Education: Citizenship

Debate between Lord Nash and Lord Phillips of Sudbury

Wednesday 14th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how they propose to enhance the amount and quality of citizenship education in order to increase the democratic participation and engagement of young citizens.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)]

My Lords, citizenship is a compulsory subject in maintained secondary schools. The new programme of study ensures that teaching is directed towards how our country is governed rather than the more issues-based content that dominated the former programme of study. This will help prepare pupils to play a full and active part in society. We will continue to promote resources for schools, such as the democratic engagement resource, Rock Enrol!

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury (LD)]

I thank my noble friend for that reply, but does he not agree that engaging in today’s hyper-complex, democratically challenged society, particularly for less able pupils, requires an absolute minimum of knowledge and the will to engage? What does he think of the effect, by contrast, of 56% of our schools—all free schools and academies—not even having to teach citizenship; of the rest not being Ofsted-inspected, vis-à-vis citizenship education; and of the number of specialist teachers teaching citizenship for examinations and pupils taking it being in freefall?

[Lord Nash]

All academies and free schools are required to teach a broad and balanced curriculum, and we trust academies to teach citizenship and prepare their pupils for life in modern Britain. I am sure that my noble friend will be delighted to hear that under this Government the number of pupils taking the full course of GSCE citizenship has more than doubled.

Education: Citizenship Studies

Debate between Lord Nash and Lord Phillips of Sudbury

Monday 30th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

I am a little confused about the Labour Party’s attitude on compulsory subjects in the national curriculum. I thought that its study group had proposed that all schools should be free not to teach the national curriculum, but I will not attempt to keep up with this flip-flopping. We do not agree that it should be mandatory. A lot of people want to have subjects made mandatory in the curriculum but there is not room. Schools must teach citizenship at key stages 3 and 4. They must also teach about spiritual, moral, cultural and social responsibility and British values. The curriculum includes all the institutions to which the noble Baroness referred.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury (LD)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as the founder and president of the Citizenship Foundation. I say to my noble friend that while he paints a very rosy picture of citizenship, at the moment less than 2% of pupils take citizenship education at GCSE. The free schools and academies do not have to teach it at all and Ofsted does not extend to citizenship in schools, while the Government have withdrawn bursaries for young teacher trainers to teach citizenship education. In the light of the statistics and the general sense of gloom in the citizenship community at the moment, will my noble friend please go back to his Minister and seek to do something about what has happened to citizenship education over the past two or three years?

[Lord Nash]

Ofsted reported last year that it found that in primary schools citizenship was “thriving” and that in secondary schools the quality of citizenship education was stronger than in its 2010 survey. It also found that head teachers recognised the rich contribution the subject makes to pupils’ learning, their personal development and the ethos of the school. We have substantially improved the citizenship curriculum from the previous, rather issues-based, syllabus and we are now enhancing the requirement to teach about British institutions and values.

Schools: National Curriculum

Debate between Lord Nash and Lord Phillips of Sudbury

Tuesday 9th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

I know that the noble Baroness shares my concern about PSHE being an essential part of any school, particularly interpersonal skills and self-confidence. I do not think that we are apart at all on the necessity for all schools to teach that. Indeed, that is what good schools do; it is all part of a good education. The difference between us is that we do not feel that we should legislate for every ingredient of such education to be statutory.

For instance, on career education, I was in Norfolk today, where we were whipping up support for schools in Norfolk, which have consistently been below national standards. One of our meetings was with business leaders. There is no shortage of enthusiasm from the business community to engage with schools to help them with careers advice, work placements and so on. I then visited Wymondham College, one of our top state boarding schools, where we got into a conversation about careers. I said that I was constantly being asked whether careers advice should be more consultancy-based in schools and whether that was sensible for schools. It was absolutely clear. Everybody in the room—the top eight teachers in the school—said that a careers session of 50 minutes at the end of your school life was a very poor substitute for a good education and that they engaged widely with businesses for careers advice. They already practise the suggestion from my noble friend Lord Cormack of career panels.

That is the best practice, which we should encourage all schools to do, so that all schools fulfil the ambitions of the noble Baroness. As I said, however, what is between us is that we think that to legislate for it in a box-ticking way would lower expectations rather than encourage all schools to aim for the highest.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

My Lords, I should declare an interest as the founder and president of the Citizenship Foundation. I, too, would like to congratulate the Government on the outcome of their consultation and a lot of hard work all round. To have 17,000 people respond to a consultation must be a high response compared to some that we have had recently and it reflects the intense concern of people across the social spectrum—of course, including teachers and parents. I also recognise the dilemmas that the Government have in arriving at a curriculum, because so many subjects today call for inclusion, and there has to be some point at which you say, “Sorry, no more space”.

