Education

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2023 Ministerial Corrections

[Beth Winter]

The National Foundation for Educational Research says today that a strategy for improving recruitment and retention should involve

“pay uplifts that are higher than pay growth in the wider labour market for most or all teachers”.

Does the Secretary of State agree? Is it not the case that she cannot address the crisis until she gives teachers and support staff the fully funded, inflation-plus pay rise that they deserve?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. In 2019, we launched the Government’s first ever integrated strategy to recruit and retain more teachers in schools, which had a number of different strands in it, including supporting teachers on the way in, recruiting more, and various routes into teaching. Of course, we have an independent pay review body and this year we accepted all its recommendations in full.

[Official Report, 16 January 2023, Vol. 726, c. 2.]

Letter of correction from the Secretary of State for Education:

An error has been identified in my response to the hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter).

The correct response should have been:

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. In 2019, we launched the Government’s first ever integrated strategy to recruit and retain more teachers in schools, which had a number of different strands in it, including supporting teachers on the way in, recruiting more, and various routes into teaching. Of course, we have an independent pay review body and this year, for academic year 2022-23, we accepted all its recommendations in full.

Inflation

The following is an extract from Education Questions on 16 January 2023.

[Mr Dhesi]

In addition to having grave concerns about recruiting and retaining teachers, schools in Slough and across our country continue to struggle with their budgets, with a quarter of primary school senior leaders reporting that they have had to cut outings and trips due to budgetary constraints. How will the Government ensure that children do not miss out on these vital opportunities?

[Gillian Keegan]

The autumn statement announced significant additional investment in core schools funding. The core schools budget will increase by £2 billion in 2023-24 and 2024-25. That will be paid into schools’ bank accounts in April, and I am sure they will welcome that additional funding.

[Official Report, 16 January 2023, Vol. 726, c. 16.]

Letter of correction from the Secretary of State for Education:

An error has been identified in my response to the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi).

The correct response should have been:

[Gillian Keegan]

The autumn statement announced significant additional investment in core schools funding. The core schools budget will increase by £2 billion in 2023-24 and 2024-25. This funding will be allocated to schools from April 2023, and I am sure they will welcome that additional funding.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Monday 16th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

1. What steps her Department is taking to improve the (a) recruitment and (b) retention of teachers.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

Our fantastic teachers do an amazing job day in, day out, and I am proud to say that we have increased the number of teachers by 24,000 since 2010. Recruitment and retention has been a key challenge in every industry, in every country and in every Department that I have worked in. Whether attracting data analysts at the start of the dotcom era, or broadening the routes into healthcare professions, it is always a challenge. We are bolstering teacher numbers through the highest pay award for 30 years and we are providing generous bursaries worth up to £27,000, as well as our levelling-up premium, which is worth up to £3,000 each year for five years for maths, physics, chemistry and computing teachers.

[Beth Winter]

The National Foundation for Educational Research says today that a strategy for improving recruitment and retention should involve

“pay uplifts that are higher than pay growth in the wider labour market for most or all teachers”.

Does the Secretary of State agree? Is it not the case that she cannot address the crisis until she gives teachers and support staff the fully funded, inflation-plus pay rise that they deserve?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. In 2019, we launched the Government’s first ever integrated strategy to recruit and retain more teachers in schools, which had a number of different strands in it, including supporting teachers on the way in, recruiting more, and various routes into teaching. Of course, we have an independent pay review body and this year we accepted all its recommendations in full.

[Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)]

On Friday morning, I was privileged to attend St Paulinus Church of England Primary School in Crayford to speak with teachers and to answer pupils’ questions. As my right hon. Friend knows, an inspirational teacher is often key to opening opportunities for a young person’s future. What more can the Government do to help to retain more of those good, aspirational teachers?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his work. Many of us have a treat on a Friday when we go into our fantastic schools and meet lots of children. The early career framework, which was introduced last year, is focused on trying to ensure that we support teachers, particularly in the first five years, so that we retain more of them. The figures show that the risk of retention is in those first five years, so we have put a lot of work and effort into making sure that we support them more during that period.

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

Of course, recruitment and retention of teachers is important, but all hon. Members will prioritise keeping schoolchildren safe from sexual predators. I am sure that the Secretary of State will be aware of the Scottish child abuse inquiry, detailing the horrific allegations from a number of witnesses to events at Edinburgh Academy and Fettes College by an individual referred to as Edgar. I have a number of constituents who have complaints against Edgar. This man has admitted to inappropriate behaviour and is currently fighting extradition from South Africa, where he has been publicly named. There is a precedent in England where another alleged abuser living in South Africa, whose extradition has been sought, has been publicly named. We now know that dozens of boys have come forward to the police with allegations against the man referred to as Edgar. It is important that others who were abused by this man can come forward. It is right that his crimes against children are named and it is also right that he is now named. It is for this reason that it is in the public interest that the real name of Edgar—that is, Iain Wares—is now publicly known.

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman. Child sexual abuse is an abhorrent crime and the Government are sympathetic to the victims and survivors of such abuse. As set out in November in response to the final report of the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse, it is important that due process is followed to allow investigatory and legal processes to take place to maximise the chances of conviction.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Can the Secretary of State confirm that the Government intend to raise starting salaries for teachers to £30,000 a year and that the pension entitlement that teachers enjoy is far higher than those earning the same wage in the private sector?

[Gillian Keegan]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. In line with our manifesto commitment to raise the starting salary, it is £28,000 this year and it will be £30,000 from September next year. I can confirm that the employer contribution to teachers’ pensions is 23.6%, which is considerably higher than for many in the private sector.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State says she wants to support teachers, particularly in the first five years, and that the £30,000 a year salary will kick in next year. In London, people often move after about five years because they simply cannot afford to rent privately or buy in the capital. What is she doing, both in the immediate and the long term, to make sure that we keep good teachers in London?

[Gillian Keegan]

The hon. Lady may be aware that we have a London weighting for teachers, but I accept that the costs of accommodation in London are extremely high in some areas.

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)]

It is, indeed, a treat to visit schools. On Friday, I visited the brilliant Horndean Technology College, where I was told that there are 20 ways of getting into teaching, but still schools are struggling to get teachers. What more can we do to slim down those 20 ways, which seem rather a lot, and ensure that we have well-qualified teachers to teach pupils to a high standard?

[Gillian Keegan]

One of the main things we are doing is making sure that we have bursaries to attract teachers, particularly in subjects where there is a lot of competition for those skills. I am actually hoping to increase the number of routes, because we are looking to have an apprenticeship for teaching at undergraduate level, so that people who need to earn and learn can also be attracted into teaching.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister, Stephen Morgan.

[Stephen Morgan (Portsmouth South) (Lab)]

Having dumped the Schools Bill, the only education policy this Government seem to have is a gimmick announcement on making maths compulsory until 18, a plan that experts say is unachievable in the light of the teacher recruitment crisis. What discussion did the Secretary of State have with the Prime Minister before his announcement, because surely she would have told him it was unworkable, given that the Government have missed their recruitment target for maths teachers in each of the last 10 years?

[Gillian Keegan]

We very much have a focus on making sure that our standards are very high in schools and that our children have the very best education to compete globally when they need to get into the workforce. If we look at every other developed economy, we see that in pretty much all of them children do maths in some form up to the age of 18, and we are a bit of an outlier. We are looking to raise the expectations and standards to make sure that our children can compete, and to also give them financial skills for life. Of course, we will work with the sector, and it is a longer-term strategy to make sure that we have enough maths teachers. We have a number of strategies already in place, because it is always tough to recruit maths teachers, and that is why we have introduced a bursary of up to £27,000 for all maths teachers and also for many science teachers.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

3. What steps she is taking to improve support for (a) children with special educational needs and disabilities and (b) their families.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

4. What steps she plans to take to improve the (a) accessibility, (b) affordability and (c) quality of childcare.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

I know how important childcare is to the Chair of the Education Committee, and I look forward to his Committee’s report on that issue. Getting this right is fundamentally important for parents and children, and my hon. Friend the Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing is considering all options to improve the cost, flexibility and availability of childcare and, crucially, outcomes for children. It may interest Opposition Members to know that since 2010 we have doubled Labour’s offer of free childcare for three to four-year-olds, from 15 to 30 hours. We have also introduced 15 hours a week of free childcare for disadvantaged two-year-olds, and parents on universal credit can claim back up to 85% of their childcare costs.

[Mr Walker]

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for that answer, and she is right to set out what has been achieved. She will recognise that access to affordable and high-quality childcare is high on the agenda of parents and Members across the House, and as she said, the Education Committee is looking into that issue. There has been much speculation in the media as to whether this issue remains a priority for the Government. Will she reassure me and the Committee that she plans further reform and investment in this space?

[Gillian Keegan]

I reassure my hon. Friend and the whole House that childcare is important to this Government —indeed, I met the Chief Secretary to the Treasury about this issue only last week. Helping working families to take up childcare and remain in work is a Government priority, and we have taken steps to ensure that that happens. We want to ensure that people benefit from a lot of the schemes we have in place, as some of them are underutilised. We have a £1.2 million Childcare Choices campaign to increase the use of such schemes, but we will go further. We are considering all options to improve the affordability and availability of childcare and, crucially, outcomes for children.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

Sadly, childcare is not the only thing that parents are struggling to afford, and I am grateful to Karen Taylor from Rooted in Hull for drawing to my attention work done by the Child Poverty Action Group on poverty proofing schools. That provides a toolkit for schools to look at their academic year, identify times when they are asking parents to pay money, and try to find ways to alleviate that and reduce the costs to parents. Will the Secretary of State join me in encouraging many schools up and down the country, academy chains and headteachers, to look at that toolkit and do what they can to reduce the costs associated with sending children to school?

[Gillian Keegan]

Of course we are always focused on what more we can do. We obviously have pupil premium funding, school uniform guidance and the highest number of children benefiting from free school meals, and in deprived areas we have introduced breakfast clubs. We all know that economically, times are tough, which is why we are very much focused on trying to get inflation down and on the Prime Minister’s pledge to halve inflation this year.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

Childcare is essential social infrastructure that underpins our economy by supporting parents to work. Yet in 2022, more than 5,000 childcare providers closed, and more than half of all local authority areas saw a net loss of childcare places. The Government have admitted that they pay providers less than it costs them to deliver so-called free childcare places, and with energy bills and wages going up from April, many more providers are at risk of closure. A crisis in our early years sector is happening right now. What are the Government going to do to stop further childcare providers closing?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. Actually, Ofsted data shows that the number of childcare places has remained broadly stable at 1.3 million since August 2015. At the spending review in 2021 we announced additional funding of £160 million in 2022-23, £180 million in 2023-24 and £170 million in 2024-25 compared with the 2021-22 financial year. That will allow local authorities to increase the hourly rates paid to childcare providers.

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

5. Whether her Department plans to increase revenue funding for further education.

--- Later in debate ---

[Robin Millar (Aberconwy) (Con)]

22. What progress she has made with Cabinet colleagues on the Family Hubs and Start for Life programme.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

Family hubs are one-stop shops that make it easier for families to get the support they need and I strongly support them. The Government are investing £300 million in the Family Hubs and Start for Life programme, and 75 local authorities will begin to open hubs later this year.

[Sally-Ann Hart]

East Sussex County Council submitted an excellent bid for a network of family hubs across East Sussex. Family hubs are a part of the solution to many national and local issues, and now more than ever are vital to many of our local communities. In addition to the roll-out of family hubs, what steps is my hon. Friend taking to ensure that this fantastic policy has long-term funding to maximise long-term benefits?

[Gillian Keegan]

I strongly agree with my hon. Friend. We are funding 75 councils for the current spending review period. I have no doubt that the excellent work in East Sussex, led by Becky Shaw and her excellent team, and across the country will make the case for further investment.

[Robin Millar (Aberconwy) (Con)]

I am very proud of the work the Government are doing with family hubs, early years and Start for Life. To give babies the very best start to life, every community in Wales has a cylch meithrin—an informal group of mothers, babies and young children. Care within the community is almost a tradition in Wales, but formal support for early years is more variable across Wales. What arrangements are there for sharing or exchanging best practice with the Welsh Government on such important areas?

[Gillian Keegan]

We have regular meetings with all the devolved authorities, and we share ideas about what we are doing and our policies so that we can learn from one another. There is no monopoly on good ideas; we are always open to listening and sharing.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Since the publication of the independent review of children’s social care, which will also improve the use of family hubs, hundreds of children have been taken into care while millions in profits have been put into the private sector. When will the Secretary of State publish the Government’s delayed response to the review? Will she look at York being a pilot to ensure that we can move forward quickly?

[Gillian Keegan]

I assure the hon. Lady that the Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing—the Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho)—is working actively on the matter. The response will be published soon, and I am sure that my hon. Friend will be happy to discuss further how we will roll that out and implement it.

[Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)]

8. What steps she is taking to support maintained nursery schools.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sara Britcliffe (Hyndburn) (Con)]

15. What steps her Department is taking to improve school buildings.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

In December, I announced a further 239 schools that will benefit from large-scale rebuilding and refurbishment projects as part of our school rebuilding programme, which will transform 500 schools across the country. I saw the huge impact that our investments are having at Coundon Court, where I met the headteacher Mr Heal and his students, who were very excited at the prospect of their new classrooms and design and tech and science labs. As Conservatives, we are investing in the future not only of the next generation, but of generations to come. On top of that, we have allocated more than £13 billion to improving school buildings since 2015, including £1.8 billion this year.

[James Wild]

I welcome the recent addition of the King Edward VII Academy to the school rebuilding programme, following the inclusion of Smithdon High School in an earlier round, and the new investment that is coming to North West Norfolk. However, given Smithdon’s grade II* listed status and the complexity that it brings, can my right hon. Friend assure me that funding for the school is protected? Will Ministers meet me to ensure that we get the heritage and other permissions we need as rapidly as possible?

[Gillian Keegan]

My Department is working closely with heritage and planning officers to ensure that we can address the condition of Smithdon High School as quickly as possible, while recognising the listed status of the buildings. We are working on the project with Historic England and the Twentieth Century Society, and we would be very happy to meet my hon. Friend and provide an update on progress.

[Sara Britcliffe]

In Hyndburn and Haslingden, we received the fantastic news just before Christmas that the Hyndburn Academy and Haslingden High School will be included in the next round of the school rebuilding programme. I eagerly await the next round so that schools in my patch, such as The Hollins, can apply. Can my right hon. Friend confirm whether school rebuilding programme funding can be used, in conjunction with other investment, for initiatives that benefit not only the school but the wider community?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank my hon. Friend for her excellent question. We encourage schools to play a positive role in their community, and many choose to provide access to sports and other facilities. The school rebuilding programme directly commissions projects rather than providing funding to schools, so, where feasible, we include additional facilities beyond the scope of a project, if it is funded by the local trust or the local authority. We are interested in making sure that school facilities benefit the wider community.

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)]

The Minister of State, the right hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb), visited Joseph Leckie Academy, which really helped, and I had a good meeting with the heads of Joseph Leckie and Blue Coat Church of England Academies along with my friend the hon. Member for Worcester (Mr Walker). However, the schools still lost out. Will the Secretary of State, or one of her Ministers, meet those two heads and me to find out why on earth they cannot succeed in obtaining funds for vital repairs?

[Gillian Keegan]

Obviously some schools are disappointed that they did not have access to those funds. We have announced funding for 400 schools so far and a further 100 will be included in future rounds, but we would be happy to meet the right hon. Lady.

[Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)]

A Schools Week investigation found that at least 40 schools contained so-called aero-concrete, while 150 more needed further investigation. Officials described the concrete as

“life-expired and liable to collapse”,

which is extremely alarming. NHS England says that it will take until 2035 to remove aero-concrete from all our hospitals; will we be waiting as long as that for it to be removed from our schools?

[Gillian Keegan]

Last year the Government published updated guidance on identifying and managing reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete. In March 2022, all schools were asked to complete a questionnaire about their knowledge of RAAC and its presence in their buildings and asking how, if they had it, they were managing it. We help schools where its presence is confirmed by providing the appropriate technical support, and we want to ensure that we continue that programme.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)]

16. What recent assessment her Department has made of the impact of inflation on (a) school budgets and (b) the costs to parents associated with the school day.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

Schools, like families and businesses across the world, are facing global inflationary pressures. The Prime Minister has pledged to halve inflation, and school funding will increase by £2 billion next year as well as the year after that. This will be the highest real-terms spending on schools in history, totalling £58.8 billion by 2024-25. In 2010, school funding stood at £35 billion, so we will be delivering a 68% increase in cash terms. The Government have also announced further support for parents worth £26 billion next year.

[Mr Dhesi]

In addition to having grave concerns about recruiting and retaining teachers, schools in Slough and across our country continue to struggle with their budgets, with a quarter of primary school senior leaders reporting that they have had to cut outings and trips due to budgetary constraints. How will the Government ensure that children do not miss out on these vital opportunities?

[Gillian Keegan]

The autumn statement announced significant additional investment in core schools funding. The core schools budget will increase by £2 billion in 2023-24 and 2024-25. That will be paid into schools’ bank accounts in April, and I am sure they will welcome that additional funding.

[Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)]

17. If she will make an assessment of the adequacy of the level of school rebuilding programme funding allocated to schools in Northumberland.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

T1. If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

Given this is my first Education questions of 2023, Mr Speaker, I would like to wish you, the House and everyone working in our education sector a happy new year, and to share some of what is to come from my Department.

Later this month, along with the Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing, my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho), I will be announcing our comprehensive plan to reform children’s social care. Soon after, we will return to bring forward our transformational improvement plans to support children with special educational needs.

I hope Members will join me in celebrating National Apprenticeship Week in February, and in April our schools will have something to celebrate as they receive their funding, which will include the £2 billion uplift announced at the autumn statement. This will see overall funding rise by 15% in just two years. We are investing more in our schools than ever before. By 2024-25, it will be £58.8 billion, the highest real-terms spending in history.

[Chi Onwurah]

Special educational needs provision in school matters. So many parents contact me either because they cannot access such provision or because it is inadequate. One family with two neurodiverse children suffering from bullying and self-harm found that their school’s SEN policy did not even mention autism or neurodiversity. The Minister said this morning that the Government’s response to the review will be published imminently. Can she confirm that it will be published within the month and that the clear standards she mentioned will be enforced?

[Gillian Keegan]

I take special educational needs very seriously, as does the Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing. It will be published very soon, so there is not long to wait. I am sure the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) will be delighted with the improvement plan, which we will publish very early in the new year.

[Duncan Baker (North Norfolk) (Con)]

T2. My constituent Hayley Turner is an inspirational campaigner for special educational needs, which she has improved enormously across the whole area. Evidence shows that early diagnosis and autism interventions are paramount to ensuring that children get the help they need. Hayley now uses her experience to help many others in the community. What are the Government doing to help neurodevelopmental services and to recruit educational psychologists?

--- Later in debate ---

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)]

As a former teacher, I support the right of our teachers to strike and will oppose this Government’s anti-strike legislation. Does the Secretary of State agree that constructive dialogue with our dedicated teachers is vital, rather than demonising them as “Bolsheviks” and “commies”, as one of her colleagues has disgracefully done?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I always believe in constructive dialogue. The very first meeting I took as we welcomed in the new year was with all four main teaching unions, and I will be meeting them again later this week.

[Peter Gibson (Darlington) (Con)]

T5. If we are levelling up, and trying to recruit and train more teachers in the north-east, why on earth has the outstanding Carmel College in my constituency been stripped of its accreditation to train teachers by a tick-box, form-filling exercise, destroying 20 years of hard work and leaving the north-east worse off?

--- Later in debate ---

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

T6. [R] I remind the House of my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I am glad to hear that the children’s social care review response from the Government is going to come out shortly and that the Government have set up an implementation board to progress its findings. More than 80% of children in care are in the care of the independent sector, yet that implementation board has refused to allow any representative from that sector on to that board. Why?

[Gillian Keegan]

I am committed to reform in children’s social care across all sectors. The Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho), has been working hard in partnership with the national implementation board and the wider sector to design a plan for reform that will introduce meaningful change for children and families. It is quite a small group, and we have deliberately kept it small, but I will ask my hon. Friend to take a look and check that it is representative.

[Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab)]

T10. The number of PE teachers has fallen by nearly 3,000 in the past 10 years, and the number of hours of PE taught by 36,000. With nearly a third of young people currently classed as inactive, what will the Government do to stop physical activity flatlining and make sure that young people can get the social, physical and mental benefits of PE in schools?

Fair Taxation of Schools and Education Standards Committee

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Wednesday 11th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

My mission is to make sure that every child in this country gets a fantastic education and every opportunity to make the most of their abilities. My expectation of excellence is the same whatever the type of school and wherever it is in the country. A good education is not a battle of this school versus that school—at its most basic, it means giving every child the means to find their place in the world. My job is to make sure that schools do that, and independent schools have a valuable role in delivering that.

By the Opposition’s own account, applying VAT to independent schools might deliver £1.75 billion more per year for schools. The key word in that sentence is “might”. I gently suggest that “might” could be over-optimistic, or even economically illiterate. The Government recognise that a good education is the closest thing we have to a silver bullet when it comes to making people’s lives better, which is why we are putting an extra £2 billion into our schools next year and the year after. This will be the highest real-terms spending on schools in history, totalling £58.8 billion by 2024-25. [Interruption.] I hear a few mumblings of “2010” from the Opposition Benches, so let me put that into context. When we took office from Labour, the spending was £35 billion per year. For those following the maths, that is a 68% cash increase.

Under this Government, schools will not need tax changes to receive extra money; they will not have to wait. Without that policy, they will be getting it from April this year, and even more—£2 billion, as opposed to an optimistic £1.75 billion.

[Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con)]

I thank the Secretary of State for giving way. It is a shame the shadow Secretary of State did not afford me the same courtesy—I thought a debate was an exchange of ideas. What the Labour party is actually proposing is to financially penalise parents for paying to educate their children. I would have thought that would affect the number of families who could afford to keep their children in the independent sector, and lead to an influx of children from the independent into the public sector. What assessment have the Government made of how much that would cost the taxpayer in net terms? My hunch is that it would actually cost more than it would raise, and therefore not only would the policy not deliver for everyone, it would not deliver for anyone.

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention, showing her economic literacy in full. I will get on to explaining some of the figures.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Gillian Keegan]

I am very happy to give way to the hon. Gentleman.

[Clive Efford]

This issue surely boils down to a moral argument. It is charitable status that gives independent schools their tax benefits, but what kind of charity requires a person to pay an average of £37,000 in order for it to benefit from tax breaks? Is that really a charity?

[Gillian Keegan]

There is the huge education benefit, but I think the hon. Member may have his maths a little wrong—I do not think the average is £37,000.

We are improving state-funded education, not undermining the aspirations or choices that parents have for their children. That is important. We are delivering a world-class curriculum for all schools, not attacking world-class institutions that secure international investment and drive innovation. We are driving school improvement, not driving small schools serving dedicated religious and philosophical communities out of business. We are providing the funding to schools that they need.

I am delighted that Labour decided to include school standards as part of this debate, as our record speaks for itself. In 2010, just 68% of schools were rated by Ofsted as good or outstanding, but we have taken that to 88%—hopefully the Members opposite are still following the maths—which is a vast improvement driven by the Minister of State, Department for Education, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb).

Moreover, the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson) should join me in praising the work of this Government. Since we took office, schools in her local authority of Sunderland have gone from 67% rated good or outstanding to 91%. Meanwhile, 97% of schools in the Leader of the Opposition’s local authority now enjoy a rating of good or outstanding—I am sure he has thanked my right hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton for his role in making that happen. The shadow Schools Minister, the hon. Member for Portsmouth South (Stephen Morgan), should also be grateful; when Labour was last in power, fewer than half of his local schools met that standard, but I am happy to share with the House that we have taken that dismal record and made it good—literally. Today, Portsmouth now boasts 92% of schools rated as good or outstanding. I want to take this opportunity to thank teachers, headteachers and support staff up and down the country for their incredible work over these years, as they have been the key drivers of this success. I can guarantee that we will not stop there.

Underpinning that record are improvements in phonics, where a further 24% of pupils met our expected standard in the year 1 screening. In just eight years from 2010, we brought the UK up the PISA rankings—the programme for international student assessment—from 25th to 14th in reading and from 28th to 18th in maths.

We will continue that trajectory as we build on the ambitions of the schools White Paper, which will help every child fulfil their potential by ensuring they receive the right support in the right place at the right time. This will be achieved by delivering excellent teaching for every child, high standards of curriculum, good attendance and better behaviour. [Interruption.] Somebody opposite mumbles “13 years”—I am sure that schools are delighted with the improvement I have just outlined over the past 13 years. We will also deliver targeted support for every child who needs it, making it a stronger and fairer school system.

Let us focus on the independent school sector. We are very fortunate in this country to be blessed with a variety of different schools. We have faith schools, comprehensive schools and grammar schools, to name but a few, all of which help to support an education that is right for children. The independent school sector itself is incredibly diverse. It includes large, prestigious, household names—in this House, we will all have heard of famous alumni from Eton—but there are 2,350 independent schools, and not many of them are like Eton. Reigate Grammar School, a fee-paying independent school that now charges £20,000 a year, once educated the Leader of the Opposition; like many in this category, it started as a local grammar and became independent. In fact, 14% of Labour MPs elected in 2019 attended private schools—double the UK average. I will be interested to see which of those hon. Members votes to destabilise the sector that provided the opportunities afforded to them.

As someone who did not benefit from such a prestigious educational background, I stand here focused not on the fewer than 7% of children who attend independent schools, but much more on the 93% who attend state-funded schools, as I did. As the Opposition wish to use parliamentary time on this issue, I would point out that the sector provides many benefits to the state and individuals alike. Independent schools attract a huge amount of international investment, with more than 25,000 pupils whose parents live overseas attending independent schools in the UK. As my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Dame Caroline Dinenage) pointed out, many could be working in our armed forces.

