Independent Schools: VAT

Lord Hacking Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, as a number of your Lordships know, I prepared an assessment on the school fees issue. I believe that this assessment was fair, honest and accurate. I sent a copy to the Prime Minister on 15 August and have supplied a number of Peers with copies, including my noble friend the Minister.

On the essential issue of the likely forced pupil migration, it is clear that the Government’s assessment is patently wrong. The consequences are grave: no profits whatever for the much-needed benefit to state education; and 80,000 pupils being forcibly migrated from the independent sector. This must not happen. I ask my noble friend the Minister to prevent it.

Independent Schools: VAT Exemption

Lord Hacking Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, I stand here as a supporter of the Government, but no support can be blind. I cannot support the proposed VAT on independent school fees, whether or not it was in the manifesto. It is immoral and destined to bring about significant social and political damage to my party and the country.

There are many serious worries. For example, the introduction of an education tax will put us at odds with every country in the European Union and all federal and state law in the United States of America. There is also a serious worry about a blatant breach of the education provision in article 2 of the first protocol of the European Convention on Human Rights. Unfortunately, the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, is not among us, but we have heard his views through the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and he supports entirely what I just said.

The most worrying feature is the failure properly to assess the likely level of forced pupil migration from the independent to the state sector—a vital assessment. The VAT proponents have not revealed their calculations, but the arithmetic is such that any pupil migration above 10% will wipe out any profit for the state and become a progressive burden on the state. Since the VAT proponents are still claiming a profit of between £1.3 billion and £1.5 billion for the state sector, the assumption has to be that they are the working on a very low pupil migration figure, possibly as low as 5%.

There are other calculations. The October 2022 parent survey by the Independent Schools Council, conducted among 16,000 parents, found that 18.8% of parents were likely take their children out of independent education. In April 2024, a parent survey by the Times newspaper set a pupil migration figure of 26%. A preparatory school in Surrey forecasted the same 26% migration of pupils. The Hulme Grammar School in Oldham believes that 50% of parents will find it difficult to meet the VAT school fees. Scaling down the figures as far as possible, this means we are risking no less than 80,000 to 108,000 pupils being forced from the independent sector, with all the education disruption and distress this will involve, and with a big burden of new pupils being placed into the state sector.

The task, therefore, upon which I have embarked is to persuade my party not to carry this measure further forward. It must be noted that the well-endowed schools constitute only 10% of the independent sector, as the noble Lord, Lord Lexden, pointed out. The axe will fall not on them, although they will be affected, but on the hundreds of independent schools, some very small, throughout the country which are providing most valuable education to supplement the state sector. Take, for example, the independent schools in Greater Manchester that I recently visited—the Hulme Grammar School, which I have just mentioned, and the Bolton School in Bolton. As I learned, the parents are just working people employed in health, education, catering and hospitality. They are taxi drivers, joiners, carpenters, and all are making great sacrifices to provide a better education for their children. These are the very people my party has pledged to support.

Finally, I can only repeat that this VAT proposal is wrong. Any reasonable assessment of likely pupil migration will show that it will provide no benefit to the state but would be a heavy burden on it. I ask the Minister and the Government to respond positively to all these concerns and, as promised by the Leader of the House, to listen to constructive criticism.

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[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

No—the noble Lord has had the opportunity to have his say, and I want to respond to as many of the points that have been made as possible.

Private education is not an option for most of those people and, unlike the last Government, we will not build public policy around the expectation that public services will fail our children. Most parents need local state-funded schools to support them in meeting these aspirations. It is therefore right for the Government to focus on improving those schools—a public good that will benefit all of us.

Several noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, have identified the significance of education and the contribution that investment in that education makes. My noble friend Lady Ramsey identified the gap between that investment provided to our state schools and that provided to private schools: there was a 40% gap in 2010 and there is a 90% gap now. The noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, said that we should spend more on state schools. The noble Lord, Lord Winston, talked about the deprivation and impact on aspiration of those who do not get the education that they deserve, and argued for more investment. That is precisely what this Government want to do—but we arrived into government to discover a £22 billion black hole and, unlike the previous Government, we are determined to make that investment in our schools but make it on a sustainable basis whereby we can outline where that money is coming from. That is why ending the tax breaks on VAT and business rates for private schools is a tough but necessary decision. It will generate additional funding to help to improve public services, including the Government’s commitments relating to education and young people.

