Academies Bill [HL]

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Monday 28th June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I have no reason to doubt that—and if I discover that it is not the case, I will of course write immediately to the noble Lord.

[The Earl of Listowel]

I interject briefly to seek reassurance on those minimum standards. I am reminded by this debate of a report some time ago about a head teacher of a new academy school that had been built without a playground. The head teacher reportedly said, “We don't need one, we will have them working very hard in school all day, thank you very much”. A paper presented to the British Psychological Society emphasised the value to children of having play breaks in the school day, and looked at how those play breaks had been squeezed over time. It would be reassuring to know that there is something in the minimum standards about a play area for children in every new school. If the Minister would write to me on that, I would appreciate it.

[Baroness Whitaker]

My Lords, I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have joined in at this dreadfully late hour. I particularly value the point about CABE, which is an economical and expert organisation that we hope will continue to be used as it has been. I am grateful, of course, to the Minister for the degree of his understanding, and for his assurances on accommodation for children with disabilities. I was not quite so sure about the firmness of his assurances about design standards for all schools. Perhaps he might write to me with the assurance that the current design standards will be used for academies, or perhaps we could have a brief chat about it. If the outcome is satisfactory, there will be no need to take the matter further; but we do feel strongly that there must be this assurance. I will read Hansard carefully and hope for another letter, or perhaps a conversation. In the mean time, I am happy to withdraw the amendment.

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Moved by

[The Earl of Listowel]

190: After Clause 11, insert the following new Clause—
“Annual reports
The Secretary of State must produce a report every twelve months on the impact of the number of Academies established in the past year on the teaching workforce.”

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I will endeavour to be as brief as possible. This amendment would require the Secretary of State to produce a report every 12 months on the impact of the number of academies established in the past year on the teaching workforce. The purpose of that is twofold: first, to produce some mechanism to monitor the impact of these changes on the workforce; and, secondly, to flag up the concern that inadvertently these changes might lead to the creaming off of the best teachers into the best schools with the best pupils, with the consequence that the poorest pupils in the worst schools would have the least good teachers. I know that that is not the Government’s intention, but it is much better to consider such possibilities now rather than just walking down the road and running into them later.

As regards the reports, will the Minister consider some way of monitoring the impact of academies on the general teaching workforce? Perhaps there is already enough to measure what is happening on the ground. Can he comment on that, or perhaps write to me? I would also be grateful to hear from the Minister what action he can imagine if what I have described were to happen. He has already referred to what can be done—for instance, Teach First is focused on the most vulnerable children in the most difficult areas. I think that City Challenge helps in this area, too. What other mechanisms might be put in place to redress the possibility early on before the rot begins to set in?

I worry about stratification. I have already mentioned the consequences of a mixed market in the Prison Service, in child care and in independent social work practices. Perhaps I may remind your Lordships of the guardians ad litem, who were crack social workers appointed by the courts to represent the voice of children in public law in the courts. They present rather a good case in point for the rationale for having academies, because those social workers were frustrated by working in local authorities. By working for the courts, they were independent and pretty much decided how much time they wanted to dedicate to each child. The posts attracted many of the best social workers, paid less for their experience and gaining little career progression. At least a couple of your Lordships had spouses working in this area. Unfortunately, 12 years ago the Government decided that they wanted firmer control over these practitioners and as a consequence many of them simply left social work.

It is easy to be critical when one is not responsible for such a change, but I remember attending a meeting where the guardians were gathered. It was so disappointing to see such a great deal of expertise leaving the profession. Now we have the Child and Family Court Advice and Support Service, which amalgamates the former guardians ad litem and the former court reporting officers. There again we see a problem, in as much as CAFCASS requires officers who have at least three years’ experience in social work. That means that frontline social workers are pulled off the front line into CAFCASS and are taken away from where they are needed most.

My point is that that was all done with the best of intentions, but the consequences were not thought through at the time. I hope that the Minister will reflect on that. I would appreciate a sense that the Government have considered the issues, that they have ways of monitoring the impact and that there are means of taking action if that becomes a problem in future. I beg to move.

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I hope that I can provide some reassurance on the concerns raised by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, which he has made consistently throughout Committee. The Department for Education publishes comprehensive statistics each year on the school workforce—I give way to my noble friend.

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[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his courteous and helpful reply. I hope, like him, that there is no given number of good teachers. I am afraid that my experience elsewhere is that there have been shortages of the best, but I very much hope that his Government’s programme next year will continue the process that was begun by the preceding Government to raise the status of teaching and to make it more attractive. The current recession may well boost that.

A thought occurs to me. One thing that we have done in children’s homes in this country is to have Danish pedagogues working alongside British practitioners. Since we have talked a fair deal about Finland and other countries, perhaps we might encourage an exchange with a country such as Finland so that some of its teachers come and practise in our schools, particularly in our more difficult inner-city schools, as another means of raising standards.

I am grateful to the Minister and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 190 withdrawn.

Academies Bill [HL]

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Crosby]

My Lords, I shall speak to the amendments tabled by my noble friends Lady Garden and Lord Phillips of Sudbury and explain what is troubling me about academy orders.

Section 14 of the Education Act 2002 is incorporated into Clause 1(4), therefore enabling academies to be dealt with by what might be called the fast-track process of essentially calling into aid the powers given to the Secretary of State in that Act. The difference is that only very specific use was made of the power in Section 14; I do not think that it was intended to embrace a whole category of school in the way that will be possible under the Bill. My straightforward concern is that, where we are looking at the possibility of removing many statutory forms of consultation, virtually no restraint will be placed on the Secretary of State, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, said, and that he will be accountable to no one but himself. The combination of Section 14—the powers of the Secretary of State—being incorporated into the Bill with the fast-tracking of the academy orders means that an academy could be approved, or for that matter rejected, with the involvement of virtually no one but the Secretary of State. Within a democratic structure, that is not an acceptable way to go.

We must therefore look very closely at the amendments that have been tabled. They would bring academies back into the structure of the academy agreement—my noble friend Lady Garden referred to this—which would enable us to set conditions and requirements for the schools that have to be met under the academy agreement but that do not have to be met in the same way under an academy order.

