Seòmar agus comataidhean

The aim of the changes to the Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) proposed in 16+ Learning Choices: First Step Activity and Financial Support is to refocus existing resources to better target support towards the most vulnerable young people wherever they are learning. It is not to produce savings. Any changes to EMA would be phased in so that young people already in receipt of the allowance will not be affected by the changes. This means that the full amounts below would not be realised until 2011-12.

We estimate that the resource released by removing the (a) £10 and (b) £20 payments are (a) £1.7 million and (b) £2.8 million.

The aim of the changes to the Education Maintenance Allowance that are proposed in 16+ Learning Choices: First Steps and Financial Support is to refocus existing resources rather than to identify savings.

We do not expect to release resources from centralising the delivery of the Education Maintenance Allowance.

The Introduction of Activity Agreements would be made possible by the redirection of existing resource as outlined in 16+ Learning Choices: First Step Activity and Financial Support.

We estimate that some £10.5 million would be available. This represents the resources released through the proposals in our consultation, together with the existing Activity Agreement pilot budget of £3 million.

The aim of the changes to the Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) proposed in 16+ Learning Choices: First Step Activity and Financial Support is to refocus existing resources to better target support towards the most vulnerable young people wherever they are learning. It is not to produce savings. Any changes to EMA would be phased in so that young people already in receipt of the allowance will not be affected by the changes. This means that the full amounts below would not be realised until 2011-12.

We estimate that the resource released from the reduction of the EMA income threshold is £3 million.

The proposal within the 16+ Learning Choices: First Steps Activity and Financial Support consultation is not about financial savings. It is being proposed to address the specific issue of parity of financial support for young people in education and those in vocational training.

Activity Agreements would provide young people who are not ready or able to access formal learning or training with an offer of learning which better suits their needs.

Our prime target group is the 7,000 young people who fail to reach a positive destination on leaving school together with those who are unable to sustain a positive post-school transition.

(a) It is not possible to say if all the students in the exempt from parental/spousal contribution would be eligible to receive full means-tested support if bursary support was extended to independent students using the current income thresholds. The answer to question S3W-19187 on 23 January 2009 provided details of the number of independent student supported by SAAS in 2007-08 by age and residual income. However, these figures may be lower when the income of partners is taken into consideration as was introduced through the new means testing rules for higher education student support introduced in academic year 2008-09. In 2007-08, the income of partners was not included in the means test for student support.

(b) Under current rules SAAS are able to assess the support entitlement of some categories of students without the need for them to provide a detailed income statement. These students are shown in the income not declared / required category as answered in S3W-19187. It is therefore not possible to say how many of them would receive full means-tested support under a revised student support policy, because we don''t hold any records of their income at present.

All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament''s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx.

The following table shows the number of higher education students who received Lone Parent''s Grant and the number who received Lone Parent''s Childcare Grant in academic year 2007-08 broken down by parental/spousal income.

Income	Number of Students receiving Lone Parent''s Grant	Number of Students Receiving Lone Parent''s Childcare Grant
< £10k	40	25
£10,000 - £19,999	45	25
£20,000 - £29,999	30	20
£30,000 and above	10	30
Income not declared/required	15	5
Exempt from Parental/Spousal Contribution	2,775	1,275
Total	2,920	1,375

Source: Student Awards Agency for Scotland (SAAS) academic year 2007-08.

Student numbers have been rounded up or down to the nearest five.

Income bands are based on residual parental or, in the case of students who are married or in a civil partnership, spousal income. This is income after deductions allowed by SAAS have been subtracted.

Lone Parent''s Grant is available on an income assessed basis to students who are single, widowed, divorced or no longer living with a partner and are bringing up children. An additional grant, Lone Parent''s Childcare Grant, is available to recipients of Lone Parent''s Grant who have to pay for registered or formal child care.

In academic year 2007-08, 20,475 independent full-time Scottish domiciled undergraduate and post graduate diploma in education students studying in Scotland received support from the Student Awards Agency for Scotland (SAAS). Six hundred and twenty-five of these students already received Young Students Bursary (YSB).

Of the remaining 19,845 students, 2,605 had declared benefactor income which was below the threshold for YSB. In addition 16,430 of these students were assessed as exempt from parental or spousal contributions to their support and therefore benefactor income details were not provided to SAAS. There are no income details for a further 350 of these students, either because they have not declared income or because their income is extremely low.

If we assume that everyone in these three groups would be entitled under an extended Young Student''s Bursary scheme, a maximum total of 19,385 students would benefit. 14,885 of these students would be considered ˜mature'' i.e. aged 25 or over.

The estimated number who benefit may be lower if the income of partners was taken into consideration as was introduced with the new means testing rules for higher education student support in academic year 2008-09. In 2007-08, the income of partners was not included in the means test for student support.

The information is only available from October 2006 when Scottish Gas was appointed as the managing agent. Scottish Gas has provided the following details, for the KY postcode area, on the number of applications received and the number of applications accepted, subject to survey, in each month since October 2006, in the following table:

Month of Application	Number of Applications	Accepted Subject to Survey
October 2006	164	119
November 2006	338	209
December 2006	139	80
January 2007	136	101
February 2007	116	77
March 2007	137	101
April 2007	166	136
May 2007	170	136
June 2007	147	132
July 2007	162	120
August 2007	174	141
September 2007	121	114
October 2007	196	124
November 2007	155	122
December 2007	74	63
January 2008	151	130
February 2008	142	106
March 2008	166	124
April 2008	164	134
May 2008	153	109
June 2008	61	16
July 2008	60	23
August 2008	51	22
September 2008	72	29
October 2008	95	10
November 2008	182	135
December 2008	568	303
Total	4,260	2,916

Note: An initial assessment is made at the application stage (normally by telephone) and those applications are recorded as accepted, subject to survey.