Children and Families Bill
Lord Rix Excerpts(10 years, 10 months ago)
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Lord Rix (CB)
My Lords, I warmly welcome the government amendments to Clauses 37 and 51 on social care and redress. I thank the Minister and officials most warmly for listening to the arguments from across the House and the sector and for improving the Bill accordingly. The government amendments move us closer to the holy grail of integrated education, health and social care.
Making it clear that the provision of social care is on a statutory footing in their plans will undoubtedly aid children and young people with a learning disability and their families. The change, I hope, will mean that social care is not at risk of being an afterthought or an appendix as is currently the case in many statements.
I further thank the Minister and his officials for listening to us on the issue of a single point of appeal and for the commitment to conduct a review and pilots. As is always the case with these things, clarity is needed in a number of areas on the detail and I understand that the Special Educational Consortium and Every Disabled Child Matters will write to the department on this matter. I confirm with the Minister that the pilots will look at the possibility of hearing both appeals and complaints on education, health and care, not only complaints.
With that said, I thank the Minister again for making important and positive changes to the Bill.
Lord Low of Dalston (CB)
The Minister was kind enough to mention me as having taken part in the discussions on the subject to which the amendments relate, and I follow my noble friend Lord Rix in warmly welcoming the amendments to Clause 37 that the Minister has tabled. They go a long way towards dealing with the point that we raised about the language used to describe the social care required. By referring to the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act, they also go a long way towards addressing the question about enforceability.
To my regret, I have to be somewhere else shortly and will not be able to take part in the debate on the other amendments, so I shall take this opportunity of expressing my appreciation not only to Ministers but to their officials for the extensive way in which they have taken part in discussions throughout the lengthy passage of the Bill, and responded fully to many of the points raised. Obviously it is not appropriate at this point to refer too far forward to other subjects of discussion but, as my noble friend Lord Rix mentioned this, I may perhaps be permitted to say that I too very much welcome the package of government amendments on the review of the appeal process. There were obviously considerable difficulties in implementing the single point of appeal, which we were arguing for, right here and now, so the Government have taken the right course in agreeing to set up a review. I look forward to welcoming the outcome of that review in due course—but that is for another day. Today, I simply warmly welcome both the government amendments and—if I may be permitted to do so—the considerable number of additional amendments that the Government have tabled, and express my warm-hearted appreciation both to Ministers and to the officials who have backed them up in the production of the amendments. I also thank them for their flexible response to the debates on the Bill in general.
Children and Families Bill
Lord Rix Excerpts(10 years, 11 months ago)
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“( ) If the plan specifies social care provision, the responsible local authority must secure the specified social care provision for the child or young person.”
Lord Rix (CB)
Noble Lords will have noticed, no doubt, that Amendment 38 would place a duty to deliver the social care element of the forthcoming education, health and care plans, which gives me an excuse to indulge for a short time in a worry that has bothered me for more than 30 years. In the 1980s, I began to have discussions with civil servants, politicians and administrators, particularly at the old DHSS—then located at the Elephant and Castle—about increasing co-operation between education, health and social care, and was told on many occasions that this was the recognised way forward. The will seems always to have been there, but meaningful co-ordination and collaboration on the ground has failed to emerge. It has been entirely dependent on local circumstance. We need to change that.
To the Government’s credit, they have recognised the problem and have taken the very welcome step forward of amending the Bill so that clinical commissioning groups are under a duty to provide the health element of the plan—but, alas, social care remains the poor cousin. This could easily be remedied by aligning the duty to provide social care services, as laid down in the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970, with the education, health and care plans that appear in the Bill. In this suggestion I am supported by not only my fellow signatories to the amendment but by the Special Educational Consortium and the Every Disabled Child Matters campaign.
Currently, many families do not receive the care they need until they reach breaking point—something to which Mencap drew attention in a recent report of that name. A duty to deliver the care elements of the plan will ensure that children, young people and their families receive services earlier, thus preventing the need for higher levels of support later. I understand that the Government are looking into this matter— something I warmly welcome, if the outcome is correct. I look forward to the Minister’s response. I beg to move.
Lord Low of Dalston
My Lords, my name is on the amendment and I wish to give my full support to my noble friend Lord Rix, who moved it. It would place a duty on local authorities to deliver the social care services identified in education, health and care plans. The contention of the noble Lord, myself and the other noble Lords who have their names on the amendment is that there is very little point in assessing a child or young person’s needs, identifying social care needs and putting them in the education and health plan, and then not making the plan enforceable in respect of social care as it is in respect of education provision.
As I think the noble Lord, Lord Rix, indicated, the amendment would add no new duties on local authorities to provide social care in addition to those that already exist. It merely brings together the legislation on education, health and care plans and existing social care legislation. There is currently a misconception that the social care duties in respect of disabled children are not specifically enforceable for an individual child. However, as I think the Government accept, this duty does already exist under Section 2 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970. The proposal contained in this amendment would help to correct this misconception.
The Government have argued that a proposal to create an individually owed duty in relation to social care would prioritise one group of children in need over another. However, there is already an individually owed duty to disabled children in Section 2 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act, as I indicated, which is not enjoyed by other children in need. We had a good discussion about this in one of the Minister’s meetings with Peers, which I think we all found very valuable in developing our understanding of the Bill. I think we managed to elucidate in that discussion that if one were going to establish priorities between different groups of recipients of social care, it would have to be done at a prior stage to the formulation of the education, health and care plan. If the authority has got to the point of identifying social care needs and putting them in the plan, it really does not make any sense in terms of integrated education, health and social care provision not to make the provision identified in the plan enforceable.
Lord Nash
My Lords, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Rix and Lord Low, the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, and my noble friend Lady Sharp for raising this important matter. I also welcomed the high-quality debate on social care in Grand Committee. I understand fully all the concerns expressed by noble Lords and I say again that it remains our clear expectation that any social care services specified in an EHC plan will be provided by local authorities. As I shall explain, I hope that at Third Reading we will be able to bring forward amendments to address some of those concerns.
However, it is vital that local authorities are able to decide how to prioritise expenditure on social care based on the needs of children and young people, whether or not they have an EHC plan. As a targeted service for vulnerable children and young people, social care is different from education and health services. Education and health services are universal and it makes sense that there should be equivalent duties to provide the services in EHC plans in order to prioritise, over others, children and young people with greater needs.
Social care is a targeted service and is available only for vulnerable children and young people, so there is a greater risk that an individually owed duty for those with plans could adversely affect other vulnerable groups, including children at risk of neglect. We do not think that that is the right thing to do. In answer to a point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Ripon and Leeds, I am afraid that it is really a question of resources. However, I am delighted to hear the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, say that this is one of two remaining pieces in the jigsaw. I am dying to hear what the second one is and I am sure that I will not have to wait long. However, I hope that I shall be able to be helpful in relation to this point.
I do not propose to rehearse further all the important arguments that were made in Grand Committee except to recognise that a number of points have been raised by noble Lords about the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970. It is important to re-emphasise that, regardless of whether social care provision is included in the EHC plan, the duties in existing legislation will continue to apply, as a number of noble Lords have said. Therefore, the requirement for EHC plans to include social care provision “reasonably required” by the learning difficulty or disability which gives rise to the SEN will not introduce a new test for which social care services are to be provided. The duty of local authorities to provide services to disabled children where it is decided that they are necessary under the CSDPA will continue to apply.
