Arthur Labinjo-Hughes

Julian Knight Excerpts

Monday 6th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for so generously offering cross-party support. I hope that she will remember that I always worked on a cross-party basis to co-operate and co-ordinate when I was Vaccine Deployment Minister. I hope that, through the Josh MacAlister review, we can ensure that we reach out across the House and share thoughts, as well as through the two reviews that are specific to the tragic death of young Arthur.

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement and for his engagement over the last 72 hours.

“No one loves me” and “no one is going to feed me”: those are the words that broke the heart of my town, and, it seems, of our country as well. A young lad who never had a chance; he experienced unimaginable brutality in his short life. Will my right hon. Friend confirm that no stone will remain unturned and no difficult question unasked, that this investigation will proceed without fear or favour, and that at the end of it we will know clearly and publicly who failed Arthur and how he was failed? In addition, will he ensure that the investigation focuses on the clear breakdown in partnerships between the likes of social services, the police and educators? Why on earth were they not talking to each other? At the very least, we owe it to Arthur that every lesson from this horrific tragedy is learned and that no town has its heart broken like Solihull has had.

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s words. The words of Arthur have, I know, torn the heart of the nation. I assure him that both reviews will be able to go wherever they need to. I hope that he agrees with me that transparency is the best disinfectant in this case. I thank and commend him for making himself available at all times when we needed to make contact and discuss with him and his office what we were planning to announce in the House.

Higher Technical Education Reform

Julian Knight Excerpts

Monday 8th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her question. I visit FE colleges because of my portfolio—they do brilliant work on supported internships for students with special educational needs and disabilities—and I have to say that I hear a similar story about the financial challenges, which is where all this sits. I hope that from my earlier comments, and what she will have heard from my right hon. Friend the Minister for Apprenticeships and Skills, who has responsibility for further education, she will see that we are very much cognisant of the fact that more investment needs to go into FE. We have a spending review coming up, and my right hon. Friend will be putting her best foot forward in that negotiation. This is obviously to do with the challenge of finance in the FE sector.

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

My hon. Friend will have seen the announcement last week by Jaguar Land Rover of a massive new investment in the Castle Bromwich branch near my constituency. It is a real vote of confidence in our nation, despite Brexit. However, JLR needs an enhanced skills base. Does he agree that raising awareness of any new qualifications is key, so that they are not just alphabet soup, and so that we break down barriers of prejudice about non-degree qualifications? No more targets—let us respect, as a society, technical qualifications.

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for his question. Of course, the JLR announcement was equally welcome in Stratford-on-Avon, because many of my constituents work at the head office in Gaydon, where, as JLR recognised in its announcement, a lot of its engineering know-how and innovation are based. He is right to remind the House that if we obsess over a target for 50% of young people to go to university, we end up neglecting the FE sector, and that is something we in this Government will not do.

School Funding

Julian Knight Excerpts

Thursday 25th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)]

Let me start by saying that I share the sentiments expressed by the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Mike Kane) about Stephen Yaxley-Lennon’s visit to his constituency today, and I am sure they are shared right across this House.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for St Albans (Mrs Main) on securing and opening this important debate. The Government are determined to create a world-class education system that offers opportunity to every child, no matter their circumstances or where they live. I share the views of many in this debate that schools must have the resources they need to make that happen. That is why we are investing in our schools, delivering on our promise to make funding fairer so that the investment is going to the right places, and helping schools to make the most out of every pound they receive.

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

Does the Minister agree with my analysis, based on one-to-one meetings with headteachers in Solihull, that much of the long-term financial challenge relates to teachers’ pensions and that we must put those on a sustainable long-term footing, as well as dealing with the real challenges we face in the here and now?

[Nick Gibb]

My hon. Friend makes an important point about the teachers’ pension scheme. The employer contribution rate will increase from 16% to 23% in September 2019 but, as confirmed earlier in April, we will be providing funding for this increase in 2019-20 for all state-funded schools, further education and sixth-form colleges, and adult community learning providers. My hon. Friend the Member for Saffron Walden (Mrs Badenoch) asked about that funding in future years, and it will of course be a matter for the spending review.

The hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) asked whether I could meet his local headteachers to discuss funding, and I would be delighted to do so. The Secretary of State and I meet headteachers regularly, almost on a weekly basis, to discuss not only school funding, but other issues such as standards in our schools, and we would be happy to do that with the hon. Gentleman’s local headteachers as well.

