Schools: Pupil Premium

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Monday 3rd February 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

The answer to the noble Baroness’s first question is yes. The answer to the second is that I cannot regret something that is not taking place.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood (CB)]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that Ofsted must be judged on the basis of the quality of its evidence and of the surveys that it carries out in schools and the implications for a policy such as this, rather than on political matters?

[Lord Nash]

The noble Lord is absolutely right. Of course, given his background, he is vastly experienced in this. I could not agree more. Ofsted is doing an outstanding job. It is our sharpest tool. The first thing that the chief inspector did was to abolish the appalling and mediocre term “satisfactory” that had been allowed to exist for years. That shows where he is coming from, and he is having a great effect. Indeed, Ofsted reports that last year our schools improved at a faster rate than any other time in history.

Children and Families Bill

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, while I share the concerns of the noble Baroness—particularly as I have an 11 year-old daughter—I do not think that her amendment achieves anything. It asks ISPs to do something that is impossible. How can they provide subscribers with an internet access service that excludes adult content? People can use proxy servers; they can link across to their parents’ computers if they have set their parents’ computers up right; they can use sites that are newly created every day and whose URLs are spread by e-mail; they can indulge in these things through chat programmes, where there is nothing about the site that tells you what it is being used for. There are so many ways in which the nasty side of the internet can spread. It is utterly impossible for ISPs to block; there is no technology that would enable them to perform the functions set out here. How does a little ISP know which sites in this swiftly moving internet are offering the content which offends this amendment that were not doing so yesterday and may not do so tomorrow? They get passed around by kids and are designed to be fast moving. I cannot see how there is anything in this approach of requiring individual ISPs to do things that has any hope of success or of producing a law that is feasible and possible for individual companies to do.

If we were to approach this, perhaps, on a national level by asking our friends in Cheltenham—who, presumably, already read most of this stuff—to put a stopper on the stuff that would offend, perhaps we would have some hope of keeping up with the pace of the avoidance mechanisms that are out there. Unless we do it in a co-ordinated way like that, we really have no hope of achieving exclusion. I therefore beg the noble Baroness to think again and to look rather at enabling parents to exercise proper jurisdiction over what their children are doing. It is really quite hard to find good programmes that you can put on your children’s machines that will tell you what they have been doing and enable you to share with them what they have been seeing and experiencing on the internet and to educate and guide them. By and large, those programmes are not available on ISPs’ websites. Individual parental responsibility has a much better hope of looking after our children than pretending that we can block something when we cannot.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood (CB)]

My Lords, the previous speaker has made very plain that the ingenuity of young people is very considerable. I admire greatly his technical knowledge and understanding of the issues before us now. However, I draw attention to a very important point made by the noble Baroness: that it seems appropriate in the non-internet sphere to have regulations to do what we can; yet the ingenuity of young people is huge there as well. Big brothers buy cigarettes or alcohol for small brothers. There are ways of pretending that you are 16 when you are only 14 and a half; huge ingenuity can be shown. If regulation is important, as we accept in the law in the non-internet sphere, then surely there is a case for considering it in the sphere of the internet. The benefits of it are huge, but the downsides are massive as well, and I look for consistency between law dealing with non-internet activity and with the internet.

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

My Lords, I, too, speak in support of the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, which is also in my name, and congratulate her on encompassing in the amendment the main elements of her Online Safety Bill. I shall be brief, given the time, but the fact that I am being brief does not mean that I do not think that this is an incredibly important amendment, which I support strongly.

We have heard in this and previous debates about the growing awareness of, and concern about, the impact on young people of unfettered access to pornographic and other adult material. The noble Baroness outlined the measures in the amendment which, among other things, would introduce a mandatory requirement for default filtering to restrict access to adult content, an age-verification process and further regulation by Ofcom. Those are very important measures.

I accept that there are legitimate arguments about what filtering and age-verification can achieve, but I disagree profoundly with the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, that the amendment contains measures that would be either futile or impossible to achieve. He will know that they are already being achieved to a degree by some ISPs in some circumstances. The problem is that that level of good practice is not being achieved consistently or universally, but very imperfectly.

I suspect, given our debates so far, that most people across the House would support the measures in the amendment. The Government and, perhaps, one or two others, may argue that the voluntary approach is either more effective or preferable or both. I understand the argument in favour of self-regulation—at least in trying that first. Under the Labour Government, I chaired the internet safety sub-group for a while. It is appropriate to try self-regulation first, but I am clear that although it is good that the Government have built on that approach and recognised the importance of the issue, it is time to put these measures on a statutory footing.

There are three main reasons why. One is to maximise compliance. It is absolutely clear that the voluntary code has already failed in some instances. Many Members will be aware of the cases of Tesco and BlackBerry, which are very big providers. The key factor in both those examples was that the providers themselves and the whole industry knew what was going on, but nobody said anything about it, and Ofcom was none the wiser because it has no powers. We are entitled to conclude from those failures that we cannot trust the industry to regulate itself effectively.

Secondly, we need independent regulation. It cannot be right that, under the current voluntary arrangements, each company itself decides how it will classify what is adult content—so different companies can make different decisions about the same content—and which system of age-verification it will adopt. That means not only that there is significant variation in the age-verification process between companies but that the system adopted is weak.

For example, the big ISPs have refused to apply the age-verification process at the point when someone is trying to access the adult content; they will apply it only at the point when someone wants to open an account. They say that they will send an e-mail to the account holder when someone is trying to gain access but, of course, parents are not looking at those e-mails every second of the day. I wonder why the industry is allowed to adopt much weaker measures in relation to children than, say, the gambling industry.

The third reason is enforcement. Without statutory regulation, there is no effective enforcement. As a number of people have said today, these are child protection measures and ought to be backed by powers of enforcement vested in a public body such as Ofcom to protect consumers, and in particular children, in the same way—here I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland—as offline child protection measures.