VAT will apply to tuition and boarding fees charged by private schools for terms starting on or after 1 January 2025. I assure noble Lords that the impact of those changes has been assessed and that the Office for Budget Responsibility will certify the Government’s costings for those measures at the Budget.

Several noble Lords have asked what the impact will be of introducing the change on 1 January. We are impatient in this Government to ensure that we can start funding the improvements that so many noble Lords have argued for—that is one reason. It is also worth while, when thinking about the impact of the changes, to recognise that, for many pupils, the change should not mean that parents will automatically face 20% higher fees—nor do we expect pupils to move immediately. Most of the analysis suggests that that will not happen to the extent that pupils move at all—and I shall return to that point.

The Government expect private schools to take steps to minimise fee increases, including through reclaiming the VAT that they incur in supplying education and boarding—so the estimate is that the real VAT impact will be 15%. We think that that will happen, because we have seen what has happened in recent times. There have been above-inflation increases in private school fees for very many years. There has been a 55% increase since 2003 and a 20% increase since 2010, and there has not been a large exodus of pupils from those schools, which of course suggests an inelastic demand for private school places. It is reasonable for the Government to model and think about future impact based on previous experience.

We have provided considerable information around the proposal—both in the technical note and the draft VAT legislation. The technical consultation remains open until 15 September, and I encourage those who are interested to contribute to that as well.

The noble Baroness, Lady Monckton, raised a specific issue about the support to implement the VAT regime. The Government recognise that this will be the first time for many schools that they will need to register for VAT, and HMRC will publish bespoke guidance. It will also contact private schools directly with information about support sessions that will help them to go through this process.

The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, and the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, raised issues about what potential there is to raise revenue here. This will of course be part of the OBR assessment that will be published alongside the Finance Bill at the time of the Budget, which will enable us to consider the broad impact of this—not just the taxation impact but the broader cost impact as well. The IFS estimates that it will raise an extra £1.3 billion to £1.5 billion per year in the medium to long term. As I say, these points will be certified by the Office for Budget Responsibility. The Treasury is doing an economic analysis of the impact of this policy change and the interaction with other behaviours that might come about because of the introduction of VAT.

While there will be more detailed information about the revenue raised by this measure, this seems like a reasonable estimate of the revenue that will be raised. Unlike some other noble Lords, I do not see that amount of money as being inconsiderable. Of course there is more that I would certainly hope that we as a Government will be able to find to invest in education, as previous Labour Governments have, but this is an important contribution to some very important changes that we wish to make.

The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, asked about the devolution consequences of VAT receipts. I assure her that additional funding provided for schools in England will be matched in the devolved Administrations in line with the Barnett formula.

I move to the issue of special educational needs. Understandably, this has been raised by many noble Lords this afternoon, in particular the noble Lord, Lord Shinkwin, in his contribution about the enormous significance of the independent special school that he identified, and the noble Baroness, Lady Monckton. Once again, I say that there is excellence in the private sector in independent special schools. Such excellence is the reason why, when there is a particular need for a pupil educated in the state sector to benefit from that excellence and its provisions for their education, health and care plan, that place is paid for by the local authority. The local authority will have the ability to reclaim the VAT placed on that fee, so there will be no impact on the parents of those children with the most acute special educational needs. I can also confirm, in answer to questions from the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, that further education institutions will not be affected by these provisions, and non-maintained special schools are exempt as well.

I can understand the concern of parents—given what I said previously about everybody’s aspiration—particularly where their children have special educational needs that have not been met or assessed through an education, health and care plan, in wanting to think about the best place for their children to go, but we cannot organise policy on the basis of the broken state of public provision for children with specific learning needs. This is a government failure long in the making. I share the passion of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, about the way in which the current system is working. In fact, the former Secretary of State for Education, after 13 years of her party’s approach to special educational needs, rightly described this issue as “lose, lose, lose”. One reason for needing the additional investment that this provision will provide is to help begin turning round the special educational needs system, which I wholly agree currently fails too many of our students.

In response to those who have asked for further discussions about the position of independent special schools, we are happy to continue having those conversations. However, I reiterate that, for those children with acute needs who are being educated in independent special schools with an EHCP, there will be no impact on them from this VAT change. We will actively listen to the questions and concerns being raised and will meet with our colleagues.

