Social Mobility Commission

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Goodwill]

The Joseph Rowntree report on relative poverty will always reflect changes—for example, in levels of pensions and levels of employment. If we see higher employment or higher levels of pensions, then an unfortunate side effect will be that relative poverty will increase. As I have said, there are now over 300,000 fewer people in absolute poverty, and that is the figure that is more important to them in their everyday lives as they are shopping for Christmas.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

As the new board is formed, one of the key areas of expertise we need is the ability to build on record employment as, for the first time ever, those entering work will continue to get support from their named job coach, helping to unlock their potential to keep their work, increase their hours, increase their pay, and progress within work. Can that be a real priority for a new board member?

[Mr Goodwill]

There are a number of areas of experience and expertise that we will wish to see from the new board members. This is an opportunity to refresh the board. I look forward to an inspiring chair of the Social Mobility Commission to take forward the work that Alan Milburn has laid the foundations for.

Olympic Sports/GCSE PE

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Wednesday 1st November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Olympic sports and accepted GCSE PE activities.

This is an important matter, especially to all those students and their parents who find themselves in what I would describe as a deeply unfair situation, if I may be so bold. The mother of my constituent Kyle Ross-Waddell, who is here today with his parents, contacted me in the summer about the position he found himself in at Bramcote School in my constituency. In short, this young man is an exceptionally talented speed-skater, to the extent that he is now one of only 12 15 to 18-year-olds who are part of the national academy for primarily speed-skating, but also related sports, that is based at two centres in Nottingham and Sheffield.

In Nottingham we have a fine tradition of skating, started by Torvill and Dean, and we have a national centre in Nottingham. As a result of that, all manner of young people are now excelling in various forms of skating as a sport. Kyle is undoubtedly in that elite squad, and it has been recognised that he has genuine potential in short-track speed-skating that will take him into an elite Olympic squad.

I am proud that for some years now, Governments of whatever colour have had a policy—it has been controversial in some respects but has undoubtedly worked—of encouraging youngsters who have that elite status over the course of their development so that they achieve the very highest recognition, in the Olympic games. I will go no further than that, because I would stray into matters that do not concern us in this debate, but the importance of providing those youngsters with the training, expertise, aspiration, coaching and so on that they require to achieve at the highest level has been recognised.

I am proud that Kyle is in that elite sector, and I am proud of his achievements, as his parents undoubtedly are. At the age of 14 to 15, he chose PE as one of his GCSE topics. As part of that GCSE, a youngster has to choose three sports to be examined in. Unsurprisingly, Kyle chose speed-skating as one of those three. In fact, he made it his main sport, for obvious reasons—he is exceptionally good at it. The system is that a youngster is watched and examined to see how well they play that sport. It is not just their knowledge of the sport or other sports; their ability to play that chosen sport forms an essential ingredient of the eventual marks they get for GCSE PE.

Bramcote School assumed that the system that then prevailed would continue. Speed-skating had not necessarily been put on the main list of sporting activities, but it was recognised, as with a number of other sports, that if some national centre of excellence or other access locally was available to ensure that a pupil’s physical ability to play that sport was properly assessed, they could make it their main sport and therefore study it as part of their GCSE.

That is where it all went horribly wrong. Bramcote School thought that the system would prevail whereby if the local board agreed that there was local provision to test the young person, they could carry on and make it their main sport, even though it was not on the list. Unfortunately, the Government changed the system. The previous Administration decided to take off the list speed-skating and a number of other sports—I have the full list—many of which are accepted Olympic sports and part of the elite programme that I am very proud to say my Government and previous Governments have been so keen to support.

Kyle found, at the end of the first of his two years of studies, that he could no longer study the sport he does so brilliantly. He has been able to choose another sport, but it is not one he particularly excels in. I am not saying he does not play it very well. Indeed, I have a lot of evidence that he is extremely good at both football and athletics. I refer to the wise words of his headteacher, Paul Heery, who said in a letter to me when I raised this with him at the end of the summer:

“This decision has been a controversial one for a number of sports, and their associations and governing bodies have raised their concerns. As you indicate in the letter, our PE teachers are confident that they can assess practical skills to GCSE level—where they have had to assess unfamiliar sports in the past, they have taken advice, used available information and used their experience and judgement.”

I have had testimony from a number of people, notably a gentleman called Andy Baldwin, who is a long-standing PE teacher of great experience. He was head of PE and sport at Fernwood School in Wollaton, in the city of Nottingham and the constituency of the hon. Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood). In a lengthy email to my constituent’s mother, who is also a constituent, he explains that this system is simply unfair. My constituent and many others have effectively been—one hesitates to use these words, but I think it is proper in this context—discriminated against, because their sport, which they are extremely good at, has been taken off a list, to their profound disadvantage.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

This is a really important speech. I speak as the co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group for sport. In this country, we should champion and be proud of sporting excellence. Sometimes that will be in uncommon sports, and we should have the flexibility to champion people’s potential, because we will all celebrate it if they do make it to the Olympics. I also wish to put on record that I wish Kyle the very best of luck in his career.

