UK Council on Deafness

June 2002 Parliamentary Report

House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for 10 Jun 2002
British Sign Language

Mr. Gray: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what plans he has to recognise British Sign Language as an official language; and if he will make a statement.

Maria Eagle: I refer the hon. Member to the written answer given to the hon. Member for Coventry South, (Mr. Jim Cunningham), on 14 May 2002 which was:

British Sign Language

Mr. Jim Cunningham: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what plans he has to recognise British Sign Language as a language in its own right.

Maria Eagle: There have been calls for the Government to recognise British Sign Language by specifying it under the Council of Europe's Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. Advice is that the charter was not intended to cover indigenous sign languages. However, the Council's Parliamentary Assembly has called on the Council to give sign languages used in Europe a protection similar to that afforded by the charter. The Council is currently considering how that might be done and the Government will respond to any proposals in due course.

Mr. Evans: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what steps he is taking to have British Sign Language recognised as an official language.

Maria Eagle: I refer the hon. Member to the written answer given to my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry, South (Mr. Cunningham) on 14 May 2002.

Mr. Gray: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will commission an independent study of the demography of the British Sign Language community.

Maria Eagle: The Department has undertaken some feasibility work into a research project on the incidence and demography of BSL use. This involved discussions with research organisations, academics, and a meeting with representatives of organisations of and for deaf people. The work identified concerns about the robustness of the data which such a project might produce, its acceptability to stakeholders including deaf people themselves and the length of time it would take. We are considering what other research might be undertaken which would add to our understanding of the extent of BSL use and demography.

Mr. Gray: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many British Sign Language interpreters there are in the UK.

Maria Eagle: There is no central record of the number of people working as British Sign Language interpreters in the UK. The Council for the Advancement of Communication with Deaf People, The Association of Sign Language Interpreters, and the Scottish Association of Sign Language Interpreters all maintain directories of BSL interpreters registered with their respective organisations. These do not, however, provide a comprehensive record of interpreters both active and available for assignment. The Department will shortly publish a research report that includes an examination of BSL interpreter provision in England, Scotland and Wales. The field work was undertaken in 1999 and 2000. Preliminary estimates are that 257 qualified and trainee interpreters were available for work in England and Wales and 27 in Scotland.

Mr. Gray: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many British Sign Language tutors there are in the UK; and what are their qualifications.

Mr. Ivan Lewis: There are no centrally held statistics on the number of British Sign Language tutors. However, inquiries indicate that there are around 800 tutors, but details of the level of qualifications held are not known.

Mr. Gray: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what plans she has to offer British Sign Language as an option for an additional language as a vocational certificate of education or an advanced vocational certificate of education.

Mr. Ivan Lewis: Responsibility for offering vocational qualifications, and optional units within those qualifications, lies with the awarding bodies. There are no current plans to offer BSL within Foundation and Intermediate GNVQs, advanced vocational certificates of education, or within the new GCSEs in vocational subjects being introduced in September 2002. However, BSL qualifications are offered by the Council for the Advancement of Communication with Deaf People (CACDP). A range of BSL qualifications offered by CACDP, and included in the Department's list of qualifications approved for use in schools and colleges by pupils and students aged pre-16, 16 to 18 and over 18, will be available from August 2002.

House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for 10 Jun 2002
Digital Hearing Aids

Mr. Swayne: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what the average cost to the NHS is of providing a patient with (a) a hearing test and (b) a digital hearing aid; and if he will make a statement.

Jacqui Smith: Some hearing tests are undertaken in audiological medicine out-patient clinics. The national average cost for a first attendance at these clinics in the financial year 2000-01 was £123, while the national average cost for a follow up attendance was £98. The fitting of hearing aids (which might include a hearing test along with counselling) in the same period cost £171 per person. The average cost to the national health service of a digital hearing aid in that period was £276. Since then the NHS Purchasing and Supply Agency has been able to negotiate with several providers to reduce the average cost of those digital aids to £159. An NHS digital hearing aid negotiating team, chaired by James Strachan, Chief Executive of the Royal National Institute for Deaf People, is leading further negotiations to achieve the best possible digital hearing aid price and contract.

