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Specialist Schools

Mr. Gibb: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what direct investment is made into the relevant subject specialism of a school with specialist status; and if he will make a statement. [114216]

Mr. Miliband: Specialist schools receive a one-off capital grant of £100,000 (together with £50,000 raised from private sector sponsorship) and additional annual funding of £123 per pupil. This funding is to support the achievement of the objectives and targets set out in the specialist school development plan, which is focused on the specialism of the school. We expect specialist schools to allocate one third of their specialist school annual grant to implementing the community element of the development plan.

Sponsorship

Mr. Oaten: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills which of his Department's projects have received sponsorship in the last financial year; who the sponsor was in each case; what the nature of each project was; what time-period was covered by each project; what the total cost of each project was; how much money was involved in each sponsorship deal; and if she will make a statement. [112397]

Mr. Charles Clarke: Details of individual amounts of sponsorship valued at more than £5,000 are published in my Department's Annual Report. The 2003 Annual Report was published on 14 May. Copies are available in the Libraries of the House.

Stoke-on-Trent LEA

Mr. Stevenson: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what resources have been allocated to Stoke-on-Trent LEA in the last five years. [112979]

Mr. Miliband: The following table shows the resources allocated to Stoke-on-Trent Local Education Authority since 1999–2000.

Specific and targeted grant funding allocated by DfES to Stoke-on-Trent LEA£ million

Grant	1999–2000	2000–01	2001–02	2002–03	(13)2003–04
Standard Spending Assessment/Education Formula Spending	99.5	104.2	107.6	110.6	122.4
DfES Grant	9.3	25.0	27.0	27.6	29.4
Total	108.8	129.2	134.6	138.2	151.8

⁽¹³⁾ Estimated

Notes:

1. Education Formula Spending (EFS):

a. The figure for 2002–03 does not include funding for sixth forms transferred to the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) from 2002–2003 and is not fully comparable with the earlier figures.

b. The figure for 2003–2004 is not fully comparable with 2002–2003 and the earlier figures. It does not include funding for sixth forms transferred to the LSC. But it does include funding transferred into EFS from grant and to take account of the increase in contributions to the Teachers' Pension Scheme

2. From 2003–04 the Class Size Grant and the Nursery Education Grant were distributed via EFS.

Teachers

Mr. Damian Green: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many teacher vacancies there were in each subject in (a) primary schools, (b) secondary schools, (c) special schools and (d) all schools in each year since 1997, broken down by local education authority; and what these figures represent as a percentage of all teachers. [110114]

Mr. Miliband: A table showing the number of teacher vacancies in maintained secondary schools in England has been placed in the Library. Vacancies by subject are available only for secondary schools. The most recent data available at local education authority level are for January 2002. Vacancy rates are not available because data for the denominator (teacher numbers by subject) are not available at LEA level.

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The most recent data available at local authority level is for January 2002. Recently published provisional vacancy information at national level shows that vacancies in maintained schools decreased from 4,540 in 2002 to 3,400 in 2003. The vacancy rate reduced from 1.2 per cent. in 2002 to 0.9 per cent. in 2003.

Vacancies are recorded for posts which have been advertised for full-time appointments of at least one term's duration, that exist on the 618G survey date of the third Thursday in January. These are posts which the Local Education Authority/school intends to fill, including those for which they have unsuccessfully attempted to make an appointment, or for which an appointment has been made but the appointee has not taken up the post. A post which has been filled by a temporary appointment of less than one term, pending the finding of a more permanent appointee, is regarded as a vacancy. A post would not be recorded as a vacancy if someone appointed to that post on a full-time contract of one term or more has filled the post.

Mr. Damian Green: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many vacant teacher posts there were in (a) primary schools, (b) secondary schools, (c) special schools and (d) all schools, as a percentage of the total number of teachers, in each year since 1997, broken down by local education authority. [110132]

Mr. Miliband: The information requested has been placed in the Libraries.