[Jonathan Gullis]

One of the greatest things I saw while working in the classroom, unlike those on the shadow Front Bench, was a scheme introduced under the Conservative Government by the former Minister for Children and Families, my right hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi), which provided looked-after children with scholarships and bursaries to some of the leading boarding and private schools across our country. Are schemes like that—giving those most deprived kids the very best opportunities—not under threat because of the Opposition’s dangerous ideological plans?

[Gillian Keegan]

Absolutely. We will always focus on the people we can help. The more people we can help through a diverse school system, the better.

The independent school sector also has an international presence, exporting services through campuses in other countries. The independent sector includes many settings that serve small, dedicated faith communities, some with lower per-pupil funding than state-funded schools.

[Alex Cunningham]

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way. She said that she wanted every child to have an excellent teacher, and so do I, but two thirds of teachers are planning to leave the profession in the next two years because of unmanageable workloads. What is the Government’s answer to that?

[Gillian Keegan]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. We have 460,000 teachers, which is more than we have ever had in our school system—in fact, 24,000 more. I am glad to introduce some facts to his argument.

The sector also includes special schools, where some places are state funded. That provides vital capacity for vulnerable pupils that could not easily be replaced. There are hundreds of independent special schools that provide world-leading specialist support to some of our most vulnerable children, whether that is hydrotherapy provision for children with physical disabilities; sensory experiences for children with autistic spectrum conditions or who are non-verbal; or invaluable one-to-one support for young adults with Down’s syndrome preparing to step out into the adult world.

Many hon. Members across the House will have someone in their family or know someone who benefits from those services, such as my nephew with Down’s syndrome and the son of my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Angela Richardson). More than 5% of children with an education, health and care plan rely on the provision offered by an independent school. Are the Opposition suggesting that we put VAT on those fees? Hopefully not—[Interruption.] I am delighted to hear that they would not as the policy evolves.

The Opposition’s proposed tax policy would create a number of different challenges across that diverse sector and the outcome is uncertain. The more affordable schools, many of which are former grammar schools, are likely to be at greater risk from an increased tax burden, and the closure of such schools would increase inequality and reduce choice for families. Many schools, when faced with a sudden hike in costs, are likely to seek to avoid passing on the full cost to hard-pressed families. Indeed, many might choose to reduce the bursaries and scholarships that broaden access to such places instead.

Almost 160,000 pupils at Independent Schools Council schools receive some form of bursary or scholarship. For clarity, Independent Schools Council schools represent only about half of independent schools, so the number of people receiving financial support is likely to be far higher. Any independent school closures or a reduction in bursaries would only increase the pressures on the state-funded sector. At the current average cost per pupil of £6,970, the projected cost of educating in the state-funded sector all the pupils we are aware of who receive some form of scholarship or bursary would be more than £1.1 billion. That does not factor in any additional capital or workforce costs to create places for those pupils.

In fact, research undertaken by Baines Cutler shows that, in the fifth year of the Opposition’s ill-thought-through policy, the annual costs would run an annual deficit of £416 million. Yes, hon. Members heard correctly: the policy could end up costing money. That could have been a contributory factor to the last Labour Government, during their 13 years in office, armed with a calculator and the figures, not implementing such a divisive policy.

[Bridget Phillipson]

The Secretary of State referenced the Baines Cutler report. Can she clarify who were the commissioners of that report and who tends to cite its findings?

[Gillian Keegan]

I would like to clarify that the figures that I used—160,000 pupils times £6,970—are our figures, so £1.1 billion is our calculation. The Baines Cutler report was commissioned by the independent schools sector. Of course, everybody in the sector, as in many other sectors, commissions research, but I hope that the hon. Lady is not suggesting that, because the report was commissioned, it did not have to be validated—of course, it would be. [Interruption.] If she wants to understand, it would cost £1.1 billion at the current average cost per pupil £6,970. I do believe that that is why previous Labour Governments did not implement the policy, because it would greatly undermine the benefit of any additional funding to the state sector, and it could result in Labour’s proposed financial benefit in fact being a net cost to the Exchequer.

I remind right hon. and hon. Members that two thirds of Independent Schools Council members—almost 1,000 of them—are engaged in mutually beneficial cross-sector partnerships with state-funded schools. Those schools share expertise, best practice and facilities to the benefit of children in all the schools involved. I thank my noble friend Baroness Barran, who is in the Gallery, for her work with independent schools to emphasise and grow those partnerships.

To give one example, Warwick School and King’s High School have worked together to support students to prepare for assessments and interviews to highly selective universities. An increasing number of independent schools also provide subsidised places for disadvantaged children through the Royal National Children’s SpringBoard Foundation’s broadening educational partnerships programme.

I am sure that the shadow schools Minister, the hon. Member for Portsmouth South, will be interested in my final example, which benefits teachers in his constituency—he does not appear to be that interested, but I will try. The Hampshire Physics CPD Partnership provides fully funded professional development workshops targeted at specialist and non-specialist physics teachers to support teaching at key stage 3 and 4. The partnership includes many schools and colleges in Hampshire, including UTC Portsmouth.

The proposals do not make financial sense; they do not make sense to parents and they certainly do not make sense to children in the sector. The Labour party’s policy is the politics of envy. In this Government, we do not have to level down to level up; I am not somebody who resents other people’s opportunity. As many hon. Members understand, I went to a comprehensive school in Knowsley that I could not boast about in the same way that the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South does, because it sadly failed generations of children.

[Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

--- Later in debate ---

[Gillian Keegan]

I will not give way; I think I understand my school better than most.

That is why I am hugely honoured to be in this role to support all children in any education setting to get the excellent education that they deserve. I do not want to level down anybody; I want to level up everybody. Our independent sector is a small but important part of our school system. It brings valuable international investment to the UK; it serves small, dedicated faith communities; it creates special school capacity; it drives innovation; it gives parents a wider choice; and its bursaries are a valuable tool for driving social mobility. We should not undermine that.

[Andrew Lewer (Northampton South) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend is making an excellent defence of the independent sector and its partnership work. Does she believe that Labour’s policy would also undo the fundamental principle that the UK does not tax the supply of education? Furthermore, there have been repeated references to “tax breaks” to mean simply not paying extra tax on top of the income tax that people already pay. That is a misleading description and should not be used to describe this ill-thought-out policy.

[Gillian Keegan]

I agree with my hon. Friend that there is lots that is misleading about the way the policy has been presented, and that the benefit of education is the reason it receives tax breaks.

It is not for the Government to determine the work of parliamentary Select Committees, but the motion proposes the setting up of a new Select Committee that would take up considerable parliamentary time and resources. If I am correct, the House published an estimated cost to the taxpayer of those Committees of £417,000, at the very least, in this calendar year alone. Furthermore, there is already a Select Committee empowered to look at these issues—one which I and my fellow Ministers regularly appear in front of—the Education Committee. I have no doubt that we will hear more from members of that Committee.

Our focus should rightly remain on improving standards at all schools, so we will continue to ensure that all state-funded schools have the funding they need to make sure every child receives the best education and opportunities possible. I remind Opposition Members of the £2 billion extra next year and the year after that was awarded in the autumn statement, as well as the figure for our overall spending on education of £58.8 billion as opposed to £35 billion in 2010. We will continue to ensure all state-funded schools have the funding they need so that all children receive the best education and opportunities possible. This proposal is the politics of envy. It is pulling the rug from under good independent schools in a weakly veiled, politically motivated, economically incoherent policy which will not help our mission to ensure that every child can reach their potential. We as the Conservative party do not level down; we focus on levelling up.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to be called so early in this debate. Since we are in the business of declaring where we went to school, let me say that I went to a comprehensive school in Barrow-in-Furness. The Secretary of State said that she went to a comprehensive school in Knowsley, but I invite her to explain what her Government are doing for more than half of the children in Knowsley who are failing their maths and English GCSEs. She is very welcome to intervene on me and explain what her Government are doing for those children in Knowsley, if she wishes. Would she like to do so?

[Gillian Keegan]

I am happy to intervene. The hon. Lady may have heard me say that, when I was at school, 92% failed to get the minimum of four or five GCSEs. I look at those schools very regularly and, yes, that has improved massively since then, but it is still nowhere near good enough. We are very much focused on supporting those schools, on maths hubs and on introducing maths, free phonics and lots of things that will help in the early years, as well as the teaching support and the development of teachers. She is absolutely right that many in my family, including my cousins and my cousins’ kids, have been to schools in Knowsley, so like her, it is a very personal issue for me.

[Cat Smith]

I am really glad to hear that the Secretary of State takes such an interest in schools in Knowsley, but in Knowsley, as in many parts of England, we have schools where children are failing to reach their potential, and that is not because of a lack of will from the teachers.

This debate is a good opportunity to pay tribute to our teachers, our teaching assistants and the parents supporting children at home, who make sure that our kids get the best education possible, as well as—if I may stray a little bit beyond the debate—the youth workers. Where we still have them, youth workers also support children’s education in an informal environment. It is an environment post covid in which, frankly, it is truly remarkable the lengths that our teachers and teaching assistants have to go to make sure that our children can access such an education.

I want to put on record my personal thanks to the headteachers cluster in the Lancaster and Morecambe area, who consistently and persistently meet me and my constituency neighbour, the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (David Morris)—we are meeting them again in a few weeks’ time—to ensure that, as Members of Parliament, we are aware of the challenges that schools face in the Lancaster and Morecambe area.

However, these teachers cannot continue to shoulder the burden for the Government’s failure. I would say that the education sector is in crisis, but we have now been saying that for many years, with no active response from the Government. The Government cannot continue to pretend that they are serious about investing in schools while the vast majority of schools are facing huge cuts, in spite of growing pupil numbers and costs. In Lancashire, 520 out of 564 schools face cuts this year, with £24.3 million needed to restore real-terms per pupil funding to its level last year. The staff who work in those schools desperately want to improve schools and provide better for their pupils, but they need the Government to meet them halfway and to help them do so.

This debate is not just about one type of school, and I want to talk about rural schools. I have some small rural schools in my constituency, and I recently met Rebecca Scholz, who is the headteacher at Scorton Primary School in my constituency and Calder Vale St John Primary School. She is already struggling to make her small rural school budgets meet the needs of her pupils. Those schools do not have school halls, so they have the additional costs of hiring village halls for PE lessons. They do not have school kitchens, so they have to get school meals taxied in from schools further afield that do have kitchens. All of this puts additional costs on these small rural school budgets, and it is making it very difficult for Rebecca to ensure that these schools are sustainable.

Capital Funding for Buildings and Facilities: Energy Efficiency

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Tuesday 6th December 2022 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

Today, I am confirming £500 million of additional capital funding for schools, sixth form colleges and Further Education colleges to help improve energy efficiency this financial year.

This comprises £447 million for schools and sixth form colleges and £53 million for FE colleges to spend on capital improvements to buildings and facilities, prioritising works to improve energy efficiency. The Department has published guidance for schools and colleges on sensible steps for reducing energy use and small-scale works to improve energy efficiency, which can be implemented quickly to make a difference through the colder months and beyond.

Schools and colleges will be allocated at least £10,000 of additional capital funding, with further funding allocated in proportion to size. Primary schools have been allocated an average of approximately £16,000 and secondary schools an average of £42,000. An average group of FE colleges will be allocated £290,000. Schools and colleges can decide how best to invest the capital funding on energy efficiency measures. Where they judge this is not appropriate based on local circumstances, they have discretion to spend this on other capital projects.

The funding will be made available to FE colleges and designated institutions, as well as schools already eligible for Devolved Formula Capital (DFC) allocations in financial year 2022-23. This includes eligible maintained nursery, primary, secondary and special schools, academies and free schools, pupil referral units, non-maintained special schools, sixth form colleges and specialist post-16 institutions with eligible students.

This funding comes on top of £1.8 billion of capital funding already committed this financial year for improving the condition of school buildings. In addition, the School Rebuilding Programme will rebuild or refurbish buildings at 500 schools and sixth form colleges over the next decade. The allocations are also on top of the £1.5 billion investment in upgrading the FE college estate through the FE Capital Transformation Programme, the more than £400 m of capital funding provided so far for T Levels providers, and the £150 million allocation of capital funding for colleges announced on 29 November.

The Government understand that like families and businesses across the country, schools and FE colleges are facing challenges with rising prices due to inflation. Significant increases to school revenue funding will help schools to manage these higher costs, with core schools’ funding—including funding for both mainstream schools and high needs—increasing by £4 billion in financial year 2022-23 compared to the previous year. The autumn statement 2022 confirmed that this Government will protect the per pupil funding levels committed to at spending review 2021 in real terms, providing an additional net increase in the core schools budget of £2.0 billion in both 2023-24 and 2024-25. This brings the core schools budget to a total of £58.8 billion in 2024-25. This additional funding will be used to support both mainstream schools and local authorities’ high needs budgets.

