Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 25 July 2018 to Question 165610 on Disabled Students' Allowances, what assessment he has made of the reasons for the decrease in the number of students taking up disabled students' allowances since the introduction of the £200 contribution for computer equipment.

The overall spend on Disabled Student Allowance (DSA) equipment was expected to fall because of the introduction of the £200 contribution for computers. Students are under no obligation to take up any support recommended: some may use their recommended assistive software on an existing laptop, whilst others may find that the accessibility options offered on standard software packages meet their needs. Students in receipt of DSAs continue to be funded for a suite of tools to suit their assessed needs in relation to their course, as well as additional non-IT support.

The government is keen to better understand the impact of DSAs on eligible students, including that of recent DSAs reforms. The department has commissioned a research project to explore this, and will respond to the research findings when they are available.