Schools Bill [HL]

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Report stage & Lords Hansard - Part 1
Monday 18th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Speaker (The Earl of Kinnoull) (CB)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, is participating remotely and I invite her to speak now.

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association and it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. He talked about hair-trigger actions for the school attendance order process. He is right that we need clarity and common sense, an active relationship with parents and a way of holding local authorities to account where things have gone wrong.

Amendments 89, 95 and 96 in this group are in my name. Amendments 89 and 96 echo my amendment in the first group, which my noble friend Lord Storey spoke to. Many Peers have reported specific cases where, despite the Minister saying that this is meant to be about schools and local authorities working together with parents, that is just not happening in practice. Parents are definitely made to feel that they are always in the wrong, so I thank my noble friends Lord Storey and Lord Addington, and the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, and others, for their comments in that group that despite some schools and LAs having very good practice, unfortunately there are some which do not.

Noble Lords know that I have focused on pupils with medical conditions because some of the most concerning incidents relate to schools and local authorities making decisions that fly in the face of the pupil’s doctor. It should not be possible for education people to countermand expert advice. There are other categories, too: a looked-after child, a young carer or even a young offender may all have—in the eyes of the expert, such as their social worker or youth offending officer—a good reason why they should not be in school. Schools should not be able to countermand that.

Other noble Lords have given examples of some of that poor practice, and I cite one example I have heard about: of a paediatric oncology specialist telling a school with cases of an infectious disease—that could be Covid but could also be measles—that a pupil with cancer on strong chemotherapy should not be in school as they were severely immunosuppressed and that if this pupil caught the infectious disease, there was a high risk that it would be fatal. At present, the guidance says that there must be a partnership between parents, schools and health professionals in determining the best route forward. Unfortunately, the school can still choose to ignore that advice.

I thank the Minister for saying on the first day of Report that a headteacher disregarding specific advice would be acting unreasonably and would therefore be in breach of their duty. The problem is that no one knows that—certainly not headteachers or health professionals, and especially not parents or the pupils themselves. I am afraid that the same is true for some local authorities too, which is why these amendments are laid, to ensure that a poor process that starts in a school does not just continue on a conveyor belt. I repeat the point I made at earlier stages of the Bill: the current arrangements do not work. If we especially want to protect children with medical conditions and ensure that they have the same experience as other children, frankly, the arrangements need to be more explicit.

Amendment 95 is a probing amendment about parents who have repeatedly failed to comply with school attendance orders and not paid fines, and who can now—under the Bill—be sentenced to a prison term of up to 51 weeks. The previous maximum level was three months; that is a very large difference and, if used, is likely to lead to the local authority having to provide foster carers or, even more drastically, putting the children in care if a parent or both parents were imprisoned for 51 weeks. Surely, that is the exact opposite of what should be happening. The whole point of this part of the Bill is to encourage children into the stability of education and learning, in which their parents should have a role, and if things have gone wrong then this is a step too far.

I am grateful to the Minister for the meeting last week at which, in light of the debate we had in Committee, we discussed this. She also said in a letter that there was no intention ever to use 51 weeks and that it was a technical provision, solely because that would be the maximum sentence a magistrates’ court can give. This seems extremely strange to me, and slightly worrying. It is wonderful that the current Government say that they would never use it, but what of a future Government? I look forward to hearing the Minister confirm at the Dispatch Box exactly what she said in her letter, so that, should the 51-week term be used, the ministerial intentions when the Bill went through your Lordships’ House could be prayed in aid.

Above all, we need clarity. We need to ensure that this part of the Bill does not act solely as a form of prosecution. Surely, all the good intentions regarding parents who wish to educate their children at home should be understood. Schools and local authorities should really understand when there are genuine reasons why a child may not be in school.