Overall funding for the FE sector is increasing with an extra £1.6 billion in 16-19 education in 2024-25 compared with 2021-22. This funding has come with stretching deliverables to transform our technical education offer—including T-levels, and extra provision to support education recovery to enable learners to catch up from the pandemic.

Schools, FE colleges and education providers are also benefiting from the Energy Bill Relief Scheme. This will reduce how much schools and other providers need to spend on their energy, and give greater certainty over budgets over the winter months.

Further details and the allocations for individual schools and college groups have been published on www.gov.uk.

[HCWS414]

Oral Answers to Questions

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Monday 28th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

1. What assessment she has made of the potential effect of changes to student finance rules on young people’s social mobility.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

We have always believed that anyone who wants to, and can benefit from it, should get access to a world-class higher education. Since we took over from Labour, 18-year-olds from disadvantaged backgrounds are 82% more likely to enter full-time higher education—that is for 2021 compared with 2010. Our reforms will make student loans more sustainable and fairer for graduates and taxpayers, and will help to boost learning across a lifetime, not just in universities. A full equality impact assessment of the changes has been conducted and was published on 24 February.

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

In his autumn statement, the Chancellor spoke for nearly an hour but failed to mention students once. The Office for National Statistics reports that three in 10 students are skipping lectures to save money and a quarter have taken on new debt because of the dire economic situation. Why are the Government neglecting students who are buckling under the pressure of the cost of living crisis?

[Gillian Keegan]

I assure the hon. Lady that the Chancellor did mention teaching and all our teaching staff, which of course includes university teaching staff. My Department continues to work with the Office for Students to ensure that universities support students in hardship by drawing on the £261 million student premium. Any student who is struggling should speak to their university about the support it offers. Many universities are doing a fantastic job to provide further support: the University of Leeds has increased its student financial assistance fund almost fivefold to £1.9 million; Queen Mary University of London has a bursary scheme for lower-income families; and Buckinghamshire New University has kept its accommodation rates for halls of residence at pre-pandemic levels, so a lot of support is on hand for students.

[Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)]

I warmly welcome my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to her new role and wish her all success. I strongly support the reforms to make the student loan repayment system fairer for students so that graduates will no longer repay more than they have borrowed in real terms. That is good news. Does she agree that Conservative Governments have delivered on our commitment to address student loan interest rates?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his welcome. We did commit to address student interest rates and we have delivered on that, which I am sure all hon. Members on both sides of the House will welcome.

[Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

2. What support the Government are providing to help (a) schools and (b) parents with the cost of living.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

I recognise the current challenges faced by families and public services. We know that things are tough out there, which is why we are acting in the national interest and why we have secured funding to increase the schools budget by £2 billion next year and the year after. All education settings are benefiting from the energy bill relief scheme, which will protect them from excessively high energy bills over the winter. In addition, we are committed to supporting the most vulnerable households through the toughest part of the year with additional direct support, and we are supporting schools and parents to make sure that we can all get through this.

[Grahame Morris]

I, too, welcome the Education Secretary and her team to the Front Bench. I thank her for that response, but I point out that due to runaway costs, schools can barely stay open for five days a week, let alone provide transport. Home-to-school transport is being pared back and public transport, certainly in east Durham, is unreliable and deteriorating. Can she give us some good news and tell us what she is doing to ensure that schools can afford to pay their heating bills and stay open? How will she guarantee access to education during the cost of living crisis?

[Gillian Keegan]

I can give the hon. Gentleman good news, because we heard in the autumn statement that education will be funded by an extra £2 billion next year and the year after. We will be working through how that will affect schools; each school will get its individual allocation. School funding is £4 billion higher this year compared with last year, and the autumn statement has confirmed that increase, which takes the core schools budget to an historic high of £58.8 billion. That will deliver significant additional support to pupils and teachers and will, I am sure, be welcomed by the sector.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

What steps is my right hon. Friend taking to promote the Government’s Healthy Start scheme, and to ensure that eligible families receive the vouchers to which they are entitled?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. The Healthy Start scheme, on which we are working with the Department of Health and Social Care, delivers healthy foods and milk for women over 10 weeks’ pregnant or anyone with a child under four. Beyond this, our investment in families is very important, and we are also investing £300 million in the Start for Life family hubs, which will complement all of the others. We will of course make sure that people are aware of all the schemes in those family hubs.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)]

I welcome the Secretary of State to her new position, and indeed her team.

It was deplorable that the Chancellor failed to expand free school meals in his autumn statement. It means that at least 100,000 schoolchildren in poverty in England will continue to be denied a nutritious meal at school, which puts additional pressure on parents trying to provide for them. Will the Secretary of State urge the Chancellor to replicate the work of the Scottish Government, who have committed to providing universal free school meals to all primary children?

[Gillian Keegan]

We understand the pressures that many households are under, and that is why we are spending more than £1.6 billion per year so that children have access to nutritious meals during the school day and in holidays. The Government have indeed expanded free school meals more than any other Government in recent decades. We have put in place generous protection that means families on universal credit will also retain their free school meal eligibility. We now have a third of children in this country on free school meals, and I know that is very welcome for the families. We will have extended free school meals, and we will continue to support further education students with them as well.

[Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)]

3. What steps he is taking to help ensure childcare is (a) accessible and (b) affordable.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rob Roberts (Delyn) (Ind)]

9. What steps she is taking to promote financial education in secondary schools.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

I am a passionate champion of an education that gives children the real-world knowledge and skills that they need for later life. A good grounding in maths for children is essential for understanding things like interest rates, compound interest and the changing landscape of financial products. On Thursday, I was pleased to visit Chesterton Primary School in Battersea with the Schools Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb), to mark the first ever set of national data on children’s times tables, alongside announcing up to £59.3 million of investment to continue to increase the quality of maths teaching.

[Rob Roberts]

In conversation with my local Jobcentre Plus team earlier this year, I was told that the No. 1 thing missing for school leavers is employability skills, which are partly about understanding finances, bank accounts, loans, credit cards and taxes—all the stodgy, boring, grown-up stuff. Does my right hon. Friend agree that making sure that school leavers are equipped with information about those things will stop them getting into financial difficulty as young adults and will set them up well for the future?

[Gillian Keegan]

I agree that understanding finances is essential; I learned that myself in my Saturday job at St John’s market, where I worked in a shop from the age of 13. Education on financial matters also provides an opportunity to teach about fraud. Pupils receive financial education throughout the national curriculum in mathematics and citizenship; for pupils of secondary school age, that includes compulsory content covering the functions and uses of money, financial products and services, and the need to understand financial risk.

[Anna Firth (Southend West) (Con)]

10. What steps her Department is taking to promote degree apprenticeships.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

I am currently the only degree apprentice in this House, but I am determined to ensure that I am the first of many. We have seen year-on-year growth in degree-level apprenticeships, with more than 148,000 starts since their reintroduction in 2014, including apprenticeships in law, accounting and clinical science. We are working in schools and colleges and with UCAS to ensure that more young people are aware of the benefits of apprenticeships. We are making £8 million available to higher education providers to expand their degree apprenticeship offers.

[Anna Firth]

In Southend West, 830 young people are undertaking degree apprenticeships, including many at our outstanding South Essex College. Does my right hon. Friend agree that if local businesses that require mechanics, bricklayers, lawyers and so on could be incentivised to connect with the college and help to train apprentices, rather than just providing work placements, it would be a brilliant way for local employers not only to headhunt the best students for good jobs, but to provide better-quality apprenticeships, boost opportunities and boost our local economy?

[Gillian Keegan]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend, who continues to champion students and businesses in Southend West. The local skills improvement plans that we have introduced under the Skills and Post-16 Education Act 2022 will place employers at the heart of local skills systems and will facilitate more dynamic working arrangements among employers, colleges and other skills providers. Essex Chambers of Commerce has recently been chosen to lead on the development of an LSIP for the Essex, Southend-on-Sea and Thurrock area. It is good to see that South Essex College is working with Essex Chambers of Commerce to achieve that.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I welcome the Secretary of State and her team to their new positions, or back to their old ones. From her work on the Public Accounts Committee, among other things, she will know of the desperate need in this country for digital and cyber skills. At the recent Silicon Milkroundabout, a special day called Next Gen was set up to encourage companies to take on new graduates or people with lower qualifications, but companies said that they would only really take people with three years’ postgraduate experience. Does she think that there is an opportunity in the sector to boost apprenticeships? Would she be willing to work with businesses in Shoreditch to promote them?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her welcome. I would be very happy to work with businesses in Shoreditch. When I was the skills and apprenticeships Minister, I worked with Ada, the National College for Digital Skills, and I know that it is vital for digital and cyber offers to be made across the landscape. I recently visited Aston University, which is working with a local college to develop an institute of technology to provide, for instance, much-needed digital apprenticeships and full-time courses, and I would be happy to work with anyone who wants to ensure that that vital provision continues.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

I welcome the Secretary of State to her latest position—she has had a dizzying array of jobs recently, so it is great to see her in this post, as I know that she has a real commitment to skills and apprenticeships.

I do not know whether the Secretary of State has had an opportunity to speak at length with the new Minister for Skills, Apprenticeships and Higher Education, the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), but when he chaired the Education Committee he stressed the need for greater flexibility in the apprenticeship levy. He spoke powerfully about too much of it being spent on managerial apprenticeships, and the Committee agreed entirely, so it was a considerable disappointment to hear last week that the Government now appear to be ruling out reform of the levy. Labour’s plan to increase its flexibility has been widely welcomed by employers. Do the Government recognise that the levy is not working, and that we need to give businesses and employers the flexibility they are demanding?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments, and for welcoming me and referring to the variety of jobs that I have had—in fact, I did 30 years’ worth of jobs before I came here, so I am used to a lot of change.

The apprenticeship levy was created to support the uptake and delivery of high-quality apprenticeships, and has been set at a level to fund this employer demand. We are making apprenticeships more flexible, providing new flexi-job and accelerated apprenticeships that are accessible to employers in all sectors—something I was working on when I was last in the Department. We have also improved the levy transfer system so that employers can make greater use of their levy funds. More than 215 employers, including Asda, HomeServe and BT Group, have pledged to transfer £14.62 million to support apprenticeships in businesses of all sizes.

[Chris Loder (West Dorset) (Con)]

11. What recent steps her Department has taken to ensure that dilapidated temporary classrooms in the West Dorset constituency are being replaced.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

T1. If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

I, too, pay tribute to my predecessor and the ministerial team. Last week’s national teaching awards celebrated the inspiring work our brilliant teachers do, and I am sure the whole House will join me in congratulating this year’s winners and saying a massive thank you to incredible teachers such as Angela Williams, who won the lifetime achievement award, after 37 years of inspiring young minds in the Huddersfield and Kirklees area. During her career, she has helped more than 18,000 young people to achieve their dreams.

This Government recognise that a good education is the closest thing we have to a silver bullet when it comes to making people’s lives better. That is why we are investing an extra £2 billion in our schools next year and the year after, and that will be the highest real-time spending on schools in history. That is what was asked for by teachers, heads and unions. Given that, I very much hope that both sides of the House will be united in calling on the unions to end the threat of strike action as our children work hard to catch up on lost learning.

[Mr Walker]

I welcome this ministerial team, especially my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), who did such a brilliant job as Chair of the Select Committee on Education. I look forward to working with them all and seeking to hold them to account. I have heard concerns from both sides of the House, including today from the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi), about the affordability of childcare, and I am keen that the Select Committee urgently looks into that matter. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, if we are to meet the Prime Minister’s objective of education being a silver bullet and helping more people into work, affordable childcare is essential?

[Gillian Keegan]

Yes, I very much agree with my hon. Friend and I would like to take a moment to welcome him to his place. I congratulate him on becoming the Chair of the Education Committee. I am sure he will do a fantastic job and I look forward to working with him.

The early years are a vital part of every child’s education, helping to set them up for life. We are committed to improving the affordability, choice and accessibility of childcare, and have spent more than £20 billion over the past five years supporting families with their childcare costs.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

[Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)]

I welcome the new Secretary of State to her position and, I am sure she will agree, to the best job in Government.

Parents in key worker jobs—care workers and teaching assistants—are spending more than a quarter of their pay on childcare. Parents across our country are being forced to give up jobs that they love because of the cost of childcare. Yet, in the last two fiscal statements from the right hon. Lady’s Government, there has been no action to support families. Why not?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her comments and for welcoming me to my place. It is indeed the best job in Government.

We have taken a lot of action in this area. The last Labour Government had 12.5 hours of free childcare. That is now up to 30 hours. We have spent more than £3.5 billion in each of the past three years on early education entitlements and more than £20 billion over the past five years supporting families with the cost of childcare. Thousands of parents are benefiting from Government childcare support, but we will also work to improve the cost, choice and affordability of childcare.

[Bridget Phillipson]

On schools, Labour is committed to ending the tax breaks that private schools enjoy and to investing in driving up standards for every child. Why should we continue to provide such

“egregious state support to the already wealthy”—

the children of plutocrats and oligarchs—

“so that they might buy advantage for their own children”?

