Education Bill

Debate between Baroness Garden of Frognal and Lord True

Monday 4th July 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, the Grand Committee normally finishes at 7.30 pm. We have gone into overtime on this. If any other Lords wish to speak, could they please be very brief to make quite sure that we are not going too far into overtime? My noble friend Lord Lexden has an amendment in this group, but otherwise might we please have a plea for brevity for the convenience of the Committee?

[Lord True]

My Lords, I note what the noble Baroness said. Briefly, I add to the tributes paid to the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, and others, and the work that they have done. I am slightly surprised that some of my noble friends have supported his amendment. As I read it—and this may be something that the noble Lord wishes to reflect on or help us with when he responds—it slightly has the character of a wrecking amendment, or certainly one leading to a disincentive to take part in a decision on the future of the GTC. The amendment says:

“For such a vote to be valid, 50 per cent of registered teachers must have voted”.

As I read it, the assumption would be that the provision was part of the law of the land. Therefore, in order to frustrate the will of Parliament, as its effect would have been if the Bill had been enacted, those who were unconcerned or perhaps led to boycott the vote could decide the outcome of a ballot such as the noble Lord proposes. Having heard the eloquent statements about the ringing importance of the body in this debate, that is a very negative way of looking at it. I would therefore find it hard to support the amendment under any circumstance. It lacks confidence in the case being put, and is potentially a wrecking amendment in that it sets a threshold that would easily fail to be achieved by dint of a boycott, which is something that we should not wish to encourage.