Religious Education in Modern Britain

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Tuesday 1st November 2022 Westminster Hall

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Maria. I declare an interest as someone who was an RE teacher—although not a specialist, I must confess, which may upset some in the room—and my partner is a head of religious education. Of course, hon. Members will understand the lobbying that took place at home before attending today’s debate.

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb) on his return as the Minister for School Standards. I did not have the honour of following him directly—although I told him that was my lifelong dream—but being replaced by him is something I am more than happy to take, because he is one of the best Ministers that this Government have had since 2010. A lot of the Gove-Gibbean reforms, as I always refer to them, have meant that education standards have dramatically improved in this country. As someone who worked on the frontline for eight and a half years and saw that at first hand, I want to thank him for his work in this area then and now.

RE is a compulsory subject. It blows my mind to this day that although it is compulsory, some schools are not delivering it up until the age of 18, as is meant to be the case. There has therefore been a watering down of the quality and take-up of this subject in schools, and I have witnessed that at first hand. The term “postcode lottery” is perfect; I have worked in London, Birmingham and other parts of the country as a secondary school teacher and seen at first hand the impact it has had on pupils wishing to take the subject forward. In some schools, pupils were made to take RE, and in others it was an option. It is sad to see the low take-up, which is why we are seeing a driving down of recruitment figures.

It is clear that people who want to come into teaching do not feel that RE is valued in our curriculum. Although I am broadly supportive of a national standard for RE teaching to ensure that there is equalisation across the country, there is an easier way to put RE on the map. I know the Minister disagrees with me about this, but I dare to utter it: we could put RE in the EBacc, giving it the same status as history and geography. Many RE departments sit within the humanities department and feel like the ugly duckling in that department when RE is the only subject not to go in that EBacc pot. Doing so could have a positive impact, enabling pupils and parents to understand that RE is a subject that is worthy taking, and giving it the status it requires to be in schools. That will have a positive impact on recruitment figures, and on the take-up of RE into GCSEs and post-16 education.

When it comes to recruitment figures, I confess that I was the Minister who signed off the latest round of bursaries and scholarships, and I accept that RE was not on that list. That is because—for good reason—subjects such as physics and geography, which also face under-recruitment, offer highly competitive professional wages in the private sector. On top of the £30,000 starting salary that we are committed to delivering as per our manifesto, we had to give bursaries for those subjects—particularly physics, for which new teachers will get a £29,000 scholarship—to drive up recruitment. Had I had longer than my 50 days in post, I would have ensured that RE was included in that list. We reintroduced the bursary for teaching English. It would be good to see that happen in religious education as well. I will certainly support that from the Back Benches.

Although I do not think that someone needs to be a specialist to teach RE to a high standard—of course, I am biased as someone who did that myself—having more specialist teachers for a subject will always improve educational outcomes and attainment. There is no one better than someone with that passion. I am interested in politics and was trained in citizenship, so I was able to deliver those subjects with passion and gusto. Similarly, my partner, who did philosophy at university, is able to go into school and deliver incredibly high-quality religious education teaching. Again, I accept my bias, but her ability to teach is because of her passion for her subject area and the deep knowledge she has gained through her degree. The more we can do to drive up specialisms, the better.

Hate crimes and radicalisation are real threats, as we know at first hand in Stoke-on-Trent. The attack on Fishmongers’ Hall was carried out by a man from my constituency who had been radicalised within Islam. Islam is not a radical religion—let us not forget it is the faith that says, “To kill one human is to kill all of mankind”—but sadly there are those in every faith who push a perverse ideology. We also see that on the far right in the great city of Stoke-on-Trent, with some people pushing a white nationalist agenda.

If we do not have high-quality religious education alongside the fantastic Prevent work that is undertaken by the city council, police and local schools, how will we ever tackle the misunderstandings, mis-teachings and perverse ideologies that are pushed, particularly on to young people? That is why it is so important that we get religious education right, and we make sure that young people understand and challenge their misconceptions.

