Holiday Hunger Schemes

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Tuesday 6th November 2018 Westminster Hall

[Ruth Smeeth]

In fact, the Government of Canada have done research to demonstrate the cost of poor nutrition to the public purse over a lifetime, in lack of attainment and job prospects. Also, it ends up costing the NHS a lot; if someone starts from a low base and does not get the right nutrition, it costs the public purse even more in the end. To me, the individual families are the most important part of the issue, but there is also a question of how much it ends up costing the general public if we do not get things right. My hon. Friend is right, and I hope that the Department of Health and Social Care will view what I am talking about as part of the prevention agenda within public health.

As for data collection, six different methods of tackling child food poverty and holiday provision were tested in my constituency. Some of the methods involved the direct provision of food alongside sport and craft activities in both primary and secondary school settings. Elsewhere, the direct provision of food and activities were maintained, but the programme was taken out of an educational setting. Instead, Wesley Hall, a modern church in the heart of Sneyd Green, was used. The YMCA facilitated community meals. The whole family could turn up at lunchtime and enjoy a hot meal as part of the scheme. That was an extension of its wonderful monthly community lunch programme—once a month, on a Friday; I highly recommend it. There was even a meals-on-wheels-style scheme, where food was delivered directly and discreetly to the doors of families who could not access any of the schemes easily. Each of the approaches was found to have pros and cons, and it is clear that a broad mix of delivery approaches is necessary to reach as many of the most vulnerable families as possible.

The pilots were to my knowledge the most structured and rigorous attempts to address the challenge of holiday hunger conducted in Staffordshire, certainly—and I suggest, as I am very proud of us, nationwide. However, they were not the only activities taking place in Stoke-on-Trent North and Kidsgrove. Across the constituency, local people who had heard what we were trying to achieve got involved and organised their own projects to make sure that the kids in their community were not left behind. My favourite, and the most chaotic, was in Chell Heath in my constituency. Thirteen mums from the local children’s centre came together expecting to look after 25 to 30 children a day. They ended up with more than 100, which was not quite what they were prepared for. When you walked in, it was complete and utter chaos—organised chaos—and a delight to visit. It shows the demand out there for proper holiday provision.

All in all, last summer, more than 10,000 meals were dished up across the constituency. I am so proud of the way local people pulled together to deliver such an enormous project. Together, they touched the lives of hundreds of children who without the projects would have faced a summer of hunger and isolation.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend has been doing brilliant work. We had a pilot scheme in Bristol, and what I found particularly interesting about it, and about the national results, was that children really wanted the fresh fruit. They regarded it as something of a luxury. Also, taking the leftover food home at the end of the day was very important. It shows the level of food poverty in which those children exist.

[Ruth Smeeth]

I could not agree more. One thing that we must look at is how people cook—there could be cooking classes in some of the activity programmes—and also ensuring that there is enough food at the end of the day for the whole family to have a meal that night, if necessary; it is not just about the children participating in the schemes as a secondary consequence of making sure they get wonderful holiday provision.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

I commend the hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris) on the absolutely amazing work she is doing to ensure her constituents are fed, although it is incredibly sad and frustrating that we have to do that in our society.

Some fantastic work is being done in my constituency, and I would like to draw hon. Members’ attention to a couple of examples. Organisations in my constituency and right across Glasgow have grasped holiday hunger incredibly well. It is important that the help for families is not just a handout. We want to get the biggest take-up of holiday food provision, so it must be free from stigma. It must be community-focused and provided in an inclusive, welcoming environment.

Dalmarnock Primary School in my constituency took the lead with its “Food, Families, Future” scheme over the summer holidays. More than 80% of the children who attend Dalmarnock Primary are in Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation category 1—the lowest category—and 30% have English as an additional language. Many of their parents have no recourse to public funds due to Home Office decisions, so sadly they are also in need of support and food over the summer. The Home Office sometimes does not allow them to work—I am not quite sure where it imagines they will be fed.

