Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 14th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Damian Hinds]

The apprenticeship levy is an important structural reform to the way we do training provision in this country, to make sure that all sizeable firms are contributing to upskilling the nation. We are in a period of change, and some employers are taking longer to bed down what they are going to do with their apprenticeship levy money. We must bear in mind that they have two years to do that with each month’s money, but we are seeing a shift to longer, higher-quality apprenticeships, and that trend is to be welcomed.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I know that my right hon. Friend is committed to helping more disadvantaged apprentices. The Conservative manifesto said:

“We will introduce significantly discounted bus and train travel for apprentices to ensure that no young person is deterred from an apprenticeship due to travel costs.”

Will he confirm that that is still a commitment? When will it happen?

[Damian Hinds]

My right hon. Friend rightly identifies the importance of making sure that apprenticeships are fully inclusive, and we continue to look at ensuring that such facilitation is available.

Skills Strategy

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Tuesday 8th May 2018 Westminster Hall

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

We now come to a debate about progress on the Government’s skills strategy, in which we will hear from the former skills Minister and the present one.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered progress on the Government’s skills strategy.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. One thing that has remained remarkably consistent as I have spoken to business leaders in my constituency over many years is that, when I ask them what they look for in their future workforce, their answer does not often focus on exam certificates. They want individuals who have a good attitude and are good communicators, excellent problem solvers and strong team players. Yet, barely a day goes by without a story in the news about skills shortages in one sector or another.

It is a drain on our economy and our society that job vacancies cannot be filled because employers are unable to find the right skilled individuals. That is not just a challenge to productivity and prosperity; skills are a social justice issue too—perhaps the central one. When we look at the overwhelming number of senior leaders who were privately educated—I am lucky to be one of them—it is not so much their exam results that got them where they are today, but the connections they were able to make and the networks and team-working skills they developed. If we are serious about social justice, it is our duty to afford those opportunities to all young people.

Since the closure of the UK Commission for Employment and Skills, no single organisation has had responsibility for monitoring skills shortages and sharing information about them, so I was delighted when the Edge Foundation stepped forward to form an analysis group, bringing together key organisations in the area. I pay tribute to the foundation’s chair, Lord Baker. The first in a regular series of its bulletin is published today, and it makes for challenging reading—I will happily ensure that copies are available to Members.

The British Chambers of Commerce report says that 60% of services firms and 69% of manufacturing firms experience recruitment difficulties.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating the Culham Science Centre in my constituency? It has got together an apprenticeship hub that specialises in providing high-tech engineering apprenticeships for local people, and it has transformed how local firms react to those skills.

[Robert Halfon]

My hon. Friend is a champion of skills and apprenticeships, and the Culham laboratory is exactly what we need to build up our skills base and address our skills deficit. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend and to the organisation he mentions.

Shortages of skilled manual labour in manufacturing remain at their highest level since records began. That concern is echoed by the CBI, whose education and skills survey last year showed that the number of businesses that are not confident about being able to hire enough skilled labour is twice that of those that are confident. Reducing the skills shortages must be a key aim of our skills strategy and a barometer of its success.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on bringing the issue to Westminster Hall. Northern Ireland has a very strong education and IT skills system, which has been key in creating jobs and attracting new business. Does he feel that the Government should be encouraged to look to Northern Ireland as an example of how a skills strategy can be brought together? There are good examples there. Let us use what is good in the rest of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to benefit us all.

[Robert Halfon]

The hon. Gentleman is a great champion of skills. We can learn a lot from Northern Ireland’s incredibly high education standards. I am sure we have a lot to learn from the skills and the IT that he has just mentioned.

I recognise that my right hon. Friend the Minister for Apprenticeships and Skills has her work cut out because, as the skills strategy is implemented, the economy is changing rapidly. Driverless vehicles will automate road haulage and taxi operations. Artificial intelligence will power medical diagnosis, and 3D printing will be used to construct bridges and houses. Our skills strategy needs to not only address the skills shortages in our economy, but create our most resilient and adaptable generation of young people. They will need to be able to turn their hands to new careers and demonstrate the human skills such as creativity that robots cannot master.

CBI research shows that the biggest drivers of success for young people are attitudes and attributes such as resilience, enthusiasm and creativity. Although 86% of businesses rated attitude, and 68% aptitude, as a top attribute, only 34% said the same of formal qualifications. The Department for Education’s own employer perspectives survey showed that more than half of employers said that academic qualifications were of little or no value when recruiting, while two thirds said that work experience was significant or critical. Yet in the same survey just 58% of businesses said that 18-year-old school leavers in England were prepared for work. That is a key blocker to social justice and a gap that must be addressed through the skills strategy.

Before they are delivered into the care of the Minister for Apprenticeships and Skills, young people have already received more than a decade of education in school. As I said in the House only a couple of weeks ago, I am convinced that the quality of education, particularly in English and maths, has improved greatly in recent years. Yet despite record overall levels of public money going into schools, the skills shortages in our economy have been growing. Clearly, something has become disconnected in the wiring between our schools and our skills systems.

Four key steps would build on the strength of the knowledge-rich curriculum to ensure that it fosters young people who are also skills-rich and behaviours-rich—the areas that employers say they value most. First, we must remember that since 2015 all young people have been required to participate in some form of education and training up to 18. Yet GCSEs remain just as much the high-stakes tests they were when many young people finished their education at that age. We must fundamentally reimagine this phase of education as a time for our younger people to prepare themselves for their future life and work. At a time when we can extend the ladder of social justice to young people from all backgrounds, broadening their horizons, building their skills and helping them develop the social capital that will take them far, we have an opportunity for that phase of education to end in a much more holistic and comprehensive assessment—a true baccalaureate. Just as the international baccalaureate does in more than 149 countries, this would act as a genuine and trusted signal to employers and universities of a young person’s rounded skills and abilities.

