Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Monday 11th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Robert Halfon]

I am proud that we have a record number of students going to university. I have already mentioned the fact that the disadvantaged are 74% more likely to go to university than they were before. I will tell the hon. Gentleman what we are doing to help students: we have a £286 million welfare fund that we give to the OFS; we have increased loans by 2.8%; we have frozen tuition fees; families across the country have been given, on average, £3,700 to help with energy bills and other bills; we have given hundreds of millions of pounds to the household support fund to support all families; students know that they can have their loans reassessed if their family income falls by 15%; and finally, we have introduced degree apprenticeships so that students do not need to take out a loan but can earn while they learn and get a good, skilled job at the end.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

7. Whether she is taking steps to help improve the morale of teachers and school support staff.

[The Minister for Schools (Damian Hinds)]

Supporting teacher wellbeing is crucial to our commitment to a supportive culture in schools, and for encouraging teacher retention. That is why we co-created the education staff wellbeing charter with the education sector, and we have invested over £1 million in school leader mental health and wellbeing support.

[Mr Sheerman]

Is the truth not that retention is down, recruitment is down and early retirements are up? What is the Minister going to do to boost the morale of teachers? They say to me, “Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have a Cabinet who had been through a state sector education and sent their children to state schools?”

[Damian Hinds]

I think the hon. Gentleman needs to do some research before he starts asking questions in Parliament. On recruitment and retention, I join him in stressing the importance of retention, which we are absolutely focused on, including through our workload programme. We have a good set of scholarships and bursaries for encouraging entry and a range of different routes into teaching to get the full range of talent that can benefit our children and young people.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Hinds]

I regret that, as education is a devolved matter, the Labour party is in charge of education in Wales. It really saddens me to hear of children in my hon. Friend’s constituency suffering from its mismanagement of that system, despite the great work of brilliant and inspiring teachers in Wales. He is absolutely right that in England, under this Government, funding is at a record level. Meanwhile, in Wales, I am sad to say that education standards are not only the lowest in the UK, but lower than the OECD average. I am afraid it is clear that every time Labour gets into power, children’s education suffers.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State loves plans. What is her plan to reinvigorate and change the course of Ofsted?

[Gillian Keegan]

I was delighted to attend the Association of School and College Leaders conference alongside Sir Martyn Oliver, who announced the Big Listen, which is part of making sure that we get the cultural reforms required. I am concerned by reports that some teachers and headteachers feel that they are not listened to or are treated in a dismissive or rude manner. I hope everybody will engage fully with the Big Listen, because I think we need to make sure that Ofsted is respectful, and treats our service, and our teachers and headteachers, with respect.

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[Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)]

rose—

[Mr Sheerman]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I appreciate that two hon. Members are rising to ask questions, but perhaps they have forgotten that they have already had that opportunity; each asked a question earlier this afternoon. I know the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) got away with two questions, but I often make an exception for him due to his longevity in this place.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Monday 29th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Damian Hinds]

We have extended eligibility for free school meals on three occasions, mainly with universal infant free school meals, the extension of further education students and, most recently, by extending the protections for people in transition on universal credit. I say gently to the hon. Lady that we think it is important to target free school meals, but that it is just as important for children in secondary school as in primary.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

9. What steps she is taking to improve early years education.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (David Johnston)]

This Government are rolling out the largest expansion of childcare in England’s history, doubling the amount we spend now. This will enable more children to benefit from higher-quality early years education and childcare more of the time, building strong foundations for every child and enabling more parents to work.

[Mr Sheerman]

Why has it taken 14 years for the Government to get around to having a plan? They got rid of children’s centres and Sure Start centres, and they have not replaced them with anything until now. Now we see chaos: people cannot get the code; they do not know what money they are getting from local government; the National Day Nurseries Association says it is a mess. What is the Minister going to do to clear up this mess?