I recognise that a number of noble Lords, along with representatives of Every Disabled Child Matters and the Special Educational Consortium, are attracted to including the CSDPA in the Bill as a means of, first, providing assurance that assessed social care needs for disabled children will be met under the existing duty in Section 2 of the CSDPA and, secondly, ensuring that the EHC plan includes all the relevant social care services needed by disabled children.
The Minister for Children and Families and I have had helpful meetings with representatives of the Special Educational Consortium and noble Lords where we have discussed this proposal, and officials at the Department for Education are continuing those discussions. There are of course a number of important issues to consider and we need to avoid unintended consequences. For example, we need to ensure that including the 1970 Act in the Bill will not cause confusion if other relevant legislation is not also listed. We must also ensure that we do all we can in the SEN code of practice to explain the existing legislation clearly to parents and professionals. However, I am hopeful of a positive outcome to these discussions and hope to bring forward an amendment at Third Reading to reflect this. In view of these ongoing discussions and my undertaking, I urge the noble Lords, Lord Rix and Lord Low, the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, and my noble friend Lady Sharp not to press their amendment.
Lord Rix
My Lords, I thank every noble Lord who spoke in support of this amendment. Clearly there is greater support than the number of noble Lords present at the moment and I most grateful, too, to the Minister for his response. I can only take him at his word, which I am sure is totally unassailable, and trust that the amendment that he brings forward at Third Reading will, indeed, support all of us who have wished for Amendment 38 to be accepted. Obviously, he will bring forth something which is not quite Amendment 38, but I hope that it will satisfy all of us here concerned and ensure that social care is, in some form or another, in the Bill. With that assurance ringing in my ears, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
“(g) the social care provision specified in an EHC plan;(h) the healthcare provision specified in an EHC plan.”
Lord Rix
My Lords, Amendment 40A, supported by my noble friends Lord Low and Lady Hollins, seeks to create a single point of appeal across education, health and care. If we are to create a joined-up system across education, care and health, we must apply the same principle to an appeals process. The case was well made by noble Lords in Committee, and I know that the Minister sympathises with the arguments.
My concern is for parents whose sons and daughters have profound and complex needs that cut across education, care and health. If in September this year the provision set out in the plans is not up to scratch, parents could end up appealing left, right and centre, across three very different cultures—from the SEN tribunal, to the health ombudsman and on to the social care chamber. Ultimately, this is about making the system run smoothly so that parents can get on with just being parents—often, as I say, to children with the most complex needs. I fear that unless we do something, parents will remain knee-deep in a quagmire of different agencies, desperately battling for support so that their sons and daughters can, rightly, achieve their aspirations.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, has tabled an amendment that could see a review looking at the feasibility of bringing appeals for education, health and care together. It seems that it is a case of fix now or fix later. For the sake of disabled children and young people, and their families, I hope that whatever the outcome, the fix is soon. I beg to move.
Lord Low of Dalston
My Lords, I have my name on the amendment and give my noble friend Lord Rix my full support in moving it. The case seems self-evidently made and I do not wish to add a great deal to what my noble friend has said.
The raison d’être of this legislation, by and large, is the Government’s attempt to sweep away the barriers of bureaucracy which, it has been well attested, have come between parents, families, children and young people and the assertion of their rights in relation to special educational provision. The Government have, very laudably, brought forward this legislation to try to tackle some of those barriers by developing an integrated system of provision through the integrated education, health and care plan.
We said in relation to an earlier amendment that it does not make much sense to put things in an education, health and care plan and give people the right to enforce provision only in one or maybe two areas but not a third. Equally, it does not make any sense to create an integrated system of provision using education, health and care plans, with a view to sweeping away barriers of bureaucracy by putting in place an integrated system of provision, and then give people a wholly unintegrated system of enforcing their entitlement to what is specified in those integrated education, health and care plans.
Lord Nash
My Lords, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Rix and Lord Low, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Hughes, Lady Hollins and Lady Jones, for tabling the amendments, for their contributions and for bringing their experience to this debate.
Several noble Lords have been kind enough to discuss with me their questions and concerns about the complaints process for children and young people with SEN, including the noble Lords, Lord Rix and Lord Low, and my noble friend Lord Storey. I have been listening carefully to these points and have discussed them at length with my honourable friend the Minister for Children and Families.
Noble Lords have been right to press the Government hard to deliver an integrated complaints procedure to respond to the needs of a more integrated system. First, I reassure noble Lords that work is already in hand to improve the situation. The new code of practice will require that impartial information, advice and support is commissioned through joint arrangements and available through a single point of access with the capacity to handle initial phone, electronic, or face-to-face inquiries. It will also encourage clinical commissioning groups to ensure that relevant information is available at this single point of access, as well as including information on their local health offer on their website. A one-stop shop will be simpler and much more parent and young person-friendly than having to go to more than one place for advice on a range of issues, including how to complain.
Today, my honourable friend the Minister for Children and Families, who has vast direct personal experience in this area, announced a £30 million package to provide children and young people with SEN and disabilities and their parents with independent support to help them through the new SEN assessment and education, health and care planning process. This funding will be available between April 2014 and March 2016. The aim is to have around 1,800 trained independent supporters from the private, voluntary and community sectors in place by autumn 2014. That equates to about 12 individuals, on average, in each local authority area in England.
This will ensure that many families have access to informed advice and support at a time when the system is changing and new processes are bedding in. These independent supporters will be independent of the local authority, but they will need to work with local authorities and other statutory agencies to help families get the support they need. Where there is disagreement, independent supporters will make sure councils understand what families want, and help families to challenge decision-making. This will mean that children and young people with SEN get the help they really need across education, health and care. This is a major step forward.
On the health side, noble Lords will also be glad to hear that work is under way on how NHS complaints are handled, in the light of the Francis report and the review undertaken by the right honourable Ann Clwyd MP and Professor Tricia Hart into the NHS hospitals complaints system. The Government want to ensure that when things go wrong, the complaints system is clear, fair and open, and that at every level, the NHS scrutinises and learns from mistakes to improve care for patients.
The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, Healthwatch England and the Department of Health will work with the Patients Association, patients, regulators, commissioners and providers to develop universal expectations for the handling of complaints. These will be used across the NHS to drive improvements in patient satisfaction with complaint-handling. This will benefit children and young people with SEN, so we should be wary of establishing a new set of arrangements for this one group without allowing the wider suite of reforms on NHS complaints to establish itself.
Turning to why extending the remit of the tribunal is difficult, the issues here are extremely complicated. It is tempting to extend the tribunal’s remit across health and social care, but there are legitimate reasons why we cannot do so at this point. Local authorities’ duty to arrange provision that will meet the special educational needs of a child currently with a statement, or, in future, a child or young person with a plan, is absolute. The local authority has to arrange that provision no matter what the cost. This means that when the tribunal makes a decision that will increase the special educational provision for one child, that will have no effect on other children with statements because the local authority has the same absolute duty to arrange provision that meets their needs as well.
The position is different with health and social care. The authority is making decisions having regard to the health and social care needs of the whole population. We have already discussed the issues around social care in some detail. This means that, if the tribunal were to be given powers to make decisions in those areas, any decision the tribunal made to increase provision for one child or young person could mean that other children or young people with similar or even greater health or social care needs could be deprived of provision they require. It would therefore be wrong to give the tribunal the powers implied by the amendment.
