Workplace Dress Codes (High Heels)

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Monday 6th March 2017 Westminster Hall

[Helen Jones]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right, and I will come on to that issue later in my speech. It is very important that people have information about their rights, but information by itself is not enough.

We found that there were real issues about enforcement and access to justice. Women told us that when they raised these concerns, they were belittled. One said,

“I was told that I would be fired straight away if I chose to put flats on.”

Another was told that she would have plenty of time to rest her feet when she was unemployed. Women do not take these matters further for several reasons. Many of them are in insecure employment; they may be on fixed-term or zero-hours contracts. They may not have worked for long enough to bring a claim against their employer.

Awards in this area are fairly low. We were given a ballpark figure of £250 to £1,000, which is less than the cost of going to a tribunal nowadays. That is simply not good enough. A right that cannot be enforced is not a right at all. We also found that these cases were not getting as far as a tribunal all the time. That is why we are calling on the Government to look at increasing the penalties on employers for breach of the law. Penalties should be set at a level that does not discourage people from bringing a claim but disincentivises employers from breaking the law. As one of our witnesses said, in the current climate, employers take a punt that no one will bring a claim.

We have a situation where not only is this happening in an insecure workforce, but because the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s budget has been cut, it is no longer bringing as many test cases to test out the law. We are in the same position with the Equality Act as we were many years ago with the Equal Pay Act 1970. The Equality Act sets out general principles, but because English law proceeds by an accumulation of case law it needs to be fleshed out by people bringing cases. We also think that if the Government gave tribunals the power to issue injunctions to stop the use of discriminatory dress codes, these cases could be dealt with more quickly.

Funding and access to justice are key issues. We are very grateful that since our report was issued, the Equality and Human Rights Commission has told the Equality Advisory and Support Service to notify it of any cases involving dress codes, so that it can decide whether litigation and enforcement action are required. We are also grateful that it has started a campaign on social media to inform women of their rights. However, as the hon. Member for Bath (Ben Howlett) said, much more needs to be done. We are calling on the Government to start a campaign targeted at areas where people are most vulnerable, such as the hospitality industry, to inform employees of their rights and employers of their obligations.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

To build on a point the hon. Lady has made, does she agree that it is one thing to inform people of their rights, but it is critical that employment tribunal issue fees are set at an affordable level, so that people can exercise their rights and seek a remedy in the courts?

[Helen Jones]

I absolutely agree. Since the fees were raised in 2013, these cases have fallen off a cliff; they are not being brought any more. We have to remember that many of these women work in non-unionised workplaces, so a union cannot bring a claim. The Equal Pay Act was extended by unions bringing test cases on behalf of their workforce. That is not happening any more.

Ultimately, women must be able to enforce their rights. If only those who are well paid and in secure jobs can do that, not those who are low paid and in insecure employment, we do not have equality. If older women or women with disabilities are deterred from applying for jobs because of the dress code, we do not have equality. If women are forced to bear pain all day at work or put up with a toxic working environment, we do not have equality. If young women are subject all the time to comments about their bodies at work, we do not have equality. What our Committee thought would be a nice, limited inquiry exposed a number of issues in the workplace that will need further study and action by the Government.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Chalk]

I was interested to hear the hon. Lady read that. There was a part where she said that uniforms must be worn where provided. However, the issue is whether the uniforms required are appropriate; ultimately, the key arbiter of that must be a court, which will establish whether an employer has gone too far. Does she therefore agree that, to reiterate what I said earlier, the key is to ensure that people can access the courts to establish where the boundaries lie and to achieve justice and case law that will apply to future circumstances?

[Liz McInnes]

Yes, I agree that every worker should have access to the courts. Unfortunately, the tribunal fees that have been introduced have restricted such access. I think I am right in saying that no employee of Rochdale Borough Council has had to seek that access; I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s point, but the uniforms provided by Rochdale Borough Council tend to be practical and appropriate for the job.

A brief dress code such as that is really all that is needed. Any attempt to be prescriptive and go into further detail about particular items of clothing is a waste of everyone’s time and, given the vagaries of fashion, likely to be quickly superseded by some new fad or trend.