Several noble Lords, including my noble friend Lord Hacking and the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, raised the impact of these changes on state schools. The Government believe that the number of pupils who may switch schools as a result of these changes represent a very small proportion of overall pupil numbers in the state sector. As I have already outlined, those parents paying to send their children to private schools have already experienced considerably above-inflation increases and have not chosen to move their children, but we will of course monitor local demand to ensure that appropriate measures are taken to increase capacity where required.

I take the noble Baroness’s point about the differential impact, potentially, on different parts of the country, and DfE officials will monitor that very carefully, but children move between the private and state sectors every year and local authorities and schools have processes in place to support their transition. In terms of places, of course we are going through a period of demographic change. Even if the pupil displacement is above the estimate of the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies, which suggested that up to 40,000 might move over a period of time, that is still likely to represent less than 1% of the more than 9 million total UK state school pupils. The latest figures published showed that 83% of primary schools and 77% of secondary schools have one or more unfilled places.

I turn to the issues raised by the noble Baronesses, Lady Fraser and Lady Bull, about the enormously important contribution of Music and Dance Scheme schools. We can all see, in the talent of the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, the significance of those schools. We are continuing to engage with the schools currently within the Music and Dance Scheme project. As has already been outlined by noble Lords—and I wholly agree that, for the good of all of us, we need low-income families to be able to send their children to those schools when they have that talent—the children of parents who cannot afford the fees are funded by the Music and Dance Scheme. We will consider, in the light of the VAT charges, how and whether we can change that scheme to compensate for the VAT issue. We are willing to carry on talking, as we have done, to representatives from the Music and Dance Scheme schools about the impact of this change of policy. The same goes, as the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, raised, for the dance and drama awards, where we will also continue having discussions that we have already started with the schools in that category.

Noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Kempsell, the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, and the noble Earl, Lord Devon, raised the issue of military families. I reiterate that the Government recognise the enormous sacrifices our military families make; of course, that is why the Ministry of Defence and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office provide the continuity of education allowance to eligible officials and service personnel. It is also worth pointing out that very many military personnel send their children to state schools and want to benefit from the improvements that will happen in those state schools. However, the Government will monitor closely the impact of these policy changes on affected military and diplomatic families. The upcoming spending review is the right time to consider any changes to this scheme, but we will continue to look very carefully at that.

Several noble Lords talked about the contribution of private schools, and the defence was that because they contribute through partnerships with state schools or by providing bursaries, we should not interfere with that. I welcome the contributions private schools make to cross-sector partnerships, as outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Maude, my noble friend Lord Winston and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton; I hope that will continue. Certainly, for schools with charitable status, as charities, and in line with legislation passed by the last Labour Government, they must continue to demonstrate public benefit. I hope they will continue to do that through the provision of a small number of means-tested bursaries and through partnership with local state schools. I think they will continue to demonstrate their broad public benefit through those wider contributions.

On the legal position, raised by the noble Lord, Lord Alton—channelling the noble Lord, Lord Pannick —and my noble friend Lord Hacking, I am not going to speculate on the outcome of the ongoing technical consultation. However, legal considerations have been incorporated into the process, as is standard for all legislative changes, and we are confident that the measures are compatible with the Human Rights Act 1998.

I know I have not managed to cover all of the wide range of issues that have been raised, and I undertake to write to noble Lords, but I assure the House that private schools will remain part of our education system. The choice to send your child there will remain. However, most children are educated in the state sector and that is where we must target our support and resources most. We will work closely with schools and local authorities to make the implementation of the new tax rules as smooth as possible. I thank noble Lords for their contributions this afternoon.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

Before my noble friend sits down—

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

I have sat down.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

These are therefore imaginary words being used in the House of Lords. My noble friend was kind enough to mention the first protocol of the European Convention on Human Rights, but I would be very grateful if she could send a letter, particularly to myself and the noble Lord, Lord Alton, on the advice the Government are receiving relating to that very important issue. I remind her that it was a Labour Government, in 1998, who brought that provision into our law under the Human Rights Act 1998.

