Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to help support children with special educational needs in the London Borough of Bexley.
Answered by David Johnston
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many students who have started T-Level courses have not completed them in the last two years.
Answered by Luke Hall
The department’s recently published 2023/24 T Level Action Plan outlines the developments and next steps for T Levels and includes the latest student data for the programme. It shows that 5,321 students began their T Level in 2021/22. In summer 2023, 3,592 of those students were retained (68%), and 3,510 were retained and assessed (66%). Further data about T Levels, as well as details of the methodology used in the above can be found here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66290c86b0ace32985a7e6d6/T_Level_action_plan_-_analytical_annex.pdf.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department are taking to encourage businesses to invest in skills training.
Answered by Luke Hall
This government is committed to delivering a world-leading skills system which is employer-focused, high-quality, and fit for the future. The department’s reforms are backed with an investment of £3.8 billion over the course of this Parliament to strengthen higher and further education to help more people get good jobs, upskill and retrain throughout their lives and to improve national productivity.
Over 5,000 employers have been involved in the development of nearly 700 high-quality apprenticeships to meet their industry skills needs. To support employers of all sizes offer apprenticeships, the government has increased investment in apprenticeships to over £2.7 billion in the 2024/25 financial year. This includes investing a further £60 million to meet overall increased employer demand for apprenticeships and encourage small-medium enterprises (SMEs) to take on young apprentices.
From April, the department pays 100% of training costs when SMEs take on new apprentices aged 16-21. Additionally, larger employers can now transfer more of their levy funds (50% increased from 25%) to support businesses of all sizes, which will help more employers to invest in apprenticeship training.
Skills Bootcamps offer free, flexible courses of up to 16 weeks, giving people the chance to build sector-specific skills with an offer of a job interview on completion. Training providers work with employers to ensure training is designed to teach the skills employers need. To date, over 1000 employers have been involved in Skills Bootcamps. Employers play a range of roles from supporting the design and delivery of the training, to recruiting learners that complete training into a job, or an apprenticeship. Employers can also use Skills Bootcamps to upskill their existing employees, subject to a 10% contribution for SMEs and 30% contribution for large employers.
Institutes of Technology bring education and business closer together, creating unique collaborations between colleges, universities and industry which deliver higher-level technical education with a clear route to high skilled employment. The department has provided £300 million of capital funding for infrastructure and industry standard equipment to increase capacity to deliver level 4/5 technical skills. In addition, employer partners were encouraged to provide additional support (monetary and in kind) which for the wave 2 competition was set at 35% of value of capital expenditure.
In October 2023, the department launched a new website called Skills for Careers that provides a single digital front door to information about skills training options and careers. A link to Skills for Careers can be found here: https://www.skillsforcareers.education.gov.uk/pages/skills-for-life. From Skills for Careers, users are guided through government’s skills offer from apprenticeships to Skills Bootcamps, A levels to Multiply. The website provides an overview of each option along with information about writing job applications and CVs.
Across all areas of England, employer-led Local Skills Improvement Plans (LSIPs) have helped engage thousands of local businesses and have brought them together with local providers and stakeholders to collaboratively agree and deliver actions to address local skills needs. By giving employers a more strategic role in the skills system, LSIPs are helping to drive greater employer investment in skills and ensure businesses are more actively involved in the planning, design and delivery of skills provision.
Departmental officials are also working with the Office for Investment and Department for Business and Trade to provide support for investors to navigate the skills system at a national and local level and encourage take-up of government funded skills programmes and employer investment in skills, as well as build strategic partnerships with local education and training providers. Whilst it is not a core part of their role, some of the designated employer representative bodies leading the LSIPs have engaged with inward investors as part of developing and implementing their LSIPs.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she is taking steps to increase the number of childcare places in the London Borough of Bexley.
Answered by David Johnston
Under Section 6 of the Childcare Act 2006, local authorities are responsible for ensuring that the provision of childcare is sufficient to meet the requirements of parents in their area. Part B of the early education and childcare statutory guidance for local authorities highlights that local authorities are required to report annually to elected council members on how they are meeting their duty to secure sufficient childcare, and to make this report available and accessible to parents.
The department has regular contact with each local authority in England, including Bexley, about their sufficiency of childcare and any issues that they are facing.
Where local authorities report sufficiency challenges, the department discusses what action the local authority is taking to address those issues and, where needed, the department will support the local authority with any specific requirements through its childcare sufficiency support contract.
