Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Thursday 6th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

The crucial task in which the taskforce is now engaged is preparing a kind of mini-clearing system in which there will be firm information about places available at specific universities and on specific courses that would have been available for suitably qualified overseas students at London Met. I can tell the hon. Lady and the House that that matching process will open and start on 17 September. We also know that the UKBA will not send out any letters about their 60-day limit to apply to the overseas students affected until 1 October.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I have a registered interest.

I put it to Ministers that although enforcement is critical, the message that needs to go out from the Government is that Britain is open for business in higher education, and that we care greatly about it for students, universities and our economy. What message is being sent by this Department to ensure that the world knows that we welcome higher education students and are proud of our record?

[Mr Willetts]

I very much agree with the right hon. Gentleman, as do the Government. Of course Britain is open for business. That includes being open to attract students from around the world who have a legitimate entitlement to study here. There is no cap on the number of overseas students who can come to study in Britain. Through our Foreign Office posts around the world, we have re-emphasised that message in the light of the experience of London Met.

Secondary Education

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Thursday 21st June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. One of the principal problems with our education system is not only that it has fallen behind other nations, but that it is one of the most inequitable, stratified and segregated. The way in which we tackle that is not by dumbing down on qualifications, but by raising expectations at every level.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I appeal to the Secretary of State to stop rubbishing everything that happened before he came into office; BG—before Gove—is not a very attractive proposition. Will he tell the House why Margaret Thatcher introduced a common national curriculum and a common examination system in 1988?

[Michael Gove]

I am at pains, I hope, never to rubbish everything that preceded this Government, but I want to tell the truth, and the truth is that, although there were improvements, many as a direct result of the right hon. Gentleman’s stewardship of the Department for Education, wrong turnings were taken, one of which, I am afraid, was to allow a race to the bottom in examinations, which serves no one’s interests.

Free School Meals (Colleges)

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Wednesday 13th June 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I am sure that it will be a pleasure serving under your chairmanship, Mr Davies, and I am pleased to be doing so. I thank hon. Members from all parties who have taken the trouble to attend what I consider an important debate. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith) for the enormous amount of work that she has done on this issue, bringing it to public attention.

I hope that we have reached consensus across political parties that action is needed. The issue is simple. Those who are in school and go through to school sixth forms continue to receive free school meals and those who are in free schools or academies from 16 to 19 or in university technology colleges are entitled to free school meals, but those who are in general further education or in sixth-form colleges are not. That is so inequitable, unfair and discriminatory that I know that the Minister will say, “Time to put this right.” As it is unfair and discriminatory, it is unjustifiable. The Minister might say, “Why didn’t you do this before?” Do you know, there are times in life when it is best to put our hands up and say, “We should have done.”? Of course, we introduced the education maintenance allowance. I was Secretary of State when we introduced it and I am proud of it, and I am sorry that it has effectively been abolished.

I was proud of our Government’s taking steps to equalise funding, which the coalition Government are continuing, between those in different forms of 16-to-19 provision. That is welcome. We do not, of course, have a pupil premium for those aged 16 to 19. Had we such a provision, it might be possible to argue that youngsters from disadvantaged backgrounds and low-income families would receive additional support, but they do not.

The issue is simple. Is it right that more than 100,000 young people, nationally, should be denied something—because they made a conscious decision or received proper careers advice and took up courses in sixth-form colleges and in further education—that those who continue into school sixth forms get automatically. Clearly, it is neither acceptable nor justifiable.

I hope that, with a smile on his face, the Minister—[Interruption.] I do not know how often he smiles.

[Angela Smith (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Lab)]

He is smiling a lot.

[Mr Blunkett]

I understand that the Minister is smiling now, and I hope that that will yield fruit. I know that the case that will be put over the next 85 minutes by hon. Members from all parties will persuade him.

We have two new sixth-form institutions in my constituency. One, known as Hillsborough college, is part of Sheffield college and the other is a free-standing sixth-form college called Longley Park. Both were established from 2004. Up to that time, my constituency regrettably had the third worst figures in the country for staying on in education post-16. Only Bristol South and Nottingham North were worse. A great deal of work was done by the Further Education Funding Council, which became the Learning and Skills Council, including, for example, research by Sheffield Hallam university on the causes and issues.

