Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the effect of the presence of multilingual children in schools on the learning of monolingual children.

Analysis undertaken by the Centre for the Economics of Education in 2012 indicates that there is no association between the presence of children whose first language is not English and the educational attainment of their native English-speaking peers, after controlling for basic demographic characteristics and the schools these pupils attend.

In our recent consultation on a new national funding formula for schools, we proposed including an EAL factor in the formula. We are currently considering responses to the consultation and will come forward with further proposals in due course.