Religious Education

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Tuesday 17th May 2011 Westminster Hall

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

I am privileged to raise the role of religious education in schools under your chairmanship, Mr Brady. A number of colleagues have joined me for today’s debate; I thank them.

First, may I state that I know that the Secretary of State for Education takes very seriously the issue of enabling every child—whatever their background—to achieve their full potential by promoting the highest quality of educational standards? He is doing a sterling job in that regard and I thank him for that.

I turn specifically to religious education in schools. Hon. Members will all be aware that RE in schools is, and has long been, a compulsory subject. The Government do not intend to change that. That is good. If RE is important enough to be compulsory, why not include it in the English baccalaureate? In late 2010, the Secretary of State announced that the new E-bac certificate will be awarded to students who achieve grades A* to C in English, maths, science, a foreign language and a humanity. Of the humanities, the choice is history or geography. Why not add RE to the humanities choices?

In response to that question, the Secretary of State has answered:

“because it is already a compulsory subject. One intention of the English baccalaureate is to encourage wider take-up of geography and history in addition to, rather than instead of, compulsory RE.” —[Official Report, 7 February 2011; Vol. 523, c. 10.]

That sounds laudable, but there are serious concerns that that will produce unintended consequences. Since school league tables will now take into account the percentage of students awarded the certificate, the E-bac is increasingly being emphasised as the primary qualification for 16-year-olds, and the teaching of RE in schools risks being undermined. Indeed, according to new research by the National Association of Teachers of Religious Education, one in three schools, in a survey of nearly 800, say that they will significantly reduce the amount of resources and numbers of teachers dedicated to teaching RE in the approaching academic year. In a recent joint letter published in The Daily Telegraph, leading academics revealed that 45% of university teacher training places in RE have been cut. Therefore, non-specialist teachers will be left to teach the subject.

One reason for varying quality in RE provision in the past—less so today—has been the lack of RE teachers who are subject specialists. There has been considerable progress in increasing their numbers, due in part to the popularity of the subject at GCSE and A-level. If that progress is reversed, the overall quality of RE teaching, even as a compulsory subject, could suffer. The status of the E-bac means that, already, fewer pupils are opting to study RE, as discussions that I have had in my constituency have shown.

Why is RE so important that so many people are asking for a reconsideration and for its inclusion as a core E-bac humanities subject? Before I explore that question, I should say that the many people I refer to include 100 MPs, who have signed an early-day motion tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Stephen Lloyd), calling for just that. That was doubtless prompted in large part, as I have been myself, by constituents’ letters, representations from local schools and a public petition signed by more than 115,000 members of the public. That petition was promoted by the REACT campaign, which stands for putting religious education at the heart of humanities, and it has successfully united religious leaders from a number of faith groups, including Christians, Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs.

Why is RE important? It is important because it is a subject taught distinctly from other humanities subjects. It is quite different from the RE, or scripture, that many of us of a certain age may have studied by learning passages from the Bible by rote. Admittedly, that sometimes produced unintended consequences—some humorous, such as the answer in an exam paper that an RE teacher told me about. In response to the question, “Who was most disappointed at the return of the prodigal son?”, a pupil wrote, “the fatted calf”.

Today’s RE has moved on, as I know from closely looking at the subject with one of my sons, who is a GCSE RE student. Today’s RE is not about promoting one religion, but about understanding many and understanding many other aspects of life from a faith perspective. My son tells me that RE includes topics such as environmental issues, discrimination, law and punishment. It also includes an understanding of the cultural and religious values of different peoples and faiths. One sixth former, who recently studied GCSE RE along with total of nine GCSEs, told me:

“it was the only subject in which I got to discuss current affairs and responses to them.”

[Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Perhaps RE has become so wishy-washy that it is not worth preserving.

[Fiona Bruce]

I dispute that. My hon. Friend would, I think, respect my view, on which I shall elaborate now.

Religious issues are frequently at the top of any news agenda. Today’s RE helps young people make sense of that and wider world affairs. It also promotes community cohesion, as it allows young people, who are growing up in a diverse society, to discuss and understand the views and opinions of people whose beliefs and values differ from their own, in the safety of the classroom environment. One RE student told me:

“many societies and cultures have strong religious foundations and understanding their methodology and thought was very helpful. I thoroughly enjoyed it.”

