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1714635

registered interest
date	29/04/2024
answering body	Department for Education
answering dept id	60
answering dept short name	Education
answering dept sort name	Education
hansard heading	Childcare
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government what actions they are taking to ensure their targets for additional childcare provision are met for September 2024 and September 2025, given the National Audit Office report into early years entitlements published on 24 April.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL4190
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 14/05/2024 answer text <p>This government exceeded expectations for the first stage of the rollout to working parents of two year olds in April, with over 210,000 children accessing funded places to date, and all local authorities confirming that they are able to meet parental demand.</p><p>The department is confident that parental demand will be met for the next steps of the rollout, as it was in April.</p><p>The department has a number of interventions in place to support local authorities to deliver for September 2024 and September 2025, including £12 million delivery support funding and support through the department’s delivery support contractor, Childcare Works.</p><p>The department is also taking action to support the childcare market to expand to meet estimated demand from September 2024 and September 2025. This includes significantly increasing rates paid to providers for government funded hours and confirming an additional £500 million to provide certainty that rates will increase in line with cost pressures in the 2025/26 and 2026/27 financial years. The department has also launched a nationwide recruitment campaign, introduced a package of flexibilities to help manage staffing pressures, and allocated £100 million of capital investment to increase physical space in nurseries and other childcare settings.</p> answering member printed Baroness Barran question first answered 14/05/2024 11:56:02 answering member 4703 label Biography information for Baroness Barran
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1714637

registered interest
date	29/04/2024
answering body	Department for Education
answering dept id	60
answering dept short name	Education
answering dept sort name	Education
hansard heading	Childcare and Pre-school Education
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government what consultations have taken place with the childcare and early years sectors regarding ways to expand childcare provision.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL4191
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 14/05/2024 answer text <p>The department is delivering the largest expansion of childcare in England’s history. Already, over 210,000 two year olds are confirmed to have places for 15 hours a week of free childcare, as part of the largest ever expansion of childcare in England, and the rates for the new entitlements have been independently confirmed by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) to be well above market rates. The department will continue to support the sector’s expansion with £400 million of additional funding provided to uplift hourly rates next year and a guarantee that rates will increase in line with cost pressures for two years after that.</p><p>As part of the expansion, the department has held a number of consultations with the sector, including on proposals to support childminders and childminder agencies (closes 10 May) and on an experience-based route for early years practitioners (closes 20 May). The department is also consulting on proposed changes to safeguarding requirements in the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) statutory framework (closes 17 June). The department has also consulted on the EYFS to seek views on a range of proposals to remove burdens and to offer greater flexibility for providers within the EYFS while maintaining quality and safety standards, which included changes to staff:child ratios. The department is considering all responses as part of ongoing policy development.</p><p> </p><p>The number of childcare places has increased by 40,000 in 2023 compared with 2018. Local authorities are responsible for ensuring that the provision of childcare is sufficient to meet the requirements of parents in their area. The department has regular contact with each local authority in England about their sufficiency of childcare, including supporting them through the department’s childcare delivery support contract where appropriate. The department is in regular contact with all local authorities and none of them are reporting that they have insufficient places to meet local demand.</p><p> </p><p>On top of funding reforms, the department is providing significant support for local authorities to deliver the early years expansion from April, such as:</p><ul><li>Appointing a delivery support contractor, Childcare Works, to provide local authorities with support, advice, guidance and best practice sharing to help them deliver the expansion and deliver enough childcare places for residents.</li><li>Providing £12 million of delivery support funding to local authorities in the 2023/24 financial year to help them meet the costs associated with the rollout.</li></ul><p> </p><p>The department will continue to work closely with the sector on the implementation of these reforms at every stage. In order to make sure there are enough places across the country for everyone that needs them, the department has already begun investing hundreds of millions of pounds to increase hourly funding rates and is allocating £100 million in capital funding for more early years and wrapround places and spaces.</p><p> </p> answering member printed Baroness Barran question first answered 14/05/2024 14:05:21 answering member 4703 label Biography information for Baroness Barran
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1714638