House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for 10 Jun 2002
2001 Census

Mr. Gray: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will include a question on British Sign Language usage in the 2011 census, in the format of Question 9 in the 2001 census.

Ruth Kelly: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician. I have asked him to reply.

Letter from John Kidgell to Mr. James Gray, dated 10 June 2002:

The National Statistician and Registrar General for England and Wales has been asked to reply to your recent question regarding the inclusion of a question on British Sign Language usage in the 2011 Census, in the format of Question 9 in the 2001 Census. I am replying in his absence. The questions to be included in any future Census, will be decided nearer the time. I would expect, as in previous censuses, that the final question content will reflect a widespread need for information not available from other sources and will be based on extensive consultation, including parliamentary debate.

Questions for Written Answer
Notices given on Tuesday 11th June

Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire): To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills, what discussions she has had with the British Deaf Association and RNID about whether teachers of the deaf should be required to have a BSL qualification; and if she will make a statement.

Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire): To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills, whether teachers of the deaf are given British Sign Language training at public expense; and to what extent they are required to pay fees to achieve that training.

Private Hire Vehicles (Carriage of Guide Dogs etc.) Bill

Mr. Gerrard: The amendments deal with definitions. The Bill includes definitions for guide dog, hearing dog and assistance dog. These tidying-up amendments define them all as ''assistance dog.'' The definition includes guide dogs and hearing dogs but also other working dogs. That is quite important, although it covers a relatively small numbers of dogs. There are several other categories of working dogs and they would all be swept up in the definition of assistance dog. One of the amendments deletes the reference in the Bill to the yellow jacket. There are two reasons for doing that. First, not all assistance dogs wear yellow jackets. Many do-probably the majority-but certain assistance dogs wear red rather than yellow, and some owners of assistance dogs tend not to put a jacket but perhaps just a coloured harness on the dog. Secondly, private hire vehicles are often booked by telephone. It does not make sense to have a clause in the Bill that says that the dog must be wearing a yellow jacket when one hires a vehicle. How the operator would be able to distinguish over the phone whether a dog is wearing a yellow jacket is difficult to envisage. I know that videophones are on the way, but they are not here yet and they may not be universally used. Therefore, it makes sense to take out the reference to a yellow jacket so that we do not unintentionally introduce a nonsense. Amendment No. 6 uses the term ''prescribed charity'' rather than ''specified charity'' and brings the paragraph into line with the terms in the rest of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995. Amendment No. 8 is another technical amendment and contains a series of definitions of phrases such as ''driver'', ''licensing authority'' and ''operator''. I was rather surprised about some of the provisions, including the references to three pieces of legislation: ''the 1998 Act'', ''the 1976 Act'' and ''an equivalent provision of a local enactment''. Those are necessary to cover London and the rest of the country, while the ''equivalent provision of a local enactment'' refers only to the constituency of my hon. Friend the Minister. There is apparently some local enactment for Plymouth that must be included so that the definitions can apply throughout the country. The amendments are mainly technical. We must remove the yellow jacket reference and ensure that the definition of assistance dog covers all the categories of dog that might be involved.

Mr. Boswell: I start with a general and positive point. Dogs for the Disabled is an admirable charity and is located by a whisker in my constituency. I thoroughly enjoy visiting the people there and seeing how they train dogs to do remarkable things for disabled people. There is no suggestion from the Opposition of any covert, let alone overt, opposition to the intentions of the hon. Gentleman or his Bill. His amendments are well placed, but in the spirit of my earlier remarks I want some further assurances. Although it should perhaps be incumbent on me to know the Disability Discrimination Act, I confess that I have not checked it cover to cover. After all, there is a limit to the extent to which one can check multiple cross-references, unless one is a draftsperson, to check that it has been conceived correctly. Will the hon. Gentleman assure me that the substance of the regime for private hire vehicles covered by the legislation will be the same as that for taxis?

Mr. Gerrard indicated assent.

