Education, Skills and Training

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Jess Phillips

Wednesday 25th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I am delighted and pleased—perhaps he will pass on my congratulations to the school he mentioned on its recent Ofsted report. We want the opportunities that schoolchildren in his constituency have to be available to all children, right the way across the country. That is why the White Paper talks about “achieving excellence” areas.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State have any words for the school my children go to, where class sizes are currently increasing from 30 to 32? The notification I have had this week is that my children are now going to have more children in their classes, and their teachers will be stretched. Would she like to say anything to their school?

[Nicky Morgan]

We have created 600,000 new school places since 2010. The hon. Lady will know—everyone does—that the most important thing is to have the best quality teachers in the classroom in front of pupils, inspiring that next generation.

I will turn to the remarks made by Members on all sides of the House. The Chairman of the Education Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Neil Carmichael), welcomed the care leavers covenant. He discussed illegal and unregistered schools. Sadly, that situation has been going on for far too long. We now have a new Ofsted team leading investigations and preparing cases for prosecution, but more needs to be done, which is why we have talked about regulating out-of-school settings. We will come back to Members with proposals on that after the consultation. I will return to his comments about the consultation on the education for all Bill later in my remarks.

My hon. Friend the Member for Poole (Mr Syms) set out his track record on referendum votes. That has not been too successful, but we can all agree that, whatever we think about the current referendum debate, this Government have delivered on giving the British people an in/out vote on our EU membership on 23 June. He was the first person to talk about support for the new national funding formula. I am grateful to him and other hon. Members who mentioned that.

In a very personal speech, my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith) spoke about her experiences, saying that what matters is not where you come from but where you are going to. That is absolutely right, and a view we would all subscribe to. She supports the national funding formula. The Chair of the Science and Technology Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Nicola Blackwood), talked about the Chancellor’s recognising the importance of funding science even in a time of austerity.

My hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse)—I cannot see whether he is in his place—called the Queen’s Speech a Milk Tray of hard and soft centres, and a smorgasbord of delights. He certainly has a way with words. My hon. Friend the Member for Chippenham (Michelle Donelan), who talked about her support for the national funding formula, kindly invited me to make a visit on 5 July. I will have to look at my diary, but I very much enjoyed my last visit to Chippenham schools with her last year. She also talked about the links between schools and businesses, and we are of course backing the Careers and Enterprise Company, which offers exactly those sorts of opportunity.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Amanda Milling) talked about her support for the National Citizen Service. I am sure that, like many others, she will welcome the Bill in the Queen’s Speech to put the NCS on a statutory footing. We are also going to make sure that it can be promoted in schools, to make sure young people get the opportunities she talked about. My hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies) talked about the Wales Bill. I have to say that I have not been involved in its drafting or the debates about it, but I am sure that his remarks will have been heeded.

My hon. Friend the Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow) talked about the Higher Education and Research Bill, welcoming the establishment of new universities, which she hopes will particularly benefit her part of the country. She offered her support for the national funding formula. She also admitted that we have invented some new words in the past few weeks. For the benefit of the Minister for Schools, we have invented the verb “to academise”, along with the noun “academisation”. I look forward to those words being added to the next edition of the dictionary.

My hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes) talked about early years provision. I encourage her and interested people in her constituency to take part in the early years national funding formula consultation when it is published shortly.

My hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Seema Kennedy) talked about the better markets Bill and the problems in her own constituency. She may be interested to know that the Government today published a call for evidence seeking to establish whether there are any problems with the provision of advice, advocacy and dispute resolution in the regulated sectors, including water, to help us develop that better markets Bill.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill) also welcomed the national funding formula. She mentioned, as did other hon. Members, her concerns about young people’s mental health. She is absolutely right to identify that issue. The Department has done a lot of work on that. The Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Mr Gyimah), who has responsibility for childcare, has worked on peer support schemes, on counselling in schools and on school pilot projects on child and adolescent mental health services, but we know we can go further.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Jess Phillips

Monday 30th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

Following last week’s devastating report from the Children’s Commissioner about 450,000 children being sexually abused in the past two years, does the Secretary of State still disagree with me and, now, with the Children’s Commissioner that healthy relationships education should be compulsory in all of our schools?

[Nicky Morgan]

I do not disagree with the hon. Lady that such education should be compulsory, but I think it should be age-appropriate. Just because something is in statute, which is what I think she is referring to, does not mean that it is always taught well. On these issues, I would rather see that there is a good curriculum, and that it is taught well by confident teachers or people coming in from outside who will inspire young people.

Childcare Bill [Lords]

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Jess Phillips

Wednesday 25th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

The money for childcare providers is paid to local authorities as part of something called the dedicated school grant, and it is obviously paid for the provision of childcare. This goes back to the point I have just made about transparency. We need to know exactly how much of it is being spent and how much is reaching the frontline. In this case we are talking about childcare providers, but this also applies to the other money that local authorities receive for their education budgets.

