David Laws
Main Page: David Laws (Liberal Democrat - Yeovil)Department Debates - View all David Laws's debates with the Department for Education
(9 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)
2. When he plans to publish the results of the recent consultation on fairer funding for schools; and if he will make a statement.
The Minister for Schools (Mr David Laws)
Our consultation on fairer schools funding closed on 30 April. We are currently analysing the responses and will publish our final response next month.
Mr Walker
The Government have been right to commit to delivering fairer funding and I welcome the first small steps that have been taken. Schools in Worcestershire tell me that they are facing major challenges from increases in national insurance and pension costs. May I press the Minister to listen carefully to the concerns of the F40 authorities, which want to see fairer funding sooner?
Mr Laws
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the strong lead that he has taken in arguing the case for fairer funding, which is long overdue. As he has acknowledged, schools in his area will gain to the tune of some £5 million from the proposals that we made a couple of months ago. I repeat the commitment that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I have made on previous occasions: we are committed not just to this first big step towards fairer funding, but to a national fair funding formula, which should have been introduced many years ago but which the last Labour Government did nothing to address.
Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)
Head teachers in my constituency are concerned about their budgets for this year, and they tell me that the big effect will come with the Government’s changes to sixth-form funding. Will he look again at those changes?
Mr Laws
The hon. Gentleman will know that the Government have protected schools funding in the existing Parliament, and we have introduced a pupil premium to make sure that youngsters in more disadvantaged areas are also assisted. I agree with him that in the future we must make sure that education funding is as protected as possible across the system, and he will be aware of the announcement that the Deputy Prime Minister made on behalf of my party today. It is now up to other parties to make similar commitments.
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)
The move towards fairer funding in Northumberland has been welcomed by all my teachers and those in the F40 who are likewise affected. Will the Minister remind the individual councils of the F40 local authorities that all the schools in previously underfunded local authority areas should benefit, not just some chosen few?
Mr Laws
My hon. Friend is right that we want to see the money go from local authorities to schools. He will be aware that in his area the proposals that we consulted on involve a significant increase of some 6.4%, which is more than £10 million more for local schools. We want that money to go right through to the front line.
Mr Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)
When will the Minister agree with the wish of the hon. Member for Worcester (Mr Walker) to have a much broader review of funding? Children attending reception class in Wandsworth have almost twice the amount of money of children attending in Birkenhead. Neither of those two authorities was in the review. Given that the Government have been in power for four years, that national review is long overdue.
Mr Laws
I will not say gently to the right hon. Gentleman that, given that his party was in power for much longer than that, this could have been addressed by him. I will, however, accept the serious point he makes that we need not only to move to a national fair funding formula when we know the long-term spending plans, but that it will make sense for the next Government to consider all the different forms of deprivation funding, including a prior attainment area-based funding, to make sure that there is a coherent whole. I am very proud of what we have done on the pupil premium in this Parliament, but we ought to look in the round in the next Parliament.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
On fairer funding, is it acceptable that, according to a London Economics report today, academies have approximately £1,600 more to spend per sixth-form student than sixth-form colleges?
Mr Laws
The hon. Gentleman should know that, as part of the Government’s reforms to school funding, we are making sure there is consistent and fair funding across the system. Where there is not, we have been converging funding to ensure institutions are appropriately and fairly funded.
Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)
3. What assessment he has made of the recommendations of Sir Martin Narey’s report “Making the Education of Social Workers Consistently Effective”, published in January 2014, on the training of children’s social workers.
David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)
7. What steps he is taking to adopt a revised funding formula for schools.
The Minister for Schools (Mr David Laws)
Our proposal to allocate £350 million to the least fairly funded local areas in 2015-16 is the biggest step towards fairer schools funding for a decade. This puts us in a much better position to introduce a national fair funding formula when multi-year spending plans are available.
David Mowat
The Minister may be aware that Warrington is ranked 137th for funding out of 152 authorities. As a comparator, Westminster, which is ranked 10th, receives £3,000—60% extra—more per child each year than Warrington. It was therefore disappointing that in this new allocation, Westminster received a big uplift and Warrington received nothing—perpetuating that differential, which is really unacceptable. Will the Minister explain the logic behind that, and does he agree that we need to move to a national formula very quickly indeed?
