Baroness Walmsley
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Baroness Walmsley
“( ) to comply with the law on pupil exclusions and behaviour partnerships as set out in EA 2002, EIA 2006 and ASCLA 2009”
Baroness Walmsley
My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendments 48 and 50 in my name. Amendment 6 asks for academies to comply with the law as laid down in the Education Act 2002, the Education and Inspections Act 2006 and the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009. I know that it sounds a bit silly to ask schools to comply with the law, but there is a reason for tabling this amendment. The current law on exclusions and behaviour partnerships is found in these three Acts. Some related legislation is to be found elsewhere: attendance and short-stay schools in the Education Act 1996, parenting orders in the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003, et cetera.
Of late, academies have been included in legislation as it applies to maintained schools. My intention in tabling the amendments is to ask the Minister to make a clear statement about what does and does not apply to academies, and what will be included in the model funding agreement. I regret that I have not had time to scrutinise all of the 41 pages of the document sent to me yesterday just before our sitting.
Amendments 48 and 50 seek to include the new academies in the two areas of the law relating to exclusions and behaviour which do not currently include academies. Amendment 48 seeks to amend Section 52 of the Education Act 2002 and would include academies in the law on pupil exclusions. Section 52 enables a head teacher to exclude a pupil on disciplinary grounds for a fixed term or permanently. However, the majority of the section is taken up with providing for arrangements to appeal against exclusions.
The model funding agreement sent to us yesterday contains in annexe D a clear statement that parental appeals against exclusion from an academy are not to be treated in the same way as appeals against maintained school exclusions. This runs counter to my Amendment 48, which was tabled before I had seen the model funding agreement. For an academy, annexe D states:
“Any appeal panel will be impartial, constituted in accordance with the Secretary of State’s guidance and any decision of such a panel will be binding on the academy trust”.
The Secretary of State’s guidance has not yet been published so we do not know whether or not it is acceptable. The published guidance, School Discipline and Pupil-behaviour Policies: Guidance for Schools, dated April 2010, is clear: it states that it does not apply to academies.
There are issues of equality and human rights compliance here. Removing a place at a school is clearly a human rights issue as a person,
“shall not be denied education”.
If academy appeal rights are just about following guidance—or not, as the case may be—how does the state know whether an academy’s appeal arrangements are Human Rights Act-compliant? Who will check up on it?
The footnote states that parents can seek a judicial review of both the procedure and the outcome of any appeal arrangement. However, judicial review is not a parent-friendly form of redress. Most parents would run a mile from it, even if they understood what it meant; I probably would myself. At least a maintained school has access to the local government ombudsman on grounds of maladministration, although not necessarily on all aspects of the appeal, but the parents of a child at an academy will not have that. We need the issue clarified.
Amendment 50 seeks to add academies to the Education and Inspections Act 2006, and requires the governing bodies of academies to have a disciplinary policy and the head teacher to have a behaviour policy. All these matters arise from Sir Alan Steer’s review of behaviour and discipline and have been generally welcomed by schools.
On 28 June this year, in Hansard at col. 1573, the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, referred to the provision in the ASCL Act 2009 when she was trying to make excuses for the high number of exclusions from the original academies under Labour. I do not agree with her that we need to accept that academies, by definition, will have a greater number of exclusions than other schools. I know many schools in difficult circumstances that have difficult pupils, but they see it as their duty to deal with these problems within the school. It is a matter of good leadership and marshalling all the resources to hand, including the voluntary sector on occasions.
However, the noble Baroness reminded us that all schools, including academies, will have to work in partnership on behaviour and attendance from 1 September this year unless the law is changed. There is a statutory requirement to this effect in Section 248 of the ASCL Act 2009 which is due to commence on that date. The section requires co-operation by all secondary schools, including academies, to promote good behaviour and discipline on the part of pupils, reduce persistent absence and report to the local children’s trust board once every 12-month period. We welcomed that move by the Labour Government when the legislation came through the House.
My amendments ask the Minister whether there is any intention to change the law to exclude academies from these measures and which of the current laws—in particular, the appeal arrangements in Section 52 of the Education Act 2002—will apply. I ask also about the rumour that legislation or guidance will be introduced to allow schools to exclude a child without the usual minimum of 24 hours’ notice to the parents. I am not sure where this came from, but it would be impossible for a working single parent to respond to this. In the interests of the safety of the child and the sanity of the single parent, for whom life is hard enough, I hope that my noble friend will be able to dispel this rumour. I beg to move.
