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25 Jan 2006 : Column 2199W—continued
Executive Agencies
Anne Main:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what (a) targets, (b) advice and (c) guidance her Department has given to executive
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agencies that fall under the remit of her Department on the reorganisation of their administrative functions on a regional basis; and if she will make a statement. [41642]
Maria Eagle: The Department for Education and Skills is not responsible for any executive agencies.
Language Tuition
Keith Vaz: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many comprehensive schools offered non-European languages as an option in the last year for which figures are available. [44842]
Jacqui Smith: This Department does not collect this information or hold it centrally.
Music
Mr. Kidney: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the music service of Staffordshire education authority. [45047]
Jacqui Smith: Music Services are not subject to statutory inspections but instead undertake regular self-reviews to ensure they are providing a high quality service to schools and young people. My Department does not hold copies of the results of these self reviews.
Nationally, my Department conducts a three-yearly survey of Music Service provision, looking at issues of access, quality and breadth. The 2005 report was published in December and copies are available in the House of Commons Library. Data on individual music services are anonymised in the report, however, and for internal use only.
Mr. Kidney: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how much her Department has paid to Staffordshire education authority for the provision of music services in each year since 1998. [45050]
Jacqui Smith: We do not hold figures for music service allocations prior to 1999. Since 1999, every local authority has received a grant through the music standards fund (MSF). Since the MSF was established, Staffordshire music service has received the following funding:
| £ | |
|---|---|
| 1999–00 | 826,000 |
| 2000–01 | 826,000 |
| 2001–02 | 940,000 |
| 2002–03 | 1,054,000 |
| 2003–04 | 1,064,000 |
| 2004–05 | 1,054,000 |
| 2005–06 | 1,064,000 |
Mr. Kidney: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what assessment she has made of the pilots her Department established to trial new ways of teaching and learning music. [45048]
Jacqui Smith:
My Department has established two sets of pilots in the last four years to trial new ways of teaching and learning in music. One set of pilots focused on instrumental and vocal learning at KS2 and one on teaching and learning at KS3.
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In 2004, twelve of the thirteen instrumental and vocal pilots were evaluated by Ofsted. 'Consistently high quality of work' was observed in seven of the programmes; in the other five, Ofsted reported 'good, sometimes very good features in all of them, but not consistently so'. In 2005, Ofsted reported that 'the best provision' observed in primary schools was from these programmes, with 67 percent. of lessons good or outstanding. This compared with 43 percent. of conventional KS2 sessions.
The KS3 music pilots took place in 40 schools across five local authorities and came to an end in December 2005. My Department is currently considering evaluation data collected from the pupils, teachers and trainers involved in this pilot.
Mr. Kidney: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what progress her Department has made towards achieving the target for every child to be given the opportunity to learn to play a musical instrument. [45049]
Jacqui Smith: Since 2002, the percentage of KS2 pupils learning a musical instrument has risen from 7 percent. to 13 percent. We have achieved this by:
Sending an Ofsted evaluation and a DVD of exemplar materials based on the pilots to all schools and local authorities in England;
Commissioning QCA guidance materials based on the pilots and sending them to all schools and local authorities in England;
Funding a series of national and regional training events for teachers, local authorities and music services;
providing local authority music services with an additional £3 million over the last three years to develop their own models of delivery.
We expect to make significant further progress over the next two years by:
Allocating £26 million to primary and special schools to buy in the specialist support they need to deliver this programme in schools.
Mr. Kidney: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what additional funding she plans to provide for the improvement of (a) teaching and (b) learning music in the next five years; and how much of this money will go to Staffordshire. [45051]
Jacqui Smith: In the next two years, my Department will be providing the following additional support for the improvement of teaching and learning in music:
£2 million to fund a national strategy of training and development for musicians and classroom teachers (Staffordshire: figures not available)
£2 million for Music Manifesto Pathfinders at the Halle, the Roundhouse and The Sage, Gateshead (Staffordshire: not applicable).
Figures are yet to be finalised for additional Music Manifesto projects, including the Festival of Practice 2006, and the possible roll out of a KS3 music pilot.
It is not possible to give any indication at this stage about funding for music post-2008.
This will be considered as part of the wider Comprehensive Spending Review.
Mr. Kidney: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what assessment she has made of the potential effect of paying the money for improving the teaching and learning of music directly to individual schools on the music services provided by local education authorities. [45052]
Jacqui Smith: There has been no reduction in the amount of money paid to local authority music services for improving the teaching and learning of music; this will remain at just under £60 million per annum until at least 2008. In addition, all music services will receive an additional £10,000 in 2006–07 to support further instrumental and vocal tuition at Key Stage 2. Over the next two years, they will receive a share of £2 million for musical instruments and support for continuing professional development at a cost nationally of a further £2 million. I would expect these increases to have a significant positive impact on music services' ability to support teaching and learning at Key Stage 2.
The further £26 million allocated to primary schools may be used to buy in specialist support from a range of providers—I believe it is right to allow schools this degree of choice. Given music services' track record at KS2, and their positive relationship with schools (96 per cent. say they are satisfied with the service they receive), it is likely that a great deal of this specialist support will continue to be bought in from local music services.
Office Equipment
Mr. Weir: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many (a) personal computers, (b) laptops, (c) servers, (d) printers, (e) scanners, (f) photocopiers and (g) fax machines (i) her Department, (ii) each (A) non-departmental public body, (B) executive agency and (C) other public body for which her Department is responsible in each English region owned in (1) 2003–04 and (2) 2004–05. [40071]
Maria Eagle: My Department does not collect the information requested from NDPBs and public bodies. The information given in the following table is for my core Department only.
| Category | 2003/04 | 2004/05 |
|---|---|---|
| Personal computers | 7,216 | 6,692 |
| Laptops | 1,949 | 1,548 |
| Servers | 732 | 748 |
| Printers | 2,266 | 2,142 |
| Scanners | 278 | 288 |
| Photocopiers | 0 | 0 |
| Fax machines | 310 | 286 |
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