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Written Question
Pupils: Disadvantaged
Wednesday 18th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential impact of (a) living in temporary accommodation, (b) being a child at risk, (c) being a looked-after child and (d) being a child of UK armed services personnel on the educational attainment of children at each of the key stages from early years to KS4.

Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)

This government’s Opportunity Mission will break the link between young people’s backgrounds and their future success, ensuring family security and providing the best start in life, with all children achieving and thriving and building skills for opportunity and growth.

Too often opportunity for children and young people is defined by their background. We know that disadvantaged young people face barriers to engagement with education, which can have a negative impact on their educational outcomes. This can include practical barriers like insecure housing. If children are unable to engage with education, it doesn’t matter how good teaching and learning is, they will not benefit.

From April 2025, we will be rolling out Family Help Services that will prioritise supporting the whole family and intervening at the earliest opportunity to prevent challenges escalating. Lead practitioners will undertake assessments of all needs of the family, including those who are experiencing, or at risk of experiencing, homelessness, and work to support families where this may be part of a more complex set of needs.

As announced at the Autumn Budget 2024, funding for homelessness services is increasing next year by £233 million compared to this year, 2024/25. This increased spending will help to prevent rises in the number of families in temporary accommodation and help to prevent rough sleeping. This brings total spend to nearly £1 billion in 2025/26.

The impact of pre-care and care experience can also be a significant barrier to a child’s educational achievement. In 2022/23 at key stage 2, 37% of children in care for at least 12 months and 30% of children in need achieved the expected standard in reading, writing and mathematics, which is significantly lower than all pupils (60%). However, it is important to recognise that 49.9% of children in need and 58.1% of children in care for at least 12 months have a special educational need, including mental health needs.

All local authorities have a statutory duty to promote the educational achievement of children in their care and are required to appoint a virtual school head (VSH), who is responsible for ensuring that arrangements are in place to improve the educational outcomes of the authority’s looked after children, including those placed out of authority, and for championing their progress. While VSHs have had an overwhelmingly positive impact on the outcomes of looked-after children, we want to see the same for all children with a social worker. This is why we intend to extend the role on a statutory basis to support educational outcomes of all children on child in need and child protection plans, as announced in our policy statement ’Keeping Children Safe, Helping Families Thrive’.

Service children's attainment at school is on a par with that of non-service children and they achieve very well at school. However, children who move frequently perform less well than those who move school less often or not at all, whilst service pupils can also experience additional needs relating to their emotional and social well-being. Service children attract Service Pupil Premium, which is currently worth £340 per pupil and can be used by schools to help improve their wellbeing and educational progress.


Written Question
Foster Care: Recruitment
Tuesday 17th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to increase the number of foster carers in (a) England and (b) Cheshire.

Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)

This government is committed to working in partnership with local authorities to recruit more foster carers and committed an additional £15 million in the Autumn Budget 2024. This funding is to start work to ensure every local authority has access to a hub and to embed the existing regional fostering recruitment and retention hubs, covering 64% of local authorities in England. The hubs will transform the way people who are interested in fostering are supported and rollout the Mockingbird programme, which offers peer-support to foster carers and the children in their care. The department is also funding ‘Fosterlink’, a support service for local authority fostering services not in the regional programme. This identifies areas for improvement and creates a national network to share best practice.


Written Question
Pupils: Temporary Accommodation
Tuesday 17th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential impact of living in temporary accommodation on the educational attainment of children at each of the key stages between early years and key stage 4.

Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)

Too often opportunity for children and young people is defined by their background and we know that disadvantaged young people face barriers to engagement with education, which can include practical barriers like insecure housing. If children are unable to engage with education, it doesn’t matter how good teaching and learning is, they will not benefit.

The Opportunity Mission will break the link between young people’s backgrounds and their future success, ensuring family security and providing the best start in life, with all children achieving and thriving and building skills for opportunity and growth.

The Ministerial Taskforce jointly chaired by my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, and my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education will use all available levers to drive cross-government action on child poverty, starting with overseeing the development of our ambitious Child Poverty Strategy, which will be published in spring 2025.

From April 2025 we will be rolling out Family Help Services that will prioritise supporting the whole family and intervening at the earliest opportunity to prevent challenges escalating.  Lead practitioners will undertake assessments of all the needs of the family, including those who are experiencing, or at risk of experiencing, homelessness, and will work to support families where this may be part of a more complex set of needs.

The government has set up a dedicated Inter-Ministerial Group which my right hon. Friend, the Deputy Prime Minister chairs, bringing together Ministers from across government to develop a long-term strategy to put us back on track to ending homelessness. As announced at the Autumn Budget 2024, funding for homelessness services is increasing next year by £233 million compared to 2024/25. This increased spending will help to prevent rises in the number of families in temporary accommodation and help to prevent rough sleeping. This brings total spend to nearly £1 billion in 2025/26.

More widely, we want a school system in which all children can achieve and thrive, no matter their background. This is why we have begun work to recruit an additional 6,500 expert teachers and launched an independent, expert-led Curriculum and Assessment Review that will look closely at the key challenges to attainment for young people, in particular those who are socioeconomically disadvantaged.


Written Question
Young People: Temporary Accommodation
Tuesday 17th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what information her Department holds on the number of young people who have previously lived in temporary accommodation entering (a) further and (b) higher education.

Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)

The department does not hold information on the number of people who have previously lived in temporary accommodation before entering further education or higher education.


Written Question
Schools: Transport
Tuesday 17th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the adequacy of travel provision for children to attend school when living in temporary accommodation.

Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)

No child should be prevented from accessing education by a lack of transport. The department’s home-to-school travel policy requires local authorities to arrange free travel for children of compulsory school age who attend their nearest school and would not be able to walk there because of the distance, their special educational needs, a disability or mobility problem, or because the route is unsafe. There are additional rights to free home to school travel for children from low-income households.

Children living in temporary accommodation may benefit from the continuity of remaining in their current school with familiar teachers and friends. They will not be eligible for free travel to that school if it is not the nearest school to their temporary accommodation, but local authorities have a discretionary power to arrange free home-to-school travel for children who are otherwise not eligible.

The department encourages local authorities to support vulnerable children and young people, and is working with local authorities to understand how well home to school transport supports all children to access educational opportunity.


Written Question
Children: Temporary Accommodation
Tuesday 17th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what role Ofsted plays in ensuring the (a) safety, (b) wellbeing and (c) educational attainment of children living in temporary accommodation.

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 my hon. Friend, the Member for Runcorn and Helsby, directly and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.


Written Question
Multi-academy Trusts: Accountability
Tuesday 17th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she plans to take with local authorities to improve the (a) transparency and (b) accountability of multi academy trusts.

Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)

Multi-academy trusts are partners in this government’s vision to drive high standards across all parts of the education system. The government is committed to bringing forward legislation to enable the inspection of multi-academy trusts supporting this government’s ambition that every part of the education system which can drive improvement is doing so.

It is important that multi-academy trusts work effectively with local authorities in the areas where their schools are located.


Written Question
Care Homes: Profits
Wednesday 11th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if her Department will take steps to ensure that private firms do not profit from out of area looked after children's residential care placements.

Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)

The needs of the child are paramount when deciding the right care placement. Though the department wants to reduce out of area placements, they will always be part of the care landscape. Sometimes circumstances make it the right decision for a child to be placed elsewhere, for example when they are at risk from domestic abuse, sexual exploitation, trafficking or gang violence.

Moving a child away is not a decision to be taken lightly and there are legislative safeguards around this. Directors of children’s services are required to sign off each such decision and Ofsted can challenge where they believe poor decisions are being made. This is to encourage local authorities to place children locally wherever possible.

The department is clear that profiteering from vulnerable children in care is absolutely unacceptable, irrespective of whether a child is placed in or out of area, and the department is committed to stamping out profiteering where it occurs in the children’s social care placement market.

On 18 November 2024, the department published its policy paper ‘Keeping children safe, helping families thrive’, which set out ambitious reforms across children’s social care. As part of these, the department is taking forward a package of measures, including through legislation, to rebalance the children’s social care placement market. These measures will improve competition, regulation and commissioning of placements and bring greater visibility to the prices local authorities are paying and the profits providers are making. If the department does not see a reduction in profiteering it will not hesitate to take action to cap providers’ profits.


Written Question
Bereavement Counselling: Children
Thursday 5th December 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a new protocol to ensure that (a) local authorities and (b) public bodies inform children who have recently been bereaved about the (i) local, (ii) national and (iii) online support services available to them.

Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)

This government is committed to improving the support available to all children and young people, including those struggling with bereavement. This is why we are prioritising improving mental health support for all children and young people, which includes providing access to specialist mental health professionals in every school. In addition, the department provides a list of resources for schools on supporting pupils’ mental health and wellbeing, which may include supporting children dealing with loss and bereavement.

As I set out at a Westminster Hall Debate on childhood bereavement on 2 December, the cross-government bereavement working group, chaired within the Department of Health and Social Care, will continue to look at options for improving support for bereaved children and young people across government, including the potential to improve data collection.


Written Question
Special Educational Needs: Down's Syndrome
Friday 29th November 2024

Asked by: Mike Amesbury (Independent - Runcorn and Helsby)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help children with Down's syndrome attend mainstream schools.

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) receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life.

The department is committed to improving inclusivity and expertise in mainstream schools, as well as ensuring special schools cater to those with the most complex needs, restoring parents’ trust that their child will get the support they need. This includes strengthening accountability for inclusivity, including through Ofsted, and encouraging schools to set up Resourced Provision or special educational needs units to increase capacity in mainstream schools.

High-quality teaching is central to ensuring that all pupils, including those with Down’s Syndrome or other types of SEND, are given the best possible opportunity to achieve. The department is committed to recruiting an additional 6,500 new expert teachers over the course of this parliament. To support all teachers, the department is implementing a range of teacher training reforms to ensure teachers have the skills to support all pupils to succeed, including those with SEND.

On 1 September 2024, the government introduced a new mandatory leadership level qualification for special educational needs coordinators (SENCOs). The qualification will play a key role in improving outcomes for pupils with SEND, including Down’s Syndrome, by ensuring SENCOs consistently receive high-quality, evidence-based training on how best to support children with SEND.

This government is also providing almost £1 billion more for high needs budgets in the 2025/26 financial year, bringing total high needs funding to £11.9 billion. This funding will help local authorities and schools with the increasing costs of supporting children and young people with SEND.