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25 Jan 2010 : Column 671W—continued
Apprentices: Per Capita Costs
Annette Brooke: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how much was spent per adult student participating in (a) apprenticeships and (b) advanced apprenticeships in the latest year for which figures are available. [311820]
Kevin Brennan: This Department allocates funding to the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) for the provision of adult (aged 19 and over) apprenticeships in England. Planned spend on adult apprenticeships for 2008-09 to 2010-11 financial years is given in the following table.
| £000 | |
| Financial year | Adult (aged 19 and over) apprenticeships |
| Source: BIS Skills Investment Strategy 2010-11, November 2009 | |
The public cost of delivering an apprenticeship varies significantly depending on the industry in which the apprenticeship framework is being delivered; whether the framework is at Level 2 or 3; and whether the participant is in the 16 to 18, 19 to 25 or 25+ age group. For example, the LSC estimate that it costs £2,749 to deliver a Level 2 adult apprenticeship framework in Supporting Teaching and Learning in Schools and £4,083 to deliver the Level 3 equivalent framework. Between industries the difference in estimated costs can be more marked. LSC estimate that the cost of delivering a Level 3 adult apprenticeship in clock and watch repair is £13,409 but the cost of an adult apprenticeship at the same level in Business and Administration is £3,327.
It is not therefore possible to provide a meaningful average cost to the public purse of an adult apprenticeship at Level 2 or 3.
Billing
Mr. Vaizey: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills if he will undertake an impact assessment for the (a) retail and (b) bill payments sector of Camelot's proposed entry into the ancillary services market, with particular reference to its proposals on (i) bill payment and (ii) mobile telephone top-up services. [312805]
Mr. McFadden: This is a matter for the Office of Fair Trading which has a responsibility for investigating competition matters within markets, including Camelot's proposed entry into the ancillary services market.
Child Care Facilities: Yorkshire and the Humber
John Battle: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills what information his Department holds on the number of companies in (a) Leeds West constituency, (b) Leeds and (c) West Yorkshire which provide child care facilities. [306604]
Dawn Primarolo: I have been asked to reply.
The Childcare and Early Years Providers Survey collects information on the ownership of child care provision in England. The survey does not have information at local authority level. The 2008 Childcare and Early Years Providers Survey found that, of the 3,000 child care providers (i.e. full day care, full day care in children's centres, sessional and out of school provision) in Yorkshire and the Humber, 1,400 were privately owned.
Construction: Standards
John Penrose: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how much expenditure under each budgetary heading his Department has spent on advertising the TrustMark scheme in each year since the scheme was launched. [311420]
Ian Lucas: The Government gave a grant from their resource budget of approximately £2.5 million to set up and support TrustMark during its first two years (2005/06 and 2006/07). Approximately half of this was spent on advertising.
Departmental Billing
Mr. Maude: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills whether his Department holds records on the efficiency achieved by its (a) executive agencies and (b) non-departmental public bodies in paying invoices within 10 days of receipt. [312275]
Mr. McFadden: Yes, the Department periodically receives updates from some of its partner organisations on their performance in paying invoices within 10 working days of receipt. Performance is published annually in the respective bodies' Annual Report and Accounts.
Departmental Health and Safety
Grant Shapps: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills whether written health and safety advice is issued to new employees in his Department. [311376]
Mr. McFadden: On appointment to the Department, line managers are responsible for the initial induction process for new employees. This process includes the requirement for all new staff to receive health and safety induction, with a checklist being available for managers to follow covering health and safety policy, employee and employer responsibilities, emergency arrangements and any risk control measures and safe working practices that are in place for the tasks that they will be undertaking.
Written health and safety advice is available to all staff via the Department's intranet.
Departmental Information and Communication Technology
Mr. Hands: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how many iPods have been bought by his Department since its establishment; and at what cost. [311901]
Mr. McFadden: The information requested is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Departmental Internet
Grant Shapps: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills which websites his Department's staff are blocked from accessing on networked computers. [310762]
Mr. McFadden: We make use of a commercial database which lists existing websites by categories.
We currently only block access to the following categories:
Adult/ Mature Content,
Pornography,
Violence/Hate/Racism,
Internet E-mail Sites (for security purposes),
Spyware Effects/Privacy Concerns,
Spyware/Malware Sources,
Suspicious.
The situation is under review at the moment and we may extend the number of categories that we block. However, because of the wide remit of the Department, it is difficult to extend the blocking much further without impacting on the ability of people to carry out their work.
Andrew Rosindell: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how much his Department spent on maintaining its Flickr channel in the latest period for which figures are available. [310871]
Mr. McFadden: The Department maintains a Flickr Pro account, at a cost of US $24.95. Only one year's upgrade to Flickr Pro has so far been purchased.
