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13 Jan 2010 : Column 1058W—continued
Children's Centres: Closures
Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many (a) children's and (b) Sure Start centres have closed in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. [303725]
Dawn Primarolo: Sure Start Children's Centres were introduced from 2003-04-all former Sure Start Local Programmes are now Sure Start Children's Centres.
No Sure Start Children's Centres were closed between 2005-06 and 2008-09. In 2009-10, two Sure Start Children's Centre buildings were closed. In both cases the services originally offered are being provided by neighbouring centres.
Children's Centres: Nottingham
Mr. Allen: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many Sure Start centres there are in Nottingham North constituency; and how many children they assist. [308295]
Dawn Primarolo: There are a total of seven designated Sure Start Children's Centres in Nottingham North constituency, with a reach area of over 6,000 under fives and their families. Reach area defines those children and families with the opportunity to access Sure Start Children's Centres. Figures for the number of people actually using children's centres are not collected centrally.
Departmental Finance
Mrs. Maria Miller: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how much funding has been allocated for (a) editorial resources for and (b) enhancing and developing the Sure Start website in 2009-10 and 2010-11. [305339]
Dawn Primarolo: The Sure Start website was closed as part of the Cabinet Office web rationalisation programme. The content of the Sure Start, Local Authorities and Evety Child Matters (ECM) websites have been converged and these sites replaced with the current ECM website, which launched in May 2009. The Department allocated £341,288 for editorial resources and £274,117 for enhancing and developing the ECM website in the 2009-2010 financial year. Funding to cover the editorial resourcing and enhancement and development of ECM for the 2010-11 financial year has yet to be allocated.
Departmental Pay
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how much funding his Department has allocated for (a) year end and (b) in-year bonuses for its staff in 2009-10. [307021]
Ms Diana R. Johnson: The pay bill for 2009-10 is estimated at £133 million, of which non-consolidated performance payments payable at end year represents £2.5 million. There are no in-year non-consolidated payments.
All employees are eligible for non-consolidated performance payments, subject to strict criteria in line with the Government's policy on public sector pay. Senior civil service non-consolidated payments are determined as part of a central performance management framework managed by the Cabinet Office. Payments for other grades are subject to the pay remit process and reflect previous pay settlements. Non-consolidated performance payments have to re-earn each year and do not add to future pay bill costs (e.g. pensions) and are an integral element of the reward package for staff.
Education Maintenance Allowance: Barnsley
Jeff Ennis: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many students in post-16 education in Barnsley East and Mexborough constituency have been in receipt of education maintenance allowance in each year since its introduction. [307160]
Mr. Iain Wright: This is a matter for the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) who operate the education maintenance allowance (EMA) for the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF). Geoffrey Russell, the LSC's acting chief executive, will write to my hon. Friend with the information requested and a copy of his reply will be placed in the House Libraries.
Free School Meals: Stoke on Trent
Mr. Flello: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families if he will assess the merits of making Stoke-on-Trent city council the West Midlands' pilot authority for universal free school meals. [310259]
Ms Diana R. Johnson: As part of the pre-budget report, the Chancellor has announced an extension to the universal free school meal pilots for primary children so that there is a pilot in each English region. No decisions have been taken yet as to which local authority areas will be selected.
Further Education: Finance
Stephen Williams: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how much funding he plans to allocate to university technical colleges for 14 to 19 year olds, as referred to in paragraph 27 of his Department's paper Skills for Growth in (a) 2010, (b) 2011 and (c) 2012; and how many such colleges he plans to establish in each such year. [304836]
Mr. Iain Wright: University technical colleges are funded through the Academies programme. We currently have two projects in feasibility and the funding requirement for each project is currently being assessed. The number of future university technical colleges will be assessed on a case by case basis.
