Autism: Educational Outcomes

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Tuesday 6th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield]

My hon. Friend is right. These children have not just a right, but a legal right. As the inquiry heard, the most frustrating thing is that existing legislation should be providing for such care in the education system. We have not only the Children and Families Act 2014, but the Autism Act 2009, which my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Dame Cheryl Gillan) introduced. The 2009 Act, which is the only disability-specific piece of legislation that we have in England, sets out how autistic adults should be supported.

The problem is therefore not that the legislation is not in place, but that it is not being upheld. As the 10-year anniversary of the Autism Act approaches, we need a national autism strategy to help children and young people, to ensure that the current laws are upheld and to make sure that all autistic children receive the help to which they are legally entitled. Without that, we will continue to hear these desperate stories of parents and their children who are not getting the support that they need.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Lady agree that there is also a need for speech therapists, child psychologists, occupational therapists and other health professionals to support the special needs of those children in being diagnosed with autism in the first place?

[Maria Caulfield]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. This is absolutely about not just teachers, but the whole support staff. Our report calls on the Government to introduce a national autism strategy by the end of 2019, which should include training for school staff, the provision of a specialist curriculum for all pupils who need one and measures to reduce bullying and promote inclusion in schools. We also ask for an understanding of autism to be embedded in the education system, and we want ongoing training for teachers, including headteachers.

We are asking local authorities to collect data on children in their areas, because commissioners cannot plan a service if they do not know how many children are in need of it and on what part of the autistic spectrum those children sit. The needs of a high-functioning autistic child are very different from those of a child at the other end of the spectrum, so local authorities need to be collecting data so that they can adequately commission services.

We ask that Ofsted is required to monitor the implementation of the 2014 Act. One of the most striking pieces of evidence we heard in our inquiry was the admission of Ofsted inspectors that they do not always assess how children with autism are supported in schools when they carry out their inspections. If that is not being enforced, it is no wonder that schools are not getting the resources they need to support these children.

We also ask that local authority staff—this point was made in an intervention—as well as teachers receive training about the requirements of the 2014 Act. This is about more than teachers, who know that they need training, because a range of individuals involved in supporting children could also do with such training.

The Secretary of State came to our launch in Parliament last week. My hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle has met him since, and I know that my right hon. Friend is supportive of our report’s findings. He has asked us to list the aspects of our report that we could introduce into policy, so we will certainly follow up on that. As a society, we are failing autistic children and their families, and that has a key implication for a huge number of people in our society.

During our inquiry on autism and education in England, we heard that too many families face an uphill struggle to obtain the help and support to which their children are entitled. Children with autism only have one childhood, so there is only one chance of getting it right. The impact of getting it wrong can be far reaching for the rest of their lives. We therefore urge the Government to look carefully at our report, and to develop a national autism and education strategy before the end of 2019 that will support local authorities to become more effective commissioners for children on the autism spectrum and ensure that schools are equipped to ensure that autistic pupils are supported in the way the existing law says they should be. In the words of a suffragette, Emily Wilding Davison, this is about “deeds not words”.

Oral Answers to Questions

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Monday 11th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Morgan (Portsmouth South) (Lab)]

3. What recent assessment she has made of the adequacy of capital funding for schools.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

10. What recent assessment she has made of the adequacy of capital funding for schools.

[The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)]

The Government are making a significant capital investment in the school estate: we have committed over £23 billion in capital funding over the period 2016-21. This will create over 600,000 new school places, rebuild buildings in the worst condition at over 500 schools through the priority school building programme, and deliver thousands of projects to improve the physical condition of school buildings. Since 2010, capital funding has resulted in 735,000 new places and revenue funding is at an all-time high at £41 billion.

[Nick Gibb]

No parent should be expected to pay for the basic needs of their school, although they can, of course, be asked to fund school trips and extra things. We are spending record amounts on our school system: £41 billion this year, rising to £43.5 billion by 2019-20, and standards are rising in our school system, too, in reading, maths and GCSEs, despite a more rigorous curriculum in our secondary and primary schools.

[Bambos Charalambous]

Can the Minister confirm that, despite the additional £1.3 billion announced in July, the schools budget is still facing a £1.5 billion real-terms funding shortfall, which nothing has been done to reverse?

[Nick Gibb]

No. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State announced an additional £1.3 billion in July, as the hon. Gentleman kindly acknowledged. That means that not only have we maintained school funding in real terms, as we did in the last Parliament, but we have maintained school funding in real terms per pupil in this period up to 2020.

Free Childcare

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Thursday 12th October 2017 Westminster Hall

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for High Peak (Ruth George) on securing this important debate. The issue of properly funded, decent childcare has a huge impact on families in my constituency and across the country. It would be good to be able to welcome the Government’s actions on that and their commitment to 30 hours’ free childcare, but I see, from talking to both parents and childcare providers in my constituency, that there are clearly serious problems with the proposals and how they are being implemented.

