Unregistered Children’s Homes: Fees

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Monday 28th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The right reverend Prelate raises an important point. In the development of private children’s homes, we have seen a growth: for example, it is possible to get hold of accommodation more cheaply, but that does not necessarily mean that such homes are where children need them. Some 25% of all homes nationally are in the north-west, despite only 16% of children who need to be looked after in residential care coming from the north-west. That is why there has been investment to support local authorities to improve existing provision and to create additional placements; and it is why, through the children’s well-being Bill and in other ways, we will work to ensure that, wherever a child needs care, there is high-quality care that does not involve them having to travel or the local authority facing excessive costs.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, raised the issue of the costs associated with some unregistered children’s homes, but I want to ask the Minister a more basic question. We know from Ofsted’s 2023 guidance that it is illegal to send a child, even a child with a deprivation of liberty order, to an unregistered children’s home, yet the case to which the noble Baroness referred, as I understand it, was about a year later. What are the Government doing to make sure that children do not go to unregistered homes at all, whatever they cost?

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The noble Baroness identifies the absolute difficulty and the challenging circumstances that directors of children’s services and others find themselves in. For example, on a Friday afternoon, when faced with having to find a placement for a child urgently, they have no other option, because of a failure to provide sufficient places, than to place a child in an unregulated home. This is so unsatisfactory for everybody, and that is why, through the provisions we will bring forward in the children’s well-being Bill and through appropriate investment in increasing the number of places, we will try to ensure that that happens far less in the future.

Special Needs Schools

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Thursday 24th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lady Monckton of Dallington Forest on securing this important debate, on the truly dignified way in which she made her remarks and on combining such practical examples with deep expertise and understanding of this topic.

This has been an excellent and wide-ranging debate. We have heard from across the House that every one of your Lordships wants an education system that helps all children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities to thrive, fulfil their potential and lead fulfilling lives, whether they are in special schools or mainstream education. We recognise the important role played by our special colleges, which support young people with special educational needs both academically and in order to make the transition to more independent living, to reduce isolation, as the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Yardley, pointed out, and indeed to remove stigma, as we have just heard from the noble Lord, Lord Addington.

We have heard this afternoon that, as we knew before we came into the Chamber, this sector faces many challenges. Perhaps the most immediate that we heard in the debate, from all noble Lords, is the rising demand for specialist provision and the pressures that places on funding. It was in recognition of that growing need that the last Conservative Government increased the high-needs budget to £10.5 billion in 2024-25, which was a 60% increase on the figure in 2019-20. To help to increase capacity, £2.6 billion is being invested from 2022 to 2025 to fund new specialist places and improve existing provision. When complete, that investment in special schools will provide an additional 60,000 places.

As we all know, though, the level of need continues to outstrip that, with real consequences for parents who are looking for a place for their children, and for their children. It was the lack of consistent support and outcomes that led to the development of the SEND and Alternative Provision Improvement Plan that we published last year, which was designed to ensure high-quality early support for every child regardless of where they live. At its core was an attempt to deal with the feeling that too many parents are having to battle with the system to get help, that too many parents have lost trust in the system, that we are not offering them the confidence that their children can realise their potential and, as my noble friend Lord Jamieson said, that the system needs to be on a financially sustainable footing.

There are two key areas within that, so that children can get the right support in the right place and at the right time. One is about having a national system with national standards to deliver consistent, clear and early support. The second is about moves to improve the timeliness and quality of education, health and care plans by adopting a standardised and digitised template to deal with some of the burden and stress that parents face, as we have heard, when they try to make those applications. It would be reassuring if the Minister could just comment on whether the Government plan to continue with those two initiatives, particularly given the level of consultation that underpinned those decisions.

The pressures that we are seeing on special schools, many of which we know are operating over capacity, also make the Government’s proposal to impose VAT on independent schools from 1 January 2025 even more misguided. We know that around 100,000 children and young people without an EHCP receive specialist SEND support in independent schools. Putting VAT on their fees risks disrupting their education, particularly as it is being in brought part-way through the school year.

As the Minister knows, on these Benches we think the Government should drop this policy in its entirety or, at the very least, delay it. But I suggest the Government should look at a particular area: the position of the 130 specialist FE colleges that provide training for young people with complex needs. As the noble Baroness, Lady Wolf, and my noble friend Lady Monckton pointed out, all of their students are publicly funded through the high needs system. If these colleges are required to charge VAT, the purchasing local authority would simply reclaim it, resulting in no actual financial benefit to the public purse but considerable bureaucracy. I would be grateful if the Minister would consider reviewing that.

