Children: Local Authority Care

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Monday 7th November 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

The noble Baroness makes a very good point. It is well known that children in care quite often have a depressing number of placements. We are very well aware of this: in schools, we now have the concept of a virtual school head to take responsibility and a designated teacher in each school. There are often mental health issues as well concerning these kind of pupils. Where the child requires specialist services such as CAMHS, the local clinical commissioning group has a clear role. The noble Baroness will be aware of our strategy Future in Mind, which focuses on that area as well.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, the Education Select Committee’s report on the mental health of looked-after children, published in April this year, echoed the view of NICE that:

“Children and young people placed out of the local authority area are less likely to receive services from CAMHS in their new location”.

Matching children and young people to suitable fostering and residential settings, including the kinship settings that my noble friend Lady Armstrong mentioned, is crucial to providing stability and longevity in a placement and happiness for the child. Will the Government revisit the advice that they give to local authorities to ensure that the mental health needs of a child or young person are properly considered when deciding where they are placed?

[Lord Nash]

We are looking at this. We have an expert working group co-chaired by Peter Fonagy and Alison O’Sullivan, which is looking at the current arrangements. Sir Martin Narey has also reported so, yes, we will certainly look at this.

Education: A-levels in Creative Subjects

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Thursday 3rd November 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, on securing the debate and for her excellent opening speech, which set the tone very effectively.

“Whoever neglects the arts when he is young has lost the past and is dead to the future”—

a truism if ever there was one. Those are the words of the playwright Sophocles, written around 2,400 years ago. Just four years ago, those very words prominently began the Government’s response to the Henley review of cultural education. Sadly, somewhere along the way since 2012, it seems that the Government have lost their belief in the value of the arts and creative subjects in schools.

This issue has come to prominence largely because exam boards have dropped history of art and archaeology A-levels, as noble Lords have said. These have always been very much minority options that not many students have had access to, but the fear is that this is merely the tip of a sizeable iceberg. Squeezed school budgets, a growing emphasis on the STEM and English baccalaureate subjects, and government reforms of qualifications are reshaping what our young people study.

Ministers believe that students should mostly take what they refer to as “facilitating subjects”. I will not list them, because noble Lords are well aware of them, but there is an absence of creative subjects from the list—let me say only that ancient Greek is included but not art and design or computer science. Ministers claim that, because these are the subjects that Russell group universities want, every pupil should take them. In fact, although the Russell group prioritises these subjects, it actually says that only two of the three A-levels should be from this list.

But the Government prefer the absolute position, which chimes with their pushing the EBacc subjects at GCSE. They regard other subjects as “soft options”. This was never more obvious than when, in November 2014, the then Secretary of State for Education claimed that, for children, choosing arts subjects at school would,

“hold them back for the rest of their life”.

That was not just downright nonsense but an extremely damaging statement, suggesting a one-size-fits-all regime that ignores the strengths of many pupils and demeans their choices. Given that the creative industries are now such an important feature of our economy, does the Minister agree that we should not be sending a message to schools and young people that creative and technical subjects are not valued?

The benefits of creative subjects are not merely economic. Subjects such as drama and music are widely taught in independent schools and, until recently at least, were also offered at larger sixth-form colleges. But, in recent years, the colleges have suffered funding cuts, while the continued absence of a VAT refund scheme for them—which is available to academy sixth forms—leaves the average sixth-form college with £385,000 a year less to spend on front-line education. How can the Government justify their intransigence on this issue?

Cuts to sixth-form college budgets have resulted in the need to reduce their range of courses in order to increase class sizes in the remaining subjects. They are also reducing the possibility of taking additional subjects to AS-level, partly because they cannot afford the extra teaching and partly because the AS itself has been downgraded by the Government. The English sixth-form curriculum has traditionally been narrow, with just three subjects at A-level. The efforts of the Labour Government to increase breadth through the AS-level are being reversed by a mixture of cuts and policy, which particularly affects creative subjects that might be taken as an “extra”.

This impacts on the decisions of exam boards. With the costs of managing small-uptake A-levels already an issue, boards must be feeling an additional financial pinch with the loss of AS-level income now that A-level is a stand-alone exam. The numbers studying music at A-level have never been large, but they are dwindling. Schools across the country have already reluctantly decided to stop offering music as an option, and the likelihood is that more will follow.

Even modern languages, one of the EBacc subjects, is not safe. Last week, the Sixth Form Colleges Association published a report based on a survey of its members, which found that more than one-third of colleges have ended courses in modern languages, including A-levels in German, French and Italian. Indeed, evidence points to languages suffering a slow death. This year, fewer than 4,000 students sat German A-level and French entries were down to fewer than 10,000. Schools and sixth-form colleges with pressurised budgets are forced to choose which courses to keep and which to cut. Not enough modern teenagers want to study a language, it seems, which is a great shame because a language is more than just a qualification; it is a skill for life. As the country becomes mired in acrimonious negotiations on leaving the EU and turns ever more in on itself, the future looks bleak for the study of languages.

In a trend that leads directly to the reduction of A-levels in creative subjects, the Sixth Form Colleges Association report also found that almost six out of 10 colleges have reduced extracurricular activities, including educational visits, music, drama, sport and Duke of Edinburgh award schemes, or cut them altogether.

There has been a great deal of discussion about the need to close the divide between academic and vocational education, but with the EBacc the Government are unequivocally promoting the superiority of the academic pathway. If the reduction in the availability of creative subjects is the result, should we be surprised? Less than 50% of students took the EBacc in the past academic year, yet already there has been a significant effect on other subjects since it was introduced—most notably on what I argue is the key subject of design and technology, for which there has been a 30% drop in take-up. The curriculum should not be driven by the needs of the minority who are going to the most selective universities—what my noble friend Lady Nye described as a false hierarchy of subjects taught. Every student should have elements of the EBacc subjects in their curriculum. Equally, they should have artistic and practical elements. Many of the essential work-related skills that the CBI says are in short supply may well be better developed in artistic and practical contexts.

More investment from government is essential if sixth-form colleges and school and academy sixth forms are to continue providing young people with the breadth of high-quality education, including creative subjects, which they need to progress to higher education and employment. Failure to do so risks turning sixth-form education into a narrow and restricting experience. That would be bad for students, bad for society and bad for the economy.

Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Tuesday 18th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Listowel (CB)]

My Lords, I follow my noble friend Lord Ramsbotham in being most grateful to the Government for bringing forward this Bill; there is much in it that is very welcome. I know that the complexities of parliamentary timetables can mean that Bills get introduced to us with fairly short notice, but there is one clause in the Bill that causes particular concern. Clause 29—formerly Clause 15—has the opportunity to roll back significant child protection legislation from the past. My personal concern is that something as important as that needs more time for consultation.

The document Putting Children First, which lays out the basis for this particular proposal, came out in July—so, just as we were looking at this proposed amendment, we were also given the theoretical background to it. We have not had enough information or a long enough time to process this important clause, so I ask the Minister to consider withdrawing the amendment, consulting on it properly and bringing it back at a later date. I know that we have not yet settled a second day on Report, which gives us more time to consider this important issue. I hope that that suggestion is helpful.

I support the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, on this matter, and declare my interest in mental health assessments for looked-after children and designated mental health professionals for them. I am a trustee of the Brent Centre for Young People, a centre of excellence in the treatment of adolescents with health disorders, including eating disorders and other issues, and of the charitable foundation the Child and Family Practice, which brings together paediatricians, head teachers and psychiatrists to produce assessments of children with complex needs such as autism. I strongly support her amendment and I have added my name to it.

The Minister may be concerned about whether we should assess all children. I have heard people say, “What about young children? They will not necessarily need a mental health assessment”. But research from the Tavistock a few years ago was quite clear that we were overlooking the need to assess the mental health of three and four year-olds; their needs were not being caught or addressed. I have been interested in the work of the Anna Freud Centre for many years. It does admirable work with infants, for example in Holloway Prison and in refuges, working with very young children and providing them with therapy and assistance—so that should not be an obstacle.

I look forward to the Minister’s response. There is such a call on mental health provision at the moment and I am afraid about what will happen if we do not legislate—and obviously we want to legislate sensitively. The mental health of these young people has been ignored for many years. We have prioritised their education but we have not given enough thought to the trauma that they experience before entering care and on entering care—and that trauma is often exacerbated by suffering many different placements in care. I strongly support the noble Baroness’s amendment.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I support the amendments in this group, particularly Amendment 4. I am pleased to support the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, who stressed the need for screening for the various neurodevelopmental disorders and neurodisability needs listed in the amendment. Many of those arguments were made in Committee with particular reference to communication disorders, and I hope the Minister will find them more persuasive on this occasion.

There are many problems related to getting children an assessment and/or a diagnosis. The social worker needs to be aware of neurodisabilities and the support and training to enable them to develop this understanding. The lack of time to build meaningful relationships with a child and really get to know them is also of concern. Again, I hope the Minister will have something to positive to say on that.

On Amendment 1, the Minister acknowledged the need for parity of esteem between physical and mental health, and of course that is welcome. That being the case, however, there is surely no reason why he should not accept that his amendment is logically extended by the wording of Amendment 8 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler. Looked-after children are among the most vulnerable in our society, often entering care with a history of abuse and neglect. But it is the sad case that once they are in the care system—a system intended to protect them—many continue to be at risk of further abuse. The Children’s Commissioner estimated that between 20% and 35% of children who had been sexually exploited were in care at the time of that exploitation. I am afraid that, all too obviously, there have been several such cases in our newspapers recently.

Knowing and understanding what types of support would benefit children entering care should be a simple step. It should be a basic element of that support that they receive a mental health assessment alongside the physical health assessment that already happens. Not only would that identify children with diagnosable conditions that require clinical interventions, it would allow foster carers, social workers, teachers and other responsible professionals to develop an understanding of how they could foster therapeutic relationships with those children in their care. I echo the recent remarks by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel: in many cases children require mental health assessments prior to entering the formal education system because damage can often be done at that stage that it is very difficult to deal with later. Children cared for in institutional settings have often experienced a high number of foster placements which have subsequently broken down, which can often be a by-product of poor emotional well-being.

It is estimated that almost three-quarters of children in residential care have a clinically diagnosable mental health condition. If a concerted effort had been made to address the mental health needs of those children when they entered care, it is at least possible that they may never have needed to be placed in residential care, which is, after all, a much more expensive option than foster care. That is why a whole raft of professionals working with the mental health needs of looked-after children believe that this help should be offered as early as possible. There is no rational reason for delaying the introduction of these simple measures, which could prevent further trauma being inflicted on these children.

