Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Debate between Earl of Effingham and Lord Lucas

Tuesday 2nd September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, it is my intention not to speak to the amendments in this group but to await what the Minister will say about them in order to shorten the debate.

In view of the conversation before we had Questions, I want to reconfirm to noble Lords that, according to paragraph 4.31 of the Companion:

“When the House is in committee there is no restriction on the number of times a member may speak”.


Therefore, a Member may speak after the Minister, and the Minister may speak during the mover of the group’s response to the Minister. The back and forwards may involve as many sessions of conversation and ministerial intervention as possible; it is completely unnecessary to use the phrase “before the Minister sits down” in Committee. Committee is a free-for-all and a conversation. It is an opportunity to focus on the real issues of the group and to have the time to talk them out and get to the nub of them, even if that takes a certain amount of backwards and forwards.

The great advantage of this is that noble Lords do not need to speak until they are sure that the point they want to talk about has not been covered already by other people and satisfactorily answered by the Minister. They can wait to see who speaks and what the Minister says, and only then, if they feel that what they wanted to say has not been said, need they say anything. It is a great technique for focusing debate and shortening groups, which is something which I hope the Government will find helpful. On this group, I beg to move Amendment 255 and look forward to the Minister’s response.

[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

My Lords, I shall speak to this group of amendments on the children not in school register, which seek to probe issues surrounding privacy. The children not in school consultation aimed to collate thoughts and views around local authority registers of children not attending school to ensure that all children receive a positive and beneficial education regardless of where that education might be taking place. There were close to 5,000 responses, predominantly from parents, but also from both local authorities and charities, and the findings will help to weave a gold standard of policy and guidance, which I am sure all noble Lords wish to be entirely fit for purpose.

On these specific amendments, it is of course acknowledged that the priority should be to find the right balance between privacy on the one hand and the safety of children who are not well looked after on the other. I am most grateful to my noble friend Lady Barran, who has already set out so well His Majesty’s loyal Opposition’s view on these issues in the previous groups, so I will not detain your Lordships’ House by repeating those same arguments.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Storey, on that. I think it is an excellent amendment. To have the certainty of that review would be a great comfort. Home education legislation appears so rarely that it might be 10 years before some malfunctioning system was put right. To make it appear after two years would be a great comfort.

[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

My Lords, as we have heard, Amendments 274, 276 and 425 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Wei, seek to introduce different iterations of sunset clauses for the use of children not in school registers. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Wei, when he reads Hansard, will understand it would be relatively challenging for His Majesty’s loyal Opposition to support such an approach, as our long-standing policy has been to introduce these registers.

We do, however, see merit in Amendment 331 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Storey, which seeks a review of reporting requirements and the impact on home educators. It is vital that we achieve workable and realistic reporting requirements as this Bill passes through your Lordships’ House in line with Amendment 260 in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, and the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, debated earlier, which we very much hope will be accepted by His Majesty’s Government and which aims to avoid adding additional information requirements for the children not in school register. We look forward to the feedback from the Minister.