We know that our special schools and colleges perform a crucial role but it is also the case that the relationship between special school and mainstream provision is important, as we heard in particular from the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lincoln. We are concerned that the demand pressures that have built up in recent years, which were also highlighted in the National Audit Office report today, are leading to other impacts, including a worrying increase in the number of home-educated children with special educational needs. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Storey, who is not in his place, and the Minister have plans for legislation in this area. I look forward very much to those debates.

We support the principle of assuring that all children receive a suitable education. More broadly, we look forward to hearing more from the Government in the coming months about how they will improve their use of data in this area, as also recommended in the NAO report, in predicting changes in demand for special educational needs and disability provision, and how they will build on some of the excellent work which officials had already started, to ensure that expansions in capacity are done in the right place.

There is one topic which I think has not come up in your Lordships’ debate this afternoon, which is alternative provision. The previous Government intentionally brought together our strategies for children with special educational needs and disabilities with those in alternative provision, given the very high incidence of special educational needs among those children. In fact, my first visit as a Minister was to a school near Bristol for children who had been excluded from other schools. Some were as young as five and it was clear that they needed many things from the system, but two stayed with me.

First, for very young children, it seems obvious that they need a clear route to return to mainstream education. All children should have access to integrated care teams so that all their wider needs can be met and again, where possible, they can return to mainstream. My understanding is that there were some encouraging results from the DfE’s specialist task force pilot—only the DfE could come up with that name—where there was a multiagency response for those children. I would encourage the Minister to consider continuing with that.

To conclude, there is unity in this House about the desire to ensure that the SEND system works better and provides the support and outcomes that children and people with special educational needs and disabilities deserve. I think we are also in agreement that this is one of the hardest areas of policy to get right—although I was encouraged by my noble friend Lord Jamieson’s remarks in this regard. I would like to reassure the Minister that, in opposition, we will work constructively with the Government to try to get this right for children and their families.

Special Educational Needs

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Thursday 24th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The right reverend Prelate makes an important point about the experience of looked-after children, which I also discussed in an Oral Question earlier this week in response to the noble Lord, Lord Laming. We have to get to a system where there are fewer bureaucratic processes to enable children and young people to get the support that they need. The point about moving from authority to authority is very important, and I will certainly take it back to my colleagues in the department. This strikes me as an additional piece of bureaucracy. While it is obviously important that, in every context, children’s needs are properly understood—and that provision through an EHCP, for example, is properly put in place—that should not be a bureaucratic process that prevents children getting the support they need when they need it.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, can the Minister confirm whether the Government are committed to continuing the reforms that the previous Government set out in the SEND and AP plan to set national standards and to digitise the process, so that EHCPs are much clearer and speedier, removing a lot of stress for parents and their children?

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The Government are committed to doing everything we can to ensure that the process of going through an education, health and care plan—even now, only 50% of parents get them within 20 weeks of applying for them—is made much easier. I am sure that there are ways that we can build on work from the previous Government to ensure that that happens. Fundamentally, the problem with the system, which we also inherited from the previous Government, is that too many parents feel the need to go through this arduous process alone, because they do not have the support in the rest of the school system and do not get identification early enough. That is what, more fundamentally, we need to put right, and that is what the Government are committed to doing.

Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Transfer of Functions etc) Bill [HL]

Baroness Barran Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 22nd October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, as I rise to speak at Second Reading, I say first how much I enjoyed the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Beamish. I look forward to the insights he will bring to your Lordships’ House.

The goal of improving our skills system and meeting skills gaps is not a new one. Indeed, today, as my noble friend Lady Finn said, it is an international one. Under successive Governments, we have seen work to simplify the system, achieve parity of esteem with academic qualifications, place employers at the heart of the system and improve the quality of skills-based qualifications. In their manifesto, His Majesty’s Government committed to establishing a new body, Skills England, to deliver their skills strategy, but unfortunately this Bill merely abolishes the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education and transfers its functions to the Secretary of State; in effect, absorbing them into the Department for Education. We have no details on the plans for Skills England itself, nor on how the Government’s proposed changes to the funding of skills-based qualifications will work in practice.

