Higher Education: T-Levels

Baroness Blower Excerpts

Thursday 24th February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I absolutely agree with my noble friend about the value of work experience and the whole philosophy of T-levels—that students undertaking them will be work-ready. I am aware that there has been disruption to opportunities for work experience—caused principally by the pandemic—but, having designed the qualification with employers, we remain confident that those opportunities will emerge.

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My question follows rather well from the previous question. In the information to employers, the Government say:

“At the heart of each course, a 45-day industry placement will give you early access to the brightest talent entering your market”.


How are we going to ensure that this happens? The Minister has responded to that point, but what oversight will there be to ensure that this really is good-quality work experience?

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I am happy to write to the noble Baroness and send more details on the oversight. We know that local colleges are working closely with their employers so that the framework and aspirations of T-levels will be delivered most effectively.

Capita: Turing Scheme Contract

Baroness Blower Excerpts

Thursday 27th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

The noble Earl is right to raise the issue of tuition fees, but I am sure he is aware that even under Erasmus+ half of mobility placements were outside Erasmus+. Judging by the incredible success of our universities announced yesterday, with 605,000 international students coming to our universities —a ratio of two to one of in-placements to out under Erasmus—I do not think it is our top concern.

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a member of the APPG for modern and foreign languages. Removing the Turing scheme from the British Council, which has a global reach and reputation, is questionable. Awarding it to Capita, whose list of public sector failures in England is extensive, is frankly incredible. How does the Minister justify this decision? Is it based on an ideology that, axiomatically for her, “public sector bad, private sector good”, even in the face of evidence to the contrary?

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

No, I tried to set out at the beginning how the decision was taken but I can give the noble Baroness more detail. The criteria for appointing the new provider were based 70% on quality and 30% on cost. Within that 70%, 10% was in relation to social value and Capita came out as the stronger provider on both counts.

Alternative Education

Baroness Blower Excerpts

Wednesday 15th December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

The noble Lord is right. About 83% of children in alternative provision have special educational needs and 24% of them are on an education, health and care plan, compared with 4% in the wider population. We will be looking at all the best evidence and research to make sure in the SEND review that we deliver for these children who, for the most part, have had a difficult start in life and we need to support them in the best way we can.

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, given that the reason for young people being in alternative provision is that they have been less than successful in mainstream settings and given that academies and free schools do not have to follow the national curriculum, does the Minister think that there is a reason to look at the national curriculum so that more schools, including all our academies, might think it was fit for purpose?

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I do not think that there is any suggestion that the educational quality in our academies is not fit for purpose. I hope the noble Baroness would agree that it is crucial that when we plan provision in an area, we first consider our most vulnerable children—of whom this is an important group—and make sure that they get the education that they deserve.

Education (Environment and Sustainable Citizenship) Bill [HL]

Baroness Blower Excerpts

Committee stage
Friday 3rd December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Knight of Weymouth (Lab)]

My Lords, although it is my Bill, I thought that I could probably take advantage of Committee and speak twice. But I take this advantage to outline why I am in support of the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, in his very helpful amendment. When I put together the original wording, I stole it from the Act that he quoted, and I perhaps could have paid more close attention to Parliament’s role. I am very grateful to the Delegated Powers Committee for its report and consideration.

The noble Lord was kind enough to send me an email on Wednesday. When I received it, it was with a little trepidation as to what he might have to say about how he would proceed today. It was of huge reassurance when he said that his amendment is not a re-emergence of the old Eric Forth and David Maclean “wreck a Private Member’s Bill on a Friday” scenario. I am grateful for the noble Lord’s support for the Bill and for the way in which he has gone about this.

One reason for wanting to speak early in the discussion of this amendment is to have an opportunity to ask the Minister a couple of things for her to consider in her response. I think the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, agrees that there is sometimes a danger of it feeling as though the Department for Education, because it makes a lot of regulations, is reluctant to go down the road of guidance being in the regulatory form. My question to the Minister is: is there a good reason why we should not have this sort of guidance in regulation, as opposed to a good reason why, because it is important?