I particularly congratulate Michael Gove on resisting the advice from his expert panel and keeping citizenship education in the core curriculum at key stages 3 and 4. It has always seemed to me—and, probably, everybody in the Chamber—that the democratic world of today is unbearably complex. The work of this House is often beyond the ability of its Members to grapple with. It is irresponsible of us to the point of being hypocritical not to give our school leavers the chance, through a minimum level of competence, to take their part in this hyper-complex society—in particular, their democratic part. I fully endorse the conclusions reached that citizenship is part of the essential knowledge that we have to give our citizens, no less than teaching them the Highway Code before they get into a motor car.

I should like to ask my noble friend four questions. The framework document issued this week starts by saying, of citizenship, that the purpose of study is a high-quality citizenship education. I would be grateful if my noble friend would consider the extent to which we need rather badly to have a much greater quantity and quality of teacher education for that difficult subject. Secondly, I agree with my noble friend Lord Storey that this is a subject where you could bring in people from outside the world of formal teacher qualification. Very quickly, I think—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

I would be grateful if my noble friend would consider extending the Ofsted inspection to cover citizenship education. If it is not within the compulsory Ofsted inspection, that lowers its status. That is certainly not needed. Finally, I do not see why this subject should not be as necessary, compulsory and essential for non-maintained schools as for maintained schools.

[Lord Nash]

I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Phillips for his comments. I believe that we have greatly improved the citizenship curriculum, not least with the helpful advice from noble Lords such as him that it should be a much less issues-based curriculum, with greater focus on the political systems in this country. So far as Ofsted is concerned, I will look at that point in the context of what Ofsted already inspects for in terms of a rounded conversation and whether we can do anything further on that. As far as the core subject is concerned, I rather refer back to my earlier point that some independent schools teach citizenship very effectively in a much wider way. As far as teaching quality is concerned, we are doing all that we can to improve the quality of teachers. I may want to discuss with my noble friend further his specific points about citizenship teachers to see whether we cannot do more in this regard.

Education: Citizenship

Debate between Lord Nash and Lord Phillips of Sudbury

Thursday 27th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash)]

My Lords, I thank those who have taken part in this debate, particularly my noble friend Lord Cormack for raising this important issue. I know he is committed to ensuring that young people leave school as active and responsible citizens. I strongly agree with my noble friend that young people need to be equipped with the knowledge and skills to prepare them to play a full and active part in society. This is why the Government intend to retain the statutory status of citizenship in secondary schools as part of the review of the national curriculum. The new draft citizenship programme of study includes a requirement that all pupils should be given opportunities to undertake voluntary work for the first time. I believe that that will support one of our key aims, which is to ensure that our young people are committed to volunteering and that they will take that with them into adulthood. All good schools have an active programme of engaging with voluntary organisations and charities, and we shall certainly be encouraging all schools to do that. The Cabinet Office announced a new campaign today, as the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, noted, to get young people involved in social action. This is in addition to our youth social action fund.

We have revised the citizenship programmes of study to ensure that they direct teaching towards the core knowledge of citizenship: namely, teaching about the way our society is governed and its laws, including those that protect human rights, rather than the more issues-based content that dominates the current programme of study. The shorter programmes of study give teachers greater freedom to define what is taught. However, they require teaching about laws, which my noble friend Lord Phillips said is so important, about rights and responsibilities and about the liberties enjoyed by citizens of the United Kingdom. The new programmes of study are not just focused on the UK; they provide opportunities for pupils to learn about other systems and forms of government in other countries as well as our relations with Europe, the Commonwealth and the wider world. However, I take note of the points made by him.

Our proposed changes to the citizenship curriculum include having a stronger emphasis on teaching about our political system, our democracy and the nature of our laws, so that many more of our young people engage with the political process, as my noble friends Lord Norton and Lord Storey and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, said. The noble Lord, Lord Parekh, made a point about the importance of teaching political ideology and multicultural literacy and of reference to history and current events and about bringing all this and the teaching of our institutions to life. His speech was one of the best pieces of advocacy that I have heard for a rich cultural curriculum of the kind that this Government are determined to see in all schools for all pupils.

I agree with the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Oxford about the importance of RE, which is compulsory as part of the basic curriculum. RE GCSE will count towards the “best eight” measure. I am delighted that the dioceses are engaging so actively in the academies programme.