Later in the Bill, the Government have announced welcome additional measures to protect children from smoking by banning the proxy purchasing of cigarettes and the selling of e-cigarettes to children. The Government are not saying that people can decide for themselves whether a prospective purchaser of those products is a child; the onus will be on retailers to find out whether those children are under age and, if they provide to children, they will be prosecuted. I think that we need the same approach to these online products. I hope that noble Lords will support the amendment, which is very much needed.

Ofsted: Annual Report 2012-13

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Wednesday 8th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

Assessment, as opposed to testing, is obviously crucial to ensure effective accountability and to work out whether pupils are making progress, which is an issue that I know Ofsted is very focused on. We have held a public consultation on proposals for key stage 1 assessment, whose results have not been published. As far as key stage 3 tests are concerned, we have no plans to reintroduce key stage 3 tests but we expect all schools to be able to demonstrate to Ofsted, through whatever assessment mechanism they use, that their pupils are making progress.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood (CB)]

My Lords, would the Minister agree that, while the use of the word “lucky” is good shock tactics—and, possibly, good politics—the primary responsibility of Government, and all of us who are involved in education, is to improve the quality of schools and teaching and to take luck completely out of the picture?

[Lord Nash]

I agree entirely with the noble Lord. That is what we aim to do.

National Curriculum: Violence against Women

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Monday 28th October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

The noble Lord makes a good point. We can try to do this but I feel that it is really a job for the police authorities.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood (CB)]

My Lords, the two topics mentioned in the Question clearly refer to abhorrent sides of our society; we all agree on that. However, does the Minister agree that dealing with all those problems by inserting them on a statutory basis into the national curriculum is almost a confession of failure and that there have been many other interesting suggestions made from around the House today?

[Lord Nash]

I am grateful for the noble Lord’s question and I agree entirely. Pupils will often respond better to dialogues with mentors from outside agencies that are skilled in their work. It is right to help pupils in this way: issues around drug-running in gangs, for instance, are completely different from those relating to forced marriages. Schools should be free to engage with outside agencies as appropriate.

Education: Reform of GCSEs

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Tuesday 11th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

My Lords, I welcome the Statement from the Minister, and the fact that it has come now. Generations of students should benefit as soon as possible from the potential progress that we have marked here.

On a specific point, I welcome the attention to assessment, reflecting the whole range of ability and achievement in our school population. We have been failing to do this, which has been a disincentive to some of our most able pupils. The Minister will be aware of the success of Finland in the PISA international comparisons. Is he equally aware that one of the elements contributing to that success has been an attempt to ensure that the curriculum is more rigorous and detailed? I assume that these are the principles underlying what we have heard today.

Finally, can the Minister reassure us that the policy issues raised here will in fact be assessed, and that evidence as to whether or not they work will be presented to the House in due course?

[Lord Nash]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for his comments; I know that he is extremely well informed on these matters. I was aware of the success of Finland. We believe that Ofqual, particularly after its performance on the English exams, is now a rigorous organisation. The various assessment techniques it is consulting on—one in particular—will be rigorous.

National Curriculum

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Tuesday 26th March 2013 Grand Committee

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

My Lords, in view of the points I am about to make, I have to declare two interests. I shall be speaking briefly about Ofsted, so I should declare that I was formerly a Chief Inspector of Schools. I also declare an interest in computing and computer science, so I warmly support the points that have been made, not least about the presence of IT in design. I am the non-executive chairman of a company called Frog Trade which operates in Halifax and employs 90 software engineers, many of whom are recruited locally. The absence of appropriate training in schools will be a difficulty. Frog Trade supplies more than 20% of English secondary state schools with their IT and software, and will be supplying every mainland Malaysian school with IT and software products. That is a sign of the importance of having this discipline embedded in young people’s development. It is there anyway, so we might as well support it in the curriculum.

Let me offer some statistics. I repeat without apology two that were given to us by the noble Lord in introducing the debate. In 2011, some 18% of pupils in England left primary school without meeting the current expected standards in English, while 20% did not meet the expected standard in maths. I shall add two further statistics to those. Some 30% of 16 year-olds do not achieve the expected standards of literacy, and the real shocker is that over half of those who are serving sentences in Her Majesty’s prisons are functionally illiterate and innumerate. We are failing many young people in our society, and that alone is justification enough for looking once again at the priorities that must deliver an education to deal with these problems.

Perhaps I can give some bold and rational advice. Following on from Micawber, if there are 36 teaching hours in a week and we provide material for 37 actual hours of teaching, the result will be frustration and bad education. If there are 36 teaching hours and we provide 35 hours of content, perhaps professionalism and balance in education will be part of our legacy. It means that we have to be careful not to say that everything should go into the curriculum. One of the great heresies is this: if something must be learnt, it must be in the school curriculum. That is a mistake. My grandchildren pick up huge amounts of learning from what are sometimes rather dubious forms of education. Indeed, if I were pushing my special area, I would be arguing that Socratic dialogue should be compulsory for all students at key stages 2, 3 and 4, but I think I might lose.

The national curriculum is one of the three great pillars of our education system. One pillar deals with content, which is the curriculum, one deals with standards in the form of national testing, and the last deals with accountability, which is national inspection. All three play an important part. The danger in this consultation—this is where I differ from the force of the papers that we received—is that we select this one topic, the national curriculum, without looking at the impact on the other two areas, which are significant.

I remind noble Lords of some of the other heresies to demonstrate what I mean. Heresy one is that it is too readily assumed that only the examined in education are likely to be taken seriously or to be of any value at all. We assume that examination is the criterion of importance. This is the head teachers’ heresy. Head teachers who bow to this principle in what they do should be condemned. Heresy two closely follows this—the twin educational sins of teaching to the test and focusing on those students who might be coaxed from grade D to grade C. This is the bad teachers’ heresy. The third heresy, which has been mentioned, is that the national curriculum is to be equated with the school curriculum. This is the lobby groups’ heresy. It is not true that one overlaps completely with the others. The principle behind what we are talking about is that there should be a core—for the statistical reasons that I have given, if no others—but there should be a balanced education.