The summer project is fantastically well thought out and has had input from partner organisations from all over Glasgow, including Possibilities for Each and Every Kid—PEEK—which is brilliant at doing play work with children and giving them a proper summer to remember. The project did not just provide food for kids, but used the school’s resources to tackle several key poverty-related indicators. It was more of a summer camp than a food bank. In addition to holiday hunger, it addressed social isolation for parents, who often cannot take their children out to different places, and find being stuck in the house on their own all summer isolating and lonely. Being on a tight budget over the summer holidays means that there is limited scope for play and entertainment. Parents face a long period in which they cannot take up work because they have got caring responsibilities. Working is difficult because they have to pay for childcare.

The Dalmarnock Primary School scheme was about more than just free meals. It gave families the chance to support one another, and for children to take part in sports and other activities in a safe, familiar space—they got to go to their own primary school over the summer. Such projects offer a crucial link for families and communities, and build strong support networks so families are more likely to access help that they need in the future and parents are less likely to feel isolated. They build up peer-group friendships, which they might not otherwise have been able to do.

Glasgow City Council has since allocated £2 million for Glasgow children’s summer food programme, hoping that similar projects can be replicated throughout the city. The fund makes awards available to organisations that can feed children over the holiday period, in ways that support their wellbeing and a healthier relationship with food. The Scottish Government have made Scotland the only UK country to have defined statutory targets for tackling child poverty, through the Child Poverty (Scotland) Act 2017. They have allocated £1 million towards the tackling child poverty development plan, which sets out practical assistance for measures to improve food security during the school holidays.

It is important to acknowledge that child poverty cannot be solved by one strategy, one Department or one Government. It is a complex issue and we have to consider the wider context in which any policy is operating.

[Kerry McCarthy]

The hon. Lady is right to say that this is a cross-departmental issue. The other day, the Environmental Audit Committee quizzed four Ministers from four Departments about the sustainable development goal to end hunger, and asked them where responsibility sits within the Government structure for ending hunger. I was extremely alarmed when they all looked blank. They all looked at each other, and nobody knew the answer. It is important that we have a departmental lead —a Minister with responsibly for fulfilling that sustainable development goal.

[Alison Thewliss]

I absolutely agree. If no Minister is responsible for it, it is easy to pass the buck, ignore it and say, “It’s not my job.” It has to be somebody’s job, but it is nobody’s job. That is an important point.

A point that is often missed in debates about child poverty, hunger and food banks is the cost of infant formula. A report that the all-party parliamentary group on infant feeding and inequalities will launch soon details that the cost of infant formula has increased, but the wages in people’s pockets and healthy start vouchers have not kept pace, so families have to make the impossible choice between feeding themselves or feeding their infants.

The Chancellor said that austerity is ending soon—perhaps, maybe—but it will be a very long time before families in my constituency feel any change. There is no denying that, over the past 10 years, austerity has been a huge underlying driver of child poverty in Scotland and across the UK. The Scottish Government are doing what they can to mitigate the effects of the cuts, but the actions that can be taken are limited. Their analysis shows that, this year, 130,000 more children in Scotland could be pushed into poverty as a result of the UK Government’s welfare cuts. That is approximately the population of Dundee. If the number of children in poverty can fill a whole city, something has gone drastically wrong.

Universal credit has started to be rolled out in my constituency, and will hit the Shettleston jobcentre on 5 December. Somebody applying for universal credit on the very first day of the roll-out at the Shettleston jobcentre will not get any money until 9 January. The Government often say that people can get advances, but they push people below what the Government say they need to live on for a year as they clear that debt. That is absolutely unacceptable. They rob themselves in advance to get an advance on universal credit.

I have always found the idea of independence for Scotland attractive, but I do not want it for its own ends. I want it so we can have a Government that we elect, not a Government that chooses austerity over the future of our children.

Relationships and Sex Education

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Thursday 19th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Oh!

[Kerry McCarthy]

I am easily forgotten.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

My apologies. The prize for patience and perseverance goes to Kerry McCarthy.

[Kerry McCarthy]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I very much welcome this statement. It is important that we reflect on the fact that this is not just about providing protection for possible victims of sexual abuse, exploitation, bullying and unhealthy relationships, but about reaching out to potential perpetrators, which is why it is important that as many young people as possible are part of this programme.

