Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps Opportunity North East will take to smooth transitions from primary to secondary education.

Our intention is to invite schools, trusts and local authorities to bring forward proposals for improving secondary outcomes for young people through better transition from primary to secondary school. Through Opportunity North East we will then fund several projects to test the impact of the most promising proposals. This will support more young people in the North East to continue to achieve well at secondary school. It will also enable us to learn more about which approaches have the greatest positive impact so that a greater number of young people are able to benefit in the future.