I, too, would be very grateful for greater enlightenment from the Minister on what accountability there is in mind. For example, it might be possible to look at the report from the education department on the experience of academies, their standards, their meeting of the admissions orders and other requirements under the academy agreements. That would enable Parliament to debate how far those requirements and conditions had been met and to distinguish between the effects of academy orders and academy agreements.

Perhaps even more significant than the proposals that my noble friends and the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, have put forward is the need for this Committee to look closely at the level of accountability for academies and at academy orders under the Bill.

[The Earl of Listowel]

I rise to support Amendment 96 and Amendment 31, which is in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. I support the former because, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, rightly said, further education colleges can be particularly beneficial to disadvantaged cohorts of pupil. Children in public care may find themselves in a further education college earlier than their peers, meaning that they can carry on with an education that they might otherwise have been denied. The noble Baroness, Lady Sharp of Guildford, has been a strong advocate of equal treatment. I am very pleased to hear that there will be no threat to progress in that area.

The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, asks in Amendment 31 that substantial freedom be given to schools to innovate. He reminds me of the eminent American philosopher and educationalist, John Dewey, who died in the middle of the last century and was very much admired by Bertrand Russell. He moved our thinking on with regard to the gaining of knowledge. He said that we were not simply spectators: we learnt because we had a reason to learn and because there was some impulse to our learning. That is particularly relevant to children who are disillusioned with the mainstream system. Schools need to innovate and find ways of working that engage such children. For example, Lent Rise Combined School in Slough, which has a large Traveller population, works each year to enable young people to work with local businesses to design products and then attempt to sell them at an open day. Those sorts of innovative approaches where Traveller people can see the application of their learning are very helpful. That may be some of what was meant by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

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[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

My Lords, would it help the Minister and the Committee if I were to say that the score is England 1, Slovenia 0?

[The Earl of Listowel]

I apologise if this has already been covered but the noble Baroness, Lady Perry of Southwark, pointed out that the academy schools will have considerable additional funds. I am sure that we will have discussed this; it is something that I should have given more attention to sooner. Could the Minister, in replying or in correspondence, give as much detail as possible on exactly how much academies can expect to be given? That would be helpful. I thank the Minister.

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

My Lords, I should probably speak now while England is ahead in the football; on past form that may not persist. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, for his insight into ministerial life. I know that many will recognise what he says, as I have discovered over the last three days. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, for his kind welcome. I am sorry that the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, is not here, but I am grateful for the noble Lord’s words.

Some interesting and important points have been made about transparency. It is important not just that everything should be fair. It is absolutely clear that our intention is that our approaches to funding should be fair. However, I take the point that they also need to be seen to be fair. Funding is a fiendishly complicated area, as I am discovering as I try to get my head around it. I recognise the need for greater clarity. I say at the beginning that I undertake to reflect on whether there are ways in which we can better demonstrate that, without going down some of the routes that have been suggested in a range of amendments, which, for various reasons, may be slightly overcomplicated and bureaucratic.

I start by summarising some of the main points that have been made and by responding to the opening points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt. The Bill, as he said, would allow the Secretary of State to fund academies either by contractual agreement—as now—or, for the first time, through grants. The purpose of that is to give the Secretary of State greater flexibility. To respond to the point made by my noble friend Lady Garden, it is not intended to be a bit of both; it is a case of either/or. There would be no top-up from one to the other. As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, set out, it is our view that the vast majority of academies will continue to be funded by the route with which we are familiar—the contractual funding agreement, which runs for seven years. The proposal for the grant, as the noble Lord summarised, is to give a greater degree of flexibility, probably in a small number of cases where having that—particularly in the case of a new school being set up under the academy model—might make more sense. The requirements on academies relating to admissions, exclusions and special educational needs will be the same, whether they are funded through a grant or a funding agreement. I hope that that provides some reassurance to the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath.

On Amendment 79, the Government have made it clear that they will apply a rigorous “fit and proper person” test in approving any sponsors of an academy or promoter of a free school. The Secretary of State will publish on the department’s website the criteria for deciding applications from schools that are not outstanding. In some ways I recognise the point that there is a need for greater clarity on these issues. Part of the answer to the points that have been raised on both sides of the Committee is that, if we publish more information to make clear what the criteria are, we may be able to reduce some of the uncertainty.

We are keen that there should be flexibility in the criteria that the Secretary of State can use, so that he makes the best decision in each case. The Secretary of State expects to approve all applications from outstanding schools other than those where there are exceptional circumstances—for instance, if a school has a significant financial deficit. As the programme develops, it may be necessary to adjust those processes in the light of experience, particularly with regard to free schools. We are keen to ensure that we have the flexibility to do so.

Amendments 14, 79 and 80 all require that the conditions of academy arrangements should be set out as statutory instruments. The noble Lord made that point. Again, we are keen to try to maintain as much flexibility as possible. We will publish a revised model funding agreement, some elements of which I have circulated, although not as early as I would have liked. They are now in the Library. That will make clear the standard terms and conditions under which an academy will be funded.

An academy agreement is a contract between the Secretary of State and an academy trust under which the academy trust agrees to establish and run an academy and in return the Secretary of State agrees to provide funding for the academy trust. Amendment 11 would mean that an academy agreement could put in place only one half of these arrangements, so the contract would not be properly made. Clause 1(3) has been drafted to ensure that future academy agreements will, as now, need to contain both those elements. Amendment 10 would allow the Secretary of State or the academy trust to amend the terms of the funding agreement at any time. That is already the case: the funding agreement can be amended by mutual consent of both parties, via a deed of variation.

Amendments 124 and 125 would require that academy orders be made by statutory instrument—in the case of Amendment 125, subject to the affirmative resolution procedure. The making of an academy order is an administrative process on the way to becoming an academy. While it is important for the school in question, there is not necessarily a wider public interest in an individual decision by an individual school that would make it necessary or appropriate to bring each and every one of these before Parliament.