We were convinced that youngsters would stay on if there was an accessible institution, with support—the education maintenance allowance—and if their parents could be persuaded that youngsters would be supported in other ways. That worked. Both institutions that I have mentioned are now over-subscribed, contrary to what the cynics thought, and young people’s lives have been transformed. Now the colleges are worried about what is happening to the young people in terms of the careers advice that they receive, because careers advice has been in what might be described generously as an interregnum. I hope that, online or otherwise, advice will be more readily available.

Advice is skewed. Understandably, because it is human nature, schools with sixth forms do their best to persuade youngsters to stay in the school. If they can also say, “And you’ll receive free meals,” where entitlement exists and, “But if you take a different course or even the same one in a college, you will not receive free school meals,” that is bound to have at least some impact on a really disadvantaged family. That brings me to my final point, because I want other hon. Members to emphasise the situation.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

I am one of eight children and, unfortunately, felt the embarrassment or shame of having to claim free school meals. Not only should those aged 16 to 18 in further education who qualify get school meals, but there should be a way to pay for those meals that does not single them out: a cashless payment of some sort. In Liverpool, Walton, extrapolating what happens in school, some 24% of those going into FE could be entitled. It is important that we de-stigmatise people on free school meals.

[Mr Blunkett]

My hon. Friend is right. With the advent of new technology, it is possible to make the system sensitive, non-discriminatory and easy. Institutions with other facilities that are available to disadvantaged youngsters make them available appropriately and sensitively.

[Mr Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Blunkett]

Anything for Merseyside this morning.

[Mr Field]

I hope that the Minister has the same view as my right hon. Friend.

Some time ago, on a Friday afternoon, I asked a group of 15-year-olds in Birkenhead what they wanted from school. I asked how many of them would have their next proper main meal at their school dinners on Monday. About 40% of that group would wait till Monday for their next main meal. That does not mean that some poor families are not good at budgeting and would not ensure that their children were well fed over the weekend, but it underscores my right hon. Friend’s point that, for many families on low incomes, it is difficult to make ends meet. We give child benefit up to the age of 19, and school dinner costs wipe out that additional sum given to families.

I hope that the Minister will, with a smile on his face—[Interruption.] He is smiling. I cannot believe that it would be impossible for him, looking at the Department’s budget over, say, the past three years, to find a spare £30 million at the end of the year and allocate it to the task that my right hon. Friend has brought to his attention.

[Mr Blunkett]

I agree. I do not want to want to give away secrets, but there were times between 1997 and 2001, when I had responsibility for education, when I was told by officials that there was no chance of finding the necessary funding for small expenditure and schemes. I am sure that the Minister has found that to be so in the past two years. However, it is amazing, when suggesting taking away things that officials are particularly interested in, how the money suddenly emerges. I recommend that he think about that. The now Lord Heseltine mentions some interesting times when reflecting on his wily ways and getting his own way when he was a Secretary of State. I recommend that the Minister chat with him if he has any problems finding the resource.

Sheffield college, including Hillsborough college, takes on 47% of all the youngsters who had free school meals during their school life. Longley Park and Sheffield colleges between them have more than 1,000 youngsters who would have been entitled to free school meals had they been on a sixth-form course. That is clearly unacceptable, in particular given that Sheffield college has had to set up food banks to help students and that staff bring in food parcels for the youngsters, although, obviously, in a sensitive way behind the scenes. However, that is not a situation that we can countenance in 2012, whatever the deficit or the difficulties of the recession. I rest my case.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Teather]

Absolutely. I represent an inner-London constituency so I see very high levels of deprivation there, but there are also high levels of deprivation in rural areas, which is often unseen either because it is in pockets or because people might perceive that because an area is leafier it must also be wealthier. Many rural schools, including in my hon. Friend’s constituency, will benefit from the pupil premium and will be able to focus their efforts on raising the attainment of all their pupils.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I have written to the Minister’s colleague the Secretary of State about a specific issue relating to transient populations clustered in particular areas, such as north-east Sheffield, where as many as 25% of primary school pupils and about 15% in one secondary school do not claim the usual benefits that entitle their school to receive the pupil premium. I therefore take the unusual step of asking the Minister to come to Sheffield and to my constituency, so as to examine this issue and then reformulate the pupil premium so that such schools can be supported and helped?

