Oral Answers to Questions

David Ward Excerpts

Thursday 17th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We have now learned more about post boxes and the Minister’s travel plans and personal interests, for which we are grateful.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

21. What his Department’s strategy for employment growth is for areas that have a high proportion of public sector employment.

[The Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills (Vince Cable)]

The Government’s overriding economic policy objective is to bring about strong, balanced and sustainable growth. The growth review will support private sector growth, providing jobs to people released from the public sector. The regional growth fund will focus on providing financial support to areas with weak private sectors, and we will announce the first allocation of funds shortly.

[Mr Ward]

I thank the Secretary of State for that answer. If the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills is the Department of growth, then the Department for Communities and Local Government must be the Department for cuts. If we treat communities—or individuals—who are unequal as equal, we reinforce inequality. I welcome many of the measures that have been announced, but they are national measures. Are any special measures in place for communities that suffered from the front-loading of the cuts as a result of the local government settlement?

[Vince Cable]

I know that my hon. Friend has worked extremely hard for the community he represents, which is a deprived area with relatively high unemployment. We would hope that specific tailored measures will come from the Leeds city region local enterprise partnership, which covers that area. The funding announcement on the regional growth fund is imminent, and it is often forgotten that, as a result of our negotiations with the banks, the business growth fund has an additional £2.5 billion, which will support private sector development across the country, including in my hon. Friend’s area.

Building Schools for the Future

David Ward Excerpts

Monday 14th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Gentleman, along with the hon. Member for Coventry North West (Mr Robinson), met me last summer to make the case for Coventry, and he did so very effectively. I appreciate that a number of schools in Coventry need investment at some point in the future and have suffered as a result of the way in which the BSF timetable has operated. We hope that the James review of the allocation of capital will be published shortly—as I said, some of the pilot projects have shown that there is significant scope for savings—but naturally I want to make sure, as part of this process, that we can receive the submissions from the local authorities cited in this case.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

Under phase 3 of BSF, 19 school projects in Bradford were frozen. I am sure that the Secretary of State will agree that it was a cruel deceit to sign off phase 3 just before the general election when there was no money available to build those schools. However, is it not also cruel to spend new capital money on free schools before we first meet the needs of the schools tied up in BSF?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes a balanced point. The point I would make about free schools is that in the work that we have done so far, we have established that we can cut significantly—by up to 50%—the costs of providing school places. There is a proposal for at least one free school in Bradford, and it will be considerably cheaper than BSF schools. I hope that he will work with me to ensure that all new schools that are built—whether free, maintained or academy—are value for money and admit students on the basis of social justice and equality for all.

Education Maintenance Allowance

David Ward Excerpts

Wednesday 19th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

I thank the Labour party for initiating the debate. It is certainly a subject that warrants a debate. Between the wild statements that have at times been made by Members on both sides of the House, some useful points have come out, and they needed to.

I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) for the work he has been doing. I may be privileged to know some of that more than others, but a lot more work still needs to be done, and I hope that he will come to Bradford and talk to us about the implications of the withdrawal of the education maintenance allowance. There is a lot more work to do, but my right hon. Friend has done enough for me for now. However, my continued support for his work is dependent on the success with which he deals with concerns that I and many hon. Members have about the proposals. The Labour motion is tempting, but it fails to recognise that although EMA has played a valuable role in supporting young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, it is very costly.

[Karl Turner]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Ward]

No, I will keep going. With or without a national economic crisis, the operation of EMA is far from perfect. Although they are not in the amendment to the motion, I welcome the comments that have been made on this side of the House about looking at whatever replaces EMA. The Labour motion mentions a rethink of the decision. Had it included a review of EMA, I probably would have supported it. We must look at the scheme and its weaknesses. I thank all those who have campaigned against the withdrawal of EMA, who have undoubtedly made a difference. I did not need convincing that a well thought through and adequately funded replacement was necessary.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Ward]

No, I will keep going. I hope that we all start from the same standpoint: that we have made a social contract with young people and their parents to provide free education for those who want it up to the age of 18. When young people must decide at 16 what to do with the next couple of years of their life, the continuing benefit from that social contract is not available equally to everyone. I think we can also agree that as far as possible we want that decision to be completely unfettered by financial limitations. In plain English, I am sure we all agree that the respective costs, whether for apprenticeships, school, college or for going into employment, should not be allowed to distort and unduly influence the decision-making process.

For those families that are sufficiently well off to be able to keep their child at school or college for a further couple of years, it is a straightforward options analysis: what is best for their son or daughter, what do they want to do with the rest of their lives and what are the local employment opportunities. For youngsters from low-income families, however, the options appraisal is often constrained because they cannot afford to stay in education without EMA.

We have been told that 88% of young people from low-income families would stay on in education without EMA and that it is a dead-weight calculation. On that principle, if the Secretary of State was willing to do his job for two thirds of the salary, would that be a dead-weight? If people are still going to provide some food for their children when they go to school, does that mean that free schools meals are a dead-weight cost? There are so many ways one can look at that concept. I think the proposal shows, more than anything else, a failure to understand that it is not about EMA being so important in getting young people into a situation in which they can do what they want, but the experience of the people who would say, “Yes, we would do it even if it was not available.”

