Asked by: Rebecca Long Bailey (Labour - Salford and Eccles)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to help improve educational outcomes for homeless children in temporary accommodation or experiencing rough sleeping.
Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
DLUHC is investing £1.2 billion through the Homelessness Prevention Grant over three years, including a £109 million top-up for 2024/25, to ensure that families can move out of temporary accommodation and into stable accommodation, as well as reducing the need for temporary accommodation by preventing homelessness before it occurs.
To help schools tackle the challenges facing disadvantaged pupils, including pupils who might be in temporary accommodation or experiencing homelessness, and to improve children’s educational outcomes, the department has provided pupil premium funding since 2011. Pupil premium funding is increasing to over £2.9 billion this financial year which will ensure that the most disadvantaged pupils receive the support they need to succeed at school.
In 2024/25, the department has targeted a greater proportion of schools’ National Funding Formula towards deprived pupils than ever before with over £4.4 billion of the formula allocated according to deprivation in 2024/25, and over £7.8 billion through additional needs factors based on deprivation, low prior attainment, English as an additional language and mobility. This is alongside various support programmes including free school meals, the National School Breakfast Club programme and the Holiday Activities and Food programme. The department is also targeting support at young people who most need help with the costs of staying in post-16 education and training, through the 16-19 bursary and has extended free meals to disadvantaged 16 to 18 year old students attending further education institutions.
The department is prioritising the attendance of vulnerable children in education, including those who are in temporary accommodation, by introducing stronger expectations of schools, trusts, and local authorities to work together to tackle absence set out in guidance that will become statutory in August 2024, including an expectation on schools to identify at-risk pupils and work with families to support absent students and, from September 2024, introducing a mandatory attendance data tool, allowing them to identify pupils at risk of persistent absence and to enable early intervention.
Asked by: John Healey (Labour - Wentworth and Dearne)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, with reference to the Answer of 25 July 2023 to Question 194671, what his Department's recruitment targets for the armed forces are for 2024-25.
Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)
Recruitment targets for Regular Serving personnel in 2024-25 currently are summarised below:
Royal Navy
Officers 450
Sailors 2,864
Army
Officers 677
Soldiers 9,800
Royal Air Force
Officers 462
Aviators 2,615
In my answers to Questions 7264, 8358, 12118 and 17290, I incorrectly stated that there were no recruitment targets for officers.
I have therefore provided below the historic Army recruitment targets for officers, as contained within the Recruiting Partnering Project (RPP) Demand Plan. The Plan reflects the number of personnel that Capita are directed to recruit annually. The figures include Direct Entrants and Professionally Qualified Officers.
The RPP started in 2012. Please note that data pre-dating 2014 could not be accessed in the time available.
Year | OF Reg | OF Res |
14-15 | 709 | 362 |
15-16 | 742 | 368 |
16-17 | 747 | 318 |
17-18 | 713 | 372 |
18-19 | 696 | 241 |
19-20 | 713 | 315 |
20-21 | 700 | 230 |
21-22 | 688 | 125 |
22-23 | 610 | 220 |
23-24 | 644 | 220 |
In relation to the question asking for the target for recruitment of officers into the British Army for each of the first three quarters in the 2023-24 financial year; please note that OF in-year targets are based on the intakes to the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst (RMAS), of which there are three a year. The following reflects the target by intake, rather than quarter.
RY | Target |
RY23 1 | 152 |
RY23 2 | 227 |
RY23 3 | 152 |
Data is sourced from Army Recruiting and Initial Training Command and reflect single Service estimates.
Asked by: Miriam Cates (Conservative - Penistone and Stocksbridge)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment she has made of (a) the effectiveness of the Kooth mental health app for tackling children's mental health problems, (b) the value for money of that app and (c) whether that app meets her Department's safeguarding expectations.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
It is for local National Health Service organisations to choose which products and services they commission. We would expect local organisations to commission services which they deem to be effective and value for money.
A local Digital Technology Assessment Criteria (DTAC) assessment is required as part of the procurement process. It is expected that Kooth would only have been commissioned if the local NHS organisation had ensured it met baseline DTAC standards across technical assurance, data protection, clinical safety, interoperability, usability, and accessibility.
NHS England are reviewing the concerns raised by Members of Parliament and campaigners relating to Kooth.