As many noble Lords present will know, we have raised this issue time and again. I was among several noble Lords making the case at each stage in the passage of the Children and Families Act 2014. It was repeated at Second Reading and in Committee on this Bill. I raised it again at the briefing session on the Bill for noble Lords which the Public Health Minister hosted in September. All this was to no avail. Nor has this House been the only source of such pleading. As the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, said, in April, the Commons Education Select Committee published its report entitled Mental Health and Well-being of Looked-after Children. One of its recommendations was that,

“all looked-after children should have a full mental health assessment by a qualified mental health professional. Where required this should be followed by regular assessment of mental health and well-being as part of existing looked-after children reviews”.

The Government considered the Committee’s report, rejected most of it, it must be said, and their response on that point was:

“We do not accept the recommendation as it stands”.

The response went on to refer to the expert working group for looked-after children that the Government established in May as a possible means of filling this long-established gap in provision for looked-after children. Perhaps there is reason to be optimistic as to that group’s recommendations, since it will have as its co-chairs Alison O’Sullivan, the former president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services, and Professor Peter Fonagy, a psychologist and medical researcher. By what I am sure is complete coincidence, both gave evidence to the Education Select Committee’s inquiry and both, I understand, indicated their support for children having a full mental health assessment when they enter care. The expert working group also included four people who gave evidence to the Select Committee, plus the person who acted as its adviser, so the crossover is considerable, which I very much hope is all to the good.

It would lack consistency for the Minister today to submit Amendment 1 but then dig in his heels and steadfastly refuse to go further with regard to a full mental health assessment. Simply pointing to the expert group is not satisfactory, because it is not due to report for at least 18 months, which means that the Government will effectively stonewall again when the Bill reaches another place. Even if the expert group recommends a mental health assessment for each child entering care, the Government would then need to accept the recommendation—which, on past practice, requires a leap of faith—and then we would need to await the next suitable Bill as a vehicle to introduce it. So if anything does change, it will be quite some way down the line.

The Minister, his advisers and officials at the DfE should ask themselves how many more children will have their mental health issues undiagnosed because of government foot-dragging on an issue that the professionals are quite clear on. Over the years ahead it will be many thousands and that is not a thought of which anyone associated with the Bill on the government side should be proud.

[Lord Warner (CB)]

My Lords, I support all the amendments in this group, particularly Amendment 8, spoken to so ably by the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler. I shall turn to Amendments 4 and 5, to which I have added my name, in a moment. It is a strange irony that she could find an assessment tool in the youth justice system for these conditions; looked-after children seem to have to work their way into the criminal justice system before they can avail themselves of this tool. If I may say so to the Minister, it might be worth considering getting in there a little earlier with looked-after children and accepting the noble Baroness’s amendment.

I strongly support Amendments 4 and 5 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. I declare my interest as the grandparent of a child on the autistic spectrum and a staunch supporter of the National Autistic Society. From all my involvement with looked-after children over the years, many of whom then appeared in the youth justice system, where I saw them again, far too many of these children end up in that system and far too many of them have neurodisabilities or neurodevelopmental disorders. Their problem has often been overlooked for a very long time. These disabilities can be at the heart of their problems in terms of social non-compliance in the school and in the wider community. This leads to their becoming children at risk and in need, as well as often ending up in the youth justice system. The way that they process information and instructions—or, more accurately, fail to do so—is at the heart of many of their problems. Knowing about this is a first step to helping them to manage their condition.

If the state is to take the drastic step of assuming responsibility for these children, the least it can do is to make very sure whether these children have disorders and disabilities about which, on their own, they can do very little and with whose management they need help. The Government should take this issue seriously and include in the Bill a provision of the kind set out in Amendments 4 and 5.

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[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

My Lords, I and other noble Lords attempted in Committee to persuade the Minister that the list of corporate partners in the Bill should be widened. We were unsuccessful then, so today we have tried a slightly different approach with an amendment that speaks only of,

“such other persons or bodies as may be defined in regulations”,

with the proviso that such regulations must be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.

Corporate parenting is one of the most important roles of a local authority, and elected councillors take that responsibility extremely seriously. Corporate parenting means the full and active involvement of the formal and local partnerships needed between local authority departments and services and associated agencies which are responsible for working together to meet the needs of looked-after children and young people as well as care leavers. Recognising that the different component parts each have a contribution to make is critical to the success of corporate parenting. A major challenge in operating effective corporate parenting is to manage its contradictory nature, balancing the need for continuity with the changes necessarily involved, whether through political control, staff changes within the local authority or other partners, or the emergence of new policies, perhaps even new legislation. The aim must remain static: to help provide each individual child or young person with a sense of stability in their life.

Any duties to co-operate must, of course, be reciprocal, with local government, health partners and the police all working together to protect and support looked-after children in their area. All corporate partners need to fully understand and accept their responsibilities as corporate parents, and governance arrangements will be in place to make sure that work within councils and their partner organisations is child-centred and focused on achieving the overarching outcome. The overarching outcome of corporate parenting should be for young people who have experienced the care system to go on to be successful learners in whatever career path they choose, to become confident individuals, responsible citizens and effective contributors whose life outcomes mirror those of their peers as far as possible. The ultimate aim must be that there is no discernible difference between the outcomes of children and young people who have been looked after and those who have not. That, I accept, is a lofty aim, but it is surely one that no one who has the interests of our most vulnerable children at heart can turn away from. I hope that, in that sense, the Minister will look upon Amendments 6 and 7 and give a positive response.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I draw the House’s attention to my interests as a councillor in the Borough of Kirklees and therefore a corporate parent, with whom the buck finally lands. We had a considerable debate in Committee, as the noble Lord, Lord Watson, said, because there was a lot of concern about having clarity of definition about corporate parenting principles. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, talked about the report of the noble Lord, Lord Laming, In Care, Out of Trouble, drawing attention to, “Less clarity leading to more inconsistencies”. That is precisely why, at this stage, there is an endeavour to find greater clarity in the corporate parenting principles laid out in the Bill as it stands.

I also suggest that we ought to support greater clarity because of the changing role of local authorities, given the financial pressures on them. It is also the right thing to do because it makes corporate parenting more effective. There has to be work across other public sector partners; those referred to in the amendment laid before us are the police and the health service. The reason for doing that is to ensure that those two bodies in particular have it as a priority in their planning and actions that they take note of the importance of corporate parenting when they meet young people who are in need of care, and who are sometimes—more often than we would like—brought to the attention of the law.

The third reason why we support the amendment proposed is because, in the principles as laid out, and as described by the Minister in Committee, everyone who is employed by a local authority is responsible as a corporate parent. My fear is that, if everybody is responsible, no one is. That is why I have argued consistently that we need to be clear about where the final responsibility lies.

We need to expand the definition of corporate parenting responsibilities to include other key public sector organisations, but also to have clarity within local authorities on where the final responsibility lies. In the words of the noble Lord, Lord Warner, it is always helpful to refresh requirements in earlier legislation because it brings it to the attention of professionals that this is a matter on which legislators place great importance. With those words, I support wholeheartedly Amendments 6 and 7.

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Moved by

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

10: After Clause 1, insert the following new Clause—
“Duty to provide suitable accommodation
(1) Each local authority in England must take reasonable steps to provide all former relevant children up to the age of 21 with accommodation that—(a) is within the authority’s area; and(b) meets the needs of those former relevant children.(2) A local authority is deemed to have discharged this duty towards a former relevant child where staying put arrangements have been made under section 98 of the Children and Families Act 2014 (arrangements for living with former foster parents after reaching adulthood).”

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

My Lords, Amendment 10 would place a new duty on local authorities to take reasonable steps to provide care leavers up to the age of 21 with suitable accommodation. It would also end the inequality between young people in stable foster care placements, who are entitled to stay with their foster family until the age of 21 under the “staying put” arrangements, and other groups of young people leaving care.

The Bill rightly aims to improve outcomes for care leavers, a group of young people who, as many noble Lords have said, face significant challenges. However, as currently drafted, we do not believe that it goes far enough to make a real difference to young people’s lives. Organisations supporting these young people have consistently said that safe and stable accommodation must be the starting point for improving outcomes in other areas. Education, training, employment and health would be the main examples. A 2015 report by the National Audit Office found that young people with a background in care were more likely to become homeless or to end up in custody. Indeed, the most recent figures from the Department for Education show that, in 2015-16, 7% of care leavers aged 19 to 21 were in accommodation considered unsuitable and the suitability of the accommodation of a further 11% could not be established. Equally, 4% of care leavers aged 19 to 21 were in custody, and 40% of care leavers in that age group were not in education, employment or training. All these figures combined show the scale of the task that faces us when we seek to look after young people leaving care.

When most young people leave home, they are usually able to continue to rely on their parents, as the noble Lord, Lord Warner, said, for many things, not least advice as well as practical and financial support. Young people who have been in care do not have that support system open to them. Many have significant emotional and mental health needs which are often due to a history of abuse or neglect. The transition to adulthood can be daunting at the best of times for all young people. By definition, looked-after children rarely experience the best of times and have to cope with multiple changes: finishing school or college; moving from child and adolescent mental health services to adult services; and often the need to find alternative living arrangements. Even among children in different forms of care, there is real inequality between care leavers who can stay with their foster family under “staying put” and all other young people leaving care.

The Government have promised to pilot “staying close”, which would offer accommodation to young people leaving residential care, but we understand there is to be no duty on local authorities to do so, and there is certainly no clarity on funding. As it stands, if you are not in a stable foster placement at 18, you may well end up in an unsafe or unstable accommodation placement or be homeless or sofa-surfing. Outcomes for care leavers in general will not improve until this issue is addressed.

In 2014, the Government recognised the importance of safe, stable and appropriate accommodation for care leavers. “Staying put” arrangements mean some young people can remain with their foster family until they reach 21. In 2015-16, of those who ceased to be looked after on their 18th birthday and who were in foster care, 54% of 18 year-olds, 30% of 19 year-olds and 16% of 20 year-olds were able to remain with their foster family. However, for other young people, including those in residential accommodation, who may be the most vulnerable of all and have significant needs, no equivalent support is available. This Bill offers an opportunity to ensure that all young people leaving care have an appropriate place to live until they reach 21 to help them start their adult lives.