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

My noble friend is right, and I am very proud of that. Our position, as I said, has been tested in the legal advice in the consideration of these changes. Our view is that being charged at the standard rate of VAT paid by millions of businesses across the UK is not discriminatory and is clearly proportionate to the objective of better funding for state schools. To the extent that I am able, I will certainly ensure that I write further about that issue to my noble friend and to others.

Schools Bill [HL]

Lord Hacking Excerpts

Report stage & Lords Hansard - Part 1
Monday 18th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, I said at Second Reading, putting the register aside for a moment, that we as a society have a responsibility to ensure that all our children are safe, secure and educated. If that is not happening, we need to ask why and what we can simply do to make sure that every child is safe and educated.

Over the last seven or eight years, I have put down a whole series of Written Questions asking how many children are missing from our school rolls, such that we do not even know where they are. The answer is that we do not know. The best we can do currently—this goes back to 2018-19—is information from the National Crime Agency, which, by the way, identifies as missing anyone whose whereabouts cannot be established and who may be the subject of a crime or at risk of harm to themselves; examples include child trafficking, getting involved in drug pushing, et cetera. It concluded that there are 216,707 children missing whose whereabouts we do not know. That is a very low figure. I think it is considerably higher than that.

For me, that is what this debate is about: protecting children and making sure that they are safe, secure and educated. That is why I welcome these measures on home education and congratulate the Government on having the courage to pick up this political hot potato and try to do something about it—it is not perfect; I take it for granted that there are some concerns—and about unregistered schools.

Of course, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Carlisle was right about parents’ rights and values, but society has to make sure that, when children are in schools which are not subject to any checks or inspections, they are not being taught the most appalling practices, which Ofsted highlights in its reports. There have been a couple of cases where it has taken those schools to court and managed to close them down—the right reverend Prelate would be horrified if he knew. One such school, which was not unregistered, was a Christian school as well; I am happy to talk to him privately about it.

Let us understand where we are coming from in this debate. We all have anecdotal evidence of home tuition and teaching. I listened with great interest to the concerns of the noble Lord, Lord Wei, and his worries about what might happen. I accept that the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, is absolutely right that there have been some appalling practices by local authorities; there have also been some fantastic practices by them, which should be the model for how we behave. That is why I will suggest in the next group that local authorities appoint home school co-ordinators.

I have been struck by the number of emails I have had—I think it was 82 at the last count—from home educators. They have concerns, of course, or they would not be emailing me, but I come away thinking, “Wow, what a tremendous job you’re doing.” I have met some of them. I met one last week, who told me about how she had ignited an interest in the Tudors in her daughter. I thought again, “What a tremendous job you’re doing.” However, those actually doing the work of home tuition are perhaps seeing problems that will not be there.

We need a simple register which collects some simple information. I did not know and was quite surprised to learn that independent schools do not provide any data—that is a new one on me. They should be doing so. As the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, rightly said, we should know where all our children are—whether they are in school, home educated, in an unregistered school or in the independent sector. Let that be the rallying call from these amendments.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, I am in a bit of a dilemma. My noble friend Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, if I may so refer to her, has spoken to all the clauses she would like to have taken out of the Bill. When I was last in the House, during my 26 years, the issue of whether a clause remained in the Bill came up only in debates of clause stand part. At that stage only did the argument come forward, if someone wanted to make it, that a clause no longer stand part of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

Did the noble Lord, Lord Hacking, want to speak to his amendments in this group?

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness very much. The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, was giving me a signal from the other side of the Chamber, and I was wondering what it was, but now I know, and I am very grateful for knowing.

I must start with an apology to the whole House for the massive number of manuscript amendments tabled by me to remove, one by one, all the clauses in Parts 3 and 4. This was a mistake by me. When I went to the Legislation Office this morning, I said, “Can I table a simple amendment that runs on the lines ‘leave out Parts 3 and 4’?” I was told it could not be done that way, but only by individually asking for each clause to be left out of the Bill. I should have realised that I needed only to give one example of my proposal, and then your Lordships would not have received this massive number of manuscript amendments. For that, I again apologise.

I should also say that I have not, save for one occasion, which I will come to in a moment, spoken so far on the Bill. I sat through parts of Second Reading and many of the sittings in Committee, but I did not intervene. The one exception was in Committee, when the Clock of our House was stuck at 10 minutes to 3 pm. I thought a literary comment could be brought into the Bill’s proceedings and I reminded the Committee of Rupert Brooke’s poem, “The Old Vicarage, Grantchester”, which ends with a reference to whether the village church clock in Grantchester was still standing “at ten to three” and was there “honey still for tea”. That was my little contribution as a matter of literature on a Bill which, after all, is to do with education.

