Tag: Parliamentary Question

Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-05-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the report of Ofsted on its inspection of Audenshaw School Academy Trust which took place on 23 and 24 February 2016, if she will make an assessment of the effect on the students for whom pupil premium funding was intended of that funding being saved for a capital project.

Mr Sam Gyimah

The conditions of grant for the pupil premium make clear that its purpose is to raise the attainment of disadvantaged pupils. School leaders are best placed to decide how to spend the pupil premium in line with this policy and the needs of their pupils. Schools are not prevented from using the pupil premium to fund capital projects or from carrying over funding between years.

The Department for Education supports schools to make evidence-based decisions through the work of the Education Endowment Foundation, established to identify and promote effective practice in raising the attainment of disadvantaged pupils. The Department does not monitor how Academies and maintained schools spend the pupil premium but instead holds them to account for the outcomes of eligible pupils through the publication of data in performance tables and Ofsted inspection.

Where concerns are raised about the performance of an academy then they are addressed by the Regional School Commissioner with responsibility for that area. The Department also takes seriously any concerns about the financial management of a school. We are aware of the findings of the Ofsted report on Audenshaw School relating to its use of the pupil premium, following an inspection in February 2016. We are also aware that the Hon. Member, Andrew Gwynne, has met the Regional Schools Commissioner for Lancashire and West Yorkshire, Vicky Beer, on a number of occasions to discuss his concerns about Audenshaw School Academy Trust. The Department has carefully reviewed all the information provided on this matter and has identified no grounds to take further action.

01/01/2023
Cheryl Gillan – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Cheryl Gillan on 2016-07-11.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many children and young people who are either educated at home or not in employment, education or training are recorded within the statistics and analysis on statements of special educational needs and education, health and care plans in England published on 26 May 2016; and under which categories such children and young people are recorded.

Edward Timpson

The number of children and young people with a statement or education, health and care (EHC) plan who are educated at home is not specifically collected in the ‘Statements and EHC plans England: 2016’ publication[1]. However, as these children and young people will be included in the total number of children and young people with statements and EHC plans, local authorities are likely to have included these children and young people in the ‘other arrangements made by the local authority’ or ‘other arrangements made by the parent’ category.

The number of children and young people with statements or EHC plans who are not in employment, education or training (NEET) is not specifically collected in this statistical first release. Where young people have a statement or EHC plan and are NEET, they will be included in one of the other categories, e.g. ‘other arrangements made by local authority’ or ‘awaiting provision’.

There is not an exhaustive list of arrangements included in the category of ‘Other – arrangements made by the local authority in accordance with Section 319 of the Education Act 1996 or Section 61 of the Children and Families Act 2014’. The published SEN 2016 guide for local authorities[2] completing this part of the collection is as follows:

‘Section 319 of the Education Act 1996 empowers an authority to provide education for children with special educational needs “other than in school”. This may include education in centres run by social services or at home. Children would not normally be on another school register.

‘Section 61 of the Children and Families Act 2014 empowers an authority to provide education for children and young people with special educational needs “other than in school, post-16 institutions, etc”. This may include education in centres run by social services or where the local authority has named home education on an EHC plan.’

[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/statements-of-sen-and-ehc-plans-england-2016

[2] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/special-educational-needs-survey-2016-guide

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01/01/2023
Tom Blenkinsop – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tom Blenkinsop on 2016-09-13.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 7 September 2016 to Question 44365, what assessment the Health and Safety Executive has made on the effect of long shift patterns on the incidence of (a) errors, (b) accidents and (c) injuries in (i) all sectors of the workforce and (ii) the mining industry.

Penny Mordaunt

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) does not hold this information. However, HSE recognises that poorly designed shift-working arrangements and long working hours can result in fatigue, accidents, injuries and ill health and has produced guidance for employers on designing and implementing shift-working arrangements:

(http://www.hse.gov.uk/humanfactors/topics/fatigue.htm).

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01/01/2023

Lord Ahmed – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ahmed on 2015-11-03.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the current waiting time for processing of (1) Spouse Visas, (2) Visitor Visas, (3) Student Visas and (4) Entrepreneur Visas.

Lord Bates

The average global processing time for the period July 2014 to June 2015 and the most recent data – which covers the month of June 2015 – on global processing times for spouse, visitor, student and entrepreneur visas are set out in the table below.