[Sarah Teather]

Obviously, I have not seen the right hon. Gentleman’s letter to the Secretary of State, but I would be happy for either me or a colleague to come to see the specific issues in his constituency. I recognise the challenges of having a transient population and ensuring that all those families are claiming their benefits and are registered for free school meals. The Department is beginning a series of work to encourage schools to make sure that all families are signed up to free school meals.

Academies (Funding)

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Thursday 16th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gibb]

My hon. Friend is, of course, absolutely right. It is not clear where the Opposition stand on, for example, free schools. Since the election, the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) has said that he opposes the establishment of free schools. However, since the news broke that one of Tony Blair’s closest aides is setting up his own free school, the right hon. Gentleman has told journalists that he now supports free schools. Which is it: does he support our academies programme and the free schools programme, or would he close down those schools if he came to power?

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

When I published the original policy paper on academies 10 years ago, it was never intended that they should be overpaid and that local authorities should be underpaid for doing the job of supporting pupils. Can the Minister confirm that the 2.25% that has been withdrawn from school funding generally and the overspend on academies have denied other children the key services that they need to raise standards and give them the life chances that all of us should want for every child?

[Mr Gibb]

I think it is rich when former Education Secretaries attack us for this policy. We are talking about a system that this Government inherited from the previous Government, and we are trying to sort it out. We will look at every instance of underfunding or overfunding of academies on a case-by-case basis. We want to reach a position where all schools and academies in this country are funded through a fair, simple and transparent process.

Education Bill

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Tuesday 8th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The total increase as a proportion of the cohort was actually less than 1%, because it was a remarkably low base. The right hon. Gentleman cites a selective statistic, because he chooses only two years from Labour’s record. It is interesting that he chooses only those two years, because, when we look at the broad spectrum of statistics, we see that he cannot gainsay any of them.

If the right hon. Gentleman wants more statistics, why does he not look at the OECD programme for international student assessment—PISA—statistics? He quoted them yesterday, and they tell us what happened on Labour’s watch to every child’s education. We know that the poorest were worst off, but the other set of statistics that he invoked yesterday demonstrates that, actually, all our children were failed by Labour. We moved from fourth to 14th in the world rankings for science, seventh to 17th in literacy and eighth to 24th in mathematics by 2007.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Michael Gove]

Not yet. I shall be delighted to give way in just a second.

By 2010, we had moved from fourth to 16th, from seventh to 25th and from eighth to 28th in those subjects. In mathematics, 15-year-olds in Shanghai are more than two years ahead of 15-year-olds here. The OECD found that, in this country, the number of 15-year-olds who can generalise and creatively use information based on their own investigations and the modelling of complex problem situations is just 1.8%; in Shanghai, it is 25%—more than 10 times better.

[Michael Gove]

In a second.

The only way in which we will generate sustainable economic growth is by reforming our education system so that we can keep pace with our competitors. How can a country that is now 28th in the world for mathematics expect to be the home of the Microsofts, the Googles and the Facebooks of the future? The only way in which we can hope to compete effectively is not just by educating a minority to a high level, but by utilising the innate talent of every child, and that is what the measures in this Education Bill will do.

[Mr Blunkett]

Of course it is true that many countries throughout the world are investing in and driving forward their educational standards in a commendable way. However, the PISA study to which the Secretary of State referred and the changes in tables that he described are affected substantially—are they not?—by the fact that the number of countries taking part doubled, so he was not comparing like with like.