This is also an opportunity for me to ask the Minister whether the announcement made by the Secretary of State on 5 November, in the context of COP 26 in Glasgow, changes the Government’s position as we heard it at Second Reading. We had a different set of Ministers then and a slightly different situation. The Secretary of State made his announcement in the foreword to the document that he has then consulted upon. He said:

“Education is critical to fighting climate change. We have both the responsibility and privilege of educating and preparing young people for a changing world—ensuring they are equipped with the right knowledge, understanding and skills to meet their biggest challenge head on.”


It was almost as if he had been listening to the Second Reading debate. I was so encouraged to read the consultation document and hear what he had to say, and to see that there is an emphasis on climate education, green skills, the education estate and the supply chain. Indeed, I loved the idea of the national education nature park and the climate leaders awards, which are part of what Secretary of State is proposing.

Can we push the department that little bit further on the climate education side of things, so that we get this guidance and ensure that there is more than just a voluntary approach from our schools to delivering climate and sustainability education, which is what the Bill would do? Also recently—I think it was last week or the week before—we had Nadia Whittome introducing her own Private Member’s Bill on this subject. The subject is not going to go away, so I strongly encourage the new ministerial team to give it their own encouragement. It might not be now; I would be really delighted to meet the Minister to discuss whether we can do anything with this Bill to get it into the national curriculum. However, I want to hear from her whether there has been any slight shift in her position.

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, this is a short, precise and extremely welcome Bill, improved by the helpful amendment presented today. I am pleased to tell noble Lords that the National Education Union—the largest education union in Europe, with 450,000 members —welcomes the Bill and the amendment.

The climate emergency is of course the existential threat to the future of all our children and young people. It is certainly the case that educators have a role to play in helping children address the threat by enabling them, as was said at Second Reading, to understand the climate emergency and ecological issues, and to think critically about how they can play their part as we seek a more sustainable way of life.

To demonstrate enthusiasm for teaching about the climate emergency and sustainability, the National Education Union worked with other organisations, including Teach the Future, to promote Climate Learning Month, which overlaps October and November, ahead of COP 26. Despite the high-quality resources produced, not all schools, and therefore not all children and young people, accessed them.

The Bill, particularly with the amendment, would ensure that all those educated in maintained schools would have access to this important area of learning. Alas, those educated in academies and free schools are not required to follow the national curriculum. However, Robin Walker, the Schools Minister, speaking on this in another place, said that

“I want us to do more to educate our children about the costs of environmental degradation and what we are doing to solve that, both now and in the future. Not only do our children deserve to inherit a healthy world, but they also need to be educated so that they are … prepared to live in a world affected by climate change, so that they may live sustainably and continue to fight the effects of climate change.”—[Official Report, Commons, 27/10/21; col. 146WH.]

I therefore hope that Her Majesty’s Government will not only support the Bill but press upon all schools the benefit of this aspect of learning. Of course, I hope that the Government will will the means to ensure that educators are themselves properly educated and trained to ensure high-quality teaching on this important issue.

Finally, it is the case that climate and sustainability issues are covered in the current curriculum—as has been said, they are covered in science and geography—but the magnitude of the climate emergency requires the holistic approach to content and skills development outlined in my noble friend Lord Knight’s Bill. The brevity of this speech should not be taken to imply anything less than my wholehearted support for the Bill and this amendment.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

It seems almost superfluous to get up to support this Private Member’s Bill because it is so self-evident that it is excellent. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Knight of Weymouth, on the progress it has made. Quite simply, you can care for something only when you understand it. That is true about caring for ourselves, for each other and for the natural environment. It is especially true for what can feel like an abstract concept: caring for future generations. The Bill will help tackle not only the environmental and ecological crises but the humanitarian and mental health crises.

Our Green MP, Caroline Lucas, has done great work promoting a nature GCSE and my noble friend Lady Bennett has called for a right to nature for children. Together with this Bill and the future generations Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Bird, we begin to see a framework for the cultural and educational shift needed to underpin an ecologically minded society that no longer destroys our living world.