On these Benches, we have three main concerns. First, we do not believe that the proposed machinery of government changes are likely to make the difference that the Government hope they will. In the last 50 years, there have been no fewer than 12 skills agencies, or 13 including Skills England. If the creation of a new body was alone enough to address our challenges in this area, surely one of the earlier iterations would have been the answer. Secondly, as we have heard across the House, we believe that the powers of the Secretary of State created by this Bill are too wide-ranging, have little accountability and will risk directly damaging the status of these qualifications. Thirdly, we have real concerns that these changes will lead to harmful delays in addressing some of the most important strategic issues in skills development that the Government face and have set out.

Given that all noble Lords want the most effective approach to developing our skills system, it is important to recognise the achievements of the last Government and the key challenges that remain so that the new Government benefit from the institutional memory of this House and avoid repeating any past mistakes. The last Government delivered on a major simplification of the system in relation to T-levels, higher technical qualifications and apprenticeship standards. We raised the value of skills-based qualifications in the minds of students and employers, particularly in relation to apprenticeships, which we put on a statutory footing for the first time.

The noble Baroness, Lady McGregor-Smith, spoke eloquently about the importance and effectiveness of putting employers at the heart of the system, which IfATE brought as well as the creation of local skills improvement plans, which linked employers and providers for the first time. We improved the quality of qualifications across the board, including for the missing middle which your Lordships have referred to, and we laid the foundations for lifelong learning through the skills Act and the lifelong learning Act of 2023 so that options for training and retraining were available at every stage of a person’s career. I hope the Minister will confirm that the Government will not discard the progress of the past 14 years but build on it and focus on the key challenges of the future.

If we look at the challenges of improving our skills system, I am genuinely baffled as to why one would start by creating a new agency within the DfE and abolish IfATE. I am not sure how this helps build demand for newer and less well-established qualifications such as T-levels and HTQs. I am not sure how it addresses the workforce pressures in further education or the decline in investment in training by employers or how it will help the Government realise the potential of the lifelong learning Act. How does it quickly set out the plans for the new growth and skills levy which the Government promised in their manifesto, so that we avoid a hiatus in skills development and investment, as alluded to in their impact assessment? Can the Minister explain why the Government could not have achieved their goals of co-ordination with the industrial strategy council and the Migration Advisory Committee through IfATE rather than placing Skills England within the DfE, with all the time, cost and reorganisation that would have avoided?

If we had a blank sheet of paper—in the words of the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, perhaps a sheet of paper that was nimble, agile and other good adjectives—and had to choose between an independent, employer-led body and an internal team within a government department to create the best skills system, I am pretty sure that most people would naturally assume that the former would be more effective. It would help if the Minister could give the House examples of where such centralisation of power has actually delivered on the Government’s aspirations.

We are also really concerned about the powers of the Secretary of State and expect to come back to these in Committee. In the King’s Speech, the Government committed to creating a new body, Skills England, but as noble Lords have noted, the Bill does not do that. Far from simply replacing the institute, the Bill abolishes it, leaving the Secretary of State in control. We now understand that Skills England will not be on a statutory footing and therefore will unquestionably be less independent than IfATE.

The Bill gives the Secretary of State sweeping powers to prepare apprenticeship standards and plans, either personally or by commissioning others. Clauses 4 and 5 make it possible for the Secretary of State to bypass industry groups and employers entirely. In her opening speech, the Minister helpfully set out some examples to reassure the House about some of the limitations on how those powers might be used, but can she explain what the barrier is to putting them in the Bill if the Government are clear on what those limits are?

Secondly, we should be concerned about the potential impact on the quality of technical qualifications. Clause 6 removes the requirement for reviews of technical education qualifications, standards and apprenticeship assessment plans to be published at regular intervals. What will the arrangements be to do this in future, and why has the duty to publish been removed? This flexibility is supposedly to align qualifications with employers’ needs, but we know that without rigorous and independent oversight, standards can slip. Can the Minister tell the House how she plans to ensure that we have standards that are recognisable and high, without that regular independent review?

There is the further risk of dilution of quality via Clause 7, which removes the requirement to have a third-party examination of a standard or apprenticeship assessment plan before approval, leaving the power for the Secretary of State to appoint one if she sees fit. What should we expect from this? How often does the Minister expect this power to be used and under what circumstances? It would also help if the Minister could clarify under what circumstances the Secretary of State would use her powers set out in Clause 8 in relation to Ofqual.