Enjoyment is key to learning well. We all learn better when we enjoy it, and GCSE RE is popular. In the past 15 years, the number of students taking GCSE RE has quadrupled from 113,000 to approximately 460,000. The Archbishop of Westminster, the Most Reverend Vincent Nichols, has said:

“In an increasingly confusing world, Religious Studies gives young people perhaps their only opportunity to engage seriously not only with the most profound philosophical questions concerning human existence and the nature of reality, but also with the most fundamental ethical dilemmas of our day”.

Where else will our young people obtain that? To put it more grittily, I cite a real life example from a teacher of almost 30 years’ standing, who has taught near where I have lived for much of my life. She has been a deputy head teacher with management responsibility for developing spiritual, moral, social and cultural values policy in schools. She recalls:

“On the day after 9/11, a 12-year-old Muslim girl ran to me in tears saying that she had been taunted, chased and threatened on her way to school. Other pupils and youngsters, many older than her were accusing her of being responsible for the destruction of the twin towers and multiple murders. She was identifiable because of the colour of her skin and she wore a scarf. Up until that day, there was no evidence of…any problem. She had received interest and questioning, but she never experienced hatred. Overnight, the media’s coverage and the need to find someone to blame meant that she became a target. She was the only Muslim child in a mostly white school. There had to be an immediate response to identify the main bullies, but for many weeks, through RE, there was specific teaching about Islam and Islamophobia. The outcome was positive, with the girl being accepted and becoming a senior prefect who was respected and valued by others.”

Cultural diversity is explored through teaching RE. Pupils are able to share their beliefs, arrange church visits, demonstrate how a turban is worn, demonstrate how others pray, bring in homemade food for festivals and share the meaning of specific rituals. As well as promoting community cohesion and giving young people an insight into their own and other cultures and heritage, RE also supports pupils in articulating moral judgments and dealing with misfortune, death, loss, and issues in their neighbourhoods and workplaces. It prepares them for adult life.

As one teacher told me:

“good RE teaching can promote positive values for young people and society.”

She cited the example of James Delaney, a twelve-year-old boy from a Traveller family, who was murdered in Ellesmere Port in Cheshire. She speaks from a close perspective, with experience of teaching in the boy’s area. She said:

“Traveller children often have strong religious views…however, if they move into communities, there can be hostility…often their children in school…are exposed to bullying in response to what they may hear their parents and other adults saying. Getting pupils to empathise and ‘step into the shoes’ of a family whose 12-year-old son was murdered…because he was a traveller, proved to be a powerful way of challenging perceptions and wrongly held views, as children should not be held to blame for things their parents do.”

RE lessons also develop transferrable skills such as critical analysis, essay structure and general written and verbal language skills. Those benefit other subjects as pupils learn how to express and articulate their views and, equally importantly, to respect those of others. Questioning, reasoning, empathy, philosophy, values and insight are all highly valuable skills fostered within RE learning. One student told me:

“It focused my thinking on areas of abstract thought, it improved and developed my analytical skills and logical reasoning”—

quite powerful points, in his own words, from a student who has recently studied GCSE RE. Another pupil told me how each essay is commented on according to the qualities of K, U and E——knowledge, understanding and evaluation—which appeared in the margin of all his essays and had to be demonstrated.

Research among 1,000 16 to 23-year-olds has found that 83% felt that RE could promote understanding of different religions and beliefs, while more than half agreed that it had had a positive influence on them. So what would be the negative results, however unintended, of excluding RE from the E-bac as proposed?

Currently, most state secondary schools arrange their timetables with a humanities bloc of geography, history and RE. An experienced teacher told me that

“under the new system if RE is not part of the E-bacc, I can foresee that schools will no longer want to pay exam fees as it will not be acknowledged in the new targets or E-bacc. Pupils will be forced to study either geography or history and will not have space on their timetable to study a full GCSE in RE. Whilst RE remains a compulsory subject, it will have to be taught, but it will be relegated and in pupils, parents and many teachers’ eyes, it will soon become the Cinderella subject it was many years ago.”