A commitment has been made to ensure that 30 hours of funded childcare is available for every child over the age of 9 months with working parents by September 2025.
More parents are going to be able to return to work while balancing childcare commitments. This is thanks to the government’s £4 billion per year expansion of childcare in England. This is the largest expansion of funded childcare ever and will remove barriers to work for nearly half a million parents with a child under three in England.
Local authorities have received £12 million of delivery support funding for this financial year to support with meeting programme and delivery costs associated with rolling out the expanded early years entitlements. Bexley will receive money from this fund. Bexley Local Authority are due to receive £716,747.72 to enable them to deliver additional wraparound places.
The department is also allocating £100 million for local areas to use to make sure childcare settings in their areas have enough physical space. This funding is anticipated to add thousands of new places across the country. More detail on the £100 million capital funding, including allocation amounts to local authorities and accompanying guidance, will be published shortly.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many apprenticeship starts there were in (a) Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency, (b) Bexley Borough and (c) Greater London in each year since 2010.
Answered by Robert Halfon
Since the 2010/11 academic year, there have been 8,480 apprenticeship starts in Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency, 22,140 in Bexley and 529,370 in London reported to date. These totals include figures for the 2022/23 academic year, which are provisional and cover the first three quarters from August 2022 to April 2023. The full year figures for the 2022/23 academic year will be published on 30 November 2023.
Apprenticeship starts are recorded on the Individualised Learner Record and published by the department in the apprenticeships and traineeships statistics publication, which can be accessed at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/apprenticeships-and-traineeships.
Apprenticeship starts for the Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency, Bexley and London for the 2010/11 to 2022/23 academic years are available here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/befe0070-1c12-4f0f-6246-08dbea615343.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to help increase the availability of childcare in Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Shadow Minister (Equalities)
In the government’s Spring Budget, on 15 March, the government announced a number of transformative reforms to childcare for parents, children, the economy and women. By 2027/28, the government will expect to be spending in excess of £8 billion every year on free hours and early education, helping working families with their childcare costs. This announcement represents the single biggest investment in childcare in England ever.
This measure will expand the free early education entitlements offer, so that eligible working parents in England will be able to access 30 hours of childcare per week, for 38 weeks of the year, from when their child is nine months old to when they start school.
This will be rolled out in stages:
The government will also substantially uplift the hourly rate paid to local authorities to increase hourly rates paid to childcare providers, to deliver existing free entitlements offers. In 2023/24 £204 million of additional funding will be provided, paid from September 2023, rising to £288 million by 2024/25.
This will include an average of 30% increase in the two-year-old rate from September 2023, and means that the average hourly rate for two year olds will rise from the current £6 per hour in 2023/24 to around £8 per hour. The average three to four year old rate will rise in line with inflation to over £5.50 per hour from September 2023, with further uplifts beyond this.
The early years workforce makes a huge contribution to young children’s lives. Supporting and growing this workforce to deliver the transformative reforms announced by the Chancellor in the Spring Budget is a priority for the department.
The department will launch a new national recruitment campaign early next year to support the recruitment and retention of talented staff. Alongside this, we will consider how to introduce new accelerated apprenticeship and degree apprenticeship routes so everyone from junior staff to senior leaders can easily move into a career in the sector.
The department has also launched a consultation on the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) to offer providers increased flexibility and alleviate known burdens, exploring giving providers more choice over how they operate and making it easier for them to deliver the EYFS. The intention is that these changes will support settings to deliver the new entitlements announced at the Spring Budget.
Under Section 6 of the Childcare Act 2006, local authorities are responsible for ensuring that the provision of childcare is sufficient to meet the requirements of parents in their area. Part B of the Early education and childcare statutory guidance for local authorities highlights that local authorities are required to report annually to elected council members on how they are meeting their duty to secure sufficient childcare, and to make this report available and accessible to parents. The guidance can be found at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1149556/Early_education_and_childcare_statutory_guidance_-_April_2023.pdf.
The department has regular contact with each local authority in England about their sufficiency of childcare and any issues they are facing, including Bexley local authority, who oversee the Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency.
