§ Mr. Bryan DaviesTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what is the planned expenditure on the relaunch strategy in each of the next three years; and how many partnership projects run by local consortiums this will support. [8842]
§ Mr. PaiceThe relaunch strategy will concentrate all relevant funding on tackling disaffection among young people. That includes mainstream education and training budgets, which have been increased over future years: the Government have allocated an extra £128 million over the next three years for work-based training for young people delivered by training and enterprise councils and further education funding has been increased by £40 million next year.
Partnership projects will make an important contribution to the formulation of the relaunch strategy and the Government are setting aside £10 million over the next three years to support them. Bids will be invited from local consortiums in spring 1997.
The number and pattern of projects to be funded will depend on the nature of the bids received but the aim is to support at least one in each of the 10 Government regions.