Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what her Department's budget allocation was for reducing the number of young people who were classed as not in employment, education or training in each year since 2011-12.

We want to ensure that everyone has access to high-quality education and training, which is why we are spending around £7billion on education and training for 16 to 19-year-olds this year. All of this funding helps to reduce the number of young people who are classified as not in education, employment or training (NEET) by ensuring there are attractive options available.

The Department’s NEET reduction strategy is working and numbers are the lowest since consistent records began - the proportion of 16- to 18-year-olds who are NEET has reduced from 9.8% in 2011 to 6.5% in 2015[1]. Funding allocations within this budget which especially help support young people at risk of being NEET reflect these year on year successes, including:

• extra funding for providers to attract, support and retain disadvantaged students[2];

o academic years 2013/14 - £594million; 2014/15 - £573million; 2015/16 - £569million; 2016/17 - £544million;

• financial support for young people who need help with their costs such as transport to enable them to participate;

o financial years 2011-12 - £365million; 2012-13 - £240million; 2013-14 – £212million; 2014-15 - £239million; 2015-16 – £239million;[3]

• Traineeship[4] funding[5]; and

o we estimate expenditure in academic years 2013/14 - £20million; 2014/15 - £35million; 2015/16 - £45million

• the Youth Contract, which commenced in 2012 and ceased in March 2016, to encourage the most difficult to reach young people to participate;

financial years 2012-13 - £6.9million; 2013-14 - £11.3million; 2014-15 - £23million; 2015-16[6].

[1] Participation in education, training and employment: 2015: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/participation-in-education-training-and-employment-2015

2 Equivalent information for earlier years is unavailable because the disadvantage block funding system changed in 2013

[3] Financial year 2015-16 figures are extracts from the management accounts, final figures will be available once the statutory accounts are published

[4] Traineeships were introduced in 2013. Providers target Traineeship programmes at particular groups, most commonly young people who are NEET and/or on benefits: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/supporting-young-people-to-develop-the-skills-for-apprenticeships-and-sustainable-employment-framework-for-delivery

[5] These are approximations based on 16-18-year-old enrolments as funding for Traineeships is included in general provider allocations

[6] The process of collecting 2015-16 delivery data for financial claims has not been completed so a reliable figure for 2015-16 is not available at this time