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16 Mar 2010 : Column 734W—continued
Departmental Written Questions
David Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families pursuant to the answer of 10 February 2010, Official Report, columns 1087-8W, on departmental written questions, by what mechanism his Department monitors its responses to parliamentary questions; what its target time is for responses; and how its performance against that target is measured. [318385]
Ms Diana R. Johnson: The Department has recently implemented a new IT system for monitoring its responses to parliamentary questions. This Department aims to ensure that Members receive a substantive response to their named day question on the date specified, and endeavours to answer ordinary written questions within a working week of being tabled. The new system will enable the Department's performance to be measured against these targets.
Family Proceedings
Mr. Timpson: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what recent assessment he has made of the likely effects on the welfare of children of the provisions in the Children, Schools and Families Bill on family court proceedings. [312932]
Dawn Primarolo: Protecting the welfare of children is our paramount concern. In developing the proposals for the Bill, officials met and sought the views of various stakeholders including 11 Million, the Association of Directors of Children's Services and the Association of Lawyers for Children. My hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, East (Bridget Prentice) also met the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service/National Youth Advocacy Service Young People's Board to seek their views on proposals in the Bill.
The proposals in the Bill are carefully drafted in response to this stakeholder feedback to ensure that children's welfare is protected and sensitive personal information remains confidential. In addition, the measures in the Bill propose to strengthen the current position and give indefinite anonymity to children involved in family proceedings.
The current proposals before Parliament make clear that it is only possible to alter the treatment of sensitive personal information once an independent review of the operation of the provisions has been carried out, including their impact on the welfare of children.
National Youth Community Service
Mr. Maude: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families with reference to the Prime Minister's speech at Britain's Everyday Heroes Book Launch of 24 July 2007, what progress has been made on the launch of the National Youth Community Service for Britain since July 2007. [318354]
Ms Diana R. Johnson:
The 44-week volunteering programme vTalent Year was launched in January 2009 involving young people aged 16 to 25 volunteering for approximately 30 hours per week. The first cohort
of 358 young people is working across 32 local authority children and young people's services and the second cohort will start in March 2010.
Volunteers are undertaking a range of placements from nurseries, children and youth centres to youth crime prevention, asylum seekers and substance misuse teams. Nearly 60 per cent. of the volunteers were not in education, employment or training prior to starting the programme.
In April 2009 the Prime Minister alongside Ministers for the Cabinet Office and the Department for Children, Schools and Families also announced a package of measures to support our ambition that, in time, all young people should give at least 50 hours of their time between the ages of 14 and 19 to serve their communities.
incorporating community action into learning programmes for 20,000 16 to 18-year-olds as part of Entry to Employment programmes in 2009/10 and again as part of Foundation Learning in 2010/11;
the creation of five intensive local authority pilots to test approaches to achieving near-universal participation among 14 to 16-year-olds;
new ways of recognising participation in community action; and
more support for schools to engage their pupils in this activity, to complement existing local support teams for 16 to 25-year-olds.
Office for Standards in Education: Children's Services and Skills
Miss McIntosh: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what recent representations he has received on the system of inspection operated by Ofsted. [321867]
Mr. Coaker: As the Secretary of State stated in Oral Questions on 25 January 2010, stakeholders are in regular contact with Ministers and the Department about a wide range of matters, including Ofsted jinspections.
Schools
Michael Gove: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what estimate his Department has made of the cost of providing one-to-one or small group tuition to every child not reaching the expected level at key stage 1 and 2 in (a) 2009-10, (b) 2010-11 and (c) 2011-12. [317823]
Ms Diana R. Johnson: Funding for the one-to-one tuition programme was announced as part of the most recent comprehensive spending review (CSR) settlement. There is a total of £468 million funding over the CSR period, including £138 million to support 3.5 per cent. of the key stage 2, key stage 3 (and in National Challenge schools key stage 4) cohort in each of English and maths in 2009-10; and £315 million to support 300,000 pupils in English and 300,000 children in mathematics in 2010-11.
