Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Spring Budget 2024, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of locating one of the 15 new special free schools in Bournemouth.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Shadow Secretary of State for Education
The department received a total of 85 applications from local authorities to open a special free school in the most recent, very competitive application round, including two applications from Bournemouth, Christchurch, and Poole Council.
The department plans to select 15 successful applications from the pool of applications. This will remain a competitive process. The approach means the department can move quickly to appoint trusts to run these schools.
The department plans to announce those local authorities which have been successful for the additional special free schools by May 2024.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to support Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council to reduce the time taken to complete education, health and care plans.
Answered by David Johnston
Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission conducted a joint inspection of the local area of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole in June 2021 and identified eight areas of significant weaknesses. Following this inspection, the Local Area Partnership were required to produce a Written Statement of Action.
Where local authorities are failing to deliver consistent outcomes for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), the department works closely with them using a range of improvement programmes and SEND specialist advisors to address weaknesses.
The department has appointed a SEND specialist advisor to work closely with the Council and has approved a robust package of sector led improvement support from Bedford Borough Council. Amongst a wide range of support, the specialist advisor and Bedford Borough Council are supporting the Council with meeting the 20 week timescales within the Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan process and improving the quality of EHC plans being produced.
Alongside this support, the department has issued the Council with a statutory direction for SEND services on 26 February 2024. This is due to the inadequate progress the Council has made following the Written Statement of Action Plan since their local area SEND inspection in June 2021. In line with the direction, the department will be working closely with the local area to ensure they are supported in addressing issues and driving improvements to services.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to increase childcare provision in (a) Bournemouth East constituency and (b) the South West.
Answered by David Johnston
Under Section 6 of the Childcare Act 2006, local authorities are responsible for ensuring that the provision of childcare is sufficient to meet the requirements of parents in their area. Part B of the early education and childcare statutory guidance for local authorities highlights that local authorities are required to report annually to elected council members on how they are meeting their duty to secure sufficient childcare, and to make this report available and accessible to parents.
In the government’s 2023 Spring Budget, my right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced transformative reforms to childcare for parents, children and the economy. By the 2027/28 financial year, this government expects to be spending in excess of £8 billion every year on free hours and early education, helping families with pre-school children with their childcare costs. This represents the single biggest investment in childcare in England ever and is set to save working families using the full 30 funded hours up to £6,500 per year from when their child is nine months until they are five years old by September 2025.
Funding will be key to delivering the existing and expanded childcare entitlements. The department has substantially uplifted the hourly rate paid to local authorities to increase hourly rates paid to childcare providers. In the 2024/25 financial year, the department is investing over £400 million additional funding to deliver a significant uplift to hourly rates, building on the £204 million of additional funding paid in September.
To support the sector further to deliver the expansion of childcare support, the government is confirming that the hourly rate that providers are paid to deliver the free hours offers will increase in line with the metric used in the Spring Budget 2023. This reflects that workforce costs are the most significant costs for childcare providers and represents an additional £500 million of investment over financial years 2025/26 and 2026/27.
Alongside increasing funding rates, the government is allocating £100 million in capital funding to local authorities in the 2023/24 financial year to support the expansion of childcare places for eligible working parents and to increase the supply of wraparound care in primary schools. The funding is anticipated to deliver thousands of new places across the country.
Following the department’s consultation on changes to the early years foundation stage framework, the department has introduced flexibilities that aim to make things easier for providers, as well as continuing to explore how the department can support the sector to deliver the additional places that will be required.
The department is ensuring a phased implementation of the expansion to the 30 hours offer to allow the market to develop the necessary capacity. On 2 February 2024, the department launched ‘Do something big, Work with small children’, a new national recruitment campaign to support the recruitment and retention of talented staff to support the expansion of the 30 hours offer. This campaign will raise the profile of the sector, support the recruitment of talented staff, and recognise the lifelong impact those working in early years and childcare have on children and their families.