Secondly, we must match the broader phase of education with a broader and more balanced curriculum. I support the need for every young person to be able to access through their schooling a working knowledge of our cultural capital, our history and our literature. However, it is also essential that we develop the next generation of engineers, entrepreneurs and designers. A narrow focus on academic GCSEs is driving out the very subjects that most help us to do that. Entrants in design and technology have fallen by more than two fifths since 2010, alongside reductions in creative subjects such as music and the performing arts—the very skills that will give young people an edge over the robots. There is a real danger that no matter how hard the Minister for Apprenticeships and Skills works to make skills a success post 16, young people who have never experienced anything but an academic diet up to that age will be unable to compete for an apprenticeship or even progress to a T-level.

Thirdly, I often speak about the importance of careers advice, and it is vital, but we must go further and create deep connections between the world of education and the world of work that inspire and motivate young people. I am talking about employers providing externships so that teachers can experience local businesses and provide first-hand advice to their pupils, collaborating on projects that bring the curriculum to life and sharing real-world challenges to help students to develop their problem-solving skills. That kind of profound employer engagement strikes right at the heart of the social justice debate: it gives young people from all backgrounds the kinds of experiences, contacts and networks that have traditionally been the preserve of those attending elite institutions. We should merge the duplicate careers organisations into a national skills service that goes into schools and ensures that students have the opportunity to do skills-based careers.

Fourthly, we must acknowledge that what we measure affects what is delivered in the education system. Therefore, we should start to measure explicitly what really matters—the destinations of young people who attend our schools and colleges. At present, destination measures are seen as no more than a footnote in performance tables. We need to move destination measures front and centre, giving school leaders and teachers the freedom to deliver the outcomes that we want for our young people.

I had the pleasure last month of meeting senior education leaders from Nashville, Tennessee. Ten years ago, Nashville’s high schools had very poor rates of graduation, and businesses were clear that they were not receiving the skilled labour that they needed. They set about working intensively with the school board to revolutionise the system. In the first year of their high school experience, young people have the opportunity to take part in intensive careers exploration: through careers fairs, mentoring, visits and job research, they broaden their horizons and understand the full range of opportunities available. For the remainder of their time at high school, they join a career academy, which uses a particular sector of the local economy as a lens to make their schoolwork more relevant and engaging. Young people in the law academy learn debating skills by running mock trials, while those in the creative academy are mentored by lighting designers, who help them to understand the relevance of angles, fractions and programming in the real world.

The results are extraordinary. High school graduation has risen by more than 23% in 10 years, adding more than $100 million to the local economy. Attainment in maths and English has improved by as much as 15% to 20% as young people see the relevance of their work. Leading schools in the UK are already starting to show that similar approaches work just as well here. They range from School 21 in Stratford, where employer engagement is its ninth GCSE, to XP School in Doncaster, whose innovative expeditionary learning Ofsted has judged as outstanding across the board.

The planned programme of skills reforms can be a success only if it goes hand in hand with a schools system that is equally focused on preparing young people for work and adult life. I would encourage the Ministers responsible for skills and for schools to work closely together on that shared aim. I have no doubt that T-levels can provide great opportunities for young people to prepare for a successful career, and I am impatient to see them on the ground, having a tangible impact on young people’s lives. I would encourage the skills Minister to learn from some of our most prestigious apprenticeship employers and attach a rocket booster to the programme, but sometimes I wonder whether there is really a need at age 16 for young people to choose between a wholly academic route and a wholly technical route. Might many young people benefit from a more blended opportunity?

An excellent model exists north of the border in Scotland’s foundation apprenticeships, which are the same size as a single Scottish higher and can be taken alongside academic qualifications to maximise a young person’s options. They carry real currency with universities and support progression to higher education. They also allow a head start of up to nine months on a full modern apprenticeship. That is truly a no-wrong-door approach that helps people to keep their options open.

I want apprenticeships to go from strength to strength. Most people think of apprenticeships as helping young people to achieve full competency in their future career, but the figures show that in the 2016-17 academic year, 260,000 of the 491,000 apprenticeships started were at level 2, and 229,000 were started by individuals aged 25 and above. It is essential that apprenticeships continue to focus first and foremost on preparing young people for skilled jobs, otherwise we will weaken one of the rungs on the ladder of opportunity.

Continuing the expansion of degree apprenticeships—my two favourite words in the English language—will play a pivotal role in that. They hold the unique power to fundamentally address the issue of parity of esteem between academic and vocational education, which has plagued this country for far too long. They give young people the opportunity to learn and earn at the same time, gaining a full bachelor’s or master’s degree while putting that learning into practice in a real paid job. Leading employers are already making a dramatic shift from graduate to degree apprenticeship recruitment, which allows them to shape their future workforce. More must follow suit.

I recently came across an example of a remarkable university from Germany, DHBW Stuttgart, which is entirely made up of degree apprentices. I issue a challenge to our higher education institutions, including Oxford University, which will not even open the door to degree apprenticeships, to be the first to declare their intention to work towards becoming the first dedicated provider of degree apprenticeships.

