Category: Wokingham and West Berkshire Issues

I have raised the issue of school funding with the Minister for Childcare and Education, Sam Gyimah MP. I enclose a copy of his response below.

I intend to pursue this issue further with him and convey the concerns that have been raised with me by constituents.

BEGINS:

Rt Hon John Redwood MP
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA

25th June 2015

Dear John

Thank you for your letter of 9 June, about school funding.

I was sorry to read of the concerns you raised about funding for schools in Wokingham. We recognise that there are anomalies in the current school funding system, and are committed to making funding fairer.

I hope it will be helpful if I provide some background to the current funding system. There is currently no national funding formula to determine the school budget to be delegated to individual local authorities. Each local authority does, however, apply its own formula to allocate funding to individual schools in their area. The per-pupil allocation to each local authority is calculated by reference to the amount it received in the previous year. This method, known as ‘spend plus’, was introduced in 2006-07 as part of a series of reforms to the previous system of school funding. The Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) was another element of those reforms, and based initial funding levels on the amount that each local authority had planned to spend on schools in 2005-06 (the final year of the previous system). As DSG allocations are still calculated using the spend plus method, current funding still reflects levels prevailing in 2005-06.

The amount allocated in 2005-06 was determined following an assessment of each local authority’s needs and the amount it had elected to spend on schools. This means that current per-pupil allocations to local authorities are based on assessments of needs and spending decisions that may now be significantly out of date. As overall allocations to the local authorities are in turn based on those historic per-pupil units, the government recognises that the school funding system is no longer ideal, and we are committed to reforming it.

In 2015-16, we allocated an additional £390 million to 69 local authorities that we considered had been unfairly funded in previous years. To allocate this money, we set a minimum level of funding for certain pupil and school characteristics, such as a core amount of funding for each pupil, an additional amount for each disadvantaged pupil, and an amount for each school as a lump sum for fixed costs. Local authorities who would otherwise have received an amount below this minimum level of funding received an increase to their budgets to meet it. Wokingham was one of these authorities, and it received an additional £720,000. The introduction of minimum funding levels means that, while local authority per-pupil rates will still vary, pupils with similar characteristics will now attract a minimum level of funding, regardless of where they are in the country.

Although we have made progress in recent years, we recognise that there is more to be done. Reforming the funding system was a key part of our manifesto, and we will stand by that commitment. We will consult extensively with the sector, the public and Parliament before we introduce any significant reform, and I would encourage your constituents to contribute their views to any future consultation. You will also understand that we need to take account of the interactions between reforming school funding and the decision on the overall budgets for education and other public spending, which will be made later this year.

I would be happy to meet with you to discuss this further.

Thank you for writing on this important matter. I hope you find this reply helpful.

Yours ever,

Sam Gyimah MP

ENDS.

The London airport report recommends an extra runway and inclines towards building it at Heathrow, though it leaves open the possibility of Gatwick. I will study the report over the week-end and will send in formal representations to Ministers in due course. I would appreciate constituents’ views before I do so. In an interview today on the report I stressed the need to do better at controlling noise from Heathrow over our area. I am making new representations about the current level of noise and possible ways of abating it later this month.

I have written to both Councils to remind them of the new government’a policy of encouraging more affordable homes for purchase. First time buyers under the age of 40 can under this scheme buy new homes with a discount of 20%, where builders and Councils co-operate to bring this about. The government plan is to oversee 200,000 discounted starter homes. I would like to see local Councils as early adopters. There are many younger people in our area who would like to live here in a home of their own, who currently find it too expensive. They either move away to a cheaper area or have to delay their move to home ownership. I want to help more afford their own home and the freedom and pleasure of a place of their own at a younger age.

I have received the following reply from the Minister for Aviation at the Department for Transport in response to questions I posed on mitigating aircraft noise:

Dear John

Thank you for your letter of 10 June about aircraft noise at Heathrow Airport. I am sorry that you have been receiving complaints on this matter and that you have not yet received answers to the questions you previously raised. I hope that the responses below are helpful in understanding the steps both Government and industry have taken in addressing the problems caused by aircraft noise.

