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Departmental Report

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will give a breakdown of the component sums under the heading, 'Developing in everyone a commitment to lifelong learning so as to

26 Apr 2001 : Column: 362W

enhance their lives, improve their employability in a changing labour market and create the skills that our economy and employers need', referred to in the accounts on page 146 of his Department's report 2001-02 to 2003-04 (Cm 5102). [159005]

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Mr. Wills: A breakdown of the amounts under each of the headings on page 146 is given in Note 9 to the Main Estimate on page 160 of the Departmental Report (Cm 5102).

Pupil Exclusions

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what is the average amount of hours of education that a permanently excluded child receives, by local education authority. [158845]

Jacqui Smith: In July 1999 we placed a responsibility on local education authorities to phase in full-time education for all permanently excluded pupils by September 2002, compared to the two to three hours all too typically offered in the past. Data from the 2000 Schools Census indicated that around a third of PRUs were providing full-time education and two thirds were offering 13 or more hours of education each week. All LEAs must offer full-time provision to all excluded pupils from September 2002. Since 1997 there has been an expansion of PRU provision with over 1,000 additional pupil places and nearly 600 more teaching and support staff.

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many schools have received a financial penalty for not meeting their exclusion reduction targets; and what the fine imposed in each instance was. [158843]

Jacqui Smith: We have not set school level exclusion targets and schools are not fined for excluding pupils.

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many off-site pupil referral units have closed in each year since 1997. [158853]

Jacqui Smith: Schools Form 7 Census figures show the number of pupil referral units (PRUs) in each year since 1997 as:

	Number of PRUs	Number of pupils(16)
1997	309	11,933
1998	309	11,906
1999	298	12,465
2000	295	13,065
2001	(17)308	(18)--

⁽¹⁶⁾ Including dually registered pupils

⁽¹⁷⁾ Provisional

⁽¹⁸⁾ Not yet available

A number of PRUs have amalgamated to rationalise and improve the quality of provision following Ofsted concerns about standards in PRUs in 1995. Ofsted now reports that pupils in most PRUs are making satisfactory or better progress and teaching in 90 per cent. of units is at least satisfactory. Almost all PRUs now improve pupils' behaviour and attitudes to learning.

A net total of 13 new PRUs have opened in the last year. Since 1997 the number of pupil places at PRUs has risen by over 1,000 and the number of teaching and support staff is up by nearly 600. The pupil:teacher ratio is 4.3 the same as in 1997. Local authorities were planning to spend 13 per cent. more on PRU provision in 2000-01 compared to the previous year. This reflects the tenfold increase in funding to tackle poor behaviour in schools

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and provide education outside school for those who are excluded, up from £17 million in 1996-97 to £174 million this year.

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make a statement on the criteria used to determine whether a decision by a headmaster to exclude a pupil should be overridden. [158852]

Jacqui Smith: Permanent exclusions must be reviewed by the governing body of a school through its discipline committee. Where a parent or pupil appeals against permanent exclusion, an independent appeal panel will consider the case.

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State's guidance to appeal panels is that they should decide whether the pupil did what they are accused of doing, and if so whether, considering all relevant factors, permanent exclusion is a reasonable response to that conduct. He has advised that reinstatement would not normally be appropriate where the circumstances involve:

serious actual or threatened violence against another pupil or a member of staff; or

sexual abuse; or

presenting a significant risk to the health and safety of other pupils by selling illegal drugs; or

persistent and malicious disruptive behaviour--including open defiance or refusal to conform with agreed school policies on for example, discipline or dress code.

General Teaching Council

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make a statement on the salary or expenses to be paid to GTC members including details of the sums paid. [158994]

Jacqui Smith: Two of the 64 General Teaching Council for England (GTC) members receive fees in respect of their duties as Chair and Vice-Chair. All Council members are entitled to receive expenses for travel, subsistence and dependent relative carer costs incurred as a result of their attendance for approved duties. The members' support scheme is in line with standard provisions payable to the Department's staff. I have asked the Chief Executive of the GTC to write to you with details of payments made since the GTC was established on 1 September 2000 and to provide a copy of the members support scheme. A copy of her response will be placed in the Library.