Accountability takes place significantly through examinations, but it is limited accountability. Ofsted is the other source of accountability and I suggest to the Minister that he takes back to his colleagues the idea that Ofsted be tasked with looking at those areas of the curriculum that are perhaps not in the core but encourage soft skills that deal with PSHE, and with making explicit judgments on schools and their success in providing whole-pupil education in a balanced form. Perhaps that is the stick that is needed, and Ofsted could provide it. I hope that that idea can be taken forward, and I am pleased that there is consultation on accountability as well as on the curriculum.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for initiating this debate and for giving us all an opportunity to contribute to the consultation, which is clearly important. We have had a constructive and thoughtful debate and I want to continue in that spirit because, despite the very short timescale for the consultation, we have to hope that this is a genuine exercise and that our views will genuinely be taken into account before the final curriculum is put together.

This is undoubtedly a very important debate, not just among teachers and academics but among parents, employers and young people themselves. It lays the foundations of knowledge and skills for the next generation, and it is amazing how much we are defined by the years in which we were taught at school and by how much we and the next generation take them into our working lives. You can always tell how old you are by what poems you know and what books you read at school. They instantly give you away. The national curriculum creates a national presence and culture in society. There is never a perfect solution, and whatever we come up with, we will always be criticised. There will always be competing views on either side, but it does not alter the fact that we should always have an open and inquiring mind as to how we can get the best out of the curriculum and how it can be improved.

Before I comment on the detail, I should also like to give the Minister the chance to set the record straight on who drafted the proposals. He will no doubt have read the concerns from some of the department’s advisers on the history curriculum that the final draft bore no resemblance to the versions on which they were working as late as January. Can he reassure us that Michael Gove, in a fit of overexuberance, did not personally write the final version of the history curriculum?

I should also be grateful if the noble Lord can address the essential contradiction mentioned by several noble Lords, including the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and the noble Lord, Lord Storey, of the national curriculum applying only to maintained schools, of which there will be a shrinking number as more and more schools become academies. If it matters educationally that the curriculum is updated, how much real flexibility are we prepared to give to academies that choose to flout the direction of the Secretary of State? At what point would Ofsted or the department intervene, and what sanctions are available if academies veer off course in a major way from what is prescribed in the national curriculum?

We share the ambitions of the Government that every child should be stretched to fulfil their maximum potential. However, we differ because we also see the immense variety of attributes and learning styles that make each child unique. We therefore reject the hothouse philosophy that underpins these proposals based on every child being crammed full of facts and examined to see how much they have been able to retain. Some children undoubtedly flourish in such an environment but, for others, learning becomes a miserable and frustrating treadmill that can put them off the whole educational experience. This is why we have major concerns about the move to revert back to exams as the sole measure of success. I was surprised to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, had to say on this because, contrary to him, I believe that that takes a lot of teacher creativity out of the system and inevitably leads to teachers being put under pressure to teach to the test. The noble Lord seemed to imply that that was a heresy, but there is probably a lot of anecdotal evidence to support my position.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

I thank the noble Baroness for giving way. I absolutely agree that the heresy is actually to follow those principles rather than to accept them.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

Perhaps this is something for a longer debate but some teachers would say that they are desperate to escape the straitjacket of being forced to teach to the test but are literally prevented from doing so. We can all see the absolute merit of teachers being freed up to inspire and be creative in the way that they teach.

A couple of references have already been made to the academics and professionals who wrote to the Telegraph and the Independent last week. I share a number of the concerns those people expressed. They said that the new curriculum will severely damage educational standards. Without boring noble Lords too much, because I am sure a number have read the letters, I will just illustrate the point with a couple of short quotes. They said:

“The proposed curriculum consists of endless lists of spellings, facts and rules. This mountain of data will not develop children’s ability to think, including problem-solving, critical understanding and creativity”.

They also went on to say:

“Inappropriate demands will lead to failure and demoralisation”.

These themes were illustrated very well by the excellent contribution of my noble friend Lady Whitaker on the significance of design as a creative, multidisciplinary, problem-solving subject, which is really what we are looking for in terms of a progressive education but which is not really captured in the current proposals. Can the Minister comment on the widely held concerns that there is an overemphasis on learning by rote at the expense of deeper understanding and creativity in the way that the curriculum is being designed?

The consultation document also emphasises the need to learn from international comparisons. We absolutely agree that we can learn from high-performing countries and aim to do better in the international league tables. However, there is an increasing controversy about the comparisons and the conclusions that are being drawn from the data. That is why our party has resolved to remove the interpretation of the evidence from politicians and instead set up an independent body, an office for educational improvement, which will verify the research and provide genuinely well informed learning points for practitioners in the field. Can the noble Lord comment on whether he agrees that a greater degree of independent analysis would be beneficial in this regard?

Turning to the specific subject areas, I do not intend to comment on every subject, but will just pick out some key concerns which are symptomatic of our wider concerns. A number of noble Lords have mentioned history but they have not really gone into the detail, so it falls to me to do so. We accept that there is a need for pupils to have a greater grasp of the chronology of events along the timeline. However, we also agree with the critique of Professor Chris Husbands that you cannot address this by starting at the beginning of time with the youngest children and working forward, as seems to be proposed, otherwise, as he says,

“you end up with a seven-year-old understanding of the Saxons, a ten-year-old understanding of the Middle Ages and a fourteen-year-old understanding of the industrial revolution”.

More fundamentally, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, we feel that there is a concern that the curriculum is focused too much on our island history and does not have sufficient material about our global history and our interconnections.

