International Baccalaureate: Funding in State Schools

Freddie van Mierlo Excerpts

Wednesday 29th October 2025 Westminster Hall

[Olly Glover (Didcot and Wantage) (LD)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered funding for the International Baccalaureate in state schools.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Roger. The international baccalaureate—which I will henceforth refer to as the IB, but I hate acronyms, so I wanted to say it properly to start with—establishes the global standard for education and is recognised by universities, employers and educators worldwide as a symbol of academic excellence.

For those who are unaware, the IB diploma is an alternative to A-levels that offers a breadth of subjects across the curriculum: languages, humanities, sciences, maths and arts. Students complete extended projects, theory of knowledge and service in the community, making for a well-rounded education. Studies have shown that IB students in the UK are three times more likely to enrol in a top 20 higher education institution, 40% more likely to achieve a first-class or upper second-class honours degree and 21% more likely to continue to the second year of university. That is why thousands of British families choose to send their children to schools offering the IB diploma.

[Freddie van Mierlo (Henley and Thame) (LD)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour for giving way. I have constituents who attend the Europa School in his constituency, and they have been in touch with me about this issue. He speaks of choice. If we can have faith schools, free schools, maintained schools, academies, grammar schools, state boarding schools and colleges—

[Sir Roger Gale (in the Chair)]

Order. Let us get the ground rules right: this is an intervention, not a speech.

[Freddie van Mierlo]

Does my hon. Friend agree that choice is an extremely valuable part of the education system, and we should be supporting the Europa School?

--- Later in debate ---

[Helen Hayes]

I think the Government are right to focus on how to improve education for every young person. If the hon. Member will bear with me, I will come on to some wider points about the importance of the IB, and the features of the IB that should be applicable more widely across the education sector. We need to be clear that we are talking about 1% of schools across the country, and that the other 99% of schools and colleges have many deep challenges. The Government are right to turn their attention to them as well.

How can the Government ensure that every young person has opportunities for enrichment and opportunities to develop broad transferable skills? Given the shockingly high figure of one in eight young people who are not in education, employment or training, how can the Government ensure that post-16 education is engaging, inspiring and exciting for all young people?

Where I take issue with the Government is in relation to the lack of consultation underpinning their decision to redeploy funding within the large programme uplift.

[Freddie van Mierlo]

In so many policy areas, the Government seem to be unable to break wind without consulting for 18 months. Does the hon. Lady agree that they should reverse their decision and hold a consultation before proceeding?

[Helen Hayes]

If the hon. Gentleman will bear with me, I will elaborate on consultation and engagement in a moment, but I encourage Liberal Democrat Members to reflect on the role that their own Government played in the shockingly deep cuts to 16-to-19 education across the board from 2010, and the implications of those decisions in what the current Government are now trying to tackle.

Engagement with schools and colleges on the decision would have been helpful. Given the Government’s objectives for the economy, I understand the focus on STEM subjects and pupils taking four or more A-levels, but STEM subjects are not the only ones with a higher cost base to deliver. Some creative subjects with direct links to employment in the creative industries also carry higher costs, which can exclude students from lower-income backgrounds.

In the context of the Government’s objective of ensuring parity of esteem between vocational and technical routes and academic ones, it is possible to imagine how the redeployment of the large programme uplift could have helped to increase quality in vocational and technical courses. Evidence of consideration of a range of options and an understanding of the views of those working in the sector would have been helpful in the context of the decision.

The Government’s ambitious programme of education reform will have significant implications for post-16 education. The curriculum and assessment review, the post-16 White Paper, the introduction of V-levels, the youth guarantee and technical excellence colleges will all have potentially profound and positive implications for the opportunities available to young people and the quality of the education they receive.