RE, even as a compulsory subject, might be increasingly merged with PSHE—personal, social and health education—and citizenship at key stage 4, something I understand Ofsted does not appear unduly concerned about. If those subjects are merged, to overcome a timetable or time issue, staff might not be specialist RE teachers, and the more media-focused or sensational topics within PSHE and citizenship might dominate. Scaling back might also affect the post of RE adviser, a role that ensures that appropriate importance is given to the content of the RE syllabus in response to the needs of a local community, taking into account such factors as the numbers of a particular religious or ethnic group.

RE might not be taught or advised on by specialists to the standard of other subjects, and fewer students and teachers might be able to understand and communicate the impact of religion on culture, society and current affairs. Without that guidance, young people might find it more difficult to cope with the more difficult moral, philosophical or cultural challenges that they find today; to form good relationships with others, especially those of a different cultural background; or to maintain secure values and beliefs enabling them to make good rather than bad choices, in particular in early adulthood. It is also argued that without RE, the influence of simplistic or extreme sources of information on religion could increase, at the risk of greater stereotyping and prejudice; a less tolerant society might ensue.

If faith schools continued to prioritise GCSE RE, they might fall down the school league tables. Some schools might even stop offering GCSE RE as a separate subject or course, putting resources into priority E-bac subjects to raise or maintain the school ranking. Students who devoted time to study GCSE RE could be penalised, as it does not qualify as an E-bac subject.

What am I asking the Minister to do? Primarily to protect, support and sustain the increasing improvement of religious education in our schools, ideally by including the GCSE full course on religious studies as one of the humanities choices in the E-bac, in addition to geography and history. Students could be able to opt for any one of them, or, under a changed specification, to take two of the subjects, so that history and geography retained the same status as currently proposed under the E-bac. Whether or not the Minister responds favourably to that request, which, as I mentioned at the outset, has huge public support, RE will remain a compulsory subject for all school students, even if they do not study GCSE RE, so I ask the Minister to consider my next points as well.

It is critical that RE should not be unintentionally downgraded, that the teaching of RE as a compulsory subject, quite separately from the teaching of GCSE RE, should be accorded the priority it merits, and that appropriate signals should be sent out to such effect from the highest level. Will the Minister kindly consider how the Government can ensure that the appropriate resources are applied to the teaching of RE in schools and that an appropriately robust approach is taken regarding the nature of such teaching and of the Ofsted inspections for the provision and quality of RE? That would reaffirm the important role of RE in schools and its vital contribution to the whole school curriculum. It would recognise RE’s importance to pupils as a preparation for the character that they will require in adulthood, as well as throughout the whole of a child’s school life.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

It has been an interesting debate and I hope that I will not, as so often happens, be the grit in the oyster. I value religion as much as anybody in the House—I have written a book on the decline of religion and how it affects society—but I believe that we owe the Minister a careful hearing, because the whole point of the E-bac is to bring rigor back into academic education. I support RE more than anybody, but too many schools have climbed up the league tables by, frankly, cheating by providing Mickey Mouse courses. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) on performing a great service with this debate. I have a son at the London Oratory, which is a Catholic school, and I value that fact. It will do very well out of the E-bac, because a rigorous academic school, which will continue to promote faith studies, will benefit in the league tables by concentrating on rigorous academic subjects such as maths and English.

I intervened on my hon. Friend earlier because those of us who support RE must argue based on what it is. Has it been so degraded in how it is taught that it is no longer an academic subject? Of course we should support other religions and value people of other religions—that goes without saying—but my hon. Friend the Member for St Albans (Mrs Main) says that we need to understand and to debate whether it is right for people to wear the burqa or the cross. That is fine as a subject of public debate, but should it be part of a rigorous academic subject?

[Mr Lammy]

I generally agree with the hon. Gentleman on these matters, but is he suggesting that Shakespeare is of more value than the Koran or the Bible?

[Mr Leigh]

No, I am not. I am saying that a close study of the Talmud is as valuable and rigorous, and in my view as academic, as a close study of the Koran or the Christian Bible.

If we are to restore religious education as an academic subject, we may have to restore it as an academic study. Otherwise, it will continue to be an easy cop-out. One cannot defend an academic subject on the ground of good citizenship—we should all be good citizens, we should all value other people and we should all be kind and nice to others, but that is not an academic subject.

