Children: Special Educational Needs

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Tuesday 17th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blunkett]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government when they expect to publish the outcome of their departmental review into children with special educational needs, announced on 6 September 2019, and whether this will include a response to other recent reviews and consultations on this subject.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government are committed to carrying out a SEND review. The 2014 reforms gave vital support to more children, but we know that for too many children and parents the vision has yet to become a reality. We all want a system of support for those with special educational needs and disability which is consistent, high quality and integrated across education, health and care. We will take the time we need to get that right, drawing on evidence from the relevant reviews.

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, at a time of enormous challenge, those who face challenges on a daily basis need our support most of all, so it is extremely disappointing news about the review of the education high-needs block for local government, which started between May and July last year, and the review that the Minister referred to, announced in September last year. The House of Commons Select Committee report of 23 October, which has not yet been responded to, and the Budget on 11 March, failed completely to deal with the challenges that children with special educational needs and their parents face on a daily basis. Is it not time that there was action rather than review?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, the review is a comprehensive review led by the Department for Education across government. It incorporates last year’s call for evidence on the funding of schools. We need to take the time to get this right. This year, we have given another £780 million to support education for those with special educational needs and disability. At this time, it is not possible to give a specific timetable for the publication of the review. I hope noble Lords will understand that.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, can my noble friend tell us what the focus of the review of the autism strategy will be, and whether it will focus in particular on providing more support for girls with autism?

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to my noble friend. Under the 2009 Act, the Government are required to review the autism strategy every three years. This is the first time that the strategy will include children and young people; my noble friend is correct that one of the areas we will also address within that review is the misdiagnosis, and what we are convinced is an underdiagnosis, of girls with autism, who often present later and are better at camouflaging it. They often present very differently to boys with autism.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, do the Government accept that there are huge numbers of people who have moderate problems, which are being left for a long time and then have to be dealt with in the high-needs category? This is because we are not investing in classroom support. Could this be a key part of any review and new strategy? At the moment, all it does is to make people’s lives worse and costs us more money.

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, I will take the specific question for the review about moderate needs becoming high needs. As the noble Lord will be aware, most young people who have special educational needs and disabilities—the SEND population—are accommodated within mainstream schools and without an EHCP, which was in the 2014 reforms. We are providing through dyslexia organisations and the Autism Education Trust, as he will be aware, further teaching qualifications and support for those in the classroom.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I endorse the concerns expressed by my noble friend Lord Blunkett, but there is a more immediate issue as far as special educational needs are concerned. It can surely be only a matter of time now before all schools in England are closed. When that happens, the effects will be widespread across the country but for SEND children and their families, the impact will be profound. What planning are the Government undertaking with a view to ensuring that the vital support that SEND children and their families rely on will be prioritised in the weeks and months ahead? Will local authorities and other agencies be properly funded to enable them to deliver it?

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to the noble Lord. Obviously, within priorities at the moment the most vulnerable group at risk has been that of older people; but, as of last night’s guidance, there was reference to those young people with specific medical conditions, such as severe asthma or cystic fibrosis. They will be contacted directly by the NHS. But we are acutely aware that there are groups of young people, particularly within the SEND population—for instance, those in special residential schools—where there are implications in having any kind of household-type isolation. There are also profound implications for the families; those children are in residential special provision for very good reasons. As we completely realise, it is not as simple as saying “You now need to go home”, so that guidance is being worked on as well.

[Lord Lexden (Con)]

My Lords, is it not important to try to reduce the large sums of public money that are being spent by local authorities as they attempt to resist legitimate requests by families for special educational needs?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, I think my noble friend is referring to the tribunal process. Since 2014, the percentage of decisions being taken to the tribunal as a proportion of the overall number of plans is the same. Numerically, it is going up because the number of plans is going up. There are actually now five different decisions, or combinations of decisions, that parents can appeal. But my noble friend is right, too: we have given £365 million of capital so that local authorities can build more spaces because—he might not be happy to hear this—it is actually cheaper for local authorities to provide the spaces themselves, rather than use private or independent providers.

[Baroness Uddin (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I declare my interest in that I have an adult son with learning disability and autism. Will the Government’s review consider ring-fencing the money for special educational needs, which has always been a problem? This is especially given the fact that local authorities and other institutions are facing extreme cuts and pressures at this time.

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, as I understand it, the funding goes out to local authorities and schools now receive, within the national funding formula, a proportion of that money. The money that I referred to—what is now over £7 billion— is given to local authorities and it is for them to determine locally what the needs of their population are. We believe that to be the right strategy, as they are closer to the needs on the ground.

Innovation Economy: Skills

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Monday 16th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bull]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of (1) the skills required for a successful innovation economy, and (2) whether the education system is structured to deliver a workforce equipped with such skills.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government want the UK to be a science and research and development superpower, increasing our research and development spending to 2.4% of GDP by 2027. The Government are constantly assessing the skills required to deliver this ambition. We are prioritising STEM, digital and technical education; creating a new £3 billion skills fund; and reforming the global talent visa so that we can create a fast-track scheme for top scientists, researchers and mathematicians.

[Baroness Bull (CB)]

My Lords, the innovation foundation Nesta and the OECD have identified three skill sets required in an innovation economy: technical, behavioural and creative-thinking skills, the process by which we generate, critique and refine ideas. Their research shows that pupils who study art at school are more likely to develop these skills. Do the Government recognise the contribution of arts-based learning to the wider innovation economy? Given that creative thinking is identified as a core innovation skill, will she commit to reviewing the department’s decision to opt out of the PISA 2021 test for creative thinking?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, as part of our ongoing commitment to arts in schools, we are continuing funding of about £85 million a year for a range of music and cultural education programmes. Cognitive science shows that a knowledge-based curriculum is then the foundation for stimulating the critical thinking and creativity that we need. That is why the focus of our curriculum is on getting that bed of knowledge on which all students, including arts students, need to build. The Government believe that the short, online, intensive survey by PISA is not sufficient to give us a realistic indication of creative thinking in our students.

[Baroness Blackstone (Ind Lab)]

My Lords, as so often, the Minister made no reference to further education in her initial reply. Given the importance of FE in delivering skills training, will she say something about how the Government will tackle the problem of lack of trained staff in the FE sector, following the enormous cuts made to it? I know that the House will welcome the extra funding that has been provided for FE, but it will be useless if we do not have the relevant and appropriately skilled staff to do the training needed.

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for raising the role of FE, which often does not get mentioned in this space. Yes, £400 million has been invested into the estate, and I think that more money was announced in the Budget. There has not been a specific fund to skill up the FE workforce as well, but one initiative that the Government have embarked on are the new institutes of technology, 12 of which have begun to open from September 2019. They are an innovation of employers, universities and the FE sector. The Government are committed to the role of the FE sector in delivering the skills that we need for the future.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

One of the problems highlighted by the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, in other Questions is transitioning from schools into apprenticeships, particularly in the creative and media sector. In an Answer to a Written Question from me, the Minister said that nearly half a billion pounds in the apprentice levy budget is unspent from 2018-19. Can she undertake to use some of that budget to enable creative and media companies to provide a route to work for this important group of people?

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to the noble Lord; I expected that this Question would highlight the role of the creative and arts sector. There has been a specific initiative in the apprenticeship space, which I have mentioned before in your Lordships’ House, because of the difficulties of a 12-month apprenticeship when we have an industry sector that has a lot of sole traders. We have therefore devised the apprenticeship training agency—I think that is what it is called—to be one employer, so that a number of placements can be created. We are committed to delivering apprenticeships in the creative sector.

