Written Assembly Questions tabled on 26 February 2015 for answer on 5 March 2015
R - Signifies the Member has declared an interest.
W - Signifies that the question was tabled in Welsh.
(Self identifying Question no. shown in brackets)
Written Questions must be tabled at least five working days before they are to be answered. In practice, Ministers aim to answer within seven/eight days but are not bound to do so. Answers are published in the language in which they are provided, with a translation into English of responses provided in Welsh.
To ask the Minister for Communities and Tackling Poverty
Antoinette Sandbach (North Wales): Will the Minister detail the number of new childcare businesses, their location and the number of places that have been created in the last 12 months as a result of the out-of-school childcare grant? (WAQ68424)
Answer received on 5 March 2015
The Minister for Communities and Tackling Poverty (Lesley Griffiths): The Out of School Childcare Grant is allocated to support Local Authorities in offering sufficient out of school childcare in their local areas. Local Authorities agree their proposals with the Welsh Government in line with national priorities. However, it is for them to determine locally how the funding can be most effectively utilised in the context of local needs. Whilst it can include support for business start up and expansion, the delivery of this support can vary from area to area. The Welsh Government monitors the progress made by Local Authorities, but doesn’t collect specific information relating to the number of new businesses, their location and number of places created.
To ask the Minister for Education and Skills
Andrew RT Davies (South Wales Central): Will the Minister detail what safeguards and procedures are in place to protect and support schools that have been wrongly categorised and consequently suffered a great deal of harm within their community? (WAQ68425)
Answer received on 5 March 2015
The Minister for Education and Skills (Huw Lewis): A system was put in place and details of the outcomes of categorisation were confirmed by the Welsh Government with each consortium, before publication. The details on My Local School website provide a snapshot the categorisation outcomes of each school as at December 2014, and will be published annually. The improvement capacity and support category of a school may, however, change during the academic year.
As a result, enquiries about the outcomes of Step two or Step three should be directed to the regional education consortia.
Andrew RT Davies (South Wales Central): What assessment has the Minister made of the ability and capacity of consortia in managing the Early Intervention Grant, which includes Foundation Phase funding, especially with the large amount of public money involved? (WAQ68426)
Answer received on 3 March 2015
The Minister for Education and Skills (Huw Lewis): The consortia are currently responsible for managing a wide range of public money in the form of grants including, the current School Effectiveness Grant, Welsh in Education Grant, 14-19, etc. They are well placed to manage this funding in line with the regional nature of working, as articulated by the National Model for Regional Working. These current arrangements are working well and the consortia have demonstrated via the management of these grants their capacity and ability to deliver.
The decision to place the management of the new Education Improvement Grant (EIG) with the consortia reflects the current delivery mechanism at a regional level for a number of the historic grants that are being incorporated into the EIG.
In respect of Foundation Phase some consortia are already engaged in regional delivery of elements of the grant money, and the approach embodied by the EIG builds on this. Discussion has taken place with both consortia and their constituent local authorities (via WLGA and ADEW) to ensure the robustness of the proposal for the consortia to manage deliver of the new EIG.
Business plans for 2015/16 from the consortia will reflect and articulate their plans for the utilisation of the new grant and will be, as always, subject to close scrutiny by Welsh Government officials. These plans will also be subject to sign off by me as Minister for Education and Skills.
The new grant will be subject to monitoring scrutiny by my officials and audit arrangements that ensure the proper use of public funds.
Andrew RT Davies (South Wales Central): Will the Minister explain how Estyn, as an independent body, is able to have such a large influence on the schools categorisation process, with its judgements forming an influential layer of triggers within the criteria? (WAQ68427)
Answer received on 5 March 2015
The Minister for Education and Skills (Huw Lewis): ESTYN, as an independent body, was not involved in determining the level of the colour support category for a school. Estyn reports that are publically available may have been considered by local authorities and consortia at Step two of categorisation, since the framework for Step two relates to the use of criteria for leadership and teaching and learning, and reflects elements of the Estyn inspection framework.
Andrew RT Davies (South Wales Central): What assessment has the Minister made of the school categorisation criteria to ensure that it is being applied consistently across all schools and consortia and could he outline what safeguards - apart from inter-consortia moderation - are in place to ensure that the triggers are applied consistently across all similar schools? (WAQ68428)
Answer received on 5 March 2015
The Minister for Education and Skills (Huw Lewis): Full guidance for schools, local authorities and consortia, as well as a guide for parents, is available on the Welsh Government website:
http://wales.gov.uk/topics/educationandskills/schoolshome/raisingstandards/schoolbanding/?lang=en
The guidance sets out the details of the categorisation measures, approach and methodology. Following the outcomes received from consortia I ensured that a two day national moderation process was put in place for both primary and secondary schools. This was undertaken in advance of publication of school colour support category outcomes.
Andrew RT Davies (South Wales Central): Can the Minister explain how the school categorisation process was published within the public domain and across all media, with some schools being labelled as failing and having little or no aspiration, before the schools, governing bodies and the Welsh Government's schools website (mylocalschool.wales.gov.uk) were informed? (WAQ68429)
Answer received on 5 March 2015
The Minister for Education and Skills (Huw Lewis): The full National School Categorisation guidance document for schools, local authorities and consortia, as well as a guide for parents, was made available on the Welsh Government website on 21 January. The outcome of categorisation was made available on the Welsh Government website on Thursday 29 January, followed by more detailed information on the My Local School website on 30 January. As part of the categorisation process and the schools' own self-evaluation, consortia provided their schools with indicative outcomes.
To ask the Minister for the Economy, Science and Transport
Russell George (Montgomeryshire): Further to the answer to question WAQ67879, will the Minister publish a full list of the 202 premises in Montgomeryshire which fall outside the Superfast Cymru intervention area and the footprint of commercial superfast broadband providers? (WAQ68423)
Answer received on 5 March 2015
The Deputy Minister for Skills and Technology (Julie James): We have published a list of postcodes that fall outside of the Superfast Cymru intervention area and the footprint of commercial superfast broadband providers:
At least one premises in each postcode area will not be covered by either intervention.
To ask the Minister for Health and Social Services
Janet Finch-Saunders (Aberconwy): Will the Minister make a statement on the numbers of individual patient funding request applications made across Wales in the financial years 2011/12, 2012/13 and 2013/14? (WAQ68422)
Answer received on 3 March 2015
The Minister for Health and Social Services (Mark Drakeford): Data on the number of Individual Patient Funding Requests (IPFR) is not held centrally. The annual IPFR report is compiled by Public Health Wales and is published at www.publichealthwales.wales.nhs.uk/. The 2013 – 2014 annual IPFR report was published on 19 May 2014.