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the cost was of the early exit from the lease for the Rosalind Franklin Laboratory.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The figures were released on Monday 21st May 2024 and are included in the link below:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ukhsa-spend-over-25000-2024
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department plans to allocate new (a) funding and (b) resources to support children with special educational needs and disabilities in schools.
Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
High needs funding for children and young people with complex special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) is over £10.5 billion in 2024/25, which is an increase of over 60% from the 2019/20 allocations. Of this, Sefton Council is due to receive a high needs funding allocation of £47.8 million in 2024/25, which is a cumulative increase of 32% per head over the three years from 2021/22. This funding will help local authorities and schools, both mainstream and special schools, with the increasing costs of supporting children and young people with SEND.
In addition, on 22 May the department published 2024/25 allocations of the Teachers’ Pay Additional Grant, which helps schools with the costs of the 2023 teachers’ pay award, and the 2024 Teachers’ Pension Employer Contribution Grant, which helps schools with the increased employer contribution rate from April 2024. This funding totals £1.9 billion in 2024/25 and is to support schools with the costs of their teachers, and therefore contributes to the resources that are available for schools’ pupils with SEND.
In March 2024, the department also published just under £850 million of High Needs Provision Capital Allocations (HNPCA) for 2023/24 and 2024/25. This funding is allocated to local authorities to support them deliver new places and improve existing provision for children and young people with SEND or who require alternative provision (AP).
This funding forms part of the department’s transformational investment of £2.6 billion in new high needs provision between 2022 and 2025 which, when combined with the department’s ongoing delivery of new special and AP free schools, is creating over 60,000 new specialist places across the country.
In total, Sefton Council has been allocated just over £9.7 million through HNPCA between 2022 and 2025.
This funding can be used to deliver new places in mainstream and special schools, as well as other specialist settings, and to improve the suitability and accessibility of existing buildings.
In addition to local authority allocations, 201 special free schools are either open or planned to open in future years. Once at capacity, these schools will provide over 21,000 places for pupils with special educational needs. Over 10,000 of these places have already been delivered.
This includes 56 special free schools being delivered as part of the £2.6 billion of high needs capital funding received in the 2021 Spending Review, plus additional funding announced at the 2024 Spring Budget.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment she has made of the (a) availability and (b) trends in the use of nicotine pouches in the last 12 months.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Current evidence suggests that whilst nicotine pouch use is low amongst adults, it is increasing, especially with the younger male audience.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make an assessment of trends in the level of non-tobacco nicotine product usage in the last five years.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Current evidence suggests that whilst nicotine pouch use is low amongst adults, it is increasing, especially with the younger male audience.
Asked by: John Healey (Labour - Wentworth and Dearne)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, when he plans to respond to Question 21542 on Armed Forces: Housing tabled by the Rt hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne on 15 April 2024.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
I responded to the right hon. Member on 24 May 2024.
Asked by: Lord Blunkett (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what was the total value of the Department for Education’s apprenticeships budget in each financial year since 2017–18.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department’s apprenticeships budget is used to fund training and assessment for new apprenticeship starts in apprenticeship levy and non-levy paying employers to cover the ongoing costs of apprentices already in training and any additional payments made to employers and providers.
The table below provides the total value of the department’s apprenticeship budget for England for each financial year since 2017/18.
Financial Year | 2017/18 | 2018/19 | 2019/20 | 2020/21 | 2021/22 | 2022/23 | 2023/24 | 2024/25 |
DfE Apprenticeships Budget (£ million) | 2,010 | 2,231 | 2,469 | 2,467 | 2,466 | 2,554 | 2,585 | 2,729 |
The budget figure for the 2024/25 financial year reflects the Spending Review 2021 settlement, as well as additional funding that has recently been announced to support apprenticeships, including the growth pilot announced at the Autumn Statement, and the additional funding the Prime Minister announced in March to boost apprenticeships for young people in smaller business and meet overall increased demand for apprenticeships.
Asked by: Baroness Altmann (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of (1) the impact of vacancy rates and (2) of frontline social care and support staff turnover on (a) the quality of care that those in receipt of social care receive and (b) the ability of social care providers to deliver high quality care, following the publication of the Who Cares Wins Report by Community Integrated Care in March.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has made no assessment of the impact of vacancy rates and of frontline social care and support staff turnover on the quality of care that those in receipt of social care receive, or on the ability of social care providers to deliver high quality care.