Languages: Education
Mr. Jenkins: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many secondary schools in England provided tuition in (1) Arabic in each year since 2007; [310093]
(2) Mandarin in each of the last three years. [310094]
Ms Diana R. Johnson: We do not have exact numbers of secondary schools offering tuition in Arabic and Mandarin. However, figures for the proportions of secondary schools offering tuition in Arabic and Mandarin in 2007 and 2008, based on a survey of a representative sample of schools, are in the following table. Research for 2009 will be published later this month by CILT, the National Centre for Languages.
| Percentage | ||
| Arabic | Mandarin | |
Leeds
John Battle: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how much capital expenditure his Department has incurred in the Leeds city area in the last three years. [306942]
Mr. Coaker: The information requested is as follows:
(a) Support for capital investment in schools in Leeds City is shown in the following table
| £ million | |
The allocation in 2007-08 included £42.2 million in respect of Building Schools for the Future, and the allocation in 2009-10 includes £11.0 million advanced from 2010-11.
(b) Support for capital investment on Sure Start Early Years and Childcare in Leeds City is shown in the following table.
| £ million | |
(c) Support for capital investment from Young Person's funding covers a number of different projects and programmes. Leeds City area has received the following from the Youth Capital Fund:
| Youth Capital Fund (£ million) | |
With regard to MY Place capital spending Leeds has one project for which funding was awarded in November 2008 was £4.979 million. Leeds city council is the lead partner.
Personal Social and Health Education
Tim Loughton: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what role school governors would have in determining the personal, social, health and economic education curriculum at Key Stages 3 and 4 under the provisions proposed in the Children, Schools and Families Bill. [309712]
Ms Diana R. Johnson: The role of school governors' will be crucial to the success of statutory PSHE as they will take a lead in setting the tone for good PSHE, including SRE and drugs education through the development of clear policies in consultation with teachers, pupils and parents.
In addition the legislation will introduce a set of guiding principles that govern the way in which the PSHE as a subject should be delivered in secondary schools. Schools governors will be under a duty to ensure these principles act as safeguards against inappropriate teaching.
It will also be a requirement for the governing body to have regard to any guidance that may be issued by the Secretary of State.
Pre-school Education: Closures
Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many maintained nurseries have closed in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. [303729]
Dawn Primarolo: The following table provides details of the 32 local authority maintained nursery school closures that have been implemented since 2005 along with the reason for closure.
| Reason for maintenance | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | Total |
This shows that in three (cease to maintain) of the cases the nursery provision was not replaced with planned alternative provision. In all the other cases the closures were effectively technical and each was replaced with alternative nursery provision of some type.
The reasons the department has been given for the three closures were:
(a) Staffordshire 2005: Two nursery schools ceased to be maintained due to numbers on roll having declined rapidly as birth rates fell and the range of other local provision, much of it incorporating childcare, developed.
(b) Manchester 2007: The Nursery school had a capacity for 65 full-time equivalent places, but only 19 pupils on roll, so was no longer viable; there was sufficient alternative provision available elsewhere.
Pre-School Education: Finance
Mrs. Maria Miller: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families (1) how much funding has been allocated for the purposes of extending the free early learning entitlement to two year olds from the most deprived households in (a) 2008-09, (b) 2009-10 and (c) 2010-11; [305270]
(2) what funding his Department has allocated to the extension of the free entitlement to early education to two year olds who do not have such an entitlement at present in (a) 2009-10, (b) 2010-11 and (c) 2011-12. [305278]
Dawn Primarolo [holding answer 8 December 2009]: Funding allocated to support the Free Early Learning and Childcare offer to the most disadvantaged two-year-olds is as follows:
| £ million | |
Decisions regarding future funding settlements will be taken as part of the next spending review.
Mrs. Maria Miller: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many two year olds are receiving the free entitlement to early education; and what plans he has to increase the number of two year olds in receipt of the free entitlement to early education in each of the next three financial years. [305277]
Dawn Primarolo [holding answer 8 December 2009]: Over 20,000 two-year-olds already have access to free places and we will continue to make progress on the long-term ambition to provide free part-time nursery places for all two-year-olds whose parents want them. The reforms the Government are making to tax relief for Childcare Vouchers will allow us to go further. Two-year-old places will continue to be rolled out stage-by-stage in each of the next three financial years.
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