Those are not my words, Mr Speaker, but those of the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. Does the Secretary of State agree with him?

[Gillian Keegan]

I agree that the most important thing is to ensure that we focus on every child who goes to a state school getting a brilliant education. That is about 90% of all children in this country. The policy that the hon. Lady has been talking about and that Labour is developing is ill-thought through. Indeed, it could cost money and lead to disruption, as young people move from the private to the state sector. It is the politics of envy. We have fought for an extra £2 billion in the autumn statement, the highest per pupil spend in history, and I am sure that the hon. Lady—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I remind Members that these are topicals and we want to get all the Back Benchers in. We do not want Front Benchers to take up all the time.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

T2. The further education capital transformation fund is seeing colleges across the country replan their estates and modernise their facilities. In my constituency, Harrogate College has secured £16 million and is replanning its estate around delivering T-levels and the skills for growth sectors. Is the Minister ensuring that these FE construction projects are all focused on creating estates to deliver the skills needed in the growth sectors of the future and their local economies?

[Gillian Keegan]

Yes, and I am delighted to return to the Department as Secretary of State to find that T-levels, which I launched as a Minister, are off to a great start. They are rigorous courses for young people. It is a fantastic achievement that, for the first cohorts of students, the pass rate was 92%. I urge all Members to visit their local college or institute of technology to see what the future of technical education looks like.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)]

Reports that this Government could cause monumental damage to higher education by restricting international students to so-called elite universities have been described by former Universities Minister Lord Johnson as a “mindless crackdown”. Can the Secretary of State confirm that this Government will not implement such a mindless policy?

[Gillian Keegan]

I can confirm that we have a world-class education system and we will attract the brightest students from around the world. That is good for our universities and delivers growth at home. We were proud to meet our international student ambition earlier this year to attract 600,000 international students per year by 2030. Today that is worth £29.5 billion and we are now focused on bringing in £35 billion from our education exports, which are the best in the world.

[Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)]

T3. Like many parts of the country, Aylesbury has too many people who are economically inactive despite the overall unemployment rate being extremely low. We also have many job vacancies where we need people with new or different skills. How can my right hon. Friend’s Department ensure that courses in schools, university technical colleges and colleges equip young people with the right skills for today’s job market?

--- Later in debate ---

[Gillian Keegan]

I think we have already discussed this to some degree, but we have extended free school meal availability. Now, more than one third of children in school settings have access to a free nutritious meal. We are spending £1.9 billion on that facility.

[Lia Nici (Great Grimsby) (Con)]

I met a 12-year-old constituent a couple of weeks ago. He has been excluded from school and is now being home tutored, but he is struggling to see where his home tutoring will get him in his aspiration to become a mechanical engineer. Will my right hon. Friend meet me to discuss getting some provision that will suit my constituent and people like him in my constituency?

[Gillian Keegan]

I would be very happy to meet my hon. Friend. I thoroughly enjoyed working with her on many things vocational and technical education when I was last in the Department. We very much need more mechanical engineers, so I encourage that young student and very much look forward to working with my hon. Friend.

[Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)]

What steps are Ministers taking to achieve the target of delivering 20,000 defibrillators in schools by 2023?

Hesley Group Children’s Homes: Independent Report

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2022 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

Today, the independent child safeguarding practice review panel published phase 1 findings from its national review into safeguarding children with disabilities and complex health needs in residential settings. I want to thank the panel for their work to date and for their continued commitment as they move into phase 2, which will make recommendations to improve practice and policy in spring 2023. I also want to extend my thanks to Doncaster Safeguarding Partnership and South Yorkshire police for their co-operation and contribution to the review.

The report outlines the shocking abuse and safeguarding failures in three dual-registered children’s homes/residential special schools for disabled children in Doncaster, owned by the private provider the Hesley Group. I am horrified about what has happened and I want to assure the House that this is something that I, and the Department, take with the utmost seriousness.

The children living in such homes are some of the most vulnerable in our society and it is imperative that we protect them from harm. We expect all children’s homes and residential schools to provide the right support, care and protection for children who live there.

Following whistleblowing referrals in February 2021, Ofsted undertook emergency inspections. The provision’s registration was suspended and the 60 children and young adults who resided in the settings were moved to alternative settings by May. I understand that the families and the children themselves found the urgency of moving a very unsettling and disturbing process, and my heart goes out to the children, young people and their families who went through this. Doncaster Safeguarding Partnership took the lead on investigating these incidents and on working with all other relevant local authorities to ensure that the children and families affected have received support and care and been able to participate in this investigation. I am grateful to them for their action.

Given the seriousness of the concerns and the vulnerability of the children, it has been important to learn lessons as soon as possible on how to improve practice and policy to protect children better in future. That is why the then Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi), agreed the panel should undertake a national child safeguarding practice review at the same time as the ongoing live criminal investigation. This is the first time that the panel has carried out a review while a live police investigation is ongoing, and I am unable to provide any further comments on specifics of the case as we need to respect that process.

The safety and wellbeing of all children and young people in the settings has been at the heart of all the decisions we have made. In January, my officials sought and received assurances from 55 local authorities (LAs) about the wellbeing of all of the children that had been placed in the provision operated by Hesley in scope of the investigation. In February my officials wrote out to remind all LAs of the importance of checks for all children placed out of area and the importance of ensuring that disclosure barring service and pre-employment checks are always undertaken prior to anyone’s employment in residential establishments.

We also asked LAs to review their commissioning processes for children and young people with complex needs and ensure that they acted on any concerns. The panel has asked all LAs in England to review urgently the quality and safety of individual placements of children in specialist residential provision, and they will report to the Department by the end of the year.

Phase one of the review has set out the complex interactions between special educational needs and disability (SEND) and children’s social care services, and the challenges regarding placement quality, commissioning and oversight. Phase 2 of the review will commence shortly and will ask some important questions about how children with SEND are safeguarded and cared for in residential settings. Most importantly, it will seek to identify ways in which practice, policy and the system might need to change to protect children better in the future.

The independent review of children’s social care and the SEND and alternative provision Green Paper provide an opportunity to reset children’s social care and SEND services and provide better outcomes for the most vulnerable children. Recent reports by the Competition and Markets Authority, the national child safeguarding panel and the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse will also be reflected in our response. Our plans for children’s social care and SEND reform are being drawn up in parallel so that reforms resulting from these reviews lead to a coherent system that works for all vulnerable children. We are rapidly working up an ambitious and comprehensive implementation strategy in response to the reviews.

However, I am committed to taking urgent action to change and improve the system as soon as possible. The Department will bring forward work to:

Strengthen the standards and regulations governing the care of children who are looked after to ensure consistently high-quality provision and inspection, with a high level of ambition for all children;

Strengthen the national minimum standards for residential special schools; and

Work with Ofsted to strengthen its inspection and regulatory powers to hold private providers of children’s homes to account.

We will work closely with other Government Departments and partner organisations, particularly local authorities, to review the role of the local authority designated officer (LADO) and consult on developing a LADO handbook that includes improving handling whistleblowing concerns and complaints in circumstances such as these.

In addition, I will convene a roundtable discussion with providers of residential special schools and children’s homes, to ensure they are holding themselves and their staff to the highest quality standards and are confident that the vulnerable children in their care are safe and having their needs met. While the majority of children’s homes are rated good or outstanding, I want to work with providers to tackle issues which have been highlighted in phase 1 of the panel report and act on the recommendations which will follow on completion of phase 2 of the panel’s work.

I also expect Ofsted, as the inspector and regulator of residential children’s homes, to take urgent action wherever safeguarding concerns are identified. I have written to His Majesty’s chief inspector of education, children’s services and skills to ask what lessons Ofsted has learned and the changes they have made as a result.

[HCWS343]

Crisis in Iran

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs if he will make a statement on the current crisis in Iran.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (Gillian Keegan)]

We have all been in awe of the bravery of the Iranian people since the death of Mahsa Amini over five weeks ago. The Iranian people have taken to the streets to express in no uncertain terms that the sustained repression of their rights by the Iranian regime must end. Women should no longer face detention and violence for what they wear or how they behave in public. The Iranian regime’s use of live ammunition and birdshot against protestors is barbaric. There have been reports of at least 23 children having died and non-governmental organisations suggest over 200 deaths during the protests.

Mass arrests of protestors and the restriction of internet access are sadly typical of this oppressive regime’s flagrant disregard for human rights. These are not the actions of a Government listening to the legitimate demands of their people for greater respect for their rights. It can be no surprise that the Iranian people have had enough. This year, 2022, has seen a sharp increase in the use of the death penalty, a sustained attack on the rights of women, intensified persecution of the Baha’i, and greater repression of freedom of expression and speech online.

The UK has been robust in joining the international community’s response to holding Iran accountable for its human rights violations. The Foreign Secretary summoned the most senior Iranian official in the UK on Monday 3 October to express our concern at the treatment of protesters. On Monday 10 October, the UK imposed sanctions on Iran’s so-called morality police and seven individuals responsible for serious human rights violations in Iran.

The UK has consistently raised the situation in Iran in the United Nations Human Rights Council and through other multilateral fora. On 13 October, the UK issued a joint statement with European partners condemning the death of Mahsa Amini and calling on Iran to stop the violence and listen to the concern of its people. On 20 October, the UK joined 33 other members of the Freedom Online Coalition in issuing a joint statement condemning internet shutdowns in Iran.

We continue to work with our international partners to explore all options for addressing Iran’s human rights violations. Through the UK’s action on sanctions and robust statements with international partners, we have sent a clear message. The Iranian authorities will be held accountable for their repression of women and girls and for the shocking violence that they have inflicted on the Iranian people.

[Bob Blackman]

Thank you for granting this urgent question, Mr Speaker, and I thank the Minister for her answer. I also thank the Foreign Secretary for his letter yesterday advising me that I have been sanctioned by the Iranian regime.

Since the brutal murder of Mahsa Jina Amini by the morality police, there has been a nationwide uprising in Iran. Contrary to what the Minister advised, the National Council of Resistance of Iran advised that more than 400 mainly female protesters have been murdered and that more than 20,000 have been arrested over the past 39 days of nationwide protests. Does my hon. Friend agree that we must issue the strongest condemnation of those killings and mass arrests? In order to do so, is it not right that we recall our ambassador from Tehran and even consider closing our embassy in Iran, to demonstrate that this is unacceptable?

Does the Minister also agree that we need to recognise the Iranian’s people right to self-defence and resistance in the face of the deadly crackdown, which particularly targets women and their right to establish a democratic republic? I note the sanctions that have been issued by our Government against particular individuals in Iran, but does she not agree that now would be completely the wrong time to renew the JCPOA—joint comprehensive plan of action—agreement and give Iran the capability to establish nuclear weapons? Does she also agree that it is now time to proscribe the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and—I say this to the Secretary of State—its assets in the UK?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank my hon. Friend, and I probably ought to congratulate him on being sanctioned—that shows all the efforts that he and many colleagues in the House have made to call out the regime and the terrible actions that are taking place in Iran. The death of Mahsa Amini is a shocking reminder of the repression that women in Iran face.

We condemn the Iranian authorities and have taken very strong action. We condemn the crackdown on protesters, journalists and internet freedom. The use of violence in response to the expression of fundamental rights by women, or any other members of Iranian society, is wholly unjustifiable. We will continue to work, including with our international partners, to explore all options for addressing Iran’s human rights violations. However, as my hon. Friend knows, we will never be able to comment on possible future actions, sanctions or designations.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

For the past six weeks, Iran has seen huge protests following the death of Mahsa Amini at the hands of its brutal morality police. Ms Amini was violently beaten following her arrest for breaching strict hijab rules.

Iranians in huge numbers have bravely said that they will accept this no longer. Women and girls are putting their lives on the line to lead a mass movement calling for nothing more than basic human rights and civil liberties. Braving severe state repression, hundreds of thousands of Iranians have joined protests. Over 12,500 have been arrested and, sadly, over 250 people have died at the hands of the security forces. Britain must support all those who stand up for basic freedoms, including freedom of conscience and religion and the freedom to live one’s life as one chooses.

It is clear that the Iranian regime is restricting information in an attempt to quash the protests. Internet access has been periodically blocked in the country, meaning that details of human rights abuses cannot be shared and protesters cannot organise. Freedom of information is integral to the success of any political movement. The UK must and can play a strong role in supporting an independent press in Iran. Reporters Without Borders has declared Iran one of the worst countries in the world for press freedom: journalists routinely face harassment, detention and threats to their family. What are the UK Government doing to encourage press freedom in Iran? What pressure is the UK putting on Iran to support fundamental human rights and freedom of speech?

The UK can and should lead calls for the UN Human Rights Council to urgently establish an international investigative and accountability mechanism to collect, consolidate, preserve and analyse evidence of the most serious crimes in Iran under international law. Can the Minister assure me that the UK will do so?