1. The Government currently limits Heathrow to 5,800 flights a year during the night quota period, which runs from 23.30 to 06.00. This equates to approximately 16 ‘movements per night. Heathrow also voluntarily bans any aircraft scheduled to land between 04.30 and 06.00 from landing before 04.30 and does not schedule any departures between 23.00 and 06.00. The vast majority of Heathrow’s night movements are flights arriving from long haul destinations, especially South East Asia, between 04.30 and 06.00. These flights typically arrive from the east due to wind conditions and will not therefore arrive over Wokingham. As a result of time differences, these flights represent demand from business users wanting to travel at the end of the previous day in order to arrive in time for work the next day, and generate significant benefits for the UK economy. These flights all count towards Heathrow’s night movement limit. The current night flights regime lasts until October 2017 and the Government plans to consult on the new regime from spring 2016. As part of this process, a wide range of options will be considered and both the economic benefits of night flights and the costs to communities will be assessed.

2. The Government also sets a noise quota limit at Heathrow which limits the total noise an airport can make during the night quota period and encourages quieter aircraft. Aircraft are certified by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) according to the noise they produce and the higher the band an aircraft is certified as the higher quota amount it uses with each movement. This encourages Heathrow to schedule quieter planes in the night quota period. The Government has also prohibited the noisiest types of aircraft from using the airport during the night. Heathrow themselves are encouraging airlines to use quieter aircraft by charging much lower landing fees for the quietest planes before 06.00. As part of the next flights consultation, the Government will consider what other incentives can be employed to encourage the use of quieter aircraft at night. Many airlines are already in the process of phasing out noisier aircraft, for instance British Airways have begun to replace their Boeing 747s with the quieter Airbus A380.

3. The Government expects industry to continue the good progress already made in addressing the problems caused by aircraft noise. A part of ICAO’s Balanced Approach to managing aircraft noise, reducing noise at source will remain the priority for tackling the issue. Improvements in aircraft design have meant that the noise contour around Heathrow has reduced over the years even as the number of flights has increased. The UK was instrumental in securing an agreement on a tougher international noise standard in the ICAO Committee on Aviation Environmental Protection (CAEP). This requires new types of large civil aircraft, from 2017, to be at least 7dB quieter in total, across the three test points, than the current standard. Standards for smaller aircraft will be similarly reduced in 2020. Heathrow themselves are working with airlines and manufacturers to achieve the phase out of the noisiest Chapter 3 aircraft still in service, which make up just 1% of the aircraft in use at Heathrow, down from 5% in 2009. They are also working to encourage airlines to retrofit noise reducing technology to the A320 family of aircraft that make up the majority of planes that use the airport.

4. It is recognised that continuous climb operations and continuous descent operations reflect industry best practice and can have a beneficial impact on the noise for local communities. For this reason, the Government, as part of the Future Airspace Strategy, will continue to encourage the CAA and industry to explore options that allow even steeper angles of ascent and descent. Heathrow will be trialling steeper angles of descent in September 2015, but as I’m sure you will understand, safety will have to remain the paramount concern in deciding whether these changes go ahead.

5. No action is taken against individual pilots who fly planes in a way that increases noise, but the Government does set departure noise limits and Heathrow fines airlines who breach these. In addition to noise limits, the Government issues noise abatement procedures to Heathrow that stipulate an aircraft must be flown in a certain way to minimise the impact of noise. These procedures include the use of continuous climb, continuous descent operations and lower power/low drag operations, and ensuring that at 6.5km from take-off, an aircraft must have an altitude of at least 1000ft. The Department of Transport’s Aircraft Noise Management Advisory Committee (ANMAC) regularly review these procedures for effectiveness and consider additional measures that can be taken. Heathrow have also introduced the Fly Quiet programme which ranks airlines by the noise they produce and incentivises airlines to prioritise the reduction of noise by recognising good performance.

I would like to reassure you that the Government recognises noise is the primary concern of local communities near airports and will continue to balance these concerns when assessing the economic benefits that the aviation sector generates. As stated in the 2013 Aviation Policy Framework, the Government expects that future growth in aviation should ensure that benefits are shared between the aviation industry and local communities and that the industry must continue to reduce and mitigate noise as airport capacity grows. The Government will ensure that any future decision on runway capacity fully considers the noise impacts on communities and how these can be mitigated.

Yours sincerely

Robert Goodwill

The Government is changing the law to give local communities the final say over planning decisions for new onshore wind farms.

Wind turbines will only get the go-ahead if the local community has made it clear they support onshore wind projects in their area. They will be free to decide where turbines should go and any proposals must address the concerns of local people and have their backing.

In addition, the law will be changed to end billpayer subsidies for new onshore wind farms from April 2016. This will ensure that the UK meets renewable energy commitments in a way that protects taxpayers and keeps bills low for working people.