Mr. Boswell: The hon. Gentleman nods, which is helpful. Having said that, and in the knowledge that I do not have the text in front of me, I shall ask him a couple of specific points about the drafting of the amendments. He referred to a "rescribed charity", and I presume the DDA specifies the charities that that covers and that the Secretary of State may make an order to prescribe them as such. I am not a lawyer, but there is always the potential that a list that specifies one type may be held to exclude another. There is a slight difficulty in singling out assistance dogs for blind people, those for deaf people and other assistance dogs, as a dog may have an obligation to cover the multiple disabilities of an individual who, for example, was blind and had locomotive disabilities. No one wants to see a situation in which a dog that qualifies to do two jobs is somehow disqualified under the arrangements by a legal accident. I do not want to make a meal of this for the Committee, as these are matters on which the hon. Gentleman and his advisers may want to reflect, but my final point concerns amendment No. 6, which relates to dogs that are trained to guide blind persons. They are what most people would think of typically as "guide dogs". Paragraph (b) refers to the special category of assistance to deaf people and paragraph (c), the third category, to general assistance. A slightly different standard of approval of what is being done is required in the different cases. For example, it is not clear from the proposal whether the blind person referred to is a registered blind person. There are more people who are visually impaired than there are those who have no sight at all. The definition of a deaf person, and the appropriate amount of training, are also not clear from the provision. The third category, training by a prescribed charity, does not define the amount of training or the nature of the assistance given, but it appears to impose a slightly different sort of test. For example, it is not clear why, given the role of the Royal National Institute for the Blind in respect of visual impairment or of the Royal National Institute for Deaf People in respect of hearing loss, they could not all be swept up within the single category of prescribed charities, which would make it simpler. My point of substance is that, whenever categories are broken down and different ones proposed, it may involve two separate interests or two slightly different methods of handling a situation, and that may have unfortunate legal consequences, which we neither seek nor fully anticipate. However, the amendment is more straightforward than the clause and is therefore a welcome simplification. Assuming that it is accepted, I shall be happy to consider it again on Report. In the spirit of my earlier remarks, I ask the hon. Gentleman to reflect on whether the amendment really optimises the proposal and to ensure that nothing has been overlooked which would help to make its implementation clearer and better.

Mr. Gerrard: I take the hon. Gentleman's point; we do not want to leave loopholes in the Bill. The meaning of ''prescribed'' is as in the Disability Discrimination Act. The Secretary of State has the power, through statutory instruments, to define the organisations covered. I do not want the Bill to include a list that would have to be amended in primary legislation, if for example, new organisations were to be included. Dual-purpose dogs should not be a problem provided that they come within one of the categories. It would make no difference if they fell within two of the categories. With the amendments, the section will still include references to the disabled person having a disability that consists of epilepsy or otherwise affects his mobility or manual dexterity. Those phrases will remain in the measure, which is pretty much a catch-all one. I understand what the hon. Gentleman said about definitions and creating loopholes, but I do not think that there are any in the proposal. However, before Report I will ensure that the Bill contains no unnecessary loopholes. Amendment agreed to.

Amendments made: No. 6, in page 2, line 22, leave out from beginning to 'which' in line 24 and insert '- (a) has been trained to guide a blind person; (b) has been trained to assist a deaf person; (c) has been trained by a prescribed charity to assist a disabled person who has a disability'

House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for 17 Jun 2002
Mental Health

Mr. Oaten: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what funding is being made available to organizations in the voluntary sector working to promote employment of people with mental health problems as set out in the National Service Framework for Mental Health.

Jacqui Smith [holding answer 17 June 2002]: Over the period 1998-99 to 2003-04 the Department has awarded funding of £627,428 through the Section 64 general scheme of grants to the following mental health voluntary organisations to support national projects that are designed to help improve employment opportunities for people with mental health problems.

SIGN
"Education and employment training for deaf people with mental health problems" £99,000

Turning Point
" Starting point: Routes to work for people with mental health problems" £286,428

Working Well Trust
"On Line"-Professional IT training and support for people who have mental health problems, including help with job search and vocational advice £92,000

Southside Partnership
"Mentally disordered offenders prison discharge support"-Includes help for mentally disordered offenders to find employment £150,000

House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for 18 Jun 2002
Hearing Aids

Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Health if a patient with an NHS-provided digital hearing aid is entitled to a replacement digital hearing and continued support with it if they move from living within an NHS trust that routinely provides digital hearing aids to an NHS trust that provides only analogue hearing aids.

