Education Bill

Lord Ramsbotham Excerpts

Tuesday 28th June 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Walmsley]

My Lords, we on these Benches very much support the principles of what the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, is trying to achieve. I am quite sure that this Government will not sweep under the carpet the most important and powerful arguments made by Graham Allen and Frank Field in their excellent reports. I very much look forward to hearing the department’s response to the need for much more early intervention, which I believe will come along the track before very long. Indeed, the Government may decide that another legislative vehicle, which may be before us next year, might be more appropriate for putting forward what the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, is seeking to do. I absolutely agree with him about the vital importance of the early years, about parents as first teachers and as carers of the child, and the importance of supporting those parents in doing what we all know is the most difficult job in the world.

[Lord Ramsbotham]

My Lords, I, too, support the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, in this very important amendment. I also support his suggestion that this will be followed by more substantive amendments on Report.

Clause 1 is more about who things should be done to than what should be done. Here I declare an interest as the chairman of the all-party group on communication and language skills, which has been campaigning for years to try to get every child assessed to see that, in the words of the noble Lord’s amendment, children are ready,

“to enter school on reaching school age”.

I would like to see guidance in the Bill on what assessment should be received by each child to ensure that they are ready and who is responsible for doing it. One problem I have found when trying to get this assessment done is who pays. The people who do the assessment come from the Department of Health, but it is the Department for Education which is putting this through. Some people at the Department for Communities and Local Government are involved, while some are from the Ministry of Justice. Who is going to do this?

The best advice is contained in the excellent report published the other day by Dame Clare Tickell. In paragraph 3.22 of chapter 3, which is entitled “Equipped for life, ready for school”, she recommends strongly,

“that the Government works with experts and services to test the feasibility of a single integrated review”,

at age two to two and a half. That is excellent advice, which I hope will be taken up. Armed with that, then the work can be done to see what needs to be done to make certain that people are ready to back up the tone and the good sense of my noble friend’s amendment.

[Baroness Howe of Idlicote]

My Lords, the amendment is crucial for everything that follows in education. Frank Field and Graham Allen have set the scene; the sadness is that it has been accepted by all parties that this is the way forward. I am looking at the noble Lord, Lord Elton, who, under the previous Government, was at the forefront of pushing for the early assessment of children to make sure that those who had particular needs, whether special needs or needs related to background, had support. So we have agreement, but we do not have the resources that have been agreed for allocation.

The point that I tried to make in my Second Reading speech is that we must test the effectiveness of this—I do not mean a pilot; it is far too important for that. It must have the back-up of our belief that this is the way forward for such a huge proportion of our young people. The balancing, the nurture groups, and all the things that have been experimented with over the years can be brought into play in this area. We must work on that.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Earl of Listowel]

Before my noble friend replies, I thank him for the news of the statement this summer and I join the noble Lord, Lord Elton, in asking whether the draftsmen might keep a couple of points in mind. One is the importance of midwives, whom I omitted to mention. In my experience, if a midwife can make a relationship with a mother, particularly a vulnerable mother, there can be many beneficial results in terms of breastfeeding, for example. I am afraid that midwives often feel almost as if they are working in a factory; there is a very mixed experience across this country of what it is to be a midwife.

There is also concern about family support workers because of the cuts in funding to local authorities. I understand that local authorities are living up to their requirements with regard to child protection; they are focusing on the area that is most critical, but there is concern that funding for family support workers is being cut back. It would be good to have information on how that role is being impacted by the recession. Family support workers provide a crucial service for the most vulnerable families, as I am sure your Lordships will agree. I am sure that this will be a part of the statement in any case.

[Lord Ramsbotham]

May I say how much I welcome the announcement of the foundation years document? Will we have a chance to discuss it in the context of this Bill?

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I think that the Committee stage will have finished by then, but I am sure we can find another opportunity to discuss it.

Education Bill

Lord Ramsbotham Excerpts

Tuesday 14th June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ramsbotham]

My Lords, I am not going to talk about offender education, although I have to say to the Minister that I was extremely disappointed that at the heart of the recent paper on offender learning was the suggestion that the Government would change the arrangements for the delivery of learning by bringing together into clusters prisons that regularly transfer prisoners between them. That is a practical impossibility. The clustering of prisons was laid down by the noble Lord, Lord Baker of Dorking, when he was Home Secretary in 1991. It has never happened, and prisoners are sent round nationally. For example, a boy was sent from Feltham on the eve of taking A-levels 18 months after he had started work on them.

Instead, I want to concentrate on something that echoes very much what the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, was saying. I have always believed that the only raw material that every nation has in common is its people. Woe betide it if it does not do everything it can to identify, nurture and develop the talents of its people—all its people—as individuals. Unless it does, it has only itself to blame if it fails. Individuals are individuals.