[David Johnston]

There was a lot in that question. On the Sure Start point, we are rolling out family hubs, which will be a lot broader than the Sure Start centres were and will cover children with special educational needs up to the age of 25. As for the codes issue, as the hon. Gentleman will already know, we have worked with His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs to provide a solution to that issue for all parents so that no parent will miss out as a result.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (David Johnston)]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. This is a highly competitive training scheme. Between 2017 and 2019 the Department filled all 160 of its funded training places per year, and since 2020 it has filled all 200 of the funded places each year. We have now committed to training a further 400 educational psychologists.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the right hon. Lady agree that we need highly qualified, excellent teachers in every school? Is she worried, as I am, that so many highly qualified, gifted teachers are leaving the profession after just a few years?

[Gillian Keegan]

Of course I agree, which is why I am delighted that we have 27,000 more teachers in our schools than we had in 2010. We have a retention and recruitment plan with many different facets to make sure that we retain our excellent teachers.

Books in Primary Schools

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Wednesday 24th January 2024 Westminster Hall

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the availability of books in primary schools.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Ms Elliott. I am delighted to have this time to talk about books, after raising this issue many times since entering Parliament and serving as chair of the all-party parliamentary group for libraries, information and knowledge.

If it were not for books I would not be standing here now. As a child, I started going to libraries and I have never stopped. In fact, I spent so much time in libraries that I ended up working in not just one but several over the years, from public libraries to academic libraries. I eventually earned my degree in information and library studies as a mature student. Books changed my life. I know that they have the potential to change the lives of millions of children, too.

As a former librarian, I have had the privilege of welcoming countless children through the doors of my local library, watching as they were whisked away to far-flung places, captivated by the magic of words. Children are whisked away to the land of Shakespeare, Dickens, the Brontës and many others. This is a country whose identity is steeped in story, which is why I find it so shocking that there is no statutory requirement for schools to have any library facilities. It is no wonder that one in six adults in the country have very low levels of literacy, rising to one in three in some of the poorest communities. I fear that those statistics could be even bleaker in future.

Research conducted by the National Literacy Trust found that 56% of eight to 18-year-olds do not enjoy reading in their free time—the lowest level since surveys began in 2005. More than ever, books are fighting phones and video game consoles for relevance at home. Although those have their place, it is vital that we do everything in our power to help establish a love of reading during children’s formative years.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does she agree that libraries in primary schools are more important in areas of deprivation than in areas of affluence? It is essential that we listen to teachers in primary schools so that we know whether a child has not been spoken to and not been read to. If that is the case, they start at a terrible disadvantage, which can impact the rest of their lives. I support her debate and her ambitions 100%.

[Gill Furniss]

My hon. Friend is correct. It is crucial that people in poorer communities have access to public libraries.

[Mr Sheerman]

In Sunderland and Huddersfield, for example.

[Gill Furniss]

Yes.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gill Furniss]

I am not quite sure about that. I think it is nice to have a new book, if possible. All children should be treated as equals and not have to show that they maybe do not have as much money as others. I will dwell on that point, and I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention.

Children are not the only ones to benefit from the impacts of daily story time: 91% of teachers said that they want to continue with daily story time, and 88% would like it to be mandated in the curriculum to help mitigate the guilt of coming away from the statutory curriculum requirements to spend time reading stories.

It is clear from multiple academic studies and reports that a love of books can help to form the bedrock for a better life. However, we are in the midst of a national reading crisis. That crisis is compounded by the fact that one in seven state primary schools in this country do not have a library. In the most disadvantaged communities, that number rises to one in four. We must do more to help get books into the hands of children. Ensuring that no child is left behind when it comes to reading is worth every penny; it is an investment in their future and our country’s future. However, there has been little growth in spending per pupil over the last 14 years. In fact, the Institute for Fiscal Studies predicted that the purchasing power of school budgets will be around 3% lower in 2024-25 than it was in 2010.