I want to ask about physical health education, particularly education about food. May I urge the Secretary of State to look at the work of the children’s future food inquiry? It is being carried out by two all-party groups, and it will report early next year. It is one thing to teach children what healthy food looks like, but if they are living in food poverty and do not have access to healthy food, that will not go very far.

[Damian Hinds]

The hon. Lady is right to identify the importance of the physical health parts of this programme. That touches on the obesity strategy, and we know that obesity is a serious problem that we have to face. This is really about empowering children to make good decisions about what they eat and about exercise; it is also about smoking and alcohol, and good decisions in such cases obviously involve just not doing them or, in the case of alcohol, not doing it to excess. Doing so from an early age is incredibly important. I will have a look at the report that she mentioned.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Monday 14th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

We have made £200 billion available to local authorities in the spending review, and high-needs funding has actually risen from £5 billion in 2013 to £6 billion this year.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

In the last few weeks, we have tragically seen the deaths of another three students at Bristol University. What are the Government doing to ensure that the NHS and universities work more closely together to improve student mental health services?

Environmental and Food System Education

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Tuesday 19th December 2017 Westminster Hall

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered environmental and food system education in schools.

My reasons for calling this debate were twofold: to highlight some of the positive work already being done in schools and to call on the Government to go further and embed some of this work in the curriculum or support it across all schools. It is so important that our young people learn about the wonders of our natural environment and our wildlife, how we should respect them and how we should take care of them for future generations. Many are also calling for animal welfare to be taught in schools. If young people were taught respect for animals at an early stage, perhaps that would make a difference with some of the horrific crimes that we see carried out against animals.

Young people should also learn about climate change, the impact our behaviour is having on the planet and how we can address that. They should learn about where our food comes from and why what we grow and eat matters. It is not just about acquiring knowledge for the sake of it; it is about children’s mental and physical wellbeing and equipping them for life as adults, enjoying nature and living sustainably. The fact is that they love learning about these things, and I will come on to that later.

The last Labour Government took environmental education seriously. In 2000, education for sustainable development was introduced as a non-statutory element of the curriculum. That was followed in 2006 by the launch of the sustainable schools strategy, which encouraged schools to follow the recommendations in the eight doorways, which were: buildings and grounds; energy and water; travel and traffic; food and drink; purchasing and waste; local wellbeing; inclusion and participation; and the global dimension. Through that, they would have become completely sustainable schools by 2020. Unfortunately, the strategy was scrapped by the Government in 2010.

In 2006, the Government launched the “Learning Outside the Classroom” manifesto, which promoted outdoor learning as an essential part of education, whether that was in school grounds and the local area or visits further afield and residential trips. The manifesto highlighted the value of hands-on, experiential learning as a way of enhancing and supporting work back in the classroom. It is a shame that the current Government have not built on that. As I said, the sustainable schools strategy was scrapped in 2010.

The environmental science and environmental and land-based science GCSEs were recently discontinued. The Government told me that was due to a lack of confidence in new content being developed, but it leaves a vacuum. The environmental studies A-level is currently at the tail end of being phased out, with the final set of exams being sat in the next six months. It will be replaced by a new environmental science A-level that started teaching this year, but the shift to stripped-back, science-only learning will deter many pupils from taking it up. Pupils have told me that is the case.

The national curriculum references the environment and climate change only in science and geography, and even then mostly in relation to the technical causes and processes, rather than the impact of climate change on individuals and communities. Key stage 3 science only includes reference to

“the production of carbon dioxide by human activity and the impact on climate.”

Key stage 4 science only mentions the effects of increased greenhouse gases on the Earth’s climate system and supposed “uncertainties” in the evidence for climate change. The geography syllabus has only passing reference to the changing climate from the ice age to the present day and how human and physical processes can change the environment. The parliamentary digital engagement service put something out on Facebook and Instagram over the weekend, and people came back to say that although there is the option to study climate change in geography, it is not always taken up. Geography GCSE is optional, so young people will not necessarily learn about that aspect of the curriculum unless they are studying that GCSE and the teacher decides to focus on climate change.

