---

Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill

What I have here is the number of entries in subjects from maintained schools and FE colleges; the number of entries for 2008 in mathematics is 45,084. I am assuming—I am looking behind the noble Lord in the hope that I shall get some indication—that that figure includes all maths A-levels. Perhaps not. I am afraid that I will have to come back to the noble Lord on that figure. On the wider point about attracting maths specialists into teaching, we are extremely aware of the importance of doing that and we have been investing through our STEM programme in improving the offer to maths graduates to come into teaching and in attracting maths graduates from other professions, such as the finance sector, to consider coming into maths teaching. Having expert teachers who are qualified in the subject is an important factor in exciting and encouraging young people to maintain an interest, particularly in mathematics. I have some inspiration coming my way. Maths entries have increased from 35,000 to 45,000—I presume that that is pure maths—and entries to further maths have increased from 3,000 to nearly 6,000. That is between 2005 and 2008.