I personally think that high heels hobble and restrict women and hamper our ability to move freely, and even to run away if necessary. However, I recognise that some women choose to wear heels of their own volition, and I will not criticise them for that—we should all be free to wear whatever we like. What I cannot tolerate is employers trying to force women into an ideal of what constitutes professionalism or power dressing by insisting that particular items, such as cripplingly high heels, must be worn.

I am reminded of Ginger Rogers’ famous response when she was asked about dancing with Fred Astaire and said, “It’s easy, I just do everything that Fred does,” and then added, “just backwards and in high heels.” That is all these strict dress code stipulations are—an attempt to hobble and restrict women, meaning that we have to perform as well as men, if not better, while being held back by quaint, stereotypical notions of what constitutes femininity and a professional appearance. So I say to women everywhere, “Let’s have no more going backwards in high heels; let’s go forwards, and in sensible shoes.”

Oral Answers to Questions

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Monday 6th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Joseph Johnson]

The UK has an excellent post-study work offer. Students can switch into a number of other visa routes to take up work after their studies. About 6,000 switched to a tier 2 skilled worker visa in 2015, and there is no cap on the number who may make that switch.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

Higher education is one of the United Kingdom’s greatest exports, and the Government are promoting it brilliantly. Do the Government think that, as we move forward post-Brexit, we should look to take student numbers outside the immigration figures?

[Joseph Johnson]

The key thing is that, whether or not they are in those figures, there is no limit on the number of international students who can come here to study. The UK is the best place in the world to get a higher education, and we are delighted that, for the last six years, over 170,000 international students have come to study in the UK.

School Funding

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)]

For the first time in a generation, schools will face spending cuts to their budgets—[Interruption.] Right out of the gate, the Secretary of State is chuntering. In her authority area, that equates to a 15% cut, with £13 million coming out of her schools’ budgets by 2020. I look forward to campaigning in her constituency on this issue.

The Department expects schools to find £3 billion of savings in this Parliament to counteract cumulative cost pressures, including pay rises, the introduction of the national living wage, higher employer national insurance contributions, contributions to the teachers’ pension scheme and the apprenticeship levy, as the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (James Berry) and Labour Members said. The hon. Gentleman is happy with the national funding formula, but I have to point out that his schools will receive an overall cut of 12% in this Parliament. We are talking about an 8% real-terms reduction in funding per pupil in this Parliament.

The Department regularly compiles a list of future policy changes that will affect schools, but it has no plans to assess the financial implications for schools of these changes. We have no assurances that the policy is affordable within current spending plans without adversely affecting educational outcomes. The Government are leaving schools and multi-academy trusts to manage the consequences individually. The Department has clearly not communicated to schools the scale and pace of the savings that will be needed to meet the expected cost pressures.

The proportion of maintained secondary schools spending more than their income increased last year from 33% to 59%—[Interruption.] No matter what the right hon. Member for East Devon (Sir Hugo Swire) says, this Government have racked up a £1.7 trillion debt on their watch and now want to pass on part of that debt to our school system. The Department expects much of the savings to come from procurement and the introduction of shared services. Changing procurement and shared services requires strong leadership, clear plans for achieving savings, effective risk management and support from stakeholders. That leadership is clearly lacking among the Government Members. The Minister himself has said that he is confident that pages of guidance on the Department’s website will provide enough support for schools—it will not.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mike Kane]

I have literally seconds left.

As the National Audit Office has suggested, school leaders who do not have support are likely to make decisions that make the teacher retention crisis worse. The NAO went on to say that the Government’s current

“approach to managing the risks to schools’ financial sustainability cannot be judged to be effective or providing value for money”.

It is important to recognise the impact that the required efficiency savings will have on staff. We expect already unsustainable workload pressures to increase as staff efficiencies eventually start to bite. Moreover, the size of the savings that schools will have to find will lead to worse educational outcomes, and the biggest impact will be felt by those in the most deprived areas and those with special needs.