In July, the Government committed to piloting “staying close” in Keep on Caring: Supporting Young People from Care to Independence. The aim is to explore models of accommodation for young people leaving residential care. That is to be welcomed, but Amendment 10 enables us to go a step further. I hope that the Government will look upon it favourably.

Amendment 12 in my name amends Clause 2. It concerns the local offer for care leavers and seeks to set up a national minimum standard that would set out the quality and extent of services to be offered by local authorities to care leavers. In a later group, we will discuss the national offer. I am aware that the Government, at this stage at least, are not minded to embrace such a concept. Setting out a national minimum standard is a similar approach in the sense of avoiding the postcode lottery that we all understand and that applies in different ways in different settings. That lottery could allow local authorities in some areas to provide a much less satisfactory service to care leavers than is provided in others. That is why it makes sense to set a national minimum standard. It would be no more than a minimum to be built on but it is necessary so as to have something on which to fall back.

Regarding the other part of the amendment, it makes sense to consult appropriately to ensure that the basis on which the national minimum standard would be set was one that carried the benefit of the experience of the various corporate parenting partners. It is important to say that the setting of a minimum standard is something that we need to do because the patchwork effect of the accommodation issues to which I referred in commenting on the earlier amendment show that there is no common policy across the country. That, surely, is not acceptable. For that reason, I beg to move.

[Lord Warner]

My Lords, I shall speak in support Amendment 12, to which I have added my name, but I should like first to add my support to Amendment 10. Affordable single-person accommodation is one of the areas in shortest supply in many of our cities. This is the pool in which we are often trying to find accommodation for these young people. They do need a lot of support. We are asking them to live independently and to battle their way through what is often a confusing and difficult accommodation market. Even older, more mature adults find it difficult to survive in that market.

We are setting these young people up to fail if we do not do more to help them to get into safe and suitable accommodation. It is no wonder, sadly, that we find so many of these young people having been in care sleeping rough in many of our inner cities, including not far from this place. Anyone who late at night wanders around the South Bank will find some of these characters who have been in care having a difficult time. When you talk to some of them, you hear that they have never had good accommodation.

The Minister should take this seriously. When I was chairman of the Youth Justice Board this area was one of the major contributory factors to many of these young people moving down a path of crime and into the youth justice system. Tackling it is therefore in everyone’s interests, not just those of the young people. I strongly support Amendment 10.

I also support Amendment 12. Too often we pass reforming legislation without saying what would be an acceptable level of response by those responsible for implementing that legislation. There is a long history of the lifetime outcomes for looked-after children being inadequate. We shall come to the issue of outcomes in a later amendment. To address this long-standing problem, the Government would do well to set out some national minimum standards for the services that must be offered under their local offer for care leavers. Far too many young care leavers do not know what they can expect from the authority that has been looking after them when they move into the wider world.

From my experience as the commissioner for children’s services in Birmingham—appointed by the current Secretary of State’s predecessor but one, who has since gone on to further fame—one also finds huge variations in the performance of some of the leaving-care teams within the same authority. This is not an area that has been well served by consistency even within the same authority. Setting some national standards would not just be helpful for consistency between authorities but would help some of the bigger authorities to have consistency within themselves. So I strongly support Amendment 12.

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In light of the points I have made, I hope the noble Lord will feel reassured enough to withdraw the amendment.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

My Lords, first, I hope and suspect that my eyebrows were not the only ones to raise when the Minister said that it was not for the Government to set in statute what local authorities should be doing. It has been the pattern in recent years for Government to say what local authorities should not be doing. Housing and education were increasingly taken away from them; then planning was taken away; and social work services will to some extent be taken away if Clause 29 of the Bill becomes law. I suspect some in local authorities would be quite pleased to have the Minister standing up for them, but I am not being entirely serious, because I am suggesting that the Government should go beyond the minimum. The Minister says that there is a minimum, but the Bill does not say what that should be. Without that being set out, what is a minimum? We could be here until a week on Tuesday discussing what that is, so that is not a suitable answer. I am not asking the Government to tell all local authorities what they should do but I am asking them to set the minimum, because some local authorities clearly do not meet that minimum. We heard from the noble Lord, Lord Warner, a man whose experience is vast, of the inconsistences that already exist. I cannot believe that the Minister would regard that as acceptable—indeed, I know he would not. If it is not acceptable, we need to do something about it. That is why this amendment has been framed.

The Minister said a few moments ago that the local offer must aim to support independent living. Well, the most basic part of independent living is accommodation. While I accept what the Minister says about various agencies supporting accommodation, the most basic right anyone needs to build a sustainable life is accommodation of their own, rented or owned. Without that, I do not see how anybody can be expected to make their way in life successfully for very long. So the Government’s response is disappointing and—dare I say—a bit complacent. The situation that the Minister outlines is not that found on the ground by local authorities or by many of the organisations working in the field. I regret that the Minister has not been willing to go further, but I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 10 withdrawn.

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[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, Amendment 13 relates to the national offer for care leavers. I am grateful for the support of the Labour and Liberal Democrat Front Benches for this amendment. Recently I heard from Ashley, an 18 year-old in a Staying Put placement who has experienced at least six different foster placements during her time in care.

As I speak, I am thinking about a colleague from a charity board who recently described to me her early experience. Her mother was a crack addict who told her children both that she valued drugs more than them and that if they did not visit her regularly, she would take her own life. My colleague is extremely bright and hard-working and made it to university—one of the 6% of care leavers who do so. There, she had many black days, but she was supported by her flatmates, she completed her degree and, in August of this year, was married to a kind man—an accountant. So many care leavers do not experience that success. Without a family to call on, they might quickly find themselves alone and in debt, perhaps destitute. Our ambition must be to furnish care leavers with the necessary skills and training to allow them to excel and achieve their full potential, as we would wish for our own children.

However, financial security—the bedrock of being able to do these things—is so often difficult for them. Jack, a care leaver who attended a meeting organised by the Children’s Society last week, subsequently told me that, “The national offer would provide stability to care leavers, with protection from the darker side of financial troubles. It means we could focus on our education, employment or training and not on the stress of how we are going to pay for this or that, or whether to buy a bus pass or food shopping that week”.

I welcome the steps that the Government have taken to better support care leavers: allowing them to stay put with their foster carers until the age of 21; the Ofsted inspection of care leavers services; the Government’s care leavers strategy; and the new rights under the Bill. However, we all know that we need to do more. The Bill makes a local offer, which is very welcome, but in their role as corporate parent, the national Government need also to provide a robust offer for care leavers, with a particular focus on financial support. If the Government are serious about building a country that works for all and improves the lives of those who are just managing to keep their heads above water, they must ensure that a package of improved support for care leavers is central to that commitment. It is certainly not for this House to decide on financial matters. However, as this Bill begins with your Lordships, we can give the other place an opportunity to discuss matters that are vital to the welfare of care leavers.

This amendment has four parts. The first provides for a reduction in the penalties attached to sanctions targeted at care leavers under the age of 25. The second would provide working tax credit for care leavers under 25, and the third would extend the current exemption from the shared accommodation rate for housing benefit for care leavers from 22 to 24. Finally, the amendment would provide an exemption from council tax for care leavers under 25.

Research from the Children’s Society shows that currently, care leavers are three times more likely to receive a sanction than other young claimants, yet are much less likely to challenge these sanctions, perhaps due to the lack of a pushy parent. When they do appeal, however, two-thirds of these sanctions are overturned. This amendment would soften the sanctions on care leavers under the new universal credit system, in recognition of the additional complexities in their lives—meaning that the maximum sanction would apply for four weeks, as opposed to the existing four to 13 weeks for a first-time infraction. The cost of this measure is effectively nil, as sanctioning is a form of punishment, not a revenue generator for the Treasury.

The noble Lord, Lord Freud, has made an eloquent case for the mental health benefits of employment—but, to be a viable option for care leavers, work must pay. For this reason, our amendment would allow for care leavers under the age of 25 to claim working tax credit—a crucial form of support already paid to those over the age of 25 and to those under that age if they have children or disability. I recognise that working tax credit is soon to be phased out, but, under the new universal credit arrangements, under-25s will still be penalised, so it would be a very important flag to ensure that universal credit will also recognise the needs of this particular group.

For care leavers, a job can mean the end of isolation, as well as the beginning of independence; yet care leavers are heavily overrepresented among young people who are not in employment, education or training. Perhaps the existing assumption behind the working tax credit age limit is that low-income young people will be living at home with their family. This assumption clearly does not apply to care leavers, and they should therefore be able to benefit from this extra help if on a low income.

Thirdly, our amendment would ensure that no care leaver would pay council tax up to the age of 25. Already, six local authorities have suspended this charge for care leavers. Where they are liable for council tax, most care leavers already receive heavy discounts—but still, many struggle to cover this. Despite these changes, we still have the nonsense of corporate parents sending around the bailiffs or taking their own children—or children for whom they have a corporate responsibility—to court to pursue small amounts of money, which might cost more than the money recovered. I am encouraged that, in their latest strategy, the Government have asked local authorities to consider a council tax exemption for care leavers. However, I am sure that noble Lords would agree that the sensible thing to do is to mandate that all local authorities do this, as they do already for those in higher education.

Finally, our amendment would disapply the shared accommodation rate for care leavers until the age of 25. Currently, when a care leaver turns 22, if they are living in privately rented accommodation, their housing benefit is often reduced to that sufficient to rent for a room in shared accommodation, rather than a self-contained property. For many care leavers, their first home might be the first stable home they have ever had. Faced with reduced housing benefit, they might experience dislocation and, possibly, homelessness. We know that approximately 25% of the homeless population have been in the care of a local authority and are therefore care leavers. It cannot be right that, when almost half of all 20 to 24 year-olds still live at home with their parents, we put care leavers in a position where they could see a typical £31 a week cut to their housing benefit at the age of 22.

The cost of our amendment is estimated at around £50 million a year. The aim of the Bill is to extend provision of some key forms of support for care leavers until the age of 25. The logic behind the national offer is to extend the financial support that a care leaver can expect to receive up to that age. The cost of not introducing this amendment is far higher than the cost of its introduction. I beg your Lordships to allow the other place the opportunity to consider this national offer for care leavers. I beg to move.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

My Lords, I have added my name in support of this amendment. I pay tribute to the work done by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, and by the Children’s Society, to which he referred. Many noble Lords have benefited from the briefing provided by that organisation and it is a matter that it cares very deeply about. We in your Lordships’ House should also care deeply about it.