[Gillian Keegan]

There is much that we all agree on in this House, from our condemnation of what is happening in Iran to the actions we take and how we work with others. We are looking at all options to hold Iran to account for its human rights violations, and we are active participants at the UN Human Rights Council. On press freedom, last week we joined a statement of the Media Freedom Coalition condemning Iran’s repression of journalists. We will continue to do so, working with other countries and other groups to call out Iran, as well as taking firm steps, as I laid out in my statement.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs.

[Alicia Kearns (Rutland and Melton) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) on securing this important UQ. What we are seeing in Iran is state industrialised femicide. We are also seeing Iran being increasingly aggressive abroad in support of terrorist states and terrorist organisations. Will we finally act to sanction the IRGC, which is sending surface-to-surface missiles to Russia, supporting proxies across the region and spreading harmful radicalising narratives online? Will the Minister also broaden our classification of terrorist content beyond Salafi-Takfiri extremist ideology to include Shi’a Islamist extremist materials? That is the only way in which we will protect our communities at home from their reach.

[Gillian Keegan]

Yes. We have an assessment, which we have shared with my hon. Friend, of Iran and its support for regimes including Russia. We will continue to work with others to call out what is happening, and of course we condemn its support of anything to do with Russia’s war in Ukraine.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Alyn Smith (Stirling) (SNP)]

I am glad that you granted this urgent question today, Mr Speaker. I commend the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) for securing it and the Minister for her answer. The SNP and all of us stand in solidarity with the brave protesters in Iran in their actions against a brutal regime. I grew up in Saudi Arabia; I struggle to sound rational about any morality police anywhere. I am familiar with these men, I am familiar with what they do, and I stand shoulder to shoulder with the UK Government in their efforts to hold them to account.

The protests were triggered by the femicide—to our mind—of Mahsa Amini. There is a clear gender aspect, as I think we can all agree. Writing in The Sunday Times, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who has a greater familiarity than anyone with the Iranian regime’s brutality, put it best:

“Mahsa’s death is the latest blow to the people of a country long abused… Women in Iran are desperate. They are furious and restless. They cannot take it anymore.”

I commend the Minister for her statement, but what more can the UK Government do to ensure accountability for the perpetrators of femicide? Do His Majesty’s Government view the murder of Ms Amini as femicide? Further to the point that the hon. Member for Harrow East made about closing the UK mission, may I take another view and say that closing the mission would shut down dialogue when actually we need to continue those efforts in-country?

[Gillian Keegan]

Yes, we need to continue efforts and dialogue in-country. That also holds for continued discussion on the nuclear deal, which has been mentioned. We will always continue to work with our like-minded partners to ensure that Iran is held to account, including via the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva and the UN General Assembly in New York. At its 51st session, our permanent representative to the UNHRC in Geneva, Ambassador Simon Manley, raised the death of Mahsa Amini and called on Iran

“to carry out independent, transparent investigations into her death and the excessive violence used against subsequent protests.”

We have joined 52 other countries in issuing a joint statement to the Human Rights Council, urging restraint and accountability in Iranian law enforcement. The European Union, Canada and the United States have also sanctioned the morality police and certain individuals, and we will continue to work with those like-minded countries, but we cannot of course comment on any future designations or sanctions.

[Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) on securing the urgent question and on his being sanctioned, and I send a loud and clear message from this Parliament that we stand with the women and girls of Iran as they fight for their civil rights. However, it is not just in their own country that the Iranian regime is causing repression and havoc; it is also selling drones which are being used to attack civilians in Ukraine. Given that sanctions on Russia are working and its missiles are running out, may I urge the Minister, with the greatest urgency, to look very closely at how we can sanction those who are arming others who would do the Ukrainians harm?

[Gillian Keegan]

I can assure my hon. Friend that we will continue to look at any possible measures that we can take. I think she understands that I cannot comment on any of them, but we are aware of these actions, and we are aware of Iran’s support for the Russian forces.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) on securing the urgent question. I am delighted to join him in that select group whose members have obviously upset the regime by telling the truth about it.

I welcome the recent sanctions decisions, but I wonder whether there are any plans to extend them to other human rights abusers. Might the Minister consider the former technology Minister Mohammad-Javad Azari Jahromi and the IRGC commander Salar Abnoush, two people who would certainly merit being put on the sanctions list?

[Gillian Keegan]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on also being sanctioned. That is, of course, because of the work that he and other Members are doing in calling out these actions, and calling for more action from the UK Government as well; but I think he understands that we cannot comment on some possible future actions, or on individuals.

[Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

Murder and brutal repression internally, sponsorship of terrorism overseas, selling deadly drones that target civilians to the invading Russian army—the list of the crimes of the Iranian regime is very long indeed, and when we look at all these activities, it is the role of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps that comes up time and again. I do not expect the Minister to comment on specific sanctions measures, but will she at least pledge to the House that she will convey to the Foreign Secretary and her colleagues in the Foreign Office the message that it is the strong view of the House that the IRGC should be proscribed in full as a terrorist organisation?

[Gillian Keegan]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on being another of the seven individuals who have been sanctioned, and I thank him for raising these concerns again and again. We have made clear our own concerns about the IRGC’s continuing destabilising activity throughout the region, and the UK maintains a range of sanctions that work to constrain that activity. The list of proscribed organisations is kept under constant review. I will take back that message, but, as I know my right hon. Friend is aware, we do not routinely comment on whether an organisation is or is not under consideration for proscription.

[Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)]

These brave women are inspirational, and how lucky we would be if they were able to get out of Iran and came here to obtain sanctuary. Is there any chance of a lifeboat scheme for them, should they be able to get out?

May I also ask about something very practical? The Minister will recall that earlier in the Ukraine-Russia conflict the BBC was given extra money to ensure that the World Service could broadcast in Ukrainian and also in Russian. Is there any chance that that could also apply to BBC Persian, which currently faces the chop?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question and I join her in commending the bravery of the women in Iran. It is very easy for us to sit here, but what they are doing every day takes incredible courage and they really are showing huge strength. On BBC Persia, the BBC is operationally and editorially independent but we do provide funding, and the FCDO is providing the BBC with more than £94 million over the next three years to support the World Service. On any future actions we may do, obviously we keep everything under constant review but we do not have anything yet to announce in this area.

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

Sanctions glisten but they also cast a shadow. I am deeply envious of hon. and right hon. colleagues who have been sanctioned and I can only hope that mine is in the post. Can the Minister assure us that there can be no possibility of progress on the JCPOA while Tehran continues to export weapons of terror, particularly drone technology, to Russia to aid Putin’s war in Ukraine? Can she also assure me that, when the ambassador was called into the Foreign Office, that was made crystal clear to him?

[Gillian Keegan]

I am sure that my right hon. Friend’s letter could be in the post if he continues to raise his concerns so robustly. Iran’s nuclear programme has never been more advanced than it is today, and Iran’s escalation of its nuclear activities is threatening international peace and security and undermining the global non-proliferation system. If a deal is not struck, the JCPOA will collapse. In this scenario, we will carefully consider all options in partnership with our allies, but the JCPOA, while not perfect, does represent a pathway for constraining Iran’s nuclear programme.

[John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)]

Like the right hon. Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison), I am a bit upset that I have not been sanctioned yet. I obviously need to try harder, so here goes. We are talking about a bunch of women-hating homicidal maniacs and clerical fascists. On that basis, surely it is now time to ban the IRGC. Some of us have been calling for it to be banned for some time; my right hon. Friend the Member for Warley (John Spellar) and I called for it on one of the last sitting days in July. Now that the Government have had time to think about it, can they not just get on and ban it?

[Gillian Keegan]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his attempt to join his colleagues, and I am sure he will continue with that. As I said earlier, we have been clear on our concerns about the IRGC’s continuing destabilising activity, but we do not routinely comment on whether an organisation is under consideration for proscription. We will obviously maintain a range of sanctions that work to constrain the actions and some of the activities of the IRGC.

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) on securing this urgent question and I thank you for granting it, Mr Speaker. I say to my hon. Friend the Minister that Iran is now quite clearly a pariah state, which means that all our policy towards it must be directed on the basis that we cannot deal with it in the same way as any other state. It supplies Russia with weapons, it is now linked to China, it is developing nuclear weapons and the brutality that we have seen meted out to those who are peacefully protesting—as their human rights would allow them to do here—is appalling. Can I urge my hon. Friend, in response, no longer to continue with the JCPOA, because it is giving Iran succour while it is still developing nuclear weapons? Also, importantly, will the Government now proscribe the IRGC once and for all, to tell it that its behaviour will no longer be tolerated and that there are more sanctions to come?

[Gillian Keegan]

We have always been clear that Iran’s nuclear escalation is unacceptable. It is threatening international peace and security and undermining the global non-proliferation scheme. As I said earlier to my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison), while the JCPOA is not perfect, it does represent a pathway for constraining Iran’s nuclear programme. A restored deal could pave the way for further discussions on regional and security concerns, including in support of the non-proliferation regime. As I mentioned earlier in relation to the IRGC, we cannot comment on future sanctions, but we keep this constantly under review.

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

Of course we welcome the fact that the Government have sanctioned key senior officers of Iran’s brutal morality police and the revolutionary guard, as well as those involved in the supply of drones to Russia, but the sanctions are primarily focused on those based inside Iran. What are Ministers doing to ensure that those with links to the Iranian regime who have visas allowing them to be based here in the UK understand our strength of feeling about the Iranian regime’s unacceptable conduct towards its people, and towards women and girls in particular?

[Gillian Keegan]

Even having these debates—this is the second one on this subject in the few weeks I have been in this job—is helpful, and we will continue to raise the pressure, to work with allies and to raise concerns via our participation on the Human Rights Council. We will constantly keep things under review.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East on securing this important urgent question. There is a large Iranian diaspora in Southampton, and the women and girls who have been to see me have been clear that we must call out the murder of Mahsa Amini as femicide. It is the women and girls of Iran who are bearing the brunt of the repression. I would like to echo the comments about the BBC. Knowledge and information are power, and too little is coming out of and going into Iran to support those brave individuals. Will the Minister please go and talk to colleagues at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport to ensure that there is sufficient funding for the World Service so that the important work of BBC Persia can continue?

[Gillian Keegan]

I completely agree with my right hon. Friend about the bravery of the women in Iran, which I am sure those in the diaspora in her area are proud of. We will continue to work closely with our like-minded partners to ensure that Iran is held to account for the death of Mahsa Amini, including via the Human Rights Council in Geneva. As I mentioned earlier, the FCDO has put £94 million over the next three years towards supporting the BBC World Service, which is a vital lifeline for people both inside Iran and at home here.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for Harrow East on securing this urgent question. I know from the discussions I have had with the various opposition groups that lobby us here in Parliament that the profile that these questions give to the issues that concern them is important and heartening. I say to the Minister that it is clear that the Iranian regime not only tortures and abuses its own citizens but is now an exporter of terrorism across the world. I do not expect her to comment on what she is going to do in relation to proscription and sanctions against the likes of the IGRC, but what I think this House wants, rather than a statement about what she is going to do, is for her to just do it. We do not need her to tell us, and we do not need information about it—just do it!

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his instruction, gently delivered as always. Of course we keep everything under review, but as he has identified, it would not be appropriate to discuss any future actions at this Dispatch Box right now.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Could I ask the Minister to reassure the House that London will not become a place of safe refuge for the Iranian regime’s proponents? Can she assure me, for instance, that money from Iran that is funding pro-Iranian platforms in this country is closely looked at? There is also a substantial rumour that the families of the leaders in Iran are getting British passports, which is iniquitous.

[Gillian Keegan]

I can assure my right hon. Friend that I will look into the questions that he has raised. Obviously we have our own rule of law here in the UK. I have not heard the rumours about passports, but I will certainly look into that and write to him.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

Why is it still possible to purchase a cheap tourist flight from London to Iran for £158?

[Barry Gardiner]

If the Government’s sanctions are strong enough, surely we should be stopping travel to and from that country.

[Gillian Keegan]

As the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) points out, the price shows the popularity of the destination.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

The brutal regime in Iran is being financed by up to $100 billion a year of sanctions relief, despite delivering almost no concrete action on nuclear non-proliferation. Will my hon. Friend press our international partners to ensure that such sanctions relief is tied to Iran’s delivering on its international obligations?

[Gillian Keegan]

A viable deal was put on the table in March, which would have returned Iran to full compliance with its JCPOA commitments and returned the US to the deal. Iran has refused to seize a critical diplomatic opportunity to conclude that deal, with continued demands beyond the scope of the JCPOA. We are considering the next steps with our international partners but, as I am sure my hon. Friend is aware, we cannot comment on them at this point.

[Christian Wakeford (Bury South) (Lab)]

I put on record my support and admiration for those girls and women who are not only protesting, but putting their lives at risk on a daily basis. The violent crackdowns against civilians by the regime in recent days are a reminder of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s attitude towards dissent at home and abroad. Crackdowns against dissent are led by the regime’s ideological terror army, the IRGC. In light of the horrific state violence, both in recent days and in 2019, we have had multiple instances in this Chamber of both sides and all parties calling for the IRGC to be proscribed. When is it going to happen?