We know that staff costs represent any school’s largest expenditure—74% of schools’ budgets are spent on staff—so it is not hard to see that to save money over the next few years, schools will inevitably end up cutting back on staff. That will have a knock-on effect on workload, morale, class sizes and the breadth of the curriculum that schools can offer. All this is happening at a time when we are expecting a 3% increase in the number of children entering school.

A bad situation is compounded by the national funding formula. Some Conservative Members, who really missed the point, had been expecting “jam tomorrow” from the formula, which was a manifesto commitment, but now they are waking up to the reality that the schools in their constituency will not benefit from its introduction. Hardly any area is left unscathed. In their excellent speeches, the hon. Members for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) and for South Cambridgeshire (Heidi Allen) said that the funding formula was not the point; the point was the cuts and pressures faced by schools.

I ask the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire to speak to her hon. and learned Friend the Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Lucy Frazer), who completely missed the point. The House will have been astonished by the slap in the face for northern teachers, who are apparently not ambitious enough for their pupils, and that is from a Government who introduced the Weller report on raising standards.

A-level Archaeology

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Wednesday 14th December 2016 Westminster Hall

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the future of A level archaeology.

First, I declare an interest, having studied archaeology at university. I have hacked through jungles in pursuit of Mayan pyramid sites and spent wet summers in duffel coats digging up Roman forts on Hadrian’s wall. I started such practices at the age of seven on a Saxon homestead on a windy hillside in Sussex. I am chairman of the all-party groups for archaeology and for the British Museum, and a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. I want to put on record my thanks to Dr Mike Heyworth of the Council for British Archaeology, who provides the secretariat for the all-party group on archaeology and has provided very useful information for today’s debate.

The subject of the debate may seem somewhat niche, although I am sure it does not seem so to you, Mr Owen, but it is important. If nothing is done, the current cohort of students studying archaeology in our schools and colleges will be the last. We have already lost the GCSE in archaeology. I studied AO-level archaeology all those years ago. Those days are long since gone, because in October, the AQA examination board, the last board offering archaeology at A-level, announced that after a lot of consideration it had made the difficult decision to discontinue, from September 2017, its work creating new AS and A-level qualifications in archaeology, classical civilisation, history of art and statistics. That is despite the fact that in 2016 more than 600 candidates sat the AS exams in archaeology and 369 sat the A-level. The number has been fairly consistent over the past five years.

On its website, AQA describes archaeology as

“one of the most exciting subjects in the curriculum. It is the ultimate subject for an ‘all-round’ student, in that it combines elements of many other academic disciplines, such as Science, Art, Technology, Geography, History, Sociology and Religious Studies. The study of Archaeology challenges students to understand and use a range of evidence to draw substantiated conclusions and raises their awareness of the uncertainty of knowledge.”

Indeed, it is one of the most exciting, challenging and stretching subjects in the curriculum. Far from scrapping it, we should be promoting and expanding it to more schools and more students, particularly in the state sector.

Archaeology is not some dusty, crusty, outdated subject for eccentric fossils like me. It teaches us about who we are, where we come from, where we can go, and how we relate to those around us. As the great Roman republican senator, consul and historian, Cicero, said, to be ignorant of what happened before one was born is to remain always a child.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

On that point, will my hon. Friend give way?

[Tim Loughton]

On the point of Cicero, I am delighted to have an intervention.

[Alex Chalk]

We will have some Ciceronian advocacy. Archaeology ought not to be seen as a poor cousin of history. All the reasons to study history apply in equal measure to archaeology.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tim Loughton]

My hon. Friend is right. I am very grateful for the work that many academics in archaeology departments have done to communicate important facts to Members of Parliament about how archaeology applies across the generations and across social backgrounds.

Going back to Syria, a nation’s soul is its culture and heritage. That is why it is so important to preserve and protect important sites and the products of their civilisations. If war-torn countries such as Syria are to pull themselves up and recover, retrieving a sense of cultural identity will be a major part of that, but when misused, archaeology can be distorted by nation states to create slanted, propaganda-driven visions of the past.