I am glad that the Bill starts at the beginning of the learning process with early-years provision. Clause 1(2) states:

“An English local authority must secure that early years provision of such description as may be prescribed is available free of charge … for each young child in their area who … is under compulsory school age, and … is of such description as may be prescribed”.

I am interested that paragraph 57 of the Explanatory Notes mentions a section being added to the Education Act 2002 to enable the Secretary of State to set by regulation the nature of early education. That contrasts starkly with the Minister’s statement at the start of the debate that the Government were intending to move away from prescription, and from top-down prescription in particular. Early-years provision is too important to be left unprescribed, not least because prescription is a vital ingredient in financial resource planning and allocation. I am very concerned that one should start on such an important journey without making absolutely certain that all the necessary resources are in place.

I am also very concerned, and have been for a long time, that at the heart of any provision should be assessment. I should like to concentrate for the remainder of my time on some elements of assessment. I have mentioned many times on the Floor of this House that at the heart of everything in the educational process is the initial assessment of whether or not a child can engage with the teacher, because if not there is no connection with the educational process. That is why we have recommended the appointment of speech and language therapists to carry out compulsory assessments of every child before they begin school—something that has already been picked up and is being run with in Northern Ireland for every child at the age of two.

I realise, because my noble friend Lady Howe, spoke at length about it, that there is a planned pathway for those with special educational needs, but it is not only those with special educational needs who need this assessment. Every child needs it to start along the way. Furthermore, the lack of communication is the scourge of the 21st century. In the past two years I have visited Walsall, where there is regular assessment of children during the secondary school phase, because it has been found there that some children who can cope with primary school cannot cope with secondary school. That suggests that following on from the initial assessment there needs to be regular assessment throughout the school career.

While I am on that subject, I should like to draw attention to two other subjects that are not mentioned in the Bill but deserve assessment. One is attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder, which on balance, I am told, is detected only after the second exclusion for bad behaviour. This is an extraordinary phenomenon. I once discovered in a young offender institution a young boy who had been excluded from his playgroup at age four, and was thereafter never allowed to attend education. It strikes me that the sooner we get ADHD looked at, the better. Four per cent of boys and 1 per cent of girls in school suffer from ADHD, while 48 per cent of all those in young offender institutions suffer from it. Because it is treatable, it is avoidable.

The second subject to which I wish to draw attention for assessment is gifted children. I declare an interest as patron of an organisation called Tomorrow’s Achievers, which funds master classes for gifted deprived children. I am sorry that the Government have ended the gifted and talented budget and schools are cutting back on their enrichment programmes, because extra provision for gifted children seems to be needed more than ever. I do not want a catalogue of things that I am unhappy about because there is a great deal in this Bill that is positive and admirable and that I support strongly. However, again taking note of individuals as individuals, we must give them this early provision, and the assessment of what they need—and what they may be failing in—needs to be carried out throughout the learning journey, otherwise we will not be identifying, nurturing and developing their talent.

Children: Early Intervention

Lord Ramsbotham Excerpts

Thursday 17th March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ramsbotham]

My Lords, I join everyone who has congratulated the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, not only on obtaining this debate but on her masterly introduction to it. Perhaps I may add my admiration for her tireless championing of issues affecting children. As always, I find debates in this House on this sort of subject absolutely fascinating. I find myself nodding with agreement and learning a great deal. Every time this subject comes up I am reminded of those wonderful words of Winston Churchill, uttered in 1910, that there is a treasure in the heart of every man if only you can find it—with the urging that it is your job to find it. That is coupled with my being one of the people who believe that the only raw material which every nation has in common is its people. Woe betide a nation if it does not do everything it can to identify, nurture and develop the talents of all of its people because if it does not, it has only itself to blame if it fails.

This debate has been preceded by three weighty documents, among others. In November came the White Paper on public health, Healthy Lives, Healthy People. Then there were the two excellent documents, already referred to, by Frank Field MP and Graham Allen MP. Only last week we received Support and aspiration: A new approach to special educational needs and disability. Reading that document reminded me of my time in the Army. Whenever you were invited to do a report, you immediately looked up the previous reports on the same subject to see what had happened to their recommendations. One persistent offender, which I was always concerned about, was where people regularly checked that getting progressively less sleep meant that you worked progressively less well.

I was reminded of that because I saw that that document was a consultation document, but containing a commitment that by 2014, there would be a single assessment process and education, health and care plan which would support children from birth until 25. It went on to say:

“The plan will be clear about who is responsible for which services, and will include a commitment from all parties across education, health and social care to provide their services”.

For heaven’s sake, what on earth have we been doing for the past 100 years if that has to be said as an aim by a ministry in 2011? I then looked at the back of that document and found no fewer than 102 documents quoted, all of which contained many recommendations that seemed to have got nowhere. Why?

