Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will include safeguarding from sexual orientation and gender identity conversion therapy in his Department's guidance entitled Keeping children safe in education.
Answered by Will Quince
The department’s statutory safeguarding guidance 'keeping children safe in education' (KCSIE) contains extensive safeguarding advice which all schools and colleges must have regard to when carrying out their duties to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.
It contains extensive advice about all forms of abuse and neglect including the indicators of these harms. KCSIE is clear that all staff should have an awareness of safeguarding issues that can put children at risk of harm. So-called conversion therapy, whilst not explicitly referenced, may well in many instances fall into this category.
Currently so-called conversion therapy is not illegal, though some of the practices will be as they are already considered to be abusive and/or illegal.
KCSIE currently contains guidance on matters such as female genital mutilation and other specific harms that are underpinned by legislation. Once similar legislation is in place for so-called conversion therapy we will consider whether it is necessary and/or appropriate to reflect any changes in KCSIE as we do on a routine and annual basis.
The department has undertaken extensive communications with the sector and continues to consider what more it can do on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) matters such as this.
We are currently consulting on revisions to KCSIE for 2022, in which we have incorporated departmental advice, such as on the issue of sexual violence and sexual harassment between children in schools and colleges. In particular we have reminded schools and colleges of their legal duties with regard to the Human Rights Act 1998, the Equality Act 2010 and the Public Sector Equality Duty. We have also included a new section on how children who are LGBT can be targeted by other children. In some cases, a child who is perceived by other children to be LGBT (whether they are or not) can be just as vulnerable as children who identify as LGBT.
We expect to publish revised guidance for information in May 2022, with it coming into force in September 2022.
The consultation can be found here: https://consult.education.gov.uk/safeguarding-in-schools-team/kcsie-proposed-revisions-2022/.
Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Disabled Children's Partnership Count Disabled Children In polling results, released 17 January 2022, what recent steps he has taken to reduce the time taken to consider Education, Health and Care Plan assessments for disabled children.
Answered by Will Quince
The department works closely with the Disabled Children’s Partnership and we are reviewing the findings of their latest report.
The Children and Families Act 2014 (Section 97) requires local authorities to assess and support the needs of parents/carers as well as those of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Assessments are based on individual needs but should include parents’ well-being and ‘control over day-to-day life’.
The SEND code of practice also makes clear that local authorities must give their decision in response to any request for an education, health and care (EHC) needs assessment within a maximum of 6 weeks from when the request was received or the point at which a child or young person was brought to the local authority’s attention.
However, the SEND system currently does not deliver for all children and young people with SEND. We further recognise that the COVID-19 outbreak disproportionately impacted young people with SEND and their families, which is why we are conducting a review of the SEND system. The department uses data to monitor and assess local authority performance and has been supporting local authorities to meet their statutory duties for SEND, including by providing challenge and support to those local authorities where there are long-standing delays.
Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission continue with their full inspection programme and our team of SEND advisers and colleagues in NHS England are continuing to provide support and challenge to help improve performance.
Depending on the underlying issues that each local authority faces, such as those relating to EHC assessments, we commission specialist and regional support from our delivery partners or facilitate peer to peer support.
Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Disabled Children's Partnership Count Disabled Children In polling results, released 17 January 2022, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the finding that 18 per cent of the public thought that disabled children and families got the right support from councils and the NHS.
Answered by Will Quince
The department works closely with the Disabled Children’s Partnership and we are reviewing the findings of their latest report.
The Children and Families Act 2014 (Section 97) requires local authorities to assess and support the needs of parents/carers as well as those of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Assessments are based on individual needs but should include parents’ well-being and ‘control over day-to-day life’.
The SEND code of practice also makes clear that local authorities must give their decision in response to any request for an education, health and care (EHC) needs assessment within a maximum of 6 weeks from when the request was received or the point at which a child or young person was brought to the local authority’s attention.
However, the SEND system currently does not deliver for all children and young people with SEND. We further recognise that the COVID-19 outbreak disproportionately impacted young people with SEND and their families, which is why we are conducting a review of the SEND system. The department uses data to monitor and assess local authority performance and has been supporting local authorities to meet their statutory duties for SEND, including by providing challenge and support to those local authorities where there are long-standing delays.
Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission continue with their full inspection programme and our team of SEND advisers and colleagues in NHS England are continuing to provide support and challenge to help improve performance.
Depending on the underlying issues that each local authority faces, such as those relating to EHC assessments, we commission specialist and regional support from our delivery partners or facilitate peer to peer support.
Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what discussions his Department is having with the Department of Work and Pensions on the forthcoming trial of Access to Work adjustment passports for students leaving education; and what the planned (a) scale, (b) commencement date and (c) duration is of that pilot.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The department is supporting the Department for Work and Pensions to develop an adjustments passport that aims to smooth the transition into employment and support people changing jobs including people with special educational needs and disabilities. Twelve-month pilots of the adjustments passport are now underway in higher education and post-16 provider pilot sites. The adjustments passport will capture the in-work support needs of the individual and includes the aim to empower them in having confident discussions about adjustments with employers.
Having an adjustments passport is voluntary and the department will continue to monitor take up alongside communications as to how we might increase visibility and awareness to inform a future approach were the pilots to be successful. Following an evaluation, if the pilots prove successful, the adjustments passport will be made available to support all people with disabilities and health conditions providing a transferable record of adjustments and reduce the need for unnecessary assessments.
The government launched the SEND Review in September 2019, a cross government review being led by the department. The goal of the SEND Review is to substantially improve outcomes for children and young people with SEND, build parental confidence and bring financial sustainability to the system. The government plans to publish proposals for public consultation, in a Green Paper, in the first three months of 2022.
Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, subject to the successful piloting of Access to Work adjustment passports, whether he plans to embed passports for children with special educational needs and disabilities support (SEND) in schools and colleges in an updated Code of Practice following his Department's SEND review.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The department is supporting the Department for Work and Pensions to develop an adjustments passport that aims to smooth the transition into employment and support people changing jobs including people with special educational needs and disabilities. Twelve-month pilots of the adjustments passport are now underway in higher education and post-16 provider pilot sites. The adjustments passport will capture the in-work support needs of the individual and includes the aim to empower them in having confident discussions about adjustments with employers.
Having an adjustments passport is voluntary and the department will continue to monitor take up alongside communications as to how we might increase visibility and awareness to inform a future approach were the pilots to be successful. Following an evaluation, if the pilots prove successful, the adjustments passport will be made available to support all people with disabilities and health conditions providing a transferable record of adjustments and reduce the need for unnecessary assessments.
The government launched the SEND Review in September 2019, a cross government review being led by the department. The goal of the SEND Review is to substantially improve outcomes for children and young people with SEND, build parental confidence and bring financial sustainability to the system. The government plans to publish proposals for public consultation, in a Green Paper, in the first three months of 2022.
Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department has taken to encourage (a) awareness and (b) uptake of apprenticeships, supported internships and traineeships among young disabled school-leavers.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
In the ‘Skills for Jobs’ White Paper, published in January 2021, we announced the introduction of a three point plan to enforce provider access legislation (the ‘Baker Clause’, commenced in 2018). This requires that all maintained schools and academies provide opportunities for providers of technical education and apprenticeships to visit schools to talk to all year 8-13 pupils, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). This plan includes creating clear minimum legal requirements, specifying who is to be given access to which pupils and when. This is an important step towards real choice for every pupil.
Through the Careers & Enterprise Company (CEC) we support careers leaders in schools and colleges to design and deliver careers education programmes tailored to the needs of young people with SEND. As part of this work, the CEC has worked with the Gatsby Foundation and Disability Rights UK to create support material to help schools and colleges use the Gatsby Benchmarks to deliver high-quality career guidance for students with a wide range of needs and disabilities.
As set out in the National Disability Strategy, we will work to improve supported internships in England, including updating guidance and, through our contract/grant delivery partners in financial year 2020-21, developing a self-assessment quality framework for providers, and helping local authorities to develop local supported employment forums. In addition, the CEC continues to encourage employers to provide work experience and supported internships for young people with SEND.
We are also encouraging more young people to consider apprenticeships through our Apprenticeship Support & Knowledge (ASK) programme which reached over 600,000 students across England in the last academic year. As part of this, we are working with 40 schools through the ASK Development Schools project to support students who have the potential to progress into a traineeship or apprenticeship but who are facing significant personal barriers, including disabilities.
In partnership with Disability Rights UK, we have launched a Disabled Apprentice Network to provide valuable insight and evidence on how to attract and retain disabled people into apprenticeships. We have also improved our ‘Find an Apprenticeship’ and ‘Find a Traineeship’ services to allow people to identify Disability Confident employers offering opportunities.
We are also taking several measures to raise awareness of traineeships and increase uptake. We have created a new online collection of free resources for schools including factsheets, case studies and a guide for teachers. We are also working with the National Careers Service and the Department for Work and Pensions to ensure that young people understand the different options available to them and are supported on the right path.