Education (Guidance about Costs of School Uniforms) Bill

Debate between Baroness Wheatcroft and Lord Moynihan

Friday 16th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Wheatcroft (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I applaud this Bill and wish it a speedy passage through the House. Hence, although I see some merit in the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, I hope he will withdraw it, because we cannot afford to slow the progress of the Bill. I simply cannot agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Flight, just said. I do not think that this is over-prescriptive; indeed, I fear that I do not find the guidance prescriptive enough, although I am grateful to the Minister that she has made it available to us in advance of today’s debate.

Quite simply, the issue is that, at the moment, school uniform is too expensive for many families to afford, and in most cases it could be cheaper. I absolutely applaud the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, about children being excluded because they do not have appropriate uniform, when very often—although not always—it may well be family circumstances rather than their own strong will which means that this is the case.

I was much struck by an email I received from a mother with two children, both at state schools. She told me that if they have a games lesson now, her son has to wear tracksuit trousers in order to travel to school, because changing is no longer permitted at the school. The tracksuit trousers are specified and cost £54. She says that they are poor quality; we all know that tracksuit trousers can be obtained for a great deal less. In total, her son’s uniform for games costs £345, and that is before the cost of a mouthguard, hockey stick, tennis racket and games bag is taken into account. Her daughter’s is slightly cheaper. The games uniform is £311 but, again, that is before equipment is taken into account. These are huge sums for families to be confronted with, and they effectively rule children out from taking part in many cases. Indeed, my correspondent points out that many children claim to have forgotten their games equipment when they actually did not have it in the first place.

This Bill is necessary, and its sentiments are correct. It has been a long time awaited; the Government committed to making guidance statutory in 2015. But this is only guidance, and the guidance suggests that there should be sole suppliers only after a competitive tender. I do not think that there should be sole suppliers for anything but the barest of items—perhaps a tie and a sew-on badge. When we applaud competition in other sectors, it seems crazy that we should allow schools to continue with a process which definitely disadvantages some because the obligatory school uniform is unnecessarily expensive. So I was disappointed to see that the guidance does not say that sole suppliers should be phased out for all but a tie and a sew-on badge at the most.

With that exception, I believe that the Bill is required, and I wish it a speedy process through the House.

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Blencathra. I do so as a former member of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, which he chairs so ably.

I remain a firm supporter of the vision and commitment of all those who have worked to ensure that this legislation reaches the statute book before the end of this Session. Indeed, I would go further and call on the Government to hear the strong case made by many children’s organisations that there should be a Cabinet-level Minister for Children to oversee a children’s charter and introduce government legislation where appropriate, not least in support of the need for enhanced welfare measures to support children. Should that have been in place already, this Bill is an example of a legislative change that could have been better introduced by government.

As a result, my comments in support of my noble friend’s amendment are made more for the record than out of any desire to impede the important progress of this legislation, since this important Bill is better than no Bill. Should this amendment be pushed to a Division, thereby impeding the chances of the Bill reaching the statute book, I would not support it. Under no circumstances, I might add, do I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, is correct in his assessment that this is in any way a blocking amendment. It is certainly not. For my noble friend Lord Blencathra is right—I hope that the noble Lord agrees—that this House has a duty to consider the balance of powers between the legislature and the Executive. Far too frequently, as has been pointed out, we allow the Executive to take powers and resist parliamentary scrutiny. This is a textbook case.

Full front and central to this Bill is statutory guidance. Personally, I would urge the Government to include keeping branded items to a minimum, provide more parental choice, use enhanced online exchanges for second-hand uniform and address the monopolistic practices of certain single supplier agreements that impact cost-competitiveness; my noble friend Lady Wheatcroft just gave a good example of that. I would also urge the Government to provide financial support for struggling parents, as the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, emphasised.

However, even if all these laudable claims were included in the guidance, there is no strict legislative requirement on anyone to comply with it. The requirement “to have regard to”, as set out in paragraph 13 of the Explanatory Notes, does not impose any course of action on schools or appropriate authorities. No one has a legal requirement to comply with the guidance—just to “have regard” to it. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, said, the Delegated Powers Committee made it clear:

“If an entire Bill can be dedicated to the cost aspects of school uniforms, the resulting guidance should be subject to a parliamentary procedure.”


That must be correct.

So we are giving the Government maximum discretion. Although I have absolute faith in my noble friend the Minister and her colleagues—I am very grateful to her, as I know the whole House is, for all the hard work that she has put into this issue—unfortunately, she cannot guarantee that a future Government would not ignore the calls made by, for example, the Children’s Society and issue revised guidance without ever coming back to this House. That would be the legal position under this Bill and would negate the objectives that so many of us have in support of it, as we set out at Second Reading.

This House does not legislate for good will. We seek statutory responsibilities and accountability because we want to ensure that what is important always has to be tested and assessed by, and made accountable to, Parliament. That is why, even if he does not press this amendment to a vote, my noble friend Lord Blencathra is right.