In 2009-10, pupils who enter key stage 2 behind expectations and/or who are not on course to make two levels of progress will be eligible for one-to-one tuition,
but there is no entitlement to this support. Subject to the will of Parliament, from September 2010 one-to-one tuition will be guaranteed for all children who enter key stage 2 behind national expectations and are not on course to make two levels of progress over the course of the key stage. The funding for 2010-11 is sufficient to cover this guarantee.
The Every Child Counts and Every Child a Reader programmes in key stage 1 and the Every Child a Writer programme at key stage 2 comprise of both one-to-one tuition and small group work. Taken together, these programmes will have £52.7 million funding in 2009-10, and £94.6 million funding in 2010-11.
Schools received a personalisation budget of £1.6 billion for the three-year period of this CSR, and this funding can be used to provide further small group support.
No decisions on funding for the one-to-one tuition programme or the Every Child programmes have been taken for 2011-12.
Schools: Fires
Mr. Jim Cunningham: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families (1) what estimate he has made of the number of fires reported in schools in each year since 2005; [318629]
(2) what his most recent estimate is of the annual cost to the public purse of fires in schools. [318631]
Mr. Coaker [holding answer 26 February 2010]: The latest confirmed figures we have from the Department for Communities and Local Government (CLG) for England and Wales cover the period 2000 to 2007, and are shown in the following tables.
| Number of fires | Total costs (£ million) | Percentage arson | |
| n/a = not available | |||
| Total | Accidental | Deliberate | |
| Note: Excluding incidents not recorded during periods of industrial action in 2003 Ref: 2008066(2003-2007) .sas 12OCT09 Source: CLG | |||
The costs are rounded to the nearest £1 million and are derived from the CLG's cost of Fire Estimates. They cover property damage and the costs of the fire and rescue services attending the fires. They do not include costs of any fires not attended by the Fire and Rescue Services.
Schools: Standards
Mr. Sanders: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what steps his Department has taken to reduce the (a) administrative burden on teachers and (b) number of national performance standards for schools in the last 12 months. [321718]
Mr. Coaker: The Department works closely with the Implementation Review Unit (IRU), an independent group of front-line practitioners, to ensure that the bureaucratic and work load implications of both new and existing policies are kept under review, and to a minimum. Most recently, the IRU have been remitted to conduct a review of obstacles to effective delivery of government policies which is due to report late spring. We have also made a number of commitments to the Merits Committee and are managing better the impact of new policies on schools.
In answer to the second part of the question, since the removal of the key stage 3 national tests the national performance standards for schools have remained constant in the last 12 months.
Secondary Education: Manpower
Mr. Heald: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what the average staff to pupil ratio is in secondary schools in (a) North East Hertfordshire and (b) England. [321673]
Mr. Coaker: The following table provides the pupil:adult ratios for local authority maintained secondary schools in North-East Hertfordshire constituency and England, January 2009.
| Within school pupil:adult ratio (PAR)( 1) in local authority maintained secondary schools( 2) , year: January 2009, coverage: North-East Hertfordshire constituency and England | |
| Secondary | |
| (1) The within school PAR is calculated by dividing the total full-time equivalent (FTE) number of pupils on roll in schools by the total FTE number of all teachers and support staff employed in schools, excluding administrative and clerical staff. (2) Excludes city technology colleges and academies. Source: School Census. | |
Teachers: Pay
Mr. Amess: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what the (a) median and (b) mean salary in (i) nominal and (ii) real terms was of a teacher in a maintained school in each region in each year since 1997. [318692]
Mr. Coaker: The following tables provide the mean and median salary of teachers in service in local authority maintained schools in cash terms and real terms broken down by each Government office region in England and for Wales, March 1997 to 2008.
| Mean and median salary of full-time regular teachers( 1) in local authority maintained schools( 2 ) in cash terms and real terms( 3 ) broken down b y each Government office region, Y ears: March 1997 to March 2008 , Coverage: England and Wales | ||||||||||||
| £ | ||||||||||||
| 1997 | 1998 | 1999 | ||||||||||
| Mean | Median | Mean | Median | Mean | Median | |||||||
| Government office region | Cash terms | Real terms | Cash terms | Real terms | Cash terms | Real terms | Cash terms | Real terms | Cash terms | Real terms | Cash terms | Real terms |
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