I hope the Minister will assure us that the exclusion of religious education is not a prejudice against religion. I am sure he will want to assure us about academies, which is an important point. However, I hope that he will also give a hint to those of us who organise religious education—there is no point in denying that it was a bad Ofsted report—that it has to return to its history as a rigorous academic subject.

Education Bill

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Tuesday 8th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

What a pleasure it is to appear before you, Mr Speaker, for the third time within 24 hours.

The Bill is a response to three specific challenges that our country faces in this the second decade of the 21st century—the challenge of how to respond to an economic crisis, the challenge of how to respond to the scandal of declining social mobility, and the challenge of how to respond to our educational decline, relative to competitor nations.

We on the Government Benches, both the Conservative and the Liberal Democrat parties, believe that it is only by radically and fundamentally reforming our education system and learning the lessons of the highest performing nations that we can generate the long-term economic growth on which prosperity depends and that we can produce the level of social justice that is appropriate for a modern liberal democracy. I hope that across the House tonight we can develop consensus on the need for fundamental reform.

It was striking that just five years ago across the Dispatch Boxes in the House there was consensus between those on the two Front Benches on the fundamental need for education reform. My right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr Cameron) and the then right hon. Member for Sedgefield both recognised the fundamental need for reform. I hope that we can see the same consensus across the Front Benches tonight. If not, that will tell us something about the state of the Labour party in the second decade of the 21st century.

What about the state of the economy that the Labour party bequeathed the coalition Government—the state of the mess that we have to clear up? It is against that backdrop that we need to appreciate the fundamental need for educational reform. It is only by having a well-educated, capable and highly skilled work force that we can deal with the economic crisis generated by the right hon. and hon. Gentlemen on the Opposition Front Bench. We had a structural deficit for seven years before the banking crisis began. When we entered that period of unprecedented global turbulence, our economy had been undermined by the actions of the previous Government. [Interruption.] I know that Opposition Members find that difficult and that it is painful to be reminded of the desperate position in which they left the country, but the need for urgent reform is underlined by the terrible mess they made—[Interruption.] No matter how much they chunter, object or interject from a sedentary position, these are truths that they and the country have to face. They cannot run away from that fact.

When the OECD graded this country in 2000, we had the best fiscal position in the G7, but in 2007 we had the worst fiscal position, and that was before the banking crisis. By 2010, we had the largest deficit of any G20 country, and today we are paying £120 million a day in debt interest. Manufacturing output fell by 9% as a share of the economy in Labour’s years and we lost 1.7 million manufacturing jobs. According to the World Economic Forum’s ranking of global competitiveness, we moved from fourth to 86th. No country can succeed economically or respond to an economic crisis unless it ensures that its education system is fit for purpose, and under the previous Government it was not.

[Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Can we get back to education? The previous Labour Government tried in their last Bill to bring in compulsory sex education. The Bill before us is an excellent Education Bill, which I fully support, because it is all about devolving power to schools. Will my right hon. Friend assure me that he will resist any amendments on Report that would bring in compulsory sex education for primary schools?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for, as ever, leaping straight on to sex—I know that it is a subject of great interest to him and to many in this House. I always feel that one should discuss money before discussing sex, because the one and the other are so intimately connected in the minds of so many Members. That is why I was so anxious to ascertain whether Opposition Members were proud of the economic record they bequeathed. I am happy to reassure my hon. Friend that I will not accept amendments in Committee that seek to make the curriculum any more prescriptive or intrusive. The Bill will enhance professional freedom and autonomy, because we recognise that it is only by doing that we can ensure that our economy and education system are fit for the 21st century. It is not only the economy that was undermined by what happened on Labour’s watch; social mobility also worsened.

Oral Answers to Questions

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Thursday 13th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

In relation to banking, we are looking in our discussions at how to strengthen the system in line with international practice.

[Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Does the Business Secretary acknowledge the contribution made to the economy by the 1 million people working in the UK financial sector, who contribute £25 billion in taxes every year, on top of the staggering £54 billion contributed to the UK economy by the financial sector. That is essential for schools and hospitals. Will he defend the sector that he is charged with promoting?

School Sports (Colchester)

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Tuesday 14th December 2010 Westminster Hall

[Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)]

Although school sport partnerships are nationwide, I wish to concentrate on just one partnership in my constituency as an example to highlight how important they are for every school and every child in the country. I will first set out the national scene. The Government want to save £162 million by scrapping the highly successful school sport partnerships. That is a significant sum, but in the context of the nation’s total public spending it is not, and cutting it would be a false saving.

