§ Ms. WalleyTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science how many places on school governing bodies there are; and how many are currently unfilled.
§ Mr. FallonThere are approximately 300,000 places on school governing bodies in England and Wales. A survey 239W published by the National Foundation for Educational Research in November 1990 indicated a vacancy rate of just under 4 per cent.
§ Ms. WalleyTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science how much money has been spent on training parents to be school governors; how many parents have been trained; and how many will be ineligible to remain school governors as a result of his proposals to prevent teachers being governors at the school attended by their own children.
§ Mr. FallonFunds for the support and training of school governors are available through the grants for education support and training (GEST) programme. In the current financial year £7.1 million of LEA expenditure is being supported, and this is planned to increase to £10 million next year. No information is collected centrally about the proportion of this sum spent on parent governors, nor about the number of teachers who are parent governors.