Asked by: Damien Egan (Labour - Bristol North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent discussions she has had with local authorities on the provision of independent travel training for young people with SEND.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
The department publishes statutory guidance to assist local authorities in meeting their home to school travel duties. The guidance says that wherever possible, local authorities should offer independent travel training to children with special educational needs or disabilities who are eligible for free travel to school and who they think will be able to complete the programme. This guidance can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/home-to-school-travel-and-transport-guidance.
Departmental officials engage regularly with local authorities and host bi-monthly online meetings, to which all local authority school travel officers are invited, to share good practice and seek advice from one another and the department.
Asked by: Damien Egan (Labour - Bristol North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help improve access to therapy services for children in care.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Children in care and care leavers are significantly more likely to have poor mental health. The department’s latest data shows that two thirds of children become looked after due to abuse or neglect and we know that care experienced adults are at 4 to 5 times greater risk of suicide attempt than their peers. Providing effective support is crucial given the significant trauma that many of these children and young people have experienced and its lasting impact.
To support looked after children, looked after children attract pupil premium plus funding of £2,570 per year. This is managed by the local authority’s virtual school head and can be used to facilitate a wide range of educational support including additional mentoring, tuition, and therapeutic services.
Given our significant concerns for the health and wellbeing of children in care and care leavers, the department is working alongside the Department of Health and Social Care to review and update current statutory guidance on promoting the health and wellbeing of looked-after children. This guidance sets expectations on local authorities, Directors of Public Health, commissioners of health services for children, NHS England and others, for the promotion of physical, emotional and mental health.
Regulations require an assessment of physical, emotional and mental health needs for every child when they enter care and a plan to be developed to address their needs.
As part of the department’s statutory guidance review, we will consider what changes are needed to further ensure that children in care and care leavers receive the support they need for their physical and mental health and wellbeing, including access to any needed treatment or therapy.
In addition to the statutory guidance review, the department is also undertaking a programme of work specific to children with complex needs. Children with complex needs and multiple needs are some of our most vulnerable children in the care system. The outcomes for these children can often be very poor, with neither children’s social care nor health services alone capable of meeting their needs, and services not working effectively together for these children.
Since July 2023, the department and NHS England have jointly led a Task and Finish Group to consider how to improve the way system partners work together to support and improve outcomes for children and young people who are deprived of their liberty and who are in the most complex situations.
Drawing on the best evidence, including the voice of children, input from professionals and commissioned research, the department will, in collaboration with NHS England, test a new, community-based approach to pathways and provision which provides treatment and care, bringing in professionals from children’s social care, health, justice and education. This will enable the system to deliver specialist care and accommodation for children who have complex needs.
We have also recently commissioned independent research on how the system works, its current impacts and how we could do things differently to achieve better outcomes for children and young people. We plan to publish this research in summer 2025. We will draw on these reports to support the development and testing of evidence-based models of safe, therapeutic care that delivers integrated, consistent, and collaborative practices for these children and young people.
Asked by: Damien Egan (Labour - Bristol North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment her Department has made of trends in the levels of teacher recruitment and retention.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
I refer my hon. Friend, the Member for Bristol North East, to the answer of 13 March 2025 to Question 35471.
Asked by: Damien Egan (Labour - Bristol North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many and what proportion of local authorities in England offer independent travel training for young people with SEND.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
The department’s statutory guidance for local authorities states that wherever possible, local authorities should offer independent travel training to children with special educational needs or disabilities who are eligible for free travel to school and who they think will be able to complete the programme. This guidance can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/home-to-school-travel-and-transport-guidance.
The department does not hold the information requested. We are, however, working with local authorities to gather more data on home to school travel arrangements, including via a recent voluntary data collection.
Asked by: Damien Egan (Labour - Bristol North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment her Department has made of the adequacy of the level of knowledge and understanding of the Holocaust among school-age students in England.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
The Holocaust is the only historic event which is compulsory within the current national curriculum for history at key stage 3. The government has made a commitment that the Holocaust will remain a compulsory topic in the reformed national curriculum, which will also be required teaching in academy schools when it is implemented.
The government supports the teaching of Holocaust education in schools and colleges by funding teachers’ professional development in this subject through University College London’s Centre for Holocaust Education and the Holocaust Educational Trust’s ‘Lessons from Auschwitz’ project, which gives students aged 16 to 18 the opportunity to visit Auschwitz-Birkenau.
In addition, a further £2 million funding for Holocaust remembrance and education was committed at the Autumn Budget 2024. This will be used to support the ambition set by my right hon. Friend, the Prime Minister for all students to have the opportunity to hear a recorded survivor testimony. The department is currently exploring how it can support schools to fulfil this ambition.
Asked by: Damien Egan (Labour - Bristol North East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the adequacy of therapy services for children in care.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Children in care and care leavers are significantly more likely to have poor mental health. The latest data shows that two thirds of children become looked after due to abuse or neglect and the department knows that care experienced adults are at four to five times greater risk of attempting suicide than their peers. With consideration for the significant trauma that many of these children and young people have experienced and its lasting impact, providing effective support is crucial.
Since July 2023, the department and NHS England have jointly led a Task and Finish Group to consider how to improve the way system partners work together to support and improve outcomes for children and young people who are deprived of their liberty and who are in the most complex situations.
The department has recently commissioned independent research on how the system works, its current impacts, and how we could do things differently to achieve better outcomes for children and young people. We plan to publish this research in summer 2025 and will draw on these reports to support the development and testing of evidence-based models of safe, therapeutic care that delivers integrated, consistent and collaborative practices for these children and young people.
Drawing on the best evidence, including the voices of children, input from professionals and commissioned research, the department will, in collaboration with NHS England, test a new, community-based approach to pathways and provision, providing treatment and care and bringing in professionals from children’s social care, health, justice and education. This will enable the system to deliver specialist care and accommodation for children who have complex needs.
Given our significant concerns for the health and wellbeing of children in care and care leavers, the department and the Department of Health and Social Care are reviewing and updating current statutory guidance on promoting the health and wellbeing of looked-after children. This guidance sets expectations on local authorities, Directors of Public Health, commissioners of health services for children, the NHS in England, and others, for the promotion of physical, emotional and mental health.
Regulations require an assessment of physical, emotional and mental health needs for every child when they enter care, and a plan to be developed to address their needs.
As part of our statutory guidance review, the department will consider what changes are needed to further ensure that children in care and care leavers receive the support they need for their physical and mental health and wellbeing, including access to any needed treatment or therapy.
Additionally, looked after children attract Pupil Premium Plus funding of £2,570 per year. This is managed by the local authority’s virtual school head and can be used to facilitate a wide range of educational support, including additional mentoring, tuition and therapeutic services.