Schools have a great deal of autonomy when it comes to allocating their budget and, in recent years, they have been forced—as so many people across the country have—to make difficult financial decisions. When they are faced with buildings plagued by leaks, cold and reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete, who can blame headteachers and governors for making extraordinarily difficult decisions about how they spend their budget? The lack of prioritisation of books means that two thirds of primary schools in the UK are without a designated library budget. When parents were polled, however, the library was one of the most important facilities that they wanted their children to have access to, second only to the playground.

We must remember that there is no guarantee that pupils who do not have access to books in school have access to books at home. A lack of provision in primary schools will simply exacerbate deep-rooted inequalities. We can provide the books that will help to create a generation of readers, but simply making books available does not guarantee that they will be read. Just as important as ensuring that we have fully stocked libraries in our primary schools is having the library staff. They are often overlooked, but they are vital for ensuring that the library is a welcoming and engaging space.

[Mr Sheerman]

The hon. Lady may remember the Education Committee’s winter reports on the importance of early literacy from the time that I chaired the Committee. A key thing to come out of one of those reports was the programme of Sure Start centres for children. Is it about time we went back to that, so that every community has Sure Start centres and community centres again? They were champions for reading at school.

[Gill Furniss]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. It would be good to see again the scope of what Labour provided in its last term.

Library staff encourage new readers and put programmes in place to ensure that reading is for pleasure, not just for study. However, a study by Great School Libraries found that only 41% of schools in the UK with a designated library area had library staff, down from 54% in 2019. We need to reverse the trends in childhood reading by ensuring that schools have well-stocked, well-staffed libraries.

We need to empower children by letting them choose what they want to read and ensuring that they have a wide variety of genres to choose from. We need to allow teachers the ability to ringfence time so that all primary school children can enjoy reading for pleasure. The gift of reading is one of the most beautiful things that we can impart to the next generation. We need to ensure that primary schools are properly equipped to do so.

[The Minister for Schools (Damian Hinds)]

It is a pleasure, once again, to see you in the Chair, Ms Elliott. It is nice to be in a Westminster Hall debate in which we all overwhelmingly agree. I congratulate the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss) on securing the debate, and it is good to have others taking part. We have particularly benefited from hearing about the hon. Lady’s experience. She mentioned her early childhood experience as a user of libraries, and then her experiences throughout her life as an employee, a professional and an academic in the library service.

The hon. Lady said that we should improve children’s access to books. The Government wholeheartedly agree. Reading is the cornerstone of a brilliant education, an important part of growing up and adult life, and a core focus of this Government. She talked about being in competition with video games, consoles, phones and tablets. In the old times, we might have said that television was top of that list. There are good arguments and practical, useful roles for all those pieces of electronica, but there is nothing quite like a book for the physical, mental and emotional experience.

[Mr Sheerman]

Does the Minister agree that one of the real problems we all have—I have it in Huddersfield; everyone has it in their constituency—is early stimulation? We see so many parents now pushing their small child in a pushchair, with their headphones on; they are not talking to the child. That early learning of the language, then reading at night and taking them to the library to get their books is crucial, is it not? That is why this debate is so important.

[Damian Hinds]

What can I say? The hon. Gentleman is ahead of me, and not for the first time. I do not think he has seen my handwritten notes, but if he had, he would know that they say, “It starts with being read to.” I remember previous debates we have had in this Chamber, particularly with our former colleague Baron Field, who was the right hon. Member for Birkenhead. For example, we used to talk about how those early experiences of being read to are so important, not only because of the reading experience, but because it is quite difficult to read to a very young child without holding them, and that early attachment is part of it.

We have a focus these days on the home learning environment, and some of the ways we can make everyday experiences—little moments—matter. Everyday experiences at a bus stop, on a train or in a supermarket are all part of that early literacy experience. Ideally there should be books at home, and I pay tribute to some of the organisations that have tried to make that more widespread, particularly in disadvantaged communities or for people on lower incomes.