[Anna Soubry]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, and I know Kyle will be pleased to hear those words.

There is an outbreak of unity across the normal political divides on this issue. I am very grateful to the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker), who wanted to attend the debate but cannot. He has been good enough to share with me correspondence relating to his constituent, Natalie Crawford, whose name he has said I can mention. She happens to be a friend of Kyle’s family. She has represented her country in the youth Olympics in speed-skating and yet finds herself—I think she is now doing her A-levels—unable to put that sport on her curriculum so that she can be examined in it. That truly cannot be right.

I believe a review is being conducted in 2018. I am grateful for the letter that my hon. Friend the Minister sent me when I wrote to him back in the summer, but I urge the Government to give this their most urgent attention. I am sure that this matter can be resolved, but we need to get on with it. Someone like Kyle cannot wait until 2018, when he is due to complete his GCSE studies and sit his exams. Until the review, many other youngsters across the whole of England and no doubt Wales will be seriously discriminated against because of an arbitrary list. I will be corrected by my hon. Friend the Member for North Swindon (Justin Tomlinson) if I am wrong, but I think that sports such as judo, in which this country has done so well at the Olympics, have been taken off the list. Again, that cannot be right.

I am very grateful to my constituents for bringing this matter to my attention, and I am lucky to have secured the debate. I look forward to the Minister’s comments. I urge the Government to look again at this list and take action not in 2018, but as soon as possible.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Goodwill]

I hear what my right hon. Friend says, but the feedback from the awarding organisations was that, in some cases, the proficiency was not there across the country to assess some of these sports. When applicants put in for a GCSE exam, they may not necessarily all be of Olympic standard, and it is important that assessments can be made across the ability range in these sports. Often, specialist skills and knowledge are needed for some of the sports to make the assessment.

I understand that for some pupils, such as Kyle, the revisions to the activity list may be frustrating, but in many cases, pupils who excel in sports that are not on the activity list will also be highly proficient in a range of other sports that are included. It is important that GCSE PE can be assessed reliably and that the activities included in the list are of comparable demand among pupils and are manageable for schools to assess. I have discussed the issue with the Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch), and we agree that it is simply not practical to expect that every sport can be assessed as part of GCSE PE. Indeed, I bumped into her on the way to this debate and mentioned that it was taking place.

As we previously committed to doing, the Government will review the activity list in autumn 2018, following the first examinations next summer. We will agree that process with the exam boards and announce details closer to the time.

In the case of my right hon. Friend’s constituent, Kyle Ross-Waddell, I understand that he is on the short track speed-skating talent pathway. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate him on the progress that he is making and to wish him the very best for his future development.

[Justin Tomlinson]

I know that my hon. Friend the Minister takes a keen interest in this area, but surely, if Kyle proves to be successful, we will cheer every bit as loudly for his success as we will for anyone in any of the other sports in the Olympics, so we should rightly be celebrating and encouraging sporting excellence in all the sports that count in the Olympics.

[Mr Goodwill]

Of course we should celebrate sporting excellence, but a number of sports may not be particularly practical for schools to offer. For example, clay pigeon shooting is an Olympic sport, but I suspect that concerns would be raised were it to be a sport taught in schools.

In terms of practicality for teachers, my right hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe said that the decision was arbitrary. It was not arbitrary: the list has been reduced considerably to ensure that a PE practitioner will be able to recognise the key skills and fluency of movement in the activities proposed. The awarding organisations have removed activities that are so specialist or niche that specific expertise in the activity is required to assess them. An example is martial arts, which have been mentioned. For a number of activities used in previous specifications, experience suggested that teachers and moderators were often unfamiliar and at times uncomfortable with the assessment of them and were relying too heavily on outside expertise to inform assessment decisions.

Again, I thank my right hon. Friend for calling the debate and I reiterate that the inclusion or non-inclusion of sports in the activity list does not represent a view on their legitimacy or value. Today’s debate will be helpful in further shaping our thinking on the activity list, and we will provide further details of the review next year.

I wish Kyle all the best in his PE GCSE and in the other subjects that he is taking. I rather suspect that if he does stand on the podium at a future Olympics, people will not be looking too closely at what grade he got in his PE GCSE, although I understand from his school that he is expected to excel in the sports that he is currently taking.

Question put and agreed to.

