Holiday Pricing

George Mudie Excerpts

Monday 24th February 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mr George Mudie (Leeds East) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming) on securing this debate, but I also congratulate my generous hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel), because she chairs the Committee that gave him this debate, which is on a serious problem.

I enjoyed the speech from the hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds), which was sensible and humorous, as well as logical and grounded, and that is the approach we should take. There is a problem, but two years ago we would not have debated it, because other problems were forcing their way to this place. What on earth has happened? The person in this room who I feel most sorry for is the poor Minister from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. It has been seen as a BIS problem, but it is not; we have been forced here by a problem caused by the great Department for Education. If anyone should be explaining why we are going over all these problems, it is a Minister for Education.

I disagree with the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley on the Select Committee point. This matter does not need or deserve a Select Committee inquiry. The Secretary of State for Education should just repeal the regulations that he slipped through when nobody was looking. They have genuinely caused so much pain across the country. I can see that some people are unhappy, so I accept the petition, but I do not accept the remedy. I hope the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley will forgive me for saying this, but it brings back memories of when Shirley Williams—she is Lady Williams now—was the Secretary of State for Prices and Consumer Protection. Are we actually suggesting that we could have a cap?

The Guardian took a snapshot of the seasonal price differences. This is free advertising for these institutions, but four nights in lodge accommodation at Center Parcs Woburn Forest, Bedfordshire, has a 51% increase between summer term time and the summer holiday. Disneyland Paris has a 7% increase. It is not about foreign flights and foreign people; it is about business and supply and demand. If we try to regulate prices, we will land ourselves in trouble. A King once said, “Bugger Bognor!” I do not know if I will get into trouble for saying that, but if the King can say it, I think I can say it. Four nights at the Butlin’s resort in Bognor Regis have a 99% increase in cost between the week before schools go off and the week after.

[Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

[Mr Mudie]

I hope my hon. Friend is not going to defend Bognor Regis.

[Andy Sawford]

I agree that the regulations that the Government created to place fines on parents have exacerbated the problem, but does my hon. Friend share my concern that the Government have effectively strengthened the monopoly in the holiday period by making it increasingly difficult for parents to have any kind of flexibility? Often, we are not talking about parents taking their child out of school for two weeks year in, year out, but children missing a couple of days or even an afternoon to get a slightly cheaper flight. That flexibility has been lost.

[Mr Mudie]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. A tremendous amount is being lost, but it is because of the Department for Education, not BIS.

[Penny Mordaunt]

rose—

[Mr Mudie]

I will catch the hon. Lady’s eye in a moment, if I may. My wife is a head teacher and has been a teacher since I married her. Every family holiday that we have taken has been at the most expensive time. We were both salaried, so we could afford it, but I understand what happens to families on the breadline or families struggling with their mortgage or short-term unemployment. If they have children and want to take a holiday—the figures show that it does not matter whether it is abroad or in this country—they will face inflated prices in the summer holiday.

We are talking about doing things for schools and how we would work out whether to give kids a week off and whether we would need regulations, but I do not know what regulations we would need to regulate prices. The Labour Government tried that in the 1960s and failed miserably. There are offshoots to the issue, because with railways, we have the choice of travelling at peak times or off-peak. The difference in prices is clear. If someone is booking a hotel in London, a Tuesday will have a different price from a weekend. That is business and supply and demand.

[Penny Mordaunt]

rose—

[Dr Lewis]

rose—

[Mr Mudie]

I said that I would give way to the hon. Lady.

[Penny Mordaunt]

I thank both hon. Gentlemen for letting me intervene. We are all here because we know that the public are aggrieved by this issue and we want to do something to alleviate that. On the drive to attack the Department for Education, I can point to schools that have no problem exercising discretion under the regulations for members of the armed forces and all sorts of other exceptional cases. The real problem is those who do not have an exceptional case, but might have relatives living in a particular country. They might not have the choice that others have over their holiday destination. That is an issue for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. In particular, it should look at the costs of flights and whether the mark-up is reasonable.

[Mr Mudie]

I would not challenge the last part, but I still think that we would leave the regulators with a difficult job unless there was a specific factor—the Olympics were mentioned. We would have some difficulty. As has been suggested, we must take the issue in the round.

It is easy to criticise the people running the business, but they have to make a profit to stay afloat. If they are running below capacity in the other 46 weeks of the year, they have to even things out when they hit capacity, just to stay in business. Therefore I see some genuine difficulty in doing that.

I would like to come on to the Department for Education, because that is where I think the problem lies. I thank and congratulate the people who started the e-petition. Interestingly, the individual who is famous for starting the e-petition was not complaining about foreign holidays, but Center Parcs, in this country.

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. I want to flag with him another sort of case that has been raised by a parent in my constituency who has an autistic child. They struggle to go on holiday abroad when it is busy and when there are lots of other kids, so they are in a specific position. I am not sure whether that would be deemed to be exceptional, but that example makes the case that there needs to be more flexibility in the education system, as he has said.

Does my hon. Friend agree that, if we are to be proper in our analysis, while we must think of the cost that is lost from the amount being paid for a child’s education, we must also think of the opportunity cost of that child’s time with their parents?

[Mr Mudie]

I will answer my hon. Friend when I come on to the DFE. I was thanking the people who have signed the petition, because they have performed a great feat in putting the matter in the public consciousness and the political arena. However, we would be making a grave mistake if we chased after the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. From the answer it gave to the e-petition, I am sure that the Department would not bother if we chased after it, because its answer is quite dusty, but I have some sympathy for it, as the people who should be answering are in the DFE.