It is most important that we accept that faith schools are an important part of our system, and even allow some schools to select by faith. The idea that we would not push RE to be a compulsory subject that is taken up properly in the school system seems to be a bit of an oxymoron, and challenges what we are saying in other areas. We should be pushing work at schools such as St Wilfred’s, St Mary’s and St Thomas’s—all within Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke—to give a high-quality, faith-based education alongside a high-quality, rigorous curriculum. The Minister would want and demand that, and I fully support him in that.

I hope that we have sent a big signal today. This is definitely a cross-party effort and feeling. The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) gave a fantastic speech, and his idea that every Government and every party should commit to religious education in their manifesto is something that I will push within the Conservative party come the next general election.

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[Nick Gibb]

I will keep that idea under consideration. We have already issued guidance about the teaching of religious education in schools.

Regardless of whether teachers are following a locally agreed syllabus for RE or one designed by their own school or a multi-academy trust, ensuring that they have access to high-quality teaching resources is important, as it is for every other subject. We intend to support the teaching of RE through the procurement of full curriculum packages by Oak National Academy—that goes to the point made by my right hon. Friend. We want to make sure that what is taught is of high quality, and that applies not just to RE but to other subjects. Oak is playing an important role in providing resources for teachers and, in the second tranche of its procurement process, will be procuring curriculum materials, maps and plans for religious education.

As the hon. Member for Portsmouth South and others said, recruiting and retaining teachers is crucial to every curriculum subject, so the Department is driving an ambitious transformation plan to overhaul the process of teacher training. This includes stimulating initial interest through world-class marketing, providing support for prospective trainees, and using real-time data and insight from our new application process to help to boost recruitment where it is most needed. In the 2020-21 academic year, we exceeded the postgraduate initial teacher training target for religious education teachers, achieving 129% of the target. The equivalent target in the 2021-22 academic year was narrowly missed, as we achieved 99% of the target. We will keep these issues under review.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes and the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport raised the issue of initial teacher training bursaries. As the Government do not provide bursaries for every subject, I can understand the disappointment of those who are not eligible, and I do not put all the blame for that on to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North. These are difficult decisions that are taken every year as we decide how to allocate the scarce resource of the bursaries. They are allocated to take account of recruitment historically, the forecast economic conditions and the teacher supply needed in each subject. That allows us to focus the bursary expenditure on subjects with the greatest need and ensures that we spend money where it is needed most. My hon. Friend got that decision absolutely right in his period in office.

Specialist teacher training and continuous professional development are important for every subject. In some cases, subject knowledge enhancement courses may be appropriate for those training to become a specialist. This is where a School Direct lead school or an initial teacher training provider can identify applicants who have the potential to become outstanding RE teachers, but who need to increase their subject knowledge. There is an eight-week subject knowledge enhancement course to help them to become specialist teachers.

[Jonathan Gullis]

The Minister is completely correct to say that continuous professional development is so important to being a high-quality teacher, but sadly we are the only country in Europe that does not have enough specified hours for teachers to do teacher training throughout the academic year. This is something I was looking at in the Department while I was there. Does the Minister agree that to enable the eight-week course to be taken up by non-specialists, such as someone like me, we will need to be able to protect time for teachers to get that professional development?

[Nick Gibb]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and we have clear guidance to schools about mentoring and continuous professional development. The early career framework was implemented to help teachers in the first two years of their career to make sure they have the right mentoring and training so that they can turn into accomplished teachers.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes raised the matter of collective worship, which is an important part of school life. It encourages pupils to reflect on the concept of belief and the role it plays in the traditions and values of this country, and equips them with the knowledge they need to interact with other people. It deals with how we live our lives and includes important moral and ethical issues. Any concerns that a school is failing to provide a daily act of collective worship should in the first instance be raised via the school’s complaints unit.