Standards are rising in our schools. Thanks in part to our reforms, the proportion of pupils in good or outstanding schools has increased from 66% in 2010 to 85%. I listened carefully to the excellent opening speech by my hon. Friend the Member for St Albans, who has raised the issue of school funding, both for her constituency’s schools and nationally, on many occasions, including in Westminster Hall debates recently and again today. I am sure that the Treasury will also have heard what she had to say today. I can give her the assurances she seeks that the Secretary of State and I are both working hard to prepare our spending review bid for when that process starts later in the year to ensure that we have the best bid possible for schools, high-needs and post-16 funding.

As I was saying, standards are rising in our schools. In primary schools, our more rigorous curriculum is on a par with the highest-performing in the world and it has been taught since September 2014. Since it was first tested in 2016, we have seen the proportion of primary school pupils reaching the expected standard in the maths test rise from 70% to 76% in 2018, and in the reading test the figure has risen from 66% to 75%. Of course we would not know that if we adopted the Labour party’s policy of scrapping SATs, which of course we will not do.

Oral Answers to Questions

Julian Knight Excerpts

Monday 11th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

Personal finance education in schools is a key way of skilling up young people, so will the Minister meet me soon to discuss further plans to make available to schools a textbook on personal finance education through the all-party group on financial education for young people?

[Nick Gibb]

Financial education is important. It is in the national curriculum and in the maths curriculum, which is an essential way of children becoming financially literate. I would be delighted to meet my hon. Friend and I am particularly keen to discuss textbooks.

School Funding

Julian Knight Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Julie Cooper (Burnley) (Lab)]

As a former teacher, experienced school governor and parent, I fully understand the value of providing every child with an excellent education. Education changes lives, it empowers individuals, it increases social mobility, and it is the single biggest driver of economic success for a nation. It is right that we pursue high standards and seek to provide the very best education for all the children of this country.

This Government are going about things in the wrong way, however. The new national funding formula will see 98% of schools worse off and demonstrates more than anything else could that the Government are not serious about raising educational standards or about social mobility. My constituency of Burnley, which continues to have some of the highest levels of social deprivation and is in the top five most deprived areas in the whole of Lancashire, will lose £477 for every secondary pupil and £339 for every primary pupil. In the past, the Secretary of State has said that no school would lose more than 1.5% of funding per year under the new formula. How can she square that with projections that my schools will lose 8% on average by 2019?

Even before these cuts, we are already seeing increased class sizes, subjects being dropped from the curriculum, pupils with special educational needs and disabilities losing vital support, and teacher vacancies. I ask the Secretary of State how she believes cutting funding for schools in Burnley will help a whole generation of young people to succeed.

There is nothing fair about funding that is not sufficient. How can it be fair to take educational funding from schools that are already stretched to breaking point—schools that already go the extra mile to give every child the best possible start in life?

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

The hon. Lady said that 98% of schools will lose, but I understand from the figures that I have that 70% of the hon. Lady’s schools will gain from this new funding formula. Would she like to comment on that?

[Julie Cooper]

I hope that the hon. Gentleman’s figures are correct, but I fear that they are not. My information suggests that they are not. The research that I have done shows that that is not the case.

My schools are already working flat out to ensure that children coping with social and economic deprivation can overcome disadvantage and fulfil their potential, yet those schools are having the rug pulled from under them. Robbing Peter to pay Paul—or robbing Peterborough to help Poole—is not going to help. In my constituency, there has been a concerted effort by the key stakeholders, the schools, the council and businesses to work together to grow the local economy. That has not been easy, but we are making good progress. We are focusing our energies on raising skill levels, confidence and aspiration among young people. Considerable effort has been expended on this, and these funding cuts feel like a kick in the teeth.

Education is the key not just to better life chances for individuals but to our economic success. Ensuring adequate funding is crucial so that every child, wherever they live and whatever their background, can fulfil their potential. As a nation, we know that every citizen matters in the widest possible sense, not least to our economy. Investing in education is an investment in the economy, and failing to do that is short-sighted in the extreme. A Government who talk of increased social mobility and growing a strong economy need to understand that investment in education is absolutely fundamental to those aims.

