§ Ms WalleyTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills (1) what plans she has to extend the education maintenance allowance to the whole of England; [25525]
(2) what assessment she has made of the working of the education maintenance allowance in (a) Stoke-on-Trent, North and (b) the UK. [25528]
§ Mr. Ivan LewisDecisions on the future of the education maintenance allowance (EMA) will be taken in the light of findings from the current evaluation of the pilot scheme. Stoke-on-Trent is one of the areas where EMA is being evaluated, although our researchers are publishing their reports for the pilot scheme as a whole, rather than for individual areas.
As to the UK position, the Scottish Executive are piloting a variant of the EMA scheme in four local authority areas. The Scottish scheme is currently in its third year and will be evaluated in 2002. There is no EMA scheme running in Wales or Northern Ireland.