Adult Literacy and Numeracy

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Thursday 10th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Julie Elliott), who covered all the great work that Unionlearn has done. I have asked to see that first hand in my constituency, but I have not yet had a reply to my request.

It is also a pleasure to follow excellent and thoughtful speeches from my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr Evans) and the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman). I also wish to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Caroline Dinenage), who has done some exceptional work in this area. Indeed, I was surprised by her calm, measured and constructive manner, when I would have struggled to hold back my anger at the fact that one in six adults is financially illiterate. The OECD figures are a disgrace, and we have robbed people of opportunity. We all have drivers of our politics—the issues that motivate us to do what we do—and this is one of my core drivers.

I went to a school that was bottom of the league tables and many of my friends were robbed of opportunities in life. As Members of Parliament we see from our casework people in real distress, arguably through no fault of their own but because they are simply not equipped to deal with the challenges that life throws up. My wife volunteered for two years at a job club and found people were not equipped to get jobs to give them opportunities in life.

[Mr Nigel Evans]

Does my hon. Friend agree that one area in which numeracy has an incredible impact on people’s lives is that of payday loans at 1,400% from Wonga and various other companies? When people do not have the faintest idea what that means, they get into huge financial difficulties which cause great misery. If they were numerate, they would understand exactly why they should not take out loans at those exorbitant rates.

[Justin Tomlinson]

That is a brilliant intervention with fortune-telling skills, as that is exactly what I was about to say. Numeracy is not just about applying for jobs—it is about confidence, about being a savvy consumer and about dealing with things such as payday lending. We have had several debates on this and I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr Walker) will also touch on that issue—although to be fair, most Treasury Ministers would struggle to calculate the APR on payday lending. We live in a complex world with marketing messages, and my hon. Friend and I are working on a paper at the moment about how consumers are not empowered. The markets are in control because consumers are not equipped to make the right decisions.

I want to talk about three areas in which we have opportunities to help people—financial education, work in schools and using libraries as hubs. On financial education, we have had an exceptionally successful cross-party campaign—235 MPs signed up—and I am delighted that as of September 2014 it will be a core part of the national curriculum. The key driver behind the campaign was the fact that 91% of people who get into financial difficulties say, “If only I had known better.” My hon. Friend the Member for Gosport pointed out that 50% of adults struggle with even primary maths skills, so it is no wonder that people get into financial difficulty. The campaign focused on four strands—schools, further education, higher education and the crucial vulnerable group, work on which is led by my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce). That group is crucial because although we are bringing in the changes in schools, further education and higher education, some people will still slip through the net. The report will be published in the next couple of weeks and will contain important points for the Government to take up, so that we can ensure that the most vulnerable people are not missed out.

I am a big fan of the school reforms, which will drive up standards and include making grammar and spelling important in all exams; making mental arithmetic more important in primary schools; restricting the use of calculators; and upgrading maths in the curriculum. I was a maths fan in school, but I was in the minority, even though maths is incredibly important. The pupil premium is providing schools with opportunities to target resources to those most in need.

I had an inspiring visit to Seven Fields school in my constituency. As I have mentioned in previous debates, I had the honour of the Minister for Schools coming to visit after I had set out just how good the school is. To put it in context, it is in one of the top 5% most deprived areas and it was formerly a failing school. To give credit to the previous Government, money was provided to rebuild the school, which was the beginning of the process, but the fundamental changes came from the school reforms, which gave its inspirational head teacher the ability to make a real difference. Some 70% of the children are on the pupil premium and that money has been used—now that the class sizes have been almost halved to 17—to work with the community to get volunteers to come in and read one on one with the children. That has been done by providing a free Sunday roast on Wednesdays to the Penhill luncheon club, who work one on one with the children on reading and numeracy. It makes a huge difference.

Lately resources have been diverted to the nursery because, as the head teacher told the Minister for Schools and me, some of the children coming through have simply been abandoned in front of the television. Not only can they not walk, they have not even reached the first stages of crawling. They literally have to start again. When the children arrive at the school, they are 18 months behind the national average, but by the time they finish, they have caught up—giving those children opportunity.

Huge effort is put into selecting the best, most ambitious teachers, who want to go the extra mile to make a difference. We all know from our own time in schools how teachers who make the extra effort can make a huge difference. The school also provides a constructive and positive environment, including children taking their shoes off and treating it like their own homes. They also have opportunities to make visits beyond school to do things that they would not otherwise have the chance to do.

The head teacher still has a wish list of things that would make a difference. She feels that school holidays undo the great work that is done. Some of the children are upset that they will not be able to come into school. Before teachers start thinking that I am advocating a 52-week term, I should say that the idea is to open up the schools in holidays for summer camps on sport, literacy or numeracy, or for the Scouts and other volunteer organisations to use. PFI schools often have expensive charges for outside groups, which removes the opportunity for constructive work. The head teacher thinks that some of the children benefit from the almost family environment in the school, and should perhaps be held back beyond primary school age—perhaps up to 14 or when they are in a position to go to the local FE college or start an apprenticeship—because they need that sort of environment, perhaps because of their family background. As they go off to the traditional secondary schools, the influences and temptations away from the right path prove too great without family support—and the school can be a substitute for that.

The final, and perhaps contentious, item is the need for performance-related pay for teachers. My father was a teacher, as were my grandmother and grandfather, and many of my friends are teachers. We need to provide incentives for the very best teachers who make a real difference to people. I do not see why they should not be rewarded financially, because in any other profession they would be.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

I wish to explore how the hon. Gentleman thinks that would work in practice. My son is doing a GCSE in business studies with two different teachers. If one is good and one is bad, how would we work out who got the pay rise and who got the sack?

[Justin Tomlinson]

That is a good point, and the key is that I would not do that, because I am a politician and what do I know? It would be the head teachers who decided. We should entrust them to run schools like any other organisation. The head teacher at this school was waxing lyrical about the inspirational teachers with extra enthusiasm and energy, and she should have absolute freedom to ensure that she has the very best teachers for those children from very challenging backgrounds who do not have the luxury of private education and who rely on this single chance in life.

The parents also need to be engaged. My hon. Friend the Member for Gosport mentioned the role of parents. The school I am talking about has parental contracts. If parents want their child to go to the school, they have to play their part and engage with the school, to ensure that it is not only in school hours that the children benefit from the opportunities provided

I am chair of the all-party parliamentary group on libraries, and I think libraries have a big role to play in adult literacy, which might simply be by opening up the doors to volunteer groups in the evenings and when the library is closed. The summer reading challenge has made a huge difference in getting children to read six books over the summer, when previously they might not have read a single book—look at the number of adults who have not read a book in the last 12 months. Perhaps jobcentres could utilise the libraries to provide opportunities, even for those who need to start from scratch. I have advocated in other debates that we should open up school sports facilities for free to organisations that provide constructive, energetic activities for young people, and a similar principle could be applied to libraries.

The situation is a disgrace. We have to show urgency in our attempts to make a difference. People have one chance in life and, as all hon. Members will make clear, they are being robbed of it. That is a desperately poor situation.