Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what discussions she has had with school leaders on the effectiveness of individual healthcare plans in schools for children with (a) epilepsy, (b) asthma, (c) a history of anaphylaxis, (d) severe allegories and (e) type 1 diabetes.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Statutory guidance, ‘Supporting pupils at school with medical conditions’, recommends the use of individual healthcare plans as good practice. They can help schools support pupils with medical conditions, providing clarity about what needs to be done, when and by whom. The school, healthcare professionals and parents should agree, based on evidence, when a healthcare plan would be appropriate. ‘Supporting pupils at school with medical conditions’ can be found here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5ce6a72e40f0b620a103bd53/supporting-pupils-at-school-with-medical-conditions.pdf.
The department will keep the statutory guidance under review as we take forward the commitment to delivering an inclusive mainstream system.
The department engages closely with school leaders and their representative organisations on a wide range of issues, including supporting pupils with medical conditions.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will review the statutory guidance on Section 100 of the Children and Families Act 2014 regarding individual healthcare plans in schools.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Statutory guidance, ‘Supporting pupils at school with medical conditions’, recommends the use of individual healthcare plans as good practice. They can help schools support pupils with medical conditions, providing clarity about what needs to be done, when and by whom. The school, healthcare professionals and parents should agree, based on evidence, when a healthcare plan would be appropriate. ‘Supporting pupils at school with medical conditions’ can be found here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5ce6a72e40f0b620a103bd53/supporting-pupils-at-school-with-medical-conditions.pdf.
The department will keep the statutory guidance under review as we take forward the commitment to delivering an inclusive mainstream system.
The department engages closely with school leaders and their representative organisations on a wide range of issues, including supporting pupils with medical conditions.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of (a) motorway noise and (b) air pollution from the M25 on schools in (i) Addlestone, (ii) Chertsey, (iii) Downside, (iv) Egham, (v) New Haw and (vi) Row Town in 2023-24.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Local outdoor air quality is the responsibility of local authorities who should prepare local air quality strategies to ensure that air quality in their area is improved.
The department takes the health, safety, and wellbeing of school users very seriously and publishes a range of guidance documents, such as the Building Bulletins, which support the provision of healthy school environments.
Where the department is centrally delivering school building projects, such as through the School Rebuilding Programme, all relevant and necessary surveys will be undertaken on the projects to inform the scheme proposals, and this list of surveys will be informed by local context and guidance from the Local Planning Authority and Statutory Consultees.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to (a) train, (b) recruit and (c) retain educational psychologists.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Educational psychologists play a critical role in the support available to children and young people, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). However, the department knows that current workforce shortages are a barrier to delivering its ambition for an inclusive mainstream education system.
Whilst it is the responsibility of local authorities, as employers, to recruit to their educational psychology services, the department is taking measures to support these services by investing in building the training pipeline.
The department is investing over £21 million to train 400 more educational psychologists from this year. This builds on the £10 million currently being invested in a cohort of over 200 trainees who began their training in September 2023.
Following graduation, trainees who have had their training funded by the department are required to remain in local authority employment for a minimum period. To support local authority services to recruit and retain their educational psychology workforce, this requirement will increase to three years for those trainees beginning their course this year. This will allow local authority services to benefit from the public investment in training and will support their delivery of statutory assessments and wider work.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of (a) staff training and (b) equipment for the emergency treatment of anaphylaxis in schools.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Section 100 of the Children and Families Act 2014 places a duty on maintained schools, Academies and Pupil Referral Units (PRUs) to make arrangements to support pupils with medical conditions.
The accompanying statutory guidance, entitled Supporting Pupils at School with Medical Conditions, makes clear to schools what is expected of them in taking reasonable steps to fulfil their legal obligations and to meet the individual needs of pupils with medical conditions, including allergies. Schools should ensure they are aware of any pupils with medical conditions and have policies and processes in place to ensure these can be well managed.
The guidance is clear that policy should include how it will be implemented, what should happen in an emergency situation and the role individual healthcare plans play in supporting pupils. The policy should set out how staff will be supported in carrying out their role to support pupils, including how training needs are assessed and how training is commissioned and provided. Any member of school staff providing support to a pupil with medical needs should have received suitable training.
The department included a reminder to schools of these duties in its regular schools’ email bulletin in both March and September this year. In the same communication, the department also alerted schools to the newly created Schools Allergy Code. The Code was developed by The Allergy Team, Independent Schools’ Bursars Association (ISBA) and the Benedict Blythe Foundation, who are all trusted voices on the matter of allergies. The department has now also added a link to the Code to its online allergy guidance on GOV.UK.