Clause 9 is also of concern, as my noble friend Lady Evans of Bowes Park pointed out, quoting the Attorney-General. Through regulation made by statutory instrument, it allows for the Secretary of State to make provision that is consequential on other provisions in the Bill. This is a very broad Henry VIII power, applying to existing and future legislation passed in this Parliament. I would be grateful if the Minister could give an example of how Clause 9 would be used. Perhaps she could commit to listing the existing legislation where Clause 9 will apply.

The assumption of power by the Secretary of State reverses the reforms of the Enterprise Act 2016 and risks severely eroding the parity of esteem between academic and technical qualifications. Imagine the outcry if A-level standards were directly controlled by the Education Secretary—I hope your Lordships see the point I am making. Yet the Bill gives ministerial control over all technical qualifications, which risks undermining their credibility and status.

Leaving the specifics of the Bill, we are genuinely concerned that Skills England will not achieve its goals. The Government are actually creating not one but three new bodies with an interest in skills: Skills England in the DfE, the Labour Market Advisory Board in the DWP and the new Industrial Strategy Advisory Council. How will these three—or four, if we include the Migration Advisory Committee—potentially competing bodies work together?

This approach raises so many questions. Can the Minister reassure the House about the level of seniority the head of Skills England will have? How will Skills England, sitting in a corner of Sanctuary Buildings, have the authority to influence other government departments? How will it work with the devolved Administrations and the mayoral combined authorities? How will it interact with the Office for Students? It is of great concern and regret that the objectives and limits of the new body are not clearly set out in statute, and we will seek to gain as much clarity as possible on these points during the passage of the Bill. I ask the Minister again: where is the evidence that such an approach has ever worked in this country before and will be successful now?

My belief is that, if His Majesty’s Government were serious about progressing quickly with the urgent strategic issues around skills reform, they would build on the success of IfATE, rather than dismantling it. The real risks here are, first, that the Government will unwittingly create confusion, lower standards and erode trust in technical qualifications; and, secondly, that the time and cost involved in creating yet another overcentralised agency in the DfE delays addressing the big opportunities and challenges that need to be grasped in this area and leaves us with an unwieldy, unaccountable and ineffective approach.

The Bill threatens to undo much of the progress made under successive Conservative Governments in building a world-class apprenticeship and technical education system. I have no doubt that the Minister wants the best for our skills system and those who learn and work in it, but I have grave doubts that this Bill will deliver the system that the country needs and that she wants. I hope very much that the Minister will listen to these concerns and act to address them when the Bill reaches Committee.

Schools: Absenteeism

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The right reverend Prelate is right to identify that. The data shows that those on free school meals are far more likely to be absent from schools than those who are not. That is why we need a wide-ranging approach to ensure that we provide both the school action and the home backgrounds that will enable children to attend school and learn. My right honourable friends the Secretary of State for Education and the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions are working hard on the cross-government childhood poverty strategy precisely to address some of those issues.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

What is the Minister’s assessment of the National Parent Survey 2024 published by the charity Parentkind, which showed that three in 10 parents are now more relaxed about school attendance? This aligns with the department’s excellent data, which shows a big rise in that group since the pandemic.

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

My assessment is that it is concerning that parents, for whatever reason are becoming relaxed about their children’s attendance at school. As the noble Lord suggested, this has partly been linked to the pandemic. We know that each day of lost learning can do serious harm. Days missed can add up quickly. There is a link between absence and attainment, and pupils who are persistently absent are less than half as likely to achieve good GCSEs as those who attend every day. We need to give that message loud and clear to parents who, in being relaxed about their children’s attendance at school, are fundamentally damaging their future prospects.

Government’s Childcare Expansion

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Monday 21st October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I welcome the Statement made in the other place last week on the Government’s childcare expansion, although I note that it might have been more constructive had the Minister acknowledged the transformation in childcare provision implemented by the previous Government and I hope the Minister can acknowledge that for the House today. I remind your Lordships that there were five major stages of that expansion. In 2010, we extended the entitlement for three and four year-olds, commonly taken as 15 hours a week for 38 weeks of the year. In 2013, we introduced 15 hours a week of free early education for disadvantaged two year-olds. In 2017, we built on that by doubling the entitlement for three and four year-olds to 30 hours a week and then in 2023 we announced measures to give working parents 30 hours a week of free childcare from nine months until the child starts school, building up over two years. This constituted the biggest expansion of childcare by any UK Government in history.

