to properties, 139 of those in the South Norfolk Constituency. In this period, the most significant flooding event in this Constituency occurred on 23 and 24 December 2020 with 83 properties flooded.
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what proportion of single justice procedure convictions were for which recordable offences in the most recent year for which data is available.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
There were no defendants dealt with for any recordable offences under single justice procedure in the 12 months between September 2023 and September 2024, which is the most recent year for which data is available. Therefore, we can assume there were no convictions for recordable offences under SJP in this period.
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to improve access to NHS dentistry in (a) South Norfolk constituency and (b) Norfolk.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government plans to tackle the challenges for patients trying to access National Health Service dental care with a rescue plan to provide 700,000 more urgent dental appointments and recruit new dentists to the areas that need them most. To rebuild dentistry in the long term and increase access to NHS dental care, we will reform the dental contract, with a shift to focus on prevention and the retention of NHS dentists.
The responsibility for commissioning primary care services, including NHS dentistry, to meet the needs of the local population has been delegated to the integrated care boards (ICBs) across England. For the South Norfolk constituency, this is the NHS Norfolk and Waveney ICB.
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many and what proportion of the people serving life sentences for second listed offences in prisons in England and Wales on 31 October 2024 were sentenced (a) on or prior to 9 November 2000, (b) between 9 November 2000 and 4 April 2005 and (c) after 4 April 2005.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
Information that would enable us to answer these questions robustly is not collated centrally, and to obtain it would involve a manual interrogation of courts and prison records which would result in a disproportionate cost to the Department.
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many of the people serving life sentences for second listed offences in prisons in England and Wales on the 31 October 2024 (a) were serving a recall and (b) have never been released.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
Information that would enable us to answer these questions robustly is not collated centrally, and to obtain it would involve a manual interrogation of courts and prison records which would result in a disproportionate cost to the Department.