Education (Guidance about Costs of School Uniforms) Bill

Baroness Garden of Frognal Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 19th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

My Lords, this sensible and small Bill had an easy ride through the Commons and hopefully will through this House, too. The number of speakers seems overkill for one small cause; it is difficult to see how 21 speakers will each have different things to say about the Bill, but I am quite sure that your Lordships will find a way.

When I was a teacher, I was hugely supportive of school uniforms. They gave cohesion to the school and meant that there was no competition for who was wearing the most expensive clothes. Curiously, when I taught in Germany, where school uniforms seemed not to exist, the youngsters with the wealthiest parents aimed to look the scruffiest—at least, the boys did. Where you knew that the father was an extremely well-paid surgeon or lawyer, the lad would arrive at school looking like something that the cat had brought in.

One of my daughters, aged eight, had a year at a school with no uniform. The time spent every morning discussing what was and was not appropriate for her to wear to school was quite draining. I was relieved when her next school had a uniform and we could dispense with the pre-school fashion ritual. The key factor must be cost. These days, most state schools opt for items easily bought at high street shops as cheaply as possible, given that children sometimes grow surprisingly quickly.

I really felt for what the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, said. I was horrified to read the estimate that nearly half a million children have been sent home from school because the costs meant that they were wearing incorrect uniform. This cannot be right. Schools should be encouraged to be understanding, even as they wish to uphold standards and pride in the school. As the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, said, it is valuable if schools have second-hand shops for uniforms and/or a hardship fund, but uniforms will often be outgrown before they are outworn and thrift shops for disadvantaged children could be a lifesaver. Might this be at least in guidance, if not on the face of the Bill?

Why does the proposed new Section 1(5)(e) read,

“a pupil referral unit not established in a hospital”?

I taught in a hospital school many years ago. Many of the pupils are not there for long, so uniform for the hospital school would not make sense, but would allowing them to wear the uniform of the school that they had left perhaps encourage a learning culture? I was there to teach a stick-like, very bright anorexic girl, but some of the other pupils were young thugs, exceedingly threatening and ill-disciplined. Might their behaviour have been tempered by school uniforms? Uniforms are helpful in ensuring the community aspect of a school—the belonging and the being part of a team. They are valued by teachers, parents and pupils. I fully support the Bill and wish it a speedy passage, hopefully before the start of the next school year, as we heard, although earlier would be even better.