Time spent on maintaining the Department's Flickr pages is not recorded, but is estimated to total no more than 20 minutes per week for one staff member.
Departmental Trade Unions
Mr. Maude: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills if he will place in the Library a copy of his Department's Departmental Trade Union Side Officers agreement. [312269]
Mr. McFadden: This Department is seeking to establish a departmental trade union side agreement following the merger of the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform and the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills. Once this has been agreed, a copy will be placed in the Library.
Mr. Maude: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how many trade union side officers are employed by his Department; and how many full-time equivalent staff in his Department work exclusively on union activities. [312270]
Mr. McFadden: The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) was created on 6 June 2009 by merging the former Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) with the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS).
This Department employs 5.6 departmental trade union side officers and 2.0 FTE staff working exclusively on union activities.
Digital Broadcasting: Radio
Peter Luff:
To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills pursuant to the answer of 6 January 2010, Official Report, columns 420-21W, on digital broadcasting: radio, whether it is
his policy that the date from which it is deemed that adequate notice has been given to the programme making and special events sector on the need to use different frequencies and to purchase alternative equipment should start only after the new frequencies have been promulgated and such frequencies are fully available for use. [313178]
Mr. Timms: As the hon. Member is aware, Ofcom is responsible for the assignment of radio frequencies and is not obliged to find alternative frequencies when giving notice to vacate. However, Ofcom is working on finding alternative spectrum for PMSE users and has already identified channel 38 as a dedicated channel, and expects to announce further frequencies available on an interleaved basis from later this year.
Peter Luff: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills what recent assessment he has made of (a) the availability of radio microphones and similar technologies that will be usable following the sale of digital dividend channels 31 to 37 and 61 to 69, (b) the market size for such technologies and (c) the price of such technologies relative to their existing equivalents; and if he will make a statement. [313180]
Mr. Timms: The Department has made no assessment. The majority of wireless microphones tune to channel 69 and Ofcom has made channel 38 available as the replacement spectrum for this. Radio microphones are already available and are used in the interleaved spectrum which will still be available for programme making and special events use after digital switchover. Ofcom recently consulted on the amount of channel 69 equipment eligible for funding, but are unable to give a figure for equipment which is operating without a licence.
English Language
Mr. Hayes: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how many English language schools have been found to be operating below standard upon inspection in the last 12 months; what estimate he has made of the number to have closed as a result of such inspection findings; and if he will make a statement. [304557]
Kevin Brennan:
It is not the responsibility of this Department to fund or take remedial action on private
or charitable trusts who deliver English language. Inspection of English language schools is the responsibility of the independent accrediting bodies; these are the British Council, the Accreditation Service for International Colleges (ASIC), the British Accreditation Council (BAC) and the Accreditation Body for Language Services (ABLS).
Mr. Hayes: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how many people have been certified by English language schools in the period between those schools being deemed to fall below acceptable standards and his Department taking remedial action in the last 12 months. [304563]
Kevin Brennan: It is not the responsibility of this Department to take remedial action on private or charitable trusts who deliver English language courses. Inspection of English language schools is the responsibility of independent accrediting bodies; these are the British Council, the Accreditation Service for International Colleges (ASIC), the British Accreditation Council (BAC) and the Accreditation Body for Language Services (ABLS).
Further Education: Government Assistance
Stephen Williams: To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how many colleges have (a) applied for and (b) received exceptional support funding from the Learning and Skills Council in each year since 2005; and how much such funding each such college received. [304840]
Kevin Brennan: Information on the level of exceptional support funding provided to individual further education (FE) colleges is not held at departmental level. This information is held by the Learning and Skills Council (LSC). The LSC's chief executive, Geoff Russell, will write to the hon. Member for Bristol, West with the information requested.
Letter from Geoff Russell, dated 15 December 2009:
I am writing in response to your Parliamentary Question that asked: "how many colleges have (a) applied for and (b) received Exceptional Support Funding from the Learning and Skills Council in each year since 2005; and how much such funding each such college received."
The LSC has provided exceptional funding to the college sector as illustrated in the table below. This funding has been administered from national budgets and all cases are supported by a robust business case.
| 2005-06 | 2006-07 | 2007-08 | 2008-09 | Total | |
The above table has been split between merger support (which is written off in year and is a non-returnable cash pressure to the LSC) and exceptional support which is clawed back normally over a 3-4 year period by the LSC subject to an adequate/robust recovery plan. The final tranche of exceptional support payments (c£1.5m) are being amortised in 2009-10 out of the capital budget.
Some of the uses to which exceptional support has been given are:
To enhance provision to meet local, regional and national priorities.
Support the re-organisation of college provision.
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