registered interest
date	29/04/2024
answering body	Treasury
answering dept id	14
answering dept short name	Treasury
answering dept sort name	Treasury
hansard heading	Block Grant: Northern Ireland
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government by how much, and by what percentage, (1) resource funding, and (2) capital funding for the Northern Ireland Block Grant has increased from 2023–2024 to 2024–2025.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL4192
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 14/05/2024 answer text <p>To accurately compare the Northern Ireland Executive's (NIE’s) funding between years, it is important to compare the same point in the financial year.</p><p> </p><p>The most comparable figures are the 2021 Spending Review settlement for the NIE, which can be found in Table 4.19 here: <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/61c495ebe90e07196d2b8383/Budget_AB2021_Print.pdf" target="_blank">https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/61c495ebe90e07196d2b8383/Budget_AB2021_Print.pdf</a></p><p> </p><p>The (NIE) receives in-year funding through the operation of the Barnett Formula and non-Barnett funding provided at fiscal events and Main and Supplementary Estimates.</p> answering member printed Baroness Vere of Norbiton question first answered 14/05/2024 15:05:09 answering member 4580 label Biography information for Baroness Vere of Norbiton
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1714640

registered interest
date	29/04/2024
answering body	Treasury
answering dept id	14
answering dept short name	Treasury
answering dept sort name	Treasury
hansard heading	Block Grant: Northern Ireland
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of whether the resource funding provided in the Northern Ireland Block Grant for 2024–2025 falls below a needs-based assessment of funding.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL4193
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 14/05/2024 answer text <p>As committed to in the 2024 Northern Ireland Executive restoration financial package, the UK Government will also agree a Fiscal Framework with the Northern Ireland Executive which will outline Northern Ireland’s long-term funding arrangements.</p><p> </p> answering member printed Baroness Vere of Norbiton question first answered 14/05/2024 14:05:38 answering member 4580 label Biography information for Baroness Vere of Norbiton
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1714642

registered interest
date	29/04/2024
answering body	Department for Education
answering dept id	60
answering dept short name	Education
answering dept sort name	Education
hansard heading	Education: Standards
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of whether the proposed increase in early years childcare provision could lead to a widening of the attainment gap.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL4194
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 09/05/2024 answer text <p>Education is a devolved matter, and the response outlines the information for England only.</p><p> </p><p>The most recent Early Years Foundation Stage Profile results in 2022/23 found 67.2% of children had a good level of development, which is an increase of around 2 percentage points compared to the previous year. Additionally, the percentage of disadvantaged children with a good level of development had increased by 2.5 percentage points and the gap with their peers had narrowed by at least 0.5 percentage points.</p><p> </p><p>The department has commissioned an independent evaluation of the childcare entitlements expansion, which will explore the effects of the expansion on children’s development. Results will be made available on GOV.UK in due course. This is in addition to the existing significant programme of monitoring that includes pulse surveys with early years providers, polling with parents and annual large-scale surveys of providers and parents. The department will also continue to use the existing body of evidence from studies such as the Study of Early Education and Development and Effective Pre-school, Primary and Secondary Education to inform its work.</p><p> </p> answering member printed Baroness Barran question first answered 09/05/2024 16:17:42 answering member 4703 label Biography information for Baroness Barran
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1698303