On geography, we share the concerns mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, that the debate about climate change has been cut out of the curriculum for children under 14, when many children will stop studying the subject. Young people need to understand the impact of melting glaciers, floods and drought on the physical landscape. Can the Minister advise whether this is a deliberate decision to remove the item from the curriculum?

On mathematics, we welcome the fact that personal finance, budgeting and money management are to be included and we agree that pupils need to understand the basic tools of maths. However, going back to my earlier point, there has to be a way of allowing teachers to be creative and inspiring, so that maths does not just become a memory test of facts and formulas but is something more than that.

On English, we agree that spelling, grammar and sentence construction are important. This was included in the 2007 curriculum. However, we are concerned that the shift to final exams and the removal of controlled assessment risks undermining the teaching of speaking and listening skills, which are critical to the world of work. Perhaps the Minister will comment on how these skills will be assessed in future.

Finally, we share the concerns mentioned by several noble Lords about the long-awaited PSHE review giving so little direction to schools on issues that are crucial to the health and well-being of young people.

We will continue to engage on the future curriculum, but we believe that flawed thinking undermines the proposals. At its heart is the assumption that every child must pursue an academic career. We take a different view. We see the rise of the leaving age to 18 as a great opportunity, so we are developing plans for a gold-standard set of qualifications that test academic, practical, creative and technical learning up to 18. We are taking the time to get these proposals right. This includes engaging with employers.

I realise that my time is up. I reiterate my thanks to the noble Lord for this debate and look forward to his response.

[Lord Nash]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, for her detailed comments on design. I very much hope that she will feed them into the consultation. We recognise the concerns raised about design and technology study programmes. We are listening, and working with the subject community and the Design and Technology Association to improve the draft.

I thank my noble friend Lord Storey for his comments, in particular about the primary curriculum, an area in which he is extremely expert. It is a delight to hear someone who has spent so much time teaching children rather than thinking about theories of education talking about what it is appropriate to teach children. I am particularly grateful to him for laying off history today, and for supporting our move to give teachers more freedom.

The noble Lord asked about teaching sex education at key stage 3. Aspects of the biology of reproduction and the human life cycle are included in science in key stage 2. It is up to primary schools to decide whether to provide additional sex and relationship education, taking into account the views of parents. Many schools choose to provide sex and relationship education in year 6.

I am grateful for the comments on soft skills made by the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne. As he knows, I share his views about their vital importance. As noble Lords are aware, the outcome of the PSHE review was announced last week. PSHE remains an important and necessary part of all pupils’ education, but teachers need flexibility to deliver high-quality PSHE and are best placed to understand the needs of their pupils. This will not come from additional central prescription. Therefore, PSHE will remain a non-statutory subject, without new standardised frameworks or programmes of study. My honourable friend Elizabeth Truss wrote to Sir Michael Wilshaw last week, asking Ofsted to draw up a guide to effective PSHE practice.

Aspects of PSHE will continue to be taught throughout the statutory curriculum. In science, pupils will learn about the structure and function of the male and female reproductive systems, and the menstrual cycle. In both science and PE, children will learn about the benefits of a healthy lifestyle, including the impact on the body of diet, exercise and drugs. In maths and citizenship, children will receive financial education, including learning about wages, taxes, credit and debt. In designing appropriate PSHE content for school curricula, teachers will be expected to build on content in the national curriculum on drugs, finance and health education, and on the statutory guidance on sex and relationship education.

All schools today have to focus more on PSHE. With the collapse in many areas of family life as a result of the high incidence of absent fathers, the absence of religion in many children’s lives and the prevalence of gang culture, the only constant in many children’s lives—the only brick—is their school. All children in the modern world face a variety of issues and schools have to do much more on what was called the pastoral front than they used to. This is meat and drink to good schools and we expect all schools to emulate what the good ones do. We trust teachers and head teachers to adapt what they do to their own particular circumstances. We are not arguing about the necessity for PSHE, and no one feels more strongly about the need for it than I do, having seen the effect at first hand of what really good pastoral, inclusion, behaviour and raising aspirations programmes, which of course include PSHE as a part, can have on disaffected children. However, we do not feel that it is appropriate to legislate for it. We should leave teachers free to teach what is appropriate to their circumstances. However, we have asked a specific question in the consultation about our proposed aims for the national curriculum and we will take all views into account before finalising them.

My noble friend Lord Black of Brentwood commented on animal welfare. It is not the role of the national curriculum to prescribe everything that might valuably be taught to children. We are slimming down the national curriculum to focus on essential knowledge in core subjects. The draft primary science curriculum requires pupils to be taught about the needs of animals, including food, water and so on, and the care of animals is something that we would expect all good schools to cover in their wider curriculum as part of the soft skills. However, we will look further into this matter.

The noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, talked about languages. The evidence shows that we have a strong basis on which to build the new expectation that foreign languages will be taught in primary schools. A recent survey conducted by the CfBT Education Trust, the Association for Language Learning and the Independent Schools’ Modern Languages Association found that 97% of primary schools are already teaching a language, and that more than 80% are reasonably confident about meeting the statutory requirement for 2014. Evidence, including some from other countries, shows that children benefit from being taught languages at an early stage. They can inspire children with a love of language that will stay with them throughout their secondary education and beyond. For this reason, we are opening up the choice of languages beyond European modern languages by including Mandarin, Latin and Ancient Greek. It is right that we give our pupils this opportunity and provide a better foundation for the teaching of languages in secondary schools.

We will not be making languages compulsory at key stage 4 because we are conscious of the need to slim down the curriculum and allow schools the freedom to meet their pupils’ needs. However, to support the introduction of the new key stage 3 second language education, the Teaching Agency is facilitating an expert group chaired by a leading primary head teacher for languages and bilingual education. The group is meeting at the moment to develop the signposting of resources and the identification of high-quality teaching materials that are freely available and is looking at ways in which initial teacher training in schools can best prepare for the introduction in 2014. On schools becoming academies to avoid language teaching, we welcome schools becoming academies, but we are not encouraging them to do so for this reason. The national curriculum should be a benchmark for all schools. Academies would have to justify to their communities if they chose not to teach what all other maintained primary schools do at key stage 3.

