Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the report entitled Closed Doors: children’s centre usage between 2014-15 and 2017-18, published in June 2019 by Action for Children, what steps he is taking to ensure that local authorities submit data on children's centre use in the early years to enable children’s centre provision to meet local need.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
In 2013 the department published the children’s centre core purpose, which focussed on improving outcomes for children in greatest need of support. This can be found at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sure-start-childrens-centres.
In July 2018 we set an ambitious goal to halve, by 2028, the percentage of children leaving reception year without the communication, language and literacy skills they need to thrive. We have been clear about the outcomes that we are looking to achieve in the early years and it is for local authorities to decide how best to deliver local services.
To help local areas monitor and improve these outcomes, we published on 6 June 2019 the Early Years Outcomes Dashboard: https://department-for-education.shinyapps.io/smapey-dashboard/. This dashboard makes the most important early years social mobility metrics easily available and will allow local authorities to benchmark their outcomes against their statistical neighbours. This is in addition to the extensive range of data made available to local authorities by Public Health England through its Child and Maternal Health profiles: https://fingertips.phe.org.uk/profile/child-health-profiles.
In line with this emphasis on outcomes, the department has no plans to require local authorities to submit data on children’s centre use. The decision to reduce burdens on local authorities and stop requiring them to submit usage data was set out in paragraphs 5.28 and 5.29 of the Sure Start children’s centre planning and performance management guidance in 2006: https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20100210171222/http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters/_download/?id=4974.
The department believes this is still the right approach. Local authorities should be reviewing data on service use and outcomes in order to ensure that they are meeting the duty to have sufficient children’s centres to meet local need and their commissioning decisions are informed by evidence of the impact of their local services. We will continue to work with local authorities to achieve the Secretary of State’s social mobility ambition, including through our £8.5 million early years local government programme.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether he plans to establish a children’s centre outcomes framework.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
In 2013 the department published the children’s centre core purpose, which focussed on improving outcomes for children in greatest need of support. This can be found at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sure-start-childrens-centres.
In July 2018 we set an ambitious goal to halve, by 2028, the percentage of children leaving reception year without the communication, language and literacy skills they need to thrive. We have been clear about the outcomes that we are looking to achieve in the early years and it is for local authorities to decide how best to deliver local services.
To help local areas monitor and improve these outcomes, we published on 6 June 2019 the Early Years Outcomes Dashboard: https://department-for-education.shinyapps.io/smapey-dashboard/. This dashboard makes the most important early years social mobility metrics easily available and will allow local authorities to benchmark their outcomes against their statistical neighbours. This is in addition to the extensive range of data made available to local authorities by Public Health England through its Child and Maternal Health profiles: https://fingertips.phe.org.uk/profile/child-health-profiles.
In line with this emphasis on outcomes, the department has no plans to require local authorities to submit data on children’s centre use. The decision to reduce burdens on local authorities and stop requiring them to submit usage data was set out in paragraphs 5.28 and 5.29 of the Sure Start children’s centre planning and performance management guidance in 2006: https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20100210171222/http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters/_download/?id=4974.
The department believes this is still the right approach. Local authorities should be reviewing data on service use and outcomes in order to ensure that they are meeting the duty to have sufficient children’s centres to meet local need and their commissioning decisions are informed by evidence of the impact of their local services. We will continue to work with local authorities to achieve the Secretary of State’s social mobility ambition, including through our £8.5 million early years local government programme.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether he plans to grade foreign language GCSE and A-level subjects in accordance with the common European framework of reference for languages after the UK leaves the EU.
Answered by Nick Gibb
This is a matter for Ofqual, the Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation. I have asked its Chief Regulator, Sally Collier, to write directly to the hon. Member and a copy of her reply will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Post-18 Education and Funding Review, whether he plans to increase the teaching grant that follows disadvantaged students.
Answered by Chris Skidmore
Access and successful participation remain a priority for this government and is enshrined in the Higher Education and Research Act (2017). Everyone with the ability to succeed in higher education should have the opportunity, regardless of their background or where they grew up.
The government will consider the panel’s recommendations carefully and will conclude the review at the Spending Review. The government has not yet taken decisions with regards to the recommendations put forward.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Post-18 Education and Funding Review, what criteria his Department will use to determine whether a student is disadvantaged; and what level of support will be made available to those students.