Lord Hill of Oareford
I believe that I apologised yesterday to the noble Lord for the lack of notice and do so again. I think I am right in saying that those letters were circulated at an earlier date, but if I am wrong I will put that right.
Regarding the placement of challenging pupils, including those who have been excluded, which I know is a matter of concern across the House, academies are required through their funding agreements to participate in in-year fair access protocols, which ensure that all schools in a local area take their fair share of hard-to-place pupils, including those who have previously been excluded. Academies are equal partners in those arrangements. The requirements envisaged by Amendment 48 in relation to the decision-making process surrounding an exclusion are already part of academy funding agreements and the departmental guidance is very clear about who can exclude a pupil, and in what circumstances the decision to exclude needs to be reviewed by the governing body.
Amendment 50 would require academies to follow the law and guidance on developing and implementing their behaviour policies. Academies are independent schools and are therefore covered by the Education (Independent School Standards) (England) Regulations 2003. These state that an academy must have in place, and must implement effectively, a policy on promoting good behaviour that outlines what sanctions will be taken in the event of any misbehaviour.
As for the specific questions raised by my noble friend Lady Walmsley, we accept that academies are obliged to follow the Human Rights Act and, if they were not following it, we would expect the YPLA as the academies’ monitoring body to identify that. As for exclusions, academies are treated in the same way; the main difference from maintained schools is that the academy trust, rather than the local authority, is the body responsible for setting up an appeal.
The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, did not speak to the amendments on teacher quality, and there was an amendment that was to have been spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty. I confirm for the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, the point that I made earlier, on which, fortunately, I was right. The annexes on exclusions were circulated on the second day of Committee, on 23 June; I should be happy to dig them out and circulate them again.
I hope that that provides some assurance on exclusions on the overall points. My noble friend Lady Walmsley made some specific points; if I have not responded to them, I shall follow them up with her separately outside the House or in writing. On a general point, which links to some of the discussion that we had yesterday, I hope that the suggestion that there should be an annual report to Parliament on the whole of academies policy will provide some further reassurance to noble Lords that these important issues relating to the development of policy will be kept firmly under review. I hope that that picks up on some of the points made by my noble friend Lady Walmsley. I ask her in light of that to withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Walmsley
My Lords, I am most grateful to my noble friend for his reply and to the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, for his support. I am very much reassured by his very clear statement that academies will have to comply with the law and with guidance as it is already laid down and that the annexe to which he referred will be included in the funding agreement. I got a copy of the annexe somewhat earlier than I got a copy of the whole funding agreement model, which I received only yesterday; that was why I was able to quote from it. I have not yet carefully scrutinised the rest of the funding agreement.
I am grateful to the Minister for stating again that academies will have to comply with the Human Rights Act. I am sure that not only the YPLA will be watching to make quite sure that they do so. If they follow the legal requirements introduced by the previous Government and the guidance that still stands, there should not be problems about exclusions. I am also comforted by the fact that we will have the opportunity every year to see whether the figures for exclusions in academies of both kinds—both the ones from failing schools and those from outstanding schools—have risen at all. If there are any discrepancies that we feel are inappropriate, we will have the opportunity in Parliament to have a look at that. I know that my noble friend was not prepared for my comment on the 24 hours’ notice, so I look forward to his letter about that issue. I am very much reassured by many aspects of his reply and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Walmsley
My Lords, I have Amendments 32 and 32B in this very mixed group of amendments about selection, religion and admissions. The Minister has been very clear about the duty of academies to comply with the admissions code so, as with the previous group of amendments, I accept that it does not need to be in the Bill. I presume that it will be in the funding agreement.