My noble friend Lady Walmsley made a point about language experience courses in schools, which of course they are free to run. I am also grateful for her comments about cooking and IT. On IT careers advice, we expect all schools to engage with their local business communities for careers advice in IT and other industries.

I turn now to the subject of climate change. It is not true to say that climate change has been cut out of the curriculum. It is specifically mentioned in the science curriculum and both climate and weather feature throughout the geography curriculum. Nowhere is this clearer than in the science curriculum for 11 to 14 year- olds, which states that pupils should learn about,

“the production of carbon dioxide by human activity and the impact on climate”.

This is explicit coverage of the science of climate change. It is at least as extensive and certainly more precise than the current science national curriculum for this age group, which states only that:

“Human activity and natural processes can lead to changes in the environment”.

In addition, the Royal Geographical Society has said that the draft geography programme of study will provide,

“a sound underpinning of factual knowledge to prepare, at GCSE and A level, for pupils to study the topics that confront us all, globally, as citizens and which are inherently geographical, such as climate change, pollution, ‘food, water and energy’ security and globalisation”.

On academies not teaching the national curriculum, it is true that they have the freedom to vary any part of the national curriculum that they consider appropriate. However, even in a school system where more and more schools are moving towards greater autonomy, there is still a need for a national benchmark to provide parents with an understanding of what progress they should expect and to inform the content of core qualifications. Of course, academies and free schools must prepare their pupils for national exams and will be judged in part by destinations.

I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Lucas for his comments, particularly on the importance of the broad sweep of history and the opportunity now facing us with design and technology in schools.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, for his Mr Micawber-like comments on the need not to crowd the national curriculum. On his point about Ofsted, I have already talked about the PSHE review. Ofsted inspects for a broad and balanced curriculum and for progression. Without good PSHE, progression can be difficult for some pupils. However, Ofsted is the sharpest tool in our box and I undertake to discuss this further with Sir Michael Wilshaw.

The noble Lord, Lord Empey, commented on the lack of incentives for computer science graduates to enter the teaching profession. We are providing a £9,000 bursary for computer science graduates. The British Computer Society-Chartered Institute for IT is offering scholarships of £20,000 to exceptional candidates. The UTCs and studio schools programme is about encouraging more young people into the technical industries.

I thank my noble friend Lady Brinton for her comments about the inadequacies of the current system. On maths and English post-16, students who have not achieved at least a GCSE grade C in English or maths at the age of 16 will be required to continue to study mathematics post-16 from September 2013. We also want to encourage schools and colleges to provide opportunities for students who have already achieved a GCSE grade A to C to continue with the study of mathematics at level 3 as part of their post-16 programme. We are developing new courses for this cohort, and work is under way with Ofqual, mathematics sector bodies and awarding organisations to determine the most appropriate format for these new core mathematics qualifications.

I thank the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, for his comments about primary schools. He is quite right that education often goes wrong in primary schools. That is why we are focusing on the most underperforming primary schools. On trips to cultural places, that is something we expect all schools to do.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Quirk, for his comments about teachers. He raises a very good point. All schools will have to focus on training their teachers for the delivery of the new curriculum. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, for her opening comments about how one can never get a draft of a curriculum that pleases everyone. On the authorship of parts of the history curriculum, as the noble Baroness knows, the history curriculum was drafted with the input of a great many experts in the field. We were very pleased to see 15 eminent historians, including David Starkey, Niall Ferguson and Antony Beevor, endorse our approach in a letter to the Times on 27 February.

On academy freedoms and the national curriculum, academies were allowed under the previous Government not to teach the national curriculum. If the Labour Party wants to change that, I would be interested to hear about it. On plans for an office for educational improvement, of course we agree with the principle of evidence-based policy. That is what we have been doing, and plenty of evidence is available. However, we are not convinced that the noble Baroness’s approach of setting up a new quango—no doubt at great cost—is necessary.

Turning to the content of the history programme, I reiterate the importance of giving our pupils a clear chronological narrative of British and world history rather than a disconnected set of themes and topics, often repeated, as is the case currently with for instance Nazism, over the course of their school careers. It is right, too, that the teaching of history should cover significant individuals who have helped shape the history of Britain and the world. Those names listed in the programme of study are just some of the individuals we expect schools might cover. It is not a definitive list, and teachers are free to teach about any other individuals or aspects of the history of other countries and cultures as they see fit to meet the needs of their pupils. It is clear that the history curriculum generates a wide range of views about what pupils should be taught, and it is right to have that debate. I also acknowledge that others might have made different choices, but that is why we are consulting on the programme at present and welcome responses from all parties.

The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, made a comment about vocational education. One of the Secretary of State’s first acts was to commission the Wolf review, which we have implemented in full. We also commissioned Doug Richard to look at apprenticeships and are taking his proposals forward.

I must comment on the rather sensational latter which was recently written by 100 academics. They are of course right that we want our students to learn higher-order thinking skills, but those academics, I am sure, would acknowledge that to progress to that level, students need a basic grounding in lower-level skills and in knowledge. Sir Michael Wilshaw has—

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

I just wonder whether the Minister has noted that my noble friend Lord Quirk and I have both chaired meetings with more than 100 professors in them. They were called senates and they did not always fill us with confidence that the judgment coming out was the right one.

[Lord Nash]

I am obliged to the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, for that comment and have to say that I rather sympathise with Sir Michael Wilshaw, who has encouraged people like that to get out there and see what is happening in many of our classrooms. Once you have done that, only then can you appreciate how vacuous the content is that is being taught in many of our schools and how we need to improve the national curriculum in order for pupils to progress to a higher cognitive level.