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[Baroness Whitaker]

My Lords, I had not intended to prolong this long debate by joining in, but I have to confess that I, too, was made more anxious during the course of it. I share the anxiety of the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy. I should say that I, too, am a humanist. Indeed, I am now a vice-president of the association. Long before that, however, I felt strongly that we live in a plural society and we need more than ever to be at ease with our fellow citizens. Our education system ought to increase that. I have some sympathy with the approaches taken by the noble Lords, Lord Baker and Lord Lucas, but most of all with Amendments 61 and 133 in the name of my noble friend Lady Massey.

Perhaps I may quickly throw this in: “belief” is the name given by international law to those systems of morality or ethics that are not religious. I quite agree that it is rather an odd word for that purpose, but it is generally taken to mean that. My question for the Minister is—if he does not mind putting my anxiety in the anxiety basket, so that it is a bit heavier than the certainty one—in what way will academies teach the national curriculum in respect of religion and belief?

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, we have heard about two extremes of school—one in which only faith is taught, and the other in which everything is taught. There has been no reference to a concern that we might have, whereby one may learn much about everything but not have a thorough understanding of any particular thing. Perhaps at this time our faith schools are more important than ever to our children because, as the report of the Church of England’s Good Childhood Inquiry showed us, an increasing number of children are growing up in families where their parents separate or there are family tensions. As the 2004 UNICEF report pointed out, at that time this country performed the poorest in terms of our child welfare. There was a number of dimensions to the report. It looked at family relationships and highlighted the fact that Italy came top as regards children spending time with their family on a regular basis and enjoying a meal together.

I am speaking speculatively, but perhaps the particular value that faith schools of various kinds can offer can give children a sense of belonging when they do not have that sense at home. The value of a Catholic school is that it has behind it a whole tradition of music, ceremony and dress. Children in those schools benefit from feeling that they belong to something. While I recognise the danger of extremes, and of having a Jewish school by a Muslim school by a Catholic school by an Anglican school, and the difficulty of different faiths interacting, perhaps if this is worked right, the stronger our individual identity is, and the stronger our basis in our religious community, the more we can relate in a positive way to those of different faiths.

Academies Bill [HL]

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd June 2010 Lords Chamber

Of course, people can break the law as well as breach a funding agreement, but it is my contention that the law not only provides a more generally applicable approach but is also more transparent and enforceable, and creates obligations that are more clear cut and incontrovertible. When he reflects on how best to achieve parity between academies and maintained schools in this area, the Minister may conclude that the best as well as the simplest course will be to take the legislative route.

[The Earl of Listowel]

I hesitate to prolong the debate at this late hour and I think that my concern is probably a little far-fetched, but this is such an important area to get right that I hope your Lordships will bear with me for a moment. Before I begin, perhaps I may thank the Minister for the pains he took to organise a meeting to discuss this issue, for his helpful correspondence and for the personal note he sent to me, which I much appreciated.

Recently, I was talking with a friend who worked for some time with a number of children with learning difficulties and disabilities, including two children with Down’s syndrome. They were a girl and a boy aged 13 and 14. The 13 year-old was a real terror in a way. They would be having a picnic in the park and she would run away from the group. It was very annoying and difficult to manage for the teacher. She was a wonderful girl, full of life and really charming, but when getting back on to the minibus after the day out—the excursion—the teacher began teasing her about her boyfriend, the young man. My friend sensed that the teacher was so angry because his authority had been flouted that he was using this devious way of getting back at her.

The point of the story is that we need excellent teachers working in this area. The noble Baroness, Lady Garden, raised the issue of the status of SENCOs and said that they should be qualified teachers. It may be far-fetched because I suspect that many of the teachers working in this area have a particular vocation and will not think of leaving it. I imagine that when academy status is introduced, most of the schools that will go into it will be secondary schools and there may not be an issue. However, I remain concerned. I am grateful for the Minister’s reply on this and for the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Baker, but if the uptake of academy status is a great success and academies cream off the best teachers into their purlieu, it will be worth considering whether teachers who might have considered going into special educational needs will choose to go to these schools. The Minister said that he is not expecting a revolution; that this is a small-scale change. However, I am not sufficiently reassured by what he has said so far. The noble Lord, Lord Baker, said that the same thing was said about city technology colleges—that they would be the end of the world—but in fact they proved a welcome addition.

I approve of giving schools more autonomy but we need to think through what the general impact may be on the workforce. I refer particularly to the previous Government’s record on health visitors. In 1998, health visitors were hailed as the champions, the pioneers of the Government’s plans for early intervention. Ten years later, where are we? We have an ageing workforce, most of whom are about to retire, with great shortages and too heavy a case load. I was talking to a health visitor—a nurse with the responsibility of funding several London boroughs in this area—and she said, “I have to choose between funding the Sure Start centre, funding the Family Nurse Partnership and funding the health visitors”. It was all done with the best intention, but it is between these stools that these matters fall. I encourage the Minister to recognise the point and reflect further on what the impact might be if his plans are successful.

[Baroness Thornton]

My Lords, I agree with the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, about SENCOs; she made a very important point.

I had not intended to intervene but in briefing sent to me by TreeHouse, the charity that runs a school for children with autism, there is a question that has not yet been raised in the debate. It relates, particularly, to children with autism but I think it applies to children with SEN. Indeed, TreeHouse has worked with the special educational consortium on the Bill and agrees with all the briefings that it has sent to different Members of the House. In regard to the application of the SEN legal framework, TreeHouse states:

“Currently the Academies Bill provides that Academies are bound by the SEN Code of Practice, which is statutory guidance”.

In its view,

“This provides only a small part of the legal protection that children with autism and their families currently have in maintained schools, where their rights are more strongly protected by legislation through the Education Act 1996 and the School Standards and Framework Act 1988 in addition to the SEN Code of Practice”,

which other Members have mentioned. It continues:

“Schools that become Academies will therefore have weaker responsibilities for children with SEN, who, in turn, will have weaker legal protection”.

It is a legitimate question for TreeHouse to raise and I hope that the Minister will be able to answer it.

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To end where I started, some of these points are covered by other policy areas where the previous Government and the new coalition Government have already engaged, such as the pupil premium, Sure Start and elsewhere. Given that, I hope the noble Lord will withdraw his amendment.