I would like to ask the Minister a few questions. First, the previous Government, now on this side of the House, are delighted that the Government have committed to continuing our expansion of childcare, but I was concerned that the tone of the noble Baroness’s comments when answering an earlier Question on this subject sounded like a pitch-rolling to cut the offer and I wonder whether she could just reassure the House that that is not in the Government’s plans and set out the Government’s commitment. Certainly, there was a sense that the communications around this September’s rollout were perhaps more muted than we had expected. It is obviously critical that parents are aware of their future entitlements.

If I may, I will try to ask the Minister again whether Sir David Bell did recommend in his review of early years to continue with the previous Government’s approach to childcare and whether she could confirm when the Government will publish the early years workforce strategy. Also covered in the Statement were the Government’s plans for implementing breakfast clubs and that the Government were taking a test-and-learn approach. I was puzzled by that, given that the previous Government already had a national school breakfast programme that was active in almost 2,700 schools and, as the Minister knows, many primary schools offer breakfast clubs already, I wonder what particular aspects the Government feel they need to test and learn from.

Finally, in relation to school-based nurseries, can the Minister give the House a sense of how confident she feels about the Government’s target of opening the first school-based nurseries by September 2025, with the new funding? It looks like quite a short period to turn that around. Also, what assessment has been made of the impact of the imposition of VAT on the nursery provision of independent schools that have that provision?

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, we on these Benches welcome the proposals; they are very much in line with our manifesto at the last election. I believe that all three parties, in perhaps slightly different ways, have a real desire to develop childcare provision. I want to tease out from the Minister the most important thing for early years childcare provision: the quality of the staff and the staff feeling valued. That means not just the salary but the training opportunities they get.

Over the last decade or more, we have seen staff in nursery and early years settings feeling that they are there just as glorified helpers. One nursery nurse said to me, “I could get more stacking the shelves at Lidl than I get in my job in a nursery”. If we want brilliant early years education, we need staff who feel motivated and want a career in that line of work. I had a 100-place nursery in a primary school and I remember how the staff were absolutely devastated when their names were changed from “nursery nurse” to “NVQ level 4”. They hated that. There had been no consultation with them at all; it just happened as part of the skills agenda. That is my first point.

My second point is that, while we welcome the commitment on top-up charges, we have also to recognise that the income generated in private nurseries sometimes caused real problems for them; but doing away with top-up charges is absolutely correct.

I like the notion that we increasingly put nurseries in primary schools, where there is capacity. Why? Because the primary school can provide all the other things that are available there: advice on special educational needs, and a whole host of other opportunities.

I am pleased about childminders—although I do not actually like the title “childminder”. They do not just mind children; they develop children. They get them to play, to interact, to talk, to learn and to discover. They do more than just minding—but I suppose we are stuck with that title. Childminders were very concerned several years ago when there was a movement towards doing away with single childminders; they had to be part of a company or a group. I thought that was wrong. So I recognise and welcome the proposals on childminding. It should not be a sort of privatised provision. Anybody who has the qualifications and experience should be allowed to do it.

I want to make a final point. There is an aspiration to go to 30 weeks’ provision, but that provision does not cover a full calendar year. Nurseries—particularly private nurseries—find it very difficult because, at the end of the 30 weeks of provision, some parents, especially those from deprived communities, cannot pay the additional money, so they withdraw their children for that period. The nursery or early years setting then finds it difficult to financially survive. So, we need to look at how we ensure that there is equity for the provider as well.

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Baroness Smith of Malvern) (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness and the noble Lord. I am very happy to accept that there has been an enormous transformation in the country’s attitude to childcare and in the extent of childcare available. When I entered the other House in 1997, following a considerable period of Conservative rule, we in Worcestershire were infamous for having the worst childcare provision across the whole of Europe. I am glad that people have seen that childcare and early years provision is important for people’s ability to go to work and, at this moment in time, to support people with the cost of living, but I think that the additional area where we need to focus more attention is that good early years provision is absolutely fundamental for children’s development and giving them the very best possible start in life.

