Education: Funding

Debate between Lord Nash and Baroness Manzoor

Tuesday 4th July 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

I completely share the noble Lord’s concern about teacher retention. In fact, the news recently has been quite good. I will write to him with precise details but we are seeing more multiacademy trusts having much better teacher retention programmes because they have much better career development programmes for their teachers. I think it was the case until quite recently that a young teacher coming into the profession could look forward to perhaps becoming a head in about 20 years, but it was very difficult to have any visible career structure in the meantime. As a result of schools coming together in teaching school alliances and multiacademy trusts, teachers can now look forward to perhaps being head of a subject in their mid-20s and even being head of a primary school in their late 20s or 30s. There is a much clearer teacher hierarchy and career development structure, which bodes well for teacher retention in the future. It is also fair to say that we have a much more fluid workforce, and in many professions people leave their chosen line of work and change jobs.

[Baroness Manzoor (Con)]

My Lords, due to changes in universal credit, local authorities are no longer routinely advising schools on which students are entitled to pupil premium and free school meals. That means that head teachers are having to contact the local authority to find out this information for themselves, if parents are not able to do so or are unaware that they need to give the information. Therefore, some schools in very disadvantaged areas are losing quite significant sums of money. Can the Minister say how the Government can help to ensure that local authorities are carrying out this duty diligently and are not charging for what was originally free?

[Lord Nash]

My noble friend makes an extremely good point. That point has been brought to my attention and we are looking at it. I will write to her with some further thoughts on this.

Social Mobility

Debate between Lord Nash and Baroness Manzoor

Monday 20th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

As I said, we will respond to the report shortly, but I entirely agree with the noble Baroness about the importance of mentoring. I know that Chance UK has an active programme in that, and the system she refers to is definitely to be encouraged. At the Bridge Academy in Hackney, which is sponsored by UBS, over 1,000 UBS employees mentor individual pupils every year. When you talk to pupils, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, many of whom have often not met people who work in white-collar jobs before at all, you understand that mixing with people like this and going to their place of work clearly has a transformational impact.

[Baroness Manzoor (Con)]

My Lords, as well as the fact that there are not as many disaffected and disadvantaged young people getting into Russell group universities as there should be, there is a real problem in that, once they are in key roles, they do not progress as quickly as they should, particularly in areas such as the Civil Service and the NHS.

[Lord Nash]

My noble friend makes a very good point. I think that she is talking about what the Sutton Trust has termed “essential life skills”. It recently pointed out that Harvard University has said that the people who have been successful in recent years and are likely to be successful over the next 20 years are those with essential life skills. It is very important that all schools develop these, and I know that many of them do. Certainly, the Civil Service has a talent programme for bringing on people from a wide range of backgrounds.

School Milk

Debate between Lord Nash and Baroness Manzoor

Wednesday 25th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

We will play a full role in the existing scheme until we leave the EU, but as our involvement in the scheme will be short term, we are taking a pragmatic approach to keeping changes to current arrangements to a minimum. We will consider the long-term approach to school milk provision, following our exit from the EU, as part of our future domestic policy programme.

[Baroness Manzoor (Con)]

My Lords, milk is also rich in vitamin D, as the Minister has said. There is some research highlighting that young girls from ethnic minorities and Asian women are more prone to vitamin D deficiency. Will the Minister say whether his department is working closely with the Department of Health to highlight this issue so that it can be addressed?

[Lord Nash]

I am afraid I do not know the answer to that question. I will investigate it and write to my noble friend.