The issues are significant. None the less, we should consider what more we should do now better to integrate complaints across services. This is a matter of concern to Ministers in both the Department of Health and the Department for Education. Building on our commitment to funding for key workers to help parents who need to navigate the system, we agree that there is more to be done to ensure that redress works well and feels joined up, where it needs to, and that we will need to keep that under review as the reforms are implemented.
We would therefore be grateful for the opportunity to discuss these issues further with noble Lords before Third Reading to ensure that we can confirm a strong package by that point. The things that we particularly would like to look at include: the role of mediation, including the scope to extend the arrangements in the Bill to cover health and social care as well as special education; notwithstanding the concerns I have set out, whether there could be a role for the tribunal in joining up redress across education, health and care; and what arrangements we should put in place to review how redress works once the new system is bedded in and in the light of wider reforms to complaints in the health service.
I assure noble Lords that that is something that we are taking seriously and about which we are in active discussions, which will continue, with the Department of Health. In view of what I have said, I urge noble Lords not to press their amendments.
Lord Rix
My Lords, this is like opening a Christmas stocking, is it not? You are never quite sure what is going to come out next. The idea that we will be given time to discuss this matter in more detail before Third Reading is a promise which has great merit. To a certain extent it answers the noble Lord, Lord Storey, on his problems, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, who was asking for an extension of up to a year before any final decision were taken. If we can make a decision before Third Reading, it will be quite incredible. I would obviously welcome that, because my amendment is asking for immediate effect, but I am very happy to attend any meeting which makes this possible. Even at Third Reading, if some sort of promise is made to continue the review along the lines laid down by the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, again, I am sure that I would support that. Without knowing quite what the noble Baroness is going to say, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Children and Families Bill
Lord Rix Excerpts(11 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Rix
My Lords, last Wednesday the Minister discussed the Children and Families Bill at the weekly meeting of the Cross-Bench Peers. I was particularly interested in Part 3 and the provisions affecting children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities. I asked how the local authorities who were trialling the provisions for this group—pathfinders, as they are known—were progressing, but no one seemed to have a clear idea of the present position, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Lingfield, who obviously has studied the situation. I, too, have looked into this matter and believe that noble Lords might like to hear my findings.
The evaluation of the pathfinder programme’s Process and Implementation Research Report, published last month, shows that 18 months into 29 pathfinder projects, one pathfinder had still only partially developed a project plan while two pathfinders had only partially agreed a clear set of objectives and partially sorted out a project board and governance structure. Similarly, six had not fully established commitment to share education, seven to share social care and 14 to share health resources. The report highlights plenty of good practice and plenty of good will, but it also highlights slow responses in creating the kind of change that it is expected in the Children and Families Bill will happen very quickly.
Furthermore, the pathfinder group of local authorities was given additional resources and support, and volunteered to make changes. However, this current legislation is not going to provide additional resources for the remaining 297 local authorities. It is being introduced at a time when the authorities are restructuring their health and education provision to meet entirely different government priorities. It is being introduced by local authority staff, many of whom are having their services outsourced and having to establish new consultancy and contractual agreements across a whole raft of provision, and all of whom are having to deal with profound levels of financial cutback. What will their priority be? Will it be in delivering this new service, in meeting the demands of this legislation? It is extremely likely that, in many cases, local authorities will not consider this a priority and, as such, numerous children and young people, their families and the professionals with whom they work will pay a very high price.
Education, health and care plans will replace statements of special educational needs. As currently drafted, the special educational provision set out in a plan must be secured by the local authority. The Government have amended the Bill to place health commissioners under a duty to arrange any health provision set out in a plan. However, as has been mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, this leaves social care as a poor relative. It remains the only part of the plan that is not enforceable.
As president of Mencap, this is of great concern to me and others, as the majority of children and young people with a learning disability need some form of care and would benefit immensely from placing the social care part of the plan on an equal footing, thus leading to the longed-for joined-up support. Without this, parents will continue to find themselves battling to secure the appropriate support for their child against a cash-strapped local authority and with the most complex demands to meet before they can obtain such support.
Clause 37, among other things, sets out what education, health and care plans might specify. Explicitly, there is mention of the future outcomes to which a child or young person might aspire. However, there is no mention of work-related outcomes. The transition from education and training into work is a difficult one for people with a learning disability and simply does not happen for the vast majority. Indeed, fewer than 7% of people with a learning disability known to social services are in any form of employment, despite the National Audit Office declaring that,
“supporting one person with learning disabilities into employment could, in addition to improving their independence and self-esteem, reduce lifetime cost to the public purse by around £170,000”—
that is per person—
“at today's prices … and increase their income by between 55 and 95 per cent”.
The Government have affirmed their commitment to continuing support to those on education, health and care plans who are undertaking an apprenticeship. However, that needs to go further. Many people with a learning disability are unable to access apprenticeships because of difficulties in achieving the English and maths elements of the framework. Supported employment is a personalised approach to working with people with significant disabilities. This support enables them to access and retain open employment, focusing on learning in the workplace and shaped around the individual’s particular support needs. It is a widely recognised and well evidenced approach, and one that the Government support as best practice. I hope that the Minister can comment on why currently this is not mentioned in either the Bill or the accompanying Explanatory Notes.
It goes without saying that I support many of the points raised by my noble friend Lord Low and other noble Lords on other areas, such as strengthening the local offer, introducing a single point of redress and protecting current rights and entitlements. The aspirations of the Bill are bold and should be welcomed. However, if they are to be realised, substantial improvements are needed and appropriate resources must be provided to support the relevant agencies. In addition, social care must be put on an equal footing together with education and health. I hope that the final version of the Bill does just that and that the Government do not shy away from the real improvements that children, young people, families, professionals and so many of us here wish to see.
Special Educational Needs (Direct Payments) (Pilot Scheme) Order 2012
Lord Rix Excerpts(12 years, 11 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Hill of Oareford)
My Lords, when we discussed the general principle of testing the use of direct payments for special educational provision on Report on the Education Bill back in November, I am glad to say that there was a broad welcome for the measure from all sides of the House. However, there was a suggestion from the noble Lord, Lord Touhig, that the detail would merit further scrutiny and that the affirmative resolution procedure would be the right way forward. That was a suggestion that I was happy to adopt, and I am glad that we have an early opportunity to discuss this important order today.
I also put on record my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Rix, for the attention that he has personally paid to this issue since November and for the helpful exchanges that he has had with my honourable friend Sarah Teather. I also thank the Special Educational Consortium for the way in which it has worked very constructively with officials to look at some of the detail. We have benefited from its advice as well.
As noble Lords know, we said in the Green Paper, Support and Aspiration, that we want to give every child with a statement of SEN or in a new single education, health and care plan, and their family, the option of a personal budget by 2014. That will help give families more of a say in decisions about the support services they use. We have already set up 20 pathfinders to look at improving assessment processes and developing personal budgets for parents. What we are not currently able to do is test the contribution that direct payments for special educational services could play in empowering families. We can do that for health and social services, but not for education. By passing this order, we will also be able to trial direct payments for educational services as part of testing personal budgets across health, social care and education which, if we want to bring all the services together in a more integrated way, seems to be the logical next step. We propose that the pilot should initially run for 14 months until March 2013, with the option to extend for a further two years after that point, if necessary. This is in line with the Green Paper pathfinder testing period.