Of course, there should also be books at school. School should be the great leveller. I have visited a lot of schools in my time. Like the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), I am a former member of the Education Committee. I am now and have been previously an Education Minister, and, like all of us, I am a Member of Parliament. In those three roles, I have visited a lot of schools. I am always struck by the prominence that schools give to books and reading. They are an important part of school life, and that is true for reading time in school and for children taking books home to enjoy them there.

All pupils deserve to be taught a knowledge-rich curriculum that promotes extensive reading both in and out of school, and reading is a principal way to acquire knowledge. The texts that our young people read play a big part in their wider development, too, by broadening their horizons and introducing new ideas and perspectives.

We have strengthened the national curriculum to focus on developing reading. To encourage the development of a lifelong love of literature, we are requiring pupils to study a range of books, poems and plays. The national curriculum also promotes reading for pleasure, as the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough rightly says, with evidence showing that that is more important for children’s educational development than even their parents’ level of education.

Charities such as BookTrust and the National Literacy Trust work tirelessly to raise the profile of reading for pleasure, and I thank them for their work. Of course, such organisations also do important work to raise awareness of the vital role of libraries, and we recognise the particular importance of libraries in increasing children’s access to books and promoting reading for pleasure, whether in school or in the community library. I am grateful to the organisations and authors who are currently shining a light on the difference that libraries can make, such as Julia Donaldson, Michael Morpurgo, Philip Pullman, Cressida Cowell and others.

I also recognise the important work undertaken by a range of organisations to promote the work of libraries to children, families and schools. For example, Schools Library Services assists schools with everything from developing whole libraries to book stocks and staff training, and the Reading Agency’s summer reading challenge, which I think many MPs also take part in directly or indirectly, motivates more than 700,000 children of all abilities to read for enjoyment over the summer holidays through their local library. It is for individual schools to decide how best to provide and maintain a library service for their pupils, including whether to employ a qualified librarian. Our reading framework provides guidance on that, including how best to engage children with the books that are available in school.

Public libraries have a strong offer to support children’s development as readers beyond school, not just through books and resources, but through events such as Rhymetimes. The experience of visiting a public library these days is quite different from when we were children: there is so much more going on, and it is much more inclusive and welcoming.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Hinds]

Well, I am pleased to hear of the good ending to that story. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for all the work that he does locally and for his championing of these causes.

In 2022, my noble Friend Lord Parkinson, the Minister for Arts and Heritage, appointed my noble Friend Baroness Sanderson to review the public libraries sector to help inform future work. Her review of public libraries was published last week and makes a number of recommendations, which will inform the development by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport of the new Government libraries strategy for England.

For children to develop a love of books, we need to build a strong foundation in reading early on, and the Government have introduced a range of measures to support the effective teaching of reading right from the start.

[Mr Sheerman]

The Minister is making some very good points, but this is not just about books, surely—it is about what those books are. I had the honour of knowing Benjamin Zephaniah, who opened the John Clare cottage, which I am chairman of, but we are struggling to get children to come out of school into places such as that to learn about poetry and to hear and read poetry. Reading poetry at school has diminished. Trips outside of school have diminished. This is holistic. Would the Minister not agree that many children in our country from more deprived backgrounds are missing out holistically, not just in terms of libraries?

[Damian Hinds]

I am not quite sure how the hon. Gentleman would or could know that. I certainly know that when I visit schools, I see and hear poetry being read, discussed and being written by children. I agree with him entirely that poetry is a really important part of our literature, and it is a really important thing for children to be exposed to. Like the study of music and learning a musical instrument or to sing, they can find ways to express themselves in ways they did not know existed. It provides ways to understand the world in ways they had not previously appreciated. I agree with him absolutely on the importance of poetry.