Young people from low-income families might face a more serious decision. Affluent families will say, “We’ll put our kids through another two years of education, which might mean we go to Tenerife for 10 days rather than 14, or replace the car after four years instead of three.” However, for many families that decision is about food and clothing, or whether to send the eldest or youngest child to college because they cannot afford to send both.

Is that over-egging the pudding? In Bradford, 9,000 people receive EMA, 90% of whom receive the top rate, which means that they come from families that earn less than £21,000. We have already decided that anyone who earns less than that should not pay a penny off the student loan as a graduate, and that is not for households, but for individuals. So why are we not really looking at the consequences of the decision we are making on EMA? We need a thorough review. I welcome the work being done, but it must go much further if we are truly to support the new scheme, not only in terms of the content but with regard to the funds available.

Funding and Schools Reform

David Ward Excerpts

Wednesday 17th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am conscious that many Back Benchers, on both sides of the House, wish to contribute. I am also aware that the Opposition motion asks us all, but particularly the Government, to

“work with families, teachers and communities to deliver improved standards of learning and teaching in all local schools.”

But how? Nothing in what the shadow Secretary of State said today, what he said in his speech to the Association of Directors of Children’s Services or what he has said in any interview that he has given constitutes a new or fresh, radical or reforming idea to improve our education system. What do the Opposition offer? How are they going to work with schools, local authorities and parents to improve education? Are they just going to hold hands and sing “Kum ba ya”? Are they going to close their eyes and wish really hard? Are they going to cross their fingers and hope that Tinkerbell will somehow magic a better education system into place? Why can the Opposition not give us a single solid idea for reforming our schools system? It is because they have abandoned reform and instead prefer the opportunism of opposition.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

Now will the Secretary of State answer the question: is it £2.5 billion on top of cash balances or is it £2.5 billion in real terms on top of what schools are now receiving?

Oral Answers to Questions

David Ward Excerpts

Monday 15th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hayes]

In my ministerial role, I have conversations all the time with head teachers and college principals. What I know—I am sorry that the hon. Lady does not know this, because she cares about these things deeply—is that such people are almost always best placed to make the sensitive judgments about learners that she describes.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

I note the confidence of the Minister’s response about the replacement for EMA, but if that replacement—be it the enhanced learner support fund or whatever—proves inadequate, will he commit himself to reintroducing EMA for children from the poorest backgrounds?

[Mr Hayes]

The hon. Gentleman, again, shares my profound concern for social mobility and social justice. He can be assured that the Government will take the necessary steps to make sure that disadvantaged learners get every help to fulfil their potential. That is at the heart of our mission.

Academies Bill [Lords]

David Ward Excerpts

Monday 26th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Percy]

My hon. Friend makes that point better than I could. That is precisely why I am making the point today that governing bodies are not full of educational asset strippers. They consist of people who care deeply about their schools and communities and who will not change the governance arrangements of their school without proper consultation with parents, pupils and the wider community. We should pay respect to the people who serve as governors. They are dedicated individuals who understand their responsibilities full well, and they will not proceed without proper consultation.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

There seems to be a view that a particular school serves a community, but in many areas the reality is that it serves different communities. A catchment area will include a range of different communities, not all of which might be represented on the governing body.

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[Vernon Coaker]

I make a prediction to the right hon. Gentleman and to some of the hon. Members on the Government Benches who are saying “Hear, hear”. I predict that the Government will produce amendments in the Bill that they are introducing in the autumn to clarify the situation and that hon. Members will, at some point, be writing to the Minister asking whether he could intervene in respect of particular schools in their community where it looks as though the consultation has not taken place and other schools start complaining about the schools that have been fast-tracked to academy status. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, because he has been here longer than I have, when we legislate in this House, we do so in a way that lays out the process that we expect to be followed in order for a process to happen. The process in this Bill is confused, and people do not know what it is supposed to be. He knows as well as I do that confused legislation provides the opportunity for judicial review. All I am saying is that the fact that this reference is not in the Bill is astonishing.

[Mr Ward]

I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman is as concerned as I am about the proposals on consulting parents. Unless we receive some advice to the contrary, it appears that under clause 1(6)(d) up to 49% of the pupils in a new school do not have to be

“drawn from the area in which the school is situated.”

[Vernon Coaker]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right about that. Of course what Lord Hill said in another place was that if we were to consider the grammar schools that become academies, we might find that that area is significantly broader. What that “area” meant was very difficult to define.

My hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), the former Chair of the Select Committee, drew attention to the fact that the Government are not averse to ballots because they have introduced them for local planning decisions. Of course, the Minister will know, as we heard in the statement that took place before our discussions in Committee started today, the Government are introducing ballots for locally elected police commissioners. The principle of ballots, such as that proposed by the hon. Member for Southport (Dr Pugh), is something to which the Government are not opposed.

We think that we should lay out the details that are set out in amendment 78 rather simply leaving it to people to do what is appropriate. Parents should be consulted and, as many people have said, it is essential that the pupil voice should be heard. In answer to an earlier question from a Member on the Government Benches, of course that would be done in a way that is appropriate. The amendment refers to guidance that should be given to schools on how they should consult pupils.

