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Around 1,300 people attended a total of 14 public information events since consultation launched on 8 February, and this is the last chance for people to give their views on proposals to dual the 8-mile section of the A303 between Amesbury and Berwick Down.

Consultation on the proposals for the Highways England scheme was extended after two information events were curtailed by the severe weather of last month.

The rescheduled events were held at Mere and Salisbury last week, but consultation continues until 23 April, and anyone who would still like to comment can do so by visiting the scheme consultation page.
The scheme to improve the A303 between Amesbury and Berwick Down includes plans for a 1.9-mile long tunnel past Stonehenge, a free-flowing dual carriageway and a much-needed bypass north of Winterbourne Stoke.

During the statutory consultation process, Highways England has exhibited more detailed plans and engaged with local communities, road users, local authorities, stakeholders and heritage groups.

Derek Parody, Project Director for Highways England, said:

We have enjoyed the opportunity to share our more detailed plans, and we are delighted with the response so far.

We would like to remind people that consultation on plans to relieve congestion on the A303 past Stonehenge is still ongoing and the feedback we receive from everyone is really important in helping us to finalise our designs.

The consultation website is still live and we would urge anyone who would like to comment on the proposals to do so before consultation ends on 23 April.

During this consultation period, representatives of Highways England have also met up with a delegation from UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) and the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS).

The aim of the three-day fact-finding mission was to explain how the designs of the proposed tunnel will bring together the World Heritage Site landscape currently split by the A303.

Since the last UNESCO visit early last year and the announcement of the preferred route for the scheme in September, Highways England has continued to work with heritage groups including Historic England, English Heritage, the National Trust, and experts in the field, including the Stonehenge Scientific Committee – a body of leading independent archaeologists – to ensure a new route is built sensitively to the World Heritage Site.
The route was carefully chosen to avoid monuments and barrow groups, and Highways England’s modified plans also included moving the position of the western entrance to the tunnel to avoid conflicting with the Winter Solstice alignment.

Mr Parody said:

We were grateful to the representatives from UNESCO/ICOMOS who took time to be with us on a three-day visit to understand the scheme we are proposing. It was an excellent opportunity for us to explain how we responded to their previous recommendations and how the scheme is developing.

We look forward to the panel’s report in due course, which will help us further refine the scheme, as well as to all the feedback from all interested parties during the current public consultation.

Following consultation, the scheme will then progress through the formal planning process later this year. Subject to statutory approval, construction is planned to start in 2021.

General enquiries

Members of the public should contact the Highways England customer contact centre on 0300 123 5000.

Media enquiries

Journalists should contact the Highways England press office on 0844 693 1448 and use the menu to speak to the most appropriate press officer.

A spokesperson for the Official Receiver said:

A further 835 jobs have been saved with employees transferring to new suppliers who have picked up contracts that Carillion had been delivering. Close to 11,000 employees have now been found secure ongoing employment.

Regretably 337 employees whose positions are no longer required as Carillion’s business transfers to new suppliers will leave the business later this week. Jobcentre Plus’ Rapid Response Service will provide them with every support to find new work.

I continue to talk with potential purchasers for Carillion’s remaining contracts and will keep staff, elected employee representatives and unions to keep them informed as these arrangements are confirmed.

Further information

• In total, to date 10,960 jobs have been saved and 2,162 jobs have been made redundant through the liquidation
• This information does not include jobs attached to contracts where an intention to purchase has been entered into but has not yet formally occurred
• Just under 4,000 employees are currently retained to enable Carillion to deliver the remaining services it is providing for public and private sector customers until decisions are taken to transfer or cease these contracts
• Further information about rights in redundancy is available on gov.uk

To be notified of future updates from the Official Receiver please register to receive an email alert.

Millions of people across the Commonwealth will be free of blinding trachoma as the UK steps up its support to tackle this ancient and avoidable disease, the International Development Secretary Penny Mordaunt will announce today.

Trachoma, a bacterial infection that can lead to permanent loss of sight, affects more than 52 million people across 21 Commonwealth countries. If left untreated, the painful disease, which is the world’s main infectious cause of blindness, can cause eyelids to turn inward, or eyelashes to grow towards the eye scratching the cornea.

To help eliminate the disease, UK aid will provide additional support to 10 Commonwealth countries over the next two years, providing antibiotics to millions, surgery and education programmes to teach people how to stop the spread of this infection.

International Development Secretary Penny Mordaunt said:

British research, NGOs and pharmaceutical companies have been at the forefront of the global fight to eliminate blinding trachoma that causes debilitating pain for its victims.

UK aid has already made a huge difference to vulnerable people in countries including Malawi, Mozambique and Uganda, freeing families trapped in a cycle of poverty as the disease passes from one generation to the next. In Malawi for example, four years ago eight million people were at risk of trachoma and now no-one is.

This further commitment will mean millions of people across the Commonwealth will receive vital sight-saving treatment and we will be on course to eliminate this ancient and avoidable disease.

This new package of UK support will:

• Enable our partners to map out where the disease remains in 138 districts in Tanzania, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Kenya;
• Help Kiribati, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Vanuatu, Nauru work with the World Health Organisation to confirm they have eliminated trachoma;
• Provide 76,000 people with surgery in Kenya, to prevent blindness and end the pain trachoma causes, and eliminate the disease as a public health problem by 2020; and
• Help Pakistan, Tanzania and Papua New Guinea get nearer to elimination as millions receive sight-saving treatment.

