Education Bill

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Wall of New Barnet

Wednesday 13th July 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Wall of New Barnet]

My Lords, I will speak to the debate on whether this clause should stand part of the Bill on behalf of my noble friend Lord Knight, who regrettably has been detained outside London. He sends his apologies. I shall be brief. First, I shall explain the background of diplomas from the point of view of my personal experience with the engineering diploma. No one would dispute that it has been exceedingly successful. The drive for diplomas came from employers who, certainly in the engineering industry, were keen to have the option that the diploma provided. When we talked about careers advice earlier, we touched on the fact that teachers tend to steer pupils down the academic rather than the vocational route. The diploma provided an answer to that because it offered the option to go either way and cross over at various different stages.

My question is this: why do the Government feel the need to repeal the entitlement to these diplomas? It would be disingenuous not to say that, so far as the engineering diploma was concerned, we ran into some issues around what it might mean for other areas of the curriculum, in particular for A-levels. However, employer demand overall—I think it is the right word to use—was very encouraging, and certainly the sector skills councils, which were heavily involved in the diplomas, approached them with great enthusiasm. Why are they being withdrawn when they were proving to be hugely beneficial and provided one of the answers to the many questions raised in the debate on the provisions of Clause 27?

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

I rise briefly to support my noble friend. We have heard a lot from the Minister and his noble friend about burdens and requirements on schools, but as I am sure he knows, the entitlement was not designed so that every school had to provide the whole range of diplomas. Within an area, however, a young individual was able to access all of them. I am looking at this from the other end of the kaleidoscope, if you like; it was not a burden on schools but an entitlement for a young person. They could study for a diploma somewhere accessible in their local area. Therefore I agree with my noble friend that it seems perverse and unnecessary of the Government to repeal this entitlement. If there is a genuine urge to achieve parity of esteem between vocational courses and academic subjects, it is hard to understand why this clause has been included in the Bill in the light of everyone’s desire to achieve parity.