What are the teachers and non-teaching staff going to come back to in September? The Minister needs to answer the question about what is happening with the TUPE negotiations about the transfer of teaching and non-teaching staff for those schools that want to become academies.

Academies Bill [Lords]

David Ward Excerpts

Thursday 22nd July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Vernon Coaker]

I was not trying to suggest that PFI was a panacea for all ills, and I know that it has sometimes led to problems. I was merely suggesting that it was one of the options that had allowed some local authorities to build new schools that might not have been built otherwise.

I was going to deal with the question of what will happen if a school fails, but the hon. Gentleman has made the point well enough to save me the trouble of making it myself. I entirely agree with him. As we discovered yesterday, one of the main drawbacks of the Bill is the huge amount of detail that it contains. In relation to one clause, we were told not to worry because a committee—I cannot remember what it was called—would be set up to examine all the issues that had been raised, as the Government did not know the answers yet. We as a Parliament, however, are being asked to pass the Bill.

Some of the problems with the Bill were illustrated very effectively by the comments of the hon. Member for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock), and other Members will doubtless make similar comments later. Moreover—let me make this point again to the Schools Minister—we cannot amend it. We can table amendments, but for a number of reasons the Government do not want it to be amended.

Does the hon. Member for Bradford East (Mr Ward) wish to intervene?

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

I am sorry. I was simply trying to catch Miss P’s eye.

[The Second Deputy Chairman]

I do not think that my name is all that difficult to pronounce. It is Pri-mar-olo. “Dawn” or “Miss P” will not do, I am afraid. I call Mr Coaker.

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[Vernon Coaker]

My hon. Friend makes an extremely good point. I was going to say that what is happening in respect of the Academies Bill is a one-off, but he has pointed out that this happened in respect of the Finance Bill as well. One would hope, however, that it is not a precedent of how other Bills will be dealt with.

I have tabled amendment 70 in order to try to be helpful. The amendment does not say that no capital moneys can be paid to free schools. In fact, it says capital moneys can be paid to free schools, but before that money is paid there has to be the agreement of “local parents and children”, the “local authority” and

“any other persons deemed appropriate.”

I thought that we were all in favour of the new localism and local decision making, and the point of the amendment is to allow the local people and communities along with the local authority to determine whether the capital moneys proposed to be used to set up a free school—that will be agreed by the Secretary of State—should be spent in that way, when it might have been used for the benefit of other schools in, for example, Liverpool, Halton and Luton.

I am trying to be helpful to the Government, therefore. I am saying to the Government, “You establish the free schools—the ‘additional schools’ as the Bill calls them—but if you’re going to take capital moneys away from other schools in the community to establish the free schools, then let’s see whether the local people and the local authority agree.” Given the furore we have seen over the cuts to Building Schools for the Future, with communities throughout the country seeing their new school buildings taken away from them, I wonder what they would say when asked whether they would wish to see their new school buildings sacrificed on the altar of a school experiment that is unproven and supported by no evidence one way or the other. I know why the Government will not accept this amendment, therefore: because they would be frightened of the answer they would get from local communities, who would turn around and say, “We want capital moneys spent for the benefit of the whole community, not for the benefit of a few.”

I have some questions linked to the amendment for the Minister. How many free schools does he expect there will be? How much money does he expect to spend on each free school? What do the changes in the review of capital expenditure actually mean? Are there going to be any regulations or are we going to allow children to go on the 13th floor, let us say? I note that the head of Tesco property offices is one of the advisers to the capital review group, and we will see what happens there. Can the Minister confirm that he expects the first free schools to open in 2011? Does he expect to spend all of the £50 million? Does he expect that to be enough money to develop the 38 schools in September 2011?

While we are talking about Building Schools for the Future, may I also ask the Minister to confirm how many academies have been affected by the BSF cuts? Looking at the list, it appears that while many local authority-maintained schools have had their BSF money stopped, lots of the academies are listed as under review. Will the Minister take this opportunity to explain to us exactly what is happening in that regard?

How much does the Minister expect the free schools to cost not only over the next six months or year, but over the next five years? How much money will the Department for Education be trying to get from the Treasury in the next spending review? What evidence does he have that the moneys to be invested in free schools is a policy worth pursuing and that it is worth taking money from the vast majority of schools to fund what I regard as an educational experiment?

We look forward to hearing the Minister’s response, and the comments of other Members who may also want to contribute to this important debate. At the heart of the debate on all the amendments, including amendment 70, is the fact that there are those of us who wish to try to ensure that opportunity and excellence for all is made a reality in every single community. There is a difference between the Government and the Opposition on this. Sometimes we are characterised as wanting to pull down those who can excel. Far from it: we want all children to achieve, including those who have talents and ability. We want all children to have school buildings of which they can be proud. The amendment before us seeks to ensure that, where the Government want to divert capital moneys from one set of priorities to another, that is done on the basis of local support—the support of local parents and the local authority—and not done at the whim of the Secretary of State.

[Mr Ward]

May I say how much I, as a new boy, have enjoyed the Committee stage and how useful I have found it as a mechanism for at least asking questions and trying to clarify points? Yesterday’s proceedings were long, but very useful to me in trying to understand how this process works.

