Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to integrate agricultural education into school curriculums.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Cooking and nutrition are mandatory in the design and technology curriculum for key stages 1 to 3. At GCSE, pupils can choose to study a food preparation and nutrition course. The subject content requires pupils to demonstrate knowledge and understanding of how foods are grown, reared or caught, and the primary and secondary stages of processing and production.
In the citizenship curriculum, the non-statutory programmes of study at key stages 1 and 2 include content about what improves and harms local, natural and built environments and how people look after them. Pupils also consider social and moral dilemmas that they come across in everyday life, such as environmental issues.
Oak National Academy’s (Oak) freely available curriculum resources explore agricultural education in a number of subject areas, including science, history and geography. New Oak science lessons for key stages 1 to 4, which will cover how humans can live sustainably to protect earth for a better future, are also being developed. These will refer to agricultural practices and their impact on the environment.
The government has established an independent Curriculum and Assessment Review, covering ages 5 to 18, chaired by Professor Becky Francis CBE. The review seeks to deliver a curriculum that readies young people for life and work, building the knowledge, skills and attributes young people need to thrive.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential implications for her polices of recent trends in the (a) adequacy of SEND provision in mainstream schools, (b) availability of specialist school places and (c) number of children being home educated.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
For too long the education and care system has not met the needs of all children, particularly those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), with parents struggling to get their children the support they need and deserve.
The department wants more children and young people to receive the support they need to achieve and thrive in their local mainstream school, reducing the need for pupils to be educated at home or to travel a long way to access a specialist placement. Many mainstream settings are delivering specialist provision locally, including through resourced provision and special educational needs units. Alongside this, the department recognises the vital role that special schools play catering to children and young people with the most complex needs.
The Children and Families Act 2014 requires local authorities to ensure there are sufficient school places for all pupils, including those with SEND. If a local authority identifies a shortage of special school places, resulting in a significant number of pupils needing to travel a long way to access a placement, they should consider creating or expanding local provision to meet that need.
My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education, has now announced £740 million for high needs capital in 2025/26 to support children and young people with SEND or who require alternative provision. This new funding can be used to adapt classrooms to be more accessible for children with SEND or create specialist facilities within mainstream schools that can deliver more intensive support adapted to suit pupils’ needs, as well as continuing to provide places to support pupils in special schools with the most complex needs.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that there is adequate provision of (a) SEND support in mainstream schools and (b) places in specialist schools.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
For too long the education and care system has not met the needs of all children, particularly those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), with parents struggling to get their children the support they need and deserve.
The department wants more children and young people to receive the support they need to achieve and thrive in their local mainstream school, reducing the need for pupils to be educated at home or to travel a long way to access a specialist placement. Many mainstream settings are delivering specialist provision locally, including through resourced provision and special educational needs units. Alongside this, the department recognises the vital role that special schools play catering to children and young people with the most complex needs.
The Children and Families Act 2014 requires local authorities to ensure there are sufficient school places for all pupils, including those with SEND. If a local authority identifies a shortage of special school places, resulting in a significant number of pupils needing to travel a long way to access a placement, they should consider creating or expanding local provision to meet that need.
My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education, has now announced £740 million for high needs capital in 2025/26 to support children and young people with SEND or who require alternative provision. This new funding can be used to adapt classrooms to be more accessible for children with SEND or create specialist facilities within mainstream schools that can deliver more intensive support adapted to suit pupils’ needs, as well as continuing to provide places to support pupils in special schools with the most complex needs.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of the time taken to approve the adoption and special guardianship support fund for 2025-26 on (a) children and (b) families requiring therapeutic support in Dorset.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department will shortly be finalising business planning decisions on how we will allocate the department’s budget for the next financial year. All decisions regarding the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund are being made as part of these discussions. An announcement will be made as soon as possible.
Applications for the fund with therapy starting in this financial year are still being accepted and processed under business as usual.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, when her Department plans to confirm funding for the adoption and special guardian support fund for 2025-26 financial year.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department will shortly be finalising business planning decisions on how we will allocate the department’s budget for the next financial year. All decisions regarding the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund are being made as part of these discussions. An announcement will be made as soon as possible.
Applications for the fund with therapy starting in this financial year are still being accepted and processed under business as usual.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to (a) support home educators and (b) protect children removed from mainstream schools for malicious reasons.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department is introducing the first ever duty on local authorities to provide support for home educating families as part of the Children not in School measures of the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill. The support duty ensures an established baseline level of support across all English local authorities, to ensure that wherever home educating families live they can have access to a reliable level of support from their local authority, if they choose to access it.
The department’s existing elective home education guidance for parents already sets out to help parents understand their obligations and rights in relation to elective home education.