In July, the Government launched Keep on Caring, a strategy for cross-government provision. That was certainly welcome, not least because it contained the proposal to introduce a care-leaver covenant. The Government have characterised this as complementing the local offer that local authorities will be required to provide. However, it did not meet what we, and several organisations involved day-to-day in the delivery of social services to children, see as the need for a national offer delivered locally. I referred to this on the previous group of amendments. We believe that the national offer is necessary because of the patchwork provision that will be made by local authorities, so I would like to reinforce the arguments that I made on the earlier group.

I will not repeat the details of the national offer that the noble Earl outlined, but I want to refer to one or two aspects of it. There are four points, and the Minister, perhaps slightly unusually, replied to all four in a letter to the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, before the debate. The noble Earl has kindly circulated that letter, and it is helpful for us to know what the Government’s position is. It is not exactly positive. None the less, it is helpful to have it outlined.

Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Tuesday 18th October 2016 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

33: After Clause 9, insert the following new Clause—
“Profit-making and children’s social services functions
(1) Social services functions conferred on or exercisable by a local authority so far as those functions relate to children shall not be discharged by a body corporate that is carried on for profit.(2) “Social services functions” has the meaning given by section 1A of the Local Authority Social Services Act 1970.”

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, has been called away and has asked me to move Amendment 33, which I am pleased to do, because I shall speak also to Amendment 35 in my name in the group.

Clause 29 refers, some would say euphemistically, to “different ways of working”, and others have spoken of the need for “innovation”, both of which are essentially code for exempting local authorities from some requirements hitherto imposed by children’s social care legislation. We hold strongly to the view that child protection and wider social care should not be run by an organisation seeking to make a profit. That is why we joined Liberal Democrat and Cross-Bench Peers, as well as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham, in Committee, demonstrating the breadth of support for that requirement to appear in the Bill.

The Minister has consistently been asked to explain what problem Clause 29 is designed to address. I have to say that from our point of view he has been unable to do so. At the briefing on this part of the Bill held last week, the Children’s Minister was also unable to come up with a convincing answer. A representative from three London boroughs highlighted one aspect of their joint operations, but it did not seem to be in an area in which they were constrained from operating as things stand. Indeed, those London boroughs were in a list of local authorities that I read out in Committee, all of which have been able to innovate within existing legislation.

However, I do not want to pre-empt the argument that we will advance when we come to consider Amendment 54, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Nash, on our second day of Report on 8 November, so I will say no more about the detail of that just now.

In Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, acknowledged that an amendment seeking to give extra force to an existing regulatory ban on profit-making in children’s services by enshrining it in primary legislation did not sit easily in a group of clauses headed “Care and adoption proceedings in England and Wales” but, he added, neither did any fear that the Government might use Section 1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 2008, which enables the social care functions of a local authority to be discharged by a body corporate, to defy that ban. Such a fear was articulated by the Association of Directors of Children’s Services, as well as many other organisations delivering children’s services, which, in its response to a 2014 consultation on draft regulations concerning a significant extension to children’s services that could be outsourced, strongly rejected any profit motive in their provision. The association wrote:

“Decisions taken about a child’s life should only ever be based on what is”,

best for,

“the child as assessed by skilled and qualified social workers and the courts system. These decisions cannot, and must not, be subordinate to the pursuit of financial profit”.

The Government’s response at the time included the insertion of a prohibition on profit-making into the final regulation of those services that could be outsourced, and the Minister assured noble Lords at Second Reading that the Government had no intention of lifting that ban. However, many in your Lordships’ House, not to mention the plethora of organisations which have contacted noble Lords since the Bill was published, feel a distinct sense of unease that his assurance sits awkwardly with Clauses 29 to 33, which allow local authorities to opt out of some of the provisions in existing regulation and legislation.

In his recent review, Sir Martin Narey questioned profit-making, despite the fact that the Government repeated their assurance on the ban in their submission to him. As events in July demonstrate, Ministers come and go, often unexpectedly, and government policy changes abruptly as a result. I need only mention the words “grammar schools” as proof of that. There have been too many government U-turns in recent history for any noble Lord to feel entirely comfortable that all will be well with the ban on profit-making service deliverers in future.

The simplest way to assure practitioners and noble Lords who feel the same way as I do on the issue would be for the Minister to confirm that the Government will reconsider their refusal to enshrine their regulatory function in the Bill. I would therefore be grateful if he would agree to take the matter away for further consideration and come back to me before Third Reading. I should say that when I say “me”, I mean the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham.

Amendment 35 has been resubmitted and is of the type that has a habit of surfacing regularly, because it seeks to get the Government to collect and collate information, publish a report and submit it—and, by extension, themselves—to Parliament to be held to account. It could be said that that is fairly basic democracy, but rarely do the Government agree. They usually cite some bureaucratic reason for being unable to comply. On this occasion, it is primarily an attempt to ensure that local authorities, rather than the Government, are held to account. If the Government are not minded to accept this amendment, then perhaps the Minister will inform noble Lords how he intends local authorities to be benchmarked. How are they to be measured in terms of how they deliver services to children in and leaving care? If there are no known outcomes, how is progress to be measured?

The Government have conceded that children’s services in some areas are not delivering the best possible outcomes for vulnerable children. Society as a whole has a responsibility to do better for these groups of children. If the Prime Minister was serious about wanting to create a country that works for everyone, these are exactly the type of young people whom she needs to focus on, because they are those who all too often get left behind. Ministers have identified improving outcomes as a priority and this is the driver for the DfE innovation programme and for the controversial innovation clauses, which as I said will be debated next month. However, the only way to measure whether innovation is working is to have an outcomes framework with annual reporting obligations. That would enable comparisons as to how different local authorities were performing and test whether different models for delivering social services are, or perhaps more importantly, are not working. It would also allow good practice to be identified and—crucially—to be shared.

The most important aspect of the outcomes highlighted in Amendment 35 is that they are about children’s well-being and life chances. This must be at the heart of any innovation, however that is described and no matter the context in which it is operated. It is essential that we make sure that changes are not made solely or even mainly for the sake of efficiency savings, which is tempting at a time of increasing demand and decreasing resource. I beg to move.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, it seems to me fairly demeaning that the state cannot collectively care for vulnerable children without resorting to a profit motive. In all the private meetings we have had with Ministers in regard to the Bill, we have been reassured that there is no background intention on the part of the Government to enable services to be outsourced to give a profit motive. That would require a change in legislation. The period of changes that we are now undergoing needs guarantees and I point to a report that I believe was in the Guardian newspaper a couple of days ago, which refers to Sandwell Council having been ordered to contract out its children’s services. It will mean,

“that services, including child protection investigations, making applications to the courts to have children removed from their families and the management of children in need plans will be outsourced to an independent organisation, and accountability will only be back to the council through a contract”.

I thought we would have learned enough from the academisation of schools to know that contracts do not necessarily provide sufficient accountability, either for financial management or—certainly not—for providing services in the best interests of children. We are talking about the most vulnerable children. As far as I can find out, no other country allows this sort of intrusion by a private company into the lives of vulnerable families, and decisions about the welfare and protection of children to be taken by private companies which are not directly accountable to the state, either to the Government, or in this case to local authorities. It raises a fundamental principle. As we have discussed at great length throughout the Bill, we are all very concerned to provide the best possible protection and care for vulnerable children. However, we are possibly undermining that by allowing and enabling the outsourcing of children’s services for a profit motive, which by its very nature may result in children not being first and foremost in the mind of the company undertaking the work.

For those reasons, we totally support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. We hope that the Minister will be able to give a categorical assurance that the outsourcing of children’s services for profit will not take place, and that, failing that, he will include such an assurance as an amendment at Third Reading.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education (Lord Nash) (Con)]

My Lords, I would like to thank noble Lords for these amendments. I will speak about each one in turn, commencing with Amendment 33, which would prohibit profit-making in children’s social services functions, and then Amendment 35, which would put a duty on local government to report on several outcomes for vulnerable children and for the Secretary of State to publish an annual report on these outcomes.

I recognise that profit-making in children’s social care is a sensitive issue, and I entirely understand noble Lords’ desire to ensure that legislation is clear on this point. We believe that it is. There is already a clear legislative restriction on the outsourcing of children’s social care functions in the 2014 relevant care functions regulations. There are also restrictions on profit-making by adoption agencies through the fact that the Adoption and Children Act 2002 allows an adoption service to be operated only by a local authority or an organisation that is not carried on for profit. These restrictions as they stand in secondary legislation have exactly the same force as they would in primary legislation. Any attempt to remove them would need to be debated in both Houses. Therefore, although I entirely understand the intention, I do not think it is necessary to move this to primary legislation.

The noble Lord, Lord Warner, referred to the LaingBuisson event—an ideas-generating event exploring new approaches to service delivery. As he said, concerns were raised about profit-making in child protection, and these are reflected in the 2014 regulations to which I have already referred.

I understand, however, that there is some concern about whether Clause 29, the power to test new ways of working, could be used to reopen this matter. I have therefore tabled a government amendment that will explicitly rule out using Clause 29 for profit-making. This was never the intention behind the clause, but by including this amendment I hope to put the point beyond doubt.

On Amendment 35, the Government are committed to understanding what drives successful outcomes for vulnerable children. It is critically important that we collect data from local authorities and others to steer evidence-based and effective policy-making. The Government have already placed a duty on local authorities under Section 83 of the Children Act 1989 to provide information to the Secretary of State on their performance on a wide range of children’s social care functions, including on vulnerable children and care leavers. The Department for Education already publishes annual reports on the outcomes for vulnerable children, including their educational attainment and levels of absence and exclusion from schooling. For looked-after children, we also collect information from local authorities on offending, substance misuse, healthcare, and emotional and behavioural health. For care leavers, we publish information on their accommodation—

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

I welcome the information that the Minister has given us about the Children Act. However, can he say whether any of the headings listed in Amendment 35 appear in that legislation and whether any of them are reported on as things stand under that legislation?

[Lord Nash]

I will check that and come back to the noble Lord, either today or in writing.

For care leavers, we publish information on their accommodation and its suitability, as well as information on their participation in the labour market. Statistics are published annually.