There is value in this amendment. It is always important to spend public money as wisely as we possibly can. There will be disputes about policy initiatives and priorities, but whatever the priority, we need always to get the best value for the money we spend. If that was ever important, it certainly is now. In the spirit of the Committee, I shall not go into why we are in the difficulties that we are in, but most people accept that we are in a time of great austerity where we face cuts, tax increases and spending decisions that require careful thought.

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[Vernon Coaker]

I tried to make that point at the beginning; otherwise, we would not make any progress. I said that there had been improvements to the Bill and that there would have been improvements in some of the documentation associated with academies. That does not change the fact that, when it comes down to it, the Government are not clear on what the funding arrangements will be, how they will work and the correct balance between centrally provided services and the academies.

As the Chair of the Education Committee asked, where do we draw the line and what is the balance between those issues? The Government have not given us any definition of what they mean by

“low incidence special educational needs or disabilities.”

In Committee, we have to tease out those sorts of issues from the Government, to ensure that the legislation that we pass in this Parliament is as robust and effective as it can be.

[Mr Ward]

May I introduce one other aspect? The discussion is seemingly taking place on the basis that there is an abundant supply of learning support services and professionals. That is simply not the case. In many cases, the authority has to carry out a difficult rationing role. A good example is educational psychologists, of whom there is not an abundant supply. It is worrying that that rationing process, which most local authorities treat in a fair way, may now face a situation in which schools can simply buy in precious resources to the detriment of other schools in the district.

[Vernon Coaker]

That is right. The issue is not only the quantity of support services for children with special educational needs, but their quality. There is also the issue of the effectiveness of some interventions. This big area of debate is no doubt outside the scope of what we are discussing at the moment, but the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right about the provision of quality.

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[Pat Glass]

Yes, it could, and yes, it should. However, as the hon. Member for Bradford East (Mr Ward) said yesterday, sometimes good people do bad things, and head teachers are not always as forward thinking as we would like them to be. Obviously, the best ones are, but if a school does not have any blind children, why would it buy in to a sensory service? It could also argue that, if a child wishes to attend that school, it cannot meet their needs.

[Mr Ward]

I must say this is a fantastic debate. I was not sure of the right time to introduce this point, but it is not always the case that, if a school has its own budget, it will do the best thing by the children. The best example is probably the provision of education social work. It might seem that the school is the client of the education social worker, but of course it is not—the child is the client. Very often, if a school is offered the money, it will buy in its own education social worker, who will be a door knocker for getting those kids into the school. Once a child is on the roll and the school is getting the funding, some schools will say, “Actually, we’re not too bothered if that person doesn’t turn up today.” Believe me, it is true! It happens—because, in many cases, schools are forced into doing it. But the child is the client, and if the best place for the child is in school, the education social worker will try to facilitate that to the best of their ability. However, if that education social worker is employed by the school, sometimes the school will let the child in, but sometimes it will not be too bothered. I have known young children who have been out of school for two years—

[The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. Interventions, by their very nature, should be short.

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[Neil Carmichael]

I certainly do. My hon. Friend is absolutely right that academies’ record in that regard is good so far. We know that because there are more than 200 of them and we can see the provision that is being delivered.

[Mr Ward]

May I follow up on the point that the hon. Member for Kingswood (Chris Skidmore) made? I have heard discussions several times over the past day or two about whether academies are inclusive, both in the number of free school meal pupils that they have and in SEN provision. The point has been made that they have a higher than average proportion of children who get free school meals or SEN provision, because of the communities that they serve. However, the evidence is that over time that proportion goes down. The danger is that because—no, I will sit down, because I am getting into a speech now; I am learning.

[Neil Carmichael]

I am not sure whether it was a speech, but the point is interesting and we should look into it. Of course, the Minister has already promised a Green Paper on the wider issue of SEN, so we should discuss that matter. I thank the hon. Gentleman for a point well made, but I believe that thus far, academies are delivering proper provision.

This matter has already been discussed in the House of Lords, and Baroness Wilkins, in an effective performance, produced two changes to the Bill. One is that the Secretary of State can intervene if special educational needs are not properly provided for. That is a sensible step and a provision that is broadly welcomed.

Academies Bill [Lords]

David Ward Excerpts

Wednesday 21st July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Vernon Coaker]

I totally agree with that.

This has been an excellent debate. May I finish by saying that I think all Members from across the House would agree that when we debate special education, not just special educational needs, and the issue of special schools, we do not pay sufficient tribute to the work of the teachers in special schools? That is the case notwithstanding our difference about whether special schools should become academies. We profoundly disagree with that approach, for some of the reasons that I have set out. It is a leap in the dark and we have no idea where it will end up. However, at least we have had the opportunity to praise special schools, to examine their work and to try to understand this issue. No doubt, the Minister will try, in her response, to allay the Committee’s fears a little more about what this will mean for special schools.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

Just to reinforce an earlier point, may I say that I closed 12 special schools as the relevant education portfolio holder and that many of those schools were an abomination? However, the process also included much more inclusion in mainstream schools and the creation of six brand-new schools, co-located, which was a great positive. That could not have been done without taking a strategic approach across the whole district and that would not have been possible if there had been independent schools within that sector.