Jacqui Smith: If the services commissioned by a trust locally do not meet the needs of a particular patient, then general practitioners (GPs) do have freedom to refer elsewhere using the out of area arrangements. If a patient requires replacement of a national health service digital hearing aid, and the local service has not received the training and equipment to fit such aids, the GP could refer the patient back to the department from which the aid was supplied or to an other which does have the necessary infrastructure to fit digital hearing aids.

Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Health when each of the NHS trusts that have been selected to become part of the modernising hearing aid services project will start routinely issuing digital hearing aids.

Jacqui Smith: The modernising hearing aid services project is being managed on the Department's behalf by the Royal National Institute for the Deaf. The project management team has contacted each of the 30 sites which will be joining the project this calendar year and are in discussion with and in the process of visiting each service. The current service is assessed (obtaining details of the sites involved, staffing, information technology needs etc.), the new service discussed and a timetable for modernisation agreed. The first of these sites should have new systems in place and staff trained and fitting digital hearing aids by the beginning of October and all 30 should be fitting them by the end of March 2003.

Mr. Swayne: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what initial investment is required of NHS trusts in order to apply for funding for the provision of digital hearing aids; and if he will make a statement.

Jacqui Smith: When deciding which national health service trusts would join the modernising hearing aid services project in 2002-03, we wrote to all trusts not involved in the first wave of the project, inviting them to express an interest in becoming a second wave site. We asked that any such expressions of interest should be signed by the appropriate primary care trusts who would be expected to contribute 25 per cent. of additional staffing costs and 25 per cent. of any additional cost incurred in supplying digital rather than analogue aids. Applicants were informed that sites would be selected on the basis of preparedness, willingness to improve access for patients by providing some services from a community base, whether they were paediatric audiology departments transferring patients to existing adult sites, whether they had interest in and willingness to implement universal new-born hearing screening and bearing in mind the need to provide reasonable geographical spread of sites across the country. Sites must have the appropriate infrastructure, information technology equipment and trained staff, before they can fit digital hearing aids.

House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for 19 Jun 2002
Sign Language

Mr. Gray: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills

(1) what discussions she has had with the British Deaf Association and RNID about whether teachers of the deaf should be required to have a BSL qualification; and if she will make a statement;

(2) whether teachers of the deaf are given British sign language training at public expense; and to what extent they are required to pay fees to achieve that training.

Mr. Ivan Lewis [holding answer 17 June 2002]: In addition to holding qualified teacher status, teachers who are employed to teach classes of pupils with hearing impairment are required by regulations to undertake an additional specialist mandatory qualification (MQ). In July 1999, at the request of the then Secretary of State, the Teacher Training Agency carried out a review of existing arrangements in order to develop a new specification for MQ provision. The resulting specification, amended in light of consultation with a wide range of organisations, including those representing children with hearing impairment, requires teachers pursuing the hearing impairment MQ to acquire a minimum competence in signing equivalent to the stage one qualification offered by the Council for the Advancement of Communications with Deaf People. Under the special educational needs category of the Department's standards fund, grant support is available to local education authorities and schools for training and professional development of teachers and other staff. It is open to them to use this funding to help staff to secure necessary mandatory qualifications, or other training in signing including British sign language.

House of Commons Hansard Debates for 18 Jun 2002 (pt 2)
Digital Hearing Aids

Mr. Ben Chapman (Wirral, South): If he will make a statement on the availability of digital hearing aids on the NHS.

The Minister of State, Department of Health (Jacqui Smith): We are committed to extending the benefits of digital hearing aids provided as part of a modernised service. We have invested more than £30 million in the modernising hearing aids services project over the past three years. This will bring the number of sites providing the service to 50 by the end of this financial year, with a further 15 ready to start from April 2003. By the end of April this year, the services had fitted more than 30,000 digital hearing aids.