Amendment 32 was laid after our discussion in Committee about selection. While I accept in general my noble friend’s assurance that,
“The Bill does not allow for any increase in selection by ability in the state-funded sector”—[Official Report, 28/6/10; col. 1563],
it occurred to me that if a selective school became an academy and then expanded the number on its roll, that would mean more actual children in the area being selected by ability. So I laid this amendment to say that such expansion should not increase the number of children in the relevant area who are selected by ability. However, I accept that this duty would be difficult for an individual school to achieve, especially when I went back and read what the Minister reminded us about the ability of selective maintained schools that are not academies to expand by 25 per cent within the normal admissions consultation. In the light of that, I think that what I am asking for in my amendment would be pretty well impossible. Therefore, I am using the amendment to ask my noble friend who would have the responsibility of watching out for a large expansion of selection by ability among schools both inside and outside the control of a local authority when a lot of new academies are created, given that some of them will be former selective schools that are opting out.
Amendment 32B was originally laid in Committee as Amendment 135. I do not believe that the Minister addressed the matter in his reply, but I forgive him because, as he does today, he had several topics to deal with in the grouping. I believe that these ridiculous groupings have arisen because of the minimal time that we have had between Committee and Report; noble Lords have not had enough time to scrutinise the draft groupings and to make some sense out of them. Amendment 32B would require the governing body of a school with a religious character, if it converts to an academy, to use the fresh start as an opportunity to look at its religious character and to decide whether it wishes to change it. Since the school was first set up, there may have been a big change in the demographics and cultural mix of the catchment area. That may lead a governing body to consider whether it wishes to join together with another faith, or more than one, or to make a larger percentage of its intake inclusive of people of other faiths or none. It would not prevent those governors from making no change at all, but it would give them an opportunity specifically to consider their duty to promote community cohesion and to make a change. It would not interfere with their discretion to make their own decision in any way; it is not prescriptive at all. I commend it to the Minister.
Lord Lucas
My Lords, in this group I have Amendment 10A, which follows on from the discussion in Committee about the effects of Clause 1(6)(d). My noble friend Lord Hill said that paragraph (d) would not prevent an academy from reaching out to areas that were not in its immediate vicinity in order to broaden its intake. It would not prevent a grammar school that became an academy from maintaining its current and typically wide catchment area. Also, to take it even further, it would not prevent an academy from being or becoming a boarding school. I asked my noble friend what, under those circumstances, the paragraph would prevent that the Government wish to prevent. He has not replied, so I presume that there is nothing and that therefore the paragraph has no function. That is my reason for returning to the matter on Report.
On the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, the crucial bit of the model academy funding agreement appears to me to be clause 12(c). Reading that, I do not see what in the agreement—although, like my noble friend Lady Walmsley, I have not parsed it as carefully as I might—updates the requirement as the general admissions requirements change. It seems to me that an academy that was created tomorrow would be for ever stuck with today’s admissions arrangements, even if we improved them in a year’s time. I do not see what in the model funding agreement rolls the requirements forward. That would also apply to SEN requirements and other matters that are dealt with in clause 12. I would be grateful if my noble friend could give me some comfort about what keeps academies current.
Baroness Walmsley
My Lords, I heartily agree with the vast majority of what has just been said by the noble Baronesses. The House knows my view that good quality teaching in PSHE should be the right of all children under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The knowledge and skills covered by the phrase, "Personal, Social, Health and Economic Education", cover all the important things that prepare children for life beyond and within the school, whether they are future rocket scientists or future waste disposal operatives. They are all human beings and deserve our help and support to lead a happy and fulfilled life. That is what PSHE does. It goes far wider than just sex and relationship education, important though that is.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, has mentioned, evidence has shown that schools which do PSHE well also benefit from improved behaviour and learning in other subjects. They are happier schools containing happier, safer and more confident children, which is what I want to see. My ambition within this coalition is to use my passion about this matter and the new influence that I hope I have among both my noble friends and my honourable friends to bring about a step change in the quality and quantity of this sort of learning for all children in all schools.
I am already working with the PSHE Association and others to produce a brief which I will submit to Ministers for the forthcoming curriculum review. It will go far beyond this amendment in two ways. First, it will cover all schools and not just academies. Secondly, it will contain many of the best elements, which, by the way, found support from all around the House, of the original version of Clauses 11 to 13 in the Children, Schools and Families Bill, which were so altered immediately prior to the general election.