I have thought very carefully, particularly last weekend, and concluded that, in the interests of the whole House, Parts 3 and 4 should be removed, not as a wrecking amendment but as a constructive one, so that the provisions in Parts 3 and 4 can properly be looked through and thought about. I am supported in that view by my noble friend Lord Grocott, who said at the beginning of the debate that the Bill is beyond repair. The Opposition Chief Whip, the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, said that the Bill is in a very bad state. That supports my general proposition, that the entirety of Parts 3 and 4 should be removed.

In making this proposal to the House, I am not denying that the many improvements that noble Lords have added should be considered. As part of a reconsideration of this Bill, those improvements might well find themselves in it. I recognised at the weekend that a new broom needs to be taken to the whole of Parts 3 and 4.

Coming back to this House after an absence of 22 years, one is struck by the increasing disease in all our Bills of what I would call particularisation. If I have invented that word, I apologise, particularly to the editors of Hansard. I refer to the ever-increasing perceived need to place everything in the Bill, to the point where our Bills are becoming more detailed and more complicated—and pretty incomprehensible. We seem to think that our job is done when the Bill passes and have insufficient thought for the users of our Bills. Look, for example, in the previous Session, at the police Act, the health Act, or the Nationality and Borders Act, and think of those who must enforce them—police officers for the police Act, health workers for the health Act, and customs officers for the Nationality and Borders Act, to say nothing of the tasks that are thrown up to judges and lawyers who interpret the terms of our Bills.

This Bill, in its present form, has no fewer than 40 pages of obligations on home schooling and local authorities. This is a vast section of the Bill, and it is those 40 pages that I ask your Lordships to reconsider. It is as though someone in the Department for Education has been thinking of everything under the sun—and, I must add, the moon—which can be put into this Bill, the result being these 40 pages. This must come to an end.

I now come to a problem that was entirely new to me. I met the five home-schooling mothers, several of whom are listening to this debate. As the Minister may remember, I introduced three of them to the Ministers when we were in Committee, the noble Baronesses, Lady Barran and Lady Penn, who kindly had a word with them about their concerns, although it was only brief. I am not denying that a lot of noble Lords have expressed a concern and I am not at all deriding all the work that has been put into the Bill by noble Lords.

When you come back to this House after a long time, you also have a freshness when looking at the issues. In this case, I looked at the Education Act 1944, a very important social Act brought in under Rab Butler, later to become Lord Butler of Saffron Walden. I also looked at the more recent Education Act 1996. I have several cited cases, one in 1980, when Lord Donaldson presided, and one in 1985, when the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, presided, for which they each provided further help and guidance over the application of the then provisions. As recently as 2019, the Department for Education issued statutory guidance. I am not going to read the terms of those two Acts or the statutory guidance. Suffice it to say that for both Acts, the recent statutory guidance gave clear support for home schooling, and little interference.

What then has gone wrong? It appears—I emphasise that word—that education officers in a few powerful local authorities have set their face against home schooling, believing that pupils should be at the school with which they were provided. The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, spoke of abusive behaviour by certain local authorities. I emphasise “appears” because the Minister, when I spoke to her, was strongly of the view that this was not the right interpretation. However, we have heard a different view from the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. Therefore, why have these provisions gone into the Bill? This is quite different from the stance taken in 1944 and 1996. It appears that the views of those education officers in a limited number of boroughs—I will not name the boroughs here but will in a meeting with the Minister—have wrongly persuaded the Government to bring in the Bill in the way that we find it.

I have already told the Minister that I will not divide the House and that remains my position. The Minister has kindly agreed to see me and some of the concerned home-schooling mothers and their advisers.