[Dr Julian Lewis]

I am slightly conflicted over the whole issue. The hon. Gentleman made the point about people needing to save money. A constituent of mine, Joy Drake, took her children on a once-in-a-lifetime holiday and saved £1,000 on the air fares. Does he not agree that, if the issue is left to individual head teachers and schools, they will be put in an invidious position in deciding which families get to save on the air fares and which families do not? Therefore, should we not look at something that enables the general discretion to be applied—other than, of course, bereavements and similar things—as to when the holiday is taken by everyone, rather than just flexibility on an individual case by an individual head teacher?

[Mrs Annette Brooke in the Chair]

[Mr Mudie]

That is an important point.

One of the things that has come from this e-petition is a request from the travel and tourism industries to get together with the Government and local authorities to see if they can work something out to alleviate the problem. The option of regional staggering has been mentioned on more than a couple of occasions. That is one thing that the industry has suggested it wishes to talk about. It has asked for talks, and I look to BIS for an acceptance of that invitation and to get the industry around the table as soon as possible to start talks. I say that not because a quick solution would be forthcoming, but because it will take such a time to get a solution that the sooner they start, the better.

[Mr Andrew Turner in the Chair]

Let me return to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern). In this place, roles are reversed at a bewildering speed. If I was standing here giving the education policy of a future Labour Government, I would be told, “You don’t trust the professionals. Leave it to the doctors and teachers”. When the solution—this is coming from a Labour MP—is about trusting head teachers, suddenly that is not enough.

I have discussed this matter—more than anything else this past week—with my wife, who is a head teacher, and all I get is common sense. None of us would be prepared to stand here and say this, particularly as two weeks ago, my wife had Ofsted in at 24 hours’ notice, but head teachers have great discretion, great judgment— on the whole—and great empathy. They have great relations with parents and know them. They can look at the attendance records and do all the things that have been suggested as a matter of common sense and as part of being a good head running a good school. I would be content to leave it at that.

I would like hon. Members to say if they had a problem with kids’ attendance when families could take an in-term holiday. Where were the letters about that? Where were the public complaints? They were not there—it was not a problem. What did the Secretary of State for Education do? I do not want to make the issue political; I have been gently asking him, for once in his life, just to act with a bit of humility and take the measure off the table, and I do not want to make it easy for him not to do it by being political. That is all he needs to do, because the situation was okay.

Due to the fuss that has gone on and the hurt that has happened, why should the Government not just take the measure off the table? The Secretary of State has caused it, so he has in his hands a remedy. If he wants change, he should get together with all the parties. Even the travel trade is saying that it has to lay people off because the measure is affecting its business.

What have the Government done? They have put through the measure without any real consultation. The first bad thing the Secretary of State did was to push through the measure to operate from last September, but people had already made their arrangements for holidays. They had taken the advice of the travel trade and got in quick, seeking the cheapest bookings. Suddenly, it was illegal to do so. There was no consultation. The measure was peremptorily introduced, smuggled through the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments.

The second bad thing is that the Secretary of State will fine the parents £60 if they do it, and it could be £120 if they are late in paying.

[Mr Andrew Turner (in the Chair)]

indicated assent.

[Mr Mudie]

I see you nodding, Mr Turner. It could get worse than that, because both parents could be fined, so the total fine could be £240.

For some of the parents of children in my wife’s school £60 or £120 is more than they have to keep their family fed, clothed and housed. If you think that that is bad, Mr Turner, the Secretary of State has made the action a criminal offence. Not only will parents get fined for taking the chance to bond with their kids on a beach somewhere, they can get a criminal record because of it. It is not just a case of what happens with picking chewing gum up off the floor, and neighbourhood wardens giving people a £60 fine: there is a criminal record. There is no easy solution. We need the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to get talks going, but the measure should also be withdrawn.

What is there to worry about in this? Ofsted inspectors can go into schools—the professionals, no matter how good they are, are frightened stiff of Ofsted—and see all the records. They can go through every one and look at whether the parents of a child with an exemplary attendance record will be fined because, to go away together, they must take the time during term. Ofsted has attendance and performance figures. All the necessary machinery is available to enable a responsible head to take the decisions in the full knowledge of what happens in the school and, most importantly, to be answerable to Ofsted for which youngsters have been given permission. I hope that BIS will get talks going, and that the Secretary of State for Education will withdraw the statutory instrument.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jenny Willott]

I am happy to ask colleagues to write to my hon. Friend, because clearly I haven’t got a clue about that. As a Minister in BIS, I do not know what discussions Ofsted and the Department for Education have had, but I am happy to pass the request on to colleagues in the Department for Education.

[Mr Mudie]

Could the Minister ask the relevant Education Minister to tell the people who have attended the debate whether a child who has an excellent attendance record can have a holiday with the rest of their family only outside term-time? Can the fact that they have a perfect attendance record and so on be accepted as exceptional? That is the dilemma that heads face: the problem is not exceptional events such as funerals, but the year in, year out problem of those who cannot afford a family holiday unless they take it outside term time. Will the Minister reassure heads that that can be regarded as exceptional?

[Jenny Willott]

When we contact colleagues in the Department for Education, I am sure that we can send them a copy of Hansard so that they can respond to the hon. Gentleman and others who have raised that point. When head teachers decide whether to grant absence, they must be able to take into account individual circumstances such as the examples raised today of parents in the military or the police, or cases in which a close relative has died. We cannot legislate for such instances; they must be left to the head teacher’s discretion.

Several hon. Members have asked for head teachers to be given clearer guidance on what constitutes exceptional circumstances, and the point has been made that it is difficult to balance the provision of clearer guidance with allowing head teachers discretion and trusting them to make the right call. I will refer that matter to colleagues in the Department for Education.