That measure, which was deleted from the Bill, listed the areas of learning to be covered but, very importantly, also listed a set of principles that should underpin the teaching. These were, first, that the information taught should be accurate and balanced; secondly, that it should be taught in a way that is appropriate to the age of the pupils concerned and their religious and cultural background and reflect a reasonable range of religious, cultural and other perspectives; and thirdly, PSHE should be taught in a way that promotes equality, encourages acceptance of diversity and emphasises the importance of rights and responsibilities.
In complying with these principles, the school would by definition have to work closely with parents and communities, which is right and proper. These principles are fundamental to delivering the rights that I believe all children have and I know that the noble Baronesses, Lady Massey and Lady Gould, agree with me about that. I congratulate the former Labour Government on putting together something that is so right. I give credit also to those who have worked so hard outside this House, some since the 1960s, to obtain these rights for all children. I am a mere newcomer to this campaign.
However, if we have come so far, we need to get this matter right and I very much regret that I find the simple amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, wanting in all respects about the principles that I have just listed. I realise why she has made it so simple, but this is not a simple matter. I believe that the earlier approach of the former Labour Government, following extensive consultation, was better. That is what I will seek from within the coalition to achieve for all children and that is why I cannot support this amendment, although I support the aim of the noble Baroness, Lady Massey.
I would ask her not to press this amendment, but to work with me to influence the coalition Government in their curriculum review. We would not be starting from scratch. We already have a very good model, but, in a matter as sensitive as this, we must take all parts of the community with us. This would give us an opportunity to do that.
Baroness Perry of Southwark
My Lords, I follow my noble friend Lady Walmsley with great warmth. What she has said is very dear to my heart and I agree with everything. There are very strong feelings about the content of any part of the curriculum. After all, the curriculum is the heritage of knowledge and skills that we pass on to each generation. Everyone has their own strong feelings about what that should be. PSHE arouses particularly strong feelings because it deals with so many of the very sensitive areas of our personal and social lives.
As has been abundantly clear in what my noble friend and the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, have said, PSHE is already widely established in our education system. It is taught in virtually every school and there is already a large cadre of several thousand teachers who have registered themselves as qualified to teach the subject. I commend the enormously good work being done by so many of those teachers in dealing with what are difficult issues, often with difficult pupils at often difficult stages of their lives. They make a huge success of this teaching.
I have two real objections to trying to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, in making this a single curriculum requirement for academies. First, in recent years I have met many teachers dealing with PSHE in, as I have said, difficult classes. They fit what they teach across the areas and how they teach it—whether it be drugs, health, obesity, sex or personal relationships, ethical or civic issues and so on—to the particular class in their particular school with its own particular mix of young people. Schools vary enormously. Some have sophisticated children and others have children who are unsophisticated. Some have children who, by the age of 11, 12 or 13, have alas already engaged in the kind of personal relationships we would rather they were not engaged in, including sexual relationships. The teacher’s skill lies in fitting what they say and how they deal with these issues to their particular class. In my view, that is where PSHE should remain—with the school and the individual teacher deciding what and how it should be taught.
The second reason why I am astonished the noble Baroness has put her amendment in this way is because this would be the only required part of the curriculum and it would only apply to the academies. If this amendment were agreed, PSHE would be a curriculum requirement for academies but not for other schools, and it would be the only part of the academies curriculum that would be a requirement. To me, that is bizarre. People in this House and certainly, I am sure, in the wider world outside would argue just as strongly for other bits of the curriculum to be made mandatory. Surely an important aspect of academies is that they will be free of a national curriculum and able to tailor what they teach and how they teach it within a broad and balanced framework for their particular pupils.
I would ask the noble Baroness not to press her amendment, and if she does, I would ask the House not to support her.
Baroness Massey of Darwen
My Lords, this has been a fascinating and enlightening debate. I think that we are all actually on the same side; we just have different ways of approaching the issue.
I am aware of the curriculum review, but I have been aware of curriculum reviews on this subject for the past 10 years. We have gone over this ground, and in doing so I am also aware of the needs of children who may well be suffering because they do not have this education in their curriculum. Young people tell us what they need, and they certainly tell us that they need personal, social and health education.
I shall respond briefly to points that have been made. I put this amendment in here because the Bill is here, and because I shall continue to put it in any Bill that I can to try to get personal, social and health education in the curriculum.