As I outlined in my opening speech, the draft national curriculum on which we are consulting is based on careful analysis of the world’s most successful school systems. That showed that our curricula, in particular for the core subjects, focuses insufficiently on key knowledge and is less demanding than in other jurisdictions. The new national curriculum will change this and will also give schools more freedom over the curriculum and teaching, not less. The new national curriculum acknowledges the vital role of knowledge in education and is based on up-to-date, cutting-edge research about how the brain learns. It lists the important knowledge pupils need to know within clear subject taxonomies. To quote the leading US cognitive scientist, Dan Willingham:

“Data from the last 30 years lead to a conclusion that is not scientifically challengeable: thinking well requires knowing facts, and that’s true not simply because you need something to think about. The very processes that teachers care about most—critical thinking processes like reasoning and problem solving—are intimately intertwined with factual knowledge that is in long-term memory (not just in the environment)”.

Indeed, how interesting would debates in your Lordships’ House be if noble Lords did not have huge reservoirs of factual knowledge stored in their long-term memories which they use to display high-order skills such as argument, reasoning, analysis, comparison et cetera? The curriculum does contain lists of facts but these facts are not opposed to higher-order thinking and the skills of analysis and creativity; rather, these facts enable such skills and provide a framework of understanding.

In every field of human endeavour it is accepted that you must know the rules of that field before you can produce anything of worth within it. Great artists and writers know their rules before they break them. Great scientists and mathematicians know the work that has gone before them. This curriculum provides the foundational knowledge that will stand our future artists, writers, scientists and mathematicians in good stead, while also allowing all pupils to appreciate the great achievements of the past.

I thank noble Lords for their valuable contributions to this important debate. As I mentioned earlier, the consultation on the draft curriculum will close on 16 April and we welcome responses from anyone with an interest. Subject to the outcome of the consultation, we then plan to publish the final curriculum in Autumn 2013, to allow time for schools to prepare for the first teaching in September 2014.

Education: Curriculum, Exam and Accountability Reform

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Thursday 7th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

I thank my noble friend for his remarks. I can confirm that coursework will continue where it is appropriate in the relevant subjects. As the noble Lord knows, the national curriculum does not run in academies and free schools and that policy will not change. The new accountability measure has two parts to it. The one that focuses on English and maths should satisfy his requirements on literacy and numeracy.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

My Lords—

[Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes]

My Lords—

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

My Lords, it should be the Cross Benches.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

My Lords, thank you. On the radio this morning, the debate about this—before any Statement had been made—seemed to focus on whether we called someone “stubborn” or “humiliated”. That does not seem to be the way in which to conduct a debate on a serious matter. We now have another term—“listening”—although I have noticed that most politicians require a very loud shout before they listen, but that is not unreasonable in the position in which they find themselves.

I have two comments and a question. I notice that in both the Statement and the letter to Ofqual the review of A-levels is canvassed, which is very important and relates to what we are talking about now. In that context, I hope that—as promised—the Government will listen to those university leaders who are involved in teaching, for example, subjects that require a strong maths content, because some who are involved in admissions found the AS-levels a useful prop or crib, but an inaccurate one, in my view.

Secondly, the paper proposes two new measures which I hope will help schools ensure that pupils have the opportunity to sit examinations at the right level. One of these is that the percentage of pupils in each school reaching an attainment threshold should be measured. The wording is very important—percentage of what? Is it the percentage of those sitting the examination, the percentage of those in the age cohort, or the percentage of pupils over the years in the whole school? It really has to be a complete cohort before the percentage tells us what we wish to know.

Education: Academies and Free Schools

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Monday 4th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

My Lords, I welcome the debate introduced so well by my noble friend Lady Perry. I also welcome the Minister to his first short debate; we are quite civilised people here, and we look forward to hearing what he has to say. I understand that the Minister has form in this area of academies, having been involved in the very successful sponsorship of Pimlico Academy, which is one of the early ones helping to set the benchmark.

I will restrict my remarks largely to academies, rather than free schools. I want to emphasise now that I agree with what has been said already in the debate about the ways in which academies and other new forces in education are enriching the educational provision in this country, which is well needed and very important. Two consequences of academy status have been especially welcome. One is the very important freedom, referred to by my noble friend Lady Perry, to exercise professional judgment. It is marvellous that this is happening, and I hope that head teachers will not be too dirigiste, operating from the top of their own little pyramid, but will make sure that the freedom passes down to classroom level.

The second consequence is a promise by the Secretary of State that the reduction in bureaucracy which would follow would be to the benefit of academies. I agree with this: they have been a positive source, even if I now have a couple of questions to raise. One element of the way in which bureaucracy is being removed is the reduction in the requirement for outstanding academies to have an inspection every five years. I can see the point and the value of this, but they are exempt from that. Although it is sometimes an irksome discipline, I have to say that excellence and outstanding qualities in 2013 might not still be there in 2018. It is important that we have one way in which to moderate that, at least. I understand that Ofsted anticipated that that would be an issue and has now put in place for exempt schools the possibility of an exercise in which it will inspect, in paper form, at least what is happening in the school—a risk assessment, as it is called, will be carried out. It will be paper-based, it will achieve a lot and will help reassure parents and governors. That is good, but I suggest that one or two features of an outstanding school may not be able to be covered in a risk-based assessment of this kind. The first, for example, is the overall judgment about the effectiveness of a school; I am not sure how that can be done on the basis of a paper exercise. Yet it is highlighted in the Ofsted statement of intent as one of the most important judgments to be made. It is rather important that this can be done one way or another.

Secondly, I am not sure how a risk-based assessment that is effectively paper-based will deal with the spiritual, moral, social and cultural activities of a school. These are immensely important to a school’s character, and it is difficult to see that they could be accounted for in this type of assessment.