First, the funding is simply inadequate. The shortfall in the Government’s commitment is detrimental to childcare providers. Last week, I spoke to the manager of a successful and popular nursery in Enfield Southgate. She told me that the Government’s plans make her fearful for her business. The inadequate money from the Government will put a terrible strain on the way in which her nursery is run. She told me that parents who used to pay for her nursery privately are now accessing the 30 hours’ childcare, but the shortfall in money from the Government to fund that will put wages and staffing costs under considerable strain. She also told me that if she were to decide not to offer the 30 hours to parents, she would lose out to other companies that will be offering it.

That hard-working nursery manager feels caught in a double bind: does she offer the 30 hours’ free childcare and risk her business making a loss, or does she avoid offering it and go under because others, who doubtless feel similarly trapped, will be offering it? We know from the excellent research done by my hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Spen (Tracy Brabin) that the fears of that nursery manager are not the exception; they are now the rule. Research also shows that three quarters of childcare providers expect the Government’s policy to have a negative impact on their business; fewer than 7% believe that it will be positive.

The Pre-school Learning Alliance estimates that there is a 20% shortfall between the amount the Government are giving local authorities to fund the scheme and the actual cost to nurseries.

Worse still, the Government are proposing that funding levels will stay the same until the end of this Parliament, even though the cost of wages, rents, pensions and much more are likely to rise during that time. Why should nursery managers and childcare providers such as the one I referred to in Enfield Southgate shoulder the financial risk caused by the Government’s ill-considered plans? The proposal of free childcare is far from free if hard-working childcare providers are carrying the cost, to the extent of even being put out of business. That is not to mention the anxiety and disruption caused to parents and children when a trusted childcare provider goes out of business, sometimes at short notice. If the 30-hour offer is to be truly free for both parents and providers, it must be funded properly now and in the future.

The other serious flaw in this pledge is that it will not help those who need it the most. I know from talking to my constituents that many parents welcome the prospect of 30 hours’ free childcare, especially those who are struggling in low-paid, insecure work. However, those who need help could easily slip through the net with this scheme, not least because of the many technical problems that parents are experiencing. After having huge technical problems accessing the scheme, one constituent contacted me last week to say:

“This is the government’s flagship childcare scheme and it’s an utter shambles with no prospect in sight of a resolution.”

Even more disturbing is the fact that to be eligible for the scheme, a parent must earn more—

[Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)]

Order. There is a four-minute time limit. I call Liz Twist.

Schools Update

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Monday 17th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

Once we have done our analysis over the summer, we will make the per-school spreadsheets available. I hope that people will look at them, because they will contain the actual reality of school funding, rather than some of the falsehoods that are being peddled.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State accept that, with schools having to pay £575 million in employer contributions to the teachers’ pension scheme and £625 million in national insurance contributions, and with inflation at 2.9%, the £1.3 billion that has been announced will barely cover those costs?

[Justine Greening]

I do not agree. What is important is that we are able to maintain the rates of per-pupil funding in our schools. That is what I have set out today, and we can only do it because we have a strong economy that is creating jobs, growth and taxes that fund our vital public services. We must not fall into the trap of thinking that, every time we want to increase our public spending, we have to reach into the public’s pocket and raise taxes. That is simply not sustainable. Neither is it sustainable to have increasing debt when our debt interest is still more than the amounts we are investing every year in our schools and high-needs funding. It is vital that we have a long-term strategy to deal with that debt, and I believe that we can make our departmental budget work more effectively and, in doing so, get more money to the frontline of schools. That has to be the first port of call for anyone in my role, rather than simply resorting to higher taxes or more debt.

Education: Public Funding

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Tuesday 4th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Nick Gibb]

When we consulted on the national fair funding formula, we said that we would limit gains to 3% in order to ensure that any schools that were losing funding did not lose more than 1.5% per pupil per year, so I cannot give my hon. Friend that reassurance, but we will respond to the consultation shortly.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

Is the Minister aware of the impact that increased national insurance contributions and pension contributions are having on schools in Enfield, Southgate, resulting in cuts in the classroom and impacts on learning and on assisting children with behavioural issues?

[Nick Gibb]

As I have said, we are spending record amounts of money on school funding, but there are cost pressures. One of those cost pressures, which the hon. Gentleman has identified, is the increased employer contribution to the teachers’ pension scheme. That is part of a range of measures that are helping to tackle our historic budget deficit, which we have reduced from 9.9% of national income to 2.5% of national income, and which we have to eliminate if we are to keep the economy strong. We are determined to continue with that.