It is a simple amendment because it is a complex subject. We have explored all possible areas connected with PSHE, today and previously. The noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, mentioned the five principles put in place by the Labour Government, and they are still there for reference. I was surprised; I just reread the noble Baroness’s speech at wash-up stage, and at that point she wanted no delay, she wanted to get on with it and she was anxious that PSHE should be part of the national curriculum. I support her.
Much work has been done already—
Baroness Walmsley
If the noble Baroness will permit me, I say to her that I still think that, but I have to convince my Government of the case, not just the former Government.
Baroness Massey of Darwen
My Lords, I, too, intend to convince this Government of the case.
I know that much work has been done on this already. I believe that schools are ready to take this on, and it would improve their chances if PSHE were a compulsory subject. I have in my hand 10 reasons why there is no need to delay, written by the Personal, Social and Health Education Association. Noble Lords will be relieved to hear that I am not going to read out the whole document, but one section says that we have had just a year and half since Jim Knight, now the noble Lord, Lord Knight, announced the last government’s intention to make it statutory, “it” being PSHE, and that most schools will have been gearing up for statutory status during that time. It says that PSHE is not a new subject; it has been taught in schools and been allocated curriculum and staffing resources for many years. I think that might respond wisely to something that the noble Baroness, Lady Perry, said.
If we pass the amendment today—I intend to divide the House—it will send a clear message to the Government and to all parties that the welfare of children is at stake here. If a large number of people support this amendment, it will be a key message to the Government that this is an important subject that we do not take lightly. Let us go on from here and incorporate PSHE into all schools, through different Bills. Let us go through a curriculum review, but let us influence that review as best we can by showing today that we think this is an important subject that deserves our attention and our commitment. I wish to divide the House.
Baroness Walmsley
Baroness Walmsley
My Lords, Amendment 10 arises from our debate in Committee about the impact of the new legislation on the early years. The Bill remains ambiguous about the care and education of young children and needs specifically to reference the Childcare Act 2006, which establishes the EYFS framework in law. The purpose of this amendment is to ensure that young children in academies are guaranteed the same balanced, age-appropriate and play-based standard of care and education under the early years foundation stage as children in maintained and independent schools.
In Committee the Minister said:
“I would suggest that the amendment is unnecessary because academies are already required, under the Childcare Act 2006, to provide the early years foundation stage. That is spelled out explicitly in their funding agreement. This stage is more than just a curriculum, as it covers much broader outcomes for very young children, including issues such as social skills”.—[Official Report, 28/6/10; col. 1570.]
The Early Childhood Forum, which has been briefing me on this matter, very much welcomes the Minister’s positive statements about the EYFS. I also welcome Minister of State Sarah Teather’s announcement a few days ago that the early years foundation stage is to be reviewed. I called for this in my speech in Committee, though I do not think her announcement was simply in response to my speech. I am delighted that the Minister stated that it is the Government’s intention that academies should implement the EYFS. However, I am still concerned that the Bill makes no reference at all to the EYFS, and that furthermore the Childcare Act 2006, to which the Minister referred, contains no reference to academies. This seems to leave an ambiguity in the law that could be easily rectified via this amendment.
Academies do not have to follow the national curriculum for primary and secondary schools. The only reference in the Bill to the curriculum is to Section 78 of the Education Act 2002, which has no application to the education of those aged under five, since the Childcare Act 2006 amended the Education Act before it and removed any reference to nursery education. The Childcare Act 2006 establishes the EYFS as the framework for the care and education of children from birth until the 31 August after their fifth birthday, and which all those registered on the early years register and maintained, approved, non-maintained, independent and special schools must deliver. Under the law, all these providers must meet the legal welfare, learning and development requirements as set out in Section 40 of the Childcare Act 2006 and its associated regulations.