I was talking about the earliest years, and in particular the early years foundation stage. As the hon. Gentleman will know, we introduced landmark reforms in the early years foundation stage to improve early years outcomes for all children, particularly disadvantaged children, in those critical areas that build the foundations of later success, including, importantly, language development and reading. The reforms will ensure that children receive the best start and develop a love of reading from early on. We have invested in early language intervention and are supporting parents through the home learning environment campaign that I mentioned a moment ago, which has been backed by further investment.

To drive up the standard of literacy teaching in primary schools, we have followed the evidence and focused on ensuring high-quality systematic synthetic phonics teaching for every child. Since 2010, we have turbocharged the effective teaching of phonics by placing it at the heart of the curriculum and introducing the phonics screening check in 2012 to assess pupils at the end of year 1. We have incorporated phonics into the teachers’ standards, the baseline of expectation for teachers’ professional practice. We have placed a greater focus on phonics and the teaching of reading in Ofsted’s inspection framework and supported schools to choose good phonics programmes by publishing a list of schemes validated by the Department.

In 2018, we launched the English hubs programme, which is dedicated to improving the teaching of reading. The programme has so far supported over 1,600 schools intensively, with a particular focus on helping children making the slowest progress in reading, many of whom come from disadvantaged backgrounds. It includes schools in Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough, which are supported by two of the hubs, Learners First and Saint Wilfrid’s. The programme is having a measurable impact. Schools supported intensively as partner schools by English hubs outperform non-partner schools by around seven percentage points when comparing the change in year 1 phonics screening check results between just before the pandemic and 2022.

[Mr Sheerman]

May I make a final intervention? The Minister’s colleague, the hon. Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson), has rudely left him on his own.

[Damian Hinds]

Go on. The hon. Gentleman spoils us.

[Mr Sheerman]

My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss) wants the Government to say that every school must have a library. Is the Minister for that, or is he against it? When is he going to introduce it? He has not got much time before the election.

[Damian Hinds]

Look: schools have books. I do not know what schools the hon. Member may have visited that do not have books on shelves, but schools have books. Sometimes libraries these days get called “learning resource centres” and all sorts of different things. Sometimes they are laid out in different ways and not necessarily laid out as a set-aside room, but schools have books. We trust schools, headteachers, boards of governors and trustees to know what is right for their school and how to provide best for their children. We want reading and books to be at the heart of that and, in my experience of primary schools in England, that is indeed what happens.

The hubs that I mentioned are about more than phonics. In 2021, we rolled out the “Transforming your school’s reading culture” programme, which was developed by hub schools and sector experts to support reading for pleasure. Reaching around 600 schools last year, English hubs is now into the third year of delivering that research-based continuing professional development programme, which trains teachers in schools across the country to ensure that every pupil develops a love of books.

We know that the hub programme cannot reach every single school, so to ensure that all teachers had clear guidance to support their teaching of reading, we published a reading framework. Updated last year, the framework offers non-statutory guidance on best practice in the teaching of reading from reception to year 9. It recognises the importance of encouraging a love of reading, including the vital importance of pupil choice and access to a wide variety of books. More than 90% of schools have taken our first reading framework published in 2021 and 66%, or two thirds, have made changes to their practice as a result.

Our clear focus on reading is making an impact. England came fourth out of the 43 countries that tested children of the same age in the 2021 progress in international reading literacy study, which is an assessment of the reading abilities of primary-age children across the world. I am grateful to all the primary school teachers, teaching assistants and everybody in our brilliant school system whose commitment to reading and to our children has made that possible. The strongest predictor of PIRLS performance was the year 1 phonics screening check mark, with higher marks predicting higher PIRLS scores.

The Department is committed to improving literacy for all pupils because we cannot knock down barriers for children if we do not teach them to read well. We are determined to drive progress further still and ensure that all children can benefit from high-quality teaching, giving them a solid base on which to build as they progress through school.

