Department for Education

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Monday 1st July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

It is a real pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy) and to have listened to her elegant speech.

Being a Member of Parliament is a great privilege, and one of the greatest privileges is going to schools in my constituency to speak to the young people. In the past month alone, I have had the pleasure of speaking to young people at Saint John’s Church of England Primary School, St James’ Church of England Primary School, St Mark’s Church of England Junior School and Lakeside Primary School.

The children from Lakeside Primary School came to the Parliamentary Education Centre. They might think they got the opportunity of asking me questions here, but it is actually me, as a Member of Parliament, who derives the greatest benefit. I find it hugely valuable and stimulating to hear from young people about their aspirations and what matters to them.

This debate has focused a great deal on funding, and I will come to that, but we ought to pause and take a moment to recognise so much of the good and positive work taking place in our schools, which is certainly the case in my Cheltenham constituency. One example, in particular, is critical to underscore: literacy improvements in our schools are astonishing. The phonics screening check has led to an enormous increase in the percentage of six-year-olds who are on track to become fluent readers, from a figure at or around 50% to well over 80%. That is a stunning increase. It is also the case that a full 85% of children are in good or outstanding schools, which compares with 66% in 2010. These are not just glib statistics; these are thousands of pupils getting a better education, setting themselves up for a better life. We should recognise that and celebrate it, and I wish to pay tribute to the teachers in my constituency, who are working phenomenally hard to deliver those excellent education outcomes.

Other exciting initiatives are taking place in the educational sector in Cheltenham, one of which is a formal partnership that has been set up between All Saints’ Academy and Cheltenham College. That is working to provide richer extra-curricular provision, shared knowledge and expertise in learning techniques, and improved career professional development opportunities. The partnership is working well and we should support it.

In addition, Balcarras is spearheading the GLOW maths hub, which provides additional teaching resources to schools, not just in Gloucestershire, but beyond. That is being headed up by Steve Lomax, who is doing a tremendous job, again raising standards and aspirations in mathematics across my constituency and beyond.

Some additional funding is also coming to Cheltenham, in the form of more than £20 million for a new school that Balcarras will be running in the south of Cheltenham. So this is additional funding going into my constituency. Although I am talking about funding, it is right to say that not every problem in our schools can be solved by finance but it does remain an issue, and I make no apology for referring to it. True it is that the Government have supported schools with additional funding—in particular, the planned increase in employer contribution rates is going to be met by the Government and the increase in pay grants—but schools have been shouldering additional pressures in national insurance and pension contributions.

The point I really want to focus on in the time left available to me is the issue of special needs funding. The budget for special needs is about £6.3 billion, which is a significant sum. To put it in context, the entire prisons budget is about £4 billion. Although the Government have continued to put money into this important sector, the need has grown, if not exponentially, certainly very dramatically. That was brought home to me when I went to a special school in Cheltenham, where I met a teacher who had been teaching for some 20 years or so. He said that when he began teaching in a special school in Cheltenham, the pupil to teacher ratio could be about 15:1; these were children who needed a bit of additional support, with which they would have been able to enter the workplace successfully and go on to lead a full and fulfilling life. The reality now, however, is that such is the level of complexity that 15:1 is manifestly inadequate. Schools that are nominally intended to be catering for children with moderate learning difficulties are increasingly dealing with children with severe learning difficulties, and schools that are supposed to be dealing with children with severe learning difficulties are addressing the needs of children far beyond what was ever anticipated, even as recently as 10 years ago.

In my constituency, we have the Battledown children’s centre, which is providing specialist assessment, as well as Belmont School, Bettridge School and The Ridge Academy. The common theme we see when we visit any of these schools is that the level of complexity has gone up. We have precious little understanding of why that is. Some people say to me that it is to do with social breakdown. Others say that there is the role of social media. Others say, in an observation that perhaps causes us some concern and is difficult to articulate but may be true none the less, that there are children surviving childbirth who might very well not have done 20 years ago. That is a matter for great celebration but it potentially has a knock-on impact. I wish to make it clear that I do not know whether that is a cause, but it has been raised with me. The point is that these needs are there. With some modest additional support, the schools can keep functioning, but if they do not get that additional support soon, I fear that some of them will be placed under intolerable strain.