--- Later in debate ---

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

Solihull is mentioned in many surveys as being one of the best places to live not just in the west midlands but in the UK as a whole and that is due in no small part to its schools. My schools have put in a Herculean effort for years. They do more with less. They have embraced change and gained the benefits from so doing, despite having been one of the losers in the fairer funding formula for many years. I welcome the Government’s commitment to making the necessary changes. Although this is a consultation at the moment, I hope that they will take on the comments that many hon. Members are making so that we can get this right and set for the future.

In my constituency, although secondary schools gain, and I am very grateful for that, some primary schools do not, with some losing up to 2.5%. In addition, the unequal treatment of Solihull schools compared with those of neighbouring Birmingham has not yet been fixed, with those in the city still enjoying a substantial per-pupil advantage, currently standing at £1,300 per year.

To put that into a real-world context, schools in Birmingham can use the extra cash to offer more competitive salaries and attract newly qualified teachers, especially in subjects such as mathematics and science, and that hurts schools in neighbouring communities that do not have the money to spare. Schools in Birmingham also have more funds to set aside for facilities, extracurricular activities, school trips and all the other things that allow schools to provide a rich and well-rounded education.

In a compact, urban region such as the west midlands, even small inequalities of that sort can have serious consequences for those who are left out, and the inequalities are more visible than they might be elsewhere. Local headteachers tell me that parents regularly ask them why pupils in Birmingham schools are taken on exciting school trips, but their own children are not. Such unfairness is made all the worse by the fact that so many Birmingham children are educated in Solihull. I believe that up to 40% of the children in some of our local schools come from outside the borough, but those pupils do not bring their funding advantages with them.

I am pleased that the need for fairer funding in our schools is widely recognised, and that the Government are grasping the nettle. The proposals are an important first step, and now we have our consultation, but we must go further to end the unequal treatment of communities such as Solihull.

National Funding Formula: Schools/High Needs

Julian Knight Excerpts

Wednesday 14th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Wishing the fellow a full recovery, I call Mr Julian Knight.

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I welcome both the substance and the tone of the statement. Schools in Solihull receive £1,300 a year less per pupil than those in nearby Birmingham. As a result, we lose teachers to Birmingham. Will the Secretary of State assure me that at least some of that unfairness will be addressed during this Parliament?

[Justine Greening]

I have set out the timelines for the roll-out of this national funding formula. My hon. Friend sets out some of the by-products of the current unfair situation. That is another reason why it is important that we address that situation.

Free Childcare for 3 and 4-year-olds

Julian Knight Excerpts

Tuesday 12th July 2016 Westminster Hall

[Karin Smyth]

I do. In the Public Accounts Committee, we have found that the situation varies across the country, and many hon. Members will be able to tell the Minister about their local experience. I will discuss quality later.

Local authorities have to provide the family information service, which gives parents details not only about childcare providers that offer free entitlement but about how to claim it. I know from my own constituents that navigating the processes can be as big a barrier to claiming entitlements as knowledge of the offer itself. That extends, incidentally, to other entitlements such as pension credit and income support.

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

The hon. Lady is making an important contribution. The challenges are multifaceted. A couple of weeks ago I met the YMCA, which runs a local nursery, and it told me that it felt that some local authorities take very high administration charges when it comes to allocating per-pupil funding to children in their care. Does she agree that local authorities need to do all they can to ensure that free childcare is spread as widely as possible?

[Karin Smyth]

I do, and I will come on to the need for local authorities to abide by the statutory direction given by the Government. That was one point that the Public Accounts Committee picked up on.

Information for people in my constituency is generally good. We have 1 Big Database, a searchable database of 1,000 childcare providers that is a collective effort of Bristol, Bath and North East Somerset and South Gloucestershire Councils and enables parents to locate the providers nearest to their home or workplace, although it lists only provision, not vacancies. However, it is clear that the quality of information varies between authorities nationwide. Shockingly, the Public Accounts Committee heard that only 30% of parents are even aware of family information services. If there is an offer but most of those who are eligible for it do not know about it or how to access it, its value is diluted to say the least. I hope that the Minister will outline how his Department will improve the quality and consistency of information for parents.

My second area of concern is workforce planning. As a former governor of a nursery and children’s centre, I recognise the importance and difficulties for providers of such planning. The Public Accounts Committee found that the Department lacked robust plans to ensure that there are enough qualified early years staff for providers to continue offering high-quality childcare. The sector has become increasingly professional, and there has been an increase in graduate recruits. That raises quality but brings challenges for providers, which now report that they are struggling to recruit. As the Department has set funding rates until 2019-20 based on 2014-15 costs, many providers are also concerned about the impact of the national living wage on their costs. The Department does not have a workforce plan for the early years sector.

