Education and Local Government

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Tuesday 14th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Gedling (Tom Randall) on his tour de force. I just googled Gedling and it looks delightful. I will certainly consider it as a destination for the next bank holiday. I am sure everyone will agree that it has been instructive sitting in the House this afternoon.

I made my maiden speech in the education part of the Queen’s Speech debate. As I said then and as I say now, as a former teacher, it is this issue and my driving passion to ensure that every single child, no matter their background, reaches their full potential that has brought me here. Of course then, whenever I see a Queen’s Speech, I scour it for the education bit. This time, I had to keep looking, because it was one sentence—one sentence in Her Majesty’s Gracious Speech on education—and it concerned an announcement that had already been made on school funding.

We do need more money. We have been debating this in the House cross-party—I give everyone their due—for a long time, but 83% of schools will have less money per pupil than in 2015, so we welcome any new money, but as has been said, we must keep an eye on what else schools are being asked to pay for—not least the very welcome rise in the basic rate for teachers’ salaries.

There is something else I find depressing about the Queen’s Speech and the speeches from Ministers. I believe that we now need a national debate on education. We are spending more money on it and I think the public deserve to know if we are getting the best value for money. As far as I can see, the Government’s policies are ideological, not evidence based. They need to be driven by what actually works. This morning we heard about behavioural standards and a rigorous curriculum, but those were buzzwords when I first started teaching, and even before that. We know so much more now about what works.

In his opening remarks, the Secretary of State mentioned PISA. My master’s was in comparative education at the Institute of Education, and I learned a few things about PISA then. It has its place and I would not like us to withdraw from it but, that said, we are in the middle of the table. There is a lot of rhetoric and a lot of warm words about world-class schools, but if the Government care so much about PISA, they should look at the evidence.

We are in the middle of the table, and those at the top do not care that much about PISA. What they are doing is innovating and breaking down the walls between subjects. It is clear from the latest report, published just a few weeks ago, that they are putting social and emotional wellbeing right up there with high-quality content: not as an adjunct, not as an afterthought, but as a driver. Children who are emotionally secure learn better. That is an obvious thing to say, but I do not think that we are prioritising it in this country. So far the approach has been haphazard, and I am sorry to say that we are seeing the same approach in other matters to do with education. Erasmus has been mentioned today. I am sad that the House chose not to support the amendment that I tabled last week.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

The hon. Lady has talked about the PISA rankings. Is it not right to pay tribute to the teachers as a result of whose hard work the UK is performing better in reading than France, Germany, Japan and the United States? Should we not pay tribute to them for those great achievements?

[Layla Moran]

I could not agree more. Our teachers are heroes. Day in, day out, teachers in secondary and primary schools, especially primaries—I still do not understand how they do it; those people have the patience of angels—are doing an incredible job, and I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving me the chance to say so. That said, however, they are doing it under enormous strain.

The thin end of the wedge is exclusions, which currently represent a huge crisis in our education system. Vulnerable children are falling through the cracks of a system that is under extraordinary strain. As I said earlier, I went into politics because I was appalled that there was such a strong link in this country between where people go and where they come from. This House is becoming more representative when it comes to women and a bit more representative when it comes to black and minority ethnic people, but how representative is it when it comes to socioeconomic backgrounds? That, I think, is the one thing that we do not talk enough about in this place.

In our schools, it is the kids who come from poorer backgrounds who are consistently falling through the cracks. The rate of permanent exclusions increased by 52% between 2013-14 and 2017-18, returning to levels not seen since the end of the last Labour Government. In secondary schools, for every 10 pupils on the school roll, one temporary exclusion is issued. Pupils with moderate special educational needs are five times more likely to be excluded than those without them, and more than 50% of children with SEND who are excluded have social, emotional or mental health difficulties. Black Caribbean and Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities are the most likely to be excluded, and pupils on free school meals are four times as likely to be excluded as their classmates from more affluent backgrounds.

I do not believe for one second that those children are in any way less able than anyone else. There is something wider going on here. I think that we need to look at our own system. There are perverse incentives in it, to do with accountability and the inspection regime, that encourage teachers to “off-roll” difficult students before GCSEs. Headteachers are desperate, because of the punitive way in which Ofsted uses results, to take some of them out of the system so that their ratings do not fall. We know that that is happening: Ofsted itself has alerted us to it.

Ultimately, who sets the regime under which Ofsted inspects? Who gives Ofsted its money? It is the Department for Education, and the direction for that is driven by this place. Schools are judged on academic progress. Incidentally, it is the support staff who are the first to go in these leaner financial times. People talk about behaviour, and we heard the Minister talk earlier about the fact that the Government were putting some more money into local government support—