Regarding equipment, in 2017, the Department of Health (now the Department of Health and Social Care) published non-statutory guidance to accompany a legislative change to allow schools to purchase spare adrenaline auto-injectors (AAIs) from a pharmacy, without a prescription and for use in an emergency situation. This guidance is kept under review and gives clear advice to schools on the recognition and management of an allergic reaction and anaphylaxis, and outlines when and how an AAI should be administered for pupils in schools.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will rebuild the Magna Carta School in Egham.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Magna Carta was announced as part of the school rebuilding programme in February 2024. The department remains committed to rebuild or refurbish all schools within the programme and we can confirm that early planning work for Magna Carta has started.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, which schools are participating in the Nuffield Early Language Intervention programme; and how much funding is provided to each school as part of the Early Language and Support for Every Child in Surrey.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
There are 11,100 schools registered for the Nuffield Early Language Intervention (NELI) programme currently, following the continuation of the programme for an additional academic year, which was announced in July 2024. The full list of schools registered to deliver the NELI programme is published online at the following link: www.gov.uk/government/publications/neli-nuffield-early-language-intervention-programme.
The department and NHSE are funding nine Early Language and Support Every Child (ELSEC) pathfinders, one per Department for Education region and each receiving £500,000 in the 2024/25 financial year.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the (a) adequacy of and (b) geographical inequalities in access to Speech and Language Screening in educational and early years settings.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
The department is aware that the most prevalent type of primary need identified among pupils with special educational needs (SEN) is ‘speech, language and communication needs’ (SLCN). Our vision for children and young people with SLCN is the same as it is for all children and young people. We want them to receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life.
The statutory Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) two-year old progress check and the Healthy Child Programme (HCP) development review offer two valuable opportunities to identify additional needs, including speech and language needs, for children aged 2 to 3 and put the right support in place for the children who need it.
The department is funding support for 11,100 schools registered for the Nuffield Early Language Intervention programme. The majority of these are schools with the highest levels of disadvantage, as defined by the percentage of pupils eligible for free school meals. As of January 2024, we estimate over 211,000 reception age children so far have received this extra support.
In partnership with NHS England, we are funding the Early Language and Support for Every Child (ELSEC) pathfinder programme, to trial new ways of working to earlier identify and support children with SLCN in early years and primary schools, utilising Therapy Support Assistants and a variation of identification tools across the pathfinders.
The department will consider how best to use learnings and insights from these programmes to improve support for children with SLCNs, including consistency of support provided across different geographies.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an estimate of the total number of (a) children whose parents or guardians have applied for them from independent to state sector schools and (b) independent schools that (i) closed and (ii) have announced their closure since 29 July 2024, broken down by constituency.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department does not hold data on the total number of children whose parents or guardians have applied for them to move from independent to state sector schools.
The Get Information about Schools website shows that five private schools across four constituencies have closed since 29 July 2024. These are shown in the table below and are also available at the following link: https://get-information-schools.service.gov.uk/.
Constituency | Number of schools closed |
Cities of London and Westminster | 2 |
Ealing Central and Acton | 1 |
North Dorset | 1 |
South West Norfolk | 1 |
The department does not routinely gather information on potential private school closures.
Since 29 July 2024, 15 private schools have opened.
Asked by: Ben Spencer (Conservative - Runnymede and Weybridge)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the covid-19 outbreak, what recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of availability of courses for international students at UK universities for academic year 2020-2021.
Answered by Michelle Donelan
Teaching, learning and assessment in higher education (HE) are not stopping. We are working with the sector to ensure universities are able to make all reasonable efforts to enable all students, both international and domestic, to continue and complete their studies; for their achievements to be reliably assessed; and for qualifications to be awarded securely.
Despite the significant disruption being felt across the HE sector, students deserve appropriate support and recognition for their hard work and dedication - many universities and colleges have moved rapidly to develop new ways of delivering courses through online teaching and alternatives to traditional end-of-course exams.
Our universities will always be open to international students. Both the government and the HE sector are working together to ensure existing rules and processes are as flexible as possible under the current unprecedented circumstances, to ensure that international students who are planning to study at a UK institution from autumn 2020 can do so.
The UK looks forward to continuing to welcome international students in the future. They enrich UK HE culturally, socially and economically, and are one of the reasons why our HE sector remains world-class.