Oral Answers to Questions

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Monday 11th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Goodwill]

I was the immigration Minister until just recently and worked in this area. We were well aware of the fact that some of the relatives who took children in under the Dublin regulation had not had much contact with the families beforehand and that that might not have worked out very well, but I am certainly happy to look at what the hon. Lady is saying, particularly in the light of her experience with Amnesty and Save the Children.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

12. What steps her Department is taking to measure the effect of the PE and sport premium on childhood inactivity over the 2017-18 academic year.

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Robert Goodwill)]

The Government want all pupils to be healthy and active, which is why since 2013 we have provided £600 million to primary schools through the primary PE and sport premium, and why we are doubling the funding to £320 million a year from this September. An evaluation in 2015 found that the premium was making a big difference and we are considering how to assess the impact of the newly doubled funding in future years.

[Justin Tomlinson]

Yes, it is making a big difference during school term time, but ukactive’s research shows that children lose a significant level of fitness in the school holidays. Using funds from the premium and the sugar tax, what can be done to open up school sports facilities for local clubs and community groups to provide sporting opportunities outside the traditional school day?

[Mr Goodwill]

Certainly, it is important to look at every opportunity. I pay tribute to the teachers who work with children outside school hours and to the clubs and other organisations that provide fantastic sporting opportunities for our children.

Social Mobility

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Tuesday 11th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell) for a very thoughtful speech, particularly on evaluating pupil progression and outcomes for graduates. There is much more work we can do in both those areas. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire (Paul Masterton) for his excellent speech.

Opportunity for all was my calling into politics—we all have our own individual callings. I went to a school that was at the bottom of the league tables. My father died at an early age and I understood the importance of opportunity for all, regardless of background. In my remaining two and a half minutes, while celebrating the fact that record employment has seen youth unemployment in my constituency fall by a staggering 61%, which is a vital tool for helping social mobility, I have a quick wish list of things that I want a proactive and constructive Government to deliver.

First, it is welcome that 1.8 million more children are in good or outstanding schools, but as a society we need to do more to celebrate the very best of teachers: those who have made the biggest difference, particularly to those from the most challenging backgrounds. We need to make more of those really outstanding individuals. I am not biased because my father, grandma and grandad were all teachers.

We need far more mentors to come into schools, engaging the local business community and the voluntary sector, because the people who have made a difference can inspire young people. I still remember my careers teacher telling me I had no chance of getting into Parliament, so anything is possible.

I am a big fan of university technical colleges, but they have a challenge. The entry level is two years after the typical secondary school enrolment, so there is a disincentive for secondary schools to suggest their best students go there. Perhaps the Government should consider lowering the age of entry or share the school league table results of the students so that those who are more technically minded can embrace their full potential.

I am a huge fan of apprenticeships. I was proud once again to attend the graduation ceremony at Swindon College last week where people from some really challenging backgrounds have started their first step into a successful career. I love the idea of the UCAS system, but we need to do far more to promote the opportunities of apprenticeships to small businesses. The sugar tax is a wonderful opportunity to provide constructive sport, after-school and holiday activities, which make a difference to busy parents as well as providing enjoyment, confidence and teamwork skills.

The national citizen service is a brilliant scheme, but in recent years I feel the quality of the leadership there is not as good as it used to be, so we are missing a trick. I am a big fan of the introduction of the named work coach in universal credit that will for the first time provide support for those in work and not just finding work. Finally, on the income divide between the older and younger generations, only six Governments since the second world war have collected more in taxation than they spend. When that does not happen, a further burden is put on our children. We must never forget that.

Budget Resolutions

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

1st reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 14th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner (Ashton-under-Lyne) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to respond to the Secretary of State, and it is quite right that we have a day in this year’s Budget debate dedicated to education and skills. This Budget comes at a time when Britain has a deep social mobility problem that is getting worse, not better. That problem is the result of an unfair education system, a two-tier labour market, an unbalanced economy and an unaffordable housing market. That is not my accusation, but the conclusion of the Government’s own Social Mobility Commission.

The commission made a number of policy recommendations, most of which seem to have been ignored. It also made a recommendation against a policy: the Government’s proposals for new grammar schools. Sadly, that recommendation has also been ignored. Instead, the Chancellor used the Budget to announce plans to spend another £320 million on the next tranche of new free schools. The Prime Minister wrote in The Daily Telegraph that that money would provide 70,000 new places, as the Secretary of State reiterated today. That would be the equivalent of £4,571 per pupil, but the Secretary of State will know that her Department’s most recent figures showed that the cash cost of a primary free school place was £21,100 and the cash cost of creating a secondary free school place was £24,600.