Question put and agreed to.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Monday 11th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[David Johnston]

I thank my hon. Friend for her work championing the early years workforce and join her in the tributes she pays to them. The total number of paid early years staff has remained stable in recent years, and between 2021 and 2022 the number of staff increased by 2%, or 5,900 people. We will publish updated statistics in the coming weeks.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Is it not a fact that after 13 years of the Conservatives in government, our country is in a situation where preschool and out-of-school care is the most expensive in Europe and beyond? We have so many talented people—especially women, but men as well—who are not coming back to use their high skills to recharge the economy, because they cannot afford childcare. What is the Minister going to do about it?

Core School Budget Allocations

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Tuesday 17th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Nick Gibb]

Yes, it is unfortunate, for which officials and Ministers have apologised. It is frustrating, particularly for local authorities that have to conduct their calculations—it was an error based on the coding of the pupil numbers.

My hon. Friend mentioned moving to the direct funding formula. That is the intention of the Government, and the latest edition of the national funding formula and high needs technical briefing does say that we want ultimately to get to direct funding. Many local authorities are moving their local funding formula ever closer to the approach taken in the national funding formula.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

I saw a tweet to the Minister earlier this morning saying that one man’s error is another man’s total cock-up—I do not know whether that is technical language, Mr Speaker. The fact of the matter is that he is the longest-serving Minister in any Department in any Government for many years, and on his watch we have seen the demoralisation of the education sector in our country, with good people leaving. It is the Gibb factor. Why does he not resign and talk to people?

Higher Education Reform

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Monday 17th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Gillian Keegan]

I agree with my hon. Friend and I am proud of our university sector. It is much admired all over the world, but we must ensure that specific courses in all institutions offer the quality that people expect. When people invest in these degrees they will come out with £40,000 or £50,000 of debt, and it is important first that they know that, and secondly that they know what they are investing in, and what return they will get on that investment.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

May I beg the Secretary of State not to throw the baby out with the bath water? Everybody wants good-quality degrees, and we all want degrees to lead to good, fulfilling occupations, but some of us are worried about the comments that were made in an interview this morning by the Secretary of State’s ministerial colleague that we have four or five of the best universities in the world, as if all the other 120 universities were rubbish. That is not the case. We have diverse universities and great courses. I ask her please not to throw the baby out with the bath water and do great damage to our higher education system.

[Gillian Keegan]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. We have an excellent university system with excellent universities. Four out of the top 10 are world-class, but if we broaden that to the top 100, many others would appear in that list. We have a good university sector, which is why it is most important that we protect the brand image. It is also very popular abroad, and every year more than 600,000 students choose to come here, which is more than to almost every other country in the world. Why? It is because they know they will get quality, and it is very important for the sector that that quality is maintained.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Monday 17th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Gillian Keegan]

I am happy to meet the hon. Gentleman. As he will know, I always have a laser-like focus on quality, and if the quality is not good enough then I will not release the apprenticeship, the apprenticeship standard or the T-level. Too often we have had low-quality qualifications in this country, and it is important that we work with a vast array of businesses to ensure that we get the quality system that they demand and that will be good for all our young people.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

May I beg the Minister to pay attention to the fact that good apprenticeships and good training in any town and city must come from a blend of good universities—I think most of our universities are good—with local further education colleges? Will she take a leaf out of Tony Blair’s book, when he said in a recent important speech that what we need is more high-class universities and more polytechnics made up from the new former FE colleges?

[Gillian Keegan]

As usual, we are ahead of the Opposition. We have already invested in 21 institutes of technology, which are where a group of colleges and universities work with employers in the area. They are a great addition to the landscape, along with all the other technical qualifications and skills training that we have introduced since 2010.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Monday 27th February 2023 Commons Chamber

[Robert Halfon]

We have to be fair to students and fair to the taxpayer. Many people do not go to university but pay their taxes. We have increased to £276 million—a £15 million increase—the money given to the Office for Students from which universities can draw down to help students who face financial difficulties. We have frozen the loan—in 2025, it will not have had an increase for seven years. Students who face difficulties can also get bursaries from universities.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

I, too, am mourning Betty’s death today. We were friends even before I got into Parliament. What a feisty woman, right to the end. Were it not for her, you would probably still be wearing a wig, Mr Speaker. [Interruption.] I know that is your own hair, Mr Speaker.

