International Day of Education

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Thursday 26th January 2023 Westminster Hall

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a real pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford). Much to my surprise, I found nothing in her speech to disagree with, but I promise not to make that a habit—just to reassure her and my hon. Friends. Two of the most significant points of substance that she raised were the importance of girls’ education, and investment in that, and continuing to build a global alliance for more investment in girls’ education.

I remember that in my time as a Minister in the Department for International Development, we began the process of putting substantial investment into girls’ education. I remember how proud I was—as I am sure other Members were at the time—that Britain was willing to show global leadership on that issue. I pay tribute to Gordon Brown who, since stepping down as Prime Minister and being appointed as the UN special envoy for global education, has continued to do everything he can to build support for that.

The right hon. Member for Chelmsford also made an important point about Afghanistan and the international community’s continuing outrage about the way in which women and, in particular, young girls are being treated there. She spoke of the need for her colleagues in the Foreign Office, if at all possible, to maintain funding for girls’ education, however difficult that is going forward.

There is one thing that the right hon. Member for Chelmsford did not mention—I think I understand why, but she will understand why I raise it. I think it would be an even better statement on education to have a separate, dedicated Department for International Development, able to champion the case for investment in education globally, free of some of the constraints that the FCDO is under.

I hope that the House will forgive me if I make some parochial points now about the importance of more education investment in Harrow, where we are blessed with remarkable headteachers and teachers, as well as impressive students. One of the great privileges for me as the Member for Harrow West is to have the opportunity to go into schools and see that the future of the community in which I have lived all my life and that I love very much is in the safe hands of such impressive young people.

Nevertheless, it is clear that many of the schools still face real financial difficulties and that the governing bodies face challenges in recruiting headteachers and teachers, not least in maths and science, and also, increasingly, in other subjects, including humanities and English. I am struck by the comments of the executive heads of some of the academies that operate in Harrow about how difficult it has been on occasion to get a field of sufficiently talented applicants for the position of headteacher. As I say, they do a remarkable job none the less, but it would be good to hear from the Minister—if not today, perhaps in a letter—the Government’s plan to address the recruitment crisis in education.

Local authorities also need more funding for special needs education, and that is certainly the case in Harrow. Mr Sharma, you may recognise that there is a continuing difficulty with the fact that teachers who are appointed to jobs in inner London get a significant pay increase compared with teachers working in outer London schools. There is little difference in the cost of living in inner London as opposed to in outer London. It seems to me that the discrepancy in pay between teachers in outer London and their compatriots in inner London, which has been around for a long time, needs addressing urgently.

My last substantive point is that I want to encourage the Government to take a fresh look at investment in supplementary schools. We are lucky to have the Foreign Office Minister present, because she knows a lot about the Asia-Pacific tilt to which the Government are committed. I am struck by the need for us to invest in teaching the languages of Asia and the Pacific. Given the global significance of the Indian economy in years to come, it seems even sadder that we are seeing a decline in the teaching of the languages of modern India, including Gujarati, Bengali, Persian, Punjabi and Urdu. Among GCSE students in this country between 2015 and 2021, we saw a very steep decline: there was a 77% drop in the number studying GCSE Gujarati, a 66% drop in the number studying GCSE Bengali, and a 37% drop in the number studying GCSE Urdu. If we as a country want the full benefit of the trade deal that we hope to sign with India, having people who can speak the languages of that great country is essential. Too much of the teaching of those languages is left to very dedicated people in temples, mosques and Saturday schools across local communities.

To be fair, the Government have invested in teaching modern languages. They have recently invested some £14 million in teaching Mandarin and some £5 million in teaching Latin. Why not have a similar amount of investment in teaching the languages of modern Asia? We need dedicated funding, and we need specialist training available for teachers in those subjects. Why not have a flagship school programme to back teaching in that area? Why not offer a bit of funding to support the Saturday schools that do so much to keep up the level of GCSE studies? Where is the academic research programme to support such a programme of investment in these vital community languages?

With that, I apologise to the Front Benchers and to other Members of the House: due to childcare reasons, I cannot stay for the full debate, but I will certainly read the contributions of my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous), the Minister and others.