Oral Answers to Questions

Dan Poulter Excerpts

Monday 15th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Edward Timpson]

I welcome the hon. Gentleman back to his post. He and I have an interesting electoral history, but I see he managed to increase his majority at the last election, so he is doing better in his own constituency than he managed in Crewe and Nantwich in 2008.

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. We have an array of extremely competent, professional and dedicated voluntary adoption agencies across England and the wider United Kingdom, and we need to ensure that they are fully part of the new adoption landscape that we are creating. I made that point when I spoke at the Consortium of Voluntary Adoption Agencies conference only last week. We will make sure that they are central to the vision going forward.

[Dr Daniel Poulter (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) (Con)]

8. What steps her Department is taking to raise educational standards in failing schools.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Nicky Morgan)]

At the heart of the Government’s commitment to delivering social justice is the belief that every child deserves an excellent education and that no parent should be content with their child spending a single day at a failing school. The Education and Adoption Bill introduces new measures to tackle failure by speeding up the process for converting failing schools into sponsored academies. It also includes measures to tackle coasting schools for the first time. This will speed up the process by which the worst schools are transformed in order to bring about rapid and sustainable improvements.

[Dr Poulter]

Suffolk county council has rightly identified education and improving educational standards as its top priority. With 80 schools in the county requiring improvement or rated “inadequate”, with what specific support can my right hon. Friend provide the council in order to raise educational standards?

[Nicky Morgan]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and pay tribute to his work as a Health Department Minister in the past two and a half years.

Like my hon. Friend, the Government want every child in Suffolk and throughout the country to receive an excellent education. The regional schools commissioner, Tim Coulson, is in regular dialogue with Suffolk County Council, and the Department is offering support, including introducing five new strong academy sponsors, encouraging the local authority to use its intervention powers, and making Suffolk a priority for national programmes such as Talented Leaders and Teach First. I hope my hon. Friend will support those measures.