Mr. Chapman: I thank the Minister for that response; it will be welcome news to my constituents. However, can she say when the hearing aids will be available and whether her Department plans to issue guidance to PCTs on funding modernised hearing aids so that national roll-out can proceed as quickly as possible? Will she comment on the steps she has taken to ensure that there are sufficient trained audiology staff to deliver the service in all regions?

Jacqui Smith: I am sure that my hon. Friend is pleased and reassured to hear that Wirral hospital is part of the second wave of those that are included in the project. The project management team, which is managed on behalf of the Department by the Royal National Institute for Deaf People, has contacted each of the 30 sites that will join the project this calendar year and is in the process of visiting each service. To assess the current service-obtaining, for example, details of the sites involved, staffing and information technology needs-the team will discuss the new service and implement the timetable for modernisation, including the timetables to ensure that new technological systems and new staff training are in place so that the necessary staff are available to fit digital hearing aids. I assure my hon. Friend that the first of the new-wave sites will be fitting digital hearing aids by the beginning of October and all 30 will be fitting them by the end of March 2003.

Mr. James Gray (North Wiltshire): Would the Minister care to tell the House when VAT first became payable on digital hearing aids?

Jacqui Smith: The important point is that whereas a Tory Government would introduce charges, when, under this Government, people receive a hearing aid on the NHS, it is free.

Mr. Tom Levitt (High Peak): The NHS is the largest purchaser of hearing aids in the whole world, so it can get a good deal by bulk buying digital hearing aids, which reinforces my hon. Friend's point. Is she aware, however, that some PCTs do not provide their own hearing aids but buy them from trusts outside their local area? Even when those neighbouring trusts are within the new wave and are providing digital hearing aids, they are not available to people who live outside the trust area. It is therefore vital that the roll-out continues. Will the Minister tell the House the time scale for the national roll-out so that we know when those services will be made available to people who do not live in an area where the PCT currently provides them? Some 4 million people could benefit from that.

Jacqui Smith: My hon. Friend makes an important point about the purchasing power of the NHS. We have worked very closely with the RNID on contracting, and we have had some success in reducing the price of hearing aids to the NHS, ensuring that we will be able to develop that roll-out as quickly as possible. My hon. Friend will know that introducing a modernised hearing aid service is not just about changing from an analogue to a digital hearing aid. It is also about ensuring that the new methods necessary for fitting digital hearing aids are in place. That is why we are working with the Institute of Hearing Research to evaluate the current programme, so as to ensure that we are able to roll it out as quickly as possible, while giving the best service to people who will receive digital hearing aids in future.

Dr. Vincent Cable (Twickenham): Will the Minister confirm that by next March it will still be the case that only one third of people in England will have access to digital hearing aids through their local hospitals? When will the national roll-out be completed so that all our constituents have access to that vital service?

Jacqui Smith: I can confirm that in just three years it has been possible to ensure that digital hearing aids will be available on the NHS for a third of patients. As I pointed out to my hon. Friend the Member for High Peak (Mr. Levitt), however, this is not a simple process of shifting from one type of hearing aid to another; it is important that the trained staff and necessary infrastructure are in place so that we can make sure that people get the quality service from the NHS that they expect. I certainly want the success of the pilot scheme to be rolled out as quickly as possible, and clearly we will consider investment for that as part of the spending review, but we must ensure that quality is maintained as we roll out the service.

Lords Hansard text for 20 Jun 2002
Prisons: Facilities

Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, first, given the overcrowded conditions in our existing prisons, are there sufficient cells available which can be quickly adapted for prisoners afflicted by blindness or deafness? Secondly, are the relevant doorways wide enough for wheelchairs?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, the position is mixed throughout the prison estate. At any one time something under or up to 1 per cent of the prison population is disabled in one way or another, including physical disablement and sight impairment, to which the noble Lord referred. As I have said, at present sufficient space is available to deal with those prisoners, but it varies from place to place. I cannot give the noble Lord an assurance that in every case doors will be wide enough to accommodate wheelchairs, nor can I say whether in every establishment there will be sufficient facilities for the sight impaired.