Thirdly—and this point follows on from the previous point and was of considerable interest to a number of noble Lords here this evening in previous debates on previous legislation—to be blunt, it will be difficult to reassure the wider community on the basis of a paper exercise that in one or other of the faith-based schools there has not been a straying from the boundaries of education into indoctrination. A few years ago, this would not, apparently, have been a real problem, but it is now. Some of our young people are suffering significant indoctrination—obviously in one faith, but in others too. One check on this in a faith-based academy, which may well do excellent work on the curriculum, pupil behaviour and all the other things, is whether there is a move towards indoctrination. It could take place, and it is essential that we are reassured that it would be picked up. There are other elements of the way in which Ofsted operates that might do this, but any reassurances that can be given would be very welcome.

Education: Development of Excellence

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Thursday 18th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

My Lords, I also congratulate my noble friend Lady Perry, not least on an excellent and insightful opening speech, in which she laid out the whole agenda for us. Her reward is already with her—she has had a rich cornucopia of responses and I am sure that that will continue throughout the debate.

In his inspiring, if at times fanciful, play about Thomas More, “A Man for All Seasons”, Robert Bolt inserts the following exchange between More and his ambitious young supporter and—dare I say?—almost political adviser, Rich. More has just become Lord Chancellor, with all the power, pomp and patronage that that implied. Rich effectively fronts up and says, “Well, what’s in it for me?”. More looks at him carefully and says, “I think you should become a teacher”. Rich does not think that that is much of an answer for a bright young man like him with a big future ahead of him and a patron like the Lord Chancellor. He says, “Why, why, why?”. More’s response in the play—fanciful, I agree—is, “If you do that and if you do it well, you will know it, your pupils will know it and God will know it”.

You do not have to be a member of the Bishops’ Benches or even a twice-on-Sunday, card-carrying Christian believer to get the point. Teaching is a profession and a calling. This is something we have lost in our community. Whatever the reasons—and there are many—we have lost the sense of the noble calling of being a teacher and the instantiation into our education system of that delicate relationship between teacher and pupil. Standards in education will improve only as teachers are given the status and support that they appropriately should have.

Of course it is fanciful what More says—it is not always quite like that. As a supply teacher I once went to a school and was instructed, “Keep them quiet for six weeks”—not much of a vision of teaching. I have to say, however, that I did teach them some mathematics which would have been helpful in the Department for Transport recently. I used to say, “Show all your workings and make sure that your addition is correct”, and they got the message.

I turn to the role of the teacher and the way in which it has been interfered with. Most of us interfere. I own up to doing so as a former chief inspector of schools. There is a risk that we will all interfere. So let us have a division of labour: the teachers teach and the politicians, advisers, specialists, theorists and academics—and I am one—should facilitate that role. We need to ensure that that division remains in place.

I am encouraged by the policies of the previous Government. The noble Baroness, Lady Perry, paid tribute to the quality of the intake to the profession. We are in a position of facilitating, at least at that level. However, the facilitation should go well beyond that. It includes support in terms of freeing-up the teacher from an overintrusive national curriculum. I worry about religious education and sport education. There are ways of dealing with that, but that is for another occasion. An overintrusive national curriculum is a great danger and a constraint on this delicate relationship. However, we are moving in the right direction and there are good signs that the review of the national curriculum will produce helpful results. We have been here before, however, and everyone with a lobby interest queues up at the door of the office of the national curriculum and says, “Insert this”.

Ministers must resist that. There are temptations, as you grow in influence and power, to continue meddling and to think that you know best. Ministers: do not do this. There is good progress so far, but we will be watching. Make sure that the teachers have the facility and support to do what they do best.

Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation (Determination of Turnover for Monetary Penalties) Order 2012

Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Excerpts

Monday 25th June 2012 Grand Committee

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

My Lords, I am grateful to the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments and the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee for their careful consideration of this order. Noble Lords will be aware that neither committee commented or thought that the House’s attention should be drawn to the order.

First, I shall give a little bit of history. Noble Lords will recall that it was as a result of concerns raised by Members of this House that we introduced a provision into the Education Act 2011 giving Ofqual new powers to impose financial penalties. That was against the backdrop of the errors in exam papers during last summer’s exam season. That power was commenced in May this year. It addresses the gap in Ofqual’s range of sanctions, as previously there was nothing between a power to direct and the ultimate sanction of withdrawing the awarding organisation’s recognition. This change brings Ofqual into line with similar regulators and is consistent with the Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Act 2008.

At the time, last year, the Government accepted the argument that a strong regulator needs a range of powers, including the ability to impose financial penalties. Fining is a flexible sanction which we expect to act as a deterrent to awarding organisations breaching regulatory requirements. In many circumstances it would provide a more proportionate response than the most severe sanction of withdrawing recognition. At the other end of the spectrum, as we have seen with other regulators, fines give a stronger public signal about the significance of the breach than giving a direction to take corrective action or public censure.

It is of course important that there should be limits on any fine. For that reason, we agreed that Ofqual’s power to fine should be subject to a cap of no more than 10% of the awarding organisation’s turnover. We also agreed that the definition of turnover for these purposes would be set out in an order made by the Secretary of State and subject to the affirmative procedure.

A wide range of awarding organisations operate in England: Ofqual currently recognises 179. They possess very different characteristics, including in relation to the way in which they derive income and the relationship between their regulated activity and any other activities that they undertake. In order to gauge the balance of views on this issue, we undertook a 12-week consultation on the draft statutory instrument, which ran from December to March this year. Parallel consultations were carried out by Ofqual and by the Welsh Government in respect of a similar power that has been introduced in Wales.

