Education Bill

Baroness Morgan of Huyton Excerpts

Tuesday 14th June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Morgan of Huyton]

My Lords, I declare an interest as the chair of Ofsted. In that context, I would like briefly to talk about the proposals in the Bill to reform the school inspection system and to explain a little of the new inspection framework that accompanies them.

Of course, inspection will never be an uncontroversial process. Few schools actively welcome an inspection, though most understand the accountability that inspection brings. Around nine in 10 heads responding to post-inspection surveys are satisfied with how their inspection was carried out and, crucially, that the inspection had identified clear recommendations for improvement. In the weeks I have been at Ofsted, I have been struck by the HMI mantra of “doing good as you go”. Inspectors should leave schools after inspection better placed to improve—something I have discussed at length with the noble Baroness, Lady Perry.

Moreover, changes to school inspections since 2009 that have been welcomed include more classroom observation and better discussion with school leaders at the end of the inspection. However, I readily acknowledge continuing concerns about the balance between data, dialogue and observation, and the extent to which schools are judged on their core responsibilities. The changes in the Education Bill respond to this criticism and should strike a better balance.

Clause 40 details that future school inspections will report on four key areas: achievement of pupils, quality of teaching and learning, leadership and management, and behaviour and safety. They must also consider spiritual, moral, social and cultural issues within these areas, and the extent to which education enables pupils with disabilities or special educational needs to achieve.

Ofsted is consulting on a new inspection framework at the moment, with time in the autumn to ensure that by the time it is fully introduced in January 2012 we will have listened and learnt as much as possible from schools and school leaders. Her Majesty's Chief Inspector has characterised the new framework as aiming to deliver inspection reports that tell more of the story of a school, give parents a stronger feel of a school’s strengths and weaknesses, and describe more clearly the path to improvement. More accessible reports are needed too and we are working on this.

The new inspections will also place greater emphasis on individual subjects, how they are taught and how pupils are learning. Even in the Google age, there is a strong correlation between poor subject knowledge in teachers and poor teaching. Inspectors will also want to see pupils with the skills that are vital to individual subjects—the tools of historical assessment, scientific experimentation or mathematical manipulation, which are so crucial to a deeper subject knowledge and inquiry for the future.

The new framework will use value-added data, rather than contextualised value-added data, or CVA. I know that some schools fear the removal of CVA, but value added will show actual progress between the end of primary school and GCSE results.

It is marked that there is a wide gap in attainment between schools with similar social characteristics. Value-added data should illustrate genuine progress without assuming that poorer pupils will underachieve, focusing schools on narrowing the gap for pupils from poorer backgrounds. This measure is a key part of the new inspections and I passionately support it.

I believe that the combination of legislative change and the new framework will help to bring a clearer focus to inspections and will be more valuable to school leaders and parents as a result. However, Ofsted is still listening to outside views, as we want to get this right.

I also caution the Minister to be vigilant about keeping the focus he is striving to deliver in this Bill. Let us take the recent announcement that inspectors will be trained in spotting putative extremism in schools. Of course, it is right that inspectors understand these issues and can report what they find. Inspectors have a part to play, along with parents and pupils, teachers and the school’s management. There are always perfectly good reasons to add to an inspector’s remit but personally I make this plea. We are about to train inspectors to hear individual children read using synthetic phonics. Do not let us collectively agree to focus on the absolute priorities, such as literacy, and then gradually allow extras to be added in the future without the most rigorous appraisal.

Clauses 39 and 41 propose that outstanding schools and colleges will in future be inspected only where there is cause for concern. This might, for example, be as a result of a significant change in results, a request from a local authority or the Secretary of State, or a series of parental complaints. The trigger mechanism is being developed now but will always present more of a risk than inspecting itself and we should collectively understand that.

In the new Labour Government’s first education White Paper in 1997, the phrase “intervention in inverse proportion to success” was used to describe the extent to which local authorities should engage with schools. It was a good principle then and it remains a good principle now.

The Secretary of State has maintained floor targets or standards, with the recent White Paper stating that secondary schools will be below the floor if fewer than 35 per cent of pupils gain five good GCSEs, including in English and Maths, and fewer pupils make good progress between key stage 2 and key stage 4 than the national average. This builds on earlier targets that since 2000 have seen the number of schools below the 30 per cent level fall from 1,600 in 1997 to fewer than 100 today. Schools not achieving those targets are rightly the subject of intervention with additional powers in Clause 43, and they may be replaced by academies.

Therefore, I welcome the continued challenge that underpins this principle in the Bill and its focus on schools that most need attention and intervention. My personal concern is whether the department has yet demonstrated fully how the removal of school improvement partners and local authority support—both of which I readily acknowledge were variable—as well as challenge leaders will be replaced in the near future in a comprehensive way. I recognise that in time teaching schools and peer support will play a big role.

Of course, change is not without its dangers. In the new regime, inspectors may not see excellence often enough and, at the same time, a few outstanding schools may rest too much on their laurels. There is a measure of reassurance in that Ofsted produces regular reports on individual subjects and important educational themes, but I still have questions—clearly shared by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas—about how we maintain a sufficient level of scrutiny of outstanding schools. I notice the time and think that we will have to return to that matter in Committee.

There is one other issue on which I should touch very briefly before I conclude. The Education Select Committee recently recommended a break-up of Ofsted into its separate education and children’s services functions. This is obviously a decision for government. I have thought about this very carefully and I believe that this would be a mistake. The reasons outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Laming, for merging education and children’s social services at a local level remain strong. A child’s life is holistic and what happens in their home or care affects their educational achievement as much as their personal development. Ofsted inspections should reflect local and national structures.

Ofsted now has strong leaders from both education and social work backgrounds and there is more confidence at local authority level about the consistency and quality of inspections. However, Ofsted recognises that it may need more of a public face for each of these sectors in the future, and that is something to which we will return.

At its core, Ofsted remains very much our national guardian of standards. I hope that these legislative changes, and the new frameworks now being developed, will reconfirm that in the future.