It would be very wrong for your Lordships not to pay recognition to the very many young people demanding action on the ecological and climate emergencies. As well as teaching them, we must learn from them and support them to use all that energy and enthusiasm to make lasting change, because it is their future that we are discussing. They will live to be the judges of our collective action or inaction.

School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions (England) Order 2021

Baroness Blower Excerpts

Wednesday 1st December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, there is a wonderful expression that infant teachers often use: I am sad in my heart. I am sad in my heart that teachers in maintained schools are in this position and effectively having a pay cut. If we have a system where we consult on pay and conditions, surely the hallmarks of good consultation are, first, that it should be at a time when we can maximise that consultation and not at the tail end of the summer period—as we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Watson—and, secondly, that we really listen to the views of those people who know what they are talking about. In the last education debate in this Chamber, we all extolled the virtues of teachers and how important they were to young lives. We spoke of how we should value them, reward them and consider their worth. And yet this happens, so, yes, I am sad in my heart.

Let us understand what all the teacher associations or teacher unions have said. All have had the same reaction: that this will undermine our attempts to stem the constant haemorrhaging of teachers. Geoff Barton, the General Secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, has said:

“Teacher and leader salaries have already failed to keep pace with inflation over the course of the past decade and the imposition of what is effectively another pay cut undermines retention of existing staff and makes salaries less competitive.”


The national teachers’ union described the Government as being “out of touch”. Its joint General Secretary, Kevin Courtney, said:

“The government’s pay freeze for teachers is demoralising”


and causes

“recruitment difficulties as we come out of the pandemic.”

It was interesting that he should use the word “pandemic”, because, at the time of the pandemic, the Government said how important teachers were and how much we valued them. Then we hear from the head teachers’ union, NAHT, which says the same thing: that this will be challenging in retaining and recruiting teaching staff, particularly for senior positions, and, again, that it is seen as

“eroding leadership supply, and risks prompting an exodus of leaders when the pandemic finally lifts”.

Finally, the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers carried out a survey in which 94% of teachers said they disagreed with the pause on pay uplifts, with 83% saying that it would have a negative impact on the recruitment and retention of teachers.

So I would be interested to hear what the Minister says. I have one cheeky, direct question for her: if it is all right for Peers to have their allowance updated for inflation, why is it not all right for teachers in the maintained sector?

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, I fully endorse the remarks of my noble friend Lord Watson of Invergowrie. The figures on teachers’ pay make depressing reading. Since 2010, teachers’ salaries have been in serious decline in real terms—we have heard the figures from the noble Lord, Lord Storey. Teachers on main scale 6, which is where they can get to before going through the threshold, would need an increase of 17% to make up for the loss against inflation since 2010. That is not even to get an increase; it is to make up for the loss since 2010. On the other pay spine, an increase of 21% would be needed, and the same figure holds good for the leadership group of teachers.

The School Teachers’ Review Body notes that teachers’ pay has worsened in the graduate labour market, as we have already heard. Is that not ironic, since, without teachers, there would be no graduates?

But worse, some would say, even than the overall level of remuneration is the lack of any coherence in the pay structure, bringing with it inherent unfairness and injustices. Performance-related pay, which was largely anathema to the profession when it was imposed, has failed on its own terms, with many teachers and school leaders seeing pay progression blocked even when they have met or even exceeded the objectives that have been set for them. This simply cannot be right, and it brings the system categorically into disrepute.

The NEU, the National Education Union—for which I worked in its predecessor form of the National Union of Teachers, the NUT—is very clear in calling for a national pay structure, with appropriate pay levels and pay progression to embed competitive and fair pay with a rate for the job. There are obvious advantages to such a system. It would assist teacher mobility and career development, allowing teachers to move between schools in the full knowledge of what their pay would be. As a young teacher and even a somewhat older teacher, I benefited from the national pay scales. Teachers, I am bound to say, were not well paid, but at least they knew what they could expect to be paid, both when they began teaching and as they progressed through their career.

