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1 Sep 2008 : Column 1629W—continued
Primary Education: School Meals
Rosie Cooper: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what steps his Department is taking to increase the provision and take-up of healthy school meals in primary schools. [221728]
Jim Knight: The Department is taking a number of steps to increase the take up of meals served in primary schools and to ensure all children have access to healthy food whilst at school.
School lunch take-up is one of the indicators in the new Child Health PSA and is one of the indicators in the National Indicator Set. New food-based nutritional standards were introduced in September 2006 for school lunches and from September 2007 for other school food. Nutrient-based standards will be introduced for school lunches in September 2008 for primary schools and September 2009 for secondary schools.
We are investing over £650 million between 2005 and 2011 to help improve school food and keep school lunch prices down. This includes funding to help build kitchens in areas with no kitchen facilities and to better support the development of training centres for the school food workforce. We are also providing an extra £6 million over the next three years to promote healthy food to young people and raise take up.
Increasing school lunch take-up is also a priority for the School Food Trust. The Trust is supporting schools through its Million Meals Campaign and encouraging healthier eating through its Get Real media campaign aimed at young people. That work is having an impact as shown by the provisional findings from their third annual survey of take up of school meals, reporting on the 2007-08 financial year. In primary schools take up in 2007-08 was 43.6 per cent. an increase of 2.3 percentage points on the value reported for 2006-07 of 41.3 per cent. These figures illustrate that the number of primary school children eating school meals rose by roughly 88000 from 2006-07 to 2007-08.
Pupil Referral Units: General Certificate of Secondary Education
Michael Gove: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many and what proportion of 15 year old pupils in a pupil referral unit sat a GCSE examination in 2007. [217200]
Jim Knight: Statistics on GCSE entries and achievement by pupils in pupil referral units are not available for 2007.
Pupils: Per Capita Costs
Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families pursuant to the answer of 10 July 2008, Official Report, columns 1818-9W, on pupils: per capita costs, how the amounts per place for level 2 (a) engineering, (b) society, health and development, (c) IT and (d) creative and media were calculated; and if he will make a statement. [220878]
Jim Knight: Guidance was issued to local authorities and 14-19 Partnerships on the funding available, including how the grant has been calculated, and can be accessed through the 14-19 education and skills website at:
http://www.dfes.gov.uk/14-19/index.cfm?go=site.home&; sid=43&pid=399&ctype=TEXT&ptype=Single
Qualifications and Curriculum Authority: Pay
Michael Gove: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what salaries were paid to each board member of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority in the last year. [221652]
Jim Knight: QCA board members do not receive a salary. They are however reimbursed for the cost of any travel and subsistence incurred in performing their duties for QCA.
Schools
Michael Gove: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many school federations took place in each year since 2005; and how many federations are planned. [219563]
Jim Knight: Schools are not currently required to notify the Department when establishing or joining a federation so the Department does not keep a systematic record of this activity. As more schools become aware of the benefits of federation we expect numbers to grow over the coming years.
Schools: Admissions
Mr. Milburn: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what assessment he has made of the socio-economic profile of those parents appealing to get their children into the school of their choice. [220658]
Jim Knight: We commissioned Sheffield Hallam university, in conjunction with NatCen, to map the effectiveness of the admission arrangements in England in 2006, and to assess parents' experience of these arrangements.
The study found no significant association between parents' family characteristics and the likelihood that they would appeal against not getting a school of their choice.
Philip Davies: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families (1) how many applications for school places were found to have been made on a fraudulent basis in each of the last five years; [220918]
(2) what guidance is given to local authorities on the investigation of allegations of fraudulent activity in school preference applications. [220919]
Jim Knight: Information on fraudulent applications for school places is not collected centrally and we do not provide guidance to local authorities on investigating such applications.
Schools: Crimes of Violence
Mr. Jenkins: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many teachers in England have reported being the subject of violence perpetrated by (a) a pupil and (b) a parent or guardian of a pupil in each of the last five years. [220135]
Jim Knight: Data are not collected centrally on the number of teachers who have been subject to violence.
The Department does collect information on the number of exclusions from schools which occur following assault on an adult, this was collected for the first time for 2004/05. Information on the number of permanent and fixed period exclusions due to assault against an adult, broken down by local authority, and covering the academic years 2004/05 and 2005/06 has been placed in the House of Commons Library.
The latest information on the number of permanent and fixed period exclusions due to assault against an adult, broken down by local authority has been published at the following link:
Schools: Finance
Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what reserves (a) primary and (b) secondary schools hold, broken down by local education authority. [221536]
Jim Knight: The latest available information on the revenue balances held by primary and secondary schools, broken down by local education authority, has been placed in the Library of the House.
Schools: Industrial Disputes
Sarah Teather: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many schools were closed in each London borough as a result of industrial action on 16 and 17 July 2008. [220125]
Jim Knight: Government Departments with responsibility for services delivered via local authorities were provided with data by Government Offices about service closures resulting from industrial action on 16 and 17 July. That data indicates that across all London boroughs around 140 schools in total were closed on each day of industrial action. However the Department has no means of validating the data, except by incurring disproportionate costs or burdens.
Schools: Safety
Mr. Ruffley: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families (1) what guidance his Department issues to schools other than that relating to the Criminal Records Bureau checking procedures on the steps schools should take to ensure safe school environments for children; [220916]
(2) whether employees of businesses offering work experience to diploma students will be required to undergo Criminal Records Bureau checks; and if he will make a statement. [221030]
Jim Knight: The Government issued comprehensive guidance for schools and other education institutions, “Safeguarding Children and Safer Recruitment in Education” in November 2006 and this came into force in January 2007. This sets out the responsibilities of all local authorities, Schools and Further Education Colleges in England, to safeguard and promote the welfare of children. This guidance includes arrangements for safe and responsible recruitment of teachers and other staff in schools and further education colleges and sets out background and other checks required on new members of staff. The guidance is available online at:
and hard copies have been made available to schools and colleges.
In addition, the Department have made available on the Teachernet website a range of guidance on health and safety and school security issues. This can be found at:
The relevant guidance to employees of businesses offering work experience to students at Key Stage 4 and to 16-18 year olds is contained in Annex A and Appendix 14 of the Department’s guidance “Safeguarding Children
and Safer Recruitment in Education”. In principle, any person whose normal duties will include regularly clearing for, training, looking after or supervising a child in the workplace should be vetted and subject to CRB disclosures to ensure he or she is not disqualified from working with children or otherwise unsuitable to be responsible for them. It is intended to apply to people who are specifically designated to have responsibility for looking after, supervising or directly training a child or children throughout the placement.
Schools: Standards
Jim Cousins: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what proportion of children aged 16 years or under are attending the schools identified as part of the National Challenge in each local education authority. [219738]
Jim Knight: The proportion of students aged 11-16 attending a school where fewer than 30 per cent. of students achieved five or more good GCSEs including English and mathematics in 2007 as a percentage of total students aged 11-16 attending schools in that local authority is set out in the following table.
| Proportion of 11 to 16-year-olds attending schools identified as being part of the National Challenge | |
| Local authority | Percentage |
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