Free Schools

Debate between Ian Mearns and Lisa Nandy

Tuesday 19th November 2013 Westminster Hall

[Ian Mearns]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who makes a telling point. We are talking about educating children at a cost to the public purse. When the public purse is involved, we should expect minimum standard requirements in education. My hon. Friend makes the point well.

We are talking about the standards of education that these children receive. All too often, school policy is discussed as if it is somehow divorced from the fact that the ultimate victims of school failure are the children themselves. Let us not forget that even though these are free schools it is still public money that is paying for them.

The Al-Madinah school was branded “dysfunctional and inadequate” by Ofsted and “a national embarrassment” by Muslim leaders. Its own head teacher, Andrew Cutts-McKay, dismayed at poor governance and lack of foresight, turned whistleblower to expose the worrying slide in standards. Ofsted lamented the “limited knowledge and experience” of the governing body and the fact that teachers lacked proper skills to deliver a quality education. It condemned the school’s governance in no uncertain terms, stating:

“Accounting systems are not in place to ensure public money is properly spent and governors have failed to ensure an acceptable standard of education is provided by the school.”

Kings science school in Bradford has been accused of “serious financial mismanagement” and possibly fraud. Indeed, as with the Al-Madinah school, it was a member of the Kings science school staff—the finance director—who blew the whistle on the management of the school.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. Does he share my concern that it took a full year after the whistleblower first raised these concerns for the Department for Education to publish that report into the alleged failings? Is that not just another example of the lack of transparency that has surrounded the free schools project from the beginning?

[Ian Mearns]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point.

Although the Department for Education, Ofsted or any other inspectorate should be absolutely sure of its facts before going public, the time delay is worrying. The worrying precedent is that in those cases we have had to rely on whistleblowers—had they not been stripped of powers in relation to free schools, local authority officers would be uncovering failures. The EFA and Ofsted obviously do not have the required infrastructure, and are therefore not currently up to the job.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Mearns]

The Minister has heard my hon. Friend’s question, and I echo that sentiment.

The Barnfield Federation has taken on some 10 schools in recent years, and I share the concerns that the federation might have overstretched itself by trying to take on too many schools too quickly. Although Barnfield college has stressed that it remains financially viable, its managerial viability is still a major cause of concern.

Advice given to those looking to set up free schools is careful to stress the importance of acquiring

“the right level of expertise to oversee the financial management of your school.”

It seems odd that the Government stress the importance of financial expertise in free schools—we have seen such failures—but have little concern about the expertise, standards or professional qualifications of the teaching staff. As I have previously mentioned, Ofsted raised concerns about both the financial and teaching provision at the Al-Madinah school, but Ofsted has not commented on the Secretary of State’s repeated assertion that free schools, and indeed all academies, do not need to have qualified teachers at all. That is apparently based on his view that what is good enough for Eton is good enough for any school. I appreciate that there is a little local difficulty in the coalition on that, but the Secretary of State and his Liberal Democrat Minister for Schools, at least, seem to be in accord, despite the apparent wider political Cleggmire.

The Government stress that expertise is necessary for the financial management of schools, yet they offer little insistence on such expertise when it comes to the governance and oversight of free schools. Many of the problems that I have outlined at the Al-Madinah school and Kings science academy, Bradford, stem from a lack of credible, organised governance and a lack of experience. The Department for Education may stress the importance of financial expertise, but if the systems of governance are poor, the financial health of a school will suffer as a direct consequence.

As free schools are autonomous, there is no way for local authorities to ensure that free schools in their jurisdiction have adequate, well rounded governance. It is imperative that that issue is addressed, urgently. The Government may write off Al-Madinah school as a one-off or as a contained incident, but the fact remains that that debacle has lifted the curtain on the fallacies and frailties of the programme. The Government simply do not have a clue about how many other free schools are in a similar situation.

The Department for Education’s website states:

“The right school can transform a child’s life and help them achieve things they may never have imagined.”

But what is the make-up of “the right school,” and what will the “wrong” school do for its students, who are ultimately children for whom we all have a duty of care?