The sum is equivalent to about half the combined wage bills for the two premiership football clubs that played last night—Manchester United and Arsenal. The total wage bill for all the premiership clubs, boosted by the vast sums they receive from television, comes to more than £1.3 billion, according to research conducted by Deloitte and kindly provided to me by the House of Commons Library. Are we seriously saying that the well-being of around 8 million school children in their developing years and, perhaps more importantly, their prospects for better health in adulthood, are considered to have such a low priority that cutting that money from the education budget is acceptable?

I propose that, in the spirit of joined-up government, the Government should get a grip on the mismanagement of football in this country. Professional football is awash with money, but it is being squandered on grotesque salaries and on the huge amounts of money that are lost from the game and find their way to parasitic agents who contribute nothing to football and instead bleed it.

I urge the coalition Government to introduce a football school sports fund—FSSF—by placing a 10% levy on the turnover of premiership football clubs. That would comfortably cover the £162 million needed to fund the school sport partnerships. After all, many of the young participants will be wearing replica shirts of clubs such as Manchester United and Arsenal. In that way, at least some of the huge sums of money sloshing around the premiership would be put to more beneficial purposes than lining the pockets of the few. It would fund the future fitness, health and sport prospects of every child in the country. It would support the many, rather than being kept by the very few.

I urge the Minister to take forward my suggestion as a means of saving the school sport partnerships at nil cost to the public purse. I am confident that my proposed FSSF would be widely welcomed by our schools and by those responsible for the nation’s health and sports development. Cross-departmental determination involving the Department for Education, the Department of Health, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Treasury could quickly bring that to fruition by the time the £162 million is due to be cut from the education budget. I shall personally bring the proposal to the attention of the Prime Minister.

Before speaking about the Colchester academy sports hub and the seven primary schools it covers, I will conclude the national overview by quoting in full an excellent article by the award-winning journalist Mr Patrick Collins, chief sports writer for The Mail on Sunday, who wrote in his column two days ago:

“When I left for Australia three weeks ago, Education Secretary Michael Gove was being furiously assaulted by just about everybody who understands the purpose and value of sport in schools. From Olympic champions to head teachers to concerned parents, they lined up to attack Gove’s crass and myopic decision to scrap direct funding for school sports partnerships.

There are 450 such partnerships across England, and these alliances of sports colleges, primary, secondary and special schools have broadened choices and increased opportunities for young people to take part in sport. The scheme has been stunningly successful in achieving its bold objectives. Yet now, at a time when the nation is seeking to establish an enduring legacy from the 2012 Olympics, Gove has decided to imperil all its gain with a piece of knee-jerk, doctrinaire cost-cutting.

In common with far too many members of this Cabinet, Gove seems to regard sport as the sweaty pastime of tiresome oiks. The fact that it promotes a healthy lifestyle, reduces juvenile crime, combats dependence on drugs and expands educational aspirations seems not to have crossed his radar. So he swings his little axe in a pathetic attempt to appear decisive.

Three weeks on, and with ignorance no longer an excuse, the wretched Gove is busily trying to present abject retreat as generous compromise—”

[Mr Edward Leigh (in the Chair)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman knows that he should not refer to the Secretary of State by name. He should refer to him as Secretary of State or by his constituency.

[Bob Russell]

Mr Chairman, I am fully aware of that, but I am quoting from a newspaper article, so those are not my words. They are the words of wisdom of Mr Patrick Collins, who continued:

“Yet the assault continues. I doubt it will be halted this side of the first Cabinet reshuffle.”

Other than giving the Secretary of State the courtesy of putting the title “Mr” before his name, I agree with every word of what Mr Collins said. I disapprove of the manner in which the Secretary of State was addressed in the article, Sir, but I was quoting from it.

It is also worth noting how the proposals to axe school sports funding are viewed by Wenda Donaldson, the director of community sport at the Australian Sports Commission, who observed:

“I am absolutely devastated to hear of the cuts to the School Sport Partnership models. I am astounded that such an amazing and world-leading initiative has been lost to the communities they serviced.”