A number of noble Lords, including my noble friends Lady Perry and Lord Storey, said that citizenship is a whole, across-school ethos, and that all good schools should embrace this approach. This is all part of a good education and not part of a prescriptive list. We trust teachers to deliver this.

I am delighted that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, supports us in making financial education statutory for the first time at secondary level in the citizenship curriculum. Pupils will be taught about the functions and uses of money, the importance of personal budgeting, money management and a range of financial products and services. In addition, the mathematics curriculum has been strengthened to give pupils from the ages of five to 16 the necessary mathematics to prepare young people for making sound financial decisions, for example about mortgages and loan repayments.

The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, asked for an update on the National Citizen Service. As one of the original supporters of this programme when it was just an idea, I am delighted that it is becoming so successful. Our ambition is for this to become a universal programme—a rite of passage for all 16 and 17 year-olds. In 2011-12, 8,500 young people participated. This increased to 26,000 this year and we announced yesterday that we will be expanding the number of places to 150,000 in 2016.

My noble friend asked what the Government were doing to enhance the delivery of citizenship and ensure that head teachers take the subject seriously. We have made our commitment to citizenship abundantly clear by retaining the statutory status of citizenship in secondary schools as part of the review of the national curriculum. Citizenship is one of only six subjects in the new national curriculum to be compulsory at key stage 4. A GCSE in citizenship currently receives credit in the school accountability system through the school performance tables, and will continue to count as part of our proposed—

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

I am grateful to my noble friend for giving way. Will he say something about the impact on the status of citizenship education as a subject which is not inspectable because it has been put into the second tier and is no longer compulsorily part of an Ofsted inspection? Does he not think that that has severe consequences for the subject’s status and standing?

[Lord Nash]

My noble friend is perfectly right in what he says. Ofsted has to inspect on social, moral and cultural issues and carries out triennial reviews of all subjects, including citizenship. However, he is right and I will take his points back. Citizenship is part of the best eight.

I thank my noble friend Lady Byford for highlighting the excellent work that the House of Lords outreach programme does with young people. Almost 1,000 visits have been made to schools in every region of the UK, and House of Lords Chamber events have brought young people to Parliament to explore and debate a range of issues.

My noble friend Lady Byford also highlighted the fantastic work of the cadets programme. We know about the transformative effect that cadet units can have on schools by increasing attendance, engagement, participation at 16 to 18, self-confidence and discipline. The cadet expansion programme was a key strand of the Government’s Positive for Youth policy. Early work was based on a pilot of between 10 and 15 third-party funded units, but this number was increased following the announcement on Armed Forces Day last year by the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, who challenged departments to deliver 100 new units by 2015, with a longer-term goal of meeting all school requests for a cadet unit by 2020.

The Government are also committed to promoting the voices of young people at both a national and local level. That is why we are extending the funding to the British Youth Council. This funding supports initiatives such as UK Youth and local youth councils, where youth-led forums represent young people’s views.

In addition to a demanding curriculum, good-quality teaching is fundamental, as my noble friend Lord Norton said. There is strong evidence that links teacher quality, above all other school factors, to pupils’ attainment. The Government’s reform of ITT demonstrates our commitment to recruiting the very best graduates and to giving teaching schools more of a role so that schools close to the needs of particular types of pupils can develop the appropriate training. Teachers have access to a wealth of continuing professional development material and support through their subject associations. There is support on financial education, for example, through specialist charities, such as the Personal Finance Education Group, which are well respected, and private sector experts, such as the banks. Organisations such as the Association for Citizenship Teaching and the Citizenship Foundation also offer a range of support to teachers.

The importance of emergency life-saving skills and first aid were highlighted by the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare. The provision of emergency life-saving skills is not compulsory and is a matter for local determination, but I will take back his observations.

I thank noble Lords for engaging in this debate. I believe our commitment to helping young people to develop as citizens is abundantly clear.

Young People: Personal Finances

Debate between Lord Nash and Lord Phillips of Sudbury

Thursday 7th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

I agree entirely with my noble friend. Schools should provide these pupils in particular with all the information that they need, including budgeting, student loans, bursaries and any other products available.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

My Lords, I declare an interest as president of the Citizenship Foundation. With his very welcome news when he first answered this Question, does it mean that citizenship is now going to remain part of the core curriculum?

[Lord Nash]

There will be a Statement on this later. It remains part of the core curriculum but it is not a mandatory GCSE.