That huge underfunding is coupled with a slightly curious detail hidden in the back of the Red Book: a further £715 million of capital funding for free schools in the next Parliament. Perhaps the Secretary of State can answer this maths question. If Philip gives Justine £320 million for new free school places, and each school place costs at least £21,000, how many school places will Theresa end up with? I look forward to marking the Government’s homework later.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

Will the hon. Lady join me and local parents in Swindon in congratulating the Government on providing the funding for two free schools and helping us to tackle the lack of school places after the last Labour Government reduced the number of school places in the noughties?

[Angela Rayner]

I will come to the hon. Gentleman’s points about the cost-efficiency of free schools later in my speech.

Either the Prime Minister has made an announcement without the Chancellor actually funding it, or they are simply disguising yet another eye-watering overspend on their staggeringly inefficient free schools programme and pretending that it is new money for new places. That would not be much of a surprise. The National Audit Office has helpfully reminded the Chancellor and the Secretary of State:

“In 2010 the Department estimated that it would cost £900 million by March 2015 to open 315 schools.”

By March 2015, the Department had spent double that initial budget and not even managed to hit its target for new schools. The NAO found that the Department had already spent around £3.4 billion on the land alone for free schools and it was on course to be Britain’s largest land purchaser, even before this Budget sank yet more money in. The NAO also showed that new places in free schools were far more expensive than those in conventional schools. Will the Minister tell the House and the British people how much money her Department will actually spend on delivering these new free schools, and will she guarantee that they will open in places where there is a clear need for spaces?

The Chancellor pledged £216 million for every other school over a three-year period, as the Secretary of State mentioned in her speech, but the NAO has found that, as the hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh) said, £6.7 billion is necessary just to return all existing schools to a satisfactory condition. The NAO also found that 85% of schools that applied to the priority schools building programme were rejected in the last round, and that that investment was cheaper than the free schools programme.

Of course, we know why the Chancellor focused on free schools despite the cost—because it

“will enable the creation of new selective free schools.”

It was the former Education Secretary who said that he had “had enough of experts”, but not even he tried to bring back grammar schools, let alone pretend that it was a policy for social mobility.

Oral Answers to Questions

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Monday 6th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gibb]

Yes, I do agree with my hon. Friend. Collaboration between schools, particularly in local multi-academy trusts, is one of the most effective ways of ensuring that we spread best practice and that schools in a multi-academy trust help one another to raise aspirations and the standard of academic education our children receive.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

13. What steps the Government are taking to increase educational opportunity for pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds.

[The Minister for Vulnerable Children and Families (Edward Timpson)]

As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State told the House in December, increasing education opportunity for disadvantaged pupils underpins our commitment to make sure our country works for everyone. Through the pupil premium, worth £2.5 billion this year, we are narrowing the gap between disadvantaged pupils and their peers. In 2016-17, over £8.8 million of this funding was allocated to schools in Swindon.

[Justin Tomlinson]

It was a great pleasure to welcome the School Standards Minister to Swindon Academy—a school with a predominantly deprived catchment area, a high proportion of children on free school meals, and, crucially, surplus places. Its decision to introduce a grammar scheme in conjunction with Marlborough College has given every student, regardless of background, an opportunity to opt into an academically rigorous curriculum. Will the Minister share this best practice?

[Edward Timpson]

My right hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards just reminded me of how impressed he was on that visit by the steps that that school is taking to provide its pupils with a rigorous academic curriculum. By trusting school leaders like those in Swindon, we are enabling them to use their unparalleled knowledge of their pupils to create new, tailor-made ways of ensuring that every child can academically succeed.

Oral Answers to Questions

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Thursday 2nd February 2017 Commons Chamber

[The Attorney General]

I recognise the point that the hon. Gentleman makes. This was a troubling report in some ways. One of the most troubling aspects is the way in which victims of crime in particular are communicated with by the CPS—the language used and the sensitivity shown. My hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor General and I have been particularly keen to ensure that the CPS takes those lessons on board and acts on them, and I am confident that it is doing so.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

What steps has the CPS taken to support victims and witnesses with mental health issues?

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Nokes]

The views and opinions from the consultations we are carrying out with claimants who use the services across the country, not simply in Scotland, will be fed into our equality analysis.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

The single biggest boost to equality delivered through our Department for Work and Pensions estate is the introduction of named universal credit work coaches and their personalised support. What is the current roll-out timetable?

Soft Drinks Industry Levy: Funding for Sport in Schools

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Tuesday 10th January 2017 Westminster Hall

[Sir David Amess (in the Chair)]

The clocks on either side of the Chamber are not working, but frankly we are not overwhelmed with people wishing to speak so there will be no time limit on speeches.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the allocation of funding from the soft drinks industry levy for sport in schools.

