Educational Opportunities
John Grady Excerpts(3 days, 18 hours ago)
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John Grady (Glasgow East) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Pritchard. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Tony Vaughan) for securing this important debate and for his compelling and comprehensive survey of adult education.
For centuries, Scotland had one of the best education systems in the world, but that is not the case today under the Scottish National party. Attainment has been falling for years. As recent programme for international student assessment reviews show, standards in literacy, mathematics and science are falling, and that is closing doors for children and young people in my seat. The response in Glasgow, I am afraid, has been to cut 172 teaching posts this year, with further cuts to come.
The attainment gap in Scottish schools is widening. Where someone is born is becoming more, not less, important than it was and barriers for poorer children are increasing. It is worth saying that the Government are tackling one of the causes of the attainment gap—poverty—by introducing legislation that will make work pay and tackling family poverty by increasing the national minimum and living wage. However, the SNP is also responsible for the attainment gap in our schools and that is preventing young people from getting good jobs and being able to provide for their families.
A simple example of that failure is that since 2010, there has been a material drop in school attendance. If someone does not go to school, they do not learn. There has also been a general worsening of behaviour in Scottish schools since 2016, shown by figures from the Scottish Government themselves. Put simply, in many Scottish schools, parents, children and teachers have great fear and worry about school behaviour. Nicola Sturgeon made it clear that closing the attainment gap was her main objective, but the SNP has failed on that.
Adult education, which my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe spoke so compellingly about, is critical for jobs for people in Scotland. The OECD recently carried out a study of Scottish adult education and other matters in the west coast of Scotland, where my seat is located. It reported that career guidance for adults is “challenging to access” and financial incentives to invest in reskilling and upskilling workers are very low. That has a terrible impact on low-paid workers in Scotland and a real impact on both economic growth in Scotland and such critical matters as the transition from oil and gas to renewables.
With six seconds to go, I will conclude by saying that elections take place in Holyrood in 2026. It is time for change and a Government that put education first.