Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what consideration her Department has given to removing VAT charged on the MDS Settlement Grant for a) MDS Schools and b) parents.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The Music and Dance Scheme provides means-tested bursaries so high achieving students in music and dance can secure world-class specialist training regardless of financial circumstances, including at eight private schools. Since 1 January 2025, the standard rate of 20% VAT has applied to all education services, vocational training and boarding services provided by private schools for a charge. This academic year, grant funding to the schools included an additional £4 million to meet the costs of VAT linked to the bursaries themselves.
The matter of VAT for private school fees was subject to a consultation led by HM Treasury and the government response was first published July 2024 and updated October 2024.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has had discussions with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on removing VAT from the Music and Dance Scheme Settlement Grant.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The Music and Dance Scheme provides means-tested bursaries so high achieving students in music and dance can secure world-class specialist training regardless of financial circumstances, including at eight private schools. Since 1 January 2025, the standard rate of 20% VAT has applied to all education services, vocational training and boarding services provided by private schools for a charge. This academic year, grant funding to the schools included an additional £4 million to meet the costs of VAT linked to the bursaries themselves.
The matter of VAT for private school fees was subject to a consultation led by HM Treasury and the government response was first published July 2024 and updated October 2024.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will publish data in relation to teacher retention and recruitment by (a) constituency, (b) Local Authority and (c) region.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
Information on the school workforce in England, including teacher recruitment and retention, is published annually in the ‘School workforce in England’ statistical release, available at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-workforce-in-england/2025. This includes school-level data on the number of full-time equivalent teachers who, by the following year, either remain in the same school, move to another state-funded school, or leave the state-funded sector.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the cost is of her Department’s marketing campaign with Gemma Collins.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
No payments, fees, gifts, hospitality, or any other benefits are being made from the department to Gemma Collins or TM Media PR or any other agent or representative on her behalf.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will publish a breakdown of her Department’s marketing and advertising expenditure in (a) 2024-25 and (b) 2025-26.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
The department's marketing and advertising expenditure for 2024/2025 is shown below. Final outturn data for the most recent financial year are not yet available.
The total marketing spend will be published in the department’s Annual Report and Accounts in due course.
Campaign name | 2024/25 Spend |
Get Into Teaching campaign | £16,215,689 |
Teach In Further Education campaign | £5,100,000.00 |
Do Something Big (early years recruitment campaign) | £11,292,716 |
Children’s social care, including social workers, adoption and care leavers | £918,474 |
Teaching Vacancies Service | £656,406 |
Skills for Life campaign | £12,899,527 |
Childcare Choices campaign | £2,751,124.25 |
Total | £49,833,936.25 |
Paid marketing activity in 2024/25 supported operational delivery by helping to recruit more school and college teachers and early years staff. It was also used to raise awareness and encourage action on topics including the benefits of formal childcare and the help available for parents with its cost, take-up of government-funded technical qualifications, skills and training offers among young people and adults. It also supported recruitment and signposting to support in children’s social care, including for children’s social workers, adoptive families and care leavers.
Paid-for communication is subject to Cabinet Office spending controls, which ensure taxpayer money is spent cost-effectively and reflects professional best practice. Where possible, activity is delivered in-house as part of cross-government campaigns or at low cost through partner coordination.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what discussions his Department has had with NHS England and NHS workforce framework providers on ensuring compliant payroll practices within the agency staffing supply chains for the NHS.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department, alongside NHS England, collaborates with framework providers like the NHS Workforce Alliance and HealthTrust Europe to ensure compliant payroll practices. Key actions include mandatory auditing, IR35 compliance, adherence to National Health Service employment checks, and enforcing agency price caps.
NHS England continues to monitor agency spending and works to reduce reliance on off-framework staffing, which is crucial for compliant, high quality, and cost-effective staffing.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many Speech and Language Therapy Advanced Practitioners will be hired (a) in England and (b) in each Integrated Care Board geographical area.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what support will be available for children with dyslexia under the Experts at Hand programme.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The Experts at Hand offer will support schools and settings with expert advice and guidance to help them identify and meet a range of special educational needs, including dyslexia. This includes strengthening early identification and supporting more effective, inclusive practice. Through the offer, settings will have earlier and easier access to specialist expertise from educational psychologists, speech and language therapists, occupational therapists and other appropriate professionals.
Experts at Hand is additional to existing statutory provision and does not replace established school-led approaches or specialist one-to-one services.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has undertaken an impact assessment of the potential reduction in enforceable rights for families arising from restricting EHCPs to only the most complex needs.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
Our ambition is to provide more opportunities for health and education professionals to support the needs of children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) more effectively and inclusively. This is why we are investing £1.8 billion over the next three years to improve access to professionals for mainstream settings, including local authorities and Integrated Care Board working together to develop a new ‘Experts at Hand’ offer.
We are also developing National Inclusion Standards supported by an expert panel, to set out evidence-informed tools, strategies and approaches for educators to draw on to identify and support children and young people with additional needs.
We have carefully assessed the impact of all our proposals, and this is included in our published ‘SEND reform: equalities impact assessment’ and ‘SEND reform child's rights impact assessment’ which include projections on how children and young people will be impacted by the proposals. The equalities impact assessment can be found at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/69985b33047739fe61889ebd/SEND_reform_equalities_impact_assessment_.pdf.
The child’s rights impact assessment is available at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/69985b75047739fe61889ebe/SEND_reform_child_s_rights_impact_assessment.pdf.
The responses to the consultation will help inform our policy development and assessments of impact of the final reforms.
Asked by: Saqib Bhatti (Conservative - Meriden and Solihull East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the projected costs per child of pupils in Targeted, Targeted Plus and Specialist layers of support are, respectively.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The department is providing additional funding to boost the capacity of mainstream settings to meet the continuum of needs children have, before any legislative changes.
The ‘SEND Reform: putting children and young people first’ consultation document includes our aim that more support will be commissioned on a cohort basis to enable more flexible, responsive provision that meets children’s needs earlier and more effectively. For example, we will invest £1.8 billion over three years in our new Experts at Hand services that will ensure individual early years settings, schools and colleges can access expert support from professionals like educational psychologists and speech and language therapists, without having to commission this individually which is inefficient and high burdensome for education settings.
The support in Targeted, Targeted Plus and Specialist layers of support will be developed through future work on National Inclusion Standards and Specialist Provision Packages. These will be developed by an independent panel of experts and tested with parents.