[Baroness Jenkin of Kennington (Con)]

My Lords, will the Minister outline what the Government are doing to ensure that future skills needs are better understood nationally?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, it is essential that this is both a local and a national approach by the Government. A national skills and productivity board has been announced and is in development, made up of experts sitting at a national level. There are now 36 skills and advisory panels—similar name but different function—at local level, which include the FE sector and employers, so that at local level we can provide the skills that the local economy needs.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, does the Minister agree with the statement from Innovate UK on its website that

“One of the most frequently-overlooked yet crucially important elements of innovation is design”?


If so, will the Government address the currently precarious and actually pitiful position of design subjects in schools, where design and technology in particular has 67% less GCSE take-up and 43% fewer teaching hours than 10 years ago?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, the Government are committed to all those sectors with a skills gap: there is design, the automotive sector and engineering. What I just outlined at local and national level is to ensure what is being developed in qualifications and skills. That is why employers are involved in ensuring that apprenticeships match the needs of the economy.

[Lord Flight (Con)]

My Lords, is the Minister aware that about 70% of people graduating from Russell group universities now end up working for SMEs and similar smaller companies? That is totally different from the position 20 years ago and is one reason for the strength of our economy.

[Baroness Berridge]

Yes, SMEs are a huge part of our economy. Along with the FE sector, the biggest single contribution the Government make to research and development for businesses is what is called the R&D tax credit. In the latest figures that I have, £4.3 billion was paid to businesses for that tax credit for their R&D spend, but £2.3 billion of that was to small and medium-sized enterprises, so this is not just about big business and universities, it is about the FE sector, local skills needs, and small and medium-sized enterprises.

[Baroness Whitaker (Lab)]

My Lords, what are the Government doing about the skills needed to reach a zero-emissions, low-carbon economy?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, through the education sector, that is part of what is taught in our schools—there is the environmental science A-level—but in terms of what the Government seek to deliver, it is part of our priority to develop the industries we need to deliver that commitment.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as chairman of the William Morris Craft Fellowship Committee. What is my noble friend doing to ensure that more young people in our schools are aware of the immensely rewarding careers available in the skilled crafts?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, the Government are investing in the Careers & Enterprise Company, there is a careers strategy nationally in schools and it is part of the Ofsted framework, but we leave it to teachers to determine who they should invite in through our various initiatives. I am sure that that is one that many schools would want to invite participants into.

Apprenticeships: Gender Segregation

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Wednesday 11th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Nye]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of any gender segregation in publicly funded apprenticeships in different (1) sectors, and (2) occupations.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, we are committed to ensuring that apprenticeships in all sectors and at all levels are accessible to anybody with passion and drive. Overall, there is a good gender balance in apprenticeships, but we want to ensure that more women access apprenticeships in traditionally male-dominated fields and benefit from those that offer the highest returns. Our Apprenticeship Diversity Champions Network is championing gender representation in apprenticeships among employers in industries where we know improvement is needed.

[Baroness Nye (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for that reply. While apprenticeship diversity champions are a useful tool, I am sure she will agree that gendered job segregation reinforces the pattern of low pay for women. The latest BEIS apprenticeship pay survey shows that women continue to be paid less and trained less and are more likely to be paid below the legal minimum. Does she agree that change needs to happen, and will she consider introducing part-time and flexible apprenticeships, which would help attract more women into higher-paid sectors?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, with the growing emphasis on apprenticeships, for a time, of course, these will reflect the existing sector issues, but I have good news for the noble Baroness, because there are part-time apprenticeships, with a 12-month minimum, and people can extend the hours of training and the time of the apprenticeship. We are working very practically with the “Find an apprenticeship” website to encourage it to offer those apprenticeships and highlight them on the website.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness alluded to, engineering and construction tend to be better paid apprenticeships than others, so what are the Government doing to encourage more girls and women into construction and engineering and to show them that it is not all greasy overalls and muddy fields? Might they consider putting 25% of the apprenticeship levy, say, into a social mobility fund to encourage more diversity, both in the regions and among these sectors?

[Baroness Berridge]

In relation to promoting construction for women, that is one of the underrepresented sectors, but the Fire It Up campaign profiles women in all these sectors, and there is our Apprenticeship Diversity Champions Network. One of those champions is Nottingham City Homes, which aimed to have 25% of their apprenticeships filled by women and it is actually 47%. I accept that we need to go further, because the figures for construction are still too low, but there are good examples to show that the initiatives we are trialling are working.

[Lord Lilley (Con)]

My Lords, last year 48,000 young people, predominantly women and girls, applied to train as nurses in this country, but half were turned away because we ration the number of places for training in nursing. Why do we ration these places while unlimited numbers are able to study every subject from art history to zoology? Why do we pretend we have to recruit nurses abroad because not enough people in this country want to study nursing, when we are turning away half of those who do?

[Baroness Berridge]

My noble friend will be aware of our commitment to recruit 50,000 nurses. I will have to write to him in detail about whether the apprenticeship offer refers to any such training.

[Lord Clark of Windermere (Lab)]

My Lords, is it not a fact that only two out of five women in apprenticeships have any formal training? Does that not make a mockery of the concept of apprenticeships?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, historically there have been issues to do with the quality of apprenticeships, which is why we have moved from the framework to the standards. They should be 12 months long, there is a minimum of 20% training off the job, and there is an end-of-year assessment. The quality is improving, we are monitoring the standards, and Ofsted is in charge of monitoring the standards of training providers, so we can assure the noble Lord that the quality of apprenticeships is going up.

[Lord Aberdare (CB)]

My Lords, I hosted an event for an initiative called Maths4Girls, which seeks to increase the number of girls involved in maths, mainly by connecting them with role models from maths-based industries. Can the noble Baroness tell us whether the Government are doing anything to encourage people to offer themselves as role models or mentors as a way to address gender imbalances in apprenticeships?

[Baroness Berridge]

Yes, mentors are particularly important in schools, and we are ensuring through the careers guidance that there are STEM encounters within schools. There has been good news on the number of girls who are now studying A-level maths, which has gone up by 31%, and undergraduates for Maths4Girls has gone up to 34%. Those are encouraging signs, which will of course help with the recruitment of girls into engineering; we are encouraging those entry-level subjects.

[Baroness Redfern (Con)]

My Lords, the allocation of apprenticeships continues to grow, and the Government have promised a £3 billion skills fund over the next five years. Can my noble friend say whether this may be used to top up apprenticeship funding for small companies and therefore help to address the gender balance?

[Baroness Berridge]

My noble friend is correct that there is much more to be done to encourage small and medium-sized enterprises. That is why the larger levy paying firms can now spend 25% of that levy down their supply chain with subcontractors and can use their corporate social responsibility to indicate to those subcontractors the diversity requirement. The £3 billion national skills fund concerns adult education, but I will take that back to my department.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, surely the fact that two-thirds of female apprenticeships are concentrated in just five sectors of the economy, with more than 25% in health and social care alone—I echo the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Lilley—is a reflection more on the stereotypical behaviour of schools and colleges regarding career paths rather than any prejudice among employers? Last year, the Augar review warned of weaknesses in the provision of guidance and of school examination advice. It suggested that the Government’s career strategy should be rolled out across the whole country so that every school would have access to a careers hub, with young people getting meaningful careers activities and meetings with employers. Can the Minister say what the Government plan to do regarding the Augar recommendations?

[Baroness Berridge]

On the Augar recommendations, I believe that the timetable is for later on this year, in the autumn, with the spending review. However, it is correct that we need to challenge those stereotypes from a young age, which is why we have given £2 million to go down even to primary school level to undo those stereotypes. The noble Lord is correct, but we also need to undo the stereotypes and encourage men to go into sectors such as education that are overrepresented by women. We have also been funding the Fatherhood Institute to ensure that that happens. Further, we have trained teachers through the ASK project so that those who do not have experience of apprenticeships can promote them to their students.