Type	Category	Average processing time (working days) – (Jun-15)	Average processing time (working days) – (Jul-14 to Jun-15)
Non-Settlement	Visit	7	7
Non-Settlement	Student	6	8
Non-Settlement	T1 Entrepreneur	11	11
Settlement	Spouse	35	54

01/01/2023

Lord Harrison – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Harrison on 2015-11-30.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whose responsibility it is to ensure the safety of lifts at Euston railway station; and what information they have about when those lifts were last inspected; and whether they will publish a report about lift safety at that station.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

Network Rail is the relevant safety duty holder with responsibility for ensuring that risks are controlled so far as reasonably practicable on its infrastructure and the stations it manages.

The Department does not hold information about when the lifts at Euston railway station were last inspected and operational issues such as these are a matter for Network Rail with oversight from the Office of Rail and Road in its role as the independent railway safety regulator.

01/01/2023
Lord West of Spithead – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord West of Spithead on 2016-01-12.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answers by Earl Howe on 16 December 2015 (HL4512 and HL4513), how long RAF Joint Force Harrier squadrons had to stay on board anti-submarine warfare carriers to ensure all pilots were flight qualified.

Earl Howe

Depending on weather and aircraft serviceability, it usually took Joint Force Harrier Squadron pilots, on average, three to four weeks to qualify for combat operations from an Invincible Class carrier.

01/01/2023
Ruth Cadbury – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ruth Cadbury on 2016-02-03.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what plans he has for the children’s hospices grant beyond 2016; and if he will make a statement.

Ben Gummer

NHS England is responsible for the annual grant to children’s hospices and for determining how it will be allocated each year. The palliative care currency is designed to provide a basis for local commissioning discussions, by clearly identifying the costs of care. The currency is being tested by NHS England locally, to ensure it makes sense to commissioners and providers, and the results will be published later in the year. The intention is that there will be an appropriate transition to local commissioning of children’s hospices, but they have pledged to continue the grant until a sustainable alternative means of local funding is in effect.

01/01/2023
Baroness Byford – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Byford on 2016-02-24.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what percentage of UK liquid milk has been sold by the 10 leading supermarkets over each of the past five years.

Lord Gardiner of Kimble

Virtually all liquid milk sold at retail in the UK is UK produced, since imports account for less than 1% of the total UK supply. We do not hold any data on milk sales provided by retailers.

01/01/2023
Richard Burden – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Richard Burden on 2016-04-11.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to ensure that (a) his Department and (b) Highways England are improving their assessments of user satisfaction in relation to the strategic road network.

Andrew Jones

The Department appointed Transport Focus (TF) as the road user watchdog and the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) as the Highways Monitor on the formation of Highways England on 1 April 2015. In addition to reporting from TF and ORR, officials regularly meet with Highways England to discuss all aspects of their performance, including customer satisfaction.

TF is developing a new Strategic Roads User Survey to measure satisfaction among those using Highways England’s network with input from the Department. It is intended to pilot this throughout 2016 and then launch the new survey during 2017. This will run in parallel with Highways England’s existing National Road User Satisfaction Survey until that ceases in March 2018.

01/01/2023

Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-05-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many successful applicants to the Schools Direct scheme there were in each of the last five years; and what the cost of that scheme was to her Department in each such year.

Nick Gibb

The School Direct scheme began as a pilot tuition fee based programme in the 2012/13 academic year. The programme was extended to include School Direct (salaried) programmes from the 2013/14 academic year.

The number of successful applicants (trainees who secured and took up a place) on School Direct programmes, and the associated cost (where available), from 2012/13 to 2014/15 are given in table 1:

Academic year	Number of School Direct (tuition fee) trainees	Number of School Direct (salaried) trainees	Cost of training bursaries for SD (fee) trainees	Cost of salary grants for SD (salaried) trainees
2012/13	349	N/A	Unavailable	N/A
2013/14	4,203	2,473	Unavailable	£40,320,214
2014/15	6,311[1]	2,759	£36,539,000	£43,031,709

Table 1: Number of School Direct trainees and associated costs from 2012/13 to 2014/15.

We are unable to provide the training bursary costs specific to School Direct only for trainees for 2012/13 and 2013/14, as the data captured did not make a distinction between core and school direct tuition fee places for the purpose of bursary funding.

Data for the 2015/16 academic year will not be available until after the end of the academic year when data submissions will be finalised and subsequently validated.

[1] Of the 6,311 tuition fee trainees in AY 2014/15, 4,264 received a bursary.

01/01/2023