Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to reduce dog bites in the UK.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra continues to work with the police, local authorities and animal welfare groups to explore measures to reduce dog attacks and promote responsible dog ownership across all breeds of dog.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what guidance her Department has issued to (a) local authorities and (b) schools on (i) annual reviews for EHC plans and (ii) the responsibilities of all parties involved.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Education, health and care (EHC) plans should be used to monitor children and young people’s progress towards their outcomes and longer term aspirations. Local authorities have a statutory duty to review EHC plans every 12 months as a minimum.
The local authority should provide a list of children and young people who will require a review of their EHC plan that term to all headteachers and principals of schools, colleges and other institutions attended by children or young people with EHC plans, at least two weeks before the start of each term. This will enable professionals to plan attendance at review meetings and/or provide timely advice or information about the child or young person where necessary.
The department has issued guidance on EHC plan reviews in the special educational needs and disabilities Code of Practice which explains the roles and responsibilities of local authorities and schools in the review process, as well as other relevant professionals.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact on local authorities' ability to meet special educational needs because of delays by local authorities in reviewing schools' funding requests for Education, Health and Care Plans.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Mainstream schools are funded through the formula set by their local authority. The funding formula is decided by each local authority in consultation with its schools and often uses factors such as low prior attainment and free school meals to give an estimate of the number of children with special educational needs (SEN) a school is likely to have. Local authorities are required to delegate funds to a level that enables schools to meet the additional cost of pupils with SEN up to £6,000 per annum.
When a school can demonstrate that the costs of additional support required for a pupil with SEN exceed £6,000, the local authority should allocate additional funding to cover the excess costs. This may follow an education, health and care (EHC) needs assessment and the creation of an EHC plan, though local authorities have discretion to provide top-up funding to pupils without an EHC plan.
If a local authority issues an EHC plan, it is statutorily required to secure the special educational provision specified in the plan. Disagreements over the provision required and the associated costs should not stand in the way of a child or young person’s education.
The department is clear that we expect commissioning local authorities and all types of schools/colleges to work together so that agreement can be reached on the level of top-up funding required to enable suitable provision to be made for individual pupils and students. More information is available in the GOV.UK guidance ‘High needs funding: 2024 to 2025 operational guide’, which can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/high-needs-funding-arrangements-2024-to-2025/high-needs-funding-2024-to-2025-operational-guide#top-up-funding.
As the statutory responsible body, the local authority is responsible for the final decision about the level of funding required to secure the necessary provision. In determining the funding level, the local authority should have consulted with the school or college and should ensure their decision is evidence-based and reasonable. However, even where provision is specified in an EHC plan, there is no statutory requirement that a local authority must pay top-up funding at a particular rate requested by a school or college.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will take steps to reintroduce the Government's £50 reduction for customers of South West Water.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The taxpayer-funded contribution to the water and sewerage bills of South West Water (SWW) household customers ended on 31 March 2025. The rebate was originally introduced in 2013 because SWW customers faced significantly higher water bills than customers in other regions due to the level of investment the company was required to make in the region’s infrastructure to meet environmental and water quality standards.
Over the last decade the difference between water bills in the South West region and others has decreased. Over the next Price Review period (2025-2029) Ofwat’s latest projections are that SWW customers will have similar bills to those in other regions.
The Government is committed to taking action to address water poverty and help vulnerable customers with their water bills. All water companies have measures in place for people who struggle to pay for their water and wastewater services, including measures such as WaterSure, social tariffs, payment breaks and holidays, and debt management support.
We expect all water companies to proactively engage with their customers to ensure they know what support schemes are available and how to use them.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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 spent by schools in requesting assessments for EHC plans on the provision of SEND services.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Schools are required to identify and address the special educational needs (SEN) of the pupils they support and, in the case of mainstream settings, to use their best endeavours to make sure that a child or young person who has SEN gets the support they need. This includes asking local authorities to carry out an education, health and care (EHC) needs assessment, if necessary.
All schools should apply the ‘graduated approach’ that is outlined in the SEND Code of Practice, which means identifying a child’s needs, planning appropriate support, implementing that support and reviewing it regularly to ensure it continues to meet the identified needs. Through this, schools should develop personalised approaches to supporting the unique needs of individual pupils. If necessary, the local authority can be asked to carry out an EHC needs assessment.
In addition, all mainstream schools and maintained academy schools, including free schools, must have a qualified teacher, or the headteacher, designated as the special educational needs coordinator (SENCO).