The situation is piecemeal and insufficient. We are failing to teach young people about the real-world impacts of climate change or the action that can be taken to mitigate it. The previous syllabus covered environmental issues much more comprehensively, but the then Education Secretary, now the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, tried to remove those things from geography altogether and have them in science only and not talk about the human role. I appreciate that he would dispute that that was his role in events. The former Energy and Climate Change Secretary, the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Sir Edward Davey), who recently returned to the House, takes credit for forcing a U-turn on the then Education Secretary. I appreciate that there is some controversy, but there was a huge pushback against what were perceived to be the Education Secretary’s plans at the time, and there was a partial U-turn.

Academies and free schools are not obliged to follow the national curriculum, so they are not required to teach environmental or climate change issues at all. The London School of Economics aptly summarised this in its response to the Government’s consultation in 2013. It said that

“there can be no justification for omitting climate change from the National Curriculum, and the education of pupils would be deficient if they did not receive teaching about it…If core climate change teaching is not included as compulsory learning…there is a risk that some students would not acquire essential basic knowledge about climate change. As the UK Youth Climate Coalition points out, ‘climate change is too important to be left to individual teacher choice’.”

As the Government’s enthusiasm for environmental education has waned, many third-sector-run initiatives have risen to fill the gap. One great initiative is the Eco-Schools programme that has been run by Keep Britain Tidy for more than 25 years. It aims to help students embed sustainable development into their schools’ daily lives. In England alone, 17,000 schools are registered on the scheme. Eco-Schools is based on pupil-led, real-world learning, empowering children to create change and environmental improvements by forming eco-committees, conducting environmental reviews of the schools’ practices and drawing up environmental action plans. I have seen that in some of the schools in my constituency. The kids get really engaged in it.

Farming and Countryside Education has a countryside classroom online portal for teachers. It includes materials to allow children to discuss what they deem to be controversial issues, such as badgers, bee health, migrant labour, food waste and flooding.

[Colin Clark (Gordon) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on bringing the debate to the Chamber. There is a great deal of interaction through visits to farms by school pupils. I am sure she will agree that commercial farming is making a huge contribution to protecting the environment. It is important that young people understand that modern farming can play its part. Does she agree that it would be good if school pupils and university students could visit modern farms to understand that farms have moved on and are making a contribution?

[Kerry McCarthy]

I think that is important. It is something FACE encourages. There is also the “FaceTime a farmer” scheme, which was started by Tom Martin, a Cambridgeshire farmer. It teams farmers up with schools. They use FaceTime or Skype to make video calls to classrooms. That is obviously no substitute for getting out on the farms, but it is a good initiative.

The Woodland Trust has flagged up with me that it has the free trees programme and the Green Tree School Awards. It is taking those things into schools, and they are incredibly popular. Another great initiative is the Soil Association’s Food for Life catering award for food quality, which more than 10,000 UK schools currently possess. To become accredited, the school is required to use locally sourced and seasonal produce, maintain in-school gardens and develop students’ practical green skills. It also encourages schools to visit farms. It has Grandparent Gardening Week from 19 to 23 March. It gets local allotment holders, grandparents and so on into schools to help set up school gardens for the growing season. That is a great way of engaging the community in what goes on in schools.

In Bristol, where the Soil Association is based, I went along to Bristol Metropolitan Academy, which is a secondary school. It had the local primary schools come along to take part in something that showed the circle of life of food. The younger kids turned up having grown basil in their schools. They were then shown by a food waste chef, Shane Jordan, how to cook pasta and make a sauce with the basil. The leftovers were then fed into a wormery and they were shown how that worked, which was the bit they loved, of course, with all those squirming worms coming out of the bottom of it. They were then shown how the compost for the wormery helps to grow more basil. It was brilliant to see the kids so involved and learning things about food that they had never heard before.

A project in my constituency, Growing Futures, has a campfire where kids can sit around and talk. People with mental health issues go along as well. The project is also about growing food and it teaches young children about it in a fairly informal setting. We very much want to incorporate that into the Feeding Bristol project that we are running to tackle food poverty in the city.