During our debate in November, noble Lords sought reassurance on a number of points. Let me try to deal with each of them. The noble Lord, Lord Touhig, sought reassurance on the potential impact of direct payments on services to other children and young people with disabilities and SEN. The issue was also raised by the Special Educational Consortium during its discussions with officials from the department. We recognise the importance of this issue not just in terms of the viability of services, but also as an equalities issue. So we are clear that the benefits that direct payments may deliver to those who choose to receive them must not be achieved at the expense of other service users.
That is why we have included the requirements set out in paragraphs 11(c) and 17(f) of the order, which require the local authority to consider the potential for any adverse impact on other service users before entering into any individual agreement on a direct payment and to stop making direct payments should that become apparent at a later date. We recognise that there needs to be a careful balance struck between achieving our aim to give families greater choice and control and protecting existing services. We will need to work through this issue, as and when it arises, with the authorities taking part in this pilot.
In response to questions raised about securing a direct payment, we have sought to give greater clarity to the process for agreeing a direct payment and the provision that it can be used to purchase. We have linked the offer of direct payments to the making of a new or amended statement or the carrying out of a learning difficulties assessment to ensure that the question of whether direct payments will be made does not affect the existing statement and assessment process.
In addition, we have included a requirement to reach agreement about the goods and services which are to be secured by means of the direct payments and a requirement to obtain the written consent of the proposed recipient and, if different, the parent or beneficiary. The written consent must specify the agreed provision and the amount of the direct payments, including whether they are to be paid in a lump sum or in instalments.
Following questions from the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, about support to families, we have included requirements in paragraph 19 of the order for authorities to make arrangements for a person receiving direct payments to obtain information, advice and support and provide them with written information about organisations that may be able to offer advice and assistance in connection with direct payments. This is an important point, and I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, for raising it.
Pathfinder authorities will need to work with independent organisations to test how this advice and guidance can be delivered most effectively. A key objective of our Green Paper pathfinders overall is to explore how the voluntary and community sector can be used to improve access to specialist expertise and to introduce more independence to the system.
We have learnt from the individual budgets for disabled children pilot, which began under the previous Government, that, with effective support, advice and information, personal budgets can be accessible to families of all backgrounds. We will work with the authorities taking part in this pilot to ensure that they benefit from the experience of those individual budget pilots. To this end, we have included the individual budget pilot authorities in this pilot scheme alongside those taking part in the Green Paper pathfinder programme.
Overall, we are clear that there is much to learn and work through in the implementation of direct payments for special educational provision. This pilot scheme will allow us to do this as a coherent part of the testing of the reforms being undertaken by our Green Paper pathfinders. This includes the work that they will be doing on personal budgets, of which direct payments are just one method of delivery, and their wider work on the new single assessment process and education, health and care plan. We have made available to both Houses a section of the Green Paper consultation response relevant to personal funding and direct payments.
Finally, I would like to repeat the reassurance I gave during our debate on the primary legislation. The pilot scheme will need to be subjected to proper evaluation if we are to learn from it. We are working on the detail of that evaluation at present, but I can confirm that we intend it to be undertaken by an independent research company and to form a distinct but coherent element of the wider evaluation of the Green Paper pathfinder programme. I am happy to repeat my commitment to sharing those findings as we go along.
To sum up, I think that the previous time we debated this we all agreed on the direction in which we are keen to travel, but we certainly recognise that a number of difficult questions and issues are still likely to arise as we go along that way. I believe that this order provides a framework within which we can explore and, I hope, find ways to address those questions while ensuring that appropriate safeguards for families and the public purse are maintained. I beg to move.
Lord Rix
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hill, and his ministerial colleague Sarah Teather, the Children's Minister, who I previously met last autumn along with a delegation from the Special Educational Consortium to discuss in more detail the statutory instruments in relation to direct payments for special educational needs in the various pilot areas. I welcome the constructive and positive dialogue and correspondence with the noble Lord, his ministerial colleagues and various officials in his department. I believe that the statutory instrument, as laid, is much improved as a consequence of that process.
However, there remain a number of points on which I continue to seek clarity. For example, I seek assurances that if people with a learning disability are the recipients of direct payments, it will not lead to a reduction in the level of resources available for the provision of their education. I believe there is a genuine risk of this. In the field of social care, I am aware that personal budgets have sometimes been used by local authorities as an opportunity to try to reduce their costs. We must not allow this to happen with direct payments for SEN, which is why it is so important to get the statementing process right.
I also welcome the Government’s inclusion of paragraph (10) in Schedule 1 to the order, which requires local authorities to agree the amount of direct payment with the recipient in advance and to obtain their consent in writing. However, it is important to bear in mind that many statements of SEN and learning difficulty assessments are not sufficiently well written to allow proper calculation of the cost of the services they describe. For example, a statement may say, “Regular input from a speech and language therapist”, when it should say, “Three hours input from a speech and language therapist per week”. It would be impossible to calculate an amount that correlates to regular input, and in practice this would be down to negotiation between recipients and the local authority. In these cases, parents or young people might agree to accept a direct payment that is not sufficient to purchase the support which is actually needed. Therefore, I would like the Government to consider how they could ensure that the provisions set out in a statement of SEN are properly quantified and specified before a direct payment for that statement is agreed upon.
The Minister will also be aware that concerns were previously raised, as he remarked, about the impact of direct payments on the SEN services provided by local authorities for other children and young people in their area. I am uneasy with the requirement in paragraph 17 of Schedule 1 that if an “adverse impact” is made on these services, the local authority would stop making the direct payments. This could potentially lead to unintended consequences. For example, what steps will be put in place to safeguard the interests of the children concerned if a direct payment is suddenly ceased? What guarantees are there to ensure that the resources allocated for the provision of SEN are not misdirected elsewhere? What steps will be taken to ensure that local authorities do not deliberately underfund direct payments so that the payments can be withdrawn soon after? I also seek assurances that the evaluation of the pilots will fully consider these issues.
I look forward to the Minister’s response to the various concerns raised about this order during today’s debate, and I hope that officials in his department will be prepared to continue working with representatives from the Special Educational Consortium as we move forward on this matter.
Education Bill
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“( ) Where a child has a special educational need, a school must demonstrate co-operation with other agencies to ensure the child’s needs are supported holistically.”
Lord Rix
My Lords, I wish to speak to Amendment 99, tabled in my name, regarding issues around the duty for schools to co-operate with other agencies. I also thank the Minister for the opportunity he gave me nearly four weeks ago now to meet him and to summon his officials to discuss this matter in more detail, and for the letter that he subsequently sent me on the issue which, thanks to the vagaries of the post, arrived 14 days after it was posted. Tempus fugit but apparently not for the postal service.
The co-ordination of services for children with SEN, including those with a learning disability, is an approach for which the disability sector has been calling for a number of years. Co-ordinated support is a holistic approach that ensures that disabled children and their families are at the centre of the services that are aimed at improving their access to a full and meaningful life. The amendment tabled in my name aims to retain the duty on schools to co-operate with external agencies, which the Bill in its current form seeks to remove. Even the Government’s own SEN Green Paper refers to the importance of multiagency working and the role of partnerships in delivering the best outcomes for disabled children. By removing the duty to co-operate, I fear that the Government are sending out completely the wrong message, and I encourage Ministers to return to the aspirations as set out in the Green Paper.