I wish also to reiterate a point that has been made by others, including the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Drew), who is no longer in his place. He made the point that mainstream schools often absorb and address some of the need within mainstream provision, but increasingly they are disincentivised from doing so because they are required to cover the first £6,000, which needs to be paid from within their existing budgets. As a matter of fact, that rule was set at a time when we could understand the logic for it—because otherwise there was a risk of creating a perverse incentive; schools would wish to mischaracterise and over-diagnose SEND to ensure that funding was provided—but that was in an era when the level of demand was nothing like what it is now.

We have to support responsible schools, including in my constituency Balcarras School, which does a fantastic job for pupils with SEND but needs to be encouraged to continue to do so, because if the school cannot provide that support, those children will go out into the schools that cater for children with moderate learning difficulties, and in turn that will shunt children with severe learning difficulties out of their schools and so on. Ultimately, if they cannot be educated in that system, they will move into alternative provision, which is fantastically more expensive and drains the high-needs budget fast.

I invite the Government, who are making really important strides to support the SEND budget—the high-needs block—to consider two things in particular. The first is the £6,000 issue to which I just referred. The second thing is that the common message coming out from special schools in my constituency is that, when they have to deal with episodes of mental health crisis, which they do increasingly regularly, they find it difficult to know what to do. Should they deal with it in-house with teachers who, truth be told, are not expert in this area, or should they take the children down for a long wait in A&E, which is unlikely to be the best place for them? If we could have specific support, no doubt commissioned by the clinical commissioning group, to provide on-tap mental health support for those schools, that would make an enormous difference and free up resources to allow teachers to do what they want to carry on doing: teaching some of the most vulnerable students in my constituency.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Kane]

It is true that it does rain occasionally in the Peak district.

We have had a good debate. May I congratulate right hon. and hon. Members from across the House on their contributions, and obviously the Chair of the Education Committee, the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), on his articulate opening? I also congratulate him on how well he chairs that Select Committee.

When I last spoke in this Chamber about education cuts, I was positively surprised about how many Members from the Conservative party were in open dissent, and it has been no different really tonight.

I will pick out a few contributions. My hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) said that education was the greatest gift that we could pass from one generation to the next. That is true, but we have heard the bleak reality today. The Chair of the Education Committee said that funding was “bleak”—several Members used that adjective—and that there is little long-term thinking about education and its budgets compared with the Department of Health and Social Care.

The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) talked about the double whammy that some coastal towns suffer in terms of education standards and attracting the calibre of people needed to our education establishments. He said that the tank was now empty. That was the best metaphor of the evening. He went on to say that there was a crisis in children’s social care on this Government’s watch.

The debate reinforces the unity in this legislature that things must change. Members who criticised the Government on education funding did so bravely and well. As they vie for the leadership of their party and the country, the right hon. Members for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) and for South West Surrey (Mr Hunt) have pledged new funding for education. Whether they fulfil their promise—I suspect that they will not—the pledge is an implicit criticism of their Government’s neglect of education.

The hon. Member for Mansfield (Ben Bradley) spoke well. He spoke for many of us when he said that his constituency surgeries were often rammed with parents who are desperate to get SEND provision for their children. Many Members will recognise that situation.

The hon. Member for Erewash (Maggie Throup) spoke passionately about the schools in her constituency. She mentioned the good work that the Long Eaton School is doing, despite suffering a £385,000 cut since 2015.

The hon. Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk) spoke well and passionately about the schools on his patch, but Gloucestershire has suffered a £41.7 million cut to its funding since 2015.

[Alex Chalk]

The hon. Gentleman will know that one of the issues that Gloucestershire has had to face is inheriting an unfair funding formula. Will he take his share of the responsibility for bequeathing to the Government a funding formula that disadvantaged rural authorities in favour of urban authorities?

[Mike Kane]

I remind the hon. Gentleman that, as a representative of the Trafford authority, I, too, am from one of the f40 authorities, so I know what underfunding looks like. We know that the fair funding formula is making no difference because it does not level up all schools as required.

We also know about the frustration in the Department. After all, the Secretary of State said that he had heard the concerns about education funding “loud and clear”. Last year, it was reported that he was trying to squeeze more money out of the Treasury. He also told us that every school would see

“at least a small cash increase”—[Official Report, 29 January 2018; Vol. 635, c. 536.]

However, we have seen nothing substantial—nothing that will wind back the years of austerity that No. 11 has waged against Sure Start centres, schools, colleges and universities and all those who work in them.

