§ Mr. DalyellTo ask the Secretary of State for Education in how many schools(a) Portuguese and (b) Spanish are taught; and how many teachers and pupils are involved.
§ Mr. Robin SquireThe Department does not have full details on the numbers of schools where Portuguese and Spanish are taught. However, the database of GCSE and GCE A-level and AS-level examination results used for the publication of school and college performance tables for England in November 1993 shows that 162 schools entered 213 pupils for GCSE Portuguese and 1,621 schools entered 25,500 pupils for GCSE Spanish in 1992–93.
The estimates from the 1992 secondary school staffing survey, which covered approximately a 10 per cent. sample of schools in England, showed that at national level there were around 3,400 full-time and part-time teachers teaching Spanish in England in 1992. Figures for teachers of Portuguese cannot be reliably estimated.