May I say what a pleasure it is to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David? This is a subject that I am passionate about. Since becoming an MP, I have spoken in a number of debates on the power of sport to influence good behaviour, create opportunities and provide enjoyment. I must stress that the purpose of the debate is to focus not on whether we are right or wrong to have a sugar tax, but on how we should spend the levy, now that the decision has been taken. With a £500 million pot, that is a significant amount of money that can make a genuine difference.

I must thank all the organisations that have contacted me in recent days ahead of the debate, including: the Sports and Recreation Alliance, which is understandably keen to see sporting opportunities increase; Sustrans, which wants to see more funding for walking and cycling programmes to and from school; Youth Sport Trust, which has also focused on the sports element and the link between greater physical activity and greater academic performance, which I know the Minister for School Standards will welcome; and ukactive, which has done a huge amount of research, highlighting in particular the cliff edge fall in activity during school holidays, which I will come back to. I was also contacted by health organisations such as: Diabetes UK, which is obviously in favour of reducing the amount of sugar being used; Cancer Research UK, on the same principle; and the Royal College of Surgeons, on behalf of dental surgeons, obviously to reduce tooth decay.

This is an important subject, because one third of children are obese or overweight by the time they leave primary school. To me, that was a staggering statistic to read. When I was growing up, it seemed that all of us were active and charging around, so I was staggered by the figure of one third—one in three. That is not only an alarming figure; social norms start to be created. If an increasing number of children are overweight or obese, that becomes acceptable and therefore it starts to increase. On a topical level, through the NHS we currently spend £6 billion a year helping people with illnesses linked to being either overweight or obese. How we could better spend that money if there were fewer obese people. And an obese child is five times more likely to be an obese adult than an adult who was not obese as a child.

The Youth Sport Trust highlights that only 21% of boys and 16% of girls meet the recommended guidelines for physical activity. I recognise that we are competing with video games, shrinking gardens—back gardens are now one third smaller than they were in the 1960s—and cautious parents. When I was growing up, parents did not think anything of children disappearing on long bike rides, playing in distant parks and going to their friends’ houses far afield, whereas nowadays parents are understandably worried if their children are out of sight. Again, that limits the opportunity to be active.

The Government recognise that we have to do something. In August 2016 they published “Childhood obesity: a plan for action” with the aim of reducing significantly the rate of childhood obesity. The plan included the soft drinks levy, which is worth £520 million a year, and clearer food labelling—something I pushed for in the previous Parliament through my work with the British Heart Foundation—because we have a duty to allow consumers to make informed decisions. Another fact that surprised me—I say this as someone who does enjoy drinking sugar-laced fizzy drinks but who wishes to be informed—was that a five-year-old should take in no more than 19 grams of sugar a day, yet one can of Coke contains 35 grams. How many consumers actually know that? If they did, would they change their habits?

Crucially, the plan was announced as part of a nudge policy, where we gave the industry two years to make changes. I recognise that many of the leading manufacturers and retailers are already making changes—as I said, I am not focusing on whether the levy was right or wrong, but clearly part of the strategy is to influence behaviour—but, as we have recognised that physical activity is good for health and good for improving academic performance, I welcomed that the money would be ring-fenced to spend on activities connected to schools. If we are to have a tax and get extra money, let us ensure that that money is spent in the right way. The best way to do that for children is through schools.

[Liz McInnes (Heywood and Middleton) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on bringing this important subject to the Chamber. Given his enthusiasm for sport in schools, which I share, would he like to comment on the coalition Government’s decision to scrap the school sport partnerships in 2010, which has had a really detrimental effect on sport in our schools? I do not see the sugar tax as going all the way to replacing the excellent school sport partnership scheme that we had.

[Justin Tomlinson]

Actually, that was the very first time I rebelled—I was rewarded by sitting on some obscure European committees thing for five years to think carefully about my actions. The funding was not scrapped. There was a change and initially a proposal to remove the ring-fencing, but the money was then once again ring-fenced, though schools were allowed to choose how to spend it on sports-related programmes. I supported that because we have got some fantastic school sport partnerships that are still thriving today—including my local one—but there were also some pretty poor ones, which have gone by the wayside, and those schools have now spent that money on individual sports coaches, sports clubs and things like that. We got there in the end, and funding has increased in this area since 2010.

[Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

Before the hon. Gentleman leaves the issue of sport, no one is against using some of the sugar tax revenue for encouraging greater sporting activities, but does he not accept that in his constituency, in mine and in everyone else’s, during the school holidays large numbers of children who would have free school dinners during term time do not get any food from the school or free school dinners? Might not one of the ways of making the sugar tax progressive be to earmark part of the revenue to ensure that schools could at least lay on the facilities for voluntary bodies to provide school dinners during the holidays?