Education: Gender Equality

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Tuesday 10th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, we want a society where choices and success are not limited by expectations and perceptions about gender. There is already scope within the school curriculum to teach gender equality through literature, history and citizenship. Schools can also organise activities outside the curriculum, such as inviting guest speakers. It was an honour to be invited to Eden Girls’ School in London last week to talk about my own experience as a woman in Parliament.

[Baroness Wilcox of Newport (Lab)]

My Lords, for the past year, five primary schools in the London Borough of Camden have been participating in a pilot programme created by a non-profit organisation called Lifting Limits. It encouraged school staff to analyse everything they did in the classroom through a gender-equality lens. It took a whole-school approach, with training for staff, sessions with parents and an overhaul of the curriculum, to shift away from almost exclusively looking at white men in areas such as art history and science, as well as making changes to the learning environment. Will the Minister please look at the outcomes of this pilot project and see how these findings can be integrated into the curriculum across England?

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for the outline of the pilot project. She is indeed right that there has to be a focus on women being promoted, particularly in the science field, and the national curriculum subject content now includes people like Rosalind Franklin. So, yes, I would be happy to look at the project and give the noble Baroness a response.

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister will be aware that the introduction of free sanitary products in schools is a major step towards tackling gender inequality in the classroom, but pupils in many schools cannot use the products if their period starts unexpectedly, because their school bans children from using the toilet during lesson times. That can leave children feeling embarrassed or fearful about going to school. Will the Minister look at introducing guidelines for schools?

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for referring to the welcome initiative of introducing free sanitary products to our schools. I will take back to the department the specific issue he raises in relation to guidelines for head teachers. Obviously, students need to be able to access toilet facilities when they need to.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, I am slightly surprised to be on my feet when nobody else is. The Minister mentioned the use of literature—and, I assume, other art forms as well—in the teaching and sustaining of ideas of gender equality. Can she give us any examples of works of literature that the curriculum might currently be using or might use in future to underpin that work?

[Baroness Berridge]

In relation to the promotion of gender equality through the use of literature, the subject content for English is not specified in detail in the curriculum. There are many novels that schools can choose from, and we allow teachers to make those informed professional choices.

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, will the Minister reflect on the experiment outlined this afternoon by my noble friend Lady Wilcox, which I was unaware of, and whether it also includes the really difficult issue of white working class boys, who underachieve in all areas—in science, in humanities and in the arts—and how we can ensure that gender equality stretches to those who may have belligerence but do not have confidence?

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for raising that issue. Yes, our standards across schools are aimed at raising the aspirations of all groups, and there are a number of projects, from raising professional qualifications to enhancing the skills of schools in disadvantaged areas to ensure that they are able to attract the best teachers. Our information about that cohort, which probably attracts the pupil premium, is that schools are best advised to invest in teacher quality.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

Last week, the United Nations Development Programme published its Gender Social Norms Index, an analysis of 75 countries that showed the shocking extent to which there has been a pushback against women’s rights globally. It was revealed that 91% of men and even 86% of women hold a bias against women in areas such as politics, education, violence and reproductive health. Of those countries, only six had a majority of the population who held no bias against women—and the UK was not one of them.

So I ask the noble Baroness, both in her role as Education Minister and in her role as Equalities Minister: the United Nations has called on Governments to introduce legislation and policies designed to address ingrained prejudice. Does she really believe that mere guidance, rather than a statutory obligation to teach gender equality, will address that ingrained prejudice?

[Baroness Berridge]

There is, obviously, the Equality Act and the public sector equality duty, so we are not without statutory force in this area. The content of the curriculum is not covered by the Equality Act, but the manner in which it is taught is part of the inclusion framework within Ofsted—so there are tools, including statutory ones, that are used to ensure that our schools are promoting gender equality and breaking down stereotypes, particularly through careers education, even into primary schools now, so that, from the earliest age, children and young people understand that every job is open to them.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, it is clear that this policy is not working. What will the Government do more and differently to ensure that this matter is addressed, because it is certainly not working so far?

[Baroness Berridge]

In relation to specific areas where girls have historically not been entering sectors of employment, we are looking at encouraging them. There is a particular issue around STEM qualifications, so we are working hard to break down those barriers. We have seen a 31% increase in the number of girls taking A-level STEM subjects. I accept that the rate of girls’ participation in those subjects is not what we want it to be, but we are also seeing a rise in female STEM undergraduates, so we are going in the right direction.

[Lord Grocott (Lab)]

One area of inequality that is very much a matter for this House is the question of hereditary Peers.

[Lord Grocott]

The Minister will know that, of the 216 names on the current list of hereditary Peers who are eligible to stand in by-elections, 215 are men. Without being too extreme in these matters, does the Minister think that the Government ought to support any measure—I have one in particular in mind—that would move us towards greater transparency?

[Baroness Berridge]

The noble Lord has had undue success in the ballot for his Private Member’s Bill, and your Lordships’ House will have time on Friday to discuss those matters.

International Women’s Day

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Tuesday 10th March 2020 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Berridge]

To move that this House takes note of International Women’s Day and the United Kingdom’s role in advancing equalities for women everywhere.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, it is an honour to begin my role as Minister for Women with a debate on International Women’s Day, which I am sure many of us marked in different ways on Sunday. I am also pleased that my noble friend Lord Ranger, of Mayfair, will make his maiden speech in this debate, as male voices are so important to this debate. I congratulate him and welcome him to his place in your Lordships’ House.

It is 111 years since the first year in which International Women’s Day was marked. I am sure that today we will hear many inspiring examples of women throughout history who have advocated for gender equality, but I also thank the many noble Lords who work tirelessly to improve the lives of women and girls around the world: thank you and please carry on. For our part, this new Government look forward to celebrating women’s achievements, while rolling up our sleeves to tackle the challenges that lie ahead. I want to talk about some of those as we begin our debate.

Many of the most difficult challenges today lie in the damaging attitudes that still exist about what it means to be a boy or a girl, and the idea that people are predisposed to certain roles or skills purely because of their gender. The evidence tells us that those stereotypes can set in at an early age and become much harder to tackle later. We know that even at only nine years of age, girls are less confident than boys in their mathematical abilities. Some would tell us that that is down to innate differences between girls and boys—that girls are less able than boys at maths. But truth be told, results show that females tend to outperform males in maths and science subjects at GCSE. These harmful gender stereotypes can also affect men and boys. New evidence suggests that men and boys are expected to be strong, unemotional and breadwinners, and that these norms can have a significant impact on their social well-being, mental health and quality of life.

Another part of the problem is that women’s role in history has long gone unrecognised—in the sciences, for instance, it has been obscured or glossed over—yet there are so many brilliant women, without whose ingenuity and tenacity our lives would be much poorer today: the first ever computer programmer, Ada Lovelace; Marie Curie, for her discovery of radium and polonium, and her huge contribution to finding treatments for cancer, which eventually won her a Nobel Prize; or Rosalind Franklin, a scientist now acknowledged for her work on X-ray diffraction images of DNA, which led to the discovery of the DNA double helix. I am delighted to say that this remarkable woman is now being recognised by the international effort to send a rover to Mars, which is naming its pioneering robot after her, all these years after the Nobel Committee acknowledged only her male colleagues.

This issue is pressing for us today as the demand for STEM skills is growing. The Government are investing in programmes to ensure that girls and boys can succeed on an equal basis, particularly in STEM subjects, to improve representation of women in higher-paying STEM sectors. DfE figures show that between 2010 and 2019 there has been a 31% increase in girls’ entries to STEM A-levels in England and a 34% rise in women accepted on to full-time STEM undergraduate courses in the UK. But as things stand, women make up 24% of the core STEM workforce.

