Schools: Local Oversight

Baroness Sharples Excerpts

Monday 28th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

The Secretary of State, to put it simply, has always been responsible for schools in this country. I cannot put it better than this:

“If a school is not delivering sound education for its pupils, and a different way of running the school would yield a different and better result, it is our duty to institute the change”.

I could not have put it as well—and not surprisingly, as that was a former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, speaking last week. We believe that the regional schools commissioners are the right structure. As for cost, this Government inherited a department from the previous Government that had no concept of value for money. We have halved the cost of running it in real terms. I will write to the noble Lord if he would like the figures. However, the actual cost of running the regional schools commissioners will be something like £5 million, compared with the huge expense of the bureaucratic system that the party opposite proposed to put in place.

[Baroness Sharples (Con)]

Can my noble friend say how many of these schools have children arriving at them for whom English is their second language?

[Lord Nash]

The proportion of pupils in schools with English as a second language has risen substantially. I will write to the noble Baroness with details on the different types of schools.