There is also the practical application of archaeology and archaeologists in a developed industrial country such as the United Kingdom. If we are to build houses, develop communities and construct major infrastructure projects, we need archaeologists to recce and clear the ground first. If the northern powerhouse, High Speed 2, garden cities and the like are to happen, we need trained archaeologists in at the beginning. They are in short supply, as confirmed by the Chartered Institute of Archaeologists and the study carried out by the all-party parliamentary group on archaeology.

Historic England has said that it is

“concerned to hear that archaeology will no longer be an option at A-level. We anticipate growing demand for archaeologists trained to handle the large number of excavations likely to be needed in advance of housing development and major infrastructure projects. So we need to be encouraging the development of archaeological skills, and broadening the appeal of archaeology as a discipline. This move will close off a small but significant route into the profession. To address the situation we are working with universities and other organisations to promote archaeology apprenticeships and vocational training to offer potential new routes into the profession.”

Professor Carenza Lewis of the University of Lincoln and of “Time Team” fame notes that archaeology develops a range of transferable knowledge and skills, such as credible thinking, structured working, reflective learning, report writing, team working, verbal communication and citizenship, and that a lack of those skills often disadvantages students, particularly those from less affluent backgrounds, when they attempt to continue their education or enter the workplace. I say “hear, hear” to that. I could add a whole list of disciplines involving the environment, sustainability, culture, regeneration and heritage.

Archaeology is also a major source of volunteering. In 1985, the Council for British Archaeology calculated that there were something like 100,000 archaeological volunteers across the country, spread between about 450 societies. By 2010, that had grown to 215,000, across 2,030 organised archaeological groups and societies. Dr Daniel Boatright, who teaches archaeology A-level at Worcester Sixth Form College and started a petition that has so far attracted 13,261 signatures, says:

“Specialist A-levels like archaeology are vital tools in sparking students’ interest in learning and in preparing vital skills for use when they go onto university courses. AQA is extremely naïve if it believes UK students will benefit from a curriculum of only the major subjects. What we will be most sorry to lose is a subject capable of bringing out talent and potential in students that might have been left undiscovered.”

He is absolutely right.

Why is archaeology A-level so integrally important? Nearly three quarters of students who study A-level archaeology go on to study it at university, from where many of our archaeology professionals come. That route to jobs will now be cut off.

It is clear that this decision by AQA is hasty and ill-thought-through. It was announced without any discussion with anyone in archaeology or anyone associated with the delivery of the A-level or its redevelopment. It came out of the blue, apparently flying in the face of the archaeological community, which is and has been ready to offer additional support and publicity for the new qualification and has already undertaken research on what is needed. A lot of hard work has already taken place in expectation that the archaeology A-level would be revamped, reinvigorated, grown and promoted. As the Council for British Archaeology said, the archaeology profession has been developing Government-approved apprenticeships, which are due to be launched in 2017. Together with A-level archaeology, they would have offered an important alternative pathway into the profession at a time when there is a growth in demand for archaeologists linked with large infrastructure projects. I want to pay tribute to the good work done by the Department for Education in promoting the Heritage Schools project to bring archaeologists and other experts into schools.

AQA has given three main reasons for its decision to discontinue the qualification: the complexity of the syllabus means that there is a lack of specialists to act as markers; there are declining numbers coming forward to study the subject, although they have been fairly constant over five years; and there are difficulties in maintaining a comparative marking system with the degree of optionality available in the specification.

The archaeological community has queried all three points. Feedback from Ofqual had been very positive about the development of the new specification and the progression of the drafts. There is general consensus among examiners and teachers that the new syllabus would reduce complexity; there is a wealth of qualified examiners and teachers; and there are offers of increased support from higher education archaeology academics. People who have applied to become markers of the archaeology A-level are on a waiting list. The necessary specialisms are available in the existing examining group; there has been no attempt by AQA to discuss this with the group, which I think is a great shame. It makes no sense that AQA has dropped the subject at this time.

[Alex Chalk]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the criticisms or concerns raised by AQA apply just as much to history of art? It made a U-turn on history of art, and therefore it ought to make a U-turn on this as well.

[Tim Loughton]

It has not made a U-turn on those subjects; they have been taken on by another examination board—I will come to that in a minute—but my hon. Friend makes a valid point.

