Written questions by Baines.

What proportion of Personal Independence Payment recipients are in work in (a) St Helens North constituency, (b) St Helens Local Authority, (c) the Liverpool City Region and (d) nationally.

The proportion of working age Personal Independence Payment (PIP) claimants who are in work can be found in the table below. Table 1: Working age Personal Independence Payment (PIP) claimants who are in work Percentage in workSt Helens North Parliamentary Constituency20%St Helens Local Authority20%Liverpool City Region19%England and Wales20% Notes:Data only includes claimants living in regions under DWP policy ownership (England, Wales and Abroad).Data includes normal rules and special rules for end of life (SREL) claims.Data is for March 2024 which is the latest year for which employment data is available.Data covers claimants who are working age, this is between 16 and state pension age.‘Work’ refers to claimants who are in paid employment, either as self-employed or employee.The Liverpool City Region contains the following Local Authorities: Halton, Knowsley, Liverpool, Sefton, Wirral and St Helens.Percentages have been rounded to nearest whole number.

What steps his Department is taking to (a) increase capacity on children's heart units and (b) ensure that children requiring treatment receive it in a timely manner.

Patients have been let down for too long whilst they wait for the care they need, including children awaiting specialist cardiac input.As set out in the Plan for Change, we will return to the National Health Service’s constitutional standard that 92% of patients wait no longer than 18 weeks from Referral to Treatment (RTT) by March 2029, a standard which has not been met consistently since September 2015. This includes for children awaiting elective care at children’s heart units.Our Elective Reform Plan, published in January 2025, sets out the productivity and reform efforts that will get us back to this standard. Through empowering patients; reforming delivery; and aligning funding, performance oversight, and delivery standards; we will ensure that all patients, including children with heart conditions, are seen as quickly as possible, in line with the RTT standard.

If she will make an assessment of the potential merits of (a) providing funding for speech and language interventions earlier than reception age and (b) help ensure that Family Hubs can support families within the home learning environment before the age of three.

Early language is a part of the best start in life pillar of the Opportunity Mission, where we have set an ambitious milestone of a record number of five-year-olds reaching a good level of development in the early years foundation stage assessment by 2028. This measure includes an assessment of children’s early communication and language development.As part of the support offer in the early years, Stronger Practice Hubs have enabled early years settings to access funded places on evidence-based professional development programmes. This has included over 20 programmes focused on speech, language and communication for under 4s.The department also works in partnership with NHS England to deliver the Early Language Support for Every Child (ELSEC) pathfinders, which utilises pre-qualification therapy support assistants to improve early identification and support for children and young people with speech, language and communication needs within early years and primary school settings.Through the Family Hubs programme for children aged 0 to 19-years-old, or 25-years-old with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), the government is investing in parent-facing interventions that seek to give children the best start in life. Research shows that what happens at home can make the biggest difference to long term impacts on a child’s life chances. Therefore, we are supporting families of 3 to 4-year-olds to create rich home-learning environments that foster a love of learning in their children. Family Hubs and voluntary and community sector partners play a pivotal role in supporting these efforts, providing local communities with the tools and support they need to succeed.This work is complemented by our national campaign, ‘Little Moments Together’, which uses paid-for social media, out-of-home advertising, online videos and free resources to raise parents’ awareness, motivation and capability in the home-environment. We will continue to monitor the Family Hubs networks to ensure we consistently adopt the best approach to support families of young children, including exploring the effectiveness of expanding the age range targeted, as the programme evolves.My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education has been clear in her commitment to early years as her number one priority and we will take the steps needed to improve children’s early learning and development, giving every child the best start in life.

Food and Rural Affairs, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of (a) financial incentives and (b) other support for (i) farmers and (ii) the wider agricultural sector for investment in (A) mac

We are committed to supporting all farming sectors to increase levels of productivity whilst increasing their sustainability and resilience. We are looking carefully at how to position further investment and support to enable the delivery of this Governme...

What steps his Department (a) is taking and (b) plans to take to help support the growth of small businesses.

Small businesses are the beating heart of our high streets, our communities, and essential to our economic success. The Government will boost small business growth and productivity by delivering upon the commitments within Labour's nine-point Plan for Sma...

With reference to her Department’s press release entitled You could get Pension Credit – Week of Action to drive take up, published on 1 September 2024, whether she has made an assessment of the impact

The department has secured funding to support increased staffing and fund our communications strategy to support our programme of activity to drive up Pension Credit claims. The latest data available shows we have received around 38,500 Pension Credit cla...

What steps he is taking to (a) review the surplus arrangements and (b) transfer the investment reserve fund to members of the Mineworkers Pension Scheme.

Our Manifesto committed to reviewing the surplus sharing arrangements and transferring the Investment Reserve back to scheme members. We are committed to ending the injustice of the Mineworkers' Pension Scheme and work on delivering these commitments is a...

What steps she is taking to reform the national curriculum.

The government has established an independent Curriculum and Assessment Review, covering ages 5 to 18, chaired by Professor Becky Francis CBE.The review will seek to refresh the curriculum to ensure it is cutting edge, fit for purpose and meeting the need...

What data her Department holds on the number and proportion of children living in poverty in St Helens North constituency in (a) 2024 and (b) 2010.

Statistics on the number of Children living in absolute and relative poverty per constituency are published annually in the “Children in low income families: local area statistics” publication and can be found in tabs “6_Absolute_ParlC” and “5_Relative_Pa...

What the cost to the public purse was of funding state schools in St Helens North constituency in (a) 2024 and (b) 2010.

The department cannot provide comparable funding for St Helens North constituency back to 2010, due to the changes in the funding system since that time. Therefore, the scope of the funding in 2010 and 2024 are not directly comparable. In particular, in 2018/19 the central services provided by local authorities were split out from the schools block funding, and instead became funded separately through the central school services block from that year onwards. The schools national funding formula (NFF) determines schools’ core revenue funding, in respect of 5 to 16 year olds, for all mainstream schools in England. Constituency figures are based on an aggregate of schools’ notional NFF allocations. In 2024/25, the schools in St Helens North constituency received an aggregated total of £86.5 million through the NFF. The allocations that schools within a constituency actually receive are determined by the local funding formula in their area. The above figure is for mainstream schools only. The department does not hold constituency level funding data for special schools. ​In addition to this core revenue funding, schools also receive funding through a number of separate streams, including pupil premium, Universal Infant Free School Meals funding, PE and sport premium funding, and the recovery premium, and the National Tutoring Programme to support education recovery following the COVID-19 pandemic. The department also has a capital budget, which funds a range of programmes for schools, such as the Schools Rebuilding Programme. Additionally, schools will receive funding for 16 to 19 year olds, or for children in school nursery provision, if applicable.

Innovation and Technology, what steps he is taking to help ensure that (a) Brsk, (b) Openreach and (c) other broadband providers use existing infrastructure wherever possible when installing new broadband provision.

We fully understand people’s concerns about the excessive deployment of telegraph poles, and are urgently considering options to address this. Obviously, telegraph poles can play an important role in delivering connectivity to communities and competition between providers can offer consumers greater choice and cheaper rates, but it is vital that operators share infrastructure wherever possible in the interests of local communities. The law already provides for this. The Electronic Communications Code (Conditions and Restrictions) Regulations 2003 require operators to share infrastructure where practicable, and the Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Act 2022 made it easier for operators to upgrade and share existing apparatus. In addition, providers can also use the Communications (Access to Infrastructure) Regulations 2016 (“the ATI regulations”), which are designed to facilitate sharing for physical infrastructure.