[Michael Gove]

I absolutely was comparing like with like, because the whole point about these tables is that they show us how we are doing relative to our competitors. Much as I admire the right hon. Gentleman, and much as I am grateful to him for embarking on a course of reform which, sadly, was thwarted subsequently, I have to acknowledge, as does he, that the statistics produced by the OECD are ungainsayable. I would love to be able to celebrate a greater level of achievement, but I am afraid that this is the dreadful inheritance that our children face as a result of the Government whom he latterly supported from the Back Benches.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I say to the Secretary of State that on reflection nothing is ever quite as good or bad as we think it is: I was not as good a Secretary of State as I thought I was, and I have a feeling that the right hon. Gentleman is not quite as bad as I think he is—at least I hope he is not.

The Bill is a mixture of incrementalism, with which I agree, contradiction, with which I do not, historical misinterpretation, downright old-fashioned conservatism and, with the exception of the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke), complete humiliation for the Liberal Democrats, who have been against most of the things in the Bill, but who now have to vote for it.

On incrementalism, as the Secretary of State managed to get across several times in his 52-minute speech, there is clearly much in the Bill with which the Labour party can agree and which in fact we put in place. However, there are major contradictions, one of which is that the more academies and free schools we have, the less the Secretary of State’s prescriptions on the curriculum, which he laid down this afternoon, will actually apply. In fact, I thought at one stage this afternoon that the Secretary of State was going to lay down a menu for all school meals that would have sweet and sour from Hong Kong, a little tortilla from Mexico and rolled herrings from Sweden, and would be dictated by the Secretary of State, so that nobody missed out on the five portions of fruit and veg required every day, because that is how he is coming across.

There has been a complete misunderstanding of the historic mission of providing diversity and flexibility. We would all agree on having the highest quality world-class headship and top-class teaching in the classroom, but the Secretary of State went into great detail this afternoon, picking out a bit of the curriculum here and a bit there from across the world, indicating that schools would have to teach certain things to reach a particular configuration—an indigestible menu that will in fact not be manageable by most schools. I therefore ask the Secretary of State to think again. He should by all means build on the progress that has been made, learn from the mistakes that we made and transfer genuine power to heads and teachers, but he should not pretend that he is doing that when he is doing exactly the opposite.

Another contradiction that I have noticed over the past few days is the way in which the Prime Minister has indicated that we should have a sense of identity inculcated in our schooling system and our society. I do not disagree with that—indeed, I have put that in place on a number of occasions, both in education and at the Home Office—but we cannot have that at the same time as seeking to abolish citizenship from the curriculum. If we really want to ensure that we have a sense of belonging and mutuality together, and that we understand our history, we need more than simply the teaching of historical figures, so that we can understand how our world works and how people find their place in it.

Above all, my worry about this Bill is the sheer politicisation involved. The power placed in the hands of the Secretary of State, with the abolition of the Qualifications and Curriculum Development Agency, is a worrying factor. Let us just imagine for a moment what our media, including our beloved BBC, would have done if we had abolished the QCDA and the Training and Development Agency, and placed their powers directly in the hands of a Labour Secretary of State. It would have been on the “Today” programme every morning, with somebody, probably from Real Education—it would probably have been the former inspector, Chris Woodhead—parading themselves, saying what a dastardly thing it all was, yet here we have a Conservative Secretary of State politicising the education curriculum and the education service.

This is not just about central administration; it is about an hegemony that can be seen throughout, with the politicisation of our life more generally. In each area—it is most heavily writ large in the case of the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, matched only by the current Secretary of State for Education—the parade is of freedom and localism, while the measures are about centralisation and diktat, and this goes right across the board. I fear that as the Government preach freedom, they take away the rights, as has already been described, of those who should be driving the system, namely the parents of the children concerned. Taking away rights in respect of the adjudicator and sheer fairness, as well as the right to have one’s voice heard and to get redress, will lead either to the courts or to complete disillusionment. Either way, that is a bad outcome for the education system.