There has been a glimmer of hope: alternative examination boards have shown an interest, most notably Pearson UK, which has previously come to the rescue of under-appreciated subjects, and which announced earlier this month that it would be taking over the art history and statistics A-levels and GSCEs and A-levels in five minor languages. Yet the archaeology A-level is left to languish unloved. I am encouraged to hear that, after an initial rejection, Pearson UK is meeting a delegation from the CBA, the chair of University Archaeology UK and the chief examiner for AQA A-level archaeology next week.

The archaeological sector has been galvanised into offering considerable support for the development and delivery of the new archaeology A-level specification, with offers from employers, academics, archaeological contractors, teachers, Historic England and assorted professional bodies. The all-party parliamentary group stands ready. Sir Tony Robinson—I am delighted that he is not far from us today—who did so much to inspire a generation of children, including my son, to dig up their garden in the pursuit of the past, as well as all his work with “Time Team”, is also fully behind the campaign. He has described the loss of archaeology A-level as

“a barbaric act…It feels like the Visigoths at the gates of Rome.”

So why is this down to the Government? What do I want the Minister to do? The situation comes about as a result of changes to A-levels under this Government. AQA has said that, prior to its decision, it was fully committed to offering a new A and AS-level in archaeology, accredited by Ofqual, using the subject criteria determined by the Department for Education. It had already put considerable resources into developing those new qualifications, fully intending to offer them from 2017. However, in the process of developing and obtaining accreditation for the new levels, it concluded that the new qualifications developed from the Government’s criteria would be extremely challenging to mark, as the large number and specialist nature of the options created major risk to safely awarding grades. It was in that context that AQA concluded that there were unacceptable awarding delivery risks for the new archaeology A-level.

AQA has signalled that, if it gives up the A-level, it is agreeable to handing over the majority of the specification material that has been developed for the planned archaeology A-level, together with initial comments from Ofqual. It also helpfully agreed to consider continuing to offer the existing specification for a further year to aid a transition to a new exam board and ensure that there is no gap. On 23 November, the Minister replied to me that he was in discussion with other examination boards on this issue. I would like to know what progress has been made. He praised Pearson UK for coming to the rescue of the other A-levels that had been dropped, but curiously not archaeology.

I know that the Minister is an accountant, but surely even he could not fail to be seized by the moment when Howard Carter glimpsed those treasures of Tutankhamun, hidden from human reach for 3,300 years; when Sir Leonard Woolley first came across the Sumerian treasures from the royal tombs at Ur; or when Hiram Bingham first glimpsed that fantastic Mayan city in the sky, Machu Picchu. Surely even the Minister, with his frenzied interest in spreadsheets and profit and loss balance paragraphs, could not have failed to be enthused and to grab for a four-inch pointing trowel to investigate what lay beneath his feet.

Parliament has a special relationship with archaeology. It was this House that, in 1753, in an Act of Parliament, established the British Museum as a universal museum; it now has 8 million items. Sir Austen Henry Layard, Liberal MP for Amersham from 1852, gave us invaluable archaeological records and some of the first sketches of the ruins at Nineveh, Nimrod and Babylon. Lord Avebury, MP for Maidstone from 1870, rescued Avebury—the largest stone-age site in Britain—invented the terms palaeolithic and neolithic, and drove the Ancient Monuments Protection Act 1882. We have a special relationship with, a special interest in, and a special duty to the archaeological treasures of this country and, indeed, the world.

This is an opportunity for the Minister to prove that he is not a Visigoth. All excavation archaeology is inevitably destructive, but has the legitimate and valuable purpose of adding to the knowledge of man.

National Funding Formula: Schools/High Needs

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Wednesday 14th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I hope my hon. Friend will see some improvement in how the funding works, following the introduction of the fair funding formula. He mentions costs, which is precisely why one of the key factors we built into the formula is an area cost adjustment to make sure that schools in locations with higher innate cost bases have that reflected in the funding that pupils have attached to them.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

I welcome the statement. Does the Secretary of State agree that it starts to address the myth that constituencies such as Cheltenham in Gloucestershire do not have areas of deprivation? The reality is that Cheltenham has intense urban challenges. This formula is starting to address funding on the basis of need and not postcode.