[The Earl of Listowel]

I thank the Minister for his reply to my noble friend. However, does he also recognise what policy in the past 10 years has recognised? These children—from difficult families that are complex to deal with—need a seamless provision of services. The Children Act 2004 enshrined a duty on all agencies to work together to safeguard and promote the welfare of vulnerable children. I spoke recently to the manager of a children’s home in Camden. He said, “I used to manage a private home which was reasonably good, but it is so much easier for me to run this home because the services in Camden are so well connected. Mental health and social services work with the children and their families”. The general principle that I think my noble friend is driving at is: please reassure us that there will be no risk of fragmentation. I suppose that is the word. It proved so hard to get everyone to work together in the best interests of the child. We certainly would not want to put that in jeopardy.

[Baroness Howe of Idlicote]

My Lords, I do not think any of us realised that the Minister was going to reply quite so soon, before there was any other opportunity to support my noble friend Lord Northbourne’s point. One of the crucial issues is what we all know is happening and has been happening for 37 years, since Keith Joseph first mentioned the cycle of deprivation. All this has been going on and we have not managed to cope with it. The pertinent question is: who will get the right provision and the early statement for young people so that they can be helped at the earliest possible age? Who will ask that question for these individual children in this state? On any view, they cost us all—the individual and the country—huge sums of money. We have really failed in this way. We have all been talking about it for 37 years. I would very much like to have that point addressed.

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As I mentioned, the Government’s stated intention is to maintain the admissions code in the hundreds of secondary schools that could be academies by the autumn. That is very welcome. If academies are to be the norm—or perhaps I should say more normal than they are now, growing and flourishing—it would be right and proper that the need to comply with the admissions code should be in the Bill. That is what Amendments 28 and 169 seek to do. We have all received many representations expressing fears about the admissions code in relation to the Bill. Simply putting this in the Bill would inspire greater confidence. I urge the Minister to consider it.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 50 in my name. I declare an interest as a trustee of TACT, a charitable provider of fostering and adoption placement in the UK, with offices in England, Wales and Scotland; and of the Michael Sieff Foundation, a child welfare charity. The purpose of the amendment is to ensure that there is not the least doubt that looked-after children will be given first priority in admissions to the new academies.

Perhaps I may say again to the Minister that I was very grateful to him for the helpful meeting on SEN that he organised. I was grateful at that meeting that he acknowledged the concern regarding the different treatment of admissions for looked-after children by academies. He described it as small; but it is significant, and I hope that he will accept that. Perhaps I may briefly remind noble Lords that the previous Government gave first priority in admissions to looked-after children in legislation enacted in February 2009. Grant-maintained schools must prioritise these children. However, in the same regulations, academies are only directed that they “should” prioritise these children. There has been considerable concern about this distinction, which has been greatly increased with the advent of this Bill and the prospect, highlighted by the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, of many more academies, and many of the best performing schools becoming academies.

I apologise for repeating a couple of statistics from Second Reading. A large percentage—28 per cent—of our prison population have experienced care. In 2008, only 7 per cent of looked-after children gained five GCSEs with grades A* to C, compared with 49.8 per cent of the general population. When an offender is given an education, their offending can reduce dramatically. The National Grid Transco programme reduces reoffending rates from 70 per cent to 7 per cent. We are seeing improved outcomes for looked-after children and children in care thanks to the previous Government’s efforts. Improvements in attainment have been modest, but at last they have begun tracking the improvement in the general population. The number of care leavers entering university has increased by 900 per cent. It was 1 per cent and I have recently been advised that it is 9 per cent. It is still far below the level for the general population but it is an important step in the right direction. I hope that the Minister will agree that now is not the time to weaken our efforts on behalf of these children.

I am most grateful to the Secretary of State, Michael Gove MP, for his decision to continue the investment in social work begun by the previous Government—in particular, the setting up of a social work college on a par with the Royal Society of Medicine and the Royal College of Nursing. I am also most thankful for his decision to appoint Dr Munro to review the bureaucratic burden on social work. I am more grateful than I can say for the Secretary of State’s commitment to supporting and developing social work. These children need the best social workers and the best schools appropriate to their needs.

In the past, these children have been put last. They have been disregarded in their families, as my noble friend said, and too often they have been disregarded in the care system. I hope that today the Minister can remove any shred of doubt that he will put them first.

[Baroness Walmsley]

My Lords, we, too, believe that it is important that children and parents choose schools and not the other way round. In speaking to my Amendment 51, I welcome the fact that the Secretary of State has stated that the code for school admissions will apply to academies. We felt that we needed to table this amendment to probe how the codes—please note that it is the plural—for school admissions will apply to academies. There are two codes: one deals with the setting of admissions criteria and the role of the school adjudicator, and the other deals with how parents can appeal against a refusal to admit their child.

Currently, academies are required to comply with the codes “as far as possible” as part of their agreement with the Secretary of State. The codes were not written for the academy sector but for maintained schools. One additional thing that the amendment requires is that parents and the local authority are able to appeal to the adjudicator about admission arrangements. Currently, parents can appeal only to the Secretary of State but that can really only be done after the admission arrangements have been agreed between the academy and the Secretary of State when the arrangements are published. An admission authority—be it a local authority or a school governing body—has to publish, at the school and in a local newspaper, any proposed changes to admission arrangements and allow objections. If the admission authority confirms the change, the parent can appeal to the adjudicator, if he or she wishes to do so.

What is really required here is a single admission system for all publicly funded schools. Having two admission systems, which will still be the case if academies are required to comply with the code only where they can, is not really good enough. Academy status will have perceived benefits on admissions for grammar schools. They will no longer be subject to the rules on parental ballots when changing their admission arrangements. However, if we are to rely on the Minister’s words in his letter to Peers that,

“no non-selective school would be able to become selective”—

words which are very welcome—that would rule out the current ability of a maintained school to select 10 per cent of pupils on the basis of aptitude in music, arts and sport. Can the Minister clarify the Government’s intention on that point while we are discussing admission codes?