There are also concerns that there is a real risk to the delivery of the pledge to provide 15 additional free hours from September 2017, due to too few providers being able to deliver that pledge because many will be minded not to become involved in the offer. I find that alarming, and it raises serious questions about the process of making pledges when deliverability appears not to have been properly assessed.

“Educational Excellence Everywhere”: Academies

Julian Knight Excerpts

Monday 9th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

I thank the Secretary of State for her statement and for listening to colleagues on academies. After all, the purpose of a White Paper is to listen and to debate. Does she share my disquiet about the approach and language adopted by some of the teaching unions and Labour Members in railing against all academies, despite the clear evidence that, in the main, they work?

[Nicky Morgan]

I thank my hon. Friend. I well remember visiting an excellent academy in his constituency that was full of innovation, vigour and creativity, and absolutely on the side of the pupils there. Yes, I am concerned that some people so want to talk about structures that they have completely missed everything the rest of the White Paper says about teaching, leadership, standards, curriculums, and funding.

Schools White Paper

Julian Knight Excerpts

Wednesday 13th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

I rise primarily in praise of academies, because in my constituency their spread has been transformative. We have some of the finest schools in the country, and I want the system that has brought us such success to be offered to many more children across the nation. In my constituency, six of our seven state schools have achieved academy status, and all save one produced results that greatly exceed the national average. The other one began to convert to academy status only in 2015, since when Ofsted reports that it is making very good progress.

[Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way because I know that he is pressed for time, but I wish to back up what he has said, particularly for the secondary system. For example, in Taunton Deane in January, Court Fields School, which had problems, became an academy and was highlighted by Ofsted inspectors as having made vast improvements, including a 20% increase in maths results.

[Julian Knight]

My hon. Friend has added grist to my mill.

The greatest success in my constituency has been Tudor Grange Academy, which for four consecutive years has registered more than 90% of its students as achieving five A to C grades, including in maths at the end of year 11. We also have our first primary school, St James, which I am pleased to report has risen above the national average for reading, writing and mathematics. It is clear that putting teachers and headteachers in charge is a recipe for success. Those Solihull school success stories should give pause to all those who deny that academies can make a powerful, positive difference to our young people.

I believe that Solihull, with its very high levels of academisation and excellent results, is a model for the future of our education system. A first-rate school system is essential if our children are to compete in the globalised economy they will grow up in. In too many instances, the old structures have failed to help talented young people to fulfil their potential.

At a time of great pressure on public finances, it is to the Government’s credit that they have chosen to invest so heavily in education. However, I have certain concerns about the academisation proposals with regard to rural primary schools. I would like to see whether, in further discussions, we can allay concerns about whether those schools are the right size and whether the process can be managed effectively over the extensive six-year time period.

In the main, the reforms give school leaders the freedom and authority to find educational solutions that work best for them, based on their first-hand experience and understanding. In particular, they are a vote of confidence in our teachers. As my right hon. Friend pointed out, teachers will now be afforded the same status as other professionals, such as those in law, medicine and the sciences.

Our move away from the top-down approach to reform has other benefits. A sad consequence of the central control of our school system has been an unhelpful level of standardisation. In pursuit of the laudable goal of equality, the drive has too often been to make sure that every school is the same. Our predecessors knew far less than we do about how pupils learn. We are now aware that children learn in many different ways and that a one-size-fits-all approach leaves too many far behind.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Julian Knight Excerpts

Thursday 17th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. As in so many areas of Government policy, we will of course finish the job that was not even started by the previous Labour Government.

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

I congratulate the Secretary of State on the bold steps on academisation. I will relate to her my own personal experience in Solihull, where the majority of secondary schools are academies and we have some of the finest schools in the country. We have found the academisation process to be transformative, and I now want to see it spreading out across the United Kingdom.

[Nicky Morgan]

I thank my hon. Friend for his comments. Not long ago, I had the pleasure of visiting a school in Solihull with him and my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman). He is absolutely right to talk about transformative education, which is what Conservative Members want to see. It is a basic right for every young person in this country to have an excellent education. We now have 1.4 million more children in schools rated “good” or “outstanding”.