Here, I declare interests as chair of the all-party group on learning and communication difficulties and as vice-chair of an organisation called the Institute for Food, Brain and Behaviour. I was extremely interested that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, began by talking about the developing brain because in the document that I referred to I was surprised to see no mention of nutrition and its vital role in pregnancy and the early years in helping to develop the brain. Then I looked to the list of documents and there they all were, so why has that been ignored? As chair of the all-party group, I am glad that that communication problem has come up over and over again. I am also grateful that the right reverend Prelate, in his excellent and thoughtful maiden speech, mentioned offenders.

If anyone ever wants to see the truth of the statement that is the subject of our debate, perhaps they would like to come with me into one of Her Majesty’s prisons. We could go to two places. We could go to any one of the landings, where every prisoner would be someone who had suffered from ineffective or non-existent early intervention. You see that repeated in spades and the costs cannot be quantified. Then we could go to the visiting centre and see the children of the people in prison. Those children are being deprived of one of the people who is so important in their early years, quite apart from having to go through the process of coming into that dreary place to visit the person who should be supporting them in that important process.

During my time as chief inspector I tried to get early intervention on young people, with regard to their communication skills or lack of them, properly investigated. A trial was carried out with speech and language therapists and it proved conclusively that, if they had only been able to connect with their education from an early stage, they might not have ended up there. I commend to the Minister the excellent briefing paper that has been produced for this debate by the Communication Trust, which has some very valuable information about the numbers of children who enter primary school without proper communication skills and who therefore cannot engage with a teacher. That is repeated at secondary school.

That last point has been mentioned over and again in this House in connection with legislation, which is why I conclude by asking the Minister why we have to wait until 2014 for a plan when all the evidence is already there. We do not need any more consultation; we have got it coming out of our ears. Who is actually going to be responsible for taking action rather than initiating yet another consultation?

Education: Pupils and Young People

Lord Ramsbotham Excerpts

Thursday 28th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ramsbotham]

I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Perry, on obtaining this important debate and particularly on including the word “excellence” in its title. I firmly believe that the only raw material that every nation has in common is its people, and woe betide it if it does not do everything that it can to nurture and develop the talents of all its people. If it does not, it has only itself to blame if it fails. Ditto the wonderful words of Winston Churchill, when he said:

“There is a treasure, if you can only find it, in the heart of every man”.

My concern that our education system is failing in this respect was confirmed by what I saw as Chief Inspector of Prisons: vast numbers of young people woefully below even level 1; 65 per cent of adult males with a reading age of less than eight; and truancy and exclusion figures among young offenders a national disgrace. Why is that and what can we do about it? In the time available, I can only scratch the surface of an answer. However, I have three experiences that I put forward for ministerial consideration.

The first comprehensive school that I saw was a British Forces Education Service one in Germany in 1966, and it was achieving amazing results. When I asked the headmaster how he achieved this with pupils of all standards and ages, coming from schools all over the world at all times of the term, he replied, “very simple”. The day was organised so that everyone did the same subject at the same time. On arrival, children were assessed in each subject and put into the class best suited to their ability. They could be in the top group in English and the bottom in maths. Talent or ability was the determinant, not age. When I said that if this was comprehensive education, I was all for it, he said that that was not how it was conducted in England, where pupils were moved up each year, regardless of ability, leading to those unable to keep up in one year slipping ever further behind as they moved up.

My second point, which echoes what the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, said about communication skills is one that I have made on the Floor of this House many times. The scourge of the 21st century is that children cannot communicate with each other, their teachers, or anyone else. Assessment by speech and language therapists discloses a raft of reasons, some to do with learning disabilities or difficulties—all of which can be ameliorated—to enable the young person to engage with his or her teacher. I firmly believe—based on the evidence of what therapists funded by Lady Helen Hamlyn achieved in young offender institutions, prompting governors to say that they did not know how they managed without them—that every child should have their communication skills assessed before they begin primary school. In the light of so much evidence of the glaringly obvious, I despair that successive Governments have, so far, not implemented this, because unless children can engage with their teachers and therefore education itself, too many will remain uneducated.

My final point reflects one made by the noble Baroness, Lady Perry, again about denied excellence. In 1999 Gabbitas initiated a programme called Tomorrow's Achievers, and I must declare an interest as a patron of the project. It provides master classes for that section of young people, namely the exceptionally bright, whose talents are currently ill served in too many instances. In each of the past two years more than 1,000 young people have been enabled to attend life-changing classes. Ten years ago they were offered to the then director-general of the Prison Service in the hope that they could rescue some who, often out of frustration, had turned to crime. So far, not one candidate has been put forward, and this remains yet another gift horse that I beg the Government to stable.

My Lords, if you sense a mood of frustrated concern, you would be correct. I care for this nation, and above all for its future and the future of its citizens. Education is all about identifying, nurturing and developing talent, and if we do not do that excellently, we risk damaging its future—and we will be to blame.