Academies Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Whitty and Baroness Perry of Southwark

Tuesday 13th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I think we have just seen the need for the Government to listen. Amendment 3 is about consultation on this whole process. It does not seek to reopen the whole issue of the strategy behind this Bill—noble Lords will know there are different opinions in this House. However, it does bring home the need for consultation. This group of amendments relates to the conversion of maintained schools into academies and the next group relates to consultation on additional schools, as the Government are now calling free schools.

We all recognise that the transformation of a maintained school into an academy is a momentous decision for the school—for the pupils, for the parents, for neighbouring schools and for the whole community. Yet originally we had a Bill that had no provision whatsoever for consultation with any of them. I acknowledge that the Minister has listened to some degree and that he came forward on Report with an amendment, which is now Clause 5, which deals with consultation.

I have to return to this as Clause 5 is deeply flawed. It is seriously flawed in three places and has a minor flaw in a fourth. First, the clause places all responsibility on the school governing body and none on the Secretary of State. Secondly, it makes no attempt to define those who must be subject to the consultation and refers simply to those whom “they think appropriate”, as subsection (1) states. Incidentally, the minor flaw is that there must be some slipping up in educational standards in either the Department for Education or the parliamentary counsel as in my young day “governing body” was actually singular and would not be referred to as “they”. No doubt that can be sorted out in another place.

The most important flaw, however, is that Clause 5(3) would allow consultation to be delayed until after the academy order has been granted. Subsection (3) says:

“The consultation may take place before or after an Academy order, or an application for an application for an Academy order, has been made in respect of the school”.

In other words, the governing body could have met and decided to have put in an application without consulting parents, staff or anybody else. The Secretary of State or his officials could have decided to make an order on the basis of that application without having consulted anybody. The terms of that order could have been negotiated, the financial arrangements could have been set up, third parties could have been lined up, all without consultation, and the order could have been issued without consultation. Only at the point just prior to implementation would consultation be required. That seems to me a common-sense reading of the option “or after” in subsection (3).

The Minister was quite helpful on Report. He explained that in practice the governing body would consult and the Government would encourage it to consult. They would issue guidance on consultation, and that guidance would be on the department’s website. I was very glad to hear that and I am sure my colleagues elsewhere were, but why we do not put it in the Bill? That would greatly reassure all the bodies concerned and set a process for every local conversion. Regrettably, I think we know why it is not in the Bill; my noble friends Lord Knight and Lord Hunt referred to the reason earlier. It may have been altered slightly by the last vote, but it is not in the Bill because the business managers are anxious to get this Bill through before the end of July, and any process that was built into statutory requirements would slow down the Government’s aim to get this through so that they could meet their deadline of bringing some academies into being in September.

I have to say to the Minister and his colleagues that it may sometimes be a bit boring and may be a problem for Ministers, but they have to slow down. Frequently, in 13 years of government, those on our side of the House found that they had to slow down and that often it was this House that required us to do that—usually at the behest of Liberal Democrats insisting that they would accept the principle as long as we engaged in widespread consultation. No doubt similar representations are being made these days rather more privately. However, if Ministers really want conversion to academies to happen, and to happen smoothly without too much local controversy, they would be wise to accept my amendments.

The amendments provide that governing bodies should engage in consultation before they apply for academy status; that the Secretary of State would issue guidance to them on whom to consult, how and with what information; and that before agreeing to an academy order, he would have to be satisfied that such consultation had indeed taken place. That is a reduction from what I was looking for on Report and puts a lot of power into the hands of the Secretary of State and the guidance that he would issue. However, separately, the amendments still require the Secretary of State to consult the local authority. That seems to be crucial, as we recognised in the previous debate. The local authority is crucial in these decisions, because the relationship between it and the school will change dramatically if the school converts to an academy. The local authority is responsible for ensuring educational provision in the whole community, not least on special needs, as we have just heard, and because the local authority has responsibility for sustaining educational provision beyond this generation of pupils and parents.

According to the speech the other day by the noble Lord’s colleague, the Secretary of State, to the Local Government Association, he wants local authorities to continue to play a strong and strategic role in the schools system. If that is the case, surely at the very least there should be a provision in the Bill that before a school converts to an academy, the Secretary of State should have consulted the local authority in question.

These amendments would require these issues to be put in the Bill, let the Secretary of State issue the appropriate guidance on the consultation, and let the Bill recognise the crucial role of the local authority. These would not derail the process unless it was being rushed. I advise the Minister to accept the amendments or indicate that in another place he will ensure something similar is put in place. I beg to move.

[Baroness Perry of Southwark]

My Lords, I am surprised and sad that the amendment has come back at Third Reading in this form. Like many other noble Lords, I have engaged in a lot of discussions with a lot of schools that have for some weeks been engaged in the process of moving to academy status. The normal procedure that they have described almost universally—with slight variations, although they have all consulted—is that the head of the school first talks the proposal through with the staff to get the feeling from inside the school. What head is going to go ahead with a change to the school’s status such as this without taking her or his staff with them? That scenario is unthinkable. Then there is a lot of discussion between the governing body and the head. After that, the governing body goes out to talk to parents.

Almost all these schools have had meetings with parents to explain what academy status would mean and why they want to move ahead. The church schools have consulted the diocesan board and the church; there have been long discussions and many of the diocesan boards have had extensive consultations with their schools and, in many cases, with each other. There is a huge amount of consultation and it is unthinkable—absolutely unthinkable—that any school, any head teacher, any group of staff or any governing body would want to press ahead in some sort of secretive way without making sure that they were taking the staff, the parents and the local community with them. That is the way schools operate.

Once again, there is an arrogance in this House that we are the only people with good intentions. Just 20 minutes ago we were talking about those excellent governors and our faith in them. Why can we not trust the people who run our schools and education services to behave in a sensible and honourable way? That is how they have always behaved. The schools that I have talked to—I am sure many noble Lords have had the same kinds of conversation—have behaved in that way. To be prescriptive, to write down as a rule that we are consulting only because it is the law, would be alien to the way in which good schools operate—and only good schools will come this way.

I am equally certain that, when we move past the stage of the first Ofsted excellent schools wanting to become academies and move to some schools that may be more questionable, the Secretary of State and the civil servants in the department will closely question them as to the nature of the consultation they have had as part of due diligence. The amendment is unnecessary, arrogant and plain rude to the people in the education service that we all support. I very much hope that the noble Lord will withdraw it.