Asked by: Taiwo Owatemi (Labour - Coventry North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment she has made of the potential merits of introducing non-repayable maintenance grant funding for higher education students from the least advantaged backgrounds.
Answered by Luke Hall - Minister of State (Education)
The government believes that income-contingent student loans are a fair and sensible way of financing higher education. It is only right that those who benefit from the system should make a fair contribution to its costs. The department has continued to increase maximum loans and grants for living and other costs for undergraduate and postgraduate students each year with a 2.8% increase for the current 2023/24 academic year and a further 2.5% increase announced for the 2024/25 academic year.
In addition, the department has frozen maximum tuition fees for the 2023/24 and 2024/25 academic years. By 2024/25, maximum fees will have been frozen for seven successive years. The department believes that the current fee freeze achieves the best balance between ensuring that the system remains financially sustainable, offering good value for the taxpayer and reducing debt levels for students in real terms.
The government understands the pressures people have been facing with the cost of living and has taken action to help. The department has already made £276 million of student premium and mental health funding available for the 2023/24 academic year to support successful outcomes for students, including disadvantaged students. The department has also made a further £10 million of one-off support available to help student mental health and hardship funding for the 2023/24 academic year. This funding will complement the help universities are providing through their own bursary, scholarship and hardship support schemes. For the 2024/25 financial year the department has increased the Student Premium, including the full-time, part-time and disabled premium, by £5 million to reflect high demand for hardship support. Further details of this allocation for the 2024/25 academic year will be announced by the Office for Students (OfS) in the summer.
Overall, support to households to help with the high cost of living is worth £108 billion over 2022/23 to 2024/25, which is an average of £3,800 per UK household. The department believes this will have eased the pressure on family budgets and so will in turn enable many families to provide additional support to their children in higher education to help them meet increased living costs.
Asked by: Taiwo Owatemi (Labour - Coventry North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to help improve the financial literacy of school children in Coventry North West constituency.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Education on financial matters helps to ensure that pupils are prepared to manage their money well, make sound financial decisions and know where to seek further information when needed.
Financial education forms part of the citizenship curriculum at Key Stages 3 and 4, but can be taught at all Key Stages. More information on the National Curriculum can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/national-curriculum. The subject covers the functions and uses of money, the importance of personal budgeting, money management and managing financial risk. At secondary school, pupils are taught content on income and expenditure, credit and debt, insurance, savings, pensions, financial products and services and how public money is raised and spent.
The mathematics curriculum includes an emphasis on the essential arithmetic that primary pupils should be taught. A strong grasp of mathematics will underpin pupils’ ability to manage budgets and money. The secondary mathematics curriculum develops pupils’ understanding in relation to more complex personal finance issues such as calculating loan repayments, interest rates and compound interest.
The Money and Pensions Service (MaPS) has published guidance to support head teachers to enhance their financial education provision. This is available here: https://maps.org.uk/2021/11/11/financial-education-guidance-for-primary-and-secondary-schools-in-england/.
The Department and MaPS are planning a series of joint financial education webinars during this academic year, aimed at promoting the importance of financial education, improving pupils’ knowledge and teachers’ confidence.
Asked by: Taiwo Owatemi (Labour - Coventry North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she plans to bring forward legislative proposals to ensure that divorced parents are not fined for unauthorised school absences for which the other parent was responsible.
Answered by Nick Gibb
I refer the hon. Member for Coventry North West, to the answer I gave on 15 November 2022 to Question 80916. The Department is currently considering its legislative priorities and will set these out in due course.
Asked by: Taiwo Owatemi (Labour - Coventry North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will revise the rules according to which local authorities can fine both parents separately for taking a child out of school during term time, in order to introduce an exception for those cases where the parents are divorced or separated and the decision to take the child out of school has been taken by one parent alone.
Answered by Nick Gibb
All parents of compulsory school aged children who are registered at school have a legal duty to ensure their children attend school regularly.
Local Authorities are independent prosecutors, each covered by their own Code of Conduct for issuing penalty notices, in line with the Education (Penalty Notices) (England) Regulations 2007. Where attendance legal intervention is used, decisions are made on an individual case-by-case basis by the relevant Local Authority.
All parents, including where parents do not live together, can commit an offence under Section 444 of the Education Act 1996 and may be issued a penalty notice if it is in accordance with their Local Authority’s Code of Conduct for issuing penalty notices. Local Authorities must not act in a way that is irrational in the particular case, taking into consideration the individual family circumstances. Parents can write to their Local Authority if they believe that they have been incorrectly issued with a penalty notice.
Asked by: Taiwo Owatemi (Labour - Coventry North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department will take to support local authorities on speeding up special educational needs assessments.
Answered by Kelly Tolhurst
This year, local authorities have access to £51.3 billion to deliver their core services, including SEND services. Local authorities have the flexibility to spend according to local needs and priorities, including to undertake education, health and care needs assessments.
Asked by: Taiwo Owatemi (Labour - Coventry North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that the level of implementation of education, health and care plans are consistent across the UK.
Answered by Kelly Tolhurst
The department publishes annual data on suspensions and permanent exclusions which include capturing those pupils with education, health and care (EHC) plans. It has also published updated Suspension and Permanent Exclusion guidance in July 2022 so that headteachers have the information they need to use these sanctions properly and proportionately.
The updated guidance makes clear that headteachers should, as far as possible, minimise the use of permanent exclusion for any pupil with an EHC plan and that initial intervention to address underlying causes of disruptive behaviour should include an assessment of whether appropriate provision is in place to support any special educational needs and disability that a pupil may have.
In March 2022, the department published the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Green Paper and Schools White Paper, which set out plans to make sure every child can reach their full potential. They set out a vision of an inclusive education system with excellent local mainstream provision that would improve the experience and outcomes for children and young people with SEND, support those who need alternative provision, and those who need the additional support delivered through an EHC plan.
The Green Paper consultation closed on 22 July 2022 and the department is currently analysing the responses. Later this year, we will publish a national SEND and AP implementation strategy, setting out our response to the consultation and the next steps for implementation of system reform.
Asked by: Taiwo Owatemi (Labour - Coventry North West)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will make an assessment of the potential relationship between trends in the levels of school exclusions and education, health and care plans.
Answered by Kelly Tolhurst
The department publishes annual data on suspensions and permanent exclusions which include capturing those pupils with education, health and care (EHC) plans. It has also published updated Suspension and Permanent Exclusion guidance in July 2022 so that headteachers have the information they need to use these sanctions properly and proportionately.
The updated guidance makes clear that headteachers should, as far as possible, minimise the use of permanent exclusion for any pupil with an EHC plan and that initial intervention to address underlying causes of disruptive behaviour should include an assessment of whether appropriate provision is in place to support any special educational needs and disability that a pupil may have.
In March 2022, the department published the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Green Paper and Schools White Paper, which set out plans to make sure every child can reach their full potential. They set out a vision of an inclusive education system with excellent local mainstream provision that would improve the experience and outcomes for children and young people with SEND, support those who need alternative provision, and those who need the additional support delivered through an EHC plan.
The Green Paper consultation closed on 22 July 2022 and the department is currently analysing the responses. Later this year, we will publish a national SEND and AP implementation strategy, setting out our response to the consultation and the next steps for implementation of system reform.