Early Years Intervention

Debate between Baroness Garden of Frognal and Lord Northbourne

Thursday 8th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Northbourne (CB)]

My Lords, like other noble Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, for getting this debate and for the wonderful work that she does for children in all sorts of other contexts. I also congratulate the Government on recognising the crucial importance of each child’s early years and on introducing the early years programme, which I fully support.

My contribution this afternoon is on one issue that your Lordships might think tangential—but it is fundamental. I do not believe that the early years programme alone as it is designed today will be enough to make a confident, committed and supportive parent out of a young person who has never known life in a secure and supportive family. We have a cycle of disadvantage to break.

All secondary schools, especially those serving disadvantaged communities, should work towards a policy that helps as many teenagers as possible to develop not only their academic skills but also their self-confidence and personal, interpersonal and emotional skills—sometimes called the soft skills—to give them the character and resilience that they need in both the workplace and raising a family as they grow up. Such a policy, alongside appropriate academic education, could be a powerful agent to increase social mobility and justice in our society—concerns about which have been so clearly expressed by noble Lords already. We know that secondary schools can do this because the best ones are doing it today. Alas, too many are not. On the same issue of supporting young people as they grow up to become parents, weekly boarding for children from severely disadvantaged families can be immensely effective.

These issues are touched on in two recent government reports published in November which I happened to find. The first is Social Justice: Transforming Lives—Progress Report. It says:

“The family is the most important influence in a child’s life”,

and that families are,

“the bedrock of our society”.

It goes on to discuss support for families but makes little or no reference to preparing young people in school for the responsibilities of adult life and parenting.

The second report is the Government’s response to the second annual report of the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission. It says:

“Children’s development in their early years provides the crucial building blocks for later life”.

The recommendation was that the Government should give,

“more focus to preparing children for the world beyond schools”.

The Government said in their response:

“We absolutely agree that preparing children for the world beyond education should be a key focus for all schools”.

However, they gave no indication of how they will do that.

I suggest a wider remit for secondary schools so that they provide opportunities for pupils. This is done in the best schools through team games, a cadet force, athletics, challenges, adventure and opportunities in drama, art, music and dancing, as well as debates and appropriate involvement in the running and discipline of the school—everywhere and always there are opportunities for belonging and to succeed. Not only secondary schools but youth movements and cadets should also participate in developing and helping tomorrow’s parents.

I expect noble Lords will think that this will be very expensive and difficult to do. It will of course cost more, and it will need more teachers and teacher training, as well as money for facilities. But if noble Lords are worried about cost, I ask them to think about the cost of dysfunctional families today, recently estimated at more than £40 billion a year. We live today in a society where disadvantage is passed down from generation to generation. Our policy should be that that must stop.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

My Lords, I apologise for intervening, but the timing of this debate is beginning to drift. I remind noble Lords that when the clock reads “5” your time is up.

Education: School Leavers

Debate between Baroness Garden of Frognal and Lord Northbourne

Wednesday 16th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My noble friend picks up a very important point from the report, and it was encouraging to see that now almost one in five maths graduates is choosing to go into teaching. Among the initiatives going on, I highlight one under which eight universities are delivering the two-year master’s-level mathematic specialist teacher programmes, which aim to improve the practice and efficiency of primary maths teaching by upskilling existing teachers who in turn train their colleagues. This year, our funding for that programme alone amounts to £2 million.

[Lord Northbourne]

My Lords, I wish to ask the noble Baroness whether the Government have a policy on helping young people in secondary schools to learn about and to acquire what used to be called the soft skills. By those, I mean interpersonal skills, including relationships skills, self-confidence, leadership, teamwork, communication skills and many others, all of which are very important both in the workplace and in raising a family.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

Indeed, it is vital that young people come out of school with the soft skills which the noble Lord has highlighted. As far as parenting skills and others are concerned, there are of course different programmes, including the PSHE programme which so many schools are following. How schools address these matters specifically is for each school to determine locally.

Media Oversight: Transfer of Responsibilities

Debate between Baroness Garden of Frognal and Lord Northbourne

Thursday 5th July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, the noble Lord has of course a great deal of experience and expertise in these fields, which is why I come back to the answer that I gave to the noble Lord, Lord Whitty: that it makes a lot of sense to deal with all these issues within one department, which is called the department for media and where expertise from officials resides. That is more likely to be helpful to all the creative industries.

[Lord Northbourne]

My Lords, can the Minister give us any encouragement to believe that an element of social responsibility will be part of the work of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport in being responsible for the media?

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

I would sincerely hope so, my Lords. Social responsibility is written into all government policies across all departments, and DCMS is certainly involved in that.

Education Bill

Debate between Baroness Garden of Frognal and Lord Northbourne

Wednesday 26th October 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

I will certainly write to my noble friend.

[Lord Northbourne]

My Lords, if you were setting up a business to manufacture and sell bicycles and you were going to subcontract the construction of the wheels and maybe the bell to another provider, would you not inspect the wheels and the bell when they came in? Would you rely entirely on the provider to give you the inspection that you need to ensure the quality of the pieces that you were bringing in and putting together and on which your life’s work would depend?

The Minister has kindly given us a great deal of detail about what the EYFS does and all the inspections that take place, and it is very exciting that that is happening, but I am looking at it from the point of view of the school in this particular case. I think that the school needs to have an independent assessment to ensure that the input into the school is up to standard; and if it is not, then extra funding perhaps needs to be provided to enable the school to give special support, rather than having to take money away from its educational work in order to have to pay for restorative work to bring children up to speed.

I will read the reply carefully, but I am sorry to say that I do not honestly think that the Minister has covered the point that I tried to address. That may be my fault for not addressing it sufficiently clearly. Under the circumstances, I certainly do not intend to take the matter any further and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.