As we are dealing with a Bill that includes a real rate of interest for students under the new fees system, which will create difficulties and have a dangerous impact on access, it is worth reflecting on the fact that Cambridge university has today announced that it will be charging the full £9,000 fee, because it believes that the demolition of the contribution from the Government—the taxpayer—towards teaching makes it impossible to do otherwise. The whole Bill could have been about building on progress made, learning the lessons or drawing down on world-class experience; instead, it is about—

[Mel Stride]

The right hon. Gentleman refers to building on progress and mentions Cambridge. Does he feel that much progress was made when only 42 pupils who were on free school meals went to Oxford or Cambridge in the last year?

[Mr Blunkett]

I was about to say that the Bill is about those contradictions and a historical misinterpretation. What the hon. Gentleman might actually be arguing for is an increase in access and a transformation in how schools relate to Oxford and Cambridge. I was at Cambridge last week—it was the nearest thing to being at Cambridge that I have ever managed, unlike my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), the shadow Secretary of State. I was pleased to be there and to find not pomposity or exclusion but a desire—from the students at least—to reach out to try to persuade students and staff in schools across the country that their pupils could aspire to the best we have to offer. Incidentally, it is not always Oxford and Cambridge doing that; it is often our best universities and their departments across the country.

I want to give time to those who have not had the privilege that I have had of contributing to education debates over the years, but I appeal to the Secretary of State and his supporters please to not reinvent the wheel. We do not need what the Business Secretary described as the perpetual Maoist revolution; instead, we can come together on sensible ways of improving the life chances of our children.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Brennan]

I do not have time to list them all, as the Secretary of State knows, but here are a few examples: which subject students should study, how teachers should teach and what types of schools communities should have. He will say that he is just nudging them in that direction, but a nudge with a loaded gun is very different from a gentle steer.

What is it about the Secretary of State, assisted by the Minister of State, the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb), that makes him so obsessed with grabbing more and more power at the centre?

[Mr Blunkett]

Megalomania.

[Kevin Brennan]

I would not quite go that far, but whether it is the power to close schools or the power to discipline teachers individually, which has been so carefully and consensually put beyond politicians in recent years, we have to ask why the big power grab.

I do not know whether any Members with children have ever seen the TV cartoon “Pinky and the Brain”, but the Minister of State and the Secretary of State rather remind me of it. As the title suggests, there are two characters. Pinky is good-natured, but he is dominated by the Brain, who is self-centred and thinks he is a genius. Every episode, after the opening titles, there is the following piece of dialogue: Pinky says, “Gee, Brain, what do you want to do tonight?”, and the Brain says, “The same thing we do every night, Pinky. Try to take over the world.” That could almost be a transcript of the ministerial meeting at the Department for Education. I know the Secretary of State thinks he is clever, possibly the cleverest boy in the Government, but trying to create an education system in his own image, with all the powers in his own hands, is ultimately a recipe for chaos, not world domination.

The Secretary of State is so intent on making sure that he grabs all the power to himself that he is getting rid of some of the bodies that might get in the way of his scheme not once but twice. Bodies such as the General Teaching Council, which was set up to give teachers the same professional autonomy as other valued professions, are abolished not only in this Bill but in the Public Bodies Bill, presumably just in case abolishing them once is not enough to make absolutely certain that they are absolutely dead. It is in case they suddenly rise up, like the false ending of some schlock horror film. We knew that the Secretary of State had a penchant for drama—we see it every week in the Chamber—although, I hasten to add, not enough of a penchant to include it in the English baccalaureate. However, killing a body twice to make sure it is dead is a bit over the top, even for him.

Why this centralising power grab? It is not just power for power’s sake, it is part of his vision of education. In their mind’s eye, the Secretary of State and the Minister of State see serried ranks of schoolchildren sitting at individual desks, preferably wearing short trousers, chanting after their teacher their conjugated Latin verbs and copying down the dates of the kings and queens of England from the board. [Interruption.] Did I hear a “Hear, hear” from the Conservative Benches? I think I might have done.

If the Secretary of State thinks that is how to raise standards, he is wrong. A curriculum designed to train a few people to run the empire is not a system that will inspire and motivate the next generation to use their talent and creativity to the maximum benefit of themselves and the country. He has made it clear that in his mind a grade C GCSE in an ancient language, a laudable achievement in itself, is more valued than an A* in engineering or information and communications technology. He is, to coin a phrase, creating an analogue curriculum for a digital age.

