Support for Left-Behind Children

David Simmonds Excerpts

Tuesday 7th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)]

The variations in school level funding and funding by local authority area have a history in this place that is older than the corn laws, but I commend Ministers in the Department for their progress in making more transparent the national funding formula, represented in these estimates, and bringing about an approach to levelling up the amount of funding that we may see at individual school level. However, the progress that we have seen in the past decade around school standards needs to be set against a legitimate concern about children in those parts of the system who will not be familiar to most mums and dads: those children who are excluded; those who are in alternative provision; those at the more complex end of special educational needs and disabilities; those in alternative education; and, as the Department will know, those who are in unlawfully run schools. These are very small numbers, but they are very important to our society. I urge some consideration for how these funds are distributed and allocated, as this is a crucial issue for the most vulnerable.

We have heard about a school funding crisis, but for the past year for which audited figures are available, the cumulative total of all school deficits in England was £233 million, and the cumulative total of school surpluses in England was in excess of £1.7 billion. The challenge is to ensure that the money that is in the system gets to the children who need it most. That task is done at local level by schools forums—the schools-led bodies that make decisions about the local funding formula. However, there is a tendency, as the Minister will be aware, for the voice of big secondary schools to dominate. I invite him, therefore, to consider how, in the context of schools forum decision making, we might see a stronger voice for early years, alternative provision and SEND schools, particularly as Department for Education figures show that across the country 40% of primary schools, 46% of special schools and 34% of secondary schools have budget surpluses that are deemed to be excessive.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is probably one of the finest minds on the Education Committee and on education in general. May I urge him to tell us more about how early targeted intervention for those at risk of being excluded, rather than intervening after they have been excluded, results not only in a huge cost saving but in better long-term outcomes for those young people?

[David Simmonds]

My hon. Friend makes a crucial point, and I know that this is very much front and centre of the Government’s thinking on how we deploy educational resources. In the special estimates, Ministers will spell out in a lot more detail how the recently announced money for the catch-up premium, among other things, is to be distributed.

It is fundamental, in respect of these most vulnerable children, that we consider how the wider system operates, because it is the system that this House is responsible for. There is a risk, when we look at the funding formula, that we prioritise institutional interests, because it is great to be able to point to high-performing schools and outstanding school leaders, but we need to think about the wider context of those children whom institutions are sometimes not so well able to support. This House has, since the Education Act 1944 onwards, passed legislation mandating that every local authority in the country has duties and obligations to support every child. On the whole, local authorities are good at that, and I invite my right hon. Friend the Minister to consider the lessons that might be learned from the operation of our virtual schools. Thanks to the interventions of local authorities—this goes back to what my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) said about identifying the most vulnerable early on—children who are in the care system now have the best school attendance of any category of children, whereas they formerly had the worst. That is an example of getting ahead of a problem and ensuring that those vulnerable children have access.

However, there is an issue around special educational needs and disabilities, which has rightly been highlighted by several Members. The education and healthcare plan—a visionary way of approaching meeting the needs of those vulnerable children—has a significant accountability gap, in that the local authority is responsible for issuing it but it is dependent on the actions of independent players, particularly schools and the NHS. Again, I invite my right hon. Friend when he responds later to consider how we might make that accountability more vigorous.

In conclusion, this is part of a much bigger picture, which the House will be able to debate. Children do not live simply in the context of the world of the Department for Education. The spend of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Treasury on things such as tax-free childcare is fundamental, but this is a Parliament focused on levelling up opportunity and outcomes for every child, and it is for this House to ensure that we pay robust attention to the whole system that supports every child, not just to the institutional interests of schools.