However, in his recent letter, to which I referred earlier, the noble Lord, Lord Hill, advised me that new inspection requirements for schools will be explicit about disability and SEN. As these inspectors will include the,
“leadership and management of the school”,
the Government hope that schools will fully consider their responsibilities when working with external partners and other agencies in the interests of the children concerned. Perhaps to pre-empt all this, there was a meeting last Thursday with the noble Lords, Lord Laming, Lord Low and Lord Touhig, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Walmsley and Lady Benjamin, to which I was invited but was unable to attend because I had to go to hospital.
The noble Lord, Lord Laming, has received a letter from the Minister. I hope he does not mind if I quote the words:
“I said that I would need to consult Ministerial colleagues, but confirmed that I intended to return to this matter at Report Stage”.
Therefore, although of course I am very happy to listen to others, at the same time when the time comes I shall withdraw my amendment.
Lord Laming
My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Rix, has indicated, the Minister generously met a group of us last week. I think we would all agree that we had a very useful meeting where we were able to express our thoughts fully and the Minister was responsive to our concerns. As the noble Lord, Lord Rix, said, the Minister has since written to me and indicated that he has given the matter further thought. The letter is written in what I would call careful language, perhaps even a touch cautious, and therefore no bunting is to be unrolled as yet. However, I am sure that I speak on behalf of the group when I say that we are extremely grateful for the Minister’s thoughtful approach to this and we look forward to returning to this on Report.
Lord Hill of Oareford
I will be brief. I can say yes to the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes. We will be clear before we reach Report; we need to be. I have given that undertaking to the noble Lords I met with and I am happy to repeat it. I am grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Rix and Lord Laming, for what they said. I was glad to have the chance to meet them and we will meet again—I will not finish that line.
I will have to follow up the point made by my noble friend Lord Elton and write to him. Ditto, I am not sure about the position in Finland, but we will look into it.
Again, I am grateful to noble Lords for meeting me. I have undertaken to discuss this further, which will probably be in September but before the Report stage. On that basis, I hope we can move forward.
Lord Rix
My Lords, I am very grateful to everyone who has spoken. I hope that the Minister can write to me during the Recess because I am going away in the first week in September, when the Bill might well reach its Report stage. I should certainly like to be able to discuss this with the Minister or with my colleagues, if that is possible, before we actually reach the next stage. However, with the Minister’s assurances ringing in my mind, I am happy to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Knight of Weymouth
My Lords, I want to speak to this group of amendments in part to avoid speaking in a clause stand part debate not only because that is more efficient but because, I have to apologise to the Committee, I will need to leave in around 20 minutes in order to fulfil a speaking engagement. If I miss the Minister’s response, I apologise. I hope, nevertheless, that it is in order for me to make some comments.
In many ways, I think that Clause 34 is possibly the worst clause in the Bill. I know that there is some stiff competition for that accolade, but the issue of fair admissions is of vital importance. In passing, I want to thank Chris Waterman, who has done some excellent work on and analysis of the issue for us.
The reason I say that fair admissions are very important is because I support diversity and more competition between schools. As moves are made to increase choice and accountability and thus to drive competition in that way, it is all the more important to ensure that admissions are fair and every child is given an equal chance to attend the good schools so that, in the end, parents are choosing schools and not the other way around. It is on that basis that I strongly support Amendments 100A, 102 and 103 because they seek clarity on the overarching aim of fairness in school admissions. They seek to improve the situation presented in Clause 34, but in the end they will not fix the problem. The problem is that Clause 34 makes the job of the adjudicator pretty toothless by taking his powers away.
Paragraph 168 of the Explanatory Notes makes the position clear by stating:
“Subsection (3) restricts the powers of the school adjudicator. It repeals section 88J of SSFA 1998 which requires schools adjudicators, upon referral of a specific matter concerning a maintained school’s admission arrangements, to consider whether it would be appropriate for changes to be made to any aspect of those admission arrangements”.
Similarly, the notes in respect of subsection (4) state that it,
“removes the requirement under section 88P … for local authorities to provide to the adjudicator reports on admissions to schools in their area”.
Why do I think it is so bad to remove these two powers? As my noble friend Lady Hughes said, every school is potentially an academy so every school is potentially its own admissions authority. That means a confusion of the arrangements faced by parents. The noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, made a strong argument in that cause. There are numerous oddities in the arrangements of schools. We have oddities of scale in areas such as South Hertfordshire, with its particular preference to parents from Islington because of some historic arrangement, as well as partial selection—something I had to wrestle with at some length and which was very odd.
In the constituency in which I used to live, the school of Budmouth, a very popular school, gave particular priority to children from the village of Chickerell for some historic reason. It was difficult for people struggling to get their children into the school to understand. There are issues of siblings. There are issues of faith, which I do not want to get into for fear of stimulating a very long debate. There are issues of children of staff. How will staff be defined? If we are true to some of the themes running through the Committee, staff might be defined just as teachers. If we go down that road, we should include all school staff, but then a parent whose children a school might want to attract might get a job for just an hour a week helping out as a member of the support staff and then, magically, their children would be allowed priority. It is very important that we get that definition right.
The problem of coherence is already an issue with voluntary aided schools and academies being their own admissions authority. The admissions forums—fora; I am struggling with my Latin—are now being abolished in subsection (2)(a), despite the fact that they provided some co-ordination and tried to ensure that local unfair anomalies did not emerge. It is a retrograde step to get rid of them as we move into even greater proliferation of arrangements.
In many ways, the simplicity of the new code, which is currently being consulted on, will create massive local complexity, for the reasons I have described. That is a view held among many admissions officers, which is why I support Amendment 101A, with its focus on the views of parents. With every school its own admissions authority, as their resources come under pressure—as they are at the moment, for understandable reasons—fair admissions must remain a sufficient priority for the admissions code to be consistently adhered to by every school and admissions authority. We know, through the work of the Sutton Trust, that even with the current tougher admissions regime in place at the moment schools still find covert means to attract children who are more likely to succeed and discourage those less likely to attain five A* to C-grade GCSEs.
The removal of subsection (4) of section 85A of the 1998 Act, under Clause 34(4) of the Bill, removes the policing of admissions and the requirement of local authorities to report to the schools adjudicator—effectively, the prosecutor—all admissions arrangements. I was interested in what the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, had to say about around where they would report to. It seems clear to me that, in the same way that the police get in touch with the CPS if an offence might need prosecuting, local authorities should report to the school adjudicator.
The removal provided for in Clause 34(3) removes the teeth from the adjudicator making changes to admissions arrangements to ensure compliance. It is obvious to me that if we are to have a fair admissions system, the person in charge must have the power to get the admissions arrangements changed to make them comply with the law—we are talking about the law. The measures that Clause 34 will remove are necessary.
Finally, it is worth reminding the Committee why the current rules came in. In 1998, when the Department for Children, Schools and Families—as it was then—commissioned a look at the admissions arrangements in three local authority areas, the abuses found included: schools asking parents to commit to making financial contributions as a condition of admission; asking about the marital, occupational or financial status of parents; and ignoring the priority for admission that schools are legally obliged to give to looked-after children. Other cases uncovered included schools giving priority for places to family members who were not siblings and interviewing children before making an admission decision. Those are not fair practices. They allow schools to select parents, and not vice versa. For that reason, I very much support Amendment 101 and would support omitting Clause 34 altogether.
Lord Rix
My Lords, Amendment 102 addresses a variety of concerns I have in relation to the relaxing of duties of schools regarding the admissions process for children with special educational needs, including those with a learning disability. My concerns are clearly shared by other noble Lords in the amendments that surround mine.