All pupils need the basic building blocks of literacy and numeracy, but beyond that, corralling pupils into a narrow range of subjects post-16 restricts choice and stifles creativity. Schools up and down the country, having been nudged by the Secretary of State with his loaded gun, are busily rewriting their timetables and pressurising pupils into taking GCSEs that are not necessarily the best ones for them to fulfil their individual talents. We must bear in mind the fact that they will already have studied history, geography, science and a modern language through the national curriculum. The English bac took a bit of a kicking from some Members on his own side of the House today, and he should listen to what they had to say.

Why is the Secretary of State doing all this? Just so that at the end of this Parliament, he can point to a measure that he invented and imposed ex post—that is a bit of Latin, in case anybody did not know—and say, “Look how we’ve improved things. More people are studying the subjects that we have retrospectively said they should have been studying all along.” It is actually pretty hard for people to fail a test when they have set the questions themselves. The provisions in the Bill on PISA tables are fine, but the Secretary of State had better stop misquoting statistics that he knows the OECD has disowned, and he had better stop ignoring evidence, such as that from Hong Kong or Scandinavia, when it does not suit his overall vision.

When the Secretary of State finally gets round to saying something about vocational education, which he seems fundamentally to believe is for people who do not do well academically, he should remember that medicine is a vocational training that he ought to support. His problem is that he sees the English baccalaureate as the premiership and any league table of vocational qualifications as the Beazer Homes league—[Interruption.] I agree that there is nothing wrong with the Beazer Homes league.

Finally, presumably the Secretary of State blames the previous Labour Government for the decline in social mobility in Government Ministers, and believes that it is our fault that the Government Front Bench is dominated by old Etonians, because we did not do enough on social mobility in government. On that point, I shall sit down.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Monday 7th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Teather]

I absolutely agree that the early years play a vital role in social mobility, which is precisely why the Government have chosen to prioritise funding in this way. Tomorrow, we will debate the Second Reading of the Education Bill, whose first clause provides the enabling powers for us to regulate so that we can help an extra 130,000 two-year-olds to experience high-quality early education by the end of the spending period.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

Does the Minister agree that there is an inherent contradiction in a policy that announces that the Government will protect the original local Sure Start programmes in the most deprived areas, which I was proud to develop from 1997, while, with the so-called “localism programme”, saying, “It is entirely the fault of the local authorities,” which have been denied the money to maintain those programmes in the first place?

[Sarah Teather]

The right hon. Gentleman is right to be proud of the Sure Start children’s centres, which are an excellent programme. That is precisely why the Government have made sure that the money is there in the early intervention grant, and why we have built on that by providing extra money for health visitors, through the Department of Health, and more money for things such as the family-nurse partnerships, which we know work on the ground and are often delivered through children’s centres. I believe that localism is the right way forward. Good local councils are thinking creatively about, for example, how to ensure that they can cluster their centres and merge their back offices, and how to prioritise outcomes for children—it is outcomes that matter.

Education Maintenance Allowance

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Wednesday 19th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I want to make some progress.

On travel, it is important that we recognise that local authorities are under a statutory duty to support young people aged between 16 and 19, and, up to the age of 24, any young learner with learning difficulties, to get to school or college. It is the law. Local authorities are failing in their statutory duty if they do not provide support. The Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009 strengthened that duty. Local authorities must consult young people and their parents, publish an appropriate plan and ensure that there is access.

I appreciate that local authorities, like all of us, are having to deal with the consequences of the desperate financial mess the previous Government bequeathed us, but the best local authorities are showing the way. Oxfordshire provides transport and totally waives the cost for any student whose family is in receipt of income support, housing benefit, free school meals or council tax benefit. Essex waives travel costs for children in receipt of a range of benefits. In Liberal Democrat-controlled Hull, any student in receipt of education maintenance allowance also receives a travel grant to cope with the full cost—

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

They won’t now.

