Children and Families Bill

Baroness Howarth of Breckland Excerpts

Wednesday 6th November 2013 Grand Committee

[Lord Storey]

I thank my noble friend for that.

I now turn to the graduated approach. We have come a long way in special educational needs, have we not? Schools must have SENCOs and a written policy. That is all to be applauded. The code of conduct clearly says that there has to be a qualified teacher working at the school, and that a newly appointed SENCO must be a qualified teacher and have the appropriate qualifications. Of course, we have SENCOs in schools who do not have those qualifications and we may need at some stage to visit that issue. The SENCO is important. You can have all the policies in the world but the SENCO makes them happen.

When we were talking about this—and I have experience of school action, school action plus and IEPs—I was quite alarmed. I said, “Man the barricades”. But the code of practice is a realistic response. It is clear in all sorts of ways. It states, on initial identification:

“As part of a graduated approach to tackling need … reviews of progress should be held once a term”.

Maybe that “should” should be “must”. It continues by stating that,

“there should be a plan that focuses on what outcomes are expected and the support that the school, college and any relevant agencies will provide”.

I applaud the document and I am more relaxed about the issue.

I say to the noble Lord, Lord Low, that I thought that IEPs were a real step forward, but my experience of them is that in many cases, sadly, they have become paper-writing exercises and increase the bureaucracy. What is needed is a much more focused and realistic approach, which is why I like the fact that the code states that the teacher has to meet the parents once a term and discuss the progress that has been made, presumably outside the normal parents’ evening.

I am slightly relaxed about the concern about school action and school action plus. What is in a name? It is not about a name. It is about an approach, an ethos, a culture and a doing mentality. I am sure that the progress we are making on that will help towards it.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland (CB)]

We could talk about both these amendments all night. I just want to say two sentences. First, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Storey. It is not about the name but about what will happen in the process on the ground in relation to that amendment. Returning to the noble Lord, Lord Addington, I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp. We need to focus on the very narrow issue of ensuring that this process can be taken forward. Quite frankly, the Labour Government should have got this into their apprenticeship legislation when they brought it forward in the previous Parliament. If the Minister cannot do what the noble Lord suggests, I hope he will take this away, look at it and come back on Report. That is the simplest way, and it is achievable.

[Lord Low of Dalston]

I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Storey, and the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, about the name. It is not the name that is important. What is important is that we have a graduated approach and that we have some way of institutionalising that so that there can be no doubt that that is the system being operated.

--- Later in debate ---

In addition, this year, 2013-14, reading pens—scanners which read text aloud to pupils and students via earphones—have been cleared for use in exams for the first time. The use of such technology may be appropriate for only a relatively small number of candidates, but Ofqual’s figures for the use of access arrangements show an almost fourfold increase in the number of candidates using computer readers, to 785 candidates in 2013 from 207 in 2012, when the BDA highlighted this issue. This is an encouraging start. Ofqual, the JCQ and the specialist bodies continue to work together to try to standardise the formats of exam papers to ensure that they are compatible with a wide range of computer readers and so that they become more widely available for those candidates who need to use them. The door is clearly open for schools, colleges and others to get the support that pupils and students need. As such technologies become more common in the classroom and on courses, they will become more widely used in exams.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

The Minister lost me for a moment. I am trying to follow him carefully but if we have such good practice as the noble Earl is describing, and all this is now possible, why can we not simply accept the amendment and move on?

[Baroness Walmsley]

I may have misheard my noble friend but when he gave a list of all the different kinds of exams for which these assisted technologies are available, I do not recall hearing him mention apprenticeships.

--- Later in debate ---

The noble Lord was encouraged to withdraw this amendment, but he wants it in Hansard because he wants the Minister to address it when he sums up. If it helps, I will pass on his letter. I have probably made a right mess of it because it is a letter written to me, as opposed to a speech, so I will hand it to my noble friend Lord Nash and he can perhaps reply to it directly, rather than doing it now.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 214. My name is attached to it and I particularly wanted to speak to it because it is the continuation of an old story of detained young people missing out on all the privileges that other young people have. In particular, when they have been in care and then find themselves detained, the local authority no longer continues to look after them in the new institution in which they find themselves. In the past, we tried very hard to ensure that that care continued, but as the noble Lord, Lord Storey, has pointed out, that has not really been carried forward and certainly is not working at present.

We should remind ourselves that children who are detained are the most vulnerable in our society, particularly if they have a range of special needs resulting in an EHC plan. We all know the statistics for children who have been in care, so I will not repeat them, and those for the most troubled families and young people with mental health problems who find themselves in some kind of detention. Because there is a plan in place, and because of the difficulties faced by these young people, they are probably known to their local authority, and are likely to have a social worker and an existing programme to meet their needs. It is therefore absolutely essential that the plan is maintained and for the child or young person with special needs to have the services in that plan continued.

Anyone who has been to any of these institutions, or talked to any young people from care who have found themselves dropping out of the care system and into the offender system, will know that they lack that continuity and their education ceases. How much more difficult it is for children with special needs whose families have often struggled anyway to get them the services that they need so far. It seems perverse, therefore, that they are deprived of this continuity. Often they are detained due to behaviour that has stemmed from their learning difficulties: the fact they do not always comprehend what is going on around them; the fact that they cannot read instructions; or the fact that they are sometimes easily led because they do not have the same intellectual grasp of what is going on as others. Those young people who are seen as the offenders and the difficult young people in our society are not seen as “the deserving”.

I contend that the opposite should be true. Having already been failed by their family, often by their education and usually by social care, what these young people need most at the time of crisis is stability and continuity. They need a programme to take them through their detention and re-establish them in their community. If their programme is continued—and their education and health plans, as they often have complex health needs—then it is clear to me that they would have a much better chance of a new start.

I know that there are young people—I have run large institutions—who are detained for their own safety, so I am not suggesting that all young people are in this category. However, many—especially those with these learning needs and dyslexia and often undiagnosed conditions—may well have found themselves in trouble because of their lack of understanding. If the plan is to have any meaning, it should identify the areas of concern wherever the child is; it should have portability, particularly into custodial facilities. I am very pleased to support this amendment.

[Baroness Walmsley]

My Lords, my name is attached to Amendment 212. I will just make a couple of short points. I, too, am familiar with the work of Jackie Hewitt-Main and have read her very inspiring book. I am a great admirer of the work that she has done in prisons. One story that she told really struck me: some young people in custody were not getting the help they needed with their dyslexia for the following reason. When they went in, they were given a form to fill in to say what sort of educational provision they wanted. They could not read it—it is a simple thing, is it not?—so they did not get any help at all. They did not get any courses because they had not ticked any of the boxes because they could not read what it said next to them. It has to be said that some prisons are very good, but the majority fall by the wayside in a very bad way.

I absolutely agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, that very often the reason why those young people are there in the first place is because they cannot read. They could not get a job and they could not get a driving licence because they could not read the Highway Code. They were at a great disadvantage. In the current economic situation, we have to ensure that money is spent as wisely as possible. I can think of no more effective way of avoiding reoffending and the great expense that it puts on the public purse than spending money on addressing the special educational needs of young people in custody. There really is a very good investment to be made there and we ought to be making more of it.