[Gillian Keegan]

I am afraid I must refer the hon. Gentleman to my earlier answer: we keep things under review, but we cannot comment on any future actions.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

I have listened carefully to my hon. Friend’s answers, but, considering that the IRGC finances and directs terror proxies across the whole middle east, including its Lebanon-based proxy Hezbollah, which has stockpiled more than 150,000 missiles on the Israel-Lebanon border, can she explain why we proscribe Hezbollah as a terrorist group, but not its financier and director the IRGC?

[Gillian Keegan]

There is obviously great strength of feeling on this subject, which, as I have said, I will take back to the Foreign Secretary. The list of proscribed organisations is kept under constant review, but we do not routinely comment on why or whether an organisation is under consideration for proscription, or the thought process behind those that are proscribed.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

I strongly support the sanctions the Government are imposing—indeed, I would like to see them go further—but will the Minister give a commitment that those sanctions will not have a negative impact on ordinary Iranian people?

[Gillian Keegan]

That is an important question; when we consider sanctions we always consider not only what can work, but the impact it will have on people. Our sanctions impose restrictions on the morality police as a whole and senior security and political figures in Iran, and will ensure that the individuals designated cannot travel to the UK and that any of their assets held in the UK will be frozen.

[Anna Firth (Southend West) (Con)]

The courage and bravery of those young women in standing up to the brutal and authoritarian regime in Iran is frankly incredible. They are superheroes and they deserve our full support and admiration. I am proud of what this country is doing to stand up for human rights in Ukraine, and we should be doing the same for those young women in Iran. I welcome the increased sanctions put in place last week on Iranian individuals and businesses responsible for supplying Russia with kamikaze drones used to bombard Ukraine. However, does my hon. Friend agree that as well as condemning the Iranian regime on human rights, we should also condemn its place on the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women? There can be no excuse for a regime that treats women with such contempt to sit on a commission that should be working to promote global gender equality and empowerment of women wherever they live.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gillian Keegan]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I congratulate my hon. Friend, because there will be people watching this urgent question and hearing what we are saying, whether among the diaspora or in Iran, and I am sure it gives them a great deal of strength and courage to know the strength of feeling in this place. The protests also send a clear message that the Iranian people are not satisfied with the path their Government have taken, and we urge Iran to listen to its own people, to respect the right to peaceful assembly, to lift all restrictions, to stop unfairly detaining protesters and, most importantly, to ensure that women can play an equal role in society.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

In the Minister’s response to my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David), she talked about sanctions against the elites, who often do not suffer the impact of broad-brush sanctions. What discussions has the Minister had with her counterparts in the Department for Education about removing study visas from the families of regime members, living here far from the restrictions in Iran, and particularly those imposed on women?

[Gillian Keegan]

I want to make clear that in addition to the sanctions recently imposed on 10 October, there are almost 300 sanctions on various activities, people and organisations within Iran. We continue to keep those under review, but I cannot comment on any potential future actions that may be taken.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

In recent months, the Iranian Government have systematically inflicted untold cruelties on the people of the Baha’i faith as the world looks on. As Baha’is across the world mark the twin holy days—I send them my best wishes—can the Minister tell me what precise steps the Government are taking to support and protect this important and targeted community?

[Gillian Keegan]

That question is very important and was the subject of a Westminster Hall debate not long ago. We condemn any actions that restrict freedom of religious belief.

[Kim Johnson (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab)]

I send my solidarity and support to the women and girls of Iran fighting for their human rights. Does the Minister agree that, in the light of recent events and the attacks on human rights, the BBC’s decision to close down its Persian radio service is deeply unfortunate when so many rely on it as a lifeline? Will she undertake to speak to the BBC director-general to ask whether the closure can be reviewed and reversed?

[Gillian Keegan]

BBC Persian is a legitimate journalistic operation, which is still operating and is editorially independent of the UK Government. However, I am shortly meeting with representatives from BBC World Service and I will discuss the matter further with them.

[Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)]

Security forces are demanding that teachers in Iran hand over the names of troublemakers, threatening arrest if they refuse. One teacher in Tehran has reportedly died trying to protect students. What support are the UK and our allies providing to protect teachers specifically from those terrifying abuses of their human rights?

--- Later in debate ---

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank the hon. Lady for bringing to light the plight of teachers. Many protesters are bravely protesting, knowing that they are putting themselves in danger. That is why I welcome the opportunity to put on record our condemnation of all the actions the Iranian regime is taking.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the Minister for her strong stance and her answers. It is encouraging to have time dedicated to this important situation, which is escalating at pace in Iran, but it is regrettable that many other groups face oppression from the Iranian state, and we must not forget them amid the ongoing crisis. Can she assure me and this House of her support for other religious and belief groups in Iran, particularly the Baha’i and Christians, who have long suffered at the hands of the Iranian regime and, with thousands of others, have had their freedom of religion and belief violated?

[Gillian Keegan]

I believe the hon. Gentleman also took part in the Westminster Hall debate, as many of us did. I met a number of people after that debate who were delighted that hon. Members kept pushing their case, but urged us to keep the debate alive and active and to call out wrongdoing wherever we see it.

Education (Careers Guidance in Schools) Bill

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 10th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mark Jenkinson) on his success in the private Member’s Bill ballot. Obviously he is a very lucky man—he knows that in many ways. I am delighted that he was first in the ballot, and I am really delighted that he chose careers guidance in schools as his priority. As we can see, it is also a priority for many Members in the Chamber, and we are all grateful that he chose it, as many young people across the country will be for many years to come.

I know that, like me and now many Conservative MPs, my hon. Friend is a former apprentice who has enjoyed the benefits of technical education and is keen to make sure that all young people get to learn about this brilliant route into the workplace. What a fantastic discussion, debate, and sharing of ideas and experience it has been. It is wonderful to hear of all the great work going on in our constituencies and how many hon. Members are involved in their schools, careers hubs and businesses, trying every day to bring them all together. It is clear that everybody involved in this debate recognises the importance of helping young people to achieve their full potential.

It was interesting to hear from the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) about the focus on engineering and manufacturing, and what happens when there is a disconnect between what young children can learn in their local environment and the needs of businesses. Indeed, that is a big focus of this Government: to try to bring those things together and to make sure we talk about things such as T-levels, which many hon. Members talked about. My hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton (Chris Clarkson) said that, I think, seven T-levels are coming to his area via Hopwood Hall College, while my hon. Friend the Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double) and others talked about the importance of T-levels and what that minimum of nine weeks’ work experience brings.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Esther McVey) is a real inspirational role model to us all, through If Chloe Can and the support that she has given schools through her charity for a decade. As the previous Member for Wirral West, she was also part of my careers journey, because I shadowed her for many a week.

A number of Members, including my hon. Friends the Members for Ynys Môn (Virginia Crosbie) and for Barrow and Furness (Simon Fell), mentioned the importance of extending careers opportunities to younger children—the year 7s—which is also very important. My hon. Friends the Members for Montgomeryshire (Craig Williams) and for Ynys Môn—maybe it is something in the water—mentioned the random nature of their careers and their journeys, and the people who helped them along their way. I think it is fair to say that all of us remember the people who help us on our way. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn is still grateful that I helped her on her way into this place, because it can be a tough career at times, although I am sure the people of Ynys Môn are very grateful for her sacrifice.

My hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart) talked about the importance of lowering the barriers for young people, which is what those interventions can achieve. “You can do it. Reach for the top. Don’t put those barriers in your way”—somebody needs to tell them that and give them permission to dream. That often happens in one of those interventions, and it is vital.

My hon. Friends the Members for Dudley South (Mike Wood) and for Great Grimsby (Lia Nici) focused on the investment in their areas, all the things happening there, the skills and opportunities that that will bring, and how important it is to align them and bring them all together.

High-quality careers advice is absolutely vital to help young people to prepare for their future. This Bill will play a key part in levelling up opportunity, ensuring that high-quality careers advice is available for all. Disadvantaged young people will gain most, as they face the greatest barriers. They have fewer role models and networks—they probably think networks are something to do with their PCs. This Bill will make a difference, with more opportunities for pupils to meet more employers from an earlier age and to be inspired about the world of work, including about jobs in emerging sectors, such as green jobs.

I thank all hon. Members for their contributions to this debate, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Workington, who has given us all the opportunity to come here today, to talk about this issue and to make a difference. I very much look forward to visiting the outstanding Lakes College and the Cumbria Careers Hub, ideally with the Careers and Enterprise Company, in the very near future, because I know that he has been inspired by a lot of the work being done there. We want to go further and faster, and ensure that every young child across the country has the best opportunity to get the best careers advice to help them on their journey in life.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time; to stand committed to a Public Bill Committee (Standing Order No. 63).

Oral Answers to Questions

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Monday 6th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)]

23. What recent assessment he has made of the potential impact of removing funding for BTEC qualifications on students wishing to undertake vocational qualifications.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

Employers are facing skills shortages that we must act to address. It is vital in a fast-moving and high-tech economy that technical education closes the gap between what people study and the needs of employers. Our plans for reform of level 3 qualifications were published on 14 July. We will continue to fund high-quality qualifications that can be taken alongside—or as alternatives to—T-levels and A-levels where there is a clear need for skills and knowledge that T-levels and A-levels cannot provide. Those may include some Pearson BTECs, provided that they meet new quality criteria for funding approval.

[Dame Diana Johnson]

The DFE’s own impact assessment says that pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds will lose most from scrapping BTEC funding, and that does not fit with what the Government talk about in their levelling-up agenda. Wyke Sixth Form College in Hull North, under the excellent leadership of Paul Britton, currently offers vocational BTECs in areas such as engineering, IT, computing, and health and social care—all highly relevant to our economic needs now. Given the growing problem of skills and labour shortages that the Minister has referred to, is not scrapping BTEC funding, with no tried and tested replacement, both damaging and short-sighted?

[Gillian Keegan]

We are not scrapping BTEC funding; we are upgrading our level 3 qualification offer to make sure that it keeps in line with the needs of today’s economy. T-levels were in design for many years. They were designed with 250 leading employers who said that the qualifications needed to be upgraded to keep up. Poor-quality qualifications benefit nobody, least of all those who are disadvantaged. All our qualifications will be high-quality and we will make sure that they offer clear progression routes into the workforce or into higher education.

[Judith Cummins]

Where learners over the age of 19 are returning to study, the removal of BTEC funding will mean that only those following an academic pathway will have the option to return to study or to skilled employment. How is removing learners’ options to progress to level 3 qualifications and to higher education or employment compatible with the lifetime skills guarantee offer? Can that be right?

[Gillian Keegan]

To be clear, the level 3 offer will also include T-levels; we are also considering access to those to a broader group. The lifetime skills guarantee is a level 3 offer specifically focused on adults that was introduced in April this year in more than 400 courses, all of which address a skills shortage. We are trying to make sure that when people put their time, and sometimes their own money, into study, it offers value to them and to the workplace. That is what is behind our level 3 qualifications review.

[James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the outstanding work done by Lackham College in Chippenham—the constituency of my hon. Friend the Minister for Universities—with regard to land-based training, agriculture, horses and animal handling, must be recognised in every possible way, and that many of these people deserve a BTEC? Will she also give some further thought to the question of how they fund resits, which at the moment are entirely unfunded?

[Gillian Keegan]

My hon. Friend the Member for Chippenham (Michelle Donelan) and I went to visit Lackham very recently and were delighted to see its investment in agritech facilities, which are groundbreaking and world class. It will mean that young people in that area will have the opportunity to study the very latest technology and techniques that will be required for our agriculture industry. In addition, there will also be a land management and agriculture T-level, which has been designed with the industry sector to make sure that many people across the country get the opportunity to study at that level with that investment.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

Some 230,000 students have just studied BTEC level 3 qualifications. For the Minister to stand there, as she just has, and dismiss those qualifications as poor quality will disgust those students and many of the people who have supported them. The Minister suggests she has widespread support, but 86% of respondents to the Department for Education’s own consultation disagreed with the Government’s plan to scrap funding for qualifications that overlapped with T-levels. Even the former Conservative Education Secretary, Lord Baker described it as

“an act of educational vandalism.”

Why are the Government intent on removing the ladder of opportunity from so many students, particularly those from the most deprived communities, when there is such widespread opposition to this move?

[Gillian Keegan]

I assure the hon. Gentleman that I would definitely not dismiss the BTEC qualification or its quality, and the reason I would not is that I am one of the very few people in this place who has taken a BTEC as part of their apprenticeship. I very much appreciated my BTEC as part of my apprenticeship, as I did my other qualifications.

T-levels are unashamedly rigorous. They are high-quality qualifications, and there is no point giving access to qualifications that are out of date and have not kept up with the requirements of the workforce. The skills gap between what our employers need and what young people study should not be there. This is an employer-led system. I will tell the House what is a tragedy—a tragedy is having young people not able to get on in the workplace because they have spent two or three years studying something that does not offer the value that employers need in this high-tech economy.

[Richard Fuller (North East Bedfordshire) (Con)]

7. What recent estimate he has made of the number of (a) primary and (b) secondary school places in North East Bedfordshire constituency.

