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22 May 2006 : Column 1367W—continued
Drug Abuse
Mr. Amess: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what action he has taken to reduce drug abuse in schools since 1997; and if he will make a statement. [71986]
Mr. Dhanda: Since 1997 the Department has introduced a number of measures to reduce drug abuse in schools. This has included: funding of £70 million for Local Authority School Drug Advisers and improvements in the quality of drug education; training for teachers through the drug, alcohol and tobacco training package and the PSHE certification programme; the National Healthy School programme which includes standards for drug education; and the production of guidance on all matters relating to drugs within schools and materials for classroom teachers. Additionally, in partnership with the Home Office and Department of Health, the Department has supported a major research programme to evaluate the effectiveness of a drug prevention initiative in schools and the FRANK drug awareness campaign.
The Department is committed to reducing Class A drug use and the frequent use of any illicit drug among the under 25s. Ensuring all young people, including the most vulnerable, have access to credible drug education and information is key to this. The responsibility of schools in relation to educating and supporting young people on drug issues and ensuring schools are drug-free was made clear in “Drugs: Guidance for Schools (2004)”.
Education Maintenance Allowance
Rosie Cooper: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what the budget was for education maintenance allowance payments in West Lancashire in 2005-06; and what proportion of post-16 students are in receipt of the allowance. [64120]
Bill Rammell: This is a matter for the Learning and Skills Council, who operate education maintenance
allowances for the DfES and hold the information about take-up of the scheme. Mark Haysom, the Council's Chief Executive has written to the hon. Lady with the information requested and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Library.
Letter from Mark Haysom, dated 25 April 2006:
I am writing in response to your Parliamentary Question that asked “what the budget was for education maintenance allowance payments in West Lancashire in 2005-06; and what proportion of post-16 students are in receipt of the allowance.”
The full EMA budget for financial year 2005-06 was £425 million. EMA is a national scheme and there are no regional budget allocations. All young people who meet the criteria are eligible to receive EMA.
By the end of March 2006, 416,184 young people nationally had received one or more EMA payment in the academic year 2005/06. Information on the number of young people who have applied, enrolled and received EMA is available at local education authority (LEA) level, but not at constituency level. In the Lancashire LEA area 10,250 young people applied, enrolled and received EMA.
For the academic year 2005-06, we estimate that around 55 per cent. of students will be eligible for EMA on income grounds.
Home Working
David Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many people in his Department have been enabled to work from home in each of the last three years; and if he will make a statement. [68000]
Mr. Dhanda: The information requested is not collected centrally and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
I can however confirm that home working is available to all staff in the Department for Education and Skills and currently 1,814 people can access the Department’s IT infrastructure from home.
Indian Students
Dr. Kumar: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many students from India his Department expects to study at educational institutions in England in the next five years. [67194]
Bill Rammell: Latest data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) shows that there were 16,685 Indian domiciles enrolled at UK HE institutions (13,555 at English HE institutions) in 2004/05. The Department does not make projections of future numbers of students from individual countries.
The Government wish to encourage Indian students and those from other countries to study in the United Kingdom. On 18 April, the Prime Minister announced the second phase of his international education initiative, which aims to attract an additional 100,000 international students to the UK and encourage partnerships between universities and colleges here and their counterparts overseas.
Learning and Skills Council
Helen Jones: To ask the Secretary of Statefor Education and Skills pursuant to the answer of27 April 2006, Official Report, column 1259W, on the Learning and Skills Council (LSC), how the estimates of redundancy costs arising from the restructuring of the LSC were calculated (a) when the estimate was given by the LSC in evidence to the Public Accounts Committee in October 2005 and (b) for the purposes of the figure given in the answer. [70325]
Bill Rammell [holding answer 12 May 2006]: Atthe Public Accounts Committee in October 2005my right hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, West (Mr. Williams) asked about
‘the redundancy costs to the LSC to date.’
Mark Haysom replied as per the following table:
| Statutory redundancy | Reshaping and redundancy | Total | |
Please note that the data only includes redundancy or voluntary severance payments to employees and excludes the cost of early retirement. This data excludes other associated redundancy costs such as outplacement consultants or tribunal costs as well as costs associated with the current re-structuring exercise.
The LSC’s estimated cost of £32 million for redundancy associated with restructuring is based on the maximum numbers of possible redundancies at each band level multiplied by the estimated average redundancy cost. The average redundancy was calculated by taking the greater cost for each individual of the Civil Service Compensation Scheme or four weeks salary for every year of service (actual sample of size of over 3,500 current staff), totalling these for each band and dividing by the number of cases in the sample.