[Michael Gove]

I suspect they won’t if a Labour council takes power, but if people are wise enough to vote Liberal Democrat at the next local election in Hull—[Hon. Members: “Oh.”]—or for the Conservatives in any seat where we are well placed to defeat Labour, they will have a council that is fulfilling its statutory duty. It is no surprise that there are Liberal Democrat and Conservative councils that ensure that all students receive the support they deserve. It is striking that that is in addition to EMA.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

Your constituency, Madam Deputy Speaker, mine and Nottingham North were identified 10 years ago as having the lowest staying-on rates and the lowest levels of access to higher education in the country. The evidence of the Higher Education Funding Council for England demonstrated that the barriers to staying on, including income disadvantage and cultural barriers, needed to be addressed, and that we needed a transformation of aspiration in schools. That transformation has taken place in my constituency, as it has across the country. There has been a 15 percentage point increase there, and a 20 percentage point rise overall, in young people staying on at 16, and there has been a transformation in the most deprived parts of the constituency.

When Sir Robert Ogden, a business man and philanthropist, first introduced bursaries in the mid-1990s in the south Yorkshire coalfield areas, he was, as my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) described, addressing the cultural barriers to young people staying on in education. He was addressing the culture in the community and the family as well as the attitudes of schools and young people. On that basis I was proud to introduce the education maintenance allowance pilots and subsequently the whole scheme, with the support of the then Chancellor. Of course improvements could be made to it, but it has literally transformed the life chances of children.

Children at the moment are currently the disadvantaged and unlucky generation. Child trust funds have been abolished; Sure Start ring-fencing has been lifted and cuts made to the scheme; Aimhigher has gone; youth and career services have been decimated; entitlement funds, which very few people have heard of, are being done away with; the future jobs fund has been abolished at a time of 20% youth unemployment, which is a catastrophe for young people and their families across the country; university fees are being trebled; and now the EMA is going too, including for young people who are already receiving it. That is a terrible blow for them and their families.

Yes, we do have a structural deficit, but by the time of the June emergency Budget it happened to be £10 billion less than had been projected in the Budget the previous March. There has been an increase in Government income above and beyond the result of the measures that the Government have taken, not least from north sea oil and the fuel escalator. We have substantially more money than expected coming in, but there are major cuts, each of them being justified by the same deficit reduction strategy. That means that any cut to any budget at any time can be justified simply by referring to the deficit.

Let us consider what we might have done instead. We could have included post-16 child benefit in assessable, taxable income. That would have been much fairer than cutting the EMA, but would still have been universal. We certainly cannot rely on the expansion of the discretionary learner scheme, because one sixth form in an affluent area receives as much for eight pupils as Longley Park college in my constituency does for 937. In other words, it is completely skewed.

For Gemma Darlow—she has given permission for me to use her name—whose parents were faced with eviction because her mum lost her job, for Yasin Yusuf, who is now at Sheffield Hallam university having come from Somalia, for Jade Fletcher and for Bianca-Jade Titchmarsh, the transformation in their lives, which they have told me about, is testament enough to why it is necessary to maintain EMA in some form, with a massive expansion in the £75 million currently planned. Some £4.2 million is needed for Sheffield college and Longley Park sixth-form college students alone, never mind the sixth forms in the most affluent areas. That is why the National Foundation for Educational Research material should not be misused; it took more account of those going through to school sixth forms than of those going to sixth-form college and FE college—a sector which, as was rightly said earlier, is the Cinderella of the education system.

We desperately need to get the message across that there can be a solution, because the abolition of EMA is bad for young people and families, bad for social mobility, and bad for the local and national economy. It is unfair and unfocused, and it will lead to the exact reverse of what everybody in this House preaches, which is improvement in staying on, attainment and the future of our country.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)]

We have had a good debate on EMA, and by and large—there were one or two exceptions—a well-tempered one. There were excellent speeches by my hon. Friends the Members for Wycombe (Steve Baker), for Blackpool North and Cleveleys (Paul Maynard), for Nuneaton (Mr Jones), for Morecambe and Lunesdale (David Morris), for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi), for Wells (Tessa Munt), for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), for Croydon Central (Gavin Barwell) and for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart). There were also passionate but temperate speeches by the hon. Members for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) and for Westminster North (Ms Buck) and the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett).