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[Lord Hill of Oareford]

My Lords, we have had an important and wide-ranging discussion and I am grateful for a number of points that have been made. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, for accepting that the Government have sought to be clear in making certain that the existing admissions requirements that apply to maintained schools will apply in the same way to academies. I shall respond to one of her specific questions about reporting on academy admission arrangements. Local authorities have to collect information on academy admission arrangements and report on them to the schools adjudicator. He will then have to report on academy admission arrangements in just the same way as for maintained schools. The Bill does not change that.

I turn to the question raised by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel. I am grateful to him for his comments. I know that he brings great experience and sincerity to this work. He was particularly concerned about looked-after children. I can reassure him that academies will continue to be required to give the highest possible priority to looked-after children. The Bill changes nothing and I know how important that is to him. I hope that that reply provides some reassurance.

[The Earl of Listowel]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way, even at this late hour, on this point. The concern raised with me is that paragraph 2 of the school admissions code reads:

“Where mandatory requirements are imposed by the Code … it is stated that relevant bodies ‘must’ comply with the particular requirement or provision”.

However, the code continues at paragraph 3:

“The Code also includes guidelines which the relevant bodies ‘should’ follow”.

The relevant bodies there are the academies, so they only “should” follow, rather than “must” follow, this prioritising of children in admissions. Perhaps I have misunderstood in reading the code; I would appreciate guidance.

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

Perhaps I could follow that matter up in writing with the noble Earl outside the Chamber and we can pursue it.

One of the issues concerning admissions and exclusions, as has been explained, is the important principle that academy principals have to be free to manage their schools. Therefore, we believe that all schools, including academies, should have the ability to do that. However, parents also need to have guarantees that their children will be treated fairly, so we will ensure that academies are required, through their funding agreements, to comply with the admissions and appeals codes and with guidance on behaviour and exclusions in just the same way as maintained schools.

I note the remarks made by my noble friend Lord Lucas, endorsed by my noble friend Lady Perry, about banding. As he has conceded, that is not an issue specifically to do with this Bill. I know that he has strong views on it. I need to learn more about it and I would be extremely happy to be educated by my noble friend.

Amendments 28, 50 and 51, 84 and 169 would all require the Secretary of State to ensure that academies complied with the school admissions code as if they were maintained schools. Amendment 84 would require them to run their admissions appeals processes as if they were maintained schools. As I have explained, we believe that we achieve that through their compliance with the admissions code and the admissions appeals code. We will make sure that they have to continue to do that.

Academies Bill [HL]

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2010 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Bath and Wells]

My Lords, from the diocese of Bath and Wells, I should point out that in Taunton we have just inaugurated an academy that will begin in September. It comprises two schools with a history of difficulty; we have spent a lot of time in preparation for them to become an academy, and we are very much looking forward to that.

Once the Bill was announced, one of our successful—indeed, our most successful—church secondary schools made a bid to become an academy. Listening to the reason given by the head of the school that it serves to produce an additional half-a-million pounds for his school budget made me a little cautious about motive. I have been a supporter of the academies since they began. I have no difficulty whatever with continuing with a single title, provided that we can ensure that none of this will make the more vulnerable in our schools less able to enjoy the benefit of full academy status.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I have listened to the debate with great interest and am prompted to speak by what the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Drefelin, said about the independent, and possibly isolated, schools. I want to ask the Minister one quick question, which may well fall within the ambit of later amendments. I recently met a social worker, whose job is to work with and support a number of schools in the local area. I also spoke fairly recently to a head teacher, who said how helpful it was to have a social worker support her in what she does. Therefore, I would appreciate an assurance from the Minister that in this legislative process we are not going to make it any more difficult for that sort of set-up to carry on working.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Hill of Oareford)]

My Lords, I shall start by speaking to Amendments 1, 5, 6, 8, 9, 65, 77, 86, 87, 93, 94, 194 and 195, which all seek to change the title and name of all existing and future academies to direct-maintained schools. Before I do so—perhaps with the words of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lincoln ringing in my ears at the beginning—I should say that I know that the whole point of Committee stage is for us to tease out misunderstandings and to try to get clarity on various issues as we go forward. I am committed to doing that during this process and shall do my best to do so in the days ahead. I have already had lots of help and advice from all sides of the House over the past couple of weeks and I know that that will continue.

I am a little perplexed as to why the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, would want to turn her back on a policy and a name which, greatly to its credit, her party pioneered in government. I was even more perplexed when over the weekend I read the 2005 White Paper, Higher Standards, Better Schools for All, which clearly argued for the extension of academy freedoms. As I think we mentioned at Second Reading, the day before the launch of the White Paper, the then Prime Minister was even more explicit. He said:

“We need to make it easier for every school to acquire the drive and essential freedoms of Academies ... We want every school to be able quickly and easily to become a self-governing independent state school ... All schools will be able to have Academy style freedom”.

That, in general terms, is what the Academies Bill makes possible.

I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, argued that using the name “academy” for all schools converting to the programme might in some way dilute the original intentions, and she specifically mentioned grant-maintained schools. These were quite different, not least because they got additional funding and operated effectively outside the system, which is not what is proposed with academies. She spoke about the policy now being for outstanding schools, rather than the original focus of the policy, which was, she said, on the most challenging schools. That point has already been picked up by my noble friend Lady Perry. I know that there has been a lot of comment about this and I am sorry if I did not do a better job in explaining it at Second Reading. The fact is that the focus on failing schools remains and, if anything, is strengthened because the Secretary of State will be able to act more decisively without local authority consent, should that be necessary.

Secondly, in line with what we believe was the previous Government’s intention, all schools will be able to apply for academy status, should they want to. In other words, the outstanding schools are simply a sub-set of all schools. I hope that that provides some reassurance on the point made by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Liverpool. In what we propose, there is no intention that the generality of schools should be excluded from the chance to take part in this programme. Because those schools are outstanding, we believe that conversion for them should be relatively straightforward, and therefore we are saying that, if they want to convert, they should be able to go first. They would not have to have sponsors, but all other converting schools would.

My main argument in resisting the amendment has already been made for me by my noble friend Lady Walmsley and the noble Lord, Lord Adonis. I am particularly sympathetic to what was described as alphabet soup—what I think of as Alphabetti Spaghetti—in that, as a new Minister trying to get my head round the descriptions of all the different kinds of schools, the thought of having one more to learn would be almost intolerable.