The noble Baroness suggested that the Government are pitch-rolling away from the pledge to entitle working parents to 30 hours of childcare a week from 2025; that is absolutely not the case. The Government are committed to providing that, but we are being transparent and honest about the challenge it will bring. As we said last week, it will mean another 75,000 childcare places and over 30,000 more staff will be necessary; that is a big challenge that needs a plan, not just an aspiration.

I am sorry that the noble Baroness thought that the comms at the beginning of the school year were a little on the quiet side; I did a whole morning media round on this and shouted it from the rooftops. I am pleased that we were able to celebrate 320,000 more parents getting their childcare entitlement this year, but there is certainly more that we need to do. That is why we will work to look more strategically at what we need to do to develop the early years sector and have undertaken to develop a strategy, which I expect us to publish and bring to this House next year.

The noble Baroness asked about breakfast clubs. A few weeks ago, we were able to announce the 750 trailblazing breakfast clubs that will be open by next year, which will build on previous work to get breakfast clubs into schools. However, we are also making a stronger commitment both to providing these free for all primary school pupils and to ensuring that the childcare element of the breakfast club is also in place—that is a very important way that we get children to school early and ready to learn, which does not necessarily happen just if you have a breakfast club, despite the excellent work those breakfast clubs are doing.

On school-based nurseries, the noble Baroness is right that we announced last week £150 million of funding which schools can bid into, so that we can develop up to 300 school-based nurseries as part of our objective to have 3,000 of those over the course of this Parliament.

The noble Lord is absolutely right that, if we are to achieve quality early years provision, we need to develop even further the brilliant staff who are working in early years and childcare. That means we need to reset our relationship with the childcare workforce, ensure that there is appropriate status for that role and think about training. We have already begun to provide, for example, more guidance around how to identify special educational needs, and we will want to continue that work.

We are taking action on ensuring that mandatory extra top-up charges are not levied on parents who take up government-funded childcare places, and we will be working with the sector and with parents in order to make sure that we strengthen that guidance.

Childminders do excellent work, but we have seen a halving of the numbers of childminders over recent years. The flexibilities, including the additional flexibilities announced last week, will help to ensure that childminding remains an important element of the childcare environment.

The noble Lord raised a point about flexibility for school holidays. It is already the case that quite a lot of childcare provision, including that provided around schools, continues into the school holidays. However, in thinking about our overall development of provision and our strategy, we will certainly want to think about how we can ensure that that is as flexible and well supported as possible for parents to be able to use all year round because of the enormously important impact that it has on those parents and, more importantly, on children’s best start in life.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

Before the Minister sits down, I wonder if she could clarify something. I heard her say that there was a £150 million capital pot for nurseries, but I think I read in the Statement that it was £15 million. If she cannot confirm that now, maybe she could write to us.

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

I apologise. The noble Baroness is absolutely right. I have been overambitious on the Government’s spending plans and I will be in big trouble for that. The figure is £15 million for up to 300 new or expanded nurseries. I thank the noble Baroness for allowing me to correct that.

Early Years Provision: Bell Review

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Monday 21st October 2024 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Barran]

To ask His Majesty’s Government whether they plan to publish the main findings of Sir David Bell’s review of early years provision, commissioned by the Labour Party in October 2023.

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Baroness Smith of Malvern) (Lab)]

The early years sector is facing shortages of places and workers, and it will be challenging to deliver the entitlements promised by the previous Government. Sir David Bell’s review, undertaken for the Labour Party prior to the election, considered how to ensure all children have access to high-quality early years education. The Government are considering how to reform the sector and will set out further information next year. Sir David’s findings will inform that work.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, when in opposition, the Secretary of State for Education repeatedly said that childcare was her No. 1 priority, but she also said that she was unable to set out her plan until Sir David Bell had completed his review. Given that the Government have now committed to roll out the previous Government’s childcare plan to increase entitlements, can the Minister confirm whether or not Sir David recommended continuing with the Conservative Government’s plan, and did he agree to the levels of fees we had published? If so, it is really puzzling that the Government will not publish his recommendations; if not, I think there is a greater reason to know what they are.

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

Importantly, having made it clear that we want to deliver the entitlements set out by the previous Government, this Government have started the hard work to put in place the action necessary to do that. It will not be easy; I am afraid that we inherited a pledge without a plan to deliver it. Having ensured that 320,000 children have been able to take up this year’s additional entitlement, the Government’s focus is to make sure we have the places and workforce to enable the growth of that entitlement, which we will try to deliver in September 2025. However, it will be a difficult task, made more difficult by the planning failure of the previous Government.