This can only be the start, but challenging these stereotypes is essential to level up our country so that everyone has the opportunity to lead their lives as they wish. This year marks 50 years since the introduction of the Equal Pay Act. This landmark legislation was the culmination of years of campaigning by women who chose to take a stand against the injustice of being undervalued, underpaid and overlooked. While the machinists of Dagenham are undoubtedly the most famous, they did not fight alone. I applaud the tenacity of the women bringing forward recent cases, demonstrating that it remains a crucial enforcement tool, empowering women from all walks of life, many in lower-paid roles, to not only secure fair pay but to demand that their work be valued.

To assist similar women we have expanded free childcare for three and four year-olds to 30 hours a week and we have introduced shared parental leave so that parents can share the joy—and, yes, some of the less joyful bits—of their child’s early years, because childcare is not just a women’s issue: fathers are of course equally responsible for their families. I also acknowledge, as many of us in this House know very well, that the childcaring team often extends far beyond parents and formal childcare arrangements to dedicated, loving armies of aunts and uncles, grandmothers and grandfathers and just about every relation in between, so the offer of flexible working should be of great value to them.

As 60% of carers are women, the Government’s £6.6 million investment to support carers to remain in or return to work is an important step, and our manifesto shows that we are committed to go further. We will also introduce a dedicated entitlement to leave for unpaid carers of one week per year, to better support carers to balance work and care. A matter of celebration is the current record employment rate for women. It has increased by 37% over the past half-century, from 53% in 1971 to its current record 72.4%, and increases in full-time employment for women have contributed roughly 90% of the increase since these more detailed statistics began to be collected in 1992.

But I want us to be honest that this is not the case for all women. Women from ethnic minority backgrounds have lower employment rates than white women, with the lowest in the British Bangladeshi and Pakistani ethnic groups, where fewer than two-fifths of women are employed. That is why we are running mentoring circles around the country, involving national employers offering specialist support to the unemployed, young, ethnic minority jobseeker.

We need to use our sector deals to support women in underrepresented industries, such as the offshore wind sector, which has committed to women being a third of the workforce by 2030. More than 130 aviation and aerospace charter signatories are also giving sustained attention to building a more balanced, fairer industry for women.

The Government are determined to see more women leading UK businesses. If women chose to start and expand businesses at a similar level to that of men, we would add billions of pounds to our economy, so the Government will be taking actions, such as those recommended in the Alison Rose review, and I am encouraged to see examples such as RBS, which recently introduced a £1 billion fund to help women’s enterprise.

As well as work, however, we need to ensure that women’s rights, safety, freedom and dignity are recognised and respected. This Government are taking action to bring an end to sexual harassment in the workplace, including carrying out the largest ever survey on this topic in the UK so that we can finally understand the true picture of the problem, and design targeted solutions that will work. We have also committed to ensuring protections against third-party harassment; for instance, from customers or suppliers. I know that the vast majority of leaders across the world of work are with us in wanting to root out sexual harassment in the workplace.

Of course, it is not only in the workplace that safety is important. Regrettably, there has been an increase in the number of female victims of homicide over the past three years, as reported through the Femicide Census. We are determined to tackle this, and I am therefore proud of this Government’s commitment to the passage of the Domestic Abuse Bill. It will be landmark legislation that tackles an injustice affecting the lives of far too many people.

While we are making progress here in the UK, we have also been blazing a trail internationally. The Prime Minister’s first speech set out his ongoing commitment to ensuring that girls across the world have the right to 12 years of quality education, and I am delighted that this will be my noble friend Lady Sugg’s first time in a debate in your Lordships’ House as the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy for Girls’ Education internationally. Noble Lords should bring their domestic concerns to me.

The UK is proud to have a strong track record of championing gender equality and women’s rights globally, evidenced by our efforts to uphold sexual and reproductive health rights, the national action plan to end violence against women and girls, DfID’s strategic vision for gender equality, and our cross-government global girls’ education campaign: Leave No Girl Behind.

The UK can learn a huge amount from other countries. For instance, Rwanda has gone above and beyond its constitutional commitments and has the highest percentage—more than 60%—of female parliamentarians in the world as of the latest elections in 2018. This translates into women holding more than 50% of cabinet positions in Rwanda.

As a woman of faith—the Christian faith—I am very conscious of the role that faith communities can and do play in gender equality. After all, 84% of people around the world self-identify as having a faith. Of course, faith communities can play different roles in different contexts. Some religious institutions and their leaderships can have an inhibiting impact on girls and women and the range of choices they are genuinely able to make, especially when it comes to working outside the home. To my mind, where faith is manipulated in this way, it really is not about faith at all, it is about power and patriarchy. What I see and applaud are the many examples of where faith goes hand in hand with rights, protections and, ultimately, social progress. For example, research funded by the UK Government has shown the incredibly positive roles that faith leaders have played to reduce violence against women in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. We must not shy away from commending and critiquing the faith dynamic as we work for women’s equality at home and abroad.

I conclude by reiterating that I am proud to participate in today’s debate with so many staunch advocates of equality for women. I am proud to be part of this Government, and it is an honour to play my part in the work we are doing and will continue to do to fight for equality for women here in the UK and across the world. I beg to move.

Educational Opportunities: Working Classes

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Thursday 5th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, I too am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, for bringing not only an important issue to the attention of the House but one that covers, in the first weeks of my job, the entire department. As a child from a working-class household, for whom education was the vital route to where I stand today, I agree with her that few issues could be so important. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, I am the first generation to attend university—I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Judd, that it is the enabler—and I am part of the 17% that noble Lord, Lord Bassam, mentioned, as I was state comprehensive-educated.

I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, read my mind, because my first question to officials was, “What is the definition of the term ‘working class’?” As a subjective expression, it is not used by the Government or my department. Our statistics deal with gender, ethnicity and place, so that means that no attainment gap data exist for the “class” of a pupil. I know, like many noble Lords, and in particular my noble friend Lord Kirkham, that many working-class families have sky-high aspirations for their children, so we recognise that we are dealing with a number of different situations here.

When we look at the evidence to see which pupil groups generally underperform at school we see that, for years, pupils from homes claiming welfare benefits have tended to achieve less than their peers. As a result of their lower qualifications they have often gained less secure employment or no employment, and have themselves created homes claiming welfare benefits in which to raise their children. This type of socioeconomic disadvantage is a key predictor of poor educational attainment. The best pupil-level proxy we have is eligibility for free school meals, either now or in the last six years. This measure enables us to provide funding to schools—in the form of pupil premium funding and certain factors in the national funding formula—to ensure that schools have the resources they need to tackle educational inequality.

There is good news—that since 2011 the attainment gap has narrowed by 9% at the age of 16, and 13% at the age of 11. On the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Woolley, the working-class issue cuts across all ethnicities, so we do not seek in any way to pit any group against another. Our aspirations in all our schools are for all pupils to attain, while recognising the particular context from which different groups come to the school environment. Our aim is for each child to have access to a world-class education, which is why the Government have set out an ambitious agenda and made record investment in opportunities for children and young people in our country.

I will start with the pupil progress from early years, which many noble Lords mentioned, and which is fundamentally important to social mobility. The more prepared a child is at the start of their education journey, the greater their chance of success. With regard to the comments made by the noble Baronesses, Lady Warwick and Lady Morris, and the noble Lords, Lord Bhatia and Lord Bassam, £3.6 billion in 2020-21 is being accessed for free childcare. In 2018 the Government set out a 10-year ambition to halve the proportion of children who finish their reception year without the communication, language and literacy skills they need to thrive, as mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor. They need those skills to access the education on offer to them. The department has launched an innovative three-year campaign called Hungry Little Minds, to help parents support their children’s early language development, setting them up for school and beyond. This is part of the wider £100 million investment we are making into the social mobility programme.