Free Schools Policy

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2010 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Listowel]

I thank the Minister for the Statement and welcome the Government’s general thrust, reflected in their announcement, of giving head teachers much more control over the environment that they teach children in. If I may say so, that is a very good direction to be moving in. But can he offer me a reassurance on the issue of stratification? There is some risk that if a significant minority of schools opts neither for academy nor free school status, many teachers will vote with their feet and go to work in these good schools. That might mean that pupils who would most need and would benefit from good teaching will actually be denied the best teachers because they will be in these other schools.

Elsewhere, the Government have proposed the introduction of independent social work practices in the style of GP practices and legal firms. Although this has been warmly welcomed by social workers who like the idea of running their own business and not being interfered with by local authorities so much, a respectable and experienced director of social services pointed out to me that if there is one service only for children with care orders, there is a danger that all the best social workers from the surrounding fields will want to work in that area and would be creamed off. We need social workers to support families where the children are not taken into care.

My second question is brief. Can the Minister assure the House that the complexity of taking forward these new measures will not distract him from maintaining a strong focus on the continuing professional development of our teachers and introducing the master’s in teaching and learning? This point was stressed by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester.

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I am grateful to the noble Earl and hope I can give him the reassurances he seeks. On the broad point about fears of stratification—which I am sure we will come back to as we debate the Academies Bill more generally—I understand the anxiety, but I think that quite a lot of it is misconceived. I say that because on Friday, when the department made the announcement on free schools, I was lucky enough to meet beforehand a number of the teachers and teacher groups who are most interested in taking free school status forward. I have to say that those teachers could not in any way be characterised as people who are looking for a quiet life and want to teach in a leafy suburb, or who want to turn their back on vulnerable children. They formed an extraordinarily impressive and passionately committed group of people whose reason for going into teaching—some through Teach First and some through the Future Leaders programme which, much to their credit, were set up by the previous Government, who I will load with laurels as often as I can as regards those two wonderful programmes on which we want very much to build—arises out of a strong sense of social commitment. I found it immensely reassuring that those teachers see this legislation as enabling them to do more for the neediest, most vulnerable and most left behind children.

On the issue of CPD and the master’s, as the noble Earl knows, we will have further legislation coming forward later in the year. This comes back to a point made previously by the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, but I do not think that the choice is between structures and teachers. Sometimes it is caricatured that people who want structural change are crazed ideologues who do not understand people, but that is not my view at all. My view, which was confirmed by meeting those excellent teachers, is that the structural change can give them the freedom to enable them to do more for the neediest children, about whom I know the noble Earl cares most strongly.

Academies Bill [HL]

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I support, first, the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Low. It is important that special needs are recognised. I also support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne. I have been a governor of a girls’ school and am now a governor of a boys’ school. As a governor of the school to which my daughter went, I was not actually asked to take on the role until she had left. That seems to be the ideal situation because you then have a parent with a real interest in the school but without the rather special interest which is local and time-limited. To have a predominance of parent governors while their own children are in the school would be a retrograde step, so I strongly support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I also support my noble friend Lord Northbourne’s amendment. I emphasise that there is much to do. Some children need smaller schools and special teachers to work with them, but others do not, even though they may face serious challenges at home. Good support can be offered in schools to include these children to the benefit of all. I give one example: the charity Voluntary Reading Help, which works in over 1,000 schools. It recruits volunteers to work for one or two lunch hours a week with particularly difficult or challenging children. I have seen for myself in a primary school nearby how the volunteer will sit down and read with a child for half an hour and then play a little game. The child chooses the book and they enjoy their time together. A significant number of these volunteers are men, which is particularly valuable given that we have so many young boys growing up without fathers. These are important relationships that can be built up over the course of a year, which is the minimum commitment. This is the sort of thing that helps to include children who might otherwise be challenging. It is important to consider who should make up the governing body and what its function is. It should take a strategic view and be able to adopt sensible approaches like the one I have outlined.

I was encouraged when Nick Clegg, the Deputy Prime Minister, said last week that he intended to recruit more men into early years childcare. I hope that he will also look at primary schools and how initiatives like Voluntary Reading Help might be developed. The charity is keen to expand in order to be able to help more children.

[Baroness Williams of Crosby]

My Lords, I follow directly on what the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, has said, as well as what was said by the noble Baroness, Lady Warnock. The House has been concerned about the position of children with special educational needs. It is one of the areas where a good governing body can make it very clear indeed that the school must make provision for children in this group. Indeed, the force of governing bodies has been one of the pressures that has encouraged the move towards children being educated at least partly in mainstream schools if they possibly can be. Not the least of this has taken place in primary schools, where the governing body is often a crucial factor in ensuring that these youngsters are given the education they need and deserve.

I do not want to detain the Committee for long. First, I ask the Minister whether more assurances can be given on the position of children with special educational needs, about which we have learnt a great deal more in the past 10 years. Far more children are now helped in schools, in some cases through one-to-one assistance, to overcome the obstacles they encountered as very young children so that they often catch up with their cohort. In the long term their special educational needs are not a handicap to them. We would like to associate ourselves closely with what has been said by the noble Lord, Lord Low, and of course by the noble Baroness, Lady Warnock.

I want to make one other point quite strongly. It was the former Secretary of State for Education who brought in the requirement that governing bodies had to include representatives of parents, teachers and non-teaching staff. Will the Government consider very carefully whether we should not consider, as is implied in the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, widening somewhat the requirements in the Bill so that governing bodies are rather more representative than the single parent governor that is presently required for the academies? In the country as a whole, there are some 300,000 governors, or at least vacancies for governors. This seems to be a perfect example of what the Prime Minister meant when he talked about the importance of the big society, because these are men and women who volunteer their time and energy and make a fantastic commitment to ensuring that their schools are as good as they can be. I have seen it over and again, particularly in respect of smaller primary schools through what I should declare as an interest in my capacity as the chairman of the judges of the Teaching Awards. Among others, we give awards directly to the governors of schools. It has been striking to see governors from often deprived parts of the country committing themselves deeply to getting their communities involved in their school. It would be a tragedy to see that go.