SENCOs have day-to-day responsibility for the operation of special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) policy and co-ordination of specific provision made to support individual pupils with SEND, including those who have EHC plans.
Schools should ensure that the SENCO has sufficient time and resources to carry out these functions. This should include providing SENCOs with sufficient administrative support and time away from teaching to enable them to fulfil their responsibilities in a similar way to other important strategic roles within a school.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the Social Metrics Commission's report entitled Measuring Poverty 2024, published in October 2024, if she will undertake a review of the finding that 47 per cent of families with at least one disabled child or adult were in poverty compared to 19 per cent of those families without a disabled person in 2022/23.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The government's impact assessment regarding Health and Disability Reform is available at Spring Statement 2025 health and disability benefit reforms - Impacts.
As part of our Plan for Change we're introducing the most far-reaching reforms in a generation, with £1 billion a year being invested to give people the best possible chance with tailored support that can be adapted to meet their changing circumstances - including their changing health – while also scrapping the failed Work Capability Assessment in Great Britain.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the Social Metrics Commission's report entitled Measuring Poverty 2024, published in October 2024, if she will make an assessment of the potential implications for his Department's policies of the finding that 54 per cent of people in poverty lived in a family that included a disabled person in 2022/23.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The government's impact assessment regarding Health and Disability Reform is available at Spring Statement 2025 health and disability benefit reforms - Impacts.
As part of our Plan for Change we're introducing the most far-reaching reforms in a generation, with £1 billion a year being invested to give people the best possible chance with tailored support that can be adapted to meet their changing circumstances - including their changing health – while also scrapping the failed Work Capability Assessment in Great Britain.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many and what proportion of tests for (a) D1 and (b) B category licenses resulted in a (i) pass and (ii) fail in each of the last five years.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The table below shows, for the last five years, the number of:
category B (car) practical driving tests conducted by the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA);
category D1 (minibus) 3b on road practical driving tests conducted by DVSA and delegated examiners; and
tests passed and failed, including pass rate.
| Category B practical driving tests | Category D1 – 3b on road practical driving tests | |||||||
Year | Conducted | Passed | Failed | Pass rate | Conducted | Passed | Failed | Pass rate | |
2020* | 809,509 | 388,217 | 421,292 | 48.0% | 1,815 | 1,417 | 398 | 78.1% | |
2021* | 1,113,735 | 552,166 | 561,569 | 49.6% | 1,950 | 1,527 | 423 | 78.3% | |
2022 | 1,667,935 | 802,223 | 865,712 | 48.1% | 2,834 | 2,249 | 585 | 79.4% | |
2023 | 1,831,588 | 883,114 | 948,474 | 48.2% | 3,454 | 2,849 | 605 | 82.5% | |
2024# | 1,479,177 | 708,847 | 770,330 | 47.9% | 2,446 | 2,023 | 423 | 82.7% | |
* - Testing reduced due to Covid-19 pandemic
# - January 2024 to September 2024 is the latest official statistics.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps her Department is taking to increase the take up of means-tested benefits amongst households with children in poverty.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Poverty Taskforce is progressing urgent work to publish the Child Poverty Strategy, and we are exploring all available levers to drive forward short and long-term actions across government to reduce child poverty.
Our focus is on bringing about an enduring reduction in child poverty in this parliament, thereby reversing the trend that is seeing forecasts of child poverty continuing to increase. More details, including on the time horizon, will be set out in the strategy publication.
We are supporting claimants to identify what support may be available including through providing extensive information on Universal Credit on Gov.uk. Additionally, we show potential customers external benefit calculators where they can identify what they are likely to be eligible for. We also work closely with Citizens Advice who provide Help to Claim support for claimants to make a claim to Universal Credit, including marketing and publicising Help to Claim support.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if her Department will develop a longer term child poverty strategy.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Poverty Taskforce is progressing urgent work to publish the Child Poverty Strategy, and we are exploring all available levers to drive forward short and long-term actions across government to reduce child poverty.
Our focus is on bringing about an enduring reduction in child poverty in this parliament, thereby reversing the trend that is seeing forecasts of child poverty continuing to increase. More details, including on the time horizon, will be set out in the strategy publication.
We are supporting claimants to identify what support may be available including through providing extensive information on Universal Credit on Gov.uk. Additionally, we show potential customers external benefit calculators where they can identify what they are likely to be eligible for. We also work closely with Citizens Advice who provide Help to Claim support for claimants to make a claim to Universal Credit, including marketing and publicising Help to Claim support.