We are at an exciting crossroads for the skills system. Employers are clear that there are significant and growing skills shortages, but they have given us a clear recipe to address them. The foundation for that must be laid in school by a broad and balanced curriculum, intensive employer engagement, and destination measures as a key driver of success. That will create the basis for a holistic system that prepares young people for high-quality T-levels and apprenticeships as part of a blended route that breaks down the artificial divide between academic and technical education to create a real ladder of opportunity for our young people.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anne Milton]

Yes. My hon. Friend mentioned an organisation in his constituency and its apprenticeship hub, and I commend that local initiative. I have seen something similar down in Gosport that showed an absolutely groundbreaking attitude. He is right that careers advice in schools has traditionally not always been very good.

[Robert Halfon]

I thank my right hon. Friend for what she said. She mentioned the legislation ensuring that schools have to invite apprenticeship organisations and university technical colleges into schools and further education colleges. What is she doing to enforce that? There are suggestions—and there have been a number of reports—that schools are not actually implementing the legislation.

School Funding

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Wednesday 25th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

One thing is certain: thanks to dedicated staff and reforms, educational standards have been rising. I have been visiting schools and colleges in my constituency for almost 18 years, as a candidate and an MP, and I am convinced that the quality of education, particularly in English and maths, has improved greatly. The teaching of phonics in particular has played a role in improving literacy, and I pay tribute to the Minister and others on the Front Bench for ensuring that it is a key part of our curriculum.

However, it is not clear that that improvement can be sustained in the face of rising pressures on schools. Our education system faces a number of major challenges, the first being resources. Despite steady investment in the English education system over the last 20 years and record overall levels of public money going into schools—it is important to get that on the record—there are rising cost pressures, which lead to serious challenges to the delivery of high-quality education for all our children.

Last Thursday, the Education Committee announced a new inquiry into school and college funding ahead of the next spending review—I am pleased to see the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Thelma Walker), a member of our Committee, in the Chamber. It is our hope that a forward-looking inquiry will move beyond the exchanges here and elsewhere, which have largely taken place at cross purposes and to little effect, and inevitably take on a party political tinge. The hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner), whom I admire greatly, said it was clear that this debate was linked to the local elections.

The Government have rightly chosen to protect overall education funding. Let us look, however, at what the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has done. He has made the case for increasing funding for the NHS, supported by the chief executive of NHS England. We need the same level of vocal support for our schools and colleges, and a similar long-term vision. The key figure to bear in mind is real-terms per-pupil expenditure. After all, it is the experience of individual students that matters, and I hope that our inquiry will give them the opportunity to inform and influence the spending review. My right hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Justine Greening) should be commended for redirecting money from the Department to the frontline of schools, but the time has come to seriously rethink the way in which we fund schools and colleges and to adopt a much more long-term perspective. I have suggested 10 years as a starting point—as is being talked about for the NHS—because it is clear that making a decision every three to four years is just not strategic enough.

The second challenge that schools are facing is the workforce. Becoming a teacher is a special and remarkable career choice, and more should be done to celebrate the contribution of the teaching profession. Many Members will have seen the Department’s public campaigns designed to attract new entrants to the profession, and will know of the financial support available through bursaries. However, the National Audit Office found last year that whereas £555 million was spent on training and supporting new teachers in 2013-14, the Department for Education spent just £35.7 million in 2016-17 on programmes for teacher development and retention, of which just £91,000 was aimed at improving teacher retention.

It is widely acknowledged that retention is just as important as recruitment, but far too many teachers leave the profession when in other circumstances they could stay. In 2016, Policy Exchange published research showing that a quarter of teachers leaving the classroom were women aged between 30 and 39. This is a challenge for productivity and for social justice, and schools will need to become much more open to part-time and flexible working in order to stop the classroom brain drain.

The third challenge involves improving social justice in our school system; my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State mentioned that earlier. This goes beyond just increasing public investment and strengthening the teaching workforce, because there are still great social injustices in our education system. Just 1.3% of children taught outside mainstream settings get five good GCSEs. I know that the Schools Minister is passionate about GCSEs, so why is this group of children being neglected in this way? Only a third of children receiving free school meals get five good GCSEs, compared with 61% of their better-off peers.

We must act to remove the built-in injustices and anachronisms, such as the favourable conditions under which the independent school sector operates. I have previously challenged the advantaged and entitled nature of many private schools. I fully acknowledge that I was proud to go to one; my father came here as an immigrant and wanted to send me to such a school. However, I believe that, given the charitable status benefits that they enjoy, there should be a levy on private schools similar to the apprenticeship levy, to ensure that we give the very poorest children in our country the chance to access and climb the private school ladder.

The fourth challenge concerns the curriculum. We face real challenges in terms of our skills deficit, the march of the robots and the arrival of the fourth industrial revolution. We must not allow a gradual and dangerous narrowing of the curriculum, to the exclusion of either creativity or vocational education. The argument is often between traditionalists and non-traditionalists, and the Opposition paint a picture in which the Government are butchering our education system. I do not agree. We need to be not so much a butcher and more of a Baker. What I mean by that is that we should support the work of Lord Baker in encouraging much more vocational education, and I urge my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to read the Edge Foundation’s report on 14 to 19 education in relation to expanding the curriculum and looking into the possibility of replacing A-levels with a wider baccalaureate that would include much more vocational and technical education. We still have a way to go in giving young people the consistent message that technical education is every bit as demanding and worthwhile as a traditionally “academic” course, and we need to make it clear that the link between technical education and apprenticeships and the world of work is often much stronger.