With regard to special educational needs, can the Minister say a little more to ensure that such children get the care and attention they need? Given the large number of academies that are to be created, I also ask him to consider again whether we should not ensure, at the very least, representation of parents—I share the view that it should not be a majority—and staff, including non-teaching staff, on the governing body in order, to put it bluntly, to ensure that those non-teaching staff members are strongly committed to the successful outcome of the school. That is a very important part of making education responsible and responsive to the community and the country as a whole.

Academies Bill [HL]

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greaves]

I think there is a real difference between primary schools and secondary schools for other reasons, but the relationship between a school and the community in which it is situated varies hugely between schools. Some schools cut themselves off from the community, unfortunately, a tendency that has increased in recent years because of the pressures put on the schools, but other schools look outwards. I do not think there is necessarily a difference between a primary school and a secondary school, although primary schools—by their very nature, because they take in very young children and bring mothers in and so on—are often more closely involved in the community than some secondary schools. However, I do not think there is necessarily a direct relationship between that, and I know secondary schools that are heavily involved in the community.

The parish council in a village, the town council in a town and the district council can all legitimately have a say. I am not saying that they should have a right of veto; I am saying that these are community institutions and if a community is to have a proper debate, no matter how quickly, everyone in that community has a right to it.

There are two principles of general consultation. They help with the difficulties, which the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, identified, of being too prescriptive about whom you consult or of trying to be prescriptive but vague at the same time and perhaps leaving things open to legal challenge. First, you must publish what you are proposing for general discussion so that anyone can pick up information about it and take part in the discussion, and you must publish the responses. That is proposed new subsection (1A) in my amendment. Secondly, once you have the responses, whether from parents, teachers, the parish council or just a group of interested people, you must obviously consider them and decide whether you want to allow them to influence your decision. If, after the consultation, you decide to send your application to the Secretary of State, you send a summary of the responses or the responses themselves to the Secretary of State alongside your application so that someone who is looking at the application can consider them at the same time. Those are the two principles of genuine public consultation and debate.

The argument against such a consultation might be that it will delay the process, but so long as you have a pretty strict timetable and people are fairly rigorous and efficient with it, it does not have to delay the process very much. I think there is also a worry on the part of the Government that if there is too much general public debate about a particular proposal, it will encourage people to decide not to go for it. They might say that it is a bit controversial and hang back a bit. However, given the scale of the interest which the Government assure us there is in these things, whether it is a free school or a conversion—they say that 1,800 schools at least have now asked for more details—the Government and the department cannot possibly deal with that very quickly and will have to go ahead with far fewer, so I do not think that the argument about putting people off carries any weight whatever.

I support the coalition Government, but everything that people have said and everything that they have published so far—in the original agreement and in the coalition document Our Programme for Government—talks about more public involvement, more consultation and more involvement of citizens. We are slowly learning what the big society means, but if it does not mean genuine consultation on something that is as important to a local community as the future of its school, what on earth does it mean? Something needs to be in the Bill about consultation, and it needs to involve not just particular interest groups in the school but the wider community.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I support Amendments 114 and 191. I particularly support Amendment 191, because it asks the Government to pilot the academy schools and I think that a conservative approach to this is appropriate. This is so significant to our children’s lives. I recognise that this is an enabling Bill, but we expect many schools to buy into this programme. This is a huge experiment and it really does behove us to act in a conservative and considered way. Piloting a scheme, as the amendment suggests, would be a good step forward.

I have previously raised with the Minister my concerns about not only the most vulnerable children in the system but also the workforce and how these schools might cream off the best teachers and head teachers from the schools around them. I think that there is a consensus that the quality of teachers and head teachers makes the most difference to the education of children and young people.

To give examples from other areas, in the prison system we now have a mixed economy of private and public prisons. Private prisons are often accused of paying huge sums of money for the best executives from the public sector. The public sector trains the best prison officers, who get creamed off by private companies. They are also accused of putting junior officers in place who are underdeveloped and undersupported, and they quickly move on. I do not know whether that is a fair accusation but, from the statistics, the turnover of junior officers in private prisons is very much higher than in public prisons. There were all sorts of benefits to introducing a mixed economy in terms of breaking down inflexible practices, but I hope that the illustration shows that there is some cause for concern.

As regards childcare, I was speaking to the manager of a voluntary nursery which is not far from your Lordships’ House. She said, “We are very keen on training our childcare workers. They work for their national vocational qualification level 3 in childcare and as soon as we train them up they move to the local authority system where they get better pensions, benefits and job security”.

I have already mentioned independent social worker practices. I heard the Minister’s response to that. It is super that such new models can be very attractive to people coming into social work or teaching. They see themselves gaining the autonomy they want to run their own businesses. There is great enthusiasm for that. However, Paul Fallon, who was director of social services at Barnet, reduced the level of social work vacancies in his local authority from 30 per cent to 3 per cent in three years—I hope that I have the figures right, because they sound a bit too neat. He was well respected and was asked by the Government to be part of a committee advising on independent social work practices. His main concern was that these social work practices would cream off all the best social workers from thereabouts and that there would not be the continuity of provision essential in dealing with these children to ensure that they get back to their families.

This is a bit like a game of chess and the devil is always very good at enticing us with an attractive knight, a rook or even a queen. But we have to look further down the game. When we are dealing with something as serious as this, we have to look a number of moves ahead to the end game. I am concerned about this matter. I wish to learn more. I appreciate the Minister’s serious endeavours to reassure me and others.

I also recall the right-to-buy policy, which had many benefits for many people. Unfortunately, the need for councils to redevelop public provision—the local authority homes that were being sold off—was overlooked in that policy. I am sorry to say that in many areas this has condemned some families to sharing a kitchen or a bathroom with five other families. Many families have to live in awful conditions in poor-quality private accommodation because sufficient thought was not given to the overall impact of that policy. This is a good proposal from the opposition Benches and I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

Academies Bill [HL]

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2010 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, to hear how carefully he has consulted with his local school and to hear him repeat Michael Gove’s concern about stratification. I share his concern that the Bill could inadvertently add to that problem. The noble Lord reminds me how very different our system is to that of many of our neighbouring countries that seem to provide fairly consistent, good quality, publicly funded systems and where private schools have difficulty finding business due to lack of demand. So much human potential is wasted in this country. My noble friend Lord Sutherland drew attention to our variable quality of education.