A number of specific points were made by noble Lords in relation to the early years foundation assessment. This is not a benchmark for schools, but we have seen the good level of development increase from 51.7% in 2013 to 71.8%. We are seeing more children with the skills to access the education system. The noble Baroness, Lady Morris, and the noble Lord, Lord Storey, and others mentioned the issue of children’s centres. It is a decision for councils in terms of the provision they make for these. There is a piece of work looking at working with MHCLG to see how the funding has been happening at local level, to preserve more for children’s social care. The Early Intervention Foundation is looking at all the evidence in relation to family hubs and children’s centres, so there is no sense that we are not seeking to use what has been done in the past and recognise and recommend what works in this sector. Over the period 2014-19, the gap between those who are on free school meals and those who are not has narrowed. In 2014 there was a gap of 18.9% in terms of the good level of development, and now that gap is down to 17.8%.

Many noble Lords made points about teachers. The professional development in this sector is very important, and there is £20 million being invested—particularly in disadvantaged areas—in the pre-reception workforce. In relation to some of the issues mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, more than £1 billion has been invested in the troubled families programme. In the debate in your Lordships’ House last week, I referred to the hundreds, if not thousands, of children who are not in care now and who are still in their homes because of the intervention of that service and other services and their key workers.

Education reforms, including those aimed at improving teaching, encouraging good attendance and behaviour and strengthening the curriculum and examination system, are designed to deliver opportunity and high standards for all, including working-class pupils. These reforms are underpinned by new accountability measures, which are intended to encourage schools to focus more closely on the attainment of all their pupils. We have high expectations for all pupils.

In relation to the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, I say that we measure the performance of disadvantaged pupils by comparing them to the national average for all pupils, because it is the measure that does not respond to individual school quality. Our reforms are working. By the end of the last academic year, 86% of schools were judged good or outstanding, compared to 68% in 2010. More children take the core academic GCSEs, more children read fluently, and more children attend good or outstanding schools. I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Knight: the system is not perfect but it is not failing and there are many examples of extremely good schools. To give an example, in 2011, just 7.9% of those on free school meals in state-funded schools took English, maths, science, history, geography and a modern foreign language—that figure is now up to 25.1%. We have high expectations and aspirations for all, and we want to see those opportunities grow. We want 90% of all 15-year-olds studying these core academic subjects by 2025.

In terms of the inspection framework, and the soft skills and experiences many young people from working-class backgrounds do not have access to—mentioned by many noble Lords—the new Ofsted framework not only says that there should be a broad and balanced curriculum but talks about the personal development opportunities for disadvantaged students. I was very pleased to learn of the programme outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Lingfield, taking students who have not had those personal development opportunities.

In answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, I do not think it is specifically in the framework, but if Ofsted were to pick up any lack of dignity for working-class students, I am sure that it would make reference to that.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, for mentioning the introduction of the pupil premium funding. It is not only reforming schools for the better, it is investing significantly in our young people. As noble Lords will be aware, the Prime Minister announced last summer that the budget for schools and high needs will be increased by a total of over £14 billion over the next three years, rising to £52.2 billion by 2022-23. This is a huge funding increase and every pupil will get more funding, so I hope the noble Lord, Lord Judd, will agree that the resources are in place. There is also specific targeted funding towards children from low economic circumstances. Since 2011, the pupil premium has seen £15 billion invested and distributed to schools, with a further £2.4 billion in the current financial year.

We know from the research that one of the best things for disadvantaged students is teacher quality. Schools are allowed to spend the pupil premium as they see fit, but we are providing them with what works: the overwhelming evidence from the Education Endowment Foundation is that they should spend that money on quality teachers. We are piloting a £2,000 after-tax payment in the first five years of a person’s teaching career in maths and science, in the opportunity areas and in the north-east, Yorkshire and the Humber region, because we recognise that we must be specific and drive the best teachers into those areas.

The noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, mentioned many different figures and statistics, so I will respond afterwards, but every pupil in England gets the same amount of money: there is no differentiation, when the money leaves the department, as to whether it will end up in a maintained school or in an academy school. Obviously, money for special educational needs is different, but all our pupils are treated the same. Of course, other aspects of development are important for working- class students, particularly such things as arts, PE and sport. The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, spoke very movingly of her environment—the home learning environment is another major factor for young people’s attainment in education. Arts, PE and sport are an essential part of the curriculum.

The noble Lords, Lord Lingfield and Lord Judd, mentioned music and the arts. The Government announced funding of £85 million for music and arts in 2020-21 and another £80 million for music hubs, coupled with further investment in film, dance, theatre and design. We are investing nearly £500 million from 2016-20 for a diverse portfolio of music and arts education programmes. In the manifesto there was a commitment to an arts premium worth over £100 million to secondary schools. I was very interested to hear about the Chickenshed project, which I had heard of. We know that access to arts can be essential for children who are struggling to access education.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall]

Will the Minister say how and with whom the money she has just outlined is going to be spent? It sounds like a lot of money and is very encouraging to hear about, but the real problem for schools is that their budgets are so tight that they cannot incorporate these things into the normal curriculum, which is where it has the most effect.

[Baroness Berridge]

I will write to the noble Baroness on the mechanism by which the money is to be spent, but I thank her for asking for that detail.

In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Kirkham, being outdoors and being active in PE and sports is very important. The Government have invested more than £1 billion in a primary PE and sports premium, which is ring-fenced funding for primary schools to improve their PE and sports. The Government have doubled the premium that has been invested since 2013 to £320 million a year using revenue from the soft drinks levy.

Further education is often a lifeline for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, and there is an input of £400 million-worth of funding to further education. The national funding formula, for 16 to 18 year-olds, includes extra funding for disadvantaged students, and we recognise that often they have barriers to accessing education. The discretionary bursaries also on offer are being reviewed and reformed, so that they meet the needs of those students. The noble Baroness, Lady Morris, referred to the workforce in this area, and there has been £20 million invested in development of the FE workforce.

I turn to higher education, the route for many people into their career. Higher education providers now have to give us ambitious access and participation plans. These are to be agreed with the Office for Students, which will monitor each provider’s progress against the targets set out in those plans.

In relation to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, there will be a response to the Augar report in the spending review, and I think he will know the Government’s position on maintenance grants when he receives that reply. There are record numbers of 18 year-olds accessing higher education. There is, in addition to the access and participation plan, a transparency condition, which requires higher education providers to publish their application, offer, acceptance, non-continuation and attainment rates by socioeconomic background, gender and ethnicity. This will help to drive fairness in admissions and outcomes.

The noble Lord, Lord Livermore, asked about contextual admissions. The Government hope that universities will look in appropriate circumstances at the background of students. The noble Lord, Lord Bassam, mentioned the post-qualification application to university; there is an ongoing review by the Office for Students, and I hear the arguments there. I am not sure whether we are allowed to submit to that review, but I am aware of the concern for disadvantaged students that post-qualification application might cut them off from the in-school support that they need to write their personal statement. So, we might inadvertently be placing them at a disadvantage. This hopefully will all be considered by the review, the outcome of which we are waiting for. It is a delight to hear of the involvement of the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, in the Amos Bursary; it looks like Stormzy has followed in someone else’s footsteps there.