The department is also continuing to monitor the sufficiency of childcare places across the sector. The department’s childcare and early years provider survey shows that both the number of places available and the workforce has increased since 2022.
The department has regular contact with each local authority in England about their sufficiency of childcare and any issues they are facing.
Where local authorities report sufficiency challenges, the department discusses what action the local authority is taking to address those issues and, where needed, supports the local authority with any specific requirements through the department’s childcare sufficiency support contract.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what progress her Department has made on expanding Family Hubs to (a) Bournemouth East constituency and (b) the South West.
Answered by David Johnston
The £12 million family hubs transformation fund (TF1) is supporting 13 local authorities, including Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP), with the costs of transforming to a Family Hub model of service delivery and a strong Start for Life offer at its core. Further information about BCP's Family Hubs can be found on their website at: https://www.fid.bcpcouncil.gov.uk/family-information-directory/information/family-hubs/family-hubs-early-help-and-outreach-centres.
As part of the Family Hubs Start for Life programme, the department is also investing £300 million in 75 local authorities. Funding has been targeted to the most deprived local authorities, ensuring families get the support they need. This will fund a network of Family Hubs and specific support within those hubs for parent–infant mental health, infant feeding services, parenting support, home learning environment, and to establish parent-carer panels. In addition, all 75 local authorities will publish their Start for Life offer and the department will be providing funding for trials of innovative workforce models to a smaller number of local authorities.
As part of the Family Hubs Start for Life programme, the department is funding 4 local authorities in the South West, which are Bristol, Cornwall, Plymouth and Torbay. Further information on Family Hubs in Bristol is available at: https://www.bristol.gov.uk/residents/social-care-and-health/children-and-families/help-for-families/family-hubs. Further information on Family Hubs in Torbay is available at: https://torbayfamilyhub.org.uk/. Further information on Family Hubs in Plymouth is available at: https://www.plymouth.gov.uk/family-hubs. Further information on Family Hubs in Cornwall is available at: https://www.cornwall.gov.uk/health-and-social-care/childrens-services/family-hubs/.
The department is currently in year 2 of the programme, and all local authorities have opened at least one Family Hub and are focusing on delivering the minimum expectations as set out in the Family Hubs and Start for Life local authority guide by March 2025. This guide is accessible at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/family-hubs-and-start-for-life-programme-local-authority-guide.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help reduce school absences in Bournemouth.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Shadow Secretary of State for Education
The government understands how important regular school attendance is for children’s education, wellbeing and life chances. The department has a national strategy for tackling absence which will impact all schools, including those in Bournemouth.
At the heart of this strategy are clearer and more consistent expectations, which are set out in guidance and seek to promote both a ‘support first’ ethos and one in which attendance is everybody’s business. Through the guidance, schools are now expected to publish an attendance policy, appoint an attendance champion, and use data to identify and then support pupils at risk of becoming persistently absent. This guidance will ensure there is greater consistency for managing attendance across all schools and different local authority areas.
The department has established a daily data pilot that provides near real-time attendance data to schools, trusts and local authorities to help them target their efforts most effectively. The department has employed ten expert attendance advisers who are working with every local authority in the country and several multi-academy trusts to put in place effective plans to deliver the new attendance expectations.
The department has also formed an Attendance Action Alliance, comprised of national leaders from critical sectors like health, social care and policing who are taking action to promote stronger attendance through their workforces. Through this alliance, the department has launched a series of attendance hubs to enable schools with excellent attendance levels to share resources and advice with other schools in similar circumstances. These have recently expanded to 32 in number, which will support improvements across 2,000 schools who are responsible for the attendance of over 1 million pupils.
Alongside this work, the department is also hoping to improve the existing evidence base on effective interventions to improve attendance. The department recently announced a plan to launch a new £15 million pilot next academic year supporting at least 10,800 pupils across ten new priority education investment areas. This programme will be evaluated and the effective practice shared with schools and local authorities.