The Food Growing in Schools Taskforce’s March 2012 report found that green activities in schools result in

“significant learning, skills, health and well-being outcomes for children”.

Surveys conducted by the Learning through Landscapes organisation found that 73% of teachers reported improved pupil behaviour, and 64% reported reduced bullying.

Another initiative that has enjoyed huge success in the UK recently is forest schools, where young children attend lessons in woodland environments. Forest schools have flourished in Bristol. We have had one since 2004 and it has its own woodland to use for sessions. Earthwise, an organisation focused on reconnecting young people with food, farming and the natural world, runs a forest school locally and works with the community farm in Chew Magna in Somerset to deliver educational visits, seasonal cookery days and holiday activities throughout the year. I do not have time today to go into the need to teach young children how to cook the food, but that is important, too.

A report by Forest Research, “A marvellous opportunity to learn”, found that children who regularly attend forest school sessions noticeably developed in confidence and independence, with social and team-working skills, better motivation and concentration and better physical skills and fine motor skills. It is a wonderful programme.

Even small physical changes can have a huge positive impact on children. The Carnegie Mellon school reported up to 26% higher test scores in classrooms with ample natural light, with the addition of plants leading to score improvements of 14%. That seems a strange connection to make, but that was the result of its survey. The 2005 report by the National Foundation for Educational Research, “The benefits of a forest school experience”, stated:

“While watching their children explore the woodland, the parents expressed their wonder at the level of independence and confidence their children were showing”,

and would in the future encourage more freedom outdoors,

“perhaps out of sight in a secure environment, leave the busy paths and let their children lead the way.”

So it is not just something that takes place in the classroom; it is outside the classroom as well. A great quote from one forest school leader summarises this:

“Children have fun during forest school, and so the place in which they have fun becomes important to them—keeping that environment cared for matters to them.”

It has also been shown to have a particularly remarkable impact on the development of students with special educational needs.

Sulivan Primary School in Fulham maintains a reading forest for its students, where children can find books “growing” on trees and in tents, as well as a wildlife garden, pond and vegetable plot. The school describes how children with special education needs, many of whom do not normally enjoy reading, benefit from the way that being in the outdoors relieves stress and anxiety, develops their social skills, motivates learning and allows them to be practical, responsible and productive members of the school’s community.

I am aware of the time, so I will skim over this quickly. The skills, knowledge and enjoyment benefit children when they become adults, too. In 2014, Lantra estimated that there were 230,000 businesses and 1.3 million employees working in the land and environmental industries, and that many more would be required by 2020. The horticultural and agricultural sectors are currently experiencing a skills shortage. The food sector is a huge part of the economy, and innovative, value-added products are the future of that industry. Innovation is going on at Harper Adams University. We need to engage young people and get them interested in careers in that field. There is the waste sector, energy sector, many high-tech engineering jobs, and renewable energy and eco-housing sectors. There are so many things that young people could be inspired to do.

It is almost obligatory in environmental debates these days to mention “Blue Planet”. The BBC natural history unit, based in Bristol, is behind amazing series such as “Planet Earth” and “Blue Planet”. In 2012, it teamed up with the University of the West of England to co-design a masters course in wildlife filmmaking, which is certainly something for young people to aspire to. Who knows? The makers of future “Blue Planets” could be in schools just waiting to have their imaginations fired.

In conclusion, we need to go further and not simply leave initiatives to the schools that have decided to run with them. We must embed them in the curriculum across the board. It could take the form of embedding the UN’s 17 sustainable development goals into lesson plans. It has been disappointing so far that when the Environmental Audit Committee has taken evidence from the Government, they still seem to see the SDGs as something that we do in developing countries rather than something that we are embedding into the way we do things here. School procurement decisions could be used to teach children about healthy eating.

I want to flag up a few countries that have gone further than the UK. I hope we can look at them as examples. The Dominican Republic, which is at great risk of climate change, established mandatory climate change education in schools in 1998. Australia introduced its national environmental education plan in 2000. Brazil’s educational guidelines required climate change to be taught in all subjects from 1998. The Philippines introduced climate change into the curriculum in 2009. Vietnam did it in 2008. Costa Rica has been doing it since the 1980s. If those countries can do it, we ought to do it in the UK, too.