--- Later in debate ---

[Cherilyn Mackrory (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)]

11. What steps his Department is taking to support the development of T-levels.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

T-levels are a fantastic new qualification, designed with leading employers to provide students with the best possible introduction to the world of work. We have provided a comprehensive package of support and investment to help trailblazing providers get ready to deliver. For example, we have made a total of £268 million in capital funding available for T-levels starting in 2020, 2021 and 2022, with £50 million-worth of projects having already been approved for providers delivering from this September and another £50 million-worth of projects for providers delivering from 2022. Additional revenue of £500 million per year will fund the extra T-level hours available, once fully rolled out, and we have also invested £23 million in T-level professional development to help teachers and leaders prepare for the delivery of T-levels.

[Cherilyn Mackrory]

I thank the Minister for her answer. I am proud that Truro and Penwith College in my constituency has been one of the first colleges to embrace the roll-out of the T-level courses. However, despite the successes of the first year, there is a need for greater flexibility—for example, with the 45 days of work placements in a part of the county where there is currently insufficient industry. Will the Minister agree to meet me and Martin Tucker, the principal of Truro and Penwith, to discuss how we can address that for the future?

[Gillian Keegan]

We are very grateful to Truro and Penwith College and all the trailblazing colleges that have pioneered T-levels. They launched T-levels in the middle of a global pandemic, and they have done an amazing job in getting the new qualifications launched. We have been implementing flexible models and approaches to make sure that we can deliver the work placements and that they are deliverable across all industries. Through the capacity and delivery fund, we have allocated nearly £165 million to providers to help them establish the infrastructure and resources they need to deliver industry placements. This will be a culture change: our businesses need to work with our education sector as well as the education sector working with businesses. We have also put in place a £1,000 per place incentive. Of course, I would be very happy to meet my hon. Friend.

[Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)]

12. What steps his Department is taking to tackle disparities in achievement at A-level between the north and south of England.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

16. What steps he is taking to encourage schools to equip students with the skills that businesses need.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

As previously mentioned, T-levels are the new gold standard that have been designed in collaboration with leading employers—250 of them—and our further education reform White Paper and Bill that will be coming before this place are focused on trying to put employers at the centre of our system, to make sure the skills people get give them real currency in the labour market and are backed up by significant funding. I have been lucky enough to visit many providers and speak to many students, and these qualifications are game-changing; the offer is unbelievable and I urge all Members to go out and meet their T-level students and encourage colleges in their area to offer them to students.

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I thank the Minister for that answer. The Careers & Enterprise Company has excellent potential to connect employers with schools but few businesses, large and small, I speak to in Thirsk and Malton have engaged with it and some have not even heard of it. What more can we do to raise awareness of it to make sure young people leave school with the skills that businesses need?

[Gillian Keegan]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Awareness is often one of the challenges of Government and it is why careers are a key pillar of our Skills and Post-16 Education Bill. We are investing over £100 million in financial year 2021-22 to help young people and adults get high-quality careers provision. This includes funding for the Careers & Enterprise Company to roll out its enterprise adviser network, on which there has been excellent feedback with more than 94% reporting that they are happy with it. Schools, colleges and businesses will be working ever more together; over 3,000 business professionals are already working as enterprise advisers, but I urge any businesses that have not yet signed up to get involved. If they want to build their talent pipeline, that is the place to start. I also urge all Members to encourage businesses to get involved.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Literacy and numeracy, digital and life skills are essential for young people to succeed at work, but progress on closing the attainment gap has stalled—indeed, it has gone into reverse—so will the Minister say exactly what steps the Government are taking to ensure that all children reach their full potential?

[Gillian Keegan]

Obviously it is vital. There has been much disruption during the pandemic. The first thing is to ensure that all children are back in school and able to stay in school and enjoy all their lessons. All of us will have been to schools and seen the joy in children as they go back to where they belong.

In addition, as the Minister for School Standards has made clear, up until the pandemic the attainment gap was closing; it had narrowed by 13% at the age of 11, and by 9% at the age of 16. Of course, the pandemic has had implications. That is why we have put forward a considerable long-term plan to help recovery in our schools, and every school will be working on that in the next year or two, but we are always focused on the most disadvantaged children and on making sure that we narrow that attainment gap after the terrible record of the last Labour Government.

[Kate Green]

But today’s Institute for Fiscal Studies report shows that two in five children did not even get minimum learning time during covid school closures, half a million left school this summer having received no catch-up support whatsoever, and the Government are funding just 10% of what Sir Kevan Collins says is needed for recovery. Will the Government finally adopt Labour’s children’s recovery plan? When we say we will invest in the skills young people and employers need, we really mean it.

[Gillian Keegan]

We set minimum requirements for all schools for what was required in terms of lessons, and of course we provided extra support, with BBC Bitesize, the Oak National Academy, additional devices—all the support we could. Clearly, it took a bit of time, because we were responding to a pandemic. However, it is clear that under the education recovery fund, which will remain under review, we have millions and millions of student tuition hours still to be taken. Many students are signing up for it; many of them will be receiving that additional support right now in classrooms. However, this is not a short-term solution; there will be longer-term answers.

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

Early Years Education Funding

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Wednesday 21st July 2021 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Fovargue. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) on securing this debate. I am grateful for the opportunity to discuss this important topic, and it is great to be joined by the chair of the APPG on childcare and early education, my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine).

Nurseries, childminders, teachers and parents have continued to support and educate our youngest children, providing crucial support throughout the pandemic. I would like to put on record our continued appreciation for their hard work. Taking a lead from my hon. Friend, I would also like to put on record our thanks to maintained nurseries in particular. I am a regular visitor to Chichester maintained nursery, which does a fantastic job, and I place on record my thanks to Ruth Campbell and the team at Chichester maintained nursery.

The early years experience is, as Members have said, a vital part of a child’s education, developing the cognitive, social and emotional skills that set them up for life. Evidence shows that high-quality childcare supports children’s development, prepares children for school and, of course, allows parents to balance work and family life. We are doing more than any previous Government to ensure that as many families as possible can access high-quality, affordable childcare. Some 96% of childcare settings in England are now rated “good” or “outstanding” by Ofsted. In 2019, 71.8% of children achieved a good level of development at the end of the early years foundation stage profile. That is where children have met the expected level across a wide range of learning areas, and compares to 51.7% in 2013—quite a remarkable achievement.

The Government invest heavily in high-quality early education. That includes the universal 15 hours of childcare for all three and four-year-olds, plus the additional 15 hours for working parents of three and four-year-olds. That was introduced in 2017 under a Conservative Government. The 15-hour early education entitlement for disadvantaged two-year-olds helps to improve the educational outcomes of disadvantaged children, to give them the best start in life. In fact, we have spent over £3.5 billion a year in each of the past three years on our early education entitlements, and we continue to support families with their childcare costs.

At the spending review last year, the Chancellor announced an extra £44 million for 2021-22, so that local authorities can increase hourly rates paid to childcare providers for the Government’s free childcare entitlement offers. At the same time, we increased the minimum funding floor, meaning that no council can receive less than £4.44 per hour for the three and four-year-old entitlements. To maximise the amount of funding reaching the frontline, we require local authorities to pass on to early years providers at least 95% of the Government funding for three and four-year-olds.

Further, we are varying our approach to funding the early years sector over this financial year to give local authorities and providers better certainty about their funding income. For the spring term 2021, we provided top-up funding for authorities that could demonstrate rising demand for free early education entitlements. For the next three terms, we will fund each authority based on attendance data they provide to us for each term. That will ensure that our funding aligns with attendance, which should provide very welcome reassurance for providers that funding for the entitlements will be commensurate with up-to-date data. The last 18 months have been particularly difficult. Nurseries, carers and parents have demonstrated a heroic effort in supporting the youngest members of our society. That is why we have provided significant support to the early years sector throughout the covid-19 pandemic.

Early years settings have had access to a range of business support packages during the pandemic, including the coronavirus job retention scheme, which is now extended to the end of September 2021. As long as their staff meet the criteria for the scheme, early years providers are still able to furlough them if they experience a drop in income. Findings from the childcare and early years provider and coronavirus survey have shown that in November and December 2020, 74% of the group-based providers had made use of the coronavirus job retention scheme at some point.

Eligible nurseries may also have qualified for business rates discounts to help reduce their bills. Eligible nurseries could get 100% off in the first three months of the 2021-22 tax year, with 66% off for the rest of that tax year. From 6 April, eligible nurseries have been able to access our new recovery loans, which were set out by the Chancellor on 3 March. Those help with access to loans and other types of finance, so that nurseries can recover from the pandemic. There has also been help for childminders, who are usually self-employed. The self-employment income support scheme has also been extended until the end of September 2021.

Our support for the sector goes wider than that. We are reforming our technical education. In September 2020 we introduced new T-levels, which are designed by industry experts and employers to bridge the gap between what they need and what young people can offer them. I am delighted that we have our first cohort of around 650 students now studying the T-level in education and childcare, which includes a large work placement. I thank the sector for its support for T-levels, which will provide a much-needed skills pipeline. Our investment in T-levels will benefit the early years sector.

[Wera Hobhouse]

Does the Minister not recognise that, however good the training is—and of course good, qualified staff are absolutely what our children need and our parents want—the qualification itself is not what brings staff into the sector? They must actually get wages so that they can pay their own bills. Unless we pay them more, we will not get staff into the sector, however good the training and qualifications are.

[Gillian Keegan]

Of course there is a relationship between pay and the work, work-life balance and type of job, but the sector still attracts a lot of young people. There is a lot of demand. In fact, the T-level in education and childcare is the biggest of the three T-levels that we have launched. There is the most demand for it.

In June, we announced £153 million of funding for training for early years staff to support our very youngest children’s learning and development, as part of a wider recovery package. In response to the pandemic, we announced £27 million to support children’s early language development, £17 million of which is to deliver the Nuffield early language intervention, or NELI, which is making a real, positive difference in schools up and down the country.

The Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford), recently visited All Saints’ Church of England Primary School in Merton and spoke to staff delivering the NELI programme about the children’s increased confidence with language and communication. That excellent programme is proven to give children the equivalent of around three months of additional progress. Some 40% of primary schools have already signed up, helping 60,000 children in this academic year.

Funding of £10 million will support language development for pre-reception children in the next academic year. Children in reception year will also benefit from the Government’s £650 million catch-up premium for schools, which will ensure that they are supported to make up for any lost teaching time.

Thanks to the financial support provided by the Government, and the hard work of settings to remain open since June 2020, I am pleased to report that we have not seen or heard of a significant number of parents being unable to access the childcare that they need. In fact, the number of places available to parents seeking childcare has remained broadly stable since August 2015. The majority of eligible two, three and four-year-olds have continued to access free childcare, despite the challenges of the pandemic.

Since 2013, more than 1 million two-year-olds who otherwise might not have received any early education have benefited from the childcare entitlement. Ofsted data published on 30 June shows that there were 72,000 childcare providers registered with them on 31 March 2021—a dip of 4%, or 3,300, since 31 August 2020. The data shows that the dip is largely driven by a fall in childminders, not nurseries.

Numbers of childcare settings on non-domestic premises are fairly stable over time, with a drop of just 1% since 31 August 2015 and a decrease of 2%, which is 400, between 31 August 2020 and March 2021. As Members would expect, the Department continues to work with the early years sector to understand how it can best be supported to ensure that sufficient safe, appropriate and affordable childcare is available to all those families who need it now and in the longer term.

I welcome the interest of the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), who has now left his place, and all hon. Members who joined this important debate. All the information and data that we collect is valuable because the Government obviously have to consider that in the forthcoming spending review.

[Steve Brine]

The Minister is coming to the end of her remarks. I quite like the point she made about there being places in the system and people being able to access those places, but they have been able to access them at great inconvenience to themselves. When Kings Worthy Pre-School in my constituency closes later this year, if indeed it does, people will access other places, but people who cannot drive will do so at huge expense and great personal cost. That is the issue: as suppliers come out of the system, it creates problems for parents. That is why we need a meaningful policy review.

[Gillian Keegan]

Of course, this is in the private sector. Places come in, there are mergers and acquisitions, businesses develop and businesses also exit the market. In fact, there were 3,929 settings left, but 2,108 new companies joined the market, providing 1.7 million places, so there is some volatility in the market. Clearly, if there is enough demand—that will obviously change over time, and demographics have an impact on that as well—the most important thing is to make sure that local authorities and parents can access childcare, and that there are sufficient places in the system. That churn will continue, because it is impacted by demographics, and obviously children move around the country.

I thank the hon. Member for Bath for scheduling this debate and for giving us the opportunity to discuss this vital issue, ahead of the spending review; it was very well timed. I hope she is reassured that the Government have the interests of children at the heart of our decision making. We are supporting our incredibly hard-working early years sector, and we appreciate it. It has risen so spectacularly to the extraordinary challenge presented by covid-19. We always look to continue to work with the sector to make sure that it continues to provide that fantastic service to families, parents and children across the country.

Question put and agreed to.