Tutoring Provision

Catherine McKinnell Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2024 Westminster Hall

[Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mrs Cummins. I thank the hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) for bringing forward this debate on tutoring provision, and all hon. Members who have spoken very passionately on behalf of the children, families and school communities they represent here in Parliament.

I think we all agree that the scale of the challenge that many of our children and young people are currently facing is immense. We know that children and families have really struggled with the combined impact of years of reduced investment in our public services, compounded by the impact of the pandemic. Indeed, the attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and their peers, which many have mentioned, has widened across all educational phases since 2019, so any limited progress made in the decade before was wiped out in a couple of years. The hon. Member for Twickenham also highlighted that issue.

We know that what happens outside the school gates reinforces the impact of what happens inside them. With the rising levels of child poverty, the cuts to youth services in communities and the dwindling support for children with additional needs, schools are increasingly becoming the frontline, with teachers having to buy food with their own money and wash clothes for families, and the increasing challenge of mental health issues.

It has now been four years since the enormous disruption and lost learning experienced by so many children began during covid. What was most concerning at that time was the lack of planning for children and for the inevitable impacts: no plan for learning from home in the early days; no plan for ensuring that all children had the equipment they needed; no plan for schools, teachers, or how to support children afterwards. So when the classrooms finally reopened after covid, it was not surprising to anyone that children found it hard to adjust. They had had little socialisation or interaction, and some had received barely any education at all.

I saw the impact on my own children. My youngest had only just started school when he found himself back at home being taught by two parents who had no teaching experience, two other children to try to teach and support, and two full-time jobs that they had to undertake from home. It was an incredibly challenging time for families everywhere, and in far too many households, particularly where less support was available, children paid a very heavy price. Kevan Collins was therefore commissioned by the Government to set out a long-term recovery plan for our children, but the Prime Minister, who was then Chancellor, opted out: he was simply not willing to make that investment in other people’s children. Our country continues to pay a very heavy price for the decision he took then, and it will for some time to come.

The National Audit Office reported last year:

“Disruption to schooling during the COVID-19 pandemic led to lost learning for many pupils, particularly disadvantaged children.”

It also reported:

“Left unaddressed, lost learning may lead to increased disadvantage and significant missing future earnings for those affected.”

As a key measure to address that, the Government introduced the national tutoring programme, which was initially provided through tuition partners. As hon. Members have noted, there were many missteps, from a very low uptake at the start to schools struggling to find the tutors they needed to deliver the support, but as the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) highlighted, once the Government introduced the school-led tutoring element in September 2021, there was some success and take-up was higher.

Evidence gathered by the National Foundation for Educational Research showed that increasing the number of tuition hours

“led to better outcomes in maths and English.”

Crucially, however, the foundation noted:

“Less than half of pupils selected for tutoring were from disadvantaged backgrounds.”

As the match-funding requirements kicked in and Government funding went from 75% to 50%, schools that were trying to make the scheme work and that needed it the most found it ever more difficult to deliver. This year, many schools, especially those in the poorest areas, have used up almost all of their pupil premium and recovery premium funding to pay for tutors, leaving them little to pay for other interventions such as enrichment or training. Indeed, the benefits of the scheme risked being undermined by the way it was delivered because it was poorly targeted, so lots of children who needed the support the most were not able to benefit from it.

Tutoring was not mentioned in the Budget earlier this month, so it seems that the national tutoring programme is coming to an end. Just a few months ago, the then Schools Minister, the right hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb), stated:

“The Department has committed that, from the 2023/24 academic year, tutoring will have been embedded across schools in England.”

However, without a specific budget for tuition, it is assumed that schools will need to use their main budgets to fund that support.

[The Minister for Schools (Damian Hinds)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Catherine McKinnell]

I will just finish my point.

As I was saying, it is assumed that schools will need to use their main budgets to fund tuition support, absorbing the costs into what is already a shrinking pot. It would therefore be helpful if the Minister set out the Government’s vision of the national tutoring programme in the future. I was going to ask if he could do so in his response to this debate, but he is welcome to make an intervention now.

[Damian Hinds]

I will speak in a moment. I just wondered whether the hon. Lady is committing, in the event of her party coming into government, to having a separate line item for the tutoring programme over and above core school budgets.

