Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Pauline Latham and Nick Gibb

Thursday 11th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

5. What steps the Government are taking to encourage more girls and women to get involved with the 2018 Year of Engineering.

[The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)]

The Year of Engineering is an opportunity to tackle historical gender stereotypes. Throughout 2018, the Year of Engineering campaign will highlight the variety and creativity of engineering to improve the understanding of what engineers do and of the enormous opportunities that a career in engineering offers both to young men and young women.

[Mrs Latham]

Engineering is a vital employment sector for residents of Mid Derbyshire, both in small and medium-sized enterprises and in larger companies like Rolls-Royce, Bombardier and Toyota. Will my right hon. Friend update the House on which external partners in Derby have signed up to the Year of Engineering campaign?

[Nick Gibb]

My hon. Friend has almost answered the question for me. She is right that Rolls-Royce, Bombardier Transportation and Toyota have all pledged to support the Year of Engineering campaign through activities in schools, both nationwide and in the Derby area.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Pauline Latham and Nick Gibb

Monday 26th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

T8. What plans has the Government to meet the demand for school places in Mid Derbyshire, in the light of the pressure on local authorities to allow planning permission for more housing to be built on brownfield sites?

[The Minister for Schools (Mr Nick Gibb)]

Helping local authorities to secure enough school places is one of the Government’s top priorities, and basic need funding is allocated to local authorities to support the creation of new places. Derbyshire will receive £12.8 million of basic need funding between 2015 and 2018.

When we came to office in 2010, we took the issue of providing more school places very seriously. We more than doubled capital spending, and we have created 445,000 new places since 2010. It is interesting to note that the Labour Government, during their last period in office, cut 207,000 places at a time when there was a baby boom.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Pauline Latham and Nick Gibb

Monday 3rd September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gibb]

I agree with the hon. Lady about the importance of a healthy school meal to children’s behaviour and their concentration at school. To extend free school meals to the whole population would cost £3.4 billion. The state of the public finances that we inherited from her party’s Government means that we have one of the highest budget deficits in the G20. We have reduced the budget deficit by a quarter in the first two years of this Government, which is a tremendous achievement, but we cannot, however worthy the spending programme, undertake new spending programmes of that order.

[Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

Is the Minister aware that, according to the School Food Trust’s own survey, almost half of all state secondary schools offer non-permitted foods, and over a quarter offer non-permitted snacks at mid-morning break? Does not that show that it is nonsense to suggest that academies are the only schools not meeting those standards?

[Mr Gibb]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. The evidence suggests that there have been improvements in maintained schools and in academies, but that more needs to be done in both types of school, which is why we have established the school review under Henry Dimbleby and John Vincent. There have been improvements over the past seven years in the proportion of healthy food taken at lunchtime. More pupils ate a balanced meal in 2010 than in 2004—67% compared to 60%, but that still means that a third of our youngsters are not taking a healthy meal at lunchtime. That is what we seek to address.