Business of the House

Matthew Offord Excerpts

Thursday 19th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for advertising forthcoming debates, which is always very helpful to colleagues, and thank him for working so constructively with my office to ensure we plan time well and give people as much notice as we possibly can of those opportunities.

I fully appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s concerns. All Members will want to lever in as much funding for their constituency as possible. There is a very good tool on the Government website, gov.uk, which maps all the funding going into constituencies via the very many funding streams there are, so people can get a good overview about what is happening where and why. We had to deal with a situation when we came in to make sure the Government were balancing their books. We also felt it was incredibly important to hold council tax rises down. Under the Labour Government they rose by 110%. He will see if he goes on to that tool that we are putting enormous amounts of money into areas, particularly those that have been deprived of funding for many years.

[Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)]

Several schools in my constituency have contacted me about the proposal to extend the school working week to 32.5 hours for those in the voluntary sector. May we have a statement from an Education Minister to explain when the proposal will come in, if additional resources will be provided and if it will be discretionary for headteachers? Will headteachers be allowed to discuss with their governing bodies whether they wish to have a longer school day, or indeed a shorter one?

[Penny Mordaunt]

The measure that was introduced is a non-statutory expectation. I would think and hope those discussions would take place. With regard to additional support, Education questions is not until late February, so I will write to the Department for Education on my hon. Friend’s behalf and ask that it contacts his office with further details of the support that is available.