Schools White Paper

Debate between Lord Bishop of Wakefield and Lord Hill of Oareford

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

Forgive me. We have discussed that point. The review of the curriculum will be announced shortly and that will be an opportunity to return to the points about which the noble Baroness feels very strongly.

[The Lord Bishop of Wakefield]

My Lords, from these Benches, I, too, thank the Minister for the Statement, its comprehensive nature and, particularly, for the title of the White Paper, The Importance of Teaching. One might make only one improvement to that title by stressing the importance of teachers. Given that I have taught in secondary and higher education, and I have a wife who has given her life to teaching, the emphasis on teachers in the document is particularly encouraging. Pressures on teachers—administrative, evaluative and disciplinary—have undermined morale over the past few decades, and the emphasis on teachers is very helpful. The slimming down of the curriculum is also helpful. I remember a few decades ago that a contrast was always made between France and Britain. France had a highly developed and overprescriptive approach to the national curriculum, and it is encouraging to see something more slimmed down.

However, I still have some points. First, I wish for reassurance about the retention of key core subjects in a slimmed-down curriculum and what those subjects might be. Secondly, the idea of working innovatively in schools on curriculum development is welcome, but support for that in small and rural schools will be required, because the necessary support within the schools themselves will not be there. Some reassurance on that would be good.

We should not lose the higher-education element in the training of teachers, because if we really are going to train teachers to promote a liberal education, the higher education element is just as important as the instrumental work that happens in schools.

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I agree with the right reverend Prelate that we could just as easily have called the White Paper “The Importance of Teachers”. I hope he, and other noble Lords, will accept that there is widely shared support on all sides of the House for teachers, for the important job that they do and for the status that we want them to have. As I said, there will be a review of slimming down the curriculum. We want to slim it down so that teachers have more latitude and more time in the school day to teach a broader range of subjects, as they think fit. However, the emphasis on the core subjects will be important, and the introduction of the English baccalaureate as a sign of the breadth of academic standards that a school offers will also help with content. I take the point about the importance of rural schools and making sure that arrangements there are properly taken into account. If schools increasingly work together in federations and partnerships, there will be more opportunities to deal with those arrangements. However, I think that we all need to reflect on the particular circumstances of rural schools, including small ones.