Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what her Department's definition is of expert teachers.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Recruiting and retaining high quality teachers is critical to the government’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity and boost the life chances for every child. This is why the government’s Plan for Change has committed to recruiting an additional 6,500 new expert teachers in secondary and special schools, and in our colleges, over the course of this Parliament.
The term ‘expert teacher’ focuses on the qualities and expertise it requires to be a high quality teacher and ensuring that teaching remains a valued profession. Quality teaching is essential to reduce the attainment gap and is the most significant in-school and college determinant of pupil outcomes.
This is why the department has put in place initiatives to ensure teachers are better qualified and better trained. We are introducing legislation to ensure new teachers have or are working towards qualified teacher status, and to help further improve teacher quality from September 2025, we will also introduce the new initial teacher training and early career framework, replacing the current initial teacher training core content framework and the early career framework. We are also reviewing national professional qualification courses to align with the latest evidence and best practice.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether the fall in the number of children at independent schools was in line with her Department’s projections.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Pupil numbers remain firmly within expectations and higher than 2021/22. As a percentage of the overall school population, private school pupils have remained the same, at 6.5%. It has been between 6% and 7% for the last two decades.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 9 June 2025 to Question 54726 on Schools: internet, what steps she is taking to ensure blocks on illegal content are (a) technically enforced and (b) cannot be overridden in all education settings.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Keeping children safe is an absolute priority for this government and schools play a critical role in this.
In England, schools must procure their own technology, including filtering and monitoring systems, and ensure they meet the statutory safeguarding requirements set out in the ‘Keeping children safe in education’ (KCSIE) statutory guidance and in the filtering and monitoring standards, in order to protect students from harmful and/or illegal content. Both are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/keeping-children-safe-in-education--2 and https://www.gov.uk/guidance/meeting-digital-and-technology-standards-in-schools-and-colleges/filtering-and-monitoring-standards-for-schools-and-colleges.
The standards require filtering systems to effectively block harmful and inappropriate content using regularly updated blocklists from the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) and the Counter-Terrorism Internet Referral Unit (CTIRU). Schools cannot alter or disable these lists. Additionally, filtering providers must be members of the IWF, signed up to CTIRU, and committed to maintaining updates.
KCSIE signposts to resources to help schools make informed decisions to support safeguarding which, amongst others, includes a tool from South West Grid for Learning that allows schools to check whether their filtering provider is aligned with the necessary blocklists. This resource is available here: https://swgfl.org.uk/services/test-filtering/. We also funded the UK Safer Internet Centre to produce a series of webinars, which are available at: https://saferinternet.org.uk/blog/filtering-and-monitoring-webinars-available. We have also recently launched the plan technology for your school service which helps schools understand how to meet the standards. The guidance is available at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/plan-technology-for-your-school.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she plans to fund level 6 apprenticeships for all ages for 2027-28.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Level 6 apprenticeships are a core part of our apprenticeships offer and continue to be funded by government.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Spending Review 2025, CP 1336, published on 11 June 2025, how she plans to allocate the additional spending on (a) training and (b) apprenticeships.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The skills system is central to achieving economic growth and breaking down barriers to opportunity. The government is providing £1.2 billion of additional investment per year by 2028/29. This includes funding to support 1.3 million 16 to 19-year-olds to access high-quality training, supporting 65,000 additional learners per year by 2028/29. It will also deliver £625 million between 2025/26 and 2028/29 to train up to 60,000 skilled construction workers, as announced at Spring Statement 2025.
Further detail on funding within this allocation will be set out in due course.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Spending Review 2025, CP 1336, published on 11 June 2025, what the constituent parts are of the commitment to making at least 5% savings and efficiencies other than the changes already announced to Level 7 apprenticeships.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Spending Review 2025 delivers on the Plan for Change and sets out spending plans for the rest of the Parliament. The settlement for the department ensures that we can invest in excellence for every child, so that we break the unfair link between background and success.
As set out in the Department for Education's section of the Departmental Efficiency Delivery Plans, the department will deliver efficiencies in both its frontline and non-frontline spending.
