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Common Foreign and Security Policy
Mr. Bercow: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the enhancement of non-military crisis response tools within the framework of the Common Foreign and Security Policy, as established in section 56 of the Cologne Presidency Conclusions; to what extent qualified majority voting will apply; what the role will be of (i) national Governments and (ii) the Commission in their deployment; and what is his policy towards the pooling of national civil resources and expertise complementing other CFSP initiatives. [100998]
Mr. Vaz: The Presidency have carried forward the conclusions of the European Council at Cologne on non-military crisis response tools, and will present a report to the European Council at Helsinki suggesting how the Cologne conclusions may be taken further. Decisions on any new arrangements in this area will be taken by consensus. No decisions have yet been taken on the roles of the Commission or of national governments in any new coordinating arrangements. We support better coordination of the various non-military crisis response tools at the disposal of the Community and member states as a way of strengthening the European Union's common foreign and security policy.
Bilateral Visits (US)
Mr. Mackinlay:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will place in the Library a list of major inward and outward bilateral visits
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to and from the USA since September 1998 compiled on the same basis as the annexe contained in the memorandum dated 5 October submitted by his Department to the Foreign Affairs Committee entitled "The FCO's Role in Promoting British Interests in Relations with Russia". [101388]
Mr. Battle:
Once a complete list is available in the early part of next year, it will be placed in the Libraries of the House.
Child Care
Jackie Ballard: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what plans he has for the strengthening of early years development and child care partnership plans to ensure a comprehensive network of child care provision. [98727]
Ms Hodge: My Department issued planning guidance to assist the early years development and child care partnerships to draw up their updated plans for 2000-01 in September. The guidance emphasises that plans should be working towards comprehensive coverage of child care services. Between May 1997 and end of June 1999, this Administration has created 94,316 new child care places, compared with 74,053 new places created by the out of school child care initiative in the four years between April 1993 and April 1997.
Since September, we have held a series of 14 planning guidance conferences around England attended by over 900 partnership members. As part of an extensive programme of partnership support we have also made a series of two and three day strategic planning modules available to partnerships. These modules offer workshop sessions tailor made to suit the needs of individual partnerships and give an opportunity for partners to identify detailed strategies to implement their early years development and child care plan.
The wider programme of partnership support includes publication of a series of good practice guides, the setting up of quarterly, regional partnership meetings for partnership chairs, lead officers and members, and the issue of regular newsletters and information sheets to partnership members. We are currently assessing partnership training needs and will make training packages available to them by the end of this financial year.
Charlotte Atkins:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will list by local education authority the number of additional nursery school places created since May 1997. [100007]
Ms Hodge:
Since September 1998, all four-year-olds have been eligible for a free early education place. Currently around 587,000, or 95 per cent., of these places are taken up.
In addition, we are making available £390 million over three years to almost double the number of three-year-olds in England able to access a free early education place. These resources will fund 190,000 new places by March
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2002. From September 1999, £40 million of this new money has been allocated to the 57 local education authorities with the highest levels of social need, to create around 48,000 new, free places during 1999-2000. From April 2000, additional funding for three-year-olds will be distributed across all local education authorities, again prioritised by social need.
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New Deal (Heywood and Middleton)
Mr. Dobbin: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many clients have joined the New Deal Voluntary Option since its launch (a) nationally and (b) in the constituency of Heywood and Middleton. [100295]
Ms Jowell: From the launch of the New Deal in January 1998 to the end of September 1999, 22,400 young people nationally, and 11 young people in Heywood and Middleton constituency, had left the Gateway to start the Voluntary Sector option.
Early Year Services
Mr. Ben Chapman: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make a statement on the inspection system for early years services. [99096]
Ms Hodge [holding answer 29 November 1999]: On 2 December, the Care Standards Bill was introduced into another place. Part V of the Bill makes provision for the reform of the regulation of early years services. In particular, it enables the regulation of child care and early years education in England to be brought together under a distinct and new Early Years Directorate in Ofsted.
Part V also makes other important changes to the regulation of child care. For example, it provides for new and uniform national standards for child care. It introduces, for the first time, checks on people working with children aged 8 and over. It will also ensure that overnight care is properly regulated.
These measures will ensure greater consistency in child care provision. They will result in safer environments of a higher quality for children and less bureaucracy for providers. Parents will have access to more information and so make better informed choices. And they will have greater peace of mind knowing that unsuitable people are prevented from caring for their children.
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