Many noble Lords, in particular the noble Lords, Lord Baker and Lord Glasman, referred to technical education. This, of course, needs to be a similarly world-class system; it is crucial to increase the skills of young people and to the nation’s productivity. Therefore, we are and have been reforming the apprenticeships system to put vocational study on a par with academic study. Apprenticeships should encourage people to get the training qualifications that they need to enter the job market.

In relation to the UTCs, we see that there is a better progression to apprenticeships from schools, and there is wonderful employer engagement in many of the UTCs, particularly the outstanding Energy Coast UTC. I thank the noble Lord for his role in helping us to reduce the level of young people not in education, employment or training to the lowest it has ever been since records have been collected. I hope that the Secretary of State meets his high hopes, but I will say nothing further, because the applications he refers to might hit my desk before they hit the Secretary of State’s.

For those aged 16, T-levels are essential to our plans for this world-class education system. The first three should be introduced by autumn this year, in construction, education and design. This is to enable students at the age of 16 to have a very clear choice between A-levels and T-levels. In terms of esteem, the technical will be on a par with A-levels, and there has been much investment to ensure that the workplace programme is high-quality from the beginning. It will be about an 80% classroom and 20% workplace placement.

On the comments by the noble Lord, Lord Bates, the Government are investing £24 million in Opportunity North East, working with local partners to tackle the specific issues holding back young people in the region. There is a great deal of freedom for them to spend that money as they see fit.

On a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Knight, a review of children’s social care is planned; it was in the manifesto.

On grants, I think that the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, read my mind again. In my area of the department, I have asked what all these things are—these little grants—so that we can get a handle on that.

Time is against me here.

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe]

I note that the Minister has indicated investment in teaching quality in schools and in the further education workforce. Does she mind responding to the point I made about investment in a workforce strategy for early years?

[Baroness Berridge]

I will write to the noble Baroness about that. There is now a first-ever national strategy for teachers. I do not know whether that includes early years, so I will come back to her on that.

I will draw to a close. We are committed to diversity in the teaching workforce and are working with a number of partners, include BAMEed and the Ambition Institute, to encourage the most talented people into one of our most important professions.

It really has been a pleasure to respond to this debate. I know I said yesterday to the noble Lord, Lord Addington, that he would hold my feet to the fire on special educational needs; I was not expecting it to be the very next day.

The attainment of working-class students is one of the Government’s top priorities. I look forward to many further debates and thank the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, for placing this front and centre at the beginning of my time in the department.

Schoolchildren: Dyslexia and Neurodiverse Conditions

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Wednesday 4th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, I join other noble Lords in paying tribute once again to the noble Lord, Lord Addington, who is a noted champion of neurodiversity. I thank him and other noble Lords for their speeches this evening on this important topic.

The attainment gap that we are dealing with here is a very serious issue. It is the Government’s ambition that every child should have access to a world-class education of the type that the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, outlined. Therefore, it is clearly important that all children with special educational needs and disabilities—I will use the acronym SEND—including dyslexia and other neurodiverse conditions receive appropriate, high-quality support so that they can achieve well in their education and future lives.

I agree with my noble friend Lord Sterling that early detection is important. He referred to these children being in mainstream education. That is enshrined in law, and we are concerned that an increasing number of those with EHC plans—about 50%—are now in special provision.

As noble Lords will remember, in 2014 we introduced major reforms to the SEND system. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Mann, for his humble recognition that, prior to these reforms, the situation was far from perfect and there have been improvements. This was part of the focus to deliver that world-class education for all our children. Our ambition was to establish a multiagency, person-centred system, from birth to the age of 25, that identified children’s needs early and focused on progress and outcomes.

These reforms gave vital support to more children, but, as has been recognised in your Lordships’ House, the problems they sought to address were complex and of long standing. For too many, the vision of the Children and Families Act is not yet a reality. On that score, I agree with many of the comments from the noble Lords, Lord Watson, Lord Addington and Lord Bilimoria. The vision that we set, on which there was a lot of cross-party support, has not become a reality for too many families.

That is why officials are working across government to review the SEND system. To assure the noble Lord, Lord Watson, it is a full, root-and-branch review. They are looking at ways to ensure the system delivers the high-quality, consistent support that should have been delivered by joining up health, care and education services. To that end, the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England are working closely with my department. They are working at pace, but these are complex issues. I am sure noble Lords would agree that it is more important to address them fully and get them right than to do so quickly. We welcome the scrutiny and challenge provided by the reports from the Education Select Committee and the National Audit Office, which will be taken into account in the review.

While the review is ongoing, we are continuing to build on what is working and improve what is not. I am pleased that the new Ofsted/Care Quality Commission inspection regime, which we introduced in 2015, has identified some really strongly performing areas, such as Portsmouth, Calderdale and Wiltshire. We also see improvement in areas that were initially found to have weaknesses, such as Middlesbrough, which recently had a strong revisit from the inspectors. These areas will have positively impacted on the experiences of the children and young people that we have talked about this evening, but I accept that this is a patchwork situation and we need to look at consistent provision across the country.

At the heart of the reforms was co-production, to ensure that children and young people with SEND and their parents and carers felt genuinely empowered, as my noble friend Lord Sterling pointed out in relation to parents’ involvement. Although I know that there are challenges around parental confidence in the system, as the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, mentioned, there are some fantastic examples of co-production in action. In Warrington, Ofsted and the CQC found that families are becoming increasingly influential in the design and implementation of plans and services across that local area. However, I accept that there is a patchwork nature to this provision.

To support this co-production, we are funding parent carer forums in every local area to ensure that they play a greater role in designing and commissioning local services. It is wonderful to hear of the role that noble Lords have played as parents to ensure the provision for their children and relatives. We are prioritising working with parents as the review progresses. The new Minister for Children and Families has already met parents to hear about their experiences.

We recognise the financial pressures that educational establishments and local authorities face. We are responding to this by investing £14 billion more in schools over the next three years to 2022-23, the biggest funding boost for a decade. This includes an additional £780 million to meet high-needs funding in 2020-21. Other years will be referenced in due course. This should support those with some of the most complex needs. It is a 12% increase in funding from the previous year, bringing the total high-needs budget to over £7 billion, to answer the queries from the noble Lords, Lord Addington and Lord Watson, about the funding that is going into this matter. We have also invested a total of £365 million in expanding and improving special provision from 2018 to 2021 and opened 43 special free schools, with a further 48 in the pipeline and 37 currently being assessed.

In reference to the points made by my noble friend Lord Lexden, there is excellent provision in the independent sector. As I understand it, when an EHCP says that that is the specific provision for that child, the local authority should be delivering it, but we need to have those special places within the state-funded system so that they are available without having to go to the independent sector. However, the Government accept that additional funding will not in itself be sufficient to address pressures on the system, which was a theme of many noble Lords’ speeches. We must ensure that funding is spent fairly, efficiently and effectively, and that the support available is sustainable in the future. We are talking about young people’s lives, so it must be sustainable.

We are intent on avoiding the situation referenced in the moving story told by the noble Lord, Lord Mann. There are manifesto commitments regarding alternative provisions, but we need to avoid the scenarios that he described by having better provision and better support through EHCPs, and special educational needs support within schools, which is available to many children. About 11% of children are having that support but do not have an EHCP.

To answer the noble Lords, Lord Touhig and Lord Addington, and other noble Lords, obviously the school workforce is a vital part of delivering this support, and workforce development is critical to closing that attainment gap and ensuring that children and young people with SEND fulfil their potential. Qualified teacher status is awarded to new teachers only if they can show appropriate teaching approaches to meet pupils’ individual needs. There are SENCOs in each school, each with a master’s-level qualification, and should be at least attaining the specific SENCO qualification. There is more to do in relation to this, but there are examples of good practice where special schools and mainstream schools in certain areas are working together to share best practice, to upskill the workforce within the mainstream, because most children with special educational needs are within the mainstream system.