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make a statement on the arrangements which have been put in place to cover the absence of those teachers who are members of the GTC and who have taken time-off in order to fulfil their GTC commitments; and if he will indicate how the costs of such arrangements is met. [158996]

Jacqui Smith: The General Teaching Council for England (GTC) pays a standard rate to schools to facilitate the release of teachers for GTC work. The payment is made to allow schools to purchase supply cover for a teacher's absence on GTC business. The costs are met from the GTC's budget.

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many meetings the GTC has held. [158995]

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Jacqui Smith: The General Teaching Council for England (GTC) has held four full council meetings since 1 September 2000. I have asked the chief executive of the GTC to write to the hon. Member with details of the number of committee meetings it has held. A copy of her reply will be placed in the Library.

GCSEs

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will set out the percentage of pupils who gained a GCSE grade A* to C in (a) physics, (b) chemistry, (c) biology and (d) ICT in each year since 1997. [158850]

Ms Estelle Morris: The number of pupils aged 15 attempting the GCSE subjects and percentages gaining grades A* to C are as follows:

Number attempting

				Thousand
	Physics	Chemistry	Biology	ICT
1996-97	34.5	35.2	36.6	62.7
1997-98	36.2	36.5	37.9	68.4
1998-99	37.2	37.6	38.8	76.3
1999-2000	37.5	37.7	39.4	85.9

Percentage gaining A* to C

	Physics	Chemistry	Biology	ICT
1996-97	89	89	88	55
1997-98	89	90	88	57
1998-99	89	90	89	55
1999-2000	90	90	89	56

Employment Green Paper

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what was the cost of producing the Green paper 'Towards Full Employment in a Modern Society'; and how many copies have been produced. [159002]

Ms Jowell: The total cost of producing this Green Paper was £72,278 for 11,200 copies.

Medical Students

Dr. Gibson: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many students have (a) applied and (b) been recruited to each medical school in (i) England and Wales and (ii) Scotland in the last five years, broken down by (1) gender, (2) ethnicity and (3) social class. [158439]

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Mr. Wicks [holding answer 23 April 2001]: The available data from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) ARE shown in the table. UCAS do not release data for individual institutions at subject level. Information on the numbers of undergraduate entrants to medical schools by socio-economic group has been published at institution level for the last two years in the circular "Performance indicators in higher education in the UK (00/40 and 99/66)" ¹ , copies of which are available from the Library.

¹ Produced by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE)

Home domiciled applicants to full-time courses and sandwich courses in medicine institutions in the United Kingdom: year of entry 1996-2000

	Year of entry
	1996	1997	1998	1999	2000
Total applicants	12,025	12,076	11,807	10,972	10,226
of which:
Gender
Male	5,950	5,795	5,637	5,035	4,455
Female	6,075	6,281	6,170	5,937	5,771
Ethnic background
White	5,879	5,969	5,894	5,405	5,198
Black Caribbean	46	43	45	34	38
Black African	268	241	249	250	230
Black Other	30	50	58	42	26
Indian	1,086	1,092	1,064	978	926
Pakistani	649	570	572	488	452
Bangladeshi	181	159	162	147	119
Chinese	195	189	158	165	174
Other Asian	513	457	435	445	402
Other	317	285	279	290	278
Not known	2,861	3,021	2,891	2,728	2,383
Social class
Professional	4,279	4,084	3,542	3,126	2,970
Intermediate	4,537	4,370	3,771	3,284	3,035
Skilled Manual	938	882	796	724	695
Skilled non-Manual	982	920	817	793	704
Partly Skilled	524	527	460	399	351
Unskilled	105	107	84	71	77
Not known	660	1,186	2,337	2,575	2,394

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