The fifth and final challenge involves improving careers advice. Schools often cite the proportion of students who go on to élite or prestigious universities, but I believe the case can be made for shifting that focus on to the proportion of students in work or undertaking quality apprenticeships. We need to replace the existing duplicated careers services with a national skills service, as well as fulfilling our manifesto commitment of creating a UCAS for further education. We also need to work with Ofsted to ensure that schools are much clearer about how to address the skills needs in schools and provide careers advice. We need to ensure that schools are—to use the Baker terminology—meeting the requirements of the Baker clause, which states that they must invite university technical colleges and other colleges to talk to their children about apprenticeships.

So there you are, Madam Deputy Speaker: five challenges in what I hope was no more than nine minutes. My final challenge as Chair of the Education Committee is to carry the debate beyond the false choice between traditionalists and progressives, to focus on addressing social injustice and our skills deficit and, above all, to set out a strategic plan for the next 10 years for what our education must become.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

It is a genuine pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon). I so enjoy being on the Education Committee with him, and with all my other Committee colleagues—

[Robert Halfon]

I just want to say that I did not see the hon. Lady sitting there—because I was so busy looking at the marvellous hon. Member for Colne Valley (Thelma Walker)—but I am delighted that she is also here today as another member of our Committee.

[Emma Hardy]

Thank you very much. We do genuinely get on very well on the Education Committee, which is a welcome change from what happens in some of the debates that are conducted across the Floor of the House.

I sometimes feel that there is a false dichotomy between the sort of education we are putting forward here and the type of education that the Government are putting forward. There are also many things to do with statistics that are simply not true. It reminds me of when I was studying for my A-levels and I was talking to my lecturer about the use of statistics. They said to me, “Ah, Emma, you see, statistics are what a lamp post is to a drunken man: it is not so much for illumination as for leaning against.” That has often been proven to be true in debates about education.

What I experienced in my 11 years as an infant teacher until 2015 was the cuts to our schools and the impact they were having. The Government can cite figures and dance around the issue, and we can cite figures right back at them, but what are the parents, the teachers and the headteachers saying? That is where the truth of the matter actually lies. In March, 50 primary headteachers from Hull wrote to the Secretary of State about funding. They are desperate for more money for the special educational needs and high needs budget. In Hull, as many as 526 children aged four and under have been identified as displaying challenging behaviour or SEN.

Post-18 Education

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Tuesday 20th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Damian Hinds]

Much achieved, but things to look at again—I could not agree more with the hon. Gentleman, because that is precisely what we are doing. As for skills, some of the ones that we are looking for are being delivered extremely well, but we need to do more. That is why we have had the big expansion in apprenticeships, the Institute for Apprenticeships, the raising of standards and, of course, the introduction of the T-levels, which he will welcome.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I welcome the review and the direction of travel, but my right hon. Friend will know that a fifth to a third of graduates are not getting graduate jobs and that the number of state school graduates has decreased in the past year. Is it not the case that our higher education system is not providing value for money for many disadvantaged people? That is why the review must focus on skills and on addressing social injustice.

[Damian Hinds]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about the need to focus on skills and to have social justice and equal opportunity at the heart of things. I should also mention that those who do not earn above the threshold do not repay their loan, which is an intrinsic part of the system.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 29th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Damian Hinds]

These are indeed important matters, and officials from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy have spoken to academics from Scottish universities—including, I think, from the University of Dundee—about the future. It is important that we have a guarantee until the end of the Horizon 2020 programme. Of course, what happens with future programmes will be a matter for us to agree with the other nations.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his new position. Has he had a chance to read the Social Market Foundation report, published today, on the problems of snobbery between higher education and technical education? Does he agree that universities need to do a lot more to embrace technical education students and degree apprenticeships and that financial incentives should go towards those universities that encourage degree apprenticeships and encourage students with BTECs into technical education?

[Damian Hinds]

I confess that I have not yet read this morning’s report, but I look forward to consuming it when I have the time to do so with proper attention. My right hon. Friend mentions something on which he has consistently campaigned throughout his time in Parliament, and it is so important that we do not have some sort of wall between the academic and the technical and vocational. Things such as degree apprenticeships are a great opportunity for more people to benefit from certain types of education and to make sure that we widen participation as much as possible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 11th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I will set out a social mobility action plan later this week. On the right hon. Gentleman’s claims about apprenticeships, starts remain on track to reach 3 million by 2020. There have already been 1.1 million since May 2015. Rather than talking them down, it would be better if he talked our education system up.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I congratulate the Minister for School Standards on the incredible work done on young children’s reading. On social justice, will my right hon. Friend consider providing 30 hours of free childcare for foster children, in line with those of working parents, by dropping the eligibility earnings cap for free childcare to £65,000 from the existing £100,000 mark?

[Justine Greening]

The 30 hours free childcare policy has been incredibly popular with parents. Nine out of 10 say they very much like it and welcome it. We are actively looking at the issue my hon. Friend mentions in relation to foster children.

Social Mobility Commission

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

May I remind the House of what I said fewer than 10 minutes ago? The question is about the resignation of the board, so questions should be about that matter; it is not unreasonable to hope that the same might also be said of answers.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Many people were inspired by what the Prime Minister said on the steps of Downing Street when she took office. Will my hon. Friend look into using this opportunity to reform the Social Mobility Commission to create a social justice commission at the heart of Downing Street to assess the impact of every bit of domestic legislation on social justice?

[Mr Goodwill]

May I put on record our commitment to maintain the Social Mobility Commission? It has done great work over the last five years, and I again pay tribute to Alan Milburn for his work as chair. We intend to refresh the commission. We need to bring in some new people—people who will hold us to account and who will hold our feet to the fire—to ensure we get a good spread of representation on the commission.