I think the Minister is being entirely complacent. A huge number of young people in our country, when little children, are identified as clever, bright and really intelligent at primary school, up to the age of 11, but when they get to big school they disappear and do not achieve very much. Why is that, and why have this Government done so little to rectify it since 2011?

[Robert Halfon]

I do not accept the hon. Gentleman’s narrative. In my area of skills, more than 5 million apprenticeships have started since 2010. Over the past decade we have invested in skills in a way that we never had before—over £3.8 billion. We have massively improved our schools, and I think 88% are now rated good or outstanding. We have a narrative in which we are delivering on education and skills. I completely reject what he said.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

And now, a short question from Barry Sheerman. [Laughter.]

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Secretary of State agree that early years stimulation is vital? When will she do something about bringing back children’s centres and Sure Start?

[Gillian Keegan]

I will do even better than that. We are introducing family hubs, which have a lot more utility and will be much more useful to those who need them.

Lifelong Learning (Higher Education Fee Limits) Bill

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 27th February 2023 Commons Chamber

[David Johnston]

I completely agree with my right hon. Friend. Part of the reason why that has happened is that young people feel, “I’m making an investment here. I’m paying £9,000 a year. I’m not doing that for you to give me a 2:2 or a third at the end of it.” There has therefore been this pressure on universities—often, unfortunately, with the threat of legal action from parents who can afford it—to inflate the grades people are given. This is another unintended consequence.

People will say, “Look, it’s not just about the money you can earn after your degree,” and that is the case, but because we as individuals are making that investment at that age, we understandably want to see an impact on our earnings. However, another problem is that lots of people will never pay back the money they have borrowed, and that is a huge liability for the taxpayer. Some taxpayers have been to university themselves, and some have not, but they will all incur this cost. We lend money to people to go to university, but if they do not earn enough to be able to pay it back, the taxpayer will not get a return on that investment. At the moment, we are on course for only a quarter of people to fully pay back their student loans. That is a huge amount that the taxpayer is investing unnecessarily in something that I hope we will change through this Bill.

As has been touched on, it is also the case that the three-year, full-time model for people aged 18 does not suit every young person. Lots of the young people I used to work with at the charities I ran had caring responsibilities, either for younger siblings or ill relatives. Perhaps a member of their family had unfortunately died, and those young people therefore had greater responsibilities, or they needed to work alongside study in order to supplement the family income. As such, again, we need greater flexibility, and that is before we come on to the technological change that we are expecting. We will see some of the most radical technological change that the country has ever known, and lots of the jobs that we train people for today will become obsolete. A person might make a decision at 18 about the particular course they want to study for a particular job, and in 20 years find that that job is obsolete and that they need to retrain for something else. That is why the Bill will be so important.

As an aside, lots of jobs should not need a degree anyway—we have slipped with the 50% target, I am afraid. In order to make the lives of employers easier, we have applied a higher and higher degree threshold to weed out people when we make selection decisions. If everybody has a degree, we end up starting to ask for master’s degrees, so we have entry inflation, not just grade inflation. Above all, that target has contributed to the disparity of esteem between academic and vocational courses. As has been touched on, this is a limited, smallish Bill, so giving people the equivalent of £37,000 in today’s money to enable them to train themselves across their lifetime, at some point in the future when they decide that they need to study for qualifications that they do not yet have, is so important for what we are trying to do: create that parity of esteem.

The Bill will promote lifelong and modular learning, and set limits on course and module fees based on credits. It will also achieve subtle things. Going back to the point about the whole system being geared towards one particular model, changing from an academic year to a course year is hugely important, because when everything is geared towards academics, we are continually reinforcing the message that the academic model is the only one for people.