It seems no coincidence that both teacher recruitment and retention are suffering under the present system of incoherence and pay cuts in real terms. The National Education Union and other unions have called for a fundamental review of issues relating to teachers’ pay. Performance-related pay certainly needs to be reviewed and revised. As my noble friend Lord Watson said, the Welsh Government and an increasing number of multi-academy trusts have already dropped it from any consideration of salaries of teachers whom they employ.

A coherent and fair pay structure would certainly render teaching much more attractive than it is now. While it is not an STRB matter, a root-and-branch reform of Ofsted, whose inspections are leading to an increased exodus from the profession, is also long overdue.

Finally, on timing and consultation for STRB reports in relation to teachers’ pay and conditions, these really should be held in term time. I hope that the Minister will agree, given her and other Ministers’ often repeated respect for and gratitude to our teachers.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I support what my noble friends Lady Blower and Lord Watson, and the noble Lord, Lord Storey, have said.

Among the great casualties of the pandemic over the last couple of years have been millions of schoolchildren —the consequences for them have been enormous. I know that we all agree with that; we will have seen it in our own families, among our friends and so on. To be fair about it, the resilience of children, often quite young children, in the face of really quite staggering difficulty and challenge has been amazing, and they deserve credit for that, as do their families. Alongside that, when they have returned to school, sometimes intermittently, the work of teachers and schools to support them has been phenomenal. Clearly, over the next year or two and beyond, the work of teachers and teaching staff, those supporting schools in the area of special needs, and educational psychologists and so on will be phenomenal. They are fundamental to the recovery plan of the Government.

All of us want that recovery plan to work, so I do not want to get into whether it should be this billion or that billion. But one thing that will be central to it is the status and morale of teachers, and how they feel their Government are respecting them and dealing with them.

As my noble friend Lady Blower said, we can argue whether it should be 3% or 4%, but I would have thought that a standstill, in real terms, for all teachers, is the very least that teachers could expect as we, hopefully, come out of the pandemic. As I say, morale is important. It is those indefinable things that make such a difference. What I find incredible is that I think the Minister probably agrees, and the vast majority of the Government probably agree, yet it does not happen. To be fair, when I was a Minister I found a disconnect between the public policy outcome and the desire to deliver certain things. Sometimes it just does not seem to happen.

Initial Teacher Training

Baroness Blower Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak in this debate. I congratulate my noble friend Lady Donaghy on securing it and on her opening speech. I fully endorse the important points and speeches made by my noble friends Lady Morris and Lord Knight, with whom I believe I worked pretty well as a highly elected member of the National Union of Teachers when they were at the Department for Education.

Teacher supply is clearly at the heart of ensuring that our schools can fulfil society’s aspiration that all children and young people should be afforded a high-quality, broad and balanced curriculum—I endorse the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, and the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, on breadth and balance—in whichever institution they are educated, allowing all to achieve their full potential and push beyond any constraints of lack of self-confidence or self-esteem which some students experience. Proposed policy on initial teacher education and training does not seem to provide securely for a sufficiency of teachers to respond to that task in all its complexity. Currently, even where places are taken up for pre-service training, as noble Lords have heard on a number of occasions in this House, the rate of attrition is very high. We are losing teachers from our classrooms at a much higher rate than is consistent with a stable profession.

The Government have now proposed a course for reform which represents a radical shift in the approach to teacher education and training. As was mentioned earlier, it was subject to consultation between 7 June and 22 August 2021—substantially, of course, during the academic year holidays. At the time, Nick Gibb was the Minister for School Standards; he justified the short timescale on the basis that it was urgent, yet 13 weeks later we are still awaiting the outcome. Meanwhile, the process has been opaque, with no record that I have been able to find of how a small, hand-picked group chaired by Ian Bauckham of the Tenax Schools Trust—as my noble friend said—went about the review of the ITTP provider market.

The Library briefing on initial teacher training providers and the review gives a large number of figures for recruitment to a variety of routes into teaching and faithfully reports what the review was ostensibly set up to do—to ensure that:

“All trainees receive high-quality training … The ITT market maintains the capacity to deliver enough trainees and is accessible to candidates … The ITT system benefits all schools.”