95% of the department spending goes to the frontline and we will continue to support frontline providers in getting maximum value from every pound spent.
In relation to children’s social care, for example, the programme (joint with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government) to reform the sector focuses on preventative activity which avoids families’ needs escalating, reducing costs and demand in the system. In relation to schools, the department will work alongside the sector to go further to get best value from their resources and is expanding the suite of productivity initiatives available. We will also work with the further education (FE) sector to improve the value for money of government spend by providing FE Commissioner support to colleges and other relevant providers. We are seeking to provide opportunities for economies of scale arising from more 16 to 19-year-olds moving into post-16 education and training, simplifying processes and reducing data collection burdens, and providing greater certainty of capital funding to enable colleges with estate planning, and exploring commercial efficiencies. Further information can be found in the Departmental Efficiency Delivery Plans.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Spending Review 2025, CP 1336, published on 11 June 2025, what the £248 million of technical efficiencies are.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Spending Review 2025 delivers on the Plan for Change and sets out spending plans for the rest of the Parliament. The settlement for the department ensures we can invest in excellence for every child, so that their background will not dictate what they go on to achieve.
The department has worked with the Office for Value for Money to identify £248 million of technical efficiencies by 2028/29. Details of these technical efficiencies are included in paragraphs 2.11 to 2.13 of the Departmental Efficiency Plans document, which was published alongside the main Spending Review document. This can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/departmental-efficiency-delivery-plans.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the time series trends are of the proportion of entrants for (a) GCSEs and (b) other public examinations that use a method other than hand writing for any written, as opposed to practical or coursework, assessment for (i) special educational need or disability reasons and (ii) other reasons from the earliest year for which data are available.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
This is a matter for Ofqual, the Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation. I have asked its Chief Regulator, Sir Ian Bauckham, to write to the hon. Member for East Hampshire directly and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Spending Review 2025, CP 1336, published on 11 June 2025, what assumptions have been made about spending on (a) special educational needs and disabilities and (b) high needs.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
At the Spending Review 2025, the government announced that funding for schools will increase by £4.7 billion per year by 2028/29, compared to the 2025/26 core schools budget, which was published at the Spring Statement 2025.
This additional funding will enable us to transform the special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) system to make mainstream schools more inclusive, improve outcomes and stop parents having to fight for support.
Details of the government's intended approach to SEND reform will be set out in a Schools White Paper in the autumn. The department will also provide further details on the national funding formulae for schools and high needs for 2026/27.
Asked by: Damian Hinds (Conservative - East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether (a) history, (b) physical education, (c) Classics, (d) drama and (e) religious education are included in the set of subjects defined as key subjects for the purposes of the commitment to recruit 6,500 new expert teachers in key subjects.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
High quality teaching is the in-school factor that has the biggest positive impact on a child or young person’s outcomes in schools and colleges. This is why the government’s Plan for Change is committed to recruiting an additional 6,500 new expert teachers across secondary and special schools, and in our colleges, over the course of this Parliament.
We recognise that workforce shortages are more acute in some subjects and we have put in place a range of measures to boost recruitment and retention in these areas. We announced a £233 million initial teacher training (ITT) financial incentives package for 2025/26, which includes bursaries worth £29,000 tax-free and scholarships worth £31,000 tax-free, to encourage talented trainees to subjects such as mathematics, physics, chemistry and computing, where there is a particular need to boost recruitment. The complete list can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/funding-initial-teacher-training-itt/funding-initial-teacher-training-itt-academic-year-2025-to-2026#postgraduate-bursaries-and-scholarships.
To support retention in key subjects, in 2025/26, the department is offering a targeted retention incentive worth up to £6,000 after tax for mathematics, physics, chemistry and computing teachers in the first five years of their careers who choose to work in disadvantaged schools or teach technical subjects in further education colleges.
The department undertakes regular reviews to ensure we are prioritising the subjects where teachers are needed most, for example through our ITT bursaries, which are reviewed annually to reflect teacher supply need in each subject.