To ask the Minister of Education to detail the public bodies and relevant stakeholders who were consulted with, prior to his Department’s announcement of cuts to Early Years Funding.

The Executive’s Budget has been reduced by the Westminster Government by £1.5bn over the last five years. As a direct result of this reduction there is significantly reduced money to spend on frontline services such as Education. I have taken every action possible to protect Education funding and those frontline services within the Department of Education’s (DE) remit. However, it is simply impossible to protect everything.

My Department’s 2015-16 budget consultation process invited all stakeholders within the Education sector to express their views on the 2015-16 Budget for Education.

Over 23,000 responses to the consultation were received, which provided me with a significant basis of evidence to inform my final 2015-16 Budget spending plans. In reaching final decisions on the 2015-16 Budget allocations, I:

Focused on protecting frontline services as far as possible, promoting equality and raising education standards;

Secured the continuation of specific programmes that reflect the Department’s statutory responsibilities;

Continued to tackle social disadvantage; and

Ensured that support for children with Special Education Needs is prioritised.

On the 13th January 2015 there was an assembly debate specifically on the Education budget. The majority of MLAs voted to protect school budgets as a priority. During this debate I pointed out that education was much broader than the classroom.

I have protected the Sure Start budget as far as possible so that the original reduction of £2m has been reduced to £1m. The reduction of £1m leaves a Sure Start budget of £24.7m for 2015/16. I was also able to re-instate fully the budget for the Pre School Education Programme. I have also ensured that budget is available in 2015/16 to enable all recipient groups in the Early Years Fund to receive continued funding to the end of the current academic year i.e. 31 August 2015.

Despite the difficult budgetary position I am continuing to invest over £216m in early years education services to ensure that key services are protected as far as possible.