Mental Health Education in Schools

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 6th November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Brady. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for the thoughtful and non-partisan way in which she approached this issue. She has done work with the petitioners, many of whom are here today, and I pay tribute to them for raising awareness of this. I also thank my predecessor as Chair of the Education Committee, and the current Chair of the Health Committee, who produced the report that the hon. Lady described. This debate is important, because we await the Government’s Green Paper on children and young people’s mental health. As I understand it, it will hopefully come out very soon.

It is essential to address the mental health of children and young people for their life chances and wellbeing, and for them to be able to climb the educational ladder of opportunity. The hon. Lady and others have quoted statistics showing that half of mental illness in adult life starts at the age of 15. In her report on mental healthcare in England, the Children’s Commissioner she says that according to the

“Millennium Cohort Study…of over 10,000 children born in the year 2000…At age 7, about 7% of both boys and girls have a diagnosable mental health condition…At age 11, about 12% of both boys and girls have a diagnosable mental health condition…At age 14, about 12% of boys and 18% of girls have a diagnosable mental health condition.”

My constituency experience is that the problem is getting greater and greater.

[Rachael Maskell]

I appreciate the right hon. Gentleman providing those statistics for the debate, but there is a real issue about young people not getting diagnoses, so the incidence is actually far higher. Children in my constituency often wait years for a diagnosis.

[Robert Halfon]

I have recently had a Westminster Hall debate about the same problem as it affects the parents of children with autism, and I agree with the hon. Lady. I did not want to repeat in my speech some of the things that other hon. Members had already mentioned, but she is right.

It is important to educate children and young people about mental health. I mentioned that in the previous Parliament the Education and Health Committees looked into the issue, and reported on it just before the general election. Both Committees recognised that schools and colleges have a front-line role in promoting and protecting children’s and young people’s mental health and wellbeing, and they recognised the need for education and mental health services to work closely together. One of the Committees’ key recommendations was to promote the whole-school approach, which embeds the promotion of wellbeing throughout the culture of the school and the curriculum, rather than confining it to PHSE lessons. They recommended that Ofsted should take the approach to mental health and wellbeing into account when inspecting and reporting on a school. The Institute for Public Policy Research report said:

“The Ofsted framework has a very strong ability to influence school behaviour”.

The Association for Child and Adolescent Mental Health described it as the

“largest driving force in school practice”.

Dr Peter Hindley also said that, although he felt that too often the relevant aspect of the framework had not been implemented, nevertheless there was strong support for the idea that Ofsted should look at how mental health is dealt with in schools.

The need for strong partnerships between the education sector and mental health services is reflected in the report, and concerns were raised, as the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North and other Members mentioned, about the variation in the quality of links between schools and colleges and CAMHS. The Committee visited Regent High School in Camden where the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust has been commissioned to run CAMHS. That partnership between education, health and the local authority was a great example of inter-agency co-operation.

When the excellent previous Minister for Children, Edward Timpson, appeared before the Health Committee, he said that the pilot would be extended to cover 1,200 more schools and that funding had been allocated for that next stage. In light of the kind of project that has been set up in Camden, will the Minister tell us the present position in relation to pilots, and what more is going to be done? The report by the Children’s Commissioner says that it is important it is to have such medical support inside the school:

“Schools should be an access point for early support for children with emerging problems such as short courses of therapy. Where possible, this should be provided within the school. The Green Paper should be clear that council and NHS budgets should help to fund these services.

Where children have more serious needs, schools should be a referral point into specialised services.”

Where there are issues that can exacerbate poor emotional wellbeing or mental health issues, we need to address the root of the problem. According to the Office for National Statistics, children who reported being bullied frequently were four times more likely to report symptoms of mental ill health. A third of children who said that they were unhappy with their appearance also reported symptoms of mental ill health, compared with one in 12 of children who were happy with their appearance. Children who spent more than three hours on social media on a school night were more than twice as likely to report symptoms of mental ill health as children who spent less time on such sites.

We need to ensure that we help children and young people to make sensible choices about social media. Our predecessor Committees recommended that schools should include education about social media in PSHE lessons, providing children with the skills and ability to make wise and better-informed choices about their use of social media. I ask the Minister and the Department for Education to conduct a serious study of the impact of social media—a separate issue from cyber-bullying, although that is very much part of it—on children’s mental health. Then we will be able to see proper data, and the impact of what is happening.

The Minister relentlessly pursues high standards, and there is a lot of sympathy for that, but the pursuit of high academic standards should not come at the expense of children’s mental health. Witnesses who gave evidence to previous Committees suggested that other subjects, such as art and creative activities, have been squeezed out, but that those things help in developing lifelong skills for improving wellbeing. Last week, as my fellow Select Committee Member, my hon. Friend the Member for Telford (Lucy Allan) pointed out, the Education Committee held a round table with teachers, who spoke movingly about the pressure on children, and the mental health problems that they faced in the classroom. One participant told us of the importance of time for physical exercise and social skills, and for wellbeing and mindfulness. Achieving a balance between promoting academic attainment and wellbeing should not be regarded as a zero-sum activity. Increased mental health treatment and wellbeing can equip pupils to achieve academically.

That is something that I know from my constituency experience. Last year, their Royal Highnesses the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge visited the Stewards Academy as part of the Heads Together campaign, which does a lot of work on mental health; it works with the mental health charity Place2Be, as well as fundraising for mental health services. The school was highly commended. Since it has placed an emphasis on looking after the mental health and wellbeing of its students its GCSE and other exam results have improved.