Today’s support is part of the UK’s £360 million commitment made in April 2017 to provide a billion treatments for people at risk of neglected tropical diseases like trachoma and guinea worm. Neglected tropical diseases affect over a billion people in the poorest and most marginalised communities in the world, stopping children going to school and parents going to work – costing developing economies billions of dollars every year in lost productivity and reducing overall global prosperity.

The International Development Secretary will highlight the results of UK aid at an event this evening organised by The Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Trust (QEDJT) to celebrate work to eliminate trachoma across the Commonwealth.

Dr Astrid Bonfield CBE, chief executive of The Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Trust, said:

At the Trust, thanks to support from DFID and our partners from across the Commonwealth, we have seen how the elimination of trachoma transforms lives for the better.

It is wonderful news that more citizens, communities and countries across the Commonwealth can now look forward to a future free of the scourge of this ancient, painful, blinding disease.

Through our partners, Sightsavers and the QEDJT, UK aid has made huge progress in fighting avoidable blindness. UK aid has helped to train more than 10,000 people to look for the final trachoma cases around the world. These trained specialists have provided crucial advice to those affected by the disease, helping them to get surgery and teach them on how to stop the spread of the infection itself.

Dr Caroline Harper CBE, CEO of the Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind – more commonly known as Sightsavers – welcomed the announcement:

Blinding trachoma is a horribly painful disease that has devastating effects on the people it affects and their communities.

This new investment the Commonwealth 2018-20 Fund will help us make huge strides towards eliminating this ancient scourge from the Commonwealth and will also encourage other donors to step forward.

Notes to editors:

1. The International Development Secretary Penny Mordaunt today announced £20 million of funding, contributing towards eliminating blinding trachoma across the Commonwealth by 2020.
2. £7 million for this programme comes from the 2018 – 2020 fund which the British government has made to create positive change in the Commonwealth, during the UK’s period as chair-in-office.
3. Today’s announcement is part of our effort to beat these diseases. The world is making great progress on these. In 2017 there were only 30 cases of guinea worm left globally, down from over 3 million a year in the 1980s.
4. Pharmaceutical companies have been critical to efforts controlling and preventing trachoma and other neglected tropical diseases, through their generous donation of the necessary drugs. For trachoma, Pfizer have donated more than 500 million doses of antibiotics, treating more than 100 million people in 33 countries.
5. The two year programme announced today will build on, and in some cases complete, the UK’s previous efforts to eliminate blinding trachoma in 10 Commonwealth countries: Kiribati, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Vanuatu, Nauru, Kenya, Pakistan, Tanzania, Papua New Guinea, and Nigeria.
6. The programme implements SAFE strategies (surgery, antibiotics, facial cleanliness and environmental improvements), which are known to eliminate blinding trachoma, and have been endorsed by the World Health Organisation.
7. UK aid supported the Global Trachoma Mapping Project 2012-2016, the largest infectious disease survey ever undertaken that helped to pinpoint the world’s trachoma-endemic areas. This project collected data from 2.6 million people in 29 countries using Android smartphones.

• 90% per cent of pupils offered their first choice of primary school and 97.2% were offered a place at one of their top three last year
• Disadvantage gap index at Key Stage 2 down 10.5% since 2011
• 825,000 new school places created since 2010 – with 90,000 more over 2016-17 alone

Pupils across the country will find out today (Monday 16 April) which primary school they will be going to in September, amid rising education standards in England.

Figures show 97.2 per cent of pupils were offered one of their top three primary schools in 2017 and follows the creation of 825,000 new school places since 2010.

Families will receive their offers as standards continue to rise thanks to the government’s reforms and the hard work of teachers, with 1.9 million more children in good or outstanding schools than in 2010 and nine out of ten schools awarded this rating at their last inspection.

School Standards Minister Nick Gibb said:

This morning, thousands of pupils and their parents will find out which primary school they will be going to this September. Thanks to our reforms and the hard work of teachers, academic standards in our primary schools are rising across the country. Our young readers are among the best in the world, the proportion of primary school pupils reaching the expected standards in reading, writing and maths standards went up 8 percentage points last year and the attainment gap between children from wealthier and poorer backgrounds has narrowed by 10.5% since 2011.

A good primary school education lays the foundations for success at secondary school and beyond, so it is right that we help make sure every child reaches their potential from the moment they start their education. That’s why we’re investing £5.8 billion to create even more good schools and good school places – building on the 825,000 we’ve created since 2010 – resulting in 9 out of 10 pupils securing one of their top three choices of schools.

Academic standards are rising following the introduction of a more rigorous primary school curriculum to match the best education systems in the world, with latest performance data showing:

• The gap between disadvantaged pupils and others in a combined measure of English, reading and mathematics has decreased in each of the last six years, narrowing by 1.3% in the latest year and 10.5% since 2011;
• There are now 154,000 more six-year-olds on track to become fluent readers than in 2012, with England’s recent rise up the international PIRLS rankings putting the success of the government’s reforms on a global scale; and
• In 2017 72% met the expected standard in reading, 75% in maths and 77% in grammar, punctuation and spelling.

On top of this, the government has invested in programmes to help raise standards in these crucial early years of education, including a £26 million network of specialist English Hubs around the country to improve pupils’ literacy and £41 million to follow the same approach to teaching maths as world leading countries through the Shanghai Mastery for Maths programme. ‎This is on top of wider changes to the primary assessment system which will reduce unnecessary workload for teachers so they can focus on what really matters in the classroom.