When we discussed this matter last year, I explained that it was our intention to define turnover in relation to activity that Ofqual regulates, rather than using a broader definition based on all an awarding organisation’s activity, which could include unregulated activity and activities beyond the United Kingdom. However, when it came to drafting the statutory instrument, it was clear that this would prove difficult to achieve, because in fact a number of awarding organisations have no income from regulated activity. Sticking to our original proposals would have resulted in those awarding organisations being able to operate without threat of this sanction. That could have led, for example, to an awarding organisation that charges for proprietary qualifications being treated differently from an employer awarding body that awards its own, very similar, qualifications to its employees without charging. For that reason, we consulted on an order that defined turnover in relation to all an awarding organisation’s activity in the United Kingdom.

The 35 responses that we received to the consultation were broadly in favour of the power to fine in principle, of the geographical scope of the power and of the proposal to calculate turnover on the basis of a business year. However, concerns were expressed over the inclusion of all income in the definition of turnover, rather than limiting the definition to income from regulated activity.

We understand the concerns of both large organisations and small charities, especially those that generate none or very little income from regulated activity. We have considered those concerns carefully and looked at a number of different options, including one proposed by Pearson that we should adopt a two-tiered approach, using one definition based on regulated activity where appropriate and a second based on all activity when an organisation does not derive income from regulated activity.

Set against these concerns, we have had to take account of the importance of establishing a regulatory regime that is simple, fair and consistent in its treatment of awarding organisations. Having considered the alternative options, we were not persuaded that any of them met this test. We think that calculating turnover must be done in a way that treats all awarding organisations equally. As the scope of regulated activity is narrow, being concerned only with the award or authentication of qualifications to which Part 7 of the ASCL Act applies, income from related activity, such as the publication of textbooks, would have been excluded from any definition that uses regulated activity as its basis. A differential approach could therefore have the effect of limiting the exposure of an awarding organisation that derives income from regulated activity, while placing no such limits on one that does not.

The order that is before us for consideration today defines turnover in relation to all of an awarding organisation’s activity in the United Kingdom. That approach mirrors the one already agreed by Welsh Ministers, following consultation and debate. If agreed by Parliament, this order will provide a consistent framework for awarding organisations operating across England, Wales and Northern Ireland. That matter was important for respondents to the consultation.

Alongside the consultation on the statutory instrument, Ofqual consulted on its policy on fining. That policy was published in May and makes clear the factors that Ofqual will consider in determining whether an awarding organisation should be subject to a fine. It will consider the harm done and whether a fine is likely to improve compliance with regulatory conditions in the future. It will also consider whether another regulatory body, such as the Welsh Government, has already imposed a financial sanction in relation to the breach.

Having decided that a fine is appropriate, Ofqual will take account of a range of factors in determining the amount of that fine, to ensure that it represents a proportionate penalty. This includes the likely impact of the fine on the awarding organisation’s provision of regulated qualifications and its turnover from regulated activities in relation to its total turnover, to avoid a disproportionate impact on awarding organisations with multiple business interests. Ofqual is required to give notice of its intention to fine, setting out reasons, and then to have regard to any representations received in response. Should Ofqual decide following any such representations to confirm the fine, the awarding organisation has a right of appeal to the First-tier Tribunal. Appeals may be made on the basis of the imposition of the fine and on the level of the fine imposed. While the independent appeals arrangements are in train, any fine is suspended.

There is no financial incentive for Ofqual to impose a monetary penalty. All money received in the payment of a fine will be paid into the Government’s Consolidated Fund. The definition set out in the order allows Ofqual to have a flexible monetary penalty policy that can take into account the diverse nature of the qualifications market. We set out to define turnover in a way that is fair, transparent, relatively easy to administer and consistent with the approach taken by the Welsh regulator. I believe that that is what we have done. I also believe that Ofqual’s commitment to act in a way that is proportionate, accountable, consistent, transparent and targeted, and the safeguards that are in place, should reassure awarding organisations that the fining power will be used proportionately and appropriately. I therefore commend this order to the Committee.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

My Lords, I support the order and commend the Government for bringing such a sensible conclusion to a complex inquiry. In doing so, I declare an interest as being currently and for the next month chair of one of the bodies mentioned in the supporting papers, the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music. I mention that body also to illustrate how complex the measure is, because it probably means that the department, or certainly Ofqual, would have to check reasonably regularly that the way in which it had constructed the annual turnover figure was accurate. The figures for ABRSM given in the supporting paper show the turnover as being just over £31 million, which was probably the figure for two years ago. That turnover is based not simply on the 300,000 candidates in this country but on 300,000 candidates overseas and shows the complexity involved in determining turnover for activity in the UK. I know that it is simply an illustrative figure in an illustrative paper, but it makes the point that there would have to be accurate checks and agreement with the organisations in question. I do not think that the eventuality will arise, but, if it did, one would need to know in advance on what figure the 10% cap was based. Another slight complexity, again illustrated by the case of ABRSM, is that the figures are to be examined in Scotland as well as in the other three jurisdictions named in the paper. I am not sure whether that makes a difference, but it is the kind of detail that should be checked out. However, I support warmly the direction in which we are now moving.

[Lord Lingfield]

As noble Lords will remember, I brought up this issue during the passage of the Education Bill, so I shall not rehearse the list of difficulties that we all saw in the newspapers during 2011 and in previous years—the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, told us a lot about those, too. The principle of giving Ofqual powers to fine awarding bodies that have been in dereliction of their duty seems entirely proper and necessary, which is why I support the Government. Their proposals seem entirely fair. The awarding bodies are a disparate group and it was always going to be difficult to devise a scheme that coped with all the differences, but the decision to limit turnover for the purposes of Ofqual regulation to all activity within the UK seems appropriate. Sufficient safeguards are built in: there will be an appeal mechanism; Ofqual will be required to state its reasons for using its powers, as the Minister has told us; and there will be a review of the order and Ofqual’s activities. Those are enough. A great deal of needless distress was caused to pupils and their parents, and a lot of difficulties were created for colleges, schools and universities. I hope that the order will be used to alleviate those problems. We shall see whether it does, because it can be reviewed.