[Justine Greening]

I strongly agree with my hon. Friend. Up to now, school funding has been the ultimate postcode lottery, and funding has been overly determined by where children were growing up. That is completely unacceptable. If we are to make Britain, and in this case schools in England, a country with schools where all children can progress, we have to get on with fair funding.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Thursday 8th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Attorney General]

I entirely share the hon. Gentleman’s confidence. We will certainly do that; we always have and we always will, and we will do it in all parts of the United Kingdom. As he knows, we will make sure that all parts of the United Kingdom are engaged in the process of exiting the European Union.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

Does my right hon. and learned Friend agree that, when referring to our exit from the European Union, it is important to distinguish between that and the convention, and that the Government’s policy continues to be that we should remain in the European convention and observe human rights as before?

[The Attorney General]

My hon. Friend is entirely right: those two things are distinct. It is our exit from the European Union that the public have confirmed in the referendum outcome and that we will now follow through. Of course, as I said earlier, our commitment to human rights will be maintained not just domestically but abroad.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Monday 14th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation (Joseph Johnson)]

The Higher Education and Research Bill will provide mechanisms, through UK Research and Innovation, to ensure that our science and innovation system stays at the cutting edge for decades to come. It will, of course, also ensure that the excellence and expertise that exist in all parts of the United Kingdom are fully reflected in decision-making structures.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

Some parents and teachers in my constituency find it frustrating that if Cheltenham’s schools simply received average funding per head, funding pressure could be dramatically alleviated. Can the Secretary of State assure me that fair funding is on the way?

[Justine Greening]

Yes, I can. As my hon. Friend knows, we are going to launch the second stage of our consultation. Ensuring that we have a fair formula which makes our funding follow need involves an incredibly complex calculation, but that is what we are doing. I know that he will look forward to and, no doubt, respond to that second stage of consultation.

Grammar and Faith Schools

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that we cannot have a one-size-fits-all approach, because there may be parts of the country—Cheltenham being one—where the comprehensive schools offer fantastic social mobility and fantastic value added? That might not be the case elsewhere, but it certainly is in Cheltenham, so we should intervene only with great care.

[Neil Carmichael]

I think I can agree with my hon. Friend—he is absolutely right. His constituency neighbours mine, and I obviously know the situation in Gloucestershire extremely well.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Thursday 27th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage]

The hon. Lady is right to raise this important issue. The Select Committee on Women and Equalities has recently announced that it will be examining it, and I know it will do so with its customary rigour and intensity. We look forward very much to hearing what the Committee comes up with.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

T4. Online misogyny and other abusive online behaviour is damaging young people’s self-esteem and is even undermining their mental health. Does the Minister agree that social media platforms must face up to their responsibilities to keep young users safe online?

[Caroline Dinenage]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. This is something that all parents worry about, and social media platforms must take some responsibility for it. This year, we invested almost half a million pounds in the Safer Internet Centre to provide advice on how to keep children safe, and we are developing guidance on cyber-bullying for schools, which will be published shortly.

Schools that work for Everyone

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Monday 12th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

My hon. Friend the Minister for Schools is, indeed, one of the principal reasons behind why school reform in our education system has delivered better outcomes for so many children. The hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) has set out some of the challenges. Many grammar schools are already looking at how to ensure that they are open to more children from disadvantaged backgrounds, and I am sure that she will welcome some of the conditions that we will set on grammars to expand and some of the challenges that we will put on existing grammars to do more.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

On selective schools, does the Secretary of State agree that we must take account of local circumstances? Cheltenham has some of the strongest comprehensives anywhere in the country—they offer exemplary academic rigour—and they sit alongside an excellent grammar school. Does she agree that, where great opportunities already exist and are growing, thanks to this Government’s policies, and local parents are happy with that provision, nothing should be done to disturb that delicate local balance?

[Justine Greening]

I do, and I have been very clear today that, as part of the consultation, we understand that we need to work with local communities. This is about more choice; it is not about dictating which schools people should have locally.