As with national data, it is essential that local authorities collect the data they need at a local level to offer bespoke services to their communities. We know that many local authorities are making great progress on their data analysis capabilities. Noble Lords may be interested in looking at the Association of Directors of Children’s Services report, Pillars & Foundations: Next Practice in Children’s Services. The Department for Education is exploring ways of improving data collection on the experiences and outcomes for vulnerable children. Last year, for the very first time, we published factors identified by social workers in assessments of children, including parental and child risk factors. This helps us to understand the risk factors that are likely to lead to social work intervention with families.

I recognise that there is more we can do to make better use of data. Putting Children First, published in July, sets out the programme of work we are following to improve our data. We want to ensure that our data collections are focused on the most useful information without placing unnecessary burdens on local authorities. We are working with local government and with Ofsted to align different data requests and avoid duplication.

We also recognise that data collected by other departments or agencies offer the potential to gain a fuller understanding of the outcomes achieved by vulnerable young people. We plan to identify opportunities across government to align and analyse different data collections to understand trends and to target resources effectively. We are already working with HMRC, the Department for Work and Pensions and the Ministry of Justice. The Department for Education will soon run its first children’s services omnibus survey, which will include questions on children’s social care to gather information from senior leaders and managers in local authorities. This biannual survey will run initially for two years, enabling us to collect data to track changes. We expect the first results to be available in early 2017.

On the point raised by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, I will write to him on that matter. I will also write to the noble Lord, Lord Watson, on the point that he raised.

I hope that the noble Lords, having heard that I am tabling a government amendment around profit-making and of the existing legal requirements and planned activity to report on outcomes for vulnerable children, will withdraw or not press their amendments.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

I thank the Minister and look forward to receiving his letter. I note what he says about further legislation on profit-making not being necessary. As I have moved the amendment on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, I should just say that he asked whether the Minister would meet with him in advance of Third Reading. As the Minister is nodding, I take it that he accepts, so that is welcome.

The noble Lord, Lord Warner, mentioned the LaingBuisson report. The Minister may recall that I recently asked a Written Question on when the report was going to be published, and his response was something like “in due course”. It would be helpful if we could have it published before we return for day 2 of Report, which is nearly a month away. That would perhaps give us the ability to have a fuller debate. I think it is there; it just has not been published. If the Minister could push that along, that would be helpful.

I note what the Minister says about collecting data and that leading to evidence-based policy, which is something that I very much agree with. In terms of the information collected already, he seemed to suggest that the means were already there for the information mentioned in the amendment to be collected. When his letter is received, I will see whether that is the case. At the moment, there is still concern. Given the changes in this Act, and moving forward not least after today on mental health, we would like to see something measured as a benchmark against which we can measure progress. I am also interested to hear about the children’s services omnibus survey, and I think that will be widely welcomed. I look forward to the outcomes of that in a year’s time. On the basis of the Minister’s responses, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 33 withdrawn.

Grammar Schools

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Thursday 13th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, like everyone else, I am very grateful to my noble friend Lady Andrews for securing this debate. Her opening remarks set the tone for what has been a high-quality debate from many noble Lords.

The Green Paper we have been discussing today is named Schools that Work for Everyone. Well, its proposals did not work for the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill of Gatley. For him, it was apparently the final straw in his general dissatisfaction with the Government of whom he was a part. He resigned as a Treasury Minister 10 days after the Green Paper was published, with much reporting of the fact that grammar schools were a major factor. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, went further, because he also resigned from the Tory party and now sits as a Cross-Bencher—a very cross bencher, it would appear. It is perhaps instructive that we have heard only four Tory Back-Bench speeches today. I would have hoped that more would be present to justify what the Government are seeking to do.

Schools that Work for Everyone is a misnomer. That is not the case if your child fails the 11-plus or if you want your child to attend a school based on a faith other than your own, and certainly not if your child has special educational needs or a disability, because these words do not make a single appearance in the document’s 36 pages. I hope that the Minister will offer an explanation for this oversight, although perhaps it should not come as too much of a surprise because the Green Paper is, after all, about being exclusive, not inclusive. Some would say that that is the raison d’être of grammar schools: it is more about who they keep out rather than who they let in.

Ministers claim that creating more grammar schools will help increase social mobility. We have heard many examples in the debate to head off that argument, and I hope we will not hear any more about that from the Government. Quite simply, all the evidence points in the opposite direction. Today, only 2.6% of pupils at grammar schools are eligible for free school meals, compared with 14.9% across all schools. So it is clear that grammars are not increasing social mobility in the areas in which they currently operate. The noble Lord, Lord Storey, has just talked about Kent. That county has the highest number of grammar schools in the country but also the highest number of failing secondary schools, including academies, of any local authority in the country. As my noble friend Lady Andrews said, grammar schools are often much better at social selection than they are at academic selection.

If the Government were genuinely concerned with increasing social mobility, surely they would invest in early years education—the stage at which state intervention makes the greatest contribution to a child’s life chances. Yet, since 2010 this Government and their predecessor have ruthlessly cut, across the country, the network of Sure Start centres, which provided a vital community resource for less well-off families, many lacking the skills to give their children the early help that is so vital. Sixty-five per cent of nursery school places are located in the 30 most deprived areas in England, yet the Government, who claim to care about social mobility, are about to cut nursery school funding. That shows their true colours: they are about being exclusive, not inclusive. That is the context within which this Green Paper has been forged. It is damaging dogma, seeking to reverse the educational orthodoxy of the past five decades and return to a so-called golden age—a time when society was ordered and people knew their place, at least in the parlance of the Conservative Party.

I will not repeat the statistics that many noble Lords have highlighted demonstrating that grammar schools widen the attainment gap between rich and poor. I found the report published last month by the Education Policy Institute particularly compelling in this regard. My noble friend Lord Cashman rightly emphasised that, in systems with more academic-style activity, educational attainment is more strongly related to family background.

A major factor in this is what the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich recalled as “shaming”. There is cruelty involved in stigmatising children at the age of 11, of which we have heard many examples today. Although I was educated in Scotland where there are no grammar schools, I none the less did sit an 11-plus. I remember very much the divisions that have been highlighted today by my noble friends Lord Knight and Lord Liddle, and, most movingly for all Members of your Lordships’ House, my noble friend Lady Taylor. They talked of siblings and friends being separated and people being branded as failures, of snobbery reinforced, class divisions entrenched and, perhaps most importantly, opportunities denied. Who would want or even tolerate those outcomes?

The Green Paper states, on page 28, that selective schools need to ensure that the pupils they admit are representative of their local communities. They certainly do, but they have a lot of ground to make up there. We hear much of the postcode lottery. Indeed, the Prime Minister referred to it when she said that there is selection by house price. Of course, grammar schools defy the postcode lottery. Rather than see themselves as part of a community, they cast their net far and wide, resulting in often ridiculous situations such as children travelling from Brighton to attend grammar schools in the London Boroughs of Kingston and Sutton—50 miles away. Southend, for instance, has four grammar schools, yet only one has a majority of children whose home is in Southend. What is the point of that? This is public money being spent on public education, yet it is being used to stroke the egos of grammar school head teachers for whom results are everything and promoting community cohesion—supposedly a legal duty of state schools—counts for, it would appear, next to nothing.

The Government suggest that creating more grammar schools within the education system will create more choice. As other noble Lords have said, it will, but it will be the schools that are given more choice over pupils, rather than parents given more choice over the school they want for their child.

I turn now to a lesser-highlighted part of the Green Paper, one mentioned by only the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich and my noble friend Lord Cashman. The proposal to allow faith-free schools, as well as those currently in existence, to dispense with the 50% limit of pupils from that faith is potentially playing with fire and should be dropped immediately, whatever the fate of the remainder of the Green Paper.

An ugly and worrying consequence of the decision by a majority of the people of England and Wales to turn inward at the referendum in June has been the development of toxic situations in many communities, with many non-British residents fearing for their safety, even those who have lived here for many years and now have British nationality. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Vere, on her fine maiden speech. She told noble Lords that she was now over the worst of the referendum result. I take no pleasure in this, but I am afraid to say to her: “You ain’t seen nothing yet”. The developments that lie ahead of us in the years to come are very worrying.

The Government’s response to those kinds of attitudes in those communities ought to be one of concern, enlightenment, bridge-building, solidarity and hope. Instead, it is none of those things, because the Government want to facilitate a policy that will harden the divisions between children by ensuring that those not of a certain faith will be shut off from their neighbours and friends because they are to be prevented from attending a local school that their parents want them to attend. So much for choice. The Government’s plan is to allow groups of children to be segregated and prevented from mixing while they learn for life, conscious only of each other’s differences and not what binds them together as citizens. This move would have been a negative one at the best of times, and, as I have already alluded to, we are very far away from the best of times.

Walls are dismantled by people coming together, not by keeping them apart. Further selection on the grounds of faith will lead to more pupils being discriminated against, primarily based on their parents’ faith. The Government claim that the cap should be scrapped because it has had little impact on improving integration in minority religious schools, but it has been in place only since 2011 and is certainly not doing any harm. If faith schools are not yet successful in promoting diversity with 50% of pupils of that faith, why on earth would they be more likely to do so with 100%? Like so much of this Green Paper, it just does not make sense.

All the evidence shows that creating more selective schools will not raise overall educational standards and is likely, as I have said, to widen the attainment gap between well-off and poor children. The Government must now give due weight to that evidence and abandon their misguided pursuit of grammar school expansion. If they do not, they will condemn countless children to second-class status and a stigma that some may never cast off. I echo the calls made today by my noble friends Lord Blunkett and Lord Liddle for the Government to focus on standards rather than structures. I also urge the Minister to urge the Secretary of State to address the existential problems facing education today—a teacher recruitment crisis, a primary assessment system in chaos and severe school budget pressures. To sideline those issues while prioritising a policy for which, it should be remembered, the Government have no mandate, would be a dereliction of duty.

--- Later in debate ---

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

I realised that we would probably have a dispute at some point about not only the statistics but the ideological angles that we take.

The most recent research by the Educational Policy Institute indicates a positive impact of around a third of a GCSE grade higher in each of the eight subjects. Even when we take the higher-ability intakes into account, we see that pupils still perform better in selective schools than in non-selective schools. I can assure the noble Lords, Lord Giddens and Lord Cashman, that the consultation focuses on how selective schools can contribute more to ensuring greater social mobility.

A number of studies have found that selective schools are particularly beneficial for the pupils from disadvantaged families who attend them, closing the attainment gap to almost zero. Indeed, one study found the educational gain from attending a grammar school to be around twice as high, of seven to eight GCSE grades, for pupils eligible for free schools meals as for all pupils—around 3.5 grades.