The attendance strategy is also underpinned by significant wider investment. This includes £5 billion worth of direct investment in education recovery, including £400 milion on teacher training opportunities and up to £1.5 billion on tutoring. Furthermore, the government is spending £2.9 billion annually on the pupil premium, on top of £1.3 billion on recovery premium. Schools must spend the pupil premium on evidence informed approaches, including attendance strategies and attendance. Recent analysis by the Education Endowment Foundation of school strategy statements found that 75% of schools in England identified poor attendance as a priority.
The government has also invested an extra £200 million on the Supporting Families programme increasing the budget to £695 million by 2024/25, to help an additional 300,000 families facing multiple problems. Sustained good attendance is a key outcome of the programme.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to (a) promote inclusivity in schools, (b) assist (i) schools and (ii) teachers to provide support for children with special educational needs and disabilities and (c) reduce exclusions of such children.
Answered by David Johnston
The Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Improvement Plan set out a vision for an inclusive system categorised by high-quality mainstream provision where children and young people have their needs identified early and can access prompt, evidence-based, targeted support. Alongside this, the department will improve access to timely, high-quality specialist provision, where this is appropriate for the child or young person.
High-quality teaching is central to ensuring that pupils with SEND are given the best possible opportunity to achieve in their education. To support all teachers, the department is implementing teacher training reforms which begins with initial teacher training and continues into early career teaching, through to middle and senior leadership. These reforms are designed to ensure teachers have the skills to support all pupils to succeed, including those with SEND.
Reaching over 70% of schools and further education colleges, the Universal Services programme will help the school and further education workforce to identify and meet the needs of children and young people with SEND, earlier and more effectively.
The department knows that if needs and behaviours that present a barrier to learning were addressed earlier, more children could be supported to thrive in their mainstream school. That is why the department’s reforms will see AP settings working closely in partnership with mainstream schools to provide high-quality targeted support and one-to-one interventions. This will build capacity in mainstream schools to identify and support needs early, reducing the numbers of preventable exclusions and expensive long-term placements, as well as lead to improvements in children’s wellbeing and outcomes.
Good behaviour in schools is essential to ensure that all pupils can benefit from the opportunities provided by education. The government supports head teachers in using suspension and permanent exclusion as a sanction where warranted as part of creating calm, safe and supportive environments where both pupils and staff can work in safety and are respected.
The government agrees with the Timpson Review of school exclusion conclusion that there is no ‘right’ number of exclusions, but the department is clear that permanent exclusion should only be used as and when absolutely necessary, as a last resort and this should not mean exclusion from education.
All decisions to exclude a pupil must be lawful, reasonable, and fair. The Behaviour in Schools guidance and the updated statutory Suspension and Permanent Exclusion guidance (2023) sets out that, when considering excluding a pupil, schools should consider any contributing factors that are identified after an incident of misbehaviour has occurred, which could include where the pupil has Special Educational Needs. Initial intervention measures should include an assessment of whether appropriate provision is in place to support any SEND that a pupil may have.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help ensure that children with special educational needs and disabilities have adequate educational support to achieve (a) GCSEs and (b) other qualifications.
Answered by David Johnston
The department wants all children and young people to be able to reach their full potential and receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life.
Under the Children and Families Act 2014, mainstream schools and colleges must use their best endeavours to make sure a child or young person who has Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) gets the special educational provision they need. This includes monitoring the progress of children and young people ahead of formal examinations and providing support where needed, including arranging diagnostic tests where appropriate.
Access arrangements can be agreed with exam boards before an assessment for candidates with specific needs, including SEND, to help them access assessments to show what they know and can do without changing the demands of the assessment. The intention behind an access arrangement is to meet the needs of an individual candidate without affecting the integrity of the assessment.
The Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator (SENCo) or equivalent for a school or college must lead on the access arrangements process, fully supported by teaching staff and members of the senior leadership team. SENCos are responsible for taking appropriate steps to gather an appropriate picture of need, demonstrate normal ways of working for candidates, and ensure that approved access arrangements are put in place for internal school tests, mock examinations and examinations.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to provide (a) activities and (b) food support for children over school holiday periods.
Answered by David Johnston
The department has invested over £200 million every year since 2022 in free holiday club places for children from low-income families, through the Holiday Activities and Food (HAF) Programme, with all 153 local authorities in England delivering in the Easter, summer and Christmas holidays.
The HAF Programme supports disadvantaged children and their families with enriching activities, providing them with healthy food, helping them to learn new things, and improving socialisation.
While the Programme is targeted primarily towards children in receipt of benefits-related free school meals, local authorities also have flexibility to use up to 15% of their funding to target and support other children and families that align with the local authorities’ own priorities.
Since 2022, the HAF programme has provided 10.7 million HAF days to children and young people in this country. The expansion of the programme year-on-year has meant a total of 5.4 million HAF days provided between Christmas 2022, Easter and summer 2023. Based on reporting from local authorities, over 680,000 children and young people attended the holiday activities and food programme in the 2023 summer holidays, including over 5,900 children and young people from Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole.
Over Easter 2023, local authorities reported that over 394,000 children attended the programme across the country, of which over 4,400 young people attended from Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole.
Over Christmas 2022, local authorities reported over 315,000 children attended the programme across the country, of which 1,800 young people attended from Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to support parents of primary-aged children with childcare outside of school hours.
Answered by David Johnston
In the Spring Budget 2023, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced a transformative set of childcare reforms aimed at increasing labour market participation. This included the largest ever investment in childcare, including expansions of early years entitlements and wraparound childcare.
The government’s ambition for wraparound childcare is that, by 2026, all parents and carers of primary school-aged children who need it will be able to access term time childcare in their local area from 8am-6pm. This will help to ensure that parents have enough childcare to work full time, more hours and with flexible hours.
To support this ambition, the government announced that it will provide up to £289 million of start-up funding over two academic years from September 2024 to support local authorities and providers in England to introduce or expand childcare provision on either side of the school day, which parents of primary school-aged children will be able to pay to access.
This programme will focus on primary school-aged children from reception to year 6, Monday to Friday during term time. The department’s expectation is that all wraparound provision is 8am-6pm, enabling parents to work a full day with travel time, unless data shows that local demand is for different hours, for example reflecting local labour market patterns.
Parents should expect to see an expansion in the availability of wraparound care from September 2024, with every parent who needs it able to access term-time wraparound childcare by September 2026.
Asked by: Tobias Ellwood (Conservative - Bournemouth East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to help families with the cost of school bus fares in (a) Bournemouth East constituency and (b) the South West.
Answered by David Johnston
The Department’s school travel policy aims to make sure that no child is prevented from accessing education due to a lack of transport. Local Authorities must arrange free home to school 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, disability or mobility problem, or because the nature of the route means it would be unsafe for them to do so. There are extended rights to free travel for children from low income families.
Most central Government funding for home to school travel is made available to Local Authorities through the Local Government Finance Settlement (LGFS) administered by the Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC). DLUHC will bring forward proposals for the LGFS 2024/25 in the usual way later in the year. Local Government spending will be carefully considered to ensure councils can continue to deliver vital services.
The Department provides grant funding to Local Authorities as a contribution towards the cost of extended rights travel for children from low income families. This is just under £45.8 million in the 2023/23 financial year. The Department will shortly be calculating Local Authorities’ allocations of this grant for 2024/25.
Fares and concessions on public transport are set by transport operators and it is for them to decide whether and how to implement any concessions for children travelling to school. The Government is offering support to help people with costs such as childcare, bills and transport. The Government’s dedicated website provides more information about cost of living support, which is available at: https://helpforhouseholds.campaign.gov.uk/.