[Vernon Coaker]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that point, which relates to the one that I have made. Where is the strategic direction coming from, given the bypassing of the local authority? He will know that the Liberal Democrats’ election manifesto showed that they understood very well that that was a real issue for them. That is why they tried to marry up the issue of the greater freedom for schools with ensuring that the strategic oversight of that was very much incorporated within the local authority framework and was not, in essence, delegated to the Secretary of State and centralised. That is a huge flaw in this model for academies.

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[Vernon Coaker]

Unusually, I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman, because a much tighter form of words in the Bill would ensure that we deliver exactly what he proposes. I believe that the Bill is so drafted because the Government think that the opposition from local authorities and local groups that always emerges to school reorganisation could hold up the progress of the Bill and the attempt to fast-track some schools to academy status. The lawyers will have said, “Put in ‘they think appropriate’, because if you start listing people and groups such as parents and community organisations, you will open yourself up, when trying to convert, to the possibility of legal challenges from parents and organisations saying they were not consulted when they should have been.” To fast-track academies is a policy objective, and I think that Ministers, their officials and their lawyers will have said, “For goodness’ sake, don’t make a list, because it will be a hostage to fortune.” Furthermore, I cannot understand why clause 5(3) includes the phrase

“or after an Academy order”.

[Mr Ward]

The way around that would have been to specify certain obvious consultees and then to add the words “plus others deemed appropriate”.

[Vernon Coaker]

I have tabled an amendment to that effect, as the hon. Gentleman will no doubt have noticed. Other than parents, local authorities are the key group that should be defined, but of course they have been missed out as well.

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The fact that they are at the heart of their communities is their strength, not their weakness.

[Mr Ward]

On the Minister’s defence of the Bill as being of a permissive nature, does he believe we should also have permissive legislation without a full impact assessment to allow everybody to walk around naked, on the basis that they would not have to do it if they did not want to?

[Mr Gibb]

That is an argument taken ad absurdum, and I do not think it is very effective.

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[Dr Pugh]

Speaking for the non-secular wing of the Liberal Democrats, I should like to say a few words about amendment 42. It appears to narrow the range of schools that can become academies. I think that the Roman Catholic Church has cautioned governors against the Bill, which would have a big impact in areas in Merseyside and Lancashire such as the one that I represent. I tire of hearing people in this place make generalisations about faith schools that are based purely on the north London experience. A person does not need to struggle to get into a faith school round where I live.

People may recognise that I have a somewhat diminished enthusiasm for this legislation. The academy project, whether in its Labour or coalition form, does not fill me with any great glee. I regard it as something of a sideshow, as an extravagance—possibly expensive—and as a distraction from improving standards across the board.

It is interesting to note that in his amendment, my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) wants to put into law what the archdiocese commands; I do not know whether that will please him, but that is, in effect, what he is doing. Looking at that amendment, a priori, there is no good argument for not having a faith academy that would not equally apply to not having a faith school. It would therefore seem rather mean to discriminate against faith schools at this time, albeit that I regard it as a boon to faith schools not to be academies.

The real argument against faith schools becoming academies seems to me to be as follows. Contrary to what people say, faith schools are often deeply rooted in their communities, and they should not disregard the disruptive effects on wider local authority provision. They should be mindful always of the community effect. That being said, if a religious community both educated and enhanced specifically religious objectives, it is right, as under the Butler Act, that that should be reflected in some way in the funding agreement. It is not obvious that that is done in the Bill, or that the Blair academy project did that. Equally, having settled for academy status and funding, it would be wrong for a school to adopt faith school status retrospectively; I think that we can agree on that. That, I think, is what amendments 43 and 44 seek to prevent, so compared with amendment 42, they are relatively innocuous.

Another consideration that swings me against amendment 42 is my own experience. Eleven of the best years of my life were spent teaching in a faith comprehensive school in Bootle, in an extraordinarily challenging environment. It was a school with a Salesian foundation, run by the Salesian order. The headmaster was a priest, the ethos was fantastic, the dedication considerable, in a very, very difficult environment. Staff never stinted on their time and the head timetabled himself to teach remedial maths to the fifth year and the upper school. When he stepped down as head, before he finished his career—this was a man who was a very distinguished scientist and writer—he continued to teach remedial maths to children whom many teachers would not give much time to in the first place. I have never seen the like, but it ought not to surprise one when one recognises that that order was founded by someone called St John Bosco, who started his schools in industrial Milan, with the vocation of schooling the deprived and transforming their lives.

I could almost be reconciled—the Minister might be delighted to hear—to the anarchy of free schools if I thought that a lot of St John Boscos and Salesians were ready in the wings, waiting to deal with children in environments where people had given up or were terminally demoralised. Sadly, my overall view is that that is not the case. But the free school project would be almost bearable if there were such people and what they were doing could be aligned with the overall social good of the community, if education could be provided that was not just a cloak for indoctrination and if there was a capacity to manage the full curriculum. Then the free school project would have a really noble basis in reality. Sadly, the people queuing up to start free schools are not in that category and do not, in many cases, turn out to be saints.