While it is hard to determine the real impact of selection on those who do not attend selective schools, the Sutton Trust found no evidence of an adverse effect on their GCSE performance, while others found small adverse effects. Nevertheless, this is evidence based on the selective school system as it currently operates.

Selective schools could contribute in a number of ways, sharing expertise and resources, assisting with teaching and curriculum support, and providing support with university applications. The Government’s proposals intend to make grammar schools engines of academic and social achievement for all pupils, whether they are in selective or non-selective schools.

The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich asked about the parameters of funding for the new opportunity areas, as Norwich is one of the first that we have announced. We will make available up to £60 million of new funding to support targeted local work in the opportunity areas to address the biggest challenges that each area faces. We expect it to be used to fund local, evidence-based programmes, and local project management and evaluation.

I can assure the noble Lord, Lord Cashman, that any proposal to remove the 50% cap on faith admissions for faith schools will include proposals to ensure that they promote inclusivity and community cohesion. The noble Lord, Lord Liddle, raised a point about plans for existing schools to become selective in a planned manner. I can assure him that the consultation asks for views on how existing non-selective schools should become selective. The Secretary of State will also take account of the impact on local communities when deciding which proposals to approve.

The noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, and the noble Lord, Lord Bragg, asked why London schools appear to be successful without selection. There are a number of reasons why London schools have improved in recent years, but there is no evidence to demonstrate that a lack of selective schools is one of them.

The noble Lord, Lord Addington, referred to special needs and the need for more teacher training in SEND. In July 2016, the Government published a new framework of core content for initial teacher training, developed by Stephen Munday’s expert group.

I believe that I am running out of time. I have a few more questions that I would prefer to answer, but I fear that I will have to call a halt. I will certainly write to all noble Lords who have raised questions and review in Hansard what I and others have said.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

The Minister has three minutes left.

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

The three minutes is for the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, to reply.

Grammar Schools

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Thursday 15th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

Yesterday, in answer to yet another Question about grammar schools, the Minister stated that early years is so important. So why is it that a highly contentious and hugely socially divisive new policy on grammar schools can appear as if from nowhere in the form of a consultation document within two months of the Prime Minister taking office, yet a consultation document promised on children’s Sure Start centres last year still has no publication date, a fact confirmed by the Minister to my noble friend Lord Beecham in a Written Answer this week? The consultation document refers to £50 million being given over for grammar schools. Given the breadth of his remit, will the Minister commit now to fight within his department for a similar amount of funding for Sure Start centres, because they make such a difference to the lives of so many children born into disadvantaged families?

[Lord Nash]

As I said yesterday, I entirely agree with the noble Lord about the importance of early years—I think we all recognise that. That is why it is so pleasing to see so many academy groups opening nurseries. There have been a number of mergers and some closures of Sure Start centres, but the number of pupils attending them has remained fairly constant and the evidence is that they are doing well. Of course, this Government have invested heavily in early years childcare.

Schools

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Monday 12th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. The former Labour Prime Minister and former Member of your Lordships’ House, Lord Wilson of Rievaulx, once opined that a week was a long time in politics. Well, rather a lot has happened in the past week in politics, particularly in the area of education, beginning with the leak, accidental or otherwise, of government plans for an expansion of grammar schools. Since then, we have had a Statement from the Secretary of State saying that there was really nothing to say, followed a mere 24 hours later by a detailed Statement from the Prime Minister, which begs the question as to whether the two actually speak to one another. Now we have a 36-page consultation document outlining radical plans for an expansion of grammar schools, a relaxation of restrictions on faith schools, plus new demands on universities and independent schools. At this rate, we can expect a Bill tomorrow and the completion of legislation by the time Parliament rises on Thursday.

It is only natural that the Prime Minister wants to make her mark early, but the proposals contained in the consultation document are little more than a hastily put-together hotch-potch of wishful thinking. These plans will neither help to bring about an inclusive education system nor promote social mobility; in fact, they will do quite the opposite. It is all very well to reference “ordinary working-class people”—ignoring the fact that the biggest proportion of the population now regards itself as middle class, ordinary or not—but to say that these people will become the Prime Minister’s priority is simply not credible when so many schools are underfunded, there is a teacher shortage and parents are to be denied any say in the manner in which their children’s education is to be forced into the straitjacket of academies.

That begs the first question for the Minister: where do the plans announced today leave the hitherto mantra of the great drive towards academisation? Judging by her remarks on Friday, it is a question that the former Secretary of State would also like to have answered. Secondly, from where do the Government believe that they gained a mandate for such a radical change to the education landscape, breaking a consensus that has existed for 40 years? The fact is that they have none, and no legitimacy to introduce these retrograde proposals. If it is the Government’s intention to form this into legislation and attempt to get it through Parliament, can the Minister indicate the timescale that that might involve?

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement but regret to say that it appears no more than a dog-whistle response by the Conservatives to the current state of the nation. How much easier it is to throw up the idea of more grammar schools than to concentrate on the real difficulties facing many working people across the country. There can be no other explanation for this situation. Earlier this year, we spent much time in this House debating and then enacting the Education and Adoption Act, which aimed to improve the quality of education in our schools through the academies route. Some of us did not support entirely the aims of that Bill, but certainly we could understand why the Government were pursuing that. Presumably, all that is now jettisoned so that we can have grammar schools brought back.

One thing on which we can agree on this side is that all children need, deserve and have a right to the opportunity of a good school. Given the figures that the Minister repeated this afternoon of more than 1 million children not having education in a good school, it seems to be a failure of this Government not to have addressed that earlier.

I will focus my comments on the proposals for introducing more grammar schools. One reason given is that it gives parents more choice. I cannot see, where schools are in the position to do the choosing, that parents have any choice. That is the whole problem of selection by test or examination: the school does the choosing. There is no way that we on this side can support that.

The second argument in support of bringing back a failed education policy from the 1950s and 1960s is that it will help children from deprived areas. At the same time it is argued that we currently have selection by house price. Apparently, this new proposal is to help children in working-class families. However, such families do not have a problem with selection by house price because most of them are in rented accommodation or in poor parts of the country where house prices are not an issue.

Thirdly, I have always thought that we ought to base our education policy on evidence. All the research over all the years, and currently, points to the fact that selection at 11 fails hundreds—thousands—of children. For the 80% of children who go into the non-grammar schools, but even for many of those who attend grammar schools, the statistics and evidence show that they do not necessarily thrive. I do not see how the Government propose to make the case for grammar schools based on evidence. I would have more faith in what they were doing if, instead of saying that they wanted to promote more selection, they said that they were actually going to promote more secondary modern schools, because that is precisely what they are doing. They are going to write off the 80% who are not going to get through the 11-plus—or whatever new test they have devised—and at 11 those children will feel that they are failures. No one who cares about children will be able to support such a divisive approach.

In conclusion, I am astonished that the Government have come forward with this proposal and we on this side will vigorously oppose it.

Lifelong Learning

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Monday 12th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Garden of Frognal, on introducing this important debate, in which we have had contributions of very high quality.

On a personal level, having the opportunity to close for the Opposition in the debate to an extent represents the wheel turning full circle. That is because my first job on leaving university in the 1970s was as a tutor/organiser with the Workers’ Educational Association. The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, mentioned trade union courses. During that period with the WEA, I was a distance tutor for courses for trade unionists, many of whom went on to further study. I echo the noble Lord’s remarks about how valuable they were and, in many cases, still are.

I spent three years with the WEA. They were enjoyable and, I hope, productive, years, helping people who had in many cases returned to education after a lengthy absence and were determined to begin a new phase in their lives. That may have meant a new direction in employment or simply an extension of knowledge to use for their personal benefit or that of their family or community.

Whatever the reason, often that first step into adult education was the most difficult, and the WEA has for more than a century opened such doors for millions of people. It continues to do so and last year it published the results of a survey of its students entitled Changing Lives. It revealed the extent to which adult learning impacts on so many areas of an individual’s life. The survey found that more than half of those under the age of 60 gave improving communication skills as a specific skill developed on a WEA course. Four months after completing their course, almost one in four reported having found employment.

Also last year, the WEA felt compelled to mount the Save Adult Education campaign. A petition, signed by more than 10,000 people and calling on the Government to stop further funding cuts to adult education was presented at 10 Downing Street by the WEA chief executive Ruth Spellman. It highlighted the fact that everyone deserves a second chance and a route back to learning. As Ms Spellman stated,

“it is essential for our economy and society that we continue to provide high quality education for adults”.

For many people living in low-income communities, adult education is a lifeline. It helps individuals and their families break cycles of deprivation by getting the skills they need to forge better lives for themselves. However, as the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, said in her opening remarks, the adult skills budget has been reduced by 35% since 2009, and funding for adults over the age of 19 on non-apprenticeship courses was cut by a further 20% in 2015-16. I ask the Minister to explain the rationale behind what is patently short-term thinking.

A report by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills published as long ago as 2011 concluded that,

“adult learning contributes to other government policies by improving health and wellbeing”—

especially that of older people, and their ability to access digital technologies—

“cultural development and active citizenship, all of which can potentially decrease the burden on public finances”.

I would not refer to public services being burdened, but I welcome official recognition of the real benefits that flow from adult education. However, the years since have not demonstrated that the Government listened to their officials in BIS, because there has been little to suggest that they really value adult learning’s contribution to the growth of the economy.

The Association of Colleges has highlighted the extent to which funding has been shifted from adult education to apprenticeships. The levy on employers has the aim of increasing the quantity and quality of apprenticeship training, but there is a real fear that some employers will offer only the lower-end apprenticeships and may even use the people filling them to replace existing staff. Why should all the burden fall on employers? The whole country will benefit from a better educated and skilled workforce, so the Government should be prepared to provide additional funding to ensure that more apprenticeships are at the higher level.

The situation in higher education is everything bit as concerning, as the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Newnham, eloquently demonstrated, speaking from her experience as an academic at Cambridge. If I may say so as a bit of an aside, I owe the noble Baroness an apology. I had not looked at her title closely enough and thought she was Baroness Smith of Newham, thereby associating her with the University of East London rather than Cambridge. I now know better and certainly found the information she imparted to noble Lords based on her experience at Cambridge invaluable.