[Catherine McKinnell]

The question that I am putting to the Government is how they envisage the future of the national tutoring programme. I would be grateful if the Government set out their vision. I will respond to the right hon. Gentleman’s point, as I deal with it in my speech—

[Damian Hinds]

It will not be long until there is a general election. We do not know exactly when, but there will be a general election at some point in the months to come. If the hon. Lady is saying that she thinks the Government’s course of action is a mistake, I am interested in hearing the alternative that she is setting out.

--- Later in debate ---

[Catherine McKinnell]

As I said, I am really interested to hear what the Government’s vision is. Given that they have committed to ensuring that tutoring is embedded within the national school system, what is their plan for ensuring that that happens? We will inherit that plan from them, so I am very keen to hear the Minister’s response to my question. I will set out Labour’s costed plans in detail, but I am interested to hear how the Government will deliver on their pledge to ensure that tutoring is embedded within the national school system.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies has found that schools funding in England is already not increasing as fast as the cost pressures schools are facing. That means that the poorest schools are likely to struggle the most to find the cash for tutoring, and that our most disadvantaged pupils will miss out. With access to tutoring seemingly diminishing, what is the Minister’s plan for children to recover the learning they lost, which they have still not recovered from? I appreciate that he would like to move these issues on to the next Labour Government to solve, but given that this Government are currently in charge, I am sure that, like me, listeners to the debate are interested in hearing what this Government’s plans are.

In government, Labour will consider how more tailored support could be most effectively delivered to ensure that children achieve what they need to in school. Crucially, we will look at introducing a range of measures to ensure that we close the attainment gap. We know that children’s speech and language have really suffered since the pandemic, which has the potential to affect their educational attainment in the much longer term, so Labour has pledged to equip every school with the funding to deliver evidence-based early language interventions to tackle the problem.

We understand that quality teaching is key to unlocking children’s potential, so we would use the funding available from ending the tax breaks currently enjoyed by private schools to hire 6,500 more teachers in our state schools, giving every child the teachers they need to benefit from a quality education.

[Jonathan Gullis]

It is a totally noble aim to bring more teachers into the system. Of course, the Government do an extensive work by providing grants for people taking specific courses; in some cases—science, for example, these are worth up to £20,000. What specifically is Labour’s plan for recruitment of new teachers that the current Government are not doing? I have previously asked shadow Ministers similar questions, because I genuinely want to understand what will be done differently by Labour, bearing in mind that this Government are giving out tens of thousands of pounds to people simply for turning up to the training course, let alone then staying on, with the levelling-up bonus payments in education investment areas. I am keen to hear what the Labour plan looks like.

[Catherine McKinnell]

I appreciate the sincerity of the hon. Member’s wish to talk about the challenge in recruitment and retention. Clearly, it is related to this debate today, in the sense that if we had all the teachers we need, would we need a national tutoring programme? Labour has set out quite detailed plans about how we will go about resolving the teacher recruitment and retention crisis, and we continue to have conversations with the sector to ensure that the money in the current spending envelope for bursaries and incentives is spent as effectively as possible, because clearly there is a problem. The Government are seriously missing their recruitment targets. We have a range of measures, but I do not think it would be appropriate to go into the detail that the hon. Member wants me to go into today. However, I recognise the sincerity of his challenge in that regard and his recognition of the challenge, and Labour is absolutely determined to meet it.

We know that children’s mental health is a huge challenge, so we will put a specialist mental health professional in every school and ensure that young people have access to early support. We will also invest in mental health hubs to ensure that young people can access mental health support where they most need it. We will offer free breakfast clubs in every primary school, to ensure that children have a softer start to the school day and the opportunity to learn, play and socialise. The evidence is clear that such clubs increase attainment and attendance; they will also put money back in parents’ pockets and ensure a start to the school day that can help parents to get to work.

We recognise that there is no one fix, given the level of challenge in our system, but we will focus not only on taking a more targeted approach, so that children who need additional support the most get it, but on making sure that there is a wider network of support for every school community. That network will ensure that every child has the best chance of having the best start in life.

This is all about Labour’s mission to break down the barriers to opportunity and to ensure that every child gets the firm foundation and high-quality education that sets them up for life. Because education is a priority for us, as it has been for every Labour Government, we will put it back at the centre of national life. We will prioritise our children, schools and families once again.