Existing academies are not referenced at all in the Childcare Act 2006. This is an understandable omission as, although there are a number of all-through academies providing education for three to 18 year-olds, until now academy status was available only to secondary schools. The Bill extends academies to many more young children and therefore needs to be unambiguous about the approach to be taken to their education and care. It is clearly not the Government’s intention to exempt academies from implementation of the EYFS. The Early Childhood Forum is concerned that academies do not fall into any of the categories of school referenced in the Childcare Act 2006. It has tried to clarify this matter with officials but they have not replied to its phone calls. Perhaps they were in purdah, pending the Minister’s statement the other day about the review of the early years foundation stage. However, it would be helpful to know the Government’s understanding of where academies fit in the framework of that Act. Perhaps this might have been sorted out if officials had responded to the Early Childhood Forum. I may not have needed, in that case, to table this amendment. It would also be helpful to know how many of the current all-through academies provide education for under-fives and whether they all currently implement the early years foundation stage as they should.
There is some confusion about whether the Government consider academies to be independent schools in law. Clause 1 refers to academies as “independent”, but it also sets out that they are to be funded directly by public money through the Secretary of State. The Independent Schools Council membership criteria determine independence through the individual school’s inspection regime, with members having to be inspected by the Independent Schools Inspectorate. However, academies—as far as they are to be inspected at all—will be under Ofsted. Noble Lords can perhaps see the confusion.
The early years foundation stage is based on the best evidence that we have from research and experience of what is most effective in helping children to develop physically, intellectually, emotionally and socially. The amendment would create parity and balance in this new legislation that matches the reference to Section 78 of the Education Act 2002 on the curriculum for those aged over five in Clause 1. I urge the Minister to accept it or to explain very clearly why it is unnecessary. If he accepts that there is a problem in the Bill and its relationship with the Childcare Act, I hope he will not ask us to wait for the pending early years foundation stage review. This would mean that primary academies and the young children in their care would be left in limbo and outside the current main framework until then. If the outcome of the review is a fundamental change, the Childcare Act would need to be amended in any case, and the legislation on academies would be resolved alongside that for all the other types of school. I beg to move.
Baroness Morgan of Drefelin
My Lords, I added my name to this amendment. From listening to the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, I think I have had exactly the same briefing as her. I simply wish to say “ditto”.
I am slightly concerned that in some things we need to rush ahead with, and in others to hang back from, reviews. It is very important for the Early Childhood Forum and the incredibly important organisations that make up the forum to have the kind of reassurances that the noble Baroness is looking for. The early years foundation stage was a very important step forward. The previous Government initiated it, and it has been well received. It is important that we build on the work of the early years specialists. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, when I first joined the House of Lords, we did not receive any briefings on anything. That situation has been transformed in the 15 years I have been here so that now, on a Bill such as this, we are deluged with briefings, which are often extremely useful.
On behalf of the Minister and the department, I apologise for unreturned phone calls. I offer, if it is helpful, a meeting with the Minister and officials to discuss this question further. On the specific issue, I reassure the noble Baroness that all schools providing for under-threes’ education are required under the Childcare Act to register with Ofsted and to deliver the early years foundation stage. This includes independent schools and therefore also includes academies. Section 40 sets out the duty to deliver the early years foundation stage. That is the key element. This already applies to academies in the same way as it does to other schools.
Reference has already been made to the review to be carried out by Dame Clare Tickell, chief executive of Action for Children, which will report to my honourable friend Sarah Teather in spring 2011. The review will be open and will look at the foundations that should be in place to protect young children’s welfare and support their development and learning. It will also consider throughout how to reduce burdens on providers as the experience of the past three years is that the requirements of the early years foundation stage have increased the workload on many of those who work with young children, and so taken time away from children. We do not intend a fundamental change but we do intend to review the way in which the Act works in practice. I hope that that is sufficient assurance. I again apologise if phone calls have not been returned. With those assurances, I hope that my noble friend will feel able to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Walmsley
I thank the Minister for his reply and the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Drefelin, for her support. The noble Lord says that academies will have to deliver the early years foundation stage. However, it does not say that in the Bill. The difficulty has arisen because of uncertainty about the independent status—or not—of academies. According to independent schools, the definition of “independent” is a school that is inspected by the Independent Schools Inspectorate. However, that does not apply to the schools that we are discussing. Nevertheless, the Minister could not have been clearer on that matter. I suspect that the Early Childhood Forum will very much welcome a meeting with officials to set its mind totally at rest. It will probably be satisfied with the clarity of the Minister’s reply, but I think that it will take advantage of the invitation anyway. I wait to hear what it says to me when that meeting has taken place. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.