This government is clear that any form of off-rolling is unacceptable, and we will work with Ofsted to tackle this. We are committed to strengthening accountability through reforming Ofsted to enhance the inspection regime by replacing a single headline grade with a new report card system, telling parents clearly how schools are performing, and introduce a new annual review of safeguarding, attendance, and pupil movement, including off-rolling.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of allocating separate funding for (a) oral hygiene education and (b) toothbrushing schemes in schools located in areas with high levels of tooth decay.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department is working with the Department of Health and Social Care to help promote and deliver supervised toothbrushing programmes for 3 to 5 year-olds in the most deprived communities.
We recognise that prevention is better than cure. For this reason, we will be targeting the areas of highest need in order to have the greatest impact on young children’s oral health.
Further information on the implementation timetable will be confirmed in due course.
Currently all state-funded schools in England are required to teach about good oral hygiene as part of the statutory health education set out within relationships, sex and health education statutory guidance. Independent schools are required to cover health education as part of their responsibility to provide personal, social, health and economic education.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to support councils (a) in West Dorset and (b) nationally to increase local special school places to reduce reliance on out-of-county placements for children with Education, Health and Care Plans.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
The department knows that many children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) struggle to find a suitable school placement that is close to their home and meets their needs. This government is committed to addressing this by improving inclusivity and expertise in mainstream schools, as well as ensuring special schools cater to children and young people with the most complex needs.
The department wants more children and young people to receive the support they need to thrive in their local mainstream school, reducing the need for pupils to travel a long way to access a specialist placement. Many mainstream settings are already going above and beyond to deliver specialist provision locally, including through resourced provision and special educational needs units.
The department is committed to ensuring special schools play a vital role in supporting those pupils with the most complex needs. The Children and Families Act 2014 requires local authorities to ensure there are sufficient school places for all pupils, including those with SEND. If a local authority identifies a shortage of special school places, resulting in a significant number of pupils needing to travel a long way to access a placement, they could consider creating or expanding provision.
My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education announced £740 million for high needs capital in 2025/26 to support children and young people with SEND or who require alternative provision. This new funding can be used to adapt classrooms to be more accessible for children with SEND, create specialist facilities within mainstream schools that can deliver more intensive support adapted to suit the pupils’ needs, alongside continuing to provide places to support pupils in special schools with the most complex needs.
Departmental officials work closely with Dorset Council to strategically oversee SEND place planning and to see what support we can provide to ensure there are sufficient high-quality SEND places in the system. We will confirm local authority allocations to West Dorset for high needs capital funding in the spring.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will take steps to allocate more funding for SEND provision in rural areas.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
This government’s ambition is that all children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) or in alternative provision receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life.
The department is providing an increase of almost £1 billion for local authorities’ high needs budgets in the 2025/26 financial year, bringing total high needs funding for children and young people with complex SEND to £11.9 billion.
The department is now in the process of calculating indicative high needs funding allocations for local authorities next year through the national funding formula, which it expects to publish shortly.
This government is taking time to consider the funding formula that the department uses to allocate funding for children and young people with SEND. It is important that there is a fair education funding system, that directs funding to where it is needed, including funding for provision in rural areas.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to help reduce waiting times for SEND assessments by local authorities in rural areas with fewer staff.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
The department wants to ensure that, where required, education, health and care (EHC) plan assessments are progressed promptly and, if needed, plans are issued as quickly as possible so that children and young people can access the support they need.
Local authorities have a statutory responsibility to assess whether children and young people have special educational needs that require an EHC plan. EHC plans must be issued within 20 weeks of the needs assessment commencing so that children and young people can access the support they need. In 2023, there were 138,200 initial requests for an EHC plan and 90,500 assessments took place. 50.3% of new EHC plans in 2023 were issued within 20 weeks.
The department knows that local authorities have seen an increase in the number of assessment requests and that more needs to be done to ensure that local areas deliver effective and timely services. This includes better communication with schools and families.
The department continues to monitor and work closely with local authorities that have issues with EHC plan timeliness. Where there are concerns about a local authority’s capacity to make the required improvements, we help the local authority to identify the barriers and put in place an effective recovery plan. This includes, where needed, securing specialist SEND Adviser support to help identify the barriers to EHC plan process timeliness and put in place practical plans for recovery.
Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission (CQC) carried out a full SEND inspection of Dorset local area in March 2024. Their published report found that the local area partnership’s SEND arrangements typically lead to positive experiences and outcomes for children and young people with SEND and the local area partnership is taking action where improvements are needed.
Dorset are not subject to formal intervention from the department or NHS England and the next full area SEND inspection by Ofsted and the CQC will be within approximately five years.