Education: Pupils and Young People

Baroness Morgan of Drefelin Excerpts

Thursday 28th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Morgan of Drefelin]

My Lords, I support my noble friend’s passionate intervention. She has a great deal of expertise in these matters and it was very helpful. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Perry, on introducing this important debate.

It is tempting for an incoming Government to believe that they are starting from zero and to dismiss everything that has gone before, and the noble Baroness is right to secure the debate to ensure that that does not happen. However, it seems to be a temptation to which this Government are particularly susceptible. In fact, almost everything before May 2010 has been removed from the DfE website and consigned to the national archive, if it is available at all, including much good research and useful material which is entirely apolitical. It is therefore important that we look back as well as forward. It is a big mistake to remove that perspective as,

“those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.

I quote, as many will know, George Santayana, the Spanish philosopher.

The evidence shows that there have been many achievements so far in our schools and children’s services and we have heard a great deal about them. They have been independently verified and should be built on. No wise policymaker would ignore them. I welcome the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Perry, about the success of our academy programme and the importance of the introduction of the diploma from which a great deal can be learnt. However, I take exception to the assertion that we were engaged in levelling down. Let me make it absolutely clear that the opposite was the case. We strongly believe that every school should be a good school and that all children should have access to excellence, as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London described so eloquently.

Let us consider what we encountered in 1997. There were no children’s centres or free nursery places; the school estate was crumbling; we had to work with a demoralised teaching profession; and more than 1,600 schools—half of all schools—achieved less than 30 per cent of pupils attaining five good GCSEs. That was our legacy. However, because of our relentless efforts in school improvement, now only about one in 10 schools displays such a poor showing—but that simply represents how much more there is to do. We delivered free nursery places to all three and four year-olds and we committed to and set in motion the extension of that to 2,500 disadvantaged two year-olds, a scheme which the coalition Government have agreed to continue. Alongside this, 3,500 of the much celebrated Sure Start centres were established and thousands of families with a disabled child—this point has not yet figured in this debate but I am sure it will arise in many others—were given access to the kind of short breaks they so desperately need in order to continue supporting their families and children.

I give the noble Baroness, Lady Perry, full marks, if I may be so cheeky, for recognising that we now have the best qualified, strongest teaching profession ever. The noble Lord, Lord Bew, and others also recognised this. This has not come about without a concerted effort in investment and professional development. It did not happen without effort. Across our country, millions of children are going to school no longer having to put up with leaking roofs and peeling walls because they attend one of the 4,000 brand new or refurbished schools that have been built in the past 13 years.

Our young people are achieving the best ever exam results and, when we left office, improvement was taking place fastest in the poorest areas. That is not to say that there is not a great more deal to do, but it does represent our potential to do more. As the noble Lord, Lord Bichard, said, we should recommit ourselves to the challenge of making a real difference for all our children.

I remind the party opposite of what has been achieved by teachers, teaching assistants—we must not forget teaching assistants because they have such a key role—parents and pupils, because we need to learn from the past and there is much more to do. The Government should avoid the urge to reinvent the wheel, which children in this country definitely cannot afford, and should learn from the experiences of our schools and children’s services over the past 13 years.

What kind of lessons can we learn and what conclusions should we draw? I have picked out three lessons. First, when we were in Government—many noble Lords around the Chamber have echoed this—we learnt that what happens in the classroom is crucial for children’s education; educational achievement does not come about otherwise. We also learnt that what happens outside the classroom matters a great deal, too, especially what happens at home. The noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, and the noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, described that parents are the single biggest influence on how well children do. That is why, when in government, we invested in programmes to support parents to help their children learn; and it is why we funded voluntary organisations to work in partnership with us locally and with families. What are the Government’s policies for supporting parents to help their children to succeed at school, especially those parents who did not do so well themselves and who will not necessarily know how best to help their children to do so? What policies will the Government promote to help those children who do not have families? Is the answer that such parents should simply apply to set up their own free school? I am sure that is not what the Minister would say.

The second big lesson we learnt over the past decade is that—not only here but across the world—the early years of a child’s life are the most important in their development. If they get the right educational help then they are set up for success. This is especially important for disadvantaged children, who can either race ahead or be held back at this stage. The crucial ingredient is high quality early years education provided by skilled, kindly, professional staff who make early learning playful and fun.

The spending review document states that the Government will return Sure Start to its “original purpose” and that they will encourage more private and voluntary sector providers to get involved. That raises some big questions. For example, what do the Government mean by Sure Start’s “original purpose”? If, as seems possible, they mean more focused support for those children left furthest behind, how will they identify those children? How will they achieve this at a time when we know that overall resources will be reducing in real terms, particularly for children’s services? Does it mean that provision will be taken away from some children and families who are receiving it now? Since we know that there is a tendency for “services for poor children” to become poor services over time, how will the Government avoid it? It is a real challenge.

Given that inspections show that the best-quality early-years education is more often to be found in the public sector, how will the Government ensure that standards continue to be high if there is simultaneously less money and more involvement from private and voluntary providers? Will they give private and voluntary independent providers the extra help that they need for training? The key ingredient in early education is undoubtedly its quality and—what we are talking about today—excellence.

We have learnt that many children whose educational achievements are held back by other barriers in their lives, such as disability, special educational need or family problems, can overcome them if they get the right help at the right time, ideally before the problems have become too entrenched. That puts a premium on schools having strong working relationships with other services for children, enabling them to get the effective professional help that they need at the earliest possible opportunity. Such help could take the form of social work, educational psychology and mental health support. That is why, when in government, we put in place children's trusts to reinforce those positive working relationships between schools and other professionals. But the Government have said that they will dismantle children's trusts. Their changes to the provision of local health services will also cause chaos. The Secretary of State for Education seems to want to create a free market for schools with autonomous institutions competing with each other. Is this a recipe for fragmentation and dislocation? What will the Government do to make sure that that is not the outcome?

I hope that schools and local authorities will not be left to deal with these dilemmas alone, because, if they are, it is children who will become the biggest losers.