[Mr Ward]

We are all fashioned on the anvil of experience, and I bring to this debate my own experience. On Second Reading I mentioned the crucial situation of schools being judged or assessed on their attainment, which is then reflected in league tables. A little earlier the Minister attacked the former Labour Government’s record, saying what a shame it was that all the successful schools were in affluent areas, and was not that an indictment? Of course they are mainly in affluent areas because of the crucial importance of intake and the link, to which I have drawn attention in other speeches elsewhere, between attainment and levels of deprivation. The issue of admissions is at the heart of the Bill for me, more than anything else. Freedoms of the curriculum, freedoms in staffing and control of staffing budgets, I am okay with. I opposed the academies of Labour, and I oppose these academies for the same reasons. There are other ways of bringing about improvements in schools.

What concerns me is my experience over nearly 30 years of what schools actually do. Amendments have been tabled saying that schools must comply with the provisions of the schools admissions code. I know what schools that are already subject to that code do now, and we can understand why. I have mentioned the league tables. Schools want to succeed and to be seen to succeed, and parents want the very best for their children, so wherever possible they go to whatever lengths are needed, legally—moving home—or in some cases, illegally, to get their children into the schools that are doing well in the league tables.

I have often heard of the importance and ethos of faith schools. Frankly, to hear people talk about the special ethos of faith schools makes me quite angry, because it is a slap in the face for all those other non-faith schools that have a fabulous ethos, are loving and caring, and provide a good education for children. It is an indication of the importance of league tables, even to faith schools, that although a faith school might say that it will totally disregard school league tables, that it does not care if it is bottom of the league, that it will open its doors to absolutely everyone and take the children that other schools do not want, it does not do that, because it knows that at the end of the day it will be assessed upon the performance of the school in the league tables, and that is so heavily dependent upon the intake. I have chaired admissions forums. It is very difficult when the area includes faith schools, foundation schools, city technology colleges and so on. In effect, there were six different admission authorities, all appearing at the admissions forum, and it was very difficult to achieve co-ordination on admissions with those schools.

The pressure on schools means that good people do bad things—it is only human nature—and I have countless examples of that. When I chaired the admissions forum, a foundation school applied to change its admissions criteria—we could not stop it doing so—to use stanines and banding. I respected the head teacher, but we argued about it. I was the only one to vote against the change and, as it transpired, we could not really have done anything to stop it. I understand why the head teacher was seeking to overcome the problem of having a catchment area of only 10 or so streets. The Minister talked about successful schools, but this school was in the top 20 for its contextual value-added score of 1,040. That was a remarkable result, but the school was also in the national challenge. That head teacher knew that whatever the school did in raising achievement, it would still have a stubbornly resistant attainment record until it changed its intake, and it therefore went ahead and did so.

I am desperately seeking not just assurances, but guarantees of the fairness of the admissions of these new schools. I am very concerned that the Bill describes the characteristics of schools that may become academies as providing

“education for pupils who are wholly or mainly drawn from the area in which the school is situated.”

My understanding of “wholly or mainly” is that it means more than 50%, so 49% could come from outside the area. Another characteristic is that

“the school provides education for pupils of different abilities”.

That may have been changed, but I thought that we were talking about all abilities.

There are some good aspects of academies, but if they are so good and important why do we not make the freedoms they will have available to all schools? I seek guarantees of fair and open admissions policies and an undertaking that this Bill does not represent the opening of the door to more selection.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

Academies Bill [Lords]

David Ward Excerpts

Monday 19th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am going to hand power back to teachers. There are some teachers, Vernon, like yourself, that I should be a little less reluctant to hand power back to.

The Bill trusts teachers. It marks a big step forward from what happened under the last Government. The last piece of education legislation that Labour tried to bring forward sought to prescribe in excessive detail exactly what should happen in every school, but all the evidence suggests that a greater degree of autonomy and freedom yields results for all pupils. Even before academies, a group of schools—the city technology colleges—was established by my right hon. Friend Lord Baker of Dorking. All of them were comprehensive schools in working-class, challenged or disadvantaged areas. All of them were established independent of local authority control. They are now achieving fantastic results. On average, their GCSE performance involves more than 82% of students getting five good GCSEs, including English and maths, which is at least half as good again as the average level of all schools in the country.

We know that CTCs have been successful. They have been in existence for more than 20 years and are a proven model of how autonomy can work. It was their persuasive work and the evidence of school improvement they generated that prompted Tony Blair, when he was Prime Minister, to go for the academies programme. He believed that the autonomy CTCs benefited from should be extended much more widely.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

Is the Secretary of State aware that Dixons CTC, one of the first in the country, has hardly any European students at all, yet the new Bradford academy, which is less than a mile away, is overrun with new arrivals from eastern Europe? How does he explain that?

[Michael Gove]

My understanding is that the Bradford Dixons CTC operates a banded entry system, which is one of the truest and fairest methods of comprehensive entry, but I recognise that demographic change in Bradford and elsewhere is posing challenges for all schools. One of the things I believe is that the success of many CTCs shows that children, including those with special educational needs and those who have English as an additional language, can flourish. I hope that other schools in Bradford will contemplate—as several of them are—taking on some of the freedoms in the Bill to address the very real deprivation that exists in that city and that my hon. Friend has done so much to address, both as a councillor and as a Member of Parliament.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

I cannot see how, when the House is, understandably, trying to rebuild its reputation for various reasons, it will help its good name to rush through such important legislation without full consultation. I cannot believe that that will add to the general view of the House as a place that is worthy to give the deliberation that the Bill deserves.

