Education and Adoption Bill (Sixth sitting)

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Tuesday 7th July 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Mr Gibb]

We are bringing down the deficit. It has been reduced from 11% of GDP to under 5% and we will bring it down further. I say to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley that over 90% of teachers continue in the profession following their first year of teaching, which has been the case for more than 20 years. Figures that say otherwise are simply inaccurate. I think that it was the Association of Teachers and Lecturers that cited some figures in the lead-up to its conference last year that were proven to be inaccurate.

The proportion of teachers joining the profession has risen—it is now 53,000 a year—and over three quarters, 76%, of new teachers are still in the profession after five years of service. More than half, 55%, of teachers who qualified in 1996 were still teaching 17 years later. I reiterate the point that I made in the evidence session that there has never been a better time than now to be a teacher, particularly an ambitious teacher. There are so many more opportunities now to lead—to lead at a younger age or to lead an academy chain—and to have the support for able and ambitious young teachers to become leaders in their profession early on. Organisations such as Teaching Leaders and Future Leaders are doing a wonderful job in helping young people to become leaders in their profession.

Amendment 27 focuses on teachers’ pay and conditions and proposes adding a new subsection to clause 4. Before exercising the power to require a governing body to enter into arrangements to help deliver school improvement, the Secretary of State would be required, under the amendment, to consider the long-term impact on the pay and terms and conditions of employees. In particular, the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley appears to be concerned that an assessment should take place on whether any change might reduce the ability of a governing body to recruit. I understand that she is concerned about the impact of academisation.

I refer back to the core purpose of the Bill: tackling failing and coasting schools as a way of ensuring that every child in this country receives a good or outstanding education. I say this because any action that the regional schools commissioner would take on behalf of the Secretary of State would always be predicated on improving the standards of the school. Some of the actions taken might, for instance, require a school to enter into a stronger collaboration, such as a federation. That is what it is all about—this clause is not about academisation; it is about intervention in maintained schools to secure improved standards. The hon. Lady is making her argument about academies; indeed, other clauses would give regional schools commissioners greater powers to require underperforming schools to become academies. In some circumstances, academisation may in fact make it easier for a school to manage and recruit staff as well as to offer more exciting CPD opportunities. An example of this is the Templar Academy Schools Trust, which was formed in 2011 in south Devon and now contains four schools, two primary and two secondary. The staff benefit from collaboration because all four schools in the trust allow teachers to move between schools, to develop their skills and to further their careers.

[Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

While a Trappist monk’s or nun’s main focus is to get a particular project carried out efficiently when choosing to engage in a community discussion, total silence is not an explicit vow. I want to share with the Minister that at Berwick academy—where I am a governor and led it to be an academy a few years ago—we have radically changed how we use teaching assistants, mentioned by the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley. We are taking on more qualified people on better pay scales to boost the impact they can make in the teaching and learning programme, both in and out of the classroom, for the children who most need that extra support.