All are highly laudable aims. However, it also records that while

“many in the sector welcomed the aims of the review”,

there has been criticism that the reality might be “potentially disruptive”, with Cambridge University among others, as referenced by my noble friend Lady Donaghy, asserting that there is

“no ‘single right way’ to train teachers”

and suggesting that it may withdraw from the market if the proposed reforms go ahead. As I understand it, it was not alone among Russell group universities in taking this view.

There is a clear sense among many who have sought to engage with the Government’s proposals that they are a straightforward step along the road to central, national control of how teachers are taught to teach and how they will be expected to teach. This may well have its genesis in Michael Gove’s time as Secretary of State for Education, when he famously insulted academics in university education departments, describing them as “the Blob”. Whether he secretly feared that university education departments were hotbeds of Marxism or was just pursuing a centralising and controlling agenda while ostensibly lauding school autonomy may be a matter for debate.

It is clear that jurisdictions held to be successful take a different approach from that suggested in the direction of current government policy. There are clearly elements that could be welcomed. However, while greater support for newly qualified teachers—what we now call early-career teachers—is a good thing, the need for schools to provide a mentor for each early-career teacher may put enormous pressure on staffing in schools and could lead to them employing fewer early-career teachers.

I trust that the Minister will be able to update the House on progress towards the establishment of an institute for teaching. There is talk of there being only two bidders on the shortlist, Star Academies and the Ambition Institute, neither of which has strong links with higher education institutions.

I hope the Minister will be able to reassure us that university departments of education are considered an important part of initial teacher training and education going forward. Professional autonomy and agency for teachers are critical for a successful teaching profession. It is in the universities that they develop these capacities.

Education: Teacher Departures

Baroness Blower Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I am very happy to check what data we have on the longevity, if that is the right word, of teachers from different disciplines. Certainly, in preparing for this Question and looking at the experience of early career teachers, I know that there is actually very little variation in their initial appointment to teaching in a state school. Art and design and music, which I know the noble Earl is interested in, are in the mid-70s, but that is the same as chemistry, physics and a number of other subjects.

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, Ministers have stood at that Dispatch Box and praised teachers in brightly glowing terms, but teacher workload continues to increase from an already unsustainably high level, as reported by Teach First and the National Education Union—the early career framework may not help this at all—and their salaries remain frozen. Even if the cap is lifted, their salaries will probably actually reduce in real terms, and certainly in terms of purchasing power. What plans does the Minister have to address these issues, which account in large part for the loss of teachers from the profession in their first five years?

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

The noble Baroness will be aware that starting salaries for teachers were increased last year by 5.5%. As I have already said, our commitment to starting salaries of £30,000 remains. That is important; in the research we did, we looked at both public and private sector jobs and set the target at a level that we believe is genuinely attractive in comparison with both.

Schools: Examination Assessments

Baroness Blower Excerpts

Tuesday 12th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

Well, I would question the noble Earl in terms of fairness. It is, of course, as I am sure he would agree, absolutely critical, and we believe that exams are the fairest way of judging students’ performance. GCSEs rigorously assess knowledge acquired by pupils during key stage 4 and are in line with expected standards in countries with the highest-performing education systems. So, despite remaining in education to 18, not all students will progress to level 3 qualifications, and therefore GCSEs remain vital to our education system.

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, I have confidence in teacher-assessed grades, but the systems used in 2020 and 2021 were, frankly, not well planned by government—unlike the systems of teacher assessment in, for example, Finland, where there is a vanishingly small private sector in education. Given that government data shows that 204,000 pupils were out of school for Covid-related reasons on September 30, what plans do the Government have to discuss at an early stage what might be put in place for alternatives to exams this academic year? No communication expected in September from the exam boards has yet arrived.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I think the noble Baroness is being slightly unfair, in the sense that the approach we took to teacher-assessed grades was extensively consulted on and agreed. It was clearly not a simple process, as the noble Baroness understands very well, but it was grounded on extensive consultation. She will be aware that we have announced adaptations to the exam system and an amended approach to grading in the coming year, which I hope will go some way to addressing her concerns.