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Disabled Students (Shrewsbury and Atcham)
Mr. Paul Marsden: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many students in Shrewsbury and Atcham have benefited from the disabled students' allowance; how much has been spent in total on these students; and if he will make a statement. [156507]
Mr. Wicks: Data are only available by local education authority, not by constituency area. Shropshire LEA paid out in disabled students allowances (DSAs) in academic year 1998-99 as follows:
| DSAs | Students | Expenditure |
|---|---|---|
| General allowance | 16 | 2,255 |
| Non-medical personal help | 42 | 52,654 |
| Specialist items of equipment | 40 | 58,364 |
| Total | 98 | 113,273 |
Note:
Students may be in receipt of more than one allowance and therefore there will be an element of double counting in the student figures.
Provisional estimates suggest that 70 full-time undergraduate, 15 part-time and 10 postgraduate students at a total cost of £240,000 will have received DSAs in Shropshire in 2000-01, a doubling of expenditure in two years. The Government's policies of removing the means test for DSAs in 1998-99 and extending DSAs to part-time and postgraduate students in 2000-01 have
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benefited disabled higher education students in every area of the country, leading to an increase in expenditure on DSAs in England and Wales from £10.4 million in 1996-97 to an estimated £34 million this academic year.
Beacon Schools (Shrewsbury and Atcham)
Mr. Paul Marsden: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will list each school in Shrewsbury and Atcham that has been awarded Beacon status, indicating the size of grant given to each; and if he will make a statement. [156513]
Ms Estelle Morris: There is one Beacon school in Shrewsbury and Atcham--The Grange Junior School. The school receives additional funding of £39,000 a year for the dissemination of good practice. It is one of a national network of 587 Beacon schools that are helping to raise standards by building partnerships with others, sharing expertise and providing professional support to teachers across the country.
Ambition:IT
Jane Griffiths: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will include Reading in the list of pilot areas for Ambition:IT. [156525]
Ms Jowell [holding answer 30 March 2001]: Ambition:IT will run in five pilot areas to be announced later in the Spring. A short list of areas for the pilot has already been announced: they are London, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, South Yorkshire, Liverpool, Tyneside, Cardiff, Glasgow, and Edinburgh and the Forth area. Areas have been selected on the basis of strong employer demand and high local levels of unemployment; both criteria had to be met for an area to be considered. On objective grounds, Reading does not meet both these criteria.
Training (Manchester)
Mr. Tony Lloyd: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many training places are available in Manchester for work-based learning for adults; and what the ratio is of adult unemployed to these training places for (a) Manchester and (b) England and Wales. [156648]
Mr. Wicks [holding answer 2 April 2001]: At 24 December 2000 (the latest date for which data are available), there were 623 people in Government- supported training on work-based learning for adults in the Manchester Training and Enterprise Council area and 16,359 adult unemployed, approximately one person in training to every 26 unemployed. Comparative figures for England and Wales are: 32,509 in training, 646,340 adult unemployed, approximately one person in training to every 20 unemployed.
Education Finance (Newcastle upon Tyne)
Mr. Cousins: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make a statement on the (a) educational SSA, (b) grants and (c) capital allocation in Newcastle upon Tyne for 2001-02. [156659]
Ms Estelle Morris [holding answer 2 April 2001]: I refer my hon. Friend to the letter sent to him by the Secretary of State on 16 February. National increases of
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£100 million in both the School Standards Grant and the devolved New Deal for Schools capital grant were announced in the Budget on 7 March. Newcastle upon Tyne's share of the increase in the Schools Standards Grant will total £0.5 million; its share of the additional New Deal for Schools capital grant will also total £0.5 million.
In addition, since 16 February, further allocations have been made to Newcastle upon Tyne from the Standards Fund. Recurrent allocations to the authority now total some £13.1 million for 2001-02. Capital allocations for 2001-02 have also been announced, and Newcastle upon Tyne will be receiving £4.3 million, including the addition for New Deal for Schools capital mentioned above. The capital figures may be altered slightly in May, when allocations of New Deal for Schools Condition funding will be adjusted if appropriate to take account of additional data submitted by the authority.
