Education and Skills Bill

The amendment is about school admissions. Whenever a new code on school admissions is issued, it must be consulted on first. The amendment confirms, for the avoidance of doubt, that the requirement to consult will be satisfied by consulting about a draft code that refers to provisions in the measure that are not yet law. That will allow the codes to remain current and relevant, and reduce the overall burden of consultation on audiences such as schools and local authorities. The remainder of the amendments in the group are technical or consequential. Amendments Nos. 185, 186 and 188 relate to the commencement of the school admissions provisions by the Welsh Ministers. The amendments make a slight change to the power of the Welsh Ministers to commence paragraph 58 of schedule 1, so that it is in line with the remainder of their commencement powers. Amendment No. 180 makes the meaning of ““prescribed”” and ““regulations”” clearer throughout the measure. For the avoidance of doubt, it is better for those terms to be set out in the Bill. Amendment No. 190 will make it clearer in drafting that, apart from subsections (1) to (3) of clause 154, the Secretary of State will bring the remaining provisions into force by order. Amendments Nos. 207 and 213 provide consequential amendments to the Welfare Reform and Pensions Act 1999. They ensure that social security information may be shared between the Department for Work and Pensions and a county council, when that county council exercises social security functions for a young person for whom it is also required to provide support via the Connexions services. Regulations made under that social security legislation define a ““local authority”” by reference to the Social Security Administration Act 1992. That definition of ““local authority”” does not include a county council of England. Therefore, but for the amendments, the current data sharing could not continue when a county council exercised Connexions functions. The amendments are purely technical, resulting from the transfer of the Connexions services to the local authority. They enable current practices to continue, and I therefore commend them to hon. Members.