We know that lifelong learning has a huge number of benefits. We know it will help with earnings; for some considerable time only about one in eight of the people who are in low pay have escaped that low pay a decade later. That has been true for decades, and part of that is about progression. By the way, that is partly the job of employers —they need to have good strategies for progression —but it is also about allowing adults to train in things they are not able to do, so that they can get more skills and therefore get more money.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

I came into the Chamber after the hon. Gentleman had started his very good speech, so I hope he will forgive me. Is he trying to reinvent the individual learning accounts, which were an early attempt by Tony Blair’s Government to create that lifelong pattern of learning and open up opportunities? I was Chair of the Education Committee at the time, and unfortunately that Government found out very quickly that that scheme could be scammed, and it collapsed. Everyone said that the Government should have brought it back, even Mr Deputy Speaker, who used to be one of my students. Even he believed in that scheme, but it has never been resurrected.

[David Johnston]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I am a politician, so I would never try to reinvent the wheel, but I think what we are trying to do in this Bill is learn from some of the problems that the Government at the time had with that situation, because lifelong learning is so important and people will need to retrain. People cycle in and out of work, and we will need to train people for jobs that none of us has even considered. Developed economies such as ours are historically bad at retraining people for new technology—it is not just a UK problem; it is a US problem too. All the developed economies find that difficult, so the Bill is an important way in which we can help people. That is before we consider the health and wellbeing advantages of lifelong learning, which are also well documented.

The Bill is set in the context of a couple of problems with which my right hon. Friend the Minister for Skills, Apprenticeships and Higher Education is familiar. One is access. It is still the case that access to certain universities is not what it should be. Disadvantaged young people find it difficult to get into certain universities, and we have to make better progress on that—some universities are still dominated by those from private schools, and that matters for everything we are training people for—and ditto the situation with international students. Some universities have made much better progress on getting international students rather than low-income students. They do that because it gives them a lot more money, but universities need to be making a good contribution to social mobility at home.

With this lifelong learning entitlement, I hope the Minister will, as with everything else, be applying two tests. First, what are the outcomes for people who undertake certain courses? I am agnostic about whether it is level 4 or level 8 and whether it is academic or vocational; the thing I care about most is whether the course helps someone get a better outcome than they otherwise would have had if they had not done that qualification. That unfortunately has not been the case with lots of the university courses that people have done at 18. The second test is simply this: do disadvantaged young people or older people who have been disadvantaged get their fair share of the courses that will really help them to have those better outcomes? Across degrees and apprenticeships, too often it is the most affluent and the most privileged who take most of the spaces on the things that will give the best outcomes. All that being said, this is an important Bill that is trying to get us to that parity of esteem, and I am very pleased to support it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Monday 16th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Robert Halfon]

My hon. Friend is an FE champion; I welcome his question. He will be pleased to know that we are investing in resources, increasing skills funding by £3.8 billion over the Parliament, investing in quality qualifications such as T-levels, higher technical qualifications, free level 3 courses, bootcamps and apprenticeships. We are also investing in infrastructure, rolling out 21 institutes of technology, spending £290 million.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Come on, my old friend—the Minister can do better than that. The fact of the matter is that further education is still a Cinderella service. When will he wake up to the fact that we desperately need more skilled people in our country and that the FE sector is the one area where we could do real investment that would pay back quickly? I like the Minister a lot—we are old friends—and urge him to get his act together and put some real heft into further education.

[Robert Halfon]

The hon. Gentleman describes FE as a Cinderella service, but I remind him that Cinderella became a member of the royal family and it is this Government who are banishing the two ugly sisters of under-resourcing and snobbery about further education and skills. As I said in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous), we are investing £3.8 billion extra in skills in this Parliament and £1.6 billion extra for FE, increasing the number of hours of learning for students. I am proud of the Government’s approach to further education and skills.