Schools must be held to account for their admissions policies and the way they operate these policies in practice. If the parents of disabled children are to have full confidence that their children are not being discriminated against in terms of admissions, schools must be aware of their obligations under the Equality Act 2010 and make the reasonable adjustments required. In the interests of openness, transparency and the genuine empowerment of parents, the second part of my amendment would set out the rights of parents in appealing and complaining against admissions and oblige schools to publicise these details.
It is often said that information is power; I want parents to have easy access to the information to which they are entitled when it comes to challenging unfair decisions by schools over the admission of their children. However, in his letter to me to which I have already referred, the noble Lord, Lord Hill, advised me that parents and others would still have the option to make their objections known to the school adjudicator. There are also proposals to include academies and free schools, which of course I welcome. No doubt he will explain more in his response to these amendments.
Lord Touhig
I support the objectives in the noble Lord’s amendment. However, in voluntary aided Catholic schools and academies, the governing body is the admissions authority. Currently it can determine admissions on oversubscription criteria based on a child being a Catholic or a non-Catholic and so on. These schools are required to, and do, comply with the Equality Act 2010. I am a little concerned. Does he think his amendment, if accepted, would remove the right of the governing bodies to determine the admissions criteria based upon the existing principles?
Baroness Morris of Yardley
My Lords, I would also like to speak to this group of amendments. I support the amendments moved by my noble friend. I shall be brief. I think that the details of the amendments and how they would affect the legislation have been made quite clear. I would like to carry on where my noble friend left off in considering what underpins this.
At first look, the system of the adjudicator and admissions forums might seem quite complicated. It clearly is a bureaucracy in the sense of the word and there are things going on there that seem to be relatively complex. However, I think that the Minister has to go back and look at why this arrangement was made. If those amendments improved the working of the adjudicator, I would not have a problem, but it is really quite clear that the powers of the adjudicator and the admissions forum are very much reduced by this.
Three things underpinned the introduction of the adjudicator. When the Minister replies, will he be able to tell us how his Government are going to deal with these three problems if he removes the power of the adjudicator? The way that the last Government dealt with these three problems was through the system of admissions forums and the adjudicator. Take them away if you do not like them but it would be disastrous if nothing was put in their place, for three reasons.
First, I go back to this great complexity of the system, when schools are their own admissions authorities, and indeed when the adjudicator system was brought in there were far fewer schools that were their own admissions authorities than is the case now. I was not in favour of any school being allowed to be its own admissions authority, save for faith schools. Indeed, I was not in favour of the move by my own Government to allow academies to be their own admissions authorities. As we now move towards having more schools in that category, it will get worse.
Education Bill
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Lord Rix
My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 77 in my name, which is also concerned with teacher training. First, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, for being such a gracious and excellent understudy for moving my Amendments 34 and 42 last Thursday week. If I was back in my old profession I fear that she might grab hold of my trousers and take over my part. I am very grateful to her.
The current teacher training programme provides inadequate provision in special educational needs. It is thought that on a typical teacher training course the voluntary module of SEN is provided for less than one day. I do not believe that the Bill builds confidence that the aspirations of the SEN Green Paper will be met. The proposal in the Bill to allow outstanding schools—as judged by Ofsted—to become training hubs is inadequate. This judgment does not factor in a requirement that there be outstanding provision of SEN teaching in such schools.
I had a meeting last week with the Minister of State for Children and Families, Sarah Teather, at which I sought assurances that all teachers in all schools will have access to quality training in SEN issues. I seek similar guarantees here today. I suggest that the proposal in my amendment for a minimum of 20 hours’ training in SEN is still a fairly modest target. For this to encourage effective training, I believe that a 20-hour requirement should be integrated within the newly qualified teacher training framework and that it should seek to transcend all aspects of the training curriculum so that newly qualified teachers have the skills and confidence to adapt all aspects of teaching in order to increase the educational outcomes of children with SEN. The identification and subsequent delivery of a child’s support needs is vital. To achieve this, teachers and other educational professionals need the right skills in place to know when a child is displaying SEN and not bad behaviour so that they can respond appropriately. I hope that the Minister, too, will respond appropriately and assure the Committee that teachers will receive the necessary level of training to meet the educational needs of all students, including those with SEN.
Lord Willis of Knaresborough
My Lords, I question all three amendments. I do so because this is a thread running throughout the Bill. This is a Bill that is all about structures and yet more structures, without looking at the fundamental reason why we are having an Education Bill, which is to improve the lot of our young people, particularly those with the greatest needs.
In terms of SEN, we are moving back from what I thought was the direction of travel which occurred over the past two decades of having schools as inclusive organisations where all members of staff are continually engaged in training in order to meet the needs of children. My worry about these three amendments is that by simply ticking a box which says you have, say, eight or 20 hours of training, somehow that makes you an effective teacher of children with special educational needs. It does not. It might give you some of the rudimentary elements, and for that these amendments are certainly a welcome direction of travel. But in reality I am looking for the Minister to say what the Government intend to do who encounter children with special educational needs in every one of our schools—not simply our special schools and not simply those children who have a statement of special needs—to ensure that all teachers have a required level of teaching and engagement, the like of which, quite frankly, we have never seen in our schools sufficient to meet the needs of those children. That is what we should really be looking for in terms of amendments to the Bill.
I hope that the Minister will give some satisfaction not only to those who tabled the amendments but to the whole of the Committee in order that we can feel satisfied that after the Bill is passed, our children with special educational needs get a better deal than the one they are getting in the vast majority of our schools today.
“( ) The Secretary of State shall monitor the teacher training provided by lead schools to ensure training includes at least 20 hours in special educational needs.”
Breaks for Carers of Disabled Children Regulations 2011
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Baroness Jones of Whitchurch
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his explanation of the purpose behind the regulations. As he acknowledged, the issue of breaks for carers was taken extremely seriously by the previous Government, which set out the groundwork for these regulations in the Children and Young Persons Act 2008 and set in train a major investment in support for disabled children through the aiming high for disabled children programme. Our main concern now is to ensure that the progress, the investment and the momentum created by the previous Government are maintained.
The whole issue has come to the fore in the very sad case reported in the press last week of Riven Vincent, who has asked her local authority to take her severely disabled child into care as she can no longer cope because of the lack of respite care. Although this single case has hit the headlines, we can be sure that many other parents are struggling with similar crises in their lives. It is therefore vital that we get the provisions right and relevant to meet the known needs of the estimated 700,000 disabled children in England.
The Government have changed the original intent of the legislation in a number of key ways, including: removing the ring-fencing of the funds, to which the noble Lord has already referred; the monitoring and assessment via the children and young people’s plan; and granting greater autonomy to local authorities to interpret their responsibilities in this area. I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure me that the priority for breaks for carers envisaged in the Act will be maintained.
I have a number of questions for the Minister. First, the department’s own impact assessment states:
“We consider that where LAs indentified and funded their own delivery support, only high performing LAs would continue to improve, leaving a mixed picture of services for families in need”.
Can the Minister reassure me that there will be a comprehensive breaks service across the country rather than the rather patchy service suggested by his department?
Secondly, there was considerable pressure on local authorities to prepare for the duty that would have come into force in April 2011, and a great deal of progress has been made. Can the Minister give an assurance that the Government’s new emphasis on local autonomy will not let local authorities off the hook, so that they are forced to give this issue priority rather than responding to vocal local pressures from electors to fund other issues?
