Pupil Premium

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Wednesday 17th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Laws]

I agree with my hon. Friend on both those points. Schools already have a duty at the very least to put on their websites the ways in which they are spending that money and to be as clear as possible with parents and pupils, rather than simply putting broad statements on their websites. The schools that have so far not realised what the money is for—if there are such schools—or that are not spending it effectively will soon find that they have no choice other than to focus on what the money is designed for, because this is now a key part of the Ofsted inspection framework. In my experience, the one thing that teachers and head teachers pay very close attention to is the chief inspector of schools.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Primary school teachers in Newcastle do tremendous work, maximising the educational opportunities of children often in very challenging circumstances. They will welcome this additional money, but to justify that welcome, will the Minister confirm whether this is additional money to what has already been announced in the comprehensive spending review?

[Mr Laws]

It is the allocation of the last tranche of pupil premium money, which is additional money. What that says is that having announced almost £1.9 billion of pupil premium money so far, we have taken the very deliberate decision for the final tranche of extra money that we have allocated in the last year to go predominantly to primary schools to support this intervention. It is additional money.