We have worked with SEND sector organisations to develop resources to assist with the early identification of and support for children with SEND, including neurodiversity. As I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Addington, is aware, these resources are available on the SEND gateway. Between April 2018 and March 2020, we have provided £3.9 million to the Whole School SEND Consortium, to support schools to embed SEND into school improvement and equip the workforce to deliver high-quality teaching across all types of SEND. As many noble Lords will be aware, the consortium includes the British Dyslexia Association and the Autism Education Trust. Through a specific contract with the Autism Education Trust, we have trained up over a quarter of a million teachers, but I recognise that there is more to do.

On the vexed issue of off-rolling, mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Touhig, in relation to Ofsted, this is a stronger part of the new framework for Ofsted. There is a strength and focus around this issue. We do not want to see this practice happening. There are now examples of schools in which Ofsted have identified this practice and therefore the school is requiring improvement, or is inadequate, as a result of off-rolling. This is a practice that the Government do not want to see happening. Regarding exclusions, we must not be nervous about saying that there are certain groups more likely to be excluded. We must address this. It is also a matter that is part of the inspection regime.

Many noble Lords raised the issue of appeals, and this is quite a nuanced issue. Yes, there is a high rate of parents being, to some degree, successful in those appeals. The percentage remains stable at around 1.6%, but because the number of plans has gone up, the number of appeals has been rising. That situation will be part of the review.

The noble Lord, Lord Addington, referred to assistive technologies. We recognise their potential to support pupils with special educational needs including dyslexia. Our edtech strategy, which was launched in April 2019, has identified accessibility and inclusion as one of five key areas of opportunity where technology can help drive a step change in support for these pupils.

On the point raised by my noble friend Lord Sterling, in our manifesto we have also committed to publishing a national strategy for disabled people before the end of this year. We are exploring multiple options for how we approach this, to ensure that there is a positive impact on disabled people across the country.

In relation to specific questions regarding the percentage of marks in certain qualifications for spelling and grammar, I will talk to my colleague, the right honourable Nick Gibb, about school standards, to fully understand how that might be impacting this group of students.

We are committed to improving the educational outcomes of all children and young people with special educational needs. The SEND review is an absolute priority for the Government. Debates such as the one we have had this evening are important for gathering information and views on the system. I am grateful for it and hope that noble Lords will continue to hold our feet to the fire. I expect to see much more of the rugged determination of, particularly, the noble Lord, Lord Addington, as we deal with matters that are so important to so many young people. We all wish to see a rapid closure of the attainment gap. It is a waste of talent if young people cannot access the support they need to fulfil their potential.

Children and Families: Early Years Interventions

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Thursday 27th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, I too congratulate the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Gloucester on securing this debate and all noble Lords who have spoken on this important issue. I am grateful for this opportunity to set out the Government’s approach to improving early years interventions. I hope that the level of co-ordination, although not perfect, will assure the right reverend Prelate and other noble Lords that we are moving in the right direction.

The approach of the Government is based on a number of principles: that early, rather than late, intervention is the key, as noble Lords have outlined; that it is central government’s role to support, facilitate and work with local government and other partners to tackle the issues together; that our solutions should be focused on outcomes and underpinned by evidence; and that successful strategies should be identified and shared widely.

This is the first debate in my widened portfolio, and it is a serious and complex matter. It straddles a number of central government departments, including the Department for Education, obviously, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Department of Health and Social Care and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. But a co-ordinated approach to tackling early intervention is what the Government aim to achieve. There are meetings between the Department for Education and the Department of Health and Social Care on the advisory programme board to ensure that there is co-ordination across government. The noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, mentioned the Welsh example, which is open to the What Works institutions that the department has set up—so there is a spread internationally and from the devolved institutions.

The need for a national strategy has been clearly outlined to me by many noble Lords. That need is under review, but I will take back to the department the clear message that while co-ordination with local government is essential, noble Lords also believe that a national strategy is valuable in this area. With this co-ordination in mind, the Government have prioritised three areas: first, improving social mobility, supported in the early years by high-quality early education settings and learning in the home; secondly, protecting vulnerable children through effective children’s social care; and, thirdly, improving mental and physical health in pregnancy and childhood. This is underpinned by our work to empower local areas to improve multiagency working and build the evidence base—not necessarily the type of research that the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, would talk about—for what works.

Early educational entitlements are not a panacea, but there is extensive evidence to demonstrate that high-quality childcare supports children’s development and prepares younger children for school. This is why the Government have made sure that all three and four year-olds, and disadvantaged two year-olds, can now access at least 15 hours of free childcare each week. In 2020-21, this is at a cost of £3.6 billion.

As many noble Lords outlined, when children start their formal education, the reception year presents a window of opportunity to address the key development gaps between disadvantaged children and their peers, before they have a chance to widen. The noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, mentioned disadvantaged two year-olds. The take-up rose from 58% in 2015 to 68% in 2019, but there was a slight decrease last year, so the department is working with the Family and Childcare Trust and Coram to ensure that there is an upward trajectory in the take-up for those disadvantaged two year-olds.

The noble Baroness, Lady Armstrong, and the noble Lord, Lord Addington, focused on the early years foundation stage. Too many children leave the reception year with poor outcomes, and the current assessment system involves too much paperwork and reduces the time that reception teachers have to support children. The proposed reforms to the early years foundation stage profile will free up teachers to interact with and support children to ensure that they develop the rich vocabulary, skills and behaviours that they need to thrive in school and to access the education on offer to them. There is good news in relation to this assessment: in 2013, 51.7% of children achieved a good developmental score; by 2019, it was 71.8%. The assessment of language and development skills will also be introduced into the universal child assessment for all two year-olds. We have also set a 10-year ambition to halve the proportion of children who finish their reception year without the necessary language and literacy skills they need to thrive.

The home learning environment, as many noble Lords outlined, is also important. We are supporting parents to improve the quality and quantity of adult-child interactions—a point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. A three-year campaign called Hungry Little Minds has been launched by the department to encourage parents to chat, play and read with their children—the noble Baroness, Lady Prosser, talked about a very moving example she witnessed on public transport—so that they can help to set their children up for school and beyond. We are taking a society-wide approach to get that message out, with different organisations, including charities and businesses, playing their part. The campaign will build on the department’s work with the National Literacy Trust. An interesting example arising from that partnership has been the work of Penguin Random House with Arriva, the train company, to give away books at stations and to train staff to have the confidence to interact with young children on public transport. So we all have a responsibility when we interact with children to help improve their outcomes.

Looking beyond parents, charities and businesses, we are committed to supporting the workforce in this sector to gain the appropriate skills and knowledge—a point made by the right reverend Prelate and the noble Lord, Lord Addington. Alongside our training of 1,000 health visitors to identify and support children with speech, language and communication needs, we have invested £20 million to ensure that practitioners in disadvantaged areas have access to high-quality professional development. On the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Watson, we are also supporting graduates into the sector through funding the Early Years Initial Teacher Training programme, including fees, bursaries and employer incentives.

In relation to the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, and the noble Lord, Lord Addington, early help of course plays an important role in promoting safe and stable families. It is about supporting and intervening with families at the right time and in the right way. Of course, that does not detract from the need for statutory guidance: Working Together to Safeguard Children is clear that local areas should have a comprehensive range of effective, evidence-based services in place to address assessed needs early. Although many noble Lords have made the point in relation to children’s centres, there is a statutory underpinning that local authorities still need to meet, when looking at services, to meet the needs of the most disadvantaged in their communities. We have also strengthened the duty placed on police, heath and local authorities to work collaboratively to safeguard and promote the welfare of children. Since September of last year, multiagency safeguarding partnerships have been in operation in England. We are implementing those reforms to try to see a further cultural shift in the way that police, health and local authorities work together in local areas to secure the outcomes for children.

