Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what purposes Ofsted has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
This is a matter for His Majesty’s Chief Inspector, Sir Martyn Oliver. I have asked him to write to the right hon. Member for South Holland and the Deepings directly and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what purposes the Teaching Regulation Agency has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Artificial intelligence (AI) is at the heart of the government’s plan to kickstart an era of economic growth, transform how we deliver public services, and boost living standards for working people across the country.
The Teaching Regulation Agency (TRA) has not used artificial intelligence for any purpose during the last 12 months.
The TRA also has access to the Government Digital Service, part of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, for expert advice.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many schools in (a) South Holland and the Deepings constituency and (b) Lincolnshire have been identified as stuck schools.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
In the ’School accountability reform – school profiles improvement and intervention’ consultation, the department defined ’stuck school’ as a school that was graded ‘requires improvement’ or equivalent at its most recent Ofsted inspection and was also graded below ‘good’ at its previous inspection.
For this purpose, we have considered a sub-judgement of ‘requires improvement’ for leadership and management and/or quality of education for a school inspected in 2024/25 academic year as equivalent to a previous single headline grade of ‘requires improvement’.
Based on the latest published Ofsted inspection data, there were 4 stuck schools in the South Holland and the Deepings constituency and 18 stuck schools in Lincolnshire by the end of December 2024.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what purposes the Standards and Testing Agency has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Artificial intelligence (AI) is at the heart of the government’s plan to kickstart an era of economic growth, transform how we deliver public services, and boost living standards for working people across the country.
The Standards and Testing Agency (STA) has used AI to create videos to support schools and local authorities with preparing for and administering the national curriculum assessments. It is also trialling the use of large language models to create stakeholder training materials.
STA can draw on a range of resources, published on GOV.UK, to inform AI usage. For example, the Generative AI Framework, the Ethics, Transparency and Accountability Framework, the Data Ethics Framework, the AI Opportunities Action Plan and the Algorithmic Transparency Recording Standard.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what purposes the Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
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 and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many primary school breakfast clubs she plans to introduce in Lincolnshire.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The government is committed to offering a free breakfast club in every state-funded school with primary-aged pupils in England.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to support children in foster care in (a) Lincolnshire and (b) the East Midlands.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The government is committed to ensuring that every child in care grows up with the love, care and support they need to achieve and thrive.
The government is supporting children in care by expanding ‘The Mockingbird Family Model’, which is an innovative, evidence-based approach. Relationships are central to the design of the programme, which involves six to ten satellite families grouped into a constellation around a hub home carer. In East Midlands, this is being delivered as part of the Foster with East Midlands recruitment hub, which launched in March 2024 and comprises of four local authorities, including Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, Derby and Derbyshire.
Across England, ten fostering regional hubs, covering 64% of all local authorities, have been set up to reform the way areas recruit and retain foster carers. An additional £15 million was announced to support this programme at the Autumn Budget 2024 and we intend to move towards full national roll out in the next financial year. Lincolnshire is not currently in a hub, but departmental officials have spoken with local authority leaders about their options to become part of an existing or new hub. In the past year, Lincolnshire participated in Fosterlink, a department funded diagnostic and analysis project to support improved recruitment of foster carers.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to work with local authorities to support kinship carers in (a) Lincolnshire and (b) other rural areas.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The government recognises the important role that kinship carers play in caring for some of the most vulnerable children. Kinship carers often take on this role at a time when they were least expecting to raise a family and we recognise the challenges they face, including financial.
Through the Autumn Budget 2024, the department announced £40 million to trial a new kinship allowance in some local authorities in England. We will test whether paying an allowance to cover the additional costs of caring for a child can help increase the number of children taken in by family members and friends. We will share further details and the process for selecting local authorities in due course.
This is the single biggest investment made by government in kinship care to date. This investment could transform the lives of vulnerable children who can no longer live at home by allowing children to grow up within their families and communities, reducing disruption to their early years, so they can focus on schooling and building friendships.
The department understands the unique challenges kinship carers face and is committed to providing the necessary support.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what purposes (a) Ministers and (b) officials in her Department have used AI in the last 12 months.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Artificial intelligence (AI) is at the heart of the government’s plan to kickstart an era of economic growth, transform how we deliver public services, and boost living standards for working people across the country.
The department has been using Microsoft Copilot, an AI-based web chat with commercial protection, for various means including:
In addition, 150 people across the organisation are piloting Microsoft 365 Copilot, which leverages AI to automate and accelerate tasks in Microsoft Products. We are tracking the benefits of this pilot which currently include:
Since summer 2023, the department has created a secure Microsoft Azure Open AI sandbox environment. This allows limited groups of users to build and test AI models based on specific uses cases, in a safe and secure environment. Use cases are approved by a technology-led steering group, and this group will ultimately decide on which applications could potentially be moved into production for use more broadly across the organisation.
We draw on a range of resources, published on GOV.UK, to inform our AI usage. For example the Generative AI Framework, the Ethics, Transparency and Accountability Framework, the Data Ethics Framework, the AI Opportunities Action Plan and the Algorithmic Transparency Recording Standard.
The department has also had access to the Central Digital and Data Office, based in the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, for expert advice.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what information her Department holds on the number of children that were home-schooled in Lincolnshire in the (a) 2022-23 and (b) 2023-2024 academic years.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department collects data on children in elective home education (EHE) from local authorities. The latest data, including at the local authority level, is published here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/elective-home-education.
In Lincolnshire, the number of EHE children at any point during the 2022/23 academic year was 2,280 and 2,040 in 2023/24.
The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, introduced on 17 December, will place a duty on all local authorities in England to hold and maintain registers of children not in school in their area. Parents and certain providers of out-of-school education will be required to provide the local authority with the information needed for the registers and there will be sanctions for failing to do so. The Bill also includes a new requirement for parents to obtain local authority consent before they can home educate if their child is subject to a child protection enquiry or has a child protection plan. Local authorities will have new powers to require any home educated child to attend school if their home or learning environment is unsuitable. These proposals will strengthen the existing system of oversight for these children.