It is a fallacy to assume that young people will learn more effectively than older people. No matter the stage they are at in their adult lives, part-time higher education is essential in delivering flexible learning for people. The Open University is one of our great institutions. Statements it has issued have often made the point that part-time higher education is a cost-effective way of raising skills levels and training so that students can earn and learn at the same time. It may surprise some to learn that 75% of Open University students come into that category, and of course the benefits of new skills are felt immediately by both the individual and their employer.

It should be a matter of great concern to noble Lords that there has been a significant fall in numbers of part-time students in recent years. The signs are that that decline could continue for some time yet, particularly among those studying for foundation degrees, where the number of part-time students has collapsed by almost 50% since 2011. Of course, foundation degrees are the means of opening doors to higher education, so perhaps the Minister can say what the Government propose to do to counter that trend.

Les Ebdon, the head of the Office for Fair Access, has warned that if sustained action is not taken it may be too late to reverse it, meaning that many talented people who missed out on the traditional route into full-time study at 18 will find their route to a second chance at study cut off. A step change in approach by the Government is needed if the potential of lifelong learning is to be fully exploited. When success is measured, it must be done for all, not simply 18 to 20 year-olds.

The data and assumptions underpinning the Higher Education and Research Bill, currently in Committee in another place, focus primarily on young, full-time students, without taking into account the value of other flexible learning options, such as part-time, especially for mature students. It seems to have escaped the DfE’s notice that 38% of all undergraduate students from disadvantaged groups are mature, but it will need to take that statistic on board if it is to have any chance of delivering on the commitment to double the number of disadvantaged students entering higher education by 2020.

Employers and individuals could be encouraged to invest in education through personal career accounts, where public funding is used to match investment by individuals, with a bigger top-up for those on the lowest incomes. This could operate in the same manner as the Help to Buy ISA scheme. Over time, these could develop further to offer career review and development opportunities, assisting people to make informed choices to deliver training and development.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Gardner, and the noble Lord, Lord Rees, mentioned, the feasibility of a digital credit system could be examined, allowing people to bank their credits in digital accounts, should personal circumstances mean that they are required to suspend their study or skills development for any reason. A good example is the Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework, which integrates work-based and lifelong learning. The benefits are widely acknowledged, from promoting social mobility and employability to supporting employer collaboration and driving up quality.

Part-time higher education could be included in the scope of the new employer levy by broadening the scope of apprenticeship levy funding. Ensuring that the levy can be used for other forms of skills training would give more flexibility to the employer, without affecting existing employer-led initiatives, such as employer-sponsored degrees. An apprenticeship, as currently defined, might not be for everyone; one size certainly does not fit all.

Education is a powerful tool for tackling economic and social disadvantage because it raises aspirations and helps people create their own life changes. Lifelong learning and adult education should inform government policy aimed at improving the country’s poor productivity and closing skills gaps, to improve competitiveness and economic performance. Potentially it is a win-win situation, and for that reason I look forward to hearing a positive response from the Minister to the thoughtful contributions from noble Lords today.

Teachers: Academies and Free Schools

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Monday 12th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I am pleased to offer my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Storey, for initiating this debate. I should also say that, certainly on these Benches, he took us by surprise when he shimmied from the Bar towards his seat while beginning his speech, having been caught slightly unawares. It was rather Sinatra-esque and I half expected “Start spreading the news” to emanate from his lips. He gave us a very good tour d’horizon on teaching qualifications, particularly in academies and free schools.

I also welcome to your Lordships’ House the noble Baroness, Lady Finn. I enjoyed her contribution which is clearly based on great experience, but I was slightly taken aback when she talked of her own school and said that she had no idea what the qualifications of her teachers were. Without being unkind and guessing her age, I should think that it is almost certain that at a maintained school they all had QTS. That is the point of this debate. Teachers with QTS clearly trained her very well for her subsequent career which is why people on this side of the House are very largely in favour of that remaining the case. If it ain’t broke, why fix it? The noble Baroness shakes her head but it was extremely unusual not to be qualified at that time.

All children deserve to be taught by qualified teachers and all parents have the right to expect that this will be the case when their child leaves for school, no matter the type of school—maintained, academy, free school or independent school. Let us not forget that the overwhelming majority of independent schoolteachers have QTS. In 2012 the Secretary of State, Mr Gove, who I notice was with us earlier but has now departed for dinner, allowed academies to appoint teachers without QTS. Parents and teachers saw this to some extent as a cost-cutting measure that could cause damage to children’s education, at least in the short term. Head teachers’ leaders were opposed to the change, and the National Association of Head Teachers described it as a significant backward step likely to damage the professionalism of teaching. Teaching is a skill and the idea of employing individuals who have not been given the tools to do a professional job flies in the face of the Government’s stated aspiration of creating more high-performing schools—an aim to which I unequivocally subscribe.

That is why the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, took my breath away. He concluded his speech with an astonishing remark—I paraphrase because I did not note him down word for word—that restricting academies and free schools from employing unqualified staff can only prevent them becoming better schools. That is perverse. By that logic, the perfect school would have no one with qualified teacher status at all. There may be some trust chief executive whose eyes would light up at that suggestion but it is surely not anything that could be argued for. If we want to improve the equality of schools, we ought to improve the quality of the teachers, as much as other aspects of the teaching. I like the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Storey, that if non-qualified staff in each school were to be identified, it would lead to a sharp reduction in their number. I agree, but I suspect it would also result in a sharp increase in the number of parents fairly quickly knocking on the door of the head teacher or the trust executive. Most parents, as I said, expect their children to be taught by somebody who has gone through proper training.

I accept that there could be a benefit for a particularly skilled individual in a subject. It could be sport, drama or music, but if that is the case, and there is an urgent need to employ that person immediately, why not do so on the basis that they will move to qualified teacher status while teaching? There is some controversy about on-the-job training with School Direct. I am not opposed to School Direct. If it brings more teachers into the profession, that is to be welcomed. Why not say that if someone is a particularly skilled individual that it will be part of the process of becoming a qualified teacher? It seems to me that that is important.

As the number of School Direct and other on-the job trainees increases, there has been a corresponding increase in the number of teachers who are working towards QTS, but it remains the case that there are unqualified teachers. I will not repeat the figures outlined already by noble Lords, but one figure really struck me. The noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, said there is not what he called an epidemic of unqualified teachers, but there are 22,500. If we were to stop the average man or woman in the street, far less the average parent, and ask, “How many unqualified teachers are in our schools?”, we would expect people to have a very much reduced figure in mind than that, if indeed they expected that any would be unqualified. The idea that it is not a large figure and is not increasing exponentially is not the issue. An awful lot of teachers are teaching with just good will and perhaps a knowledge of their subject, but not necessarily the ability to put it across. As the noble Lord, Lord Maude, said, it does not matter how well an individual knows his or her subject, if they cannot put it across effectively, the children will know fairly soon and that person will be exposed. Anybody who wants to teach should be prepared to go through the process.

Surely no education system can be better than the quality of its teachers. The most successful countries, from the Far East to Scandinavia, are those where teaching has the highest status as a profession. The noble Lord, Lord Storey, talked about Finland, which Mr Gove often highlighted. These are countries where teachers have status because they are properly qualified and understood to have gone through not just the university course but detailed training to be a teacher through regular criteria.

The QTS represents a formal set of skills, qualities and professional standards that are recognised as essential aspects of an effective educator. My noble friend Lady Morris made an outstanding contribution, drawing from her experience as Secretary of State; she said that unqualified teachers may have difficulty in coping with pupils with behavioural issues and special educational needs. They may be an expert on the subject specialism but lack the crucial classroom experience and pedagogical background needed to maximise children’s learning potential and properly support their educational development. That is a very important point, because it is impossible to guarantee consistency or quality of teaching unless the merits of QTS are universally recognised. That is why it is important that all schools, regardless of status, should adhere to the same criteria.

Earlier this year, the Government published a White Paper in which they proposed to replace QTS with what they described as a,

“stronger, more challenging accreditation based on a teacher’s effectiveness in the classroom, as judged by great schools”.

The Government’s proposals included putting head teachers in charge of accrediting new entrants into the teaching profession. That worries me with regard to academies, because it seems likely that a head teacher from another school would be likely to assess the ability of an individual teacher and there would be an interest for another head teacher from within that multiacademy trust in ensuring that the teacher got accredited status.

It is surely important that for many years teachers have had to get qualifications which everyone has understood underpins what they do in the classroom, interfacing with children. Again on the point made by my noble friend Lady Morris, nobody should teach in a state-funded school without QTS, or without working towards it. Children and their parents have the right to expect no less.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education (Lord Nash) (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Storey, for bringing this Question for Short Debate. This is a very important issue, which as the noble Baroness, Lady Wolf, has already pointed out, is often misunderstood. I thank all noble Lords for their contributions.

I start by making it absolutely clear that nothing in schools matters more than good teachers. Evidence from around the world shows that high-quality teachers are the single most important factor determining how well pupils do in school. We believe that all pupils, regardless of birth or background, should receive an excellent education wherever they are, and we cannot achieve that ambition without excellent teachers.

Academies are at the centre of our ambition to drive up standards of education. Our reforms are working. Over the past six years, we have more than 1.4 million more pupils in good and outstanding schools. In a somewhat tougher Ofsted inspection framework, the number of good and outstanding schools has gone up from 68% to 86%, as my noble friend Lord Suri pointed out. We have many more confident readers as a result of our phonics programme, and we have many more pupils leaving primary with the necessary literacy and numeracy skills that they need to succeed in secondary schools. We have doubled the number of pupils doing EBacc—and my noble friend Lord O’Shaughnessy quoted a number of other statistics in support of the academies programme. That is very much driven by the fact that we have empowered great leaders and teachers to take charge.

It is surely right that the head teacher of a school, who knows the school and its community best, should be able to employ the teachers he or she thinks will best serve the pupils of the school. That is what head teachers should be able to do. That is why, in 2012, the Government gave academies the power already enjoyed by free schools to employ teachers who do not hold qualified teacher status, where they judge it to be appropriate. The fact is that the overwhelming majority of teachers, 95.1% in state-funded schools and 94% in academies, hold QTS, and one-fifth of these are working towards QTS. Those figures suggest that heads are exercising their choice by continuing to employ a significant majority of teachers who have completed initial teacher training.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

What the noble Lord is saying is not without merit, but the point I made earlier was that if it is deemed appropriate to appoint an individual, why would you say to him or her: “Come and work in this school. It does not matter whether you qualify or not”? Surely it should be: “Come and work with us now, give us the benefit of your experience and, while you are doing that, work towards a qualification”. What is the reason for not doing that?