registered interest
date	25/03/2024
answering body	Department for Education
answering dept id	60
answering dept short name	Education
answering dept sort name	Education
hansard heading	Childcare
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government what additional support they are providing to enable local authorities and childcare providers to meet demand arising from their commitment to provide free childcare hours.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL3607
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 08/04/2024 answer text <p>There were 15,100 more childcare places in 2023 than the previous year, with 12,900 paid staff added to the same period according to the department’s latest Childcare and early years provider survey (2023).</p><p>To support providers to expand their provision further, the department is investing over £400 million of additional funding to uplift the hourly rate for the entitlements next year. This investment consists of £67 million in new funding to reflect the latest National Living Wage increase, an additional £57 million to support providers in respect of teachers’ pay and pensions, and the £288 million for the existing entitlements in 2024/25 announced in the Spring Budget in March 2023. It also builds on the £204 million of additional investment to increase funding rates this year. To further support the sector delivering the expansion of childcare support, the government is confirming that the hourly rate providers are paid to deliver the free hours offers will increase in line with the metric used at Spring Budget 2023 for the next two years. This reflects that workforce costs are the most significant costs for childcare providers and represents an estimated additional £500 million of investment over two years. Additionally, hundreds of thousands of children aged 3 and 4 are registered for a 30-hour place, saving eligible working parents up to £6,900 per child per year, helping even more working parents and making a real difference to the lives of those families.</p><p>Local authorities are responsible for ensuring that the provision of childcare is sufficient to meet the requirements of parents in their area. The department has regular contact with each local authority in England about their sufficiency of childcare, including supporting them through our childcare delivery support contract where appropriate.</p><p>The government has allocated £100 million in capital funding to local authorities to support the expansion of childcare places and the supply of wraparound care. The funding is anticipated to deliver thousands of new places across the country.</p><p>On top of the department’s funding reforms, it is also providing significant support for local authorities to deliver the early years expansion from April, such as:</p><ul><li>Appointing a delivery support contractor (Childcare Works) to provide local authorities with support, advice, guidance and best practice sharing to help them deliver the expansion and deliver enough childcare places for residents. Coram are part of the Childcare Works consortium, and the department is delighted to be working with them to support local authorities to deliver.</li><li>Providing £12 million of delivery support funding to local authorities in financial year 2023/24, to help them meet the costs associated with the rollout.</li><li>In February 2024, the department launched a new national recruitment campaign for the early years and childcare sector, ‘Do something Big, Work with small children’, and a financial incentives pilot. Eligible joiners and returners will receive a tax-free payment of up to £1,000. This followed the introduction of workforce flexibilities to the Early Years Foundation Stage in January 2024.</li><li>The department has also introduced Skills Bootcamps for Early Years which will create a pathway to accelerated Level 3 Early Years Apprenticeships.</li></ul> answering member printed Baroness Barran grouped question UIN HL3609 question first answered 08/04/2024 12:07:12 answering member 4703 label Biography information for Baroness Barran
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1698304

registered interest
date	25/03/2024
answering body	Department for Education
answering dept id	60
answering dept short name	Education
answering dept sort name	Education
hansard heading	Childcare
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the percentage of eligible families who will be able to take advantage of free childcare care hours committed by April.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL3608
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 08/04/2024 answer text <p>In the 2023 Spring Budget, my right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced that free childcare would be extended to children of eligible working parents in England from nine months old to support increased parental engagement in the labour market.</p><p>The proportion of eligible parents who will take up the new entitlement is provisionally estimated to be around 75% for those with children aged two, around 60% for those with children aged one and around 35% for those with children under the age of one. These estimates are detailed in a policy costing information note, which was published in July 2023. The information note can be found in the attachment.</p><p>Data on actual take up of the entitlement for children aged two from April 2024 will be collected via the early years census in January 2025, and published in June or July 2025.</p> answering member printed Baroness Barran question first answered 08/04/2024 12:23:14 answering member 4703 label Biography information for Baroness Barran attachment 1 file name HL3608 attachment.pdf title HL3608_attachment
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1698305