Thirdly, how will the Government monitor progress? What information will be collected centrally and how will the quality of local services for the carers of disabled children be assessed?
Finally, how will the Government ensure that the needs of the most vulnerable families are protected, given that disabled children are much more likely to live in poor housing and be in the lowest income groups? For example, children from BME families are the least likely to access the services currently available. Is there not a danger that services will be provided only to those who shout the loudest and not to those who are the most vulnerable and least able to stand up for themselves and argue for provision in their area?
I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure me on these points.
Lord Rix
My Lords, I welcome the introduction of these draft regulations by the coalition Government. As your Lordships may be aware, in March 2008, along with the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, I tabled an amendment to the then Children and Young Persons Bill on this matter. The amendment created a new duty for local authorities to help parents caring for disabled children by providing them with breaks from their caring responsibilities. As the Minister has already kindly stated, my involvement in the campaign for short breaks for disabled children has lasted for many years. I think I introduced a Private Member’s Bill about short breaks as long ago as 1994. It went through the Lords but crashed in the House of Commons. I know that representatives from across the disability sector, including Mencap, of which I am president, and Every Disabled Child Matters, will welcome the introduction of these regulations.
The case for this new duty could not be stronger, and I welcome the £800 million identified by the Government over the next four years to help local authorities provide these short breaks. However, when faced with the competing demands of filling potholes, weekly rubbish collections and street cleaning, I fear that the temptation on local authorities to spend money for short breaks in other areas could be very seductive. That is why I would have preferred to have seen these funds ring-fenced for the specific purpose of short breaks, perhaps with a provision also to address the needs of all disabled people, including adults. It is important to remember that for many parents of disabled children, their responsibilities as carers will continue long after their sons and daughters have grown up. This is particularly the case for adults with profound and multiple learning disabilities, where the case for short breaks is arguably even stronger. However, I acknowledge that this is probably a debate for another day.
As we have been reminded, the pressure on funds for short breaks and respite services received much attention only last week, when we saw a great deal of coverage in the national media about Riven Vincent, a mother who asked for her six year-old daughter, Celyn, to be placed into care after she received a letter from Bristol social services informing her that no more respite care would be available. This extremely unhappy story highlights why it is so important for the parents of disabled children to have regular access to short breaks. Despite the pressure of cuts to services, we must ensure that the funds announced by the coalition Government reach their intended audience, together with the new duty on local authorities to provide short breaks. Can the Minister assure me that these funds will be used for those whose needs are addressed by these regulations?
Baroness Walmsley
My Lords, I, too, thank the Minister for his explanation and welcome the regulations. I also have some questions. Will Regulation 3(b) have regard to the needs of carers whose break from caring may involve an extended leisure activity such as a holiday, rather than simply, as the regulation says, a “regular leisure activity”? I echo the words of the noble Lord, Lord Rix, about the importance of regular breaks from caring, if that is what carers choose, because I believe that regular breaks—a little bit of respite every now and then—can provide long-term stable care for disabled children, which is vital.
Is it sufficient for local authorities merely to publish their short-break services statements on their website? Surely they should do a little more than that. Should they not be proactive in contacting existing carers, rather than just publishing the information, especially in the light of the fact that the Explanatory Memorandum indicates that only a third of those eligible currently receive short breaks? We do not know whether that is simply because they are not aware of what is available and do not apply or whether it is because of shortage of money. Can the Minister say whether the practice guidance outlined in paragraph 8.4 of the Explanatory Memorandum will provide any guidelines on the criteria by which eligibility for the services outlined in Regulation 4 will be assessed?
I move on to a point about ensuring that this all works out in practice on the ground, which of course is very important. Is there any plan to require local authorities to publish a sufficiency assessment? The Minister talked about quality, but will local authorities also be obliged to publish an assessment of whether the quantity of short breaks that they supply is sufficient?
Can the Minister also say whether he expects a large number of applications for short-break services to result from the publication of these pieces of information by local authorities and whether any extra funding is likely to be allocated to local authorities if they report a large increase in the number of carers applying for short breaks? Does he agree that there may be a risk that, although these regulations may widen the number of people who apply for short breaks, the danger is that the funding per capita will go down to the point where the efficacy of the breaks will deteriorate? I do not think that any of us wish to see that.
Finally, can the Minister say when the Government expect to publish the initial practice guidance, to which he referred? How will this guidance be disseminated to relevant groups and how frequently do the Government intend to update it? Groups such as Every Disabled Child Matters will pay very careful attention to the guidance, but individual parents will also be interested in their local authority’s guidance so that they, as individual parents, can hold the local authority to account against the guidance.
Schools: Pupil Premium
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Lord Hill of Oareford
I am grateful to my noble friend, and I agree with her that it is extremely important that the purpose of the pupil premium—to help the children who need it most—is upheld in the system we deliver. She is absolutely right about the disparity in educational achievement between children on free school meals and those who are not on free school meals: 54 per cent who are not on free school meals get five A* to C while only 27 per cent who are on free school meals achieve it. The point about ensuring the money is used for the purpose for which it is intended is absolutely right. Our intention is that it will be for heads to spend as they think fit the money which will go to schools, in the way that they believe can best deliver help to the pupils they know. However, they will have to account each year for how the money is spent. I agree with my noble friend that one would not want the money to be used for people who are, as it were, gaming the system. That is part of a broader consideration we need to take about how to ensure that the system is not gamed in future.
Lord Hill of Oareford
The point about the pupil premium is that it is linked to deprivation. As we all know—no one better than the noble Lord, Lord Rix—there is a lot of overlap between children with SEN and children with deprivation. The key point is that the pupil premium is intended for deprivation.
Schools: Special Needs and Disabilities
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Hill of Oareford)
My Lords, the Government are committed to supporting those with special needs. This is demonstrated by our commitment to the full assistive technology package for those with special needs, as part of the home access programme. As we manage the closure of Becta, we will work closely with it to ensure that appropriate frameworks continue, and we will of course look with particular care at the requirements of those with special educational needs and disabilities.
Lord Rix
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his response, but I would ask for a few more details. The home access programme, as I am aware, ceases to be funded after March 2011. Can the Minister guarantee that it will continue beyond that time? On the question of local authorities being made more responsible for technological services for people with disabilities, is he aware that the House of Lords’ ruling some time ago has meant that local authorities can take resource implications into account when considering their duty to provide support? So, if they are short of funds, which they are likely to be at the moment, a disabled child can literally be without a voice. Is that the Government’s wish?
Lord Hill of Oareford
No, my Lords, it clearly is not the Government’s wish that that should happen. On the noble Lord’s first question, as the whole House will know, I am not in a position to give forward commitments on funding, because we have to go through the spending review first. However, as I think the noble Lord will know, because my honourable friend Sara Teather announced it at the launch of a campaign with which I think he was associated, there will be a Green Paper in the autumn particularly to do with children with special educational needs and disabilities, and the raising of educational attainment is one of the specific issues we want to look at in connection with that. I am sure that he will make representations on that. I completely accept the thrust of his question, that as we look at what will come after Becta, we need to make sure that absolute priority is given to ensuring that children with special educational needs get the help with technology that they need.
Academies Bill [HL]
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Baroness Royall of Blaisdon
My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendments 22B, 60B and 60C. The amendments in this group are designed to probe the Government’s thinking on free state education, because there appear to be mixed messages in the Bill. There is a simple but important principle to which I hope we all adhere. This essential principle is contained in the great Education Act 1944, which was brought in by this Government's coalition predecessor, the last formal coalition Government in this country. The principle is that there shall be universal education for all children in this country, and that that education shall be free.