Where local authorities report sufficiency challenges, the department discuss what action the local authority is taking to address those issues.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many (a) primary and (b) secondary school students receive free school meals in the Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Department publishes figures on the proportion of pupils who are eligible for free school meals (FSM). The most recently published figures are available at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-pupils-and-their-characteristics. In the 2022/23 academic year, 1,557 primary and 1,350 secondary pupils were eligible for FSM in the Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the average funding per pupil in mainstream schools was in (a) Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency, (b) the London Borough of Bexley and (c) England in each of the last three years.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The table below shows the average funding per pupil provided for mainstream schools in the London Borough of Bexley, and England, through the Dedicated Schools Grant, the Schools Supplementary Grant (SSG) in 2022/23 only, and the Mainstream Schools Additional Grant (MSAG) in 2023/24 only, since the 2021/22 financial year.
Per pupil funding excludes growth funding.
Financial year | Bexley | England |
2021/22 | £5,211 | £5,212 |
2022/23 | £5,543 | £5,534 |
2023/24 | £5,890 | £5,839 |
The Department, through the schools National Funding Formula (NFF), calculates notional funding allocations for each mainstream school. These are then aggregated for each Local Authority. National and Local Authority average per pupil figures are based on the actual funding schools receive from these aggregated allocations.
Each Local Authority then determines individual schools’ final funding allocations through their own local formula. The Department does not hold this information, and therefore cannot calculate constituency-level per pupil averages.
The table below shows the average funding per pupil that mainstream schools in the Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency have attracted through the schools NFF since the 2021/22 financial year, rather than their actual allocations from their Local Authority.
Financial year | Bexleyheath and Crayford |
2021/22 | £5,285 |
2022/23 | £5,435 |
2023/24 | £5,738 |
On top of this funding through the schools NFF, all schools in Bexleyheath and Crayford received additional funding through the SSG in 2022/23, worth an average additional £159 per pupil, and are receiving funding from the MSAG in 2023/24, worth an average additional £195 per pupil.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate she has made of the number of people beginning apprenticeships in Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency in each year since 2010.
Answered by Robert Halfon
Apprenticeship starts for Bexleyheath and Crayford from the 2010/11 to 2021/22 academic years are shown in the table below:
Academic Year | Apprenticeship Starts |
2010/11 | 630 |
2011/12 | 740 |
2012/13 | 790 |
2013/14 | 640 |
2014/15 | 700 |
2015/16 | 730 |
2016/17 | 690 |
2017/18 | 620 |
2018/19 | 710 |
2019/20 | 560 |
2020/21 | 580 |
2021/22 | 590 |
2022/23 Aug to Jan | 300 |
Total since May 2010 | 8,350 |
Notes:
(1) Figures are rounded to the nearest 10.
(2) Data source is the Individualised Learner Record.
(3) Location is based upon the home postcode of the learner.
(4) Starts are the count of apprenticeships started at any point during the stated academic period. Learners starting more than one apprenticeship will appear more than once.
Further information on apprenticeship starts can be found in the apprenticeships and traineeships statistics publication, which can be accessed at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/apprenticeships-and-traineeships.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to improve the recruitment and retention of teachers.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The number of teachers remains high, with over 465,500 full time equivalent teachers working in state funded schools across the country. That is over 24,000 more than in 2010.
The Department’s reforms are aimed at increasing teacher recruitment and at ensuring teachers across England stay and thrive in the profession.
The Department announced a £181 million financial incentives package for those starting initial teacher training in the 2023/24 academic year. The Department is providing bursaries worth up to £27,000 and scholarships worth up to £29,000 to encourage trainees to apply to train in key secondary subjects such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computing.
The Department provides a Levelling Up Premium worth up to £3,000 annually for mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computing teachers in the first five years of their careers who work in disadvantaged schools nationally, including within Education Investment Areas. The eligibility criteria and list of eligible schools is on GOV.UK: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/levelling-up-premium-payments-for-teachers.
The Department has recently raised starting salaries outside London by 8.9% to £28,000 and remains committed to the Government’s ambition of delivering £30,000 starting salaries to attract talented people to teaching.
To support retention in the first few years of teaching, the Department has rolled out the Early Career Framework nationally, providing the foundations for a successful career in teaching. This is backed by over £130 million a year in funding.
The Department has also launched a new and updated suite of National Professional Qualifications for teachers and head teachers at all levels, from those who want to develop expertise in high quality teaching practice to those leading multiple schools across trusts.
The Department has published a range of resources to help address staff workload and wellbeing. This includes the Education Staff Wellbeing Charter, which the Department is encouraging schools to sign up to as a shared commitment to promote staff wellbeing. The Department has also published the workload reduction toolkit, developed alongside school leadership staff to help reduce workload, and resources to support schools to implement effective flexible working practices.