Mr. Willetts: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many members there are of learning and skills councils; and what political affiliation each has declared. [70498]
Bill Rammell: On 31 March 2006 there were 710 members of the Learning and Skills Council: this includes the LSC National Council and its 47 local Councils. Information on political affiliation is not collected. However, 107 (15 per cent.) of these declared a political activity on their application for Council membership.
Appointments to the LSC are made through fair and open competition, in accordance with guidance issued by the Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments. Members are appointed on the basis of a wide range of appropriate experience, regardless of any declared political activity.
Mr. Willetts: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills whether a decision has been made to transfer the powers of the learning and skills councils in London to the Mayor of London. [70501]
Bill Rammell: The Government are considering the results of the consultation on the powers and responsibilities of the Mayor of London and the London Assembly. Its response to the consultation will be issued in due course.
Middlesbrough Academies
Dr. Kumar: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what (a) revenue and (b) capital support has been provided to (i) the King’s Academy, (ii) the Unity City Academy and (iii) the Macmillan Academy in Middlesbrough since their formation. [67186]
Jim Knight: The following table shows the capital support for King’s, Unity City and Macmillan Academies since their formation until 31 March 2006. Capital covers the costs of construction and any further capital work.
| £ | |||||
| 2001-02 | 2002-03 | 2003-04 | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | |
The following table shows the revenue costs for the same period. Revenue covers the costs of establishing the Academies and then their day-to-day running costs. Running costs are comparable to other local schools as they are based on the local authority funding formula.
| £ | ||||||
| 2000-01 | 2001-02 | 2002-03 | 2003-04 | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | |
MOSAIC
Helen Jones: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills when the results of the pilot programme using MOSAIC in local learning and skills councils will be available. [65432]
Bill Rammell: A wide range of methodologies, including MOSAIC, are used to help planners and providers develop an accurate profile of their learners. The Learning and Skills Council (LSC) has been piloting MOSAIC and is evaluating its effectiveness. Mark Haysom, the LSC’s Chief Executive has written to my hon. Friend with more information and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Library.
Letter from Mark Haysom, dated 16 May 2006:
I write in response to your recent Parliamentary Question regarding the LSC pilot project on Mosaic.
Socio-economic Data
The LSC has always used socio-economic data, through snapshot reports for each LSC region and local area. These reports, which are at a set point in time limit how the data can be used and currently does not allow a direct interface with out large datasets, such as the Individualised Learner Record (ILR). The pilot was initiated by the increased interest of local LSCs, providers and policy makers in the use of postcode analysis as a means of better understanding educational markets. Mosaic software is one such tool that provides this detailed integration and analysis.
Mosaic Pilot
The Mosaic pilot project is being delivered by the Learning and Skills Network (LSN), previously the Learning and skills development Agency (LSDA) on behalf of the Learning and Skills Council. The project is trialling the use of the standard Mosaic UK package in adding value to analysis of learning and skills sector datasets, to help inform strategic planning. The research question being explored in this pilot project is;
“How can the application of the Mosaic UK postcode classification system assist understanding of patterns of post-16 participation, retention and achievement, so as to assist local LSC planning?”
The project objectives that have been agreed are set out below:
To link the time series data from the post-16 education sector with Mosaic UK thereby deriving a breakdown of postcodes according to their patterns of participation, retention and achievement.
To develop a database that enables the national, regional and local profiles to be updated annually.
To pilot the use of Mosaic UK analysis with four local and one Regional LSC and consult on the provision of other information to provide more effective support for their respective remits, in particular those aspects relating to widening participation and raising achievement. The piloting exercise will involve support to Regional and local LSC staff from LSDA and Experian (the suppliers of Mosaic UK).
For one local LSC already familiar with Mosaic UK, there is also an equivalent pilot exercise using Education Mosaic.
Potential of Mosaic within the Sector
The application of Mosaic UK segments to learner databases, along with the development of detailed summary tables at the regional LSC level, should enable more useful intelligence to be available to providers. The potential of this work is especially promising for initiatives aimed at widening participation in a more focused and cost effective manner.
Project Outputs
Detailed tables for each LSC area will be produced, alongwith a database that allows yearly updating with new LSC information. In addition a report will be produced on the impact of the analysis in the pilot LSCs.
Online Child Protection Task Force
Margaret Moran: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many meetings of the online child protection taskforce have been attended by representatives from his Department since its inception. [72504]
Mr. Dhanda: Officials do not keep formal records of attendance at taskforce meetings but my Department has been represented at most meetings of the taskforce either by officials and/or by staff from the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta). Becta is the Department's strategic partner on technology in education.
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