Alex Chalk
Main Page: Alex Chalk (Conservative - Cheltenham)Department Debates - View all Alex Chalk's debates with the Department for Education
(5 years, 1 month ago)
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Royston Smith
That is exactly the point, and it should be what we talk about. We should be talking about our children, their outcomes and their future and not constantly make it a political battle.
School budgets have increased, but I concede they have not increased enough. [Interruption.] If Members could just allow me to get on to the points they might agree with, we might make some progress. The teacher and teaching assistant to pupil ratio in my Southampton constituency is around 10 children to one adult. When I went to school—I concede it was a long time ago—it was 30 kids in a class, sat in rows with one teacher and a blackboard. I know we do not want to go back to those days, but things have changed beyond all recognition even from, when my daughter went to school about 10 years ago. We never seem to do anything to acknowledge that, and we should, because otherwise we sound like we are moaning and whining and nothing is ever good enough.
I concede—this is important, because this is what people say, and they are right to say it—that pension contributions and national insurance are increasing. The national living wage has increased. Pupil numbers are rising. Inflation has not stood still. Pay has been held down and is quite rightly starting to rise. They are additional pressures, and they need to be funded.
Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that a huge additional pressure is the complexity that some pupils are presenting at school with? Whether that is behavioural problems or emotional problems, those are significant additional pressures that schools are being required to address.
Royston Smith
I absolutely agree. How schools deal with children who have significant and complex special educational needs or disabilities has changed beyond all recognition from how things used to be. We are doing so much better. [Interruption.] Members shake their heads, but things are so much better than when I went to school and when my daughter went to school. The reality is that it could be better still. If all we ever do is refuse to acknowledge what is happening, we will never make the progress we all want.