I welcome the Government’s intention to publish a Green Paper. The Committee and I look forward to examining it, and to seeing whether the recommendations of the previous Committees have been taken on board. Statistics from the prevalence survey have been quoted. My concern is that the previous prevalence survey was done in 2004. I understand that there is to be one next year, but the Minister and the Secretary of State are rightly mindful of the importance of data in making decisions, and it is incumbent on the Government to analyse the data on the mental health problems of children in schools and to examine whether such problems are increasing as, anecdotally, many of us have found is happening in our areas. There is a need to consider whether funding restraint has led to an increase in the number of children suffering from mental health difficulties. I should be grateful if the Minister told us when the next survey will be published.

I mentioned that it is a false dichotomy to have to choose between academic standards and students’ wellbeing. The Health Committee report noted that

“the Association of Directors of Public Health told us that ‘Children with higher levels of emotional, behavioural, social and school wellbeing have higher levels of academic achievement on average’”.

That is an important statement. I mentioned that it would be good to study the impact of funding pressures. I recognise that the Government have recently made welcome announcements about the national funding formula. However, the report of the Children’s Commissioner mentions a cost-benefit analysis in relation to resources for schools to deal with children’s mental health difficulties:

“The Department of Health estimate that a targeted therapeutic intervention delivered in a school costs about £229 but derives an average lifetime benefit of £7,252. This is cost-benefit ratio of 32:1.”

I think that that is a powerful statistic supporting the argument that if we put in resources we can make a difference and avoid huge cost pressures on the Exchequer later. Not only is it the right thing to do but it helps with funding.

Finally—I know other hon. Members want to speak—the aim of the Education Committee is to promote the educational ladder of opportunity and to look at the skills problems we face. The first rung of the educational ladder of opportunity is addressing social injustice, and there is a real problem of social injustice here. The Government have done good work, but problems for children and mental health seem to be endemic in our school system for a variety of reasons that were ably set out by the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North. I urge the Minister and the Department for Education to treat the matter of social injustice with as much importance as they do raising standards and improving quality in our education system—something that the Minister is an important proponent of and has done so much to achieve.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Morris]

I definitely agree with my right hon. Friend on that. As I said, the family is the crucible. The issue is often very complex, and the relationship between the family and the school is a critical part of what we are discussing because, again, families can be a place where therapy is very effective, and can be a very effective way of helping the child and making them resilient, so I very much agree with my right hon. Friend’s point.

[Robert Halfon]

Could I add just one qualification? Children with mental health difficulties may be experiencing significant family breakdown and may not be able to have the family involved, and therefore the school is literally the one place that can really help the child. That goes back to what my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Sir Nicholas Soames) and others said about teacher training and a young person being able to go to someone in the school who can actually look after that student.

[James Morris]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. I totally agree: clearly, it will not be possible to involve the family in all cases. I have seen examples in my constituency, particularly in the primary school environment, in which headteachers and teachers have taken really interesting and creative decisions to replicate the family environment for children who have not been brought up in a stable family environment and have not entered primary school in a properly socialised way. They have replicated the family environment and tried to create those kinds of structures because they have been absent, so I completely agree with my right hon. Friend on that.

Other hon. Members have talked about CAMHS and I want to make a few comments about early intervention. If you look at the spectrum of what we are talking about, it could be argued that by the time children get to school any mental distress and difficulties they suffer from will have been baked in for many years. There has been a debate about early intervention and mental health for years; it is what I would call a policy no-brainer. Everybody agrees we should intervene earlier. Everybody agrees that in principle that is a good thing. Yet we are still debating about whether we are doing it sufficiently well and how it should be done. The truth is that we should shift resources to where the evidence points us.

The evidence points to the joint Green Paper on children’s health and education, and adolescent mental health, which other hon. Members have mentioned. The evidence suggests that interventions at an early age, sometimes pre-primary school, are the most effective interventions that we can make on a therapeutic level. From the evidence, it looks like working with children from birth to the age of two, working with families, and working with parents is the most effective intervention we can possibly make. I urge the Minister to be bold in terms of what we will do in that Green Paper. If we can do only one or two things from that Green Paper, we should focus on the really important one, which is shifting resources to genuinely effective early intervention based on evidence. Everything else we have talked about, such as mental health first aid and so on, has a role to play in this debate, but it will not solve the problem we are trying to confront. We will solve this problem by focusing a lot more resources in a laser-like way on early intervention—even before school. That is the critical part of this debate. The one bold move for the Government would be to focus their attention on that. Then we might be able to make significant progress.

Other hon. Members have mentioned CAMHS. If we were designing a child and adolescent mental health service today, we would not design it in the way it currently operates. We have had several reviews of CAMHS over the last decade. Other hon. Members have mentioned Future in Mind, the CQC has just done its review and there have been other reviews. We know that CAMHS is currently not fit for purpose. That is not to say that people working in CAMHS are not doing an excellent job in delivering the services they do, but we need a more integrated service. We need to move away from the tiering approach, which means we concentrate on tier four—that is children with the most severe mental illness. If we can get rid of this metaphor of tiering and focus on access to the appropriate level of care required by a child or young person in a place appropriate to them and deal with it across the spectrum, and integrate it with initiatives that are being taken in schools and the initiatives I have been talking about in relation to early intervention, we can make significant progress.

