Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
Debate between Lord Black of Brentwood and Baroness Whitaker(4 weeks ago)
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Lord Black of Brentwood (Con)
That is not the case, as I understand it, but perhaps we could speak about that afterwards.
Most importantly, the regime is effective because inspection is best conducted by experts who know the sector. The ISI is made up of people who understand how it works. That is particularly true for boarding schools, which have a very different operational model from the vast majority of schools that Ofsted inspects. The noble Baroness rightly talked about accountability, which is an extremely important point. Peer review, in this case, is the best way to produce some form of accountability, but we will have to differ on that.
ISI is also, as the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, said, self-funding. So it is no burden on the taxpayer, which is an important point, especially in the current economic circumstances. Changing this tried, tested and effective system would be costly, placing additional burdens on Ofsted; it would be disruptive; and above all, it would almost certainly weaken standards of inspection because inspectors would be unfamiliar with the types of schools they were looking at, and therefore what issues of which to be mindful and aware.
I hear what the noble Baronesses say, but I do not believe the case for such a significant and expensive change has been made; nor, indeed, is there any clamour within the sector, or from parents and teachers, as far as I know, for radical reform of this sort. I hope the Committee will reject these amendments.
Baroness Whitaker (Lab)
My Lords, among several interesting amendments in this group, I support in particular Amendments 432A and 434 in the names of my noble friends Lady Blackstone and Lady Morris of Yardley. My reasons are exactly as I set out in our discussion of the previous group, so I will just sum up to my noble friend the Minister that we need to have an effective grip on unregistered schools, because of the undoubted harm to education and well-being being done—by some of them only—with impunity.