I listened carefully to the speeches of the right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr Wright). It is easy to oppose a cut in spending programmes. I was in opposition for 13 years and know that it is always tempting for an Opposition to back a campaign and jump on the proverbial bandwagon, but as every accountant knows, wherever there is a credit there has to be a debit. If hon. Members oppose the ending of a half-a-billion pound spending programme, they would have to find that money from elsewhere, but not a single one of the 20 Labour Members who spoke said which cuts they would make to fund that spending commitment.

[Mr Blunkett]

As a matter of fact, I did make an alternative proposition, which might not be universally welcomed by my party colleagues, which was that post-16 child benefit should be assessable for tax purposes.

[Mr Gibb]

That is the first of Labour’s policies to be put on to its blank sheet of paper; no doubt it will be one element in its debate.

The question for the Opposition is this: would they take this money from the schools budget?

Schools White Paper

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I thank my hon. Friend, the Chairman of the Select Committee. There is a role for the Select Committee and there is a role for Ofsted. The White Paper specifically states that we want Ofqual, the exams regulator, to benchmark our exams against the world’s best. The more data we have, the better. The White Paper also says that we will ensure that a sufficient number of schools take part in the international comparisons run by the OECD, the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study and other organisations. I am open to all ways of ensuring that we rigorously benchmark the performance of our schools and indeed our Schools Ministers.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

May I welcome those aspects of the White Paper that were directly cribbed from initiatives brought in from 1997? How does the Secretary of State justify the contradiction of being against targets but toughening them and introducing new ones, less prescription but more prescription, less central direction but more top-down diktats, and more freedom for some schools but direction and restriction for others? What form of geometry did he learn to square such circles?

[Michael Gove]

I am very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman not just for his question, but for his achievements as Secretary of State for Education. I have said it before, and I will repeat that he was an outstanding Education Secretary. One reason why he was so good was that he recognised that there is a time for central Government to play a role, and a time for them to let go. When he was Education Secretary, it was vital to tighten things up, particularly at the bottom, but, over time, he recognised that as the education system improved, we needed to let go more and more. We are saying that there should be a relentless focus on underperformance. We need tough standards for schools that are failing, but for those that can help there is, as Joel Klein said, a chance to liberate greatness rather than mandate it.

Education Policy

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Monday 18th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The Government have consulted on exactly who should receive the pupil premium. That consultation began earlier this year and there are still a couple of hours left should the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) wish to contribute to it—he has not yet done so. We are looking at a variety of measures of poverty and we wish to target the pupil premium most effectively on all children in need. One of the disadvantages of the way in which the previous Government targeted resources on the very poorest was that the premium attached to children who were eligible for free school meals was as low as £22 in some local authority areas.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

In fact, the pupil learning credit was £350 per pupil in the most disadvantaged schools.

Will the Secretary of State tell me what was the impact of the £600 million cut in area-based grant from the Department for Communities and Local Government, which was half the total announced on 22 June, and which cut child and adolescent mental health services, work dealing with teenage pregnancy and youth and careers services across the country, coupled with the £670 million cut in-year from his own Department? If we cut his salary by £40,000 and gave him £20,000 back, would he be better or worse off?

[Michael Gove]

I suspect that the taxpayer would be a lot better off, but I do not do this job for money; I do it because I am convinced that we need to do better to improve children’s education. The right hon. Gentleman was a great Education Secretary, and I wish to take this opportunity to pay tribute to him. During his years as Education Secretary, we were able to see an improvement in performance in primary schools that was not subsequently matched by any of his successors. Yet during his first three years as Education Secretary the amount spent on education in this country actually declined for three years as a proportion of national income, which proves that if the right policies are pursued and we are rigorous about cutting waste, we can ensure that children will perform better—that is what we are doing.