Let me turn to the funding review clause, which was added to the Bill in the other place. Now that we have carried out a substantial funding review and acted on its findings, we want to get on with implementing free entitlement. However, the first clause in the Bill, which aims to establish an independent funding review before the Bill comes into force, will put early implementation at risk. Despite claiming to be on the side of working parents, Labour peers were willing deliberately to delay these important measures by asking for a further funding review.

I appreciate that the hon. Member for Manchester Central and other Opposition Members might be feeling a little embarrassed as the Chancellor has comprehensively debunked all their scaremongering and doom-mongering of recent weeks about education funding. She now has the opportunity to redeem herself by backing the Bill and helping us to overturn the amendments that seek to delay the implementation of the extended entitlement. If she does not, then I do not think working parents will look kindly on her attempts to delay their access to more free childcare.

The Government deliver on their promises, so the Bill intentionally places the duty to secure 30 hours of free childcare on the Secretary of State. Local authorities are very successful in delivering the first 15 hours of free early education for all three and four-year-olds, with a take-up rate of 96%. The Bill places the duty to secure free childcare on the Secretary of State, but I will discharge it through English local authorities, which are best placed to ensure that working parents are able to access their free entitlement.

The Government are committed to working with local authorities as we develop the delivery of the programme now, through the early implementer stage from September 2016, and beyond that into full roll-out of the system from September 2017. We have been working closely with the Local Government Association and I would like to thank it for the work it has done with us and for its co-operation. About 1,800 local authorities and providers have already come forward to register their interest in taking part in the early implementer pilots. There are huge opportunities through the early implementers to test capacity, flexibility and innovation, and to make sure that all eligible children, including those with special educational needs, are able to access the 30 hours offer.

As part of early implementation, we particularly want to encourage innovative approaches to providing flexible childcare for working parents whose children are disabled. I am clear that early years providers should be able to meet the needs of all children in their care. In the previous Parliament, the Children and Families Act 2014 delivered the most significant reforms to the special educational needs and disability system for 30 years, putting early identification and integration at its heart. We are committed to continuing to make a real difference for families through inclusive early years provision.

We also want to encourage providers to offer the free hours at the times of day that will help working parents with their busy lives and offer flexibility to those working outside of nine-to-five. That means delivering flexible, full-day childcare, which is the type that parents often need. The Government recognise that the need for childcare does not end when a child starts school. That is why we are also going to give more working parents something the best schools already do. We will give parents of school-aged children the right to request childcare in the form of breakfast and after-school clubs or holiday care at their child’s school.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

I welcome the news about before and after-school clubs. Will the Secretary of State guarantee that parents will be able to access those places? I recently lost all breakfast facilities for both my children and was offered only one morning a week on two separate mornings for each of my children, which is absolutely no use to me. Will she guarantee that parents like me will be able to get that?

School Expansion

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Jess Phillips

Monday 19th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

My right hon. Friend is right. Alongside Sevenoaks is Knole Academy, which also offers an excellent education. It is a novel idea that the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) and I might make a joint visit to Kent, but I am always up for novel ideas, so perhaps I will pursue it further.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State explain to me exactly what special educational needs provision there will be at the new annexe, and exactly how it will cater for children living in the area who have such needs? Will she perhaps take a piece of advice from my son, who has Asperger’s and who is currently experiencing the transition to secondary school? We live right next to a grammar school—the one that I went to, incidentally. [Interruption.] It is not my fault, is it? My parents made many mistakes, and I was definitely one of them. [Laughter.]

I should like the Secretary of State to listen to the words of my son. When I asked him which school he wanted to go to, I also asked him if he wished to take the 11-plus. Because he has Asperger’s and takes things very literally, he said to me, “Mummy, a child should pick a school, rather than a school picking a child.”

[Nicky Morgan]

This is turning into a rather confessional hour, which I had not quite expected.

Our SEN reforms are very much about working with families, the social care system, the health system and schools to ensure that pupils go to the schools that are right for them. I understand from the answers to my questions that the school will operate the same SEN provision on both sites, but I am happy to look into that further. [Interruption.] I do not think that the shadow Education Secretary should cast aspersions and slurs, and suggest that because this is a grammar school, it will not care about less advantaged pupils. That would be wrong of her, and would cut across the very good question put by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips).

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Jess Phillips

Monday 15th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

T5. I have worked with lots of children who have suffered domestic violence, rape, grooming and exploitation, and I have seen the damage it does to their lives. When will the Government respond to the Education Committee’s fifth report from the last Session and the recommendation that the Department for Education should “develop a workplan for introducing age-appropriate…SRE—sex and relationships education—as statutory subjects in primary and secondary schools”?

[Nicky Morgan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question and welcome her to the House. I take great personal interest in that issue. We have until 26 June to respond to the report and we intend to do so by then.