We have been given assurances by the Government that they do not intend that academies should be allowed to charge. However, paragraph 13 of the Explanatory Notes states:
“Subsection (7) provides that an Academy may not charge for admission or attendance at the school or for education provided there”—
so far so good, but it goes on to state—
“(unless the Academy agreement or grant under section 14 of the EA 2002 specifically permits it)”.
Why the “unless”, and why are there any exceptions? I do not understand. The Bill would allow another party—that is to say, an individual, group of individuals or an organisation—to enter into academy arrangements with the Secretary of State, convince him or her that those arrangements should include the right to levy charges for admission to all education at the school, and open for business. I do not believe that that is the situation, but I would be grateful for an explanation and clarification from the Minister.
Lord Rix
My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 75 in my name. The possibility of charging is apparent in this clause. The Minister will be aware that children with SEN have additional needs that sometimes require additional resources. It is the responsibility of the school and local authority to meet those needs. I would be extremely concerned if there were moves to charge parents for special education provision. I do not believe that it is the intention of the legislation to charge pupils with SEN, but I would welcome clarification on this point.
Baroness Walmsley
My Lords, I tabled Amendment 67 in this group. It probes a specific point about how local authorities will continue to fulfil their statutory duty under the Childcare Act 2006 to ensure that there are sufficient free places for every three and four year-old whose parents want one. Local authorities are also responsible, in consultation with local delivery partners, for determining the rate at which providers will be funded for delivering the free nursery places, and for the arrangements for making associated payments. Since April 2004, all three and four year-olds have been entitled to a free part-time early-education place. Free places can be provided by a variety of providers in the maintained, private, voluntary and independent sectors, including preschools, playgroups and registered childminder networks. Local authorities must have regard to the comprehensive statutory guidance set out in the code of practice when making arrangements for the provision of free early-education places. Parents are not required to contribute towards the free early-education entitlement, but may be charged fees for any additional childcare services that may exceed the free part-time early- education place. The number of hours available each week is currently 12.5, which will go up to 15 in September.
Since 2006-07, the funding for under-fives provision has been provided through the dedicated schools grant to all types of provider, including private, voluntary and independent providers. The direct schools grant is a ring-fenced grant for education purposes, but local authorities retain autonomy over how they allocate their spending across the age range to make most effective use of resources at local level. In a recent parliamentary Statement, the Minister for Children, my honourable friend Sarah Teather MP, committed the Government to the extension of the free entitlement to early education, as planned, for three and four year-olds to 15 hours from September and to 20,000 of the most disadvantaged two year-olds—something that I particularly welcome. The amendment seeks clarity about how that will be achieved through the primary academy schools proposed in the Bill. Can the Minister give me some reassurances about this? We do not want academies that make provision for children under compulsory school age, as well as for those of compulsory school age, to charge by the back door.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Morris of Bolton)
If Amendment 18 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendments 19, 20 or 22 because of pre-emption.
Lord Rix
My Lords, perhaps I may jump the queue and say a few words about Amendment 55. I am afraid that I cannot support it with any degree of warmth, but it raises a number of questions that I want to put to the Minister.
In contrast to funding for mainstream schools, most funding for special schools is place-led, with the number of places agreed with the local authority and reviewed every year on the basis of local needs. Recognising that academies are funded directly by central government, I seek clarification as to the source of the upfront funding for what the Special Educational Consortium assumes will be referred to eventually as special academies.
As the Minister will be aware, special schools will frequently have a pupil intake from across a number of local authority areas, which could have major implications for the future funding arrangements for special academies. For example, some funding for special school placements will be determined locally, while some will be funded centrally. How can we ensure that the two systems work together in harmony? Will it be for the Department for Education to decide on the number of places at a special academy that should be funded each year? Will special academies be in a position to seek financial reimbursement if a child is placed in a special academy from outside their home local authority?
There are further questions on Amendment 113, but to a certain extent the Minister has already answered the first of them. I believed that it was the intention to allow the schools outstanding in the judgment of Ofsted to become academies by September this year. I seek assurances that “outstanding” in the judgment of Ofsted includes consideration of special educational needs and the outcomes for children with SEN.
As regards Amendment 188, I recognise that one of the principal intentions behind the Academies Bill is to ensure that schools are increasingly able to remove themselves from local authority control. However, academies will still have to continue to co-operate with local authorities in a range of different ways if they are effectively to meet the diverse range of needs of children in their area—for example, in meeting the needs of a child with a statement. The local education authority is legally responsible for arranging that the special educational provision specified in a statement of SEN is made, although the actual delivery of the support will be mostly at school level.
In maintained schools—and I recognise that the current system does not always function effectively—there is a degree of leverage for the local authority to ensure that the special education provision is made. However, because academies are in effect independent schools, local authorities have no levers by which to ensure that academies work in partnership to meet those needs. Parents with children in maintained schools currently have the option of complaining to the local authority, and then the Local Government Ombudsman, if they believe that a school is not meeting the specification in a child’s statement.
The coalition Government propose that parents with a child in an academy must complain directly to the Secretary of State. Where a child with a statement is not receiving the right support and is missing out on their education, parents are naturally desperate to see the issue addressed. I believe that the coalition Government should look carefully at whether handling all complaints about academies via the Department for Education is the most effective way of ensuring that parents get the quickest access to the right support for their child. I seek assurances from the Minister on that point and the others that I have raised.
Lord Rix
My Lords, I should like to take this opportunity to say how much I welcome the fact that the Bill requires mainstream academies to have characteristics which include teaching a balanced and broadly based curriculum, and provide education for pupils of different abilities. I trust that that includes pupils with a learning disability. However, I am concerned that the Bill does not appear to place a similar requirement on special schools converting to academy status. It is important to emphasise that a similar requirement is in place for special schools which become academies and ensure that they offer all children with SEN and disabilities a full and ambitious curriculum, including those working well below age-related expectations. Can the Minister guarantee that outstanding schools granted academy status also provide outstanding quality for all children, including those with special educational needs and disabilities. I beg to move.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, it is very difficult to guarantee that every school would be outstanding. That is one of the problems with statistics. The amendment in some ways seeks to go in the opposite direction from the intent of some of the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, in that it seeks to impose some restrictions on academies in terms of the curriculum that they offer.
We appreciate the noble Lord’s aim to get some security over the curriculum for pupils with special educational needs, but, as I said in answer to the previous group of amendments, for children with statements of special educational needs, the curriculum should be tailored specifically to meet their particular needs and curriculum requirements, as set out in their statements of special educational needs. We believe for children with SEN with statements this is the appropriate way to specify what they need in terms of teaching. Where a child requires a broad and balanced curriculum, I am advised that that will be specified in their statement, that the school will have to provide it, and that the amendment is therefore unnecessary. I hope that that satisfies the noble Lord. I recognise his deep concerns on this and the expertise on which he draws, but I nevertheless invite him to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Rix
My Lords, I cannot believe that I was placing restrictions in this amendment. I believe that I was trying to ensure that the teaching for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities would be of the highest quality and of the broadest possible range. However, I will take the noble Lord’s answer back to the Special Educational Consortium, which acts as my consultants on this, and I may return to this matter on Report. I hope that it is satisfied with his response. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.