Chris Skidmore
Main Page: Chris Skidmore (Conservative - Kingswood)Department Debates - View all Chris Skidmore's debates with the Department for Education
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Chris Skidmore (Kingswood) (Con)
I want to take the Minister and all hon. Members here in their minds to a road in my constituency—Soundwell road. The east side of the road is in King’s Chase ward in South Gloucestershire council, and is one of the 10% most deprived wards according to the lower layer super output area indices. To the west is the city of Bristol, which includes wards in that local authority, such as Clifton and Stoke Bishop, which are in the top 10% of local super output areas. Yet funding for a pupil on one side of Soundwell road in South Gloucestershire council is £4,487, but for a pupil on the other side of the road it is £5,469. That differential is £982. As hon. Members have said, the differential is growing. Three years ago it was only £468.
Who are the Government, and who are we to suggest that a pupil in leafy, wealthier areas such as Stoke Bishop and Clifton are worth nearly £1,000 more than pupils in areas such as Cadbury Heath and Kingswood, which are within the bottom 5% of lower layer super output areas? Such areas and indices of multiple deprivation have been brought up because they are important. We are formulating funding on a local authority basis, but we now have the data and ability to differentiate between individual pupils in a way that we could not 20 years ago, or even 10 years ago. We have the tools to go beyond even free school meals. As my hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen) said, although the Government’s proposals for a pupil premium are fantastic, free school meals are an inexact science.
There is an issue with our welfare reforms because many pupils who receive free school meals have parents on benefits. Understandably, that will probably decline as our welfare reforms progress. We have the data, and the ability to ensure, for the first time, that we differentiate genuinely deprived areas. We do not want anyone to miss out, and we don’t want an attack on deprived areas. We have the ability to pinpoint deprived areas, even within postcodes. I am sure that, although it may be difficult, the Department can do so, and I encourage it to do so. In places such as the Soundwell road—all hon. Members will know of similar roads between local authorities where there is a differential—we have the equivalent of an educational Berlin wall. To paraphrase Ronald Reagan, I say to the Minister, “Tear down that wall!”