The Bill is not an emergency measure, but it is leading to what could be a nasty accident. I believe and support the coalition agreement, which says:

“We will give parents, teachers, charities and local communities the chance to set up new schools, as part of our plans to allow new providers to enter the state school system in response to parental demand.”

But that does not add to the state school system. Whatever the intention is, the outcome will be a fragmentation and a weakening of the state school system.

It has also been said recently that

“more choice for parents is a quintessentially liberal approach. This is an area where the state needs to back off.”

However, as we have heard before in the House, liberty without equality is a name of noble sound but squalid meaning. There is a difference between freedom and a free-for-all. In a free-for-all, invariably, the least articulate, the least organised, the least well represented, the least well-off and the least well educated tend to lose out.

It is important always, in whatever we do, to begin with the end in mind. What are we trying to do with our education system? We want, first, to raise the overall attainment of the young people who go through the system and, secondly, to narrow the gap in attainment in our system. The first issue is one of productivity and getting the most that we can out of the system, whereas the second is very much a political issue about narrowing the gap and seeing the importance, not just to young people but to the nation as a whole, of doing so.

There have been some extremely good contributions from knowledgeable people on both sides of the debate, so there is a danger of my trying to teach people to suck eggs, but let me put the issue in practical terms. There is a difference between things that are simple and things that are easy. To achieve well, a school needs a great head teacher, a great management team and great teachers. Then there are other things that help but that are less crucial, such as adequate resources. What resources are adequate will differ from school to school depending on the community that the school serves. Some schools will need more—hence the pupil premium.

A school’s buildings are quite important but not as crucial as some people think. One of my schools, Carlton Bolling college, where I am a governor—one of the schools for which the BSF proposals have been frozen—became an outstanding school not because of its buildings but despite them. It became the first secondary school in Bradford to gain an outstanding Ofsted categorisation because of the things that I have mentioned—a great head teacher, a great management team and great teachers. Schools also need excellent support services such as occupational therapy, educational psychology and speech therapy.

The governing body is less important than many governors believe. A terrific governing body with a poor head teacher will not mean that the school is successful in terms of achievement. A really good head teacher can get by with a governing body that is not so good—just don’t tell them.

[Geraint Davies]

At the end of last week, I was at a school that serves a challenged area in Swansea West. It was clear that the school’s relationship with parents, who often do not have a background of high achievement over generations, in building self-esteem for children is a key part of breaking out of intergenerational poverty. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that one key issue is targeting resources on schools that serve challenged areas, rather than just having a free-for-all where middle-class parents grab what little is left of the cake from the Conservative Government?

[Mr Ward]

Hence the pupil premium. Parental involvement —my next point—is very important too.

There is nothing to stop a school having all the things that I mentioned. It does not have to be a faith school, a maintained school, an academy, a grant-maintained school or a foundation school. A point not previously raised, although I think the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Glenda Jackson) touched on it, is that everything that I have mentioned will produce a school with high achievement, but not necessarily a school with high attainment. There is a difference between the two.

As I said, it is simple to determine what makes a successful school, but it is not always easy. Apart from parental involvement, everything that I have talked about relates to school level variables—the school and what it can actually deliver—but pupil level variables determine attainment in the school. We seem to have common agreement about the need for a pupil premium to support schools serving deprived communities, but why not give it a chance in those schools? Is it not premature to look at the structure yet again, before we have seen what the additional funding can do to raise attainment in those schools?

[Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that there are poor schools in good areas and good schools in poor areas? It is much more than the relationship that he has talked about.

[Mr Ward]

Without doubt there are exceptions to the rule, and we need to learn best practice wherever it resides, but powerful opposing forces work against all schools being in the educational utopia that is described by the ingredients for high achievement. Bradford has 200 schools—special, primary and secondary. We shall not get 200 great head teachers; it will not happen.

Another force working against that utopia is how schools are judged. In most cases, they are judged on attainment, and although we often pay lip service to contextual value added, that is not how schools are actually evaluated. Because of the system, schools are in competition. They do not like being in competition, but they are in competition over who is recruited to which school.

How can we bring about change in struggling schools? Only with very great difficulty. Some of the measures are impatient, but it requires hard slog in struggling schools to put in place the ingredients required to turn them around. How much simpler to set up a new school with all the ingredients in place, including the great new head teacher. But where will the great new head teachers come from? They will come from other schools, where they may have been needed because those schools served deprived communities. If a teacher gets the same pay—or even, in these new schools, more pay—why on earth would they go in every morning to work in a school serving a deprived community for less money? Teachers’ conditions of service need to change if we are to make the most of the pupil premium, so I welcome that flexibility.