Well, they have not yet been lost; hopefully, today’s debate will help to save them.

From the world stage, let me now concentrate at a truly grass-roots local level. There are 12 sport hubs in the area covered by the Colchester-Blackwater school partnership, involving 86 schools, the majority of them in my constituency of Colchester. I will concentrate on just one sport hub, the one centred on the Colchester academy under the inspirational leadership of school sport co-ordinator Zoe Ford, and the seven primary schools that it serves. They are: from the Greenstead estate, St Andrew’s Infants school and St Andrew’s Junior school, and Hazelmere Infants school and Hazelmere Junior school; from the St Anne’s estate, Willow Brook primary, a fresh-start school formerly known as St Anne’s primary; Parsons Heath primary; and Roach Vale primary.

Last month, I visited Roach Vale primary to meet some of those involved in the school sport programme and witnessed the wonderful sight of youngsters playing football after school with two sports coaches, assisted by volunteers. I sensed that I was watching the big society in action. What I saw clearly showed the success of school sport partnerships.

From Mrs Ford, Mr Tom Evans, who is the assistant partnership development manager of the Colchester-Blackwater school sport partnership, and Mr Barry Hersom, principal of Colchester academy, established in September this year from the former Sir Charles Lucas arts college, I have been provided with the following information: it is a record of success, success, success, and of achievement, achievement, achievement. It would be extreme folly—an own goal, no less—for the coalition Government to end funding for school sport partnerships.

Four years ago, the average time spent on high-quality physical education in the Colchester academy family of schools was 118 minutes, but it is now 147 minutes. Mrs Ford, as is the case with school sport co-ordinators working for the other sport hubs, has worked alongside teachers in primary schools to increase their subject knowledge and confidence in teaching sport and physical education. That is of great importance when looking at the holistic approach to education.

I am advised that, as a direct result of the higher quality of sport on offer and more time spent on PE, there have been large improvements in the quality of teaching; that pupils’ attainment has increased and the quality of their learning has improved; that they are more physically active; and that they are adopting healthier lifestyles. Those are four positive points.

Academies Bill [Lords]

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Monday 19th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Lady will know that academies are governed by the same admissions rules as all local authority schools. They have to abide by the admissions code and subscribe to fair access protocols, so that those hard-to-place children are placed appropriately. I grant the hon. Lady that some academies, when they have made the journey from failing school to academy status, have experienced an increase in the number of exclusions, but that normally settles down after a short period, as it does in most schools with a good new head teacher who is extending discipline and control. Then we find that once academies have become settled, the number of exclusions falls, and that is certainly the case with city technology colleges. My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr Leigh) wished to make a point, and I am delighted to give way.

[Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Does the Secretary of State consider the greatest missed opportunity of the previous Conservative Government to be the failure to make all schools grant maintained? Therefore, philosophically, does he believe that such freedoms should gradually spread out so that, in the end, the head teachers of all state schools have the same freedoms as the head teachers of independent schools?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point, and I want a greater degree of freedom for all head teachers. If we compare our proposals with the ’90s and the world of grant-maintained schools, however, one big difference is that we do not envisage schools existing in a parallel universe, but collaborating with other schools. One of the great gains of the past 15 years has been the culture of collaboration that has taken root between head teachers and throughout state schools. It is wholly worth while, I wish to build on it and I make no apology for saying that it happened over the course of the past 15 years, because any fair-minded person would wish to acknowledge it and see it develop.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Leigh]

If the right hon. Gentleman’s point is that the policy is divisive, would he welcome a move to give all schools academy status?

[Ed Balls]

I was happy with the expansion of academies under our system, which involved agreement with local authorities. As we know from what has happened in Sweden, the removal of local authorities and the granting of a complete free-for-all is likely to be deeply divisive, both socially and in a wider sense. I believe that it will lead to huge unfairness and a complete lack of social cohesion. Individual groups of parents will go it alone for a range of reasons, and there will be absolutely no check on the system, because, apart from a back-stop reserve power for the Secretary of State, nobody has any obligation at all to ask why that is being done and what the impact will be on other schools. That represents an unbelievable centralisation of education policy.

The Secretary of State has proved that he cannot even announce a list, so the idea that he will be able to police social cohesion in 3,500 secondary schools is a complete and utter joke.