[Lord Nash]

If the noble Lord will let me continue, I hope I will develop the answer to that question as I go on.

It is not surprising that this is happening as we have given head teachers much greater involvement in recruiting and training their own teachers, through our very popular School Direct programmes.

There is a big difference between not holding a particular qualification or status and not being accomplished in a particular field. An influential study by McKinsey suggested that teacher quality is a complex mixture of different attributes, including personal characteristics such as commitment, resilience, perseverance, motivation and, of course, sound subject knowledge. These are qualities which the teacher Iris Williams, who inspired my noble friend Lady Finn so well, clearly had in great abundance—

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

And QTS?

[Lord Nash]

She may have had, but I am referring to a study on what McKinsey, based on worldwide evidence, think is most important for teachers. I pay tribute to my noble friend Lady Finn for her moving and inspiring speech. We need many more like Iris Williams.

One other way in which we are recruiting is through our Teach First programme, which brings teachers without QTS straight into the classroom. We have recruited just over 1,400 of these this year; 62% of them will be placed in schools outside London, many of them in cold spots where we have difficulty recruiting. Many Teach Firsters are helping transform our school system.

The freedoms that we have given academies and free schools around teacher qualifications are part of a broader policy of autonomy. Since 2010, we have given school leaders greater say over teachers’ pay and conditions and the curriculum they offer in their schools. We have even given school leaders and teachers the opportunity to open their own schools. I am extremely encouraged when I hear of schools making use of these freedoms to improve education for their pupils. For example, an academy in Barnsley has hired a published illustrator, without QTS, to teach art very successfully.

Many of our top schools, including independent schools—whose skills we intend to harness more greatly in our school system, as we have discussed several times recently in this House—employ many teachers without QTS. I know it will interest the noble Lord, Lord Addington, that the other day I was talking to the deputy head of one of our leading independent schools, who happens to have a PhD in physics and does not have qualified teacher status. His school employs many teachers without qualified teacher status. He told me about his exam results: 90% of his pupils achieved five good GCSEs. When they talk about five good GCSEs in that school, they do not mean five A to C grades; they mean 90% achieving A* to A. I agree entirely with the points made by my noble friend Lord Maude about the importance in our reforms of freedom of movement between these two sectors.

The freedoms we have given schools over teacher qualifications were influenced by the Review of Vocational Education by the noble Baroness, Lady Wolf, in 2011, which she referred to. I congratulate her on her excellent speech, which was full of truisms about the issue and international evidence. In some schools, the quality of education was suffering because it was often delivered in the absence of professionals with appropriate experience and expertise. Many schools were not even considering employing professionals from industry because they believed it was too difficult to do so. That is why, in addition to the freedoms we have given to academies and free schools, we have also made it easier for maintained schools to employ instructors—a type of teacher who has special qualifications and experience but not QTS. We also ensured that teachers qualified in the further education sector who hold QTLS are recognised as qualified teachers when they are employed in schools.

The Government recognise the enormous importance of pupils being taught by teachers who have a real depth of specialism in their subject or subjects. This point was made by the noble Baroness, Lady Wolf. It is always more challenging to recruit new teachers in some priority subjects such as maths and physics. That is why we have bursaries available of up to £30,000 in these subjects. Since 2010 we have increased the number of teachers in our schools with 2.1s or better from 63% to 75%. Some 18% of people entering teacher training now have a first, which is higher than ever, and we are putting in place support that trainees and existing teachers need to develop their subject knowledge specialism further. That includes new content for ITT that emphasises the importance of teaching a knowledge-rich curriculum, which is particularly important for pupils from a disadvantaged background who might not get that cultural capital at home, and we have designed programmes to enhance the subject knowledge of both specialist and non-specialist teachers. I hope noble Lords will be glad to hear that the latest data show that the proportion of hours recorded as taught by specialist teachers has increased in 2015 across all subjects.

The noble Baroness, Lady Morris, for whom I have the deepest respect—she is very experienced—said that we have said that teachers in academies and free schools do not need any qualification at all. We have not said that; we just trust the heads to decide what qualifications are appropriate. She also said that this would enable a free-for-all where teachers could teach any subject to any group of people in any context in any environment. Of course, that is exactly what happens in many primary schools, where teachers have a very challenging task. I pay tribute to the way in which they so often rise to the challenge, and I spoke earlier today about the importance of primary education. It also, sadly, happens in secondary schools which cannot recruit teachers with the right subject. That is why we are so keen to see more subject-specific teaching in our schools by teachers qualified in that subject.

The noble Lord, Lord Storey, talked about teacher training being a deep-end approach. I entirely agree. Far too often, that is exactly what has happened in QTS. We must remember that QTS takes nine months, that 65% happens in a school and that at the end of it there are no exams. That shows the importance we attach to training in school—which is why we have so much more training in schools. When I have interviewed newly qualified teachers and asked them, for example, where they learned about behaviour management, they have all said in schools, because that is how they learned it—except that people educated in South Africa say that they have one module in their ITT training on simulated behaviour management training and it is very important. I am delighted to see that our behaviour expert Tom Bennett and Sir Andrew Carter, in his review of ITT, have emphasised the importance of improved behaviour management in ITT.

The noble Baroness, Lady Morris, referred to our reforms mentioned in the White Paper, as did the noble Lord, Lord Watson, who said if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Well, we don’t think it’s broke but we certainly believe it can be improved substantially. We believe there is more we can do to help raise the status of the teaching profession to take its place alongside other learned professions such as law and medicine. As I say, it currently takes nine months. No one realistically considers a teacher fully qualified and fully proficient after nine months—that is why it is called initial teacher training. It is recognised that becoming a highly proficient teacher takes many years. I was recently talking to a leader of one of our unions who said he thought it took at least four years.

Of course, good schools in MATs have well-developed CPD programmes. I agree with my noble friend Lord Maude about the importance of CPD in this context. My noble friend also invited me to make an announcement about the reinstitution of direct grant schools, and earlier today the noble Lord, Lord Watson, said that he would not be surprised if there were more announcements. I am afraid that I have to disappoint my noble friend about that, but I agree with him about the importance of continuous development.

Under our proposed reforms to QTS in the White Paper, successful completion of initial teacher training would no longer result in a teacher being fully qualified. Rather, teachers would be required to demonstrate sustained proficiency in the classroom, which would continue to be judged against the teachers’ standards. I take the point that the noble Lord, Lord Watson, makes about the importance of the objectivity of the person who makes that judgment.

The noble Baroness, Lady Greenfield, talked about the importance of evidence-based theories of education, which are so important. Recognising that requires a significant shift in the current situation. That is why we have worked with experts to produce a new framework of core content for initial teacher training and a new standard for teacher professional development, both of which were published earlier this year. These make it clear that trainees should be familiar with the most recent research and theories in education and view those with a critical eye, and that ongoing professional development should continue to be underpinned by the best evidence.

As well as these important developments, the Government are supporting the establishment of the College of Teaching—I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Storey, will be pleased to hear that—expanding our network of teaching schools and working with the Education Endowment Foundation, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Greenfield, referred.

The noble Lord, Lord Addington, talked about the importance of SEN. The additional freedoms given to academies and free schools to employ teachers without QTS do not extend to special academies. All state-funded mainstream schools are required to designate a member of staff as a SENCO, who must have QTS. The new Framework of Core Content for Initial Teacher Training published this July includes strong emphasis on ensuring that courses equip trainee teachers with the skills they need to support SEND pupils effectively in the classroom. I would be very happy to facilitate a meeting with the groups to which the noble Lord referred to discuss the importance of this further.

I again thank all noble Lords for their contributions to this important debate. I emphasise that the Government are committed to ensuring that we have a high-quality teaching profession in which teachers and school leaders are given the respect that professionals deserve. They certainly deserve that because they do such an important job. That is why we have given heads much greater freedom to bring in the depth and breadth of teaching experience and expertise that they judge to be appropriate for the needs of their own pupils, whose needs, after all, they are surely best placed to judge.

Grammar Schools

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Thursday 8th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement although it must be said that it was rather vague and unconvincing. Indeed, anyone listening to the Secretary of State this morning would have been struck by just how unconvinced she herself sounded when making it. The Minister will regard it as a backhanded compliment that his delivery was slightly better.

On the day that she assumed office, the Prime Minister announced that she would put social mobility at the heart of her agenda. That pledge was cast into doubt when she quickly abolished maintenance grants for students and any doubts were removed yesterday when she defended plans for new or expanded grammar schools. The Minister said that he was open-minded on the matter; the Prime Minister has already moved at least one step beyond that because whatever claims in support of grammar schools can be sustained, advancing social mobility is not one of them. I was surprised to hear the Minister tell your Lordships’ House yesterday that there is no clear evidence to support the views of the Chief Inspector of Schools, who said that the idea that poor children would benefit from the return of grammar schools was, “tosh and nonsense”. In fact, the Minister need look no further than Buckinghamshire or Kent to have Sir Michael Wilshaw’s opinion confirmed —an opinion, it might be said, that was supported yesterday by the Minister’s colleague and former Education Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Willetts.

In answer to a question following her Statement today, the Secretary of State said that the Government’s plans will not involve a return to secondary moderns. Well, perhaps not in name, but as that suggests that a considerable amount of policy development must have taken place already, will the Minister explain how the Government believe that a return to the entrenched inequality and social disadvantage of the 1950s and 1960s can be avoided? We fully understand why some parents are attracted to grammar schools and accept they want only what is best for their children, but to expand grammar schools by a non-legislative route at a time when school budgets are squeezed and teaching posts remain unfilled shows a skewed sense of priorities. Therefore, can the Minister give an assurance that newly created academies or free schools will not be used as a backdoor method of reintroducing selection into state-funded schools?

[Lord Nash]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for his compliment. I will take any compliment I get from him, backhanded or not. As I said yesterday, I am a great fan of Sir Michael Wilshaw. He has played a big part in improving our school system and I am delighted that he is in the Chamber today. I am fully aware that there are arguments on both sides of this debate. However, we do not want this to be a dogmatic, ideological debate. Just because things may not have worked well in the past does not mean that we cannot find ways of making them work in the future for all pupils. We will make any changes against a background of ensuring that we improve the system for all pupils and against our drive for social mobility. However, we need more good and outstanding school places and we want all schools in the system that are good and outstanding to help us to do that. As I say, we have not made a policy announcement but I am sure there will be further Statements in due course.