§ Mr. StottTo ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (1) what plans he has to remove further education in Northern Ireland from education and library board control;
(2) if he will make a statement on his conclusions for the future of further education subsequent to the consultative document "Signposts for the 90s"
§ Dr. MawhinneyMy right hon. and noble Friend the Paymaster General recently announced the conclusions that the Government have reached about the future of further education in Northern Ireland. These took account of the responses received to the consultative document "Signposts for the 90s". In particular, my right hon. and noble Friend announced proposed new arrangements designed to achieve the Government's aim of a better planned and co-ordinated system of further education in the Province. The Government are satisfied that this aim can be achieved without disturbing the existing statutory position of the further education colleges and the education and library boards.
§ Mr. StottTo ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will specify the number of lecturing posts in each college of further education which have been transferred from youth training programme funding to mainstream further education funding since April 1991.
§ Dr. MawhinneyFollowing the introduction of the block funding arrangements for the youth training programme (YTP) on 1 April 1990, the Department of Education was advised that, in a number of further education colleges, some full-time teaching posts which had been funded from YTP resources in previous years were now deployed mainly on mainstream (non-YTP) courses. The number of posts, and the colleges involved are:
597W
Name of College Number of posts Institute of Further and Higher Education—Belfast College of technology 4 College of busines studies 3 Rupert Stanley college 3 Antrim 3 Ballymena 1 Coleraine 2 Magherafelt 3 Newtownabbey 5 Fermanagh 4
Name of College Number of posts Limavady 3 North West college 6 Omagh 2 Down 9 Lisburn 2 Newcastle 5 North Down and Ards college 8
§ Mr. StottTo ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will specify how much has been allocated by each education and library board to further education out of his recent announcement to allow boards to spend £2.7 million to help to prevent teacher redundancies and to specify the mechanism by which boards allocated this money to colleges.
§ Dr. MawhinneyOf the total sum of £2.7 million allocated by the Department, £1.3 million was earmarked for primary schools. Boards then decided how the remaining £1.4 million should be allocated to their post-primary schools and further education colleges.
The amounts allocated by boards to further education colleges were as follows:
Education and library board £ Belfast 70,000 Western 50,000 North-Eastern 80,000 South-Eastern Nil Southern 40,000 Boards allocated these sums to colleges by application of the formula set out in their FE delegation schemes or on the basis of greatest need.
§ Mr. StottTo ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will specify the amount of the unit of resource being applied by each education and library board to fund a full-time equivalent student in further education.
§ Dr. MawhinneyI shall write to the hon. Member as soon as possible.
§ Mr. StottTo ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what is the relative value of the unit of resource for further education to the level of funding for an A-level student in each grammar school in each board area.
§ Dr. MawhinneyI shall write to the hon. Member as soon as possible.