The chief concern I wish to raise this evening is the education of children in public care and how the Bill may affect their chances, particularly as regards the admissions priority which was granted to them in 2008 by the previous Government, from which academy schools were exempted. I shall come back to that and concentrate on a few of the principles we are discussing. I reiterate how welcome it was in the debate on the Queen’s Speech to hear the Minister clearly lay down the subsidiarity principle by which the coalition operates; namely, to pass down decision-making as far as possible to professionals, clinicians and parents in the immediate area. I welcome that move. I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Baker, and to the late Lord Dearing for what they have done with technical colleges. It is a tragedy that we have so poorly provided for our young people’s vocational training needs. It is very good to hear of the action that they have taken in that regard. National Grid Transco runs a programme in young offender institutions that has reduced reoffending rates from 70 per cent to 7 per cent by offering those young people a guaranteed job after three months’ vocational training at NVQ level 3. More than 1,000 of those young people have been guaranteed a job under that scheme, but would it not have been better if they had received an education which grabbed their interest and gave them the opportunity to get into work rather than crime?

I hope the Minister agrees that it flows from what he has said that we need to recruit the very best people into teaching and give them the best training and continued professional development and support if they are to become the autonomous head teachers we seek who can make the best decisions for their schools. I join the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, in asking what plans the Government have for implementing the proposals for a Masters qualification for teachers. Primary school heads have told me that they are disappointed in the numeracy and literacy skills of some of their recent intake of teachers. There needs to be a greater commitment to attending to those skills of the teaching workforce, although I welcome the previous Government’s commitment in that area, particularly as regards Teach First. That is a very promising initiative with more than half the candidates staying on after the two years’ probationary introductory period. I welcome the new coalition’s commitment to expand that. However, I am troubled that teachers on the Teach First initiative will have a few months’ teacher training in just one school. This differs from a Postgraduate Certificate in Education, where students spend a year in two schools with more pedagogic training. In the past, many teachers had a Bachelor degree in education, gained after several years’ training. That is very important as the Teach First teachers may become the school leaders of the future. However, we are giving them a very shallow foundation in the theory of education at the start of their careers.

The Office for National Statistics found that in 2004, 9.6 per cent of our children between the ages of five and 15 had a mental health disorder. Teachers are not therapists, but good teachers have to be successful in managing their relationships with their pupils. They have to be particularly skilful in managing the relationship with those 10 per cent of children if they are to be successful teachers. Therefore, it is imperative that we insist on having the best teachers. Finland consistently has the highest outcomes in numeracy, literacy and science and very highly qualified teachers, all of whom have Masters degrees and undergo lengthy training. In Finland, classes are smaller but are all-inclusive with no streaming. I am not sure that they are allowed to exclude children, so teachers have to work with every child in a school. I am not saying that that should be the case in this country, but it suggests that investing in teachers is the key to success for all our children. It was gratifying to hear the Minister talk of the success of the academies. The noble Baroness, Lady Morris, referred to teachers. In the furore that may arise over the efforts to roll out academies, we should not forget how important it is to concentrate on obtaining the best possible teachers.

I look at what has happened in health over the years. The previous Government invested heavily in health, and we have seen much improvement; but we also now have a gross shortage of health visitors, and midwives in many areas are very demoralised, with case loads that are far too large. It is easy, even with the best intentions, to overlook the needs of the workforce. In the area of children’s services, too, the Government put in a great deal of investment, and there was much legislation; but still today we have a vacancy rate for social workers in London authorities of 40 per cent, and a shortage of 10,000 foster carers in England and Wales. We have alienated many of our best guardians—professionals working with children and families in our family courts. If we look back at our shadow, we see that we are failing sufficiently to support those people at the front line.

The noble Lord, in his eloquent opening speech, was very reassuring about expectations. In particular, he said clearly that this was not going to be a revolution. That is comforting; but how does he know that it will not be a revolution? He talked about the interest from many schools. This is perhaps something of a Pandora’s box. Once the genie is out of the bottle, where will it lead? My noble friend referred to the current multi-tier system, and I was comforted by his lack of concern; but, perhaps because of my ignorance, I fear that this might exacerbate a situation that we all recognise is highly undesirable, with a very good education for relatively few, and a very poor education for those who would most benefit from extra attention and support. Seeing soldiers back from Afghanistan visiting the House today, I am reminded of the need for the type of strategic planning that did not take place when we went into Iraq. When one starts on an enterprise of this importance, one must have a good strategy.

I turn to the admission to academies of looked-after children, and apologise for taking so long. Seven per cent of children in public care obtained five A* to C GCSEs in 2008, compared with 49.8 per cent of the general school population. We all recognise that the educational needs of looked-after children have not been attended to. The Centre for Social Justice report, Couldn’t Care Less, highlighted, among other outcomes for these young people, the fact that one-third of rough sleepers and 23 per cent of adults in prison had experience of care. It was very welcome in 2008 when the Government introduced a duty on schools to give top priority to looked-after children. A particular problem with these children is the instability of the system. Often, their foster placements will break down and they will be moved to a new area and foster carer in the middle of a school year. It helps immensely if they are the top priority for admission to the good schools in that area, and can therefore move into a good school in the middle of a school year. What was happening was that all the popular schools were full, so the children would end up in a school that had vacancies, which was less popular and less good.

The academies were exempted to some degree from this prioritising of looked-after children. I hope that the Minister will consider bringing forward an amendment to the Bill to ensure that these children get the priority status that they clearly need and deserve. Perhaps he will want to meet some interested parties at some point. Sarah Gentles is an excellent teacher who works for Shaftesbury Homes and Arethusa, and has supported young people in care with their education over many years. The Minister might like to consult her.

I am concerned that we might inadvertently be going towards a more divisive system. I look to the Minister for reassurance on that. I look forward to working on the Bill, and particularly to learning more about the very good outcomes from the current work of the academies. I hope that perhaps we will have an opportunity to meet some head teachers from those academies and learn more about their work.