§ Mr. Duncan SmithTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what arrangements have been made to allow the Office for Standards in Education to undertake preparatory work on establishing an inspection system for funded nursery education, prior to the Nursery Education and Grant-maintained Schools Bill receiving Royal Assent. [26294]
§ Mr. Robin SquireI refer my hon. Friend to the answer which I gave on 7 March 1996,Official Report, column 348. During the first few months of 1996–97, Ofsted will need to set up a contracting system for nursery education inspections, and to recruit, train and register the inspectors needed for inspections to begin in the autumn term.
Parliamentary approval to this new service is subject to the passage of the Bill to Royal Assent. Pending that approval, urgent essential expenditure in 1996–97 estimated at £1 million will be met by advances from the Contingencies Fund, to be repaid from the 1996–97 Ofsted vote—class IX, vote 4.