• Ending the public subsidy for newly planned onshore wind. Through the Energy Bill the government will close the Renewables Obligation – which supports the overwhelming majority of onshore wind – to new onshore wind from 1 April 2016, a year earlier than planned. Support for renewables is also available through Contracts for Difference, and the government will announce plans to implement our manifesto commitment with these too in due course.

• Giving local communities the decisive say on projects that haven’t already been approved. The Energy Bill will also build on the existing changes to planning rules so local councils have the decisive say on projects which don’t already have planning permission – by putting onshore wind back in the locally led planning system. As part of this two new planning tests will be applied to wind energy developments

1. Wind turbines will only get the go-ahead if provision for them has been clearly allocated for them in areas by local people though the Local or a Neighbourhood Plan. It is important that communities are free to decide whether they want wind turbines in their local area and, if so, where they should go.

2. A planning application should not be approved unless the proposal reflects the planning concerns of the affected local community and has their backing. This second test will reassure a local community that even when their Plan outlines provision and support for wind power, any concerns they have about its impact will be addressed before any permission is granted.

• The UK has enough new onshore wind electricity capacity to help it meet the renewables target. There are now enough onshore wind projects planned to meet the 2020 renewables target. But onshore wind is unable to provide the firm capacity a stable energy system needs – so any new projects should be able to pay for themselves.

I was pleased to read this week that the government’s Help to Buy scheme has now helped 100,000 people to buy a home. 80% of those were first time buyers. In the Wokingham constituency 50 have used the mortgage guarantee, and 194 have taken out an equity loan, meaning 244 people now own a home with help from the scheme.

I am currently pressing West Berkshire and Wokingham Councils to work with developers on the new government initiative to provide more affordable homes for purchase, with a discount for first time buyers under the age of 40. I look forward to seeing the first purchases under that scheme, to add to the Help to Buy successes.

Home ownership for the many is our goal.

I have raised with Wokingham Borough the issue of school places. The Council tell me the 3 new primaries and the new secondary at Arborfield will take care of the likely demand in the next few years. Arborfield will be phased in line with forecasts of local demand for extra secondary places. There is also a small bulge in demand in primary places in Earley which will be accommodated by increased places at several schools. Anyone concerned about this should talk to their Councillor. A temporary bulge in demand in a particular area will unfortunately limit choice of school for some.

I have written to Ministers and raised the issue with them in conversation. On Monday in Education questions the Education Secretary confirmed that fairer funding for schools is part of her policy. I look forward to the new proposals for 2016/17, as Wokingham and West Berkshire remain two of the worst financed areas in the country which should benefit from the new government’s policy.

I have arranged a meeting with the Chief Executive of Heathrow to take up the question of more noise from aircraft over the Wokingham constituency. Many residents remain unhappy about the change of flightpaths put through without consultation. I will also review ways in which aircraft noise could be reduced. Anyone with points they would like me to put can log them here or send them to me at Parliament, London SW1A 0AA or 30 Rose Street Wokingham RG40 1XU.

The Rt Hon. John Redwood MP is The Freedom Association’s ‘Parliamentarian of the Week’
By Andrew Allison On June 12, 2015 The Freedom Association is pleased to announce that the Rt Hon. John Redwood MP is this week’s ‘Parliamentarian of the Week.’

The European Union Referendum Bill had its second reading this week, and during the debate John Redwood made an excellent speech in which he said “I believe in the sovereignty of the British people and I would like to help them restore it.” He also went on to speak about trade. Here is part of what he said:

“I would like to reassure anyone watching or listening to this debate that our trade is not at risk, whether we stay in or leave. There is no need to accept my word for that – I am sure that many people will not – but they may accept the word of the German Finance Minister, who has very clearly stated that he would like Britain to stay in, but that if we leave, of course Germany would want to trade with us on the same terms as she currently does. And why is that? it is because Germany sells us twice as much as we sell her.”

He finished his speech by saying:

“Let us get rid of these myths. Our economy is not at risk, and being out of the EU or in a better and new relationship with the EU is the future: it means we can be more prosperous, have more freedom and, above all, restore the sovereignty of the British people. We can restore our parliamentary democracy.”

The myths John Redwood talks about will no doubt be repeated ad nauseam throughout the referendum campaign, but it must be made clear that they are myths, and we must rebut them at every opportunity.

I offer John Redwood my congratulations as this week’s worthy recipient of our ‘Parliamentarian of the Week’ award.

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