Mr Laws
I would make two points. First, what we sought to do in the announcement of a couple of months ago was address the issues not just of low funding, but of unfair funding. It is still possible for some parts of the country that are not the lowest funded to be underfunded, as we saw in the announcement. As for comparing Westminster with Warrington, although traditionally thought of as an affluent area, Westminster has had something like 50% of its children entitled to free school meals over the last six years, so it benefits, quite rightly, from high levels of disadvantage funding. Secondly, I agree with my hon. Friend in that his points make the case for moving on from this allocation to a full national fair funding formula in the next Parliament, to which both our parties are committed.
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)
The Education Select Committee heard evidence that secondary schools in areas that will not receive extra money under changes to the funding settlement will face a £350,000 a year shortfall due to increasing costs. Meanwhile, £400 million of basic need money has been used on free schools. Instead of spending it on them, would not that basic need money have been better spent on the schools now facing a shortfall in their basic needs?
Mr Laws
I do not accept the premise of the question. Many schools whose areas are not benefiting from the uplift are in areas with high levels of disadvantage and deprivation that have benefited enormously from the pupil premium that we have introduced. As for basic need, we have allocated considerably more than the last Government, which is why we are able to have a very ambitious programme for new schools and extensions across the country.
Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
North Yorkshire is a very sparsely populated rural county, and is one of the 40 least well funded. Is my right hon. Friend aware of the problem of funding small schools in rural areas of that kind—which includes the problem of sixth-form funds—and will he address it?
Mr Laws
I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. As she knows, North Yorkshire is one of the areas that will gain from the measures that we proposed a couple of months ago. It was set to gain by £7.2 million under the proposals on which we have consulted. The sparsity issue is also extremely important in areas such as North Yorkshire, and we have therefore introduced a sparsity factor to allow local authorities to protect schools in areas where children would otherwise have to travel an unacceptable distance.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
As was pointed out earlier by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), it is the sixth-form sector that is really being hit by funding cuts. Is the Minister aware of the impact survey conducted by the Sixth Form Colleges Association, which was published today? I hear reports that officials have been asked to prepare further cuts, which will be announced in September. May I urge the Minister to think again? The sector simply cannot take any more cuts.
Mr Laws
I understand the concerns of the 16 to 19 sector. Ministers are very alive to those concerns, and we will consider them carefully before we set our final spending plans for 2015-16. I do not know whether the Labour party has made any commitments on school funding into the next Parliament, but I suggest that the hon. Lady and her hon. Friends make the same commitment that the Deputy Prime Minister has made on behalf of my party today.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
10. What steps he is taking to obtain data from HM Revenue and Customs to improve the development of destination measures for school leavers.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
12. What provision has been made to fund the furnishing of new school buildings built under the Priority School Building programme.
The Minister for Schools (Mr David Laws)
The Priority School Building programme provides funding for fixed furniture and equipment. Where a school is increasing in size, the PSBP also provides funding for loose furniture and equipment, such as tables and chairs.
Mr Cunningham
A school in my constituency, Ernesford Grange community academy, has just had a new school building built under the PSBP. However, the Education Funding Agency has informed it that there is no funding to cover furniture for the new building. That is presenting a serious problem for the school—and, I am sure, for many other schools. Will the Government try to find funding to help buy desks and chairs for the new builds, or meet me to discuss the situation?
Mr Laws
Of course I will look into the issue or meet the hon. Gentleman. Where funding is needed to fix furniture and equipment, we provide that centrally. The hon. Gentleman has three PSBP projects in his constituency. All of them are going to be receiving some funding for fixed equipment—over £1 million in total. Where there is existing equipment that can sensibly be reused in the new buildings, we ask schools to do that, but if the hon. Gentleman thinks that is posing problems, I will be happy to look into the detailed circumstances.
Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con)
This morning I visited the Holmesdale community infant school in Reigate, a very successful and popular school which is seeing a significant number of new places being provided under the new schools programme. However, with the doubling in school numbers over the past decade, there is chaos outside; there are enormous problems with traffic, which requires changes to the road structure. Is it possible to arrange some form of funding that covers the entire scheme of both setting up new school places and supporting them effectively?
Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)
Although the Government’s commitment to rebuild the Duchess’s community high school in Alnwick is very welcome, the problem of furnishing a new-build school is arising there. Will the Minister discuss with me how we can meet that problem?
Mr Laws
I will be happy to have those discussions with my right hon. Friend. I am sure he accepts that where there is furniture and equipment that can sensibly be reused, it should be—it would be ridiculous in these times to waste good furniture and equipment—but where there is a need for support, we will certainly consider that.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
13. What progress his Department has made on increasing the number and quality of apprenticeships for 16 to 18-year-olds.
Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)
16. What steps he has taken to reduce absenteeism in schools.
The Minister for Schools (Mr David Laws)
We have strengthened the rules on pupil absence and published clearer advice to schools. School attendance has improved significantly, with 7.7 million fewer school days lost in 2012-13 compared with 2009-10.
Sheryll Murray
I have been approached by many parents in my constituency who work in the tourism industry and simply cannot afford to take holidays during the busiest time, school holidays. What can be done to help these small business owners take holidays with their families without fearing punishment or hurting their children’s education?
Mr Laws
I know that this is a real issue in constituencies such as that of my hon. Friend. Indeed, last year about a third of all children in Cornwall’s primary schools missed school for a term-time holiday, a figure higher than the national figure for primary schools, which is about 20%. That is clearly not acceptable. I would say two things to my hon. Friend. First, head teachers retain the discretion to grant leave in exceptional circumstances. Secondly, and more significantly as regards the cases she raises, we are deregulating so that all schools control their own term dates from 2015. That might give schools in her area greater flexibility to make a judgment about when to have their holidays and about what the right time might be for them.
Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)
17. What steps his Department has taken to increase the number of primary school places in a) Winchester constituency and b) England.
The Minister for Schools (Mr David Laws)
During this Parliament, the Department has allocated more than £5 billion in basic need funding to help local authorities in England create the additional places that will be needed.
Steve Brine
I have campaigned throughout this Parliament to secure new primary places for my constituents. We now have a combination of additional places at existing schools and brand-new provision at the excellent new Westgate all-through school, which is the first in Hampshire. The Government should be very proud of it. Does the Minister acknowledge that Hampshire, like so many other areas, is using the additional funding he mentioned not to fund an ideological whim but to do the basics and secure new primary school places for families who need them?
Mr Laws
I agree with my hon. Friend, who will be interested to know that the allocation of money to Hampshire for basic need has almost quadrupled between the time of the previous Labour Government and the present coalition Government. We have allocated £88.9 million to basic need in Hampshire between 2011 and 2015; that compares with just £23 million over a comparable four-year period in the previous Parliament.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
18. What change there has been in educational attainment in a) Kettering constituency, b) Northamptonshire and c) England since May 2010.
The Minister for Schools (Mr David Laws)
Attainment has risen in all the areas mentioned from 2010 to 2013: in Kettering from 55.4% to 57%, in Northamptonshire from 51.9% to 58.1%, and in England as a whole from 55.3% to 60.8%.
Mr Hollobone
Northamptonshire is one of the fastest growing counties in the country and Kettering is one of the fastest growing parts of Northamptonshire. What special extra help is Her Majesty’s Government giving to boost educational attainment chances in constituencies such as Kettering that have a high population growth rate?
Mr Laws
I agree that there are challenges in Kettering and Northamptonshire, including from the rising pupil population. In that part of the world not only are we delivering the pupil premium and the additional interventions to support better school leadership, but we have almost doubled the allocation of money for new places for basic need from £29 million in the last Parliament to more than £55 million in this Parliament.
Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)
T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
T2. Will the Minister tell us how many schools are being built as a result of his programme, and how many have had their conditions improved?
The Minister for Schools (Mr David Laws)
Yes, I can tell the hon. Gentleman that we are building, rebuilding and upgrading more than 900 schools during the course of this Parliament. We have also recently announced a Priority School Building programme to rebuild many of the schools that are in the worst condition, including many that were not even on the list for Building Schools for the Future.
Annette Brooke (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)
T6. We are in the third year of phonics tests for six-year-olds, and I understand that the tests have shown an improvement in decoding skills. What action will the Minister take to ensure that we are stimulating the enjoyment of reading?
Jenny Chapman (Darlington) (Lab)
What will the Government do about the fact that there are more than 4,000 infant school children in classes of more than 30 in the north-east and North Yorkshire?
Richard Fuller (Bedford) (Con)
Thinking that it faces too many bureaucratic hurdles, the Local Government Association is looking for more powers to interfere in free schools and academies. All too often, local authorities are the bureaucratic hurdles, holding back inspired head teachers, inspirational boards of governors, and parents who want a better future for their children. Will my right hon. Friend resist these efforts by local government to take back controls?