We have come a long way. People use the word “crisis,” which I am always very wary of using. It is not as if this crisis started today. The debate about children and young people’s mental health has been going on since about 1962 when Enoch Powell, then the Public Health Minister, made the decision that we would no longer put people in asylums but would move towards a community model. That was in 1961 or 1962. We are only now beginning to have a real debate about how we really tackle some of the underlying issues that we face in society in terms of the mental health of children and young people. We are much better at talking about it, but the debate actually is only just beginning and the Government have an opportunity to take some really bold steps, which would have a lasting legacy.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Wilson. I congratulate the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) on introducing the debate and on her excellent informative and powerful speech. I congratulate HeaducationUK and the Shaw Mind Foundation for securing more than 100,000 signatures—the first time a mental health charity has achieved that level of support on the petition website. I also congratulate other hon. Members and my right hon. and hon. Friends on their informed and powerful contributions to what has been a consensual and broadly united debate about some important and far-reaching issues.

The mental health of our children is a key priority for the Government. We want all children to have the opportunity to fulfil their potential and to develop into confident and happy members of society. In our manifesto, the Prime Minister set out a commitment to publish a Green Paper on children and young people’s mental health by the end of the year. The Department of Health and the Department for Education have been working together on the Green Paper to achieve a step change in the way we support the improvement of children and young people’s mental health.

I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen and Rowley Regis (James Morris), who I congratulate on a moving speech, that the Green Paper will be bold. It will look at the roles of health and education in supporting the mental health of children and young people, how we can prevent mental illness from occurring and how we ensure that children and young people receive the right treatment in the right place at the right time. I confirm to hon. Members that evidence and recommendations from the joint report of the Education and Health Committees have informed the proposals in the Green Paper. I thank all members of those Committees for their work in producing that report.

A child’s attainment at school is linked to their mental health and wellbeing. We are determined to improve both by ensuring that children with mental health issues are given all the support required to allow them to focus on their education. Schools can play a key role in how they teach about the importance of mental health and in the prevention and identification of concerns. The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North raised the issue of exam stress. Good teaching is one of the most important factors in helping pupils to achieve. Academic success is important and good headteachers know that positive wellbeing is necessary to support that achievement. Schools should encourage pupils to work hard, but not at the expense of their wellbeing. We have removed incentives for things that add to stress, such as the culture of multiple exam resits. We are helping schools to spot mental health problems through programmes such as mental health first aid training, and through resources such as the MindEd website, funded jointly by the Department of Health and the Department for Education, which has resources and information on mental health for adults working with children and young people.

We recognise that, as been said a number of times in the debate, teachers are not mental health professionals. When more serious problems occur, schools and colleges should expect the pupil to have additional support from elsewhere, including professionals working in specialist children and young people’s mental health services, voluntary organisations and local GP practices. To help with that, the Department ran pilots to look at how joint working between health and education could be improved by having single points of contact in schools and in mental health services. The evaluation found that the pilots led to increased satisfaction with working relationships, improved knowledge and awareness of mental health issues among school leads, and improved timeliness and appropriateness of referrals.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) asked about the future of the pilots. We are extending them to up to 1,200 more schools and colleges in 20 additional clinical commissioning group areas. Our survey, “Supporting mental health in schools and colleges”, found that 73% of schools and colleges provide specific lessons to help to promote positive mental health and that 64% of schools and colleges report that the promotion of young people’s mental health and wellbeing is integrated in the school day.

[Robert Halfon]

Is the Minister referring to the pilots of 1,200 schools that were announced by the former Children’s Minister, Mr Timpson, when he gave evidence to the Select Committees, or is it another tranche of 1,200 schools on top of that?

[Nick Gibb]

It is the same point that Ed Timpson made at that Committee, but it is important for this debate that we are extending those pilots to 1,200 more schools and colleges in 20 additional clinical commissioning group areas.

As well as the role of the wider teaching staff, many schools have staff with more specific roles in relation to mental health. Around half of schools and colleges have a dedicated lead for mental health; more than two thirds of schools have a designated member of staff responsible for linking with specialist mental health services; and 87% of institutions reported that they had a plan or policy in place for supporting pupils with identified mental health needs.

Evidence shows that a whole-school approach, established with a commitment from senior leadership and supported by external expertise, is essential to a school’s success in tackling mental health. A whole-school approach involves the work of all staff and students, with clear links to school policies, for example on behaviour, and a culture and atmosphere that promote good mental health. Tom Bennett’s review of behaviour in schools found that a consistently applied whole-school policy, with clear systems of rewards and sanctions, was key to securing good behaviour. He argued for the importance of a whole-school culture that is effectively communicated to all staff and pupils and stated that the best behaviour policies balance a culture of discipline with strong pastoral support. The combination of clear boundaries and known sanctions for poor behaviour with a caring atmosphere is fundamental to promoting good behaviour and wellbeing for all pupils.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow suggested a study of the impact of social media on children’s mental health. We are working closely with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport on the internet safety strategy, which includes working on online safety with experts, social media companies, tech firms, charities, mental health practitioners and young people. I am sure that that work will highlight gaps in the evidence, as he suggested.

My right hon. Friend also asked when we would next publish a survey on children’s mental health. The Department of Health has commissioned a new survey that will examine the prevalence of mental health and wellbeing problems among children and young people nationally. The new prevalence survey will enable us to make comparisons with the prevalence recorded in the 2004 survey and will be published in 2018.