Instead, all the Chancellor offered in the last Budget was “a few little extras”. It is worth unpacking what he meant by that. When he was pressed, he said it could be for “a couple of whiteboards, or some laptop computers, or something”. It is no wonder that the Secretary of State was said to have cringed. That is another example of how isolated the Chancellor is from everyday reality. That “little extra” does not match the £3.5 billion that the Government took out of capital expenditure in the last Budget. It will not address the link between poverty and special needs, as my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy) articulated brilliantly.

The Opposition know that the massive cut, along with the impact of the public sector pay freeze, has engendered an unprecedented crisis in teacher recruitment and retention. New teachers are less likely to stay in our schools now than at any time in the past 20 years. This week alone, the statistics are getting worse. That is happening at a time when there are some 45,000 more pupils in supersized classrooms, according to the Department’s figures, which were released last week. Schools have more pupils, but fewer teachers, fewer teaching assistants and fewer support and auxiliary staff. The latest OECD international survey ratings confirmed that England has the eighth biggest problem in the world for secondary school teacher shortages and the third highest level shortages in Europe.

At the advent of a new Tory Prime Minister, it is perhaps of little worth inquiring whether we will see the money the Secretary of State said he was trying to squeeze out of the Treasury. I wonder if the Secretary of State has made representations to the leadership candidates. The right hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock) said that there would be a pay rise for public sector staff, but that seemed to be rolled back almost immediately the other day. Again, I suspect that that promise will not be fulfilled, but I hope the Secretary of State has informed both candidates of what teachers and pupils are going through. In fact, can the Minister even tell us if the School Teachers’ Review Body will publish its annual report before the summer recess, or will a new Prime Minister just kick that down the road?

The recent report by the UN special rapporteur found that children are showing up at school with empty stomachs, and that schools are collecting food and sending it home because teachers know that students will otherwise go hungry. The rapporteur also found that teachers are not equipped to ensure that students have clean clothes and food to eat, especially as teachers may be relying on food banks themselves. It is worth noting that the Chancellor rejected the report, dismissing it as nonsense. It is no wonder that the Secretary of State has not been able to get anything out of him.

The early years are the most important in anyone’s life. We have had some excellent contributions. My colleague in Trafford, my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green), said that schools are picking up the pieces of the wider austerity agenda, particularly when it comes to mental health. My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Laura Smith) in a passionate speech said that this generation of children are the austerity generation—a shameful reality, she said. The hon. Member for Dudley South (Mike Wood) spoke with passion about campaigning for the maintained nursery in his school, but his authority, Dudley, has suffered £27 million cuts since 2015. My hon. Friend the Member for High Peak said that 10% of nursery provision has been closed in the past two years.

My hon. Friend the shadow Secretary of State has spoken about her local Sure Start and how it changed her life. She speaks for many. The policy area is equally important, and yet since 2010 over 1,000 Sure Start centres have closed. We cannot quantify how many people will have missed out because of that and it is a false economy. The latest Institute for Fiscal Studies report showed that Sure Start saved the NHS millions by reducing the hospitalisation of children, a point made by a number of hon. Members across the House. Is the Minister aware that right now there are 1,500 children with special educational needs and disabilities without a school place? What is his Department doing to help them?

There is one area that has suffered the deepest cuts and there is no reason to believe that a new Prime Minister will reverse the damage. Further and adult education has suffered funding cuts every year since the Conservative party came into office. The cuts stand at £3 billion. The Chair of the Education Committee said that FE has suffered twice the amount of cuts of other sectors. If the candidates to be Prime Minister want to make a real difference, they should look at ending devastating cuts to further education. In higher education, we have seen students loaded with more and more debt just for seeking an education, but it is adult and part-time learners who have lost out the most. The Sutton Trust found that the number of adult learners fell by more than half since 2015. Will the Minister admit at long last that his Government’s policies have driven part-time learners out of education? Do we expect a future Tory Prime Minister to implement the recommendations of the Augar review?

Lastly, I would like to repeat the point many Members have made today and finish by paying tribute to all the educators in our country. My right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) summed it up brilliantly. As my hon. Friend the Member for High Peak said, governors have had to make intolerable decisions. I wish to praise them as well. They do a fantastic and vital job to educate the next generation and to feed our economy with the skills we require. For the last nine years, however, they have suffered a heavy burden as the Government have needlessly made their lives harder.