Finally, I ask the Minister not to forget the World War I poets. I could name them, as I did just now in a conversation with the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, but I just leave that as a final thought among the Ministers. I hope that she will not neglect those poets, and the literature that they produced, when she sums up.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I will start with Amendments 74 and 75, tabled by my noble friend Lord Lucas. The law is clear that parents have a right to educate their children at home, and local authorities should already be working collaboratively with parents to ensure the best outcome for the child. We are keen to ensure that home-educating parents, and local authorities, are fully supported in ensuring that the education received at home is suitable. Therefore, as my noble friend Lady Barran said, as part of the implementation of the Bill we will be reviewing our existing guidance and publishing new statutory guidance for local authorities on their “children not in school” responsibilities, which will include advice on how they should discharge their new support duty.

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[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I believe I responded about examination costs. In fact, I had an intervention from the noble Lord, Lord Knight, on it. One of the things I said to him was that in the statutory guidance we are seeking to create, we will look at the support duty. We are looking to work collaboratively with local authorities and home educators to hear all those different views in order to help us co-create that guidance. Then we will also consult on it. We are keen to ensure that we hear those views as part of that process.

I hope that my noble friend Lord Lucas will feel able to withdraw his amendment and other noble Lords will not press theirs.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

Before the Minister sits down, will she receive from me great gratitude for her willingness and that of her fellow Minister to see home schoolers, several of whom are in the House this evening, and those advising them? They have helped a lot and I hope they will help the Ministers a lot too.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

That is very much appreciated. I also pass on to my noble friend the Minister the thanks of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, for engaging with home educators. I emphasise that we see that as a very important part of the process for the Bill.

Schools Bill [HL]

Lord Hacking Excerpts

Report stage & Lords Hansard - Part 2
Monday 18th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Wilcox of Newport (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendment 118D would mean teachers in all schools would be

“required to have, or be enrolled on a course such that they are working towards, qualified teacher status”

before September 2024. I have spoken extensively previously about teachers without QTS having less pedagogical training and less subject knowledge than their qualified colleagues, although I do note the Minister’s previous replies to this on several occasions. However, I firmly believe the Government need to match the ambition of Labour’s national excellence programme. This amendment will begin to address these current failings.

Amendment 118E would mean that, within a year of Royal Assent, the Secretary of State, whoever he or she will be, would have to ensure that

“every … school is working towards establishing a breakfast club, able to provide a free breakfast to every pupil who requests one”.

Yet again this evening, the UK Government could learn from what the Labour Government are doing in Wales: providing free breakfasts in primary schools has been an integral part of the wider work the Welsh Government have done to improve food and nutrition in schools maintained by local authorities since September 2004.

Finally, Amendment 118I would mean that, within six months of Royal Assent, the Secretary of State would have to

“consult on and launch a school children’s pandemic recovery plan”.

The consultation would include:

“free breakfast clubs … extra-curricular activities for every child … provision of … in-school mental health counselling staff … small group tutoring … ongoing learning and development for teachers, and … an education recovery premium”.

This may include uplifting the current premium rate by 10%, increasing the early years pupil premium to match the premium rates for primary school pupils, and expanding the secondary age pupil premium to include pupils aged 16 to 18 and children with child protection plans. There is so much to do but this amendment clearly sets out the difference between what a Labour Government would do for the children and young people of England compared with what little they are now receiving and will continue to receive under this Conservative Government.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, I was for a short time a governor—the noble Baroness is looking at me as if I am doing something wrong—of our local primary school. I remember at a governors’ meeting that one of the teacher-appointed members of the governing body was the English teacher. The only trouble was that he could hardly speak any grammatical English. I wondered often—and spoke to the headmistress about it—how good he was at teaching English.

Two other amendments are being considered in this group, both in the names of my two noble friends on the Front Bench. I support both of those. It is not easy to set up breakfast clubs and the like at primary schools. You have to stretch teachers to provide those services but when they can be provided, they are of enormous assistance and enable parents to go and get on with their lives—nothing could be easier. It also ensures that children start with a good breakfast.

Schools Bill [HL]

Lord Hacking Excerpts

Committee stage & Lords Hansard - Part 1
Monday 13th June 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I beg to move that the House be now resumed—

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

Before the House is resumed, I draw attention to the clock, which has been stuck for a long time at 10 past three, as indeed, I understand, have all the clocks in the House. Since this is an education Bill and to do with the world of academia, I remind your Lordships of a poem written by Rupert Brooke just before the First World War. It was a nostalgic poem, because he was not very happy living in Germany at the time. He ends the poem:

“Stands the Church clock at ten to three?


And is there honey still for tea?”

House resumed.