A number of hon. Members asked about Ofsted’s role in helping to deliver these objectives in our schools. Under the current inspection framework, inspectors reach a graded judgment on pupils’ personal development, behaviour and welfare and consider their spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. We will work with Ofsted on any implications that arise from mandatory relationships education and relationships and sex education.

My hon. Friend the Member for Telford (Lucy Allan) raised the important issue of mental health and children in care. The forthcoming Green Paper will consider how to improve support for vulnerable children and young people, including children in care. This includes ways of improving access to support, better joint working among services and improved training for professionals. An expert working group has been established to look at ways of improving support and care for children and young people in care; it will report shortly and we will fully consider all its recommendations. We will pilot new approaches that draw on the group’s findings to improve the quality of mental health assessments for looked-after children.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 6th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Anne Milton]

I will not miss an opportunity to remind businesses that they have until April next year to report their gender pay gaps. [Interruption.] That includes unions and Departments. I am pleased that apprenticeship starts for women have gone up, but I recognise there are issues around pay. The bottom line is that we want to ensure access for all young women in particular, but older women, too, many of whom are taking up apprenticeships as a way of returning to the workplace.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Ofsted says that 37% of apprentice providers are not of good quality, and that does not include the 1,200 subcontractors. Does my right hon. Friend not agree that Ofsted should inspect subcontractors? Will she review the extent of subcontracting and ensure that all apprentices receive the quality training they deserve?

[Anne Milton]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right, and he did excellent work in this area in his previous role. What matters to me is that every pound spent produces a pound’s worth of good, high-quality training. We are looking at subcontracting to ensure money goes to where it is needed: producing high-quality apprenticeships that young people and employers value.

Schools: National Funding Formula

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Thursday 14th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I want to start by adding a massive thank you to the Department for Education officials who have worked on this for many years. It has been a complex piece of work, and it has been looked at under many Governments. I want to put on record my thanks to the team.

On the points raised by the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner), I had hoped, given the cross-party recognition of the need for school funding reform, that there might be a warmer welcome for this announcement. It is not just schools represented by Government Members that will gain from it; many in Opposition Members’ constituencies have been equally underfunded. This is not a political issue; it is a question of ensuring that we fund children, wherever they are growing up in our country, in a consistent, transparent and fair fashion. That is what we are shifting towards today. This is not an uncomplicated thing, and we have worked really hard to make sure that schools that were already well funded will continue to remain well funded. However, this is also about making sure that schools that have traditionally been underfunded for a very long time can now start to catch up.

The hon. Lady asked a few questions. I think she misunderstood my point about ensuring that there is a minimum per pupil funding rate of £4,800 for secondary schools and £3,500 for primary schools. There are not many schools that are not at that minimum funding rate, but it is important for those that are below it that we address those issues through the consultation response. That is what we are doing today—[Interruption.] The hon. Lady asks what the guidance says. That guidance is for local authorities, as I have explained and as I hope she will understand. Local authorities currently set local formulae. We had already said, and I had hoped she might have recalled, that that will continue for 2018-19. When I came back to the House in July this year, I set out that that would also continue for 2019-20 because we believe that the right way to bring in a significant change in school funding is to work with local authorities. As part of the setting out of the final funding formula, we also set out a small but important element of flexibility for local authorities to respond to the changes as they come through and to nuance them to take account of local issues. That is where the optional element comes in. We are simply saying that it is right to give local authorities a modicum of flexibility to ensure that they can use the funding effectively on the ground.

We are being clear-cut about what the funding formula allocates to every single school in this country, and Members will be able to see those allocations. They will be able to sit down with their local authorities, and if they want the funding to go to those schools they will be able to ensure that it does. I expect that some local authorities will feel that the right thing to do is to get on with putting the funding formula in place at local level and that they will simply pass the money straight through to the schools. That is something that I would support, but it is important to have a small amount of flexibility while the formula comes in.

The hon. Lady asked about the fact that we are putting an extra £1.3 billion of additional funding into the core schools formula and budget. I felt it was important to do this. Over the past few years, we have challenged schools to try to find efficiencies, because we want to get the most out of every pound we put in. However, it is also important that I challenge the rest of my Department to do the same kind of exercise that we are asking schools and headteachers to do. I believe that doing that has enabled us to free up some additional resourcing that we can now push directly to headteachers in the frontline. Frankly, I am staggered that the hon. Lady thinks that that is a bad thing to do. Anyone in my role should be challenging their civil servants to try to work smarter and more efficiently to get money directly through to the frontline. That is yet another example of the hon. Lady doing nothing other rant and produce rhetoric, and there is not a lot of thought behind that rhetoric about what is the right thing to do.

With that, I will sit down. I look forward to the contributions from hon. Members.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I strongly welcome this announcement, particularly the help for the disadvantaged. This is social justice in action, and I look forward to discussing the measures with my right hon. Friend when she comes to the Education Committee on 25 October. Has an assessment been made of how much the pupil premium helps disadvantaged pupils in particular? How will the pupil premium sit alongside the national funding formula?

[Justine Greening]

We have been clear about protecting the funding that is going to the children we want to be able to catch up. Both the Education Endowment Foundation and Ofsted have done important, insightful work on the use of the pupil premium. It is important that we get the most out of that investment, and I think we are steadily understanding what works to help children who are falling behind to catch up. The transparency in the new formula means that we can now take a similar approach on helping children catch up with the other money flowing through the core schools formula. In time, we can have a common strategy across the two budget elements. One of the most important things that we did in education in the previous Parliament, other than our general push to raise standards, was to identify that we needed to put funding against children who are at risk of falling behind, because that is how we will drive social mobility through education.