Mr. Damian Green: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many vacant (a) head teacher posts, (b) deputy head teacher and (c) teacher posts there were in (i) primary schools, (ii) secondary schools and (iii) special schools in each year since 1997, broken down by local education authority. [110133]

Mr. Miliband: The information requested has been placed in the Libraries.

Mr. Damian Green: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many vacant deputy head teacher posts there were in (a) primary schools, (b) secondary schools, (c) special schools and (d) all schools as a percentage of the total number of deputy head teachers, in each year since 1997, broken down by local education authority. [110147]

Mr. Miliband: The information requested has been placed in the Libraries.

Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what discussions he has had with (a) local authorities and (b) trade unions on the subject of early retirement. [114939]

Mr. Miliband: We have not had any specific discussions with either local authorities or teacher unions about early retirement. There are provisions within the Teachers' Pension Scheme under which employers can award premature retirement to teachers over the age of 50. The decision on whether an individual teacher should be granted early retirement is for the employer to take having regard to cost and the circumstances of each case.

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Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills if he will make a statement on the state of the Teachers' Superannuation Fund. [114942]

Mr. Miliband: The Teachers' Pension Scheme is unfunded. It is, however, subject to periodic valuations by the Government Actuary. The most recent valuation, covering the five years up to March 2001, was published in March of this year. A copy of the valuation report has been placed in the Library.

Textile Industry

Judy Mallaber: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what action his Department is taking to support training in the clothing and textiles industry to follow up the Strategic Training in Apparel and Textiles programme. [113392]

Mr. Ivan Lewis: DfES in partnership with the Learning and Skills Council, Department of Trade and Industry, Small Business Service and Skillfast-UK (the Sector Skills Council for the industry), have developed FAST Forward a business support and training pilot that gives apparel, footwear and textiles manufacturers direct access to skills training to support strategic business change.

The aim of the 12 month pilot will be to develop a sustainable approach to business support and training provision for the industry. It opens up the potential for employers to work with the Learning and Skills Council to develop the range of specialist sector training provision available.

FAST Forward was launched on 26 March and will build on the successful experience of Strategic Training for Apparel and Textiles (STAT).

TREASURY

Census Forms

Matthew Taylor: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer pursuant to his answer of 10 February 2003, Official Report, column 603W, on census forms, how many households received census forms; what assessment he has made of the impact of households returning forms (a) early and (b) late; and if he will make a statement. [114607]

John Healey: The information falls within the responsibility of the National statistician. I have asked him to reply.

Letter from Len Cook to Mr. Matthew Taylor, dated May 2003:

As National Statistician and Registrar General for England and Wales I have been asked to reply to your recent further question concerning the 1991 Census. (114607)

The delivery of census forms for the 1991 Census took place between 12 and 18 April 1991, although in some areas, particularly inner cities, forms were being delivered up to Census day— 21 April 1991.

In the 1991 Census, forms were collected by enumerators during the collection round between 22 and 25 April. However it was anticipated that a number of forms would be posted back direct and measures had been put in place to deal with direct postal returns. Just over 1,000 forms were returned prior to Census day

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and these were transferred to the processing office for inclusion in processing. The early receipt of these forms had no impact on the 1991 Census.

During the collection round, the timing of which was originally extended until 29 April in inner city areas, enumerators checked the forms briefly for any omissions, and issued further forms where contact had not been established or where there was some uncertainty about the occupation of the accommodation. Where households were absent a form was left asking the householders to complete and return the form to the local field staff. Due to the large number of uncollected forms, mainly from non-contacts and in inner cities, the collection period was extended into May in some areas and specially targeted postal facilities were introduced in the very worst areas to allow forms to be returned direct to OPCS (now ONS). Forms continued to be received in this way until early July.

A processing order of Counties and Regions had been agreed in advance, and the late returns did cause some problems, particularly for Inner London and counties early in the processing order, because it was necessary to insert the forms into their correct position prior to processing. Information about those households known to be present but for which no form was received in time to be included in the processing was imputed.

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