Answered by Chris Skidmore
Access and successful participation remain a priority for this government and is enshrined in the Higher Education and Research Act (2017). Everyone with the ability to succeed in higher education should have the opportunity, regardless of their background or where they grew up.
The government will consider the panel’s recommendations carefully and will conclude the review at the Spending Review. The government has not yet taken decisions with regards to the recommendations put forward.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the findings of the Institute for Fiscal Studies report entitled The health effects of Sure Start, published on 3rd June 2019; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The government welcomes the recent report by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) on the health effects of Sure Start. It is crucial that in our pursuit of better outcomes for children and families, and in making spending decisions, we are guided by high quality evidence. I refer the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme to the statement given in response to an Urgent Question about the IFS report by my right hon. Friend, the Minister of State for Skills and Apprenticeships on 5 June 2019.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to ensure young people with special needs in non-local authority schools receive the education and care they need.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The provisions of the Children and Families Act 2014, together with the associated statutory regulations and Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) Code of Practice, apply to academies and free schools as well as to schools maintained by local authorities. All schools are required to use their best endeavours to identify and address the SEND of pupils and to apply the graduated approach to support that is outlined in chapter 6 of the SEND Code of Practice.
Academies and free schools are inspected by Ofsted under the same framework as local authority maintained schools. The quality of education and support for pupils with SEND is taken into account by inspectors when making a judgement on the performance of a school.
The department has a contract with the Whole School SEND Consortium to embed SEND within approaches to school improvement and to equip the school workforce to deliver high quality teaching for all pupils with SEND. The programme of work includes building a community of practice with the involvement of 10,000 schools by 2020 and 15,000 schools by 2022, across the 8 regional school commissioner regions.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to ensure that all education professionals are adequately trained to deal with epileptic seizures.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Children and Families Act (2014) places a legal duty on schools to support children with health conditions, including epilepsy. The Department has published clear, statutory guidance on how to do so in the document ‘Supporting Pupils at School with Medical Conditions’.
Pupils with medical conditions should have an individual healthcare plan drawn up in partnership with a healthcare professional, parents and the pupil themselves. Individual healthcare plans should include details of the support a pupil requires, what needs to be done, when and by whom. It should also contain details of any training required to ensure school staff are competent and confident in their ability to provide the support needed.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on (a) creating a body image and media literacy toolkit and (b) making it a compulsory element of the school curriculum.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government is committed to an ambitious programme of activity to support good physical and mental health in children and young people. The Department for Education is working closely with the Department for Health and Social Care to provide support for schools so that they can promote good physical and mental wellbeing amongst their pupils.
As part of this, the Government is making the teaching of health education compulsory in all state-funded schools from September 2020. Relationships education will be taught in all primary schools and relationships and sex education in all secondary schools. Schools are being encouraged and supported to start teaching these new subjects from September 2019.
The statutory guidance for the new subjects sets out that pupils should be taught about the similarities and differences between the online world and the physical world. This should cover the impact of unhealthy or obsessive comparison with others online including through setting unrealistic expectations for body image and how people may curate a specific image of their life online.
The Department is also producing supporting information for schools on how to teach about issues related to internet safety across the curriculum. This will cover information about the types of harms that young people could face online, including the impact that internet content can have on body confidence, along with guidance about teaching children how to assess critically what they encounter online.
Asked by: Paul Farrelly (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to increase the (a) level and (b) quality of (i) staff qualifications and (ii) in-service professional development in the pre-school childcare sector.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
We are committed to ensuring that all children have access to high quality early education and can achieve their full potential. The latest Ofsted data confirms that 95% of early years providers are now rated ‘good’ and ‘outstanding’, up from 68% in 2010.
The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) framework is mandatory for all early years providers in England. It sets out the staffing requirements for early years settings, including ratios and qualifications.
In March 2017, we published the early years workforce strategy. This set out how the government will support employers to attract, retain and develop high quality early years staff, which is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/early-years-workforce-strategy.
Since then we have worked with sector stakeholders to develop criteria for new more robust level 2 qualifications and awarded a grant to take forward activity to promote gender diversity in the early years workforce. We have also created a new career pathway document to support careers advice, recruitment and staff development. This information is available here: https://www.cache.org.uk/media/1417/dfe-career-pathway-map-v17.pdf.
We are also supporting employer trailblazer groups to develop new apprenticeship standards for the early years workforce and investing £20 million in in-service professional development and training for early years practitioners in pre-reception settings in disadvantaged areas.