Education Sector: Equality of Opportunity

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

My noble friend is right that white working-class boys are among the lowest-attaining groups in our schools. That links to the point about regional inequality made previously. It is why the opportunity mission is absolutely clear that we need to break the link between background and success. That means more highly qualified teachers in front of our students. It means making sure that children, whatever their background, get to school, are well-fed and are able to learn, which is the reason for our rolling out breakfast clubs in primary schools. It also means that this Government are absolutely focused on raising standards in all our schools for all our children.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

The Minister talked about regional inequality. Of course, the region, or country, with a severely underperforming educational system is Labour-run Wales, which has seen standards decline and where the OECD has described the education system as having “lost its soul”. That is in contrast to England, where we have seen international rankings improve in reading, maths and sciences. What will this Government do differently from Wales to make sure that we do not see the same decline here?

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

I am surprised, given the efforts that the noble Baroness made when she was a Minister in the Department for Education, that she is quite as complacent about performance in England as she appeared to be in that question. We are still in a situation, in 2024, where at key stage 2 the gap between the highest-performing and the lowest-performing regions remains the same, at 10 percentage points, and where at GCSE, the distinction between the best-performing and worst-performing regions has grown by 0.7 percentage points. So not only are all standards not high enough but we have ongoing, persistent inequality in our system between regions and between people, dependent on their background. With respect to England, this Government will not rest on their laurels in the way in which the noble Baroness seemed to suggest the previous Government would have done. That is why, as I have outlined, whether it comes to teachers in classrooms, getting children into our schools or making sure that we have a curriculum fit for them, we will take action, which the last Government failed to do.

Independent Schools: VAT

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I too thank my noble friend Lord Lexden for securing this debate. We have heard an overwhelming set of arguments this afternoon, as we did in our earlier debate, against this misguided move on the part of the Government.

Those arguments fall into different groups of children: those with special educational needs and disabilities, children from military families, children who take part in the music and dance scheme, and those attending cathedral choir schools. We have also heard serious concerns about implementation; the timing of introducing the new tax, particularly in Scotland; the disruption to teachers and children; the lack of readiness of HMRC; and, importantly, the impact on mainstream schools.

Organisations from the education unions to the Chartered Institute of Taxation are calling for delay, so I ask the Minister two questions. First, will she commit to talk to her colleagues in the Treasury to review the timing of the introduction of VAT? Secondly, if this really is not an ideological move, will she commit that the OBR will do future annual impact assessments, and reverse this if there is not a net contribution to the economy?

Freedom of Speech in Universities

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Thursday 10th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, there are a lot of ironies in the Government’s decision to delay the implementation of the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act. First, it was done without any debate in Parliament and, secondly, it was not mentioned anywhere in the Government’s manifesto, despite the decision being taken within three weeks of the election. The failure to commence the legislation that this Parliament passed is resulting, every day, in freedom of speech and academic freedom in our universities being eroded, most recently with an elected MP being unable to speak at a university this evening.

The reasons the Minister repeated relate to the impact on minority groups, so I ask her to confirm that she agrees with those leading lawyers and academics that the new Act does not provide any further protection for those wishing to express hate speech on campus, including Holocaust denial. Can she confirm that it does not change the law in that regard? Will she agree to meet with those Jewish academics who sought a meeting with the Secretary of State and who are calling for full implementation of the Act?

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The noble Baroness probably understands that the speed with which the decision was made related to the timing of the commencement. It is right to be taking the time now and engaging in the way we are with those on various sides of the argument about the best way of proceeding on this issue.

I have spoken to some of the legal experts that the noble Baroness cites with respect to hate speech and understand their points. The fact that there is debate about the impact of this piece of legislation is part of the problem that we seek to ameliorate through the options we are considering. What I know is real is the strong concern among minority groups that the reality of the impact of the legislation would be to allow on to campuses people whose views would be reprehensible and would potentially constitute hate speech. That is what has brought the fear about. But this is not, of course, the only reason. There has also been considerable concern from universities themselves and from unions representing university staff about the disproportionate burdens. On the Jewish academics, I have met a lot of people already and I am more than content to meet with that group as well.