[Justin Tomlinson]

That is a powerful point, and I agree with the sentiment of it. I would not necessarily use the sugar tax money, but that is something that the Government could consider as a wider point. It is a fair point, and actually some of the head teachers in some of the more deprived parts of my constituency have raised similar concerns about what happens to the children not just with regard to eating, but on wider issues throughout the holidays.

As it stands, there will be £285 million to extend the school day in secondary schools in relation to sport, £160 million to double the primary school physical education budget, and £10 million to expand breakfast clubs. That was welcomed by Emma Boggis, the chief executive of the Sport and Recreation Alliance, who said it will

“deliver more opportunities to get children of a young age active”

and

“to stay active in later life.”

That is an important point. We must recognise that the opportunities we create must be regular and sustainable, because we also recognise that if the Government’s intention for the sugar tax works out and all the manufacturers reformulate their products and customers switch from full-sugar versions to zero-sugar versions, the amount of money will diminish. We must therefore ensure that the money is spent to seed regular sustainable activities. This is where I bring forward my rather reasonable—in my unbiased opinion—asks.

This has all come about from a visit to Oakhurst Community Primary School, which hosts the Draycott sports camp, run by Mark Draycott, a PE teacher at the school. The school runs after-school clubs, weekend clubs and school holiday clubs. There are lots of sports camps and I am sure that all of us as MPs have visited them at some point, but this one sets itself apart by a country mile. More than 200 primary schoolchildren were being active each and every single day in the last summer holidays, of whom slightly more were girls than boys—that is something for Sport England and the Sport Minister to recognise and celebrate, because that is a particular area of challenge—and they were engaging in all sorts of different sports.

A summary of how the camps work is that they run during every school holiday from 9 am to 6 pm, costing £12.50 a day, which is probably the cheapest childcare that a parent will find. They create an active environment that is inclusive and engaging for all abilities. That is vital, because a particularly sports-minded child probably has sports-minded parents and will already be signed up to a football, rugby or netball club. The camps are for the vast majority of children who are not necessarily sports-minded and who are the most likely to become obese.

The camps focus on helping children to be more active and introducing them to new sports—not only football and netball, but cricket, athletics, golf, lacrosse and so on—so that they can replicate what inspires them on the television. I visited a camp during the Olympics and saw them recreate the things that were inspiring them on the TV—it was amazing. Because Mark Draycott is a teacher, and because the majority of his support staff have connections to the school or are teachers themselves, they have the expertise to identify and support those children who are starting to fall by the wayside, and who are not naturally gifted or naturally enthusiastic about sports, to make sure that they remain engaged. They concentrate on killing the fear factor that some children have when playing sports and ensuring that they enjoy the activity. They are increasing participation among girls and bucking those national trends.

I highlight that because we have an opportunity to replicate this. As Mark Draycott said when he was interviewed on “BBC Points West” this morning, the camps should be not only at Oakhurst in Swindon, but all over the country; there should be hundreds and hundreds of them. They are sustainable, because the taxpayer is not paying him to do this—he is running the camps as his own organisation. However, the Government can help. First, anybody who wishes to set up one of these camps will need to build up numbers. We could therefore look to incentivise other people to do the same sort of thing as Mark by reducing the charge for hiring the school facilities at the beginning, until they build up the numbers and become sustainable in their own right and can keep going.

We also need to attract more good quality physical education teachers into the profession. We had a chronic shortage of PE teachers, although more are beginning to come in now. The beauty of this situation is that Mark Draycott came from a sporting background—he was a non-league sports player. The coalition Government tried to attract troops to become teachers, but it turned out that there were not millions of troops who wished to become teachers. However, there are many non-league sports stars who are minded and who, with the right incentives and the right instructions, could go on to become very good PE teachers in schools. I urge the Minister to look at that potential wealth of talent from whom, if we advertise to them, we could potentially recruit some very good people.

There could be lots of Draycott sports camps all over the country, which would be fantastic for those who wish to pay and can afford to do so—as I have seen, for 200 children every single day. That is something that we can replicate. However, I wish to go even further. I would also like to see all school facilities made available for free between 4 pm and 6 pm to any voluntary organisation that wishes to use them. For example, if some parents get together and wish to put on a netball, football or basketball club—I do not mind which, so long as it is a constructive activity for young people—between the hours of 4 pm and 6 pm, we should not charge them. Some of the sugar tax money can then be used to compensate the loss of income to schools. That is not a peak time for school hire fees, because school sporting facilities are generally used when offices and factories shut at 6 pm, which is when schools would expect to make their income. I therefore suspect that compensation would be only a modest part of that income, but it would remove the barrier that many enthusiastic parents find.