More important than anything else in terms of attainment, resources and how a school is judged, is the intake of the school. Why do people want academies? There must be a reason. It is because they think they will get something new. If it is simply about flexibility in the national curriculum, why not give it to all schools? If it is about flexibility in teachers’ conditions of service, why not give that to all schools? People want academies—whether or not they admit it—because by one means or another they want to change the intake of the school. If everything was made available for every school, for what reason would they want to set up an academy?

[Mr Turner]

May I suggest that one other reason might be to get away from the control of the local council? That is why people want academies.

[Mr Ward]

On local authorities controlling schools, I do not know where the hon. Gentleman has been for the last 20 years. It does not happen now. Money is passported straight to schools. If he has an issue with support services, he should get his councillors to sort it out. The local authority should be providing quality services to schools.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

Has the hon. Gentleman come across no circumstances where the local authority has acted as a barrier to innovation in a local school?

[Mr Ward]

I am reliably informed by my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) that it happens quite frequently in Essex county council.

Pointing out where there are failings or errors in the system is not to condemn the system but to improve it. One of the reasons I find the measure so difficult to accept is that it ignores the crucial role of the local authority in co-ordination. I have seen no mention of the Every Child Matters agenda in the Bill. The role of the local authority is crucial in places planning, ensuring that admissions are fair and supporting, challenging and monitoring schools. If we put those things in place we shall be on our way to improving our schools.

The final thing that I am worried about has more to do with free schools: within a year, the British National party will have a group of parents applying to set up a school.

--- Later in debate ---

[Elizabeth Truss]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. However, the Opposition seem confused. One Labour Member has argued for more academic qualifications while others have said that the qualifications that the Labour Government introduced were fantastic. They cannot agree. They have not come up with a consistent approach to our proposed legislation. The principle of autonomy has been heavily road tested and proved successful in the small minority of schools in which it has been implemented. The previous Government should have set up more academies, but instead, they competed in all the centralising tendencies, on which the previous Education Secretary was particularly keen.

The teaching unions have also been involved in centralising the system. In 2003, there were agreements between the teaching unions and the Government about how teachers operate in the classroom, how their lessons are covered, and what preparation and assessment work they do. There are such practices in no other job. There has been a vast increase in teaching assistants and cover supervisors. That is not to say that I am against those people, but decisions should be up to head teachers and not governed by a weight of paperwork from Whitehall.

There was glimmer of light—several hon. Members on these Benches have referred to the former Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair—with the academies programme. Yet the academies were a trickle rather than a flood. We had only 200 schools out of a total of 3,000 that could have become academies. In 2007, when the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls) took over as Secretary of State for Education, rather than openly oppose the academies programme, he made it increasingly difficult for schools to become academies and restricted the arrangements for, for example, the curriculum. Those arrangements were made much tighter.

[Mr Ward]

As I tried to say in my speech, if the freedoms—staffing, curriculum, release from all the paperwork and so on—are so useful, why do we not extend them to every maintained school? Why is structure important? The main improvements that took place through the national challenge did not require a change in structure. An individual interim executive board in a school that is in special measures turns a school round without a change in structure. Why are hon. Members so obsessed with structure?

[Elizabeth Truss]

I think the answer is that there are so many national regulations. I am concerned about that rather than local authorities, which have often been put under pressure by the national Government. For example, I referred to the 2003 terms and conditions agreement between the teaching unions and the Government. Schools need the ability to make decisions, to have agreements between teachers and head teachers and to make their own work force arrangements. I would like more schools to take up the opportunity offered—it is the way forward. I think that it empowers teachers, who often enjoy their jobs more. I have visited several academies, and teachers’ excitement, engagement and motivation are visible.

The opportunity provided by the fact that we will have more schools than the 200-odd we have at the moment will attract more people into the profession. Interestingly, someone asked whether the teaching unions could become involved in academies. Rather than being a roadblock to reform, it would be helpful if the teaching unions supported academies. That would bring huge benefits to teachers. We would probably see better rewards for teachers in the long term, and we would certainly see more professional autonomy for them and a greater respect and esteem for the profession, which would be helpful for the unions in the long term.

I urge Ministers not to heed the calls to slow down—I am sure that they will not—because we have waited long enough for academy schools that serve not just a few people. I applaud existing academies, but the children in our country who do not go to them have waited long enough for a good education. The Opposition are complacent about our education. We are not succeeding; we are failing internationally. There is a huge gap between the attainment of top students and low-achieving students. The Conservatives’ motivation is to close that gap, and I urge the Government to carry on.

Education Funding

David Ward Excerpts

Monday 5th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman feels that way. I appreciate that Phoenix school in his constituency—a school that I have visited, as he rightly pointed out—is an excellent school. The language of financial close is not my language; it is the language that has been chosen for Building Schools for the Future. It was the language developed by the Government of whom he was a part and the language used by the shadow Education Secretary.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

Is the Secretary of State disappointed to hear that when I asked why two of the three allowable phase 3 new build projects in Bradford were in schools with some of the highest levels of attainment in the district—instead of in schools serving deprived communities—I was told that raising educational attainment was not a criterion for the allocation of BSF phase 3 funds?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes the very good point that the criteria that govern Building Schools for the Future were not as they should be. The capital review will be looking to ensure that when future money is allocated, a more sensitive set of criteria will form part of that process.