registered interest
date	25/03/2024
answering body	Department for Education
answering dept id	60
answering dept short name	Education
answering dept sort name	Education
hansard heading	Childcare: Shortages
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the percentage of areas where there is a shortage of childcare facilities and providers to provide their commitment of free childcare hours.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL3609
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 08/04/2024 answer text <p>There were 15,100 more childcare places in 2023 than the previous year, with 12,900 paid staff added to the same period according to the department’s latest Childcare and early years provider survey (2023).</p><p>To support providers to expand their provision further, the department is investing over £400 million of additional funding to uplift the hourly rate for the entitlements next year. This investment consists of £67 million in new funding to reflect the latest National Living Wage increase, an additional £57 million to support providers in respect of teachers’ pay and pensions, and the £288 million for the existing entitlements in 2024/25 announced in the Spring Budget in March 2023. It also builds on the £204 million of additional investment to increase funding rates this year. To further support the sector delivering the expansion of childcare support, the government is confirming that the hourly rate providers are paid to deliver the free hours offers will increase in line with the metric used at Spring Budget 2023 for the next two years. This reflects that workforce costs are the most significant costs for childcare providers and represents an estimated additional £500 million of investment over two years. Additionally, hundreds of thousands of children aged 3 and 4 are registered for a 30-hour place, saving eligible working parents up to £6,900 per child per year, helping even more working parents and making a real difference to the lives of those families.</p><p>Local authorities are responsible for ensuring that the provision of childcare is sufficient to meet the requirements of parents in their area. The department has regular contact with each local authority in England about their sufficiency of childcare, including supporting them through our childcare delivery support contract where appropriate.</p><p>The government has allocated £100 million in capital funding to local authorities to support the expansion of childcare places and the supply of wraparound care. The funding is anticipated to deliver thousands of new places across the country.</p><p>On top of the department’s funding reforms, it is also providing significant support for local authorities to deliver the early years expansion from April, such as:</p><ul><li>Appointing a delivery support contractor (Childcare Works) to provide local authorities with support, advice, guidance and best practice sharing to help them deliver the expansion and deliver enough childcare places for residents. Coram are part of the Childcare Works consortium, and the department is delighted to be working with them to support local authorities to deliver.</li><li>Providing £12 million of delivery support funding to local authorities in financial year 2023/24, to help them meet the costs associated with the rollout.</li><li>In February 2024, the department launched a new national recruitment campaign for the early years and childcare sector, ‘Do something Big, Work with small children’, and a financial incentives pilot. Eligible joiners and returners will receive a tax-free payment of up to £1,000. This followed the introduction of workforce flexibilities to the Early Years Foundation Stage in January 2024.</li><li>The department has also introduced Skills Bootcamps for Early Years which will create a pathway to accelerated Level 3 Early Years Apprenticeships.</li></ul> answering member printed Baroness Barran grouped question UIN HL3607 question first answered 08/04/2024 12:07:12 answering member 4703 label Biography information for Baroness Barran
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1698306

registered interest
date	25/03/2024
answering body	Department for Education
answering dept id	60
answering dept short name	Education
answering dept sort name	Education
hansard heading	Breakfast Clubs
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government what percentage of (1) primary, and (2) secondary, schools currently provide breakfast clubs.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL3610
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 08/04/2024 answer text <p>The government is committed to continuing support for breakfast clubs in England in schools in disadvantaged areas. Up to £40 million is being invested to continue the department’s national programme until July 2025. This funding will support up to 2,700 schools in disadvantaged areas in England, meaning thousands of children from low income families will be offered free nutritious breakfasts to better support their attainment, wellbeing and readiness to learn. Schools are eligible for the programme if they have 40% or more pupils from deprived households, as measured by the Income Deprivation Affecting Children Index.</p><p>The department does not currently hold recent data on the percentage of schools that provide breakfast clubs. As of November 2022, over 2,100 schools signed up to the programme, of which 65% were primary and 23% secondary.</p><p>The recruitment process is still underway for schools that wish to sign up. In March 2023, 2,500 schools had signed up to the programme and the department will work with its supplier, Family Action, to monitor and publish updated data in due course.</p><p>​The government is very supportive of school breakfasts and the contribution these can make to children’s wellbeing and learning. ​Alongside our national programme, there are a number of organisations such as Magic Breakfast, Kellogg’s and Greggs providing valuable support to schools with a breakfast provision.</p><p> </p> answering member printed Baroness Barran question first answered 08/04/2024 12:24:26 answering member 4703 label Biography information for Baroness Barran
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme

1698307

registered interest
date	25/03/2024
answering body	Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office
answering dept id	208
answering dept short name	Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office
answering dept sort name	Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office
hansard heading	UNRWA: Finance
house id	2
legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
question text	To ask His Majesty's Government how much funding they provided to UNRWA in each of the past five years.
tabling member printed	Lord Weir of Ballyholme
uin	HL3611
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 12/04/2024 answer text <p>The UK provided the following funding to UNRWA in each of the last five financial years:</p><p>FY 2019 - 20: £65.5 million</p><p>FY 2020 - 21: £65 million</p><p>FY 2021 - 22: £11 million</p><p>FY 2022 - 23: £18.7 million</p><p>FY 2023 - 24: £35 million</p><p>The UK provided £35 million to UNRWA this financial year, including an uplift of £16 million for the Gaza humanitarian response, all of which was disbursed before the recent allegations came to light. No more British funding is due this financial year and we have paused any future funding of UNRWA.</p> answering member printed Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon question first answered 12/04/2024 09:37:19 answering member 4210 label Biography information for Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
tabling member	4970 label Biography information for Lord Weir of Ballyholme