I know that, because I spent 10 years as a borough councillor in Swindon representing a new build area with private finance initiative schools. There were limited leisure facilities, yet there were fantastic sporting facilities that the taxpayer was paying for but which we could not afford to access at a time when they were simply not being used. That does not make sense. We can find people willing to give up their time; there are hundreds of sports clubs across all of our constituencies that would seize the opportunity to provide constructive opportunities that will make our children active, that will remain in place once the money starts to diminish and, crucially, that will help busy parents.

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman recognise that many teachers across the UK are already running voluntary after-school clubs and taking their own time to offer the sorts of activities he is talking about?

[Justin Tomlinson]

I absolutely pay tribute to teachers, parents and people in the local community who are prepared to give up their own time to provide constructive activities for young people. I want the Government to encourage the entrepreneurial spirit that Mark Draycott showed so that others can set up their own holiday camps and there are regular, good and exciting opportunities for young people.

In conclusion, I urge the Government to seize this opportunity. It is not often that a Department is given a significant increase in funding. I know from my time as a Minister that it is normally a case of wondering how on earth we can find money to do all of the worthy things we would like to do. However, this is an opportunity to benefit children by making them more active and therefore less obese, and to improve their academic achievement, because there is a direct link between those who are active and their ability to progress academically. It will also be a welcome blessing for hard-working, busy parents, whose biggest challenge is often what to do with children after school, during the long school holidays and at weekends. This offers the opportunity to deliver those long-term, sustainable solutions. I want every child to have as much fun as those children who go to the Draycott sports camp, and now is the time we can make that a reality.

Technical and Further Education Bill

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Legislative Grand Committee: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Monday 9th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

I was a member of the Bill Committee, which was very constructive and involved much cross-party support. The Minister has a real passion for, and depth of knowledge about, this issue, and the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Gordon Marsden), also demonstrated a genuine interest.

I want to focus on a specific issue raised by the shadow Minister in connection with his desire to promote equality of opportunity. I think that that should include people with disabilities, and specifically those with learning disabilities. The Government have made great progress—they have helped some 600,000 more disabled people to obtain work in the last three years, which is fantastic—but those with learning disabilities still find it extremely difficult to benefit from the opportunities of work. The proportion is about 6%.

[Andrew Bingham (High Peak) (Con)]

I commend my hon. Friend for the work that he did as Minister for disabled people. Does he agree that we also need to help employers? Does not dealing with people with learning difficulties or mental health issues, about which the Prime Minister has talked today, require a great deal of support for the employer as well as the apprentice?

[Justin Tomlinson]

Absolutely. That is at the heart of the points that I am going to make. People need time to develop the necessary skills, and employers need to be able to provide suitable opportunities for individuals with learning disabilities. All Governments, in all generations, have tried their best to give opportunities to people with learning disabilities. The proportion has stayed rigidly at about 6%, which is the worst percentage involved in any disability and therefore presents us with the largest challenge.

When I was Minister for disabled people, I visited Foxes working hotel in Bridgwater. I was incredibly impressed by the fact that it had managed to get 80% of its young students into work. Its three-year course involved two years in a working hotel, where the students learned how to acquire independent living skills and how to work towards obtaining jobs once they had finished. They were acquiring skills that were needed for their local towns, involving restaurants, hotels and care homes. We all have our own skills gaps in our constituencies, so the skills would be adapted accordingly.

The students spent their final year continuing their learning directly in the workplace. My hon. Friend the Member for High Peak (Andrew Bingham) mentioned employers. That final year gave employers an opportunity to receive support. Foxes academy provided training and advice for employers, and for the staff with whom they would be working. Young lads and ladies were able to learn their skills patiently over the year, which seemed to me to constitute an apprenticeship: they were learning skills on the job.

I invited the team to my Department. I said, “This is amazing: why can we not increase numbers?” I was told, “We could increase numbers, but that final year is so expensive, because we have to support the employer, that we have to cap them.” I think that if we could rebadge the system as an apprenticeship, we could access the funding that is being created through the apprenticeship levy, and bring about a huge number of additional opportunities. I met the then Minister for Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles), who agreed with me, and we set up the Maynard review. I am delighted that the Government have accepted every one of its recommendations, and I pay tribute to both Mencap and Scope for the huge amount of proactive work that they did, as part of the review, in helping to shape real, tangible opportunities.