As a result of these increases, total funding allocated for Newcastle upon Tyne in 2001-02 is:
| £ million | |
|---|---|
| Education SSA | 118.0 |
| Grants | 14.0 |
| Capital | 4.3 |
Vocational GCSEs
Mr. Chaytor: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will list the subjects to be made available as vocational GCSEs from September 2002. [156667]
Mr. Wicks [holding answer 2 April 2001]: From September 2002, vocational GCSEs will be available in the following subject titles: Art and Design, Business, Engineering, Health and Social Care, Information and Communication Technology, Leisure and Tourism, Manufacturing and Science.
Individual Learning Accounts
Mr. Chaytor: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make it his policy to extend eligibility for individual learning accounts to include those aged 18 and studying part-time. [156669]
Mr. Wicks [holding answer 2 April 2001]: There are no current plans to change the age criteria for Individual Learning Accounts (ILAs) which are available to anyone aged 19 or over. Account holders can use their ILAs for full or part-time courses as long as the learning is eligible for the ILA incentives. The vast majority of education and training is provided free to people aged under 19. Currently some people aged 18 have to pay for certain types of learning themselves. My Department has addressed this issue and from September of this year no 16 to 18-year-olds undertaking part-time learning will be charged tuition fees.
Oxbridge Admissions
Mr. Chaytor: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make it his policy to require Oxford and Cambridge universities to provide his Department with the information they collect in respect of
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admissions to constituent colleges categorised by previous educational establishment for each of the last five years; and if he will publish this information. [156670]
Mr. Wicks [holding answer 2 April 2001]: Cambridge and Oxford University have published information on admissions for entry in 2000 from both the maintained and independent sector, disaggregated by college. The
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relevant extracts are in the tables. These data are not collected centrally and the universities themselves are responsible for its accuracy. The data have not been collected in the same way for each of the last five years.
We welcome the publication of this information, and the steps taken by both universities to widen participation. We encourage them to continue this valuable work.
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| Percentage | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Applications from maintained sector | Acceptances from maintained sector | |||
| College | Entry 2000 | Entry 1999 | Entry 2000 | Entry 1999 |
| Christ's | 55 | 55 | 37 | 49 |
| Churchill | 75 | 78 | 68 | 76 |
| Clare | 56 | 56 | 55 | 46 |
| Corpus Christi | 49 | 49 | 39 | 39 |
| Downing | 51 | 51 | 41 | 46 |
| Emmanuel | 61 | 56 | 54 | 42 |
| Fitzwilliam | 71 | 73 | 66 | 67 |
| Girton | 61 | 65 | 61 | 58 |
| Gonville and Caius | 48 | 46 | 48 | 39 |
| Jesus | 57 | 53 | 54 | 49 |
| King's | 84 | 86 | 77 | 79 |
| Madalene | 42 | 46 | 36 | 50 |
| New Hall | 59 | 62 | 58 | 59 |
| Newnham | 58 | 60 | 49 | 51 |
| Pembroke | 55 | 58 | 50 | 53 |
| Peterhouse | 52 | 53 | 43 | 40 |
| Queen's | 60 | 61 | 55 | 57 |
| Robinson | 65 | 62 | 56 | 58 |
| Selwyn | 58 | 50 | 49 | 41 |
| Signey Sussex | 55 | 48 | 45 | 43 |
| St. Catherine's | 58 | 58 | 52 | 63 |
| St. John's | 52 | 58 | 45 | 55 |
| Trinity | 56 | 53 | 48 | 43 |
| Trinity Hall | 55 | 56 | 47 | 46 |
| All standard colleges | 59 | 59 | 52 | 53 |
| Mature student colleges (Hughs Hall, Lucy Cavendish, St. Edmunds and Wolfson) | 86 | 89 | 87 | 83 |
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(14) Harris Manchester only admits students aged over 25
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