I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Wyld for raising the issue of maternity and perinatal health. Since April 2019, new and expectant mothers have been able to access specialist perinatal mental health community services in every part of the country. Public Health England is currently undertaking a systematic review and refresh of the Healthy Child Programme in England to ensure that the future approach is both universal in reach and personalised in response to those families needing extra support. I am pleased to inform the right reverend Prelate that a revised health visitor and school nurse model is being looked at within that work. Also in relation to health, the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, raised the issue of childhood obesity. The Government’s childhood obesity plan sets the ambition of halving obesity by 2030, and successful initiatives include breakfast clubs and doubling the PE and sport premium up to £35 million of expenditure.

As I have repeatedly outlined, local areas have a key role in commissioning and delivering effective early years interventions to meet the needs of children and families, and I have some examples of where we are supporting that. First, an additional £165 million has been announced for the troubled families programme, which many noble Lords mentioned, bringing the total expenditure to over £1 billion. Of the children on that programme, 34.2% are under two, showing that this is not always an intervention that is too late. This will ensure that more families get access to the programme’s support.

A key aspect of the programme is the key worker, who goes in and builds a trusted relationship with a family, with practical instructions and advice, but also helps that family access the specialist support on offer in their area. Many noble Lords referred to the fact that, often, the person needing the support is least able to be the advocate to go and get that support. That key worker reminds me of my noble friend Lady Wyld’s reference to the people who are around to help you in those years. As the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, said, it is the person who is on your side. I pay tribute to the local authorities—for schools, health provision and particularly those key workers—because this project has been and will continue to be evaluated.

When reading in preparation for today’s debate, there were moments that caused one to forget all the policy, the research and the words and to think about the lives that are being affected by this. The evaluation of this programme shows that, 19 to 24 months after starting to receive support, the proportion of children on the programme going into care—compared with a similar cohort—is reduced by a third. Those key workers, health professionals and local authorities have affected and changed the lives of hundreds, if not thousands, of children who, as we stand here today, are not in care and are still with their families. I thank them for all that work. Also, the proportion of adults on the programme going to prison has reduced by a quarter and juvenile convictions have reduced by 15%. So this is not an intervention that is always too late—and, of course, everybody would wish that we did not have to make any interventions with any families at all.

Secondly, my noble friend Lady Newlove spoke very movingly about the issues for families facing adversity. There is now the Reducing Parental Conflict programme, with £39 million of funding. I am pleased to say that 98% of first-tier local authorities have taken up work on this programme. We know that children who are exposed to parental conflict can suffer long-term harm, and intervening early to help parents reduce conflict obviously affects the outcomes for both children and parents. Through this programme, we are supporting local authorities and their partners to integrate support to reduce parental conflict into their local services for families. DWP is working with 30 local authorities across England to test eight face-to-face interventions aimed at reducing conflict. There is a theme here: it is the face-to-face, the key worker, the person who is there to intervene in situations.

Parental conflict is related to wider family risk factors including, for example, domestic abuse, poor mental health and substance misuse. The noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, referred to alcohol in this particular context. We are investing £6 million to improve the outcomes of children of alcohol-dependent parents who are also engaged in parental conflict. A key thing to say is that adult social services, which deal with the adult with the alcohol problem, work together with children’s social services to ensure that it is joined up.

The noble Lord, Lord Sheikh, asked specifically whether funding was going into local government. The early years local government programme has funding of £8.5 million and is focused on how local services work together across health, education and early help to improve the outcomes for five year-olds. As part of this work, multidisciplinary peer reviews are supporting councils to identify reforms to services, and our early outcomes fund has provided approximately £6.5 million of grants to local authority partnerships. Gloucestershire County Council, in particular, in partnership with Swindon, was successful in securing an early outcomes grant and is using the fund to develop and pilot an early language support pathway: I hope that the right reverend Prelate, with her professional background, will be very pleased to hear that that is happening in her location.

The local government programme also includes work by the Early Intervention Foundation to review effective models for provision. The foundation is reviewing what family hubs and children’s centres can offer. There are still more than 2,000 children’s centres and we do not want to throw out the baby with the bathwater. That evaluation will look at everything that works, and I assure noble Lords that it does not matter what badge is on it: we need to focus. The needs are so acute and these children need such help that it does not matter. What matters is what works: that is the threshold. The Government will continue to champion the role of family hubs because they are a slightly different model to children’s centres—to respond to the question from my noble friend Lady Wyld.

I assure my noble friend Lady Newlove that we are doing all we can for those children who live through adverse and traumatic experiences in childhood, such as abuse or neglect, or who have grown up in complex family circumstances. She has, in me, someone who did not relish school holidays and who is therefore going to take seriously these matters within the department. Such experiences can, and often do, have lasting consequences for children.

Many noble Lords raised the issue of mental health. New mental health support teams are going to be established in 25% of the country by 2023 and the Department for Education will be funding training for senior mental health leads in schools and colleges. The Government remain strongly committed to the What Works initiative. On the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, about research, I will be going back to the department to ask about the three foundations that the department funds: the Early Intervention Foundation, the Education Endowment Foundation and the Centre for Children’s Social Care—these are “what works”. I will take back his insightful experience in the use of research and the need to monitor how far What Works is spreading from one authority to another: who is using this information to improve and share what is going on.

A number of noble Lords raised the issue of special educational needs, in particular the diagnosis of autism. The NICE recommendation is that the length of time between referral and first appointment to start an assessment should be no longer than three months. Learning disability and autism is one of the priorities in the NHS long-term plan. Over the next three years, autism diagnosis will be included alongside work with children’s and young people’s mental health services to test and implement the most effective ways to reduce those waiting times. I was most moved by the contributions of my noble friend Lord Astor and the noble Lord, Lord Touhig, in this space, particularly regarding children with dyslexia. The Department for Education has contracted the Whole School SEND Consortium to deliver a two-year, £3.9 million programme to help embed SEND in school improvement. As I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Addington, is aware, from 2011 to 2018 the department funded the British Dyslexia Association and other organisations to provide resources to assist schools and local authorities in early identification of those needs.

On funding to tackle child poverty, there is to be a 4.4% real-terms increase in the local authority settlement. The specific issue was raised that local authorities have often prioritised spending on adult social care and other areas at the expense of children’s social care. The department is working with MHCLG to develop a robust and up-to-date fair funding distribution for children’s and young people’s services, which we are aiming to implement as part of a major funding reform package from 2020-21.

On child poverty, I have outlined that the 850,000 most disadvantaged two year-olds have been given free childcare places, and there is an additional 15 hours for lower income families in relation to the entitlement for three and four year-olds. There is also an early years pupil premium, which is just over £300 per pupil. It has been interesting to see how these issues all intersect and relate to that. I hope that the research into family hubs and children’s centres will enable us to look at how best we locate services and help the most disadvantaged children. The Government stand by our position that work is the most effective way to bring these children out of poverty, but of course we recognise that free childcare is needed for many parents to take advantage of that.

I apologise to noble Lords whose questions I have not answered, but I will conclude by responding to the two invitations I was kindly offered. The noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, invited me to the APPG. I think that may be for my honourable friend the Minister for Children and Families, but I will take the invitation back to the department. I apologise for my late response to the persistent invitations of the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, in relation to his wonderful work. I look forward to catching up with that and I hope that one of my first visits will be up to Rotherham. I thank noble Lords for their involvement in such an important debate.