Having spoken personally to the Minister, I know of his passionate desire to see all that through. We touched on the issue in the Bill Committee, but let me urge him now to crack on with those pilots. Every young adult will seize the opportunities which—as I know, having met hundreds of young people with learning disabilities—they are desperate to be offered. I ask the Minister to continue to make this a priority, and, in his summing-up, to explain where we are, what is the timetable, and what more we can all do to raise the issue with local employers.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

It is a great pleasure to speak in this important debate. I, too, was a member of the Bill Committee, and I am somewhat disappointed that Government amendments have not been introduced at this stage reflecting some of the points made in Committee, especially as they seemed to be accepted at the time, in broad terms, by the Minister. I therefore hope that amendments will even now be brought forward in another place to reflect some of the discussions we had in Committee, and, indeed, some of the points made this evening, particularly by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South (Gordon Marsden) on the Front Bench, who made a tour de force speech introducing all his amendments. It is surprising that there are no Government amendments or new clauses on Report; that is very unusual.

All the amendments and new clauses have been introduced by my hon. Friend on behalf of the Labour Opposition—and they are all splendid and I support them all. The lack of Government amendments is disappointing, even though there is a degree of agreement on the value of this legislation, and we all know we have to do something about improving apprenticeships and training our young people for the future. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton South West (Rob Marris) said, we have to train our own rather than just poach people from abroad.

New clause 1, requiring the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education to report annually, is specifically about the outcomes of completed apprenticeships; it is about the quality of apprenticeships, not just other, broader measures of success. The quality of apprenticeships is vital, to ensure that they lead to the development of skills for quality, long-term jobs after their completion. Young people who complete their apprenticeships must be desirable to their own and to other employers; they must be able to command good jobs for the long term and to look forward to relatively high pay and advancement in those jobs. It is very important to make sure that apprenticeships are high quality not just in words, and that apprentices can do the things they are required to do after they have qualified.

I remember the days, many decades ago now, when we had full employment. I taught in further education during that era, and in many ways it was a better and happier period than we are in now. Everybody who wanted a job got a job, and teaching in further education was a sheer joy. It has been more painful and stressful since then, I have to say, and less well paid, and the conditions of employment are less good than when I was teaching. But that was several decades ago, back in the early 1970s. We also had large companies, mainly in the manufacturing sector, and the giant public utilities, which were then in public ownership, employing thousands of apprentices every year. They had to train their own and they wanted to make sure they were good. Some of those they trained moved off to other jobs, of course, but it was nevertheless beneficial to those doing the apprenticeships and to wider society.

Our society did well because we were training our own, but we have failed to do that in recent times; we have left things to the market, and the market does not always work well in these matters. A degree of Government intervention is required, and it is significant that the Prime Minister has used a phrase not used by any Government for a long time: she has talked about the need for an industrial strategy. I absolutely support that, and we had a debate on industrial strategy just a few weeks ago, which the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Chris White) led very well.

The subject we are discussing now is part of that industrial strategy. We have to train these people, to make sure we rebuild industry. We do not produce enough any longer, particularly in the manufacturing sector; we do well in services, but not in manufacturing. We have a gigantic trade deficit because we cannot produce enough and we have to buy in from abroad. We must rebuild the manufacturing sector, not so that it becomes the dominant force necessarily, but at least so that it produces sufficient to have a sensible trade balance, which we do not have at present.

Apprenticeships have always been insecure in recent times because companies are much smaller now than they were and they are less secure because of economic crises. I have many anecdotes from my own experience. Just after the 2008 crisis, I was being driven to Heathrow for a parliamentary visit and the driver had an apprenticeship in the construction sector, but the company he had been with had collapsed and he finished up being a cab driver, which he could have done without doing an apprenticeship.

I have heard of fears, too, such as small companies training apprentices who are then poached by larger, more financially lucrative companies. That is particularly the case in the motor trade, where there are skilled small companies training their own people who are then poached by large companies that do lucrative insurance repair work, which can pay a lot more.

National Funding Formula: Schools/High Needs

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Wednesday 14th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I can reassure the hon. Lady that under the formula, London will continue to be well funded. Despite the percentage of children eligible for free school meals in London having fallen from 28% to 17% over the last 10 years, London still has some of the most deprived parts of our country. The funding formula will ensure that London still receives some of the best funding of any region for its schools. That is happening because it is appropriate, but what we cannot accept is areas in other parts of the country that have similar challenges of deprivation and, additionally, low prior attainment not being funded for no other reason than that they are not London. It is time to ensure that we have a fair approach, but it is a fair approach for London too.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

I wholeheartedly support this announcement. For too long, Swindon’s children have been short-changed by Labour’s hopeless funding formula. Change cannot come soon enough. I urge the Secretary of State to explore options on private finance initiative schemes, which are frustrating improvement plans in many of my local schools.

[Justine Greening]

That issue was raised in response to the phase 1 consultation, so we will ensure that the formula reflects the fact that there are PFI commitments that will continue in real terms. I have no doubt that that will be good news for my hon. Friend’s local area. Obviously, we do not want to perpetuate those schemes when they have steadily run down, but it is important to reflect the reality of those cost pressures on schools that are in that position.