Baroness Darcy de Knayth: My Lords, while welcoming the tone of his original Answer, does the Minister agree that it is extremely important for disabled family members, visitors and friends to know exactly what facilities are available during what will be a stressful time if they are visiting from outside? Do individual prison establishments produce in an accessible format a clear, one-page guide on what is available? If they do not, would the noble and learned Lord support that proposal?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I agree that it is important for people to know exactly what facilities are available in each prison establishment and that family members in particular should be aware of the relevant facilities if a disabled relative is to visit a prison. I do not know the answer to the question put to me by the noble Baroness. I shall look into the matter and write to her.

Lords Hansard text for 19 Jun 2002
Education Bill

Baroness Sharp of Guildford moved Amendment No. 67: Page 24, line 26, after "schools" insert "including expenditure on special educational needs support services"

The noble Baroness said: My Lords, we now move on to Clause 39 and the next section of the Bill, which concerns the determination of local authority budgets and, indeed, the ring-fencing of those budgets. In moving Amendment No. 67, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 70. These two amendments are concerned with special educational needs. They come from the Special Educational Consortium, which has very real concerns that the increased delegation to schools, while desirable in many ways, will have a detrimental effect on special educational needs services. In many local education authorities, the delegation of the special educational needs support services has led to their erosion. When they are delegated, it is difficult to maintain the expertise that once existed in the service. There is concern that the high levels of delegation now expected in LEAs is eroding the specialist expertise in local support services, particularly where staff from hearing impairment and visual impairment services have been absorbed into general services. Concerns are now at such a level that a number of organisations are worried that the expertise in their specialism is threatened. The RNIB, the RNID and Sense have all expressed concern. However, this matter relates not only to services for hearing and visually impaired pupils and for speech and language-impaired pupils; it is a problem in other areas where there is an acute need to build up expertise in schools-for example, in understanding the special educational needs of pupils with autistic spectrum disorders. The National Autistic Society also shares those concerns. Without specialist services to support and develop the capacity of schools to work with a range of pupils with special educational needs, national policy on developing effective inclusion is likely to be limited by the pace of the slowest school. We discussed that issue at length when the Special Educational Needs and Disability Bill came before the House. At that time, it was made clear that one needs to use the specialist services that are available at local education authority level or within special schools to ensure that they are available to help other schools and other teachers to develop their specialisms in this area. In so far as those specialist services are being eroded, it is far more difficult for that to happen. This Bill proposes new ways of calculating the LEA's budget and the schools budget. The intention behind the amendment is to ensure that the funding of SEN support services is located where it will not be subject to pressures to delegate. However, there are some doubts as to whether that will really be achieved. Amendment No. 70 relates to the overall pressure on SEN support services. There is concern about the lack of clarity in regard to the respective responsibilities of schools and local education authorities for children with special educational needs. It is not possible to see the effect of the new regulations requiring LEAs to set out what schools are expected to fund from their delegated budget and what LEAs will fund from their retained budget. These regulations have only just come into force, and it is too soon to assess the extent to which they may be able to help to ease the situation. This amendment is modest. It would give schools a guideline for special educational needs spending. Such a guideline would, first, provide a benchmark for special educational needs spending in schools in the LEA area; secondly, it would combine with the new regulations so that schools would have a guideline on what they might purchase with their delegated budget and how much they might spend on it; and, thirdly, it would provide a basis for professional discussion between the LEA and the school about the delegated budget. All that can be done within the context of the LEA-schools relationships code of practice and its guiding principle of intervention in inverse proportion to success. There is some feeling that Amendment No. 70 is too modest. There is a feeling that in order to stop the erosion of services and to start to build up the capacity of schools in response to the range of needs of pupils who may be placed in mainstream settings, there is a requirement for a far more radical approach to restructuring what had been the old SEN budget and a new and significant injection of funds. Both amendments derive from the current apparent erosion of specialist expertise and doubts as to whether these budgetary arrangements will be able to stop that erosion. I beg to move.

Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I have listened with great care to what the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, said in moving Amendment No. 67. I agree with what she said about the importance of the specialised services through which local education authorities support their schools in meeting the special needs of their pupils. I hope that I can give her the assurances which she seeks. Final decisions on the scope of the local education authority and schools budgets have yet to be taken. However, our firm intention-I can see no reason at all to expect this to change-is that expenditure on educational psychology services and on the statutory assessment and statementing processes will be part of the local education authority budget, while other SEN expenditure will fall within the schools budget. Moreover, while we would wish local education authorities to keep in mind the benefits of further financial delegation in the special educational needs field, we have no plans to impose any new restrictions on the purposes for which they may retain funding centrally. Under the present regulations, LEAs are permitted to fund specialist SEN support services centrally. Our intention is that they will continue to be allowed to do so under the regulations which will be made under subsection (4) of new Section 45A. I can well understand the concerns expressed about the level of delegation. We believe that the way to address the issue of further delegation from here on is to ensure that the local education authorities' expenditure plans-whether for special educational needs or anything else-are subject to well-informed local scrutiny. That is why we want to establish separate LEA and schools budgets, each with its corresponding needs assessment against which the local education authorities' expenditure can be benchmarked. It is also why Clause 41 provides for the establishment of schools forums, whose role will include the examination of LEAs' budget plans.

House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for 17 Jun 2002
British Sign Language

Mr. Gray: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills whether she intends to include British Sign Language within the personal, social and health education component of the national curriculum.

Mr. Ivan Lewis [holding answer 10 June 2002]: We have no plans to include British Sign Language in the national curriculum. Schools that wish to do so can offer British Sign Language lessons to their pupils as part of the wider school curriculum. Teaching additional subjects, such as sign language will usually be built around the skills and strengths of the teaching staff and the learning needs of their pupils.

House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for 27 Jun 2002

Digital Hearing Aids

Mark Tami: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what plans he has to extend the availability of digital hearing aids in the NHS.

Jacqui Smith: We are committed to extending the benefits of digital hearing aids, provided as part of a modernised service. We have invested over £30 million in the modernising hearing aids services project over the past three years. This will bring the number of sites providing a modernised service to 50 by the end of this financial year, with at least 15 more sites having the equipment and training to enable them to start fitting digital aids from April 2003. Audiology departments were informed, on 11 June 2002, that James Strachan, chief executive at Royal National Institute for the Deaf and the national health service purchasing and supply agency (PASA), working with the Department, have now negotiated an excellent deal on the price of digital hearing aids. All NHS audiology departments are free to purchase from these contracts, whether they are currently part of the project or not, provided they have the necessary infrastructure in place and relevant experience of fitting digital hearing aids.

Children (Deafness)

Mr. Oaten: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what estimate she has made of the number of children with deafness in full-time education in each in the last three years.

Mr. Stephen Twigg [holding answer 13 June 2002]: Information on numbers of children with specific types of special need is not available centrally. The Department is considering introducing a requirement for schools and local education authorities to provide this information from 2004.

House of Commons Standing Cttee on Delegated Legislation 24 Jun 2002
Electoral Commission (Limit on Public Awareness Expenditure) Order 2002

Mr. Cash: The Minister can say what she likes, but she will have noted that I said that the Act had been passed by Parliament and that, therefore, the Electoral Commission had a duty to perform, as specified in the Act. The question is whether the amount of money referred to in the order-an increase from £1.5 million to £7.5 million-can be justified under what is prescribed in the corporate plan. I have raised several questions on that matter, and, so far, the Minister has not answered a single one.

Yvette Cooper: As I have said, the original sum of £1.5 million was designed to cover only the nine-month period from 1 July 2001 to 31 March 2002, at a time when the Electoral Commission was just getting going and the promotional work that it was able to do was, inevitably, limited. The strategy explores an extensive range of issues-major advertising campaigns to encourage rolling registration, to promote awareness of availability of postal votes and encourage voter turnout and to persuade voters to complete and return the annual canvass form in the autumn; the provision of information on briefings and other resources; leaflets, fact sheets for the public, teachers and students, British sign language videos, audio tapes and information in Braille; briefing papers for elected and non-elected politicians and an initiatives fund to provide support for new initiatives that aim to increase voter awareness. It also looks at a wide range of research methodologies.

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