Aside from good teachers and good facilities, I believe it is imperative that there is excellent governance, guaranteed by extensive oversight and rigorous inspection. I have called this debate because I have serious concerns about the oversight of free schools. I also have more general concerns about free schools, especially the disproportionate amount of the education budget eaten up by such schools. The unit costs of free schools bear no comparison with the vast majority of schools or schoolchildren.

One of my biggest concerns is the admissions policies adopted by many free schools that appear to be at best opaque, and at worst deliberately exclusive. A study by Race on the Agenda titled “Do free schools help to build a more equal society?” shows that only two out of 78 free schools are fully meeting their legal requirement to publish information pertaining to measurable equality objectives.

The ROTA report further states that only six free schools have published at least one equality objective, which is a poorer level of compliance than any other type of school. The question posed by the report is seemingly answered by those dismal figures. Free schools are doing very little to build a more equal society.

[Lisa Nandy]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point. What lies behind this is the fact that schools are not islands: what happens in one school has an impact on children in other schools and across the wider community. Does he agree that the free-for-all that free schools have become is bad for children—not just in the failing schools he talked about, but in other schools?

[Ian Mearns]

It is clear that free schools have an impact on other schools in their areas. Where those other schools hoped to have a comprehensive intake, the free schools will have a skewing effect. Indeed, they might also undermine the financial viability of other schools by taking pupils away from them. This is about not just whether free schools have a positive impact on the children who go to them, but whether they have a significant negative impact and a destabilising effect on other schools nearby.

Welfare Benefits Up-rating Bill

Debate between Ian Mearns and Lisa Nandy

Tuesday 8th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

I do not have time to do justice to the appalling, grinding impact of this miserable piece of legislation on the 3,500 people I represent who are seeking work, including a number of people who until last year used to work for Remploy, when they were casually forced out of work by Ministers. I do not have enough time to do justice either to its impact on the 8,500 working families who will lose out as a result of the Bill, or the 40% of children across Greater Manchester who already go to school hungry. There was not one single reference to them in the autumn statement, and we have heard very little about them from Government Members today.

It is bad enough that, as food banks spring up across the country, the impact of the Bill will be felt by the children I represent. It is worse that the Government believe it is appropriate to label them and their families as shirkers and scroungers—to play the politics of division while at the same time failing to explain how jobseeker’s allowance claimants gaining 72p per week and millionaires gaining more than £2,000 per week could possibly be fair in anyone’s book.

In the past few days, it has become absolutely clear that the case for the Bill is based on a series of what I can only politely describe as false premises: that it is on the side of people in work, when, as the Resolution Foundation pointed out, two-thirds of the people who will be hit are in work; and that there is a culture of worklessness, which the Joseph Rowntree Foundation roundly disproved in its recent research.

[Ian Mearns]

One of the things that stuns me about the debate is the fact that 57% of children living in poverty actually have one parent who is in work. It is dreadful that Government Members discount that fact.

[Lisa Nandy]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. That brings me on to the third false premise that the Bill is based on: that there are two distinct groups, the working poor and the non-working poor, who can somehow be separated out and divided when, as we know and as the research proves, most of the people we are talking about are moving in and out of work at an alarming rate. Many of the people I represent work part-time on zero-hours contracts. They are agency workers and they are in insecure employment.

Freedom of Information Act

Debate between Ian Mearns and Lisa Nandy

Wednesday 14th March 2012 Westminster Hall

[Lisa Nandy]

Absolutely. Evidence has emerged in the press that that is exactly what has happened in this instance, which is why I am seeking to clear up the matter today.

There is another thing that does not, so far, stand up to scrutiny. The Department for Education’s initial response to the press reports was to say that only political e-mails were sent through private accounts. The Secretary of State subsequently repeated that claim to the Education Committee. If the Department genuinely believed the e-mails were not governmental, why did it ever seek advice on the applicability of the law to private e-mail accounts? Can the Minister shed any light on that? Did he or his officials have any conversations with the Department, the Secretary of State or his advisers about it? That is why it matters so much to so many of us in the Opposition. Not only do the e-mails relate to decisions of crucial public importance to young people and their families—not least about Building Schools for the Future—but they have created a situation that looks distinctly murky. That affects and discredits us all, and must be clarified urgently.

[Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)]

As a member of the Education Committee, I attended the hearing. Has my hon. Friend reflected on the fact that in attempting to answer, or not answer, her questions at that Committee hearing, and by evading a real answer to her questions, the Secretary of State, I am sorry to say, seemed to find some amusement in the whole matter? That is a very sad thing, given the time and effort that my hon. Friend has put just into trying to uncover the truth.

[Lisa Nandy]

Indeed; and also because of the significance to the people that we represent throughout the country of decisions that were made and discussed using private e-mail accounts.

I have been seeking answers for seven months and have not been able to get any. In that time, it has been alleged that Ministers repeatedly destroyed official Government correspondence and deliberately used private e-mail accounts to avoid the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act. They may still be doing so. The failure to answer questions about this matter makes a mockery of Parliament, the Freedom of Information Act and the commitment to open government.

I realise that Governments are reluctant to share information, sometimes for understandable reasons, but I share the Government’s view that transparency is crucial. In the words of the coalition agreement, they should

“throw open the doors of public bodies, to enable the public to hold politicians and public bodies to account. We also recognise that this will help to deliver better value for money in public spending.”

If that commitment is to have any meaning, frankly, Ministers must up their game. I should be grateful if the Minister would give a commitment today that the original guidance will be published, that in light of the Information Commissioner’s ruling, clear renewed guidance will be issued urgently across the Government regarding the application of the FOI Act to private e-mails, and that if he cannot answer all my questions, he makes a decent attempt to answer those he can, writes to me about the rest and no longer seeks to hide behind the much overused phrase, “long-standing convention.”

Education Bill

Debate between Ian Mearns and Lisa Nandy

Wednesday 11th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy]

First, I associate myself wholeheartedly with the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) and the amendments standing in our names. One of their key aims is to preserve the conditionality principle that was such an important aspect of the EMA, and I ask Ministers to give a commitment on that. The beauty of EMA was that students had to attend and attain in order to get it. In effect, the state said to the student: “If you work hard and try hard, we will back you regardless of your background. We think you deserve the same opportunities as your peers.”

That was very important. Before entering Parliament, I worked with children and young people for seven or eight years, and I was always struck by their strong sense of the importance of fairness. If young people are going to buy into whichever scheme replaces the EMA, it is essential that they see that it is fair. The aspect of the EMA that I have just highlighted was one of the main reasons why young people thought that it was fair, because those who were working hard and trying hard were assured by their Government that they would get it and be supported.

Following the chaos and insecurity caused by the shambolic way in which the cancellation of the EMA was announced, I was very pleased that Ministers listened and made some commitments in relation to students who have already started their courses. I was also deeply disappointed that the scheme for existing students was altered so that the maximum payment that they receive was reduced. Young people in my constituency rely on the EMA not as an extra or a perk, but as an essential part of their household income.

One of the reasons why my hon. Friend and I are seeking to ensure that there are clear national eligibility criteria for the EMA is that students in our constituencies rely on knowing that they will get the EMA in order to make the decision to go to college in the first place. Those students absolutely need to know whether they will qualify. The key issue in respect of the concern that has already been expressed about the possibility of a postcode lottery and about discretion appearing to be the direction of travel is that under those circumstances such students simply will not be able to make an informed choice on whether to go to college.

[Ian Mearns]

It is also a concern that the decision to abolish the EMA in the first place was based on flawed evidence from a survey that was conducted in school sixth forms but not in further education colleges. That fact in itself shows that Ministers got the whole message wrong. In 2009-10, 567,000 youngsters received the EMA at the higher level—£30 a week—yet Ministers have decided to do away with it, based on evidence from youngsters in sixth forms but not in FE colleges. In my area of Gateshead, 67% of youngsters attending the local college were entitled to the EMA at the higher level.