Global LGBT Rights

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Thursday 26th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I hope that I will not take as long as that.

I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) for his very powerful speech. He has been a tour de force in championing this issue. I really do hope that we have genuine cross-party co-operation on this—there is absolutely no reason why we should not.

I pay tribute to the countries that have made progress, and to the very brave activists in those countries who have, in some cases, even lost their lives because of standing up for LGBT rights. I think of David Kato, who set up Sexual Minorities Uganda and who was brutally murdered in 2011. We know the reaction of the Ugandan Government, with newspaper headlines more or less calling for people to hunt down and lynch homosexual men in the streets. There was very much a climate of fear, so it was incredibly brave of him and his successor, Dr Frank Mugisha, who now runs Sexual Minorities Uganda, to speak up. When I met Frank, he said that the handful of openly gay people in Uganda could almost be counted on the fingers of two hands because so few people were willing to come forward. We then had the proposals to introduce the death penalty for such people.

This debate is often couched in terms of saying, “We don’t mind what you do in the privacy of your own homes—the problem is when you promote it and start talking about these issues in front of children.” That is a very pernicious angle to take, because, in effect, it prevents people from leading their lives freely, openly, and without fear of persecution.

Another activist, Eric Lembembe in Cameroon, who was murdered in 2013, spoke of

“a climate of hatred and bigotry”

in his country

“which extends to high levels in government”

and

“reassures homophobes that they can get away with these crimes.”

Two weeks later, he was tortured and murdered. The right hon. Gentleman has spoken eloquently about some of the persecution that has been suffered by activists in countries such as Egypt and Uganda, and the suppression of Pride last year.

I want to talk briefly about what leverage we have. Certainly, our membership of the Commonwealth should give us enormous influence. I spoke at the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association conference a few years ago when I was the shadow Foreign Office human rights Minister. I came across the tricky issue where it felt slightly like people from the white countries, to put it very crudely, were preaching to people from the African countries. Somebody said to me, “You came over to our country and told us that homosexuality was wrong. You sent the missionaries over. You preached the Bible to us. You showed us where it said that these customs and practices”—which had actually been tolerated then in Uganda and some other countries—“were wrong, and now you’re coming back and telling us, ‘Hang on, we got it wrong that time—you’ve now got to start accepting our norms.’” There is a real concern about being seen as a colonial force in doing that.

There is also the issue of how this fits into the debate about freedom of religion and belief. We have heard about that in this House before. Yes, people should be free to express their religious views and beliefs, but they should not be able, through expressing those views, to promote persecution of homosexuality or bigotry towards people from the LGBT community. Too often it is used as an excuse.

The leverage we have other than through the Commonwealth is through our trading relations with other countries. In autumn 2013, the coalition Government launched, with a great fanfare, their business and human rights action plan. The then Foreign Secretary, Lord Hague, spoke of how he wanted to mesh the two and said that business and human rights should not be separate but integral. He was almost talking about an ethical foreign policy. Since then, it has been really disappointing that that action plan appears to have been shelved and is not spoken about. Two years ago, the permanent secretary to the Foreign Office gave evidence to the Foreign Affairs Committee, and he admitted that human rights were no longer a priority for his Department, saying that far more resources were going into pursuing trade deals. I think that the Foreign Office dropped the specific branches of its human rights activity in favour of some very vague priorities. At the time, human rights groups described his comments as being as

“astonishing as they were alarming”.

That was obviously before Brexit. Now that we are entering a world in which we will be pursuing ever more vigorously trade deals and new business relationships with overseas countries, human rights absolutely need to be back at the heart of our conversations. I have asked so many questions of Ministers about what they say about human rights when they go to countries like Saudi Arabia, and I get back very vague answers saying, “Nothing was off the table”, or, “A range of issues were discussed”. Clearly, if they were discussed at all, it was left to some minor official from the Foreign Office to mention them in passing at a meeting, just so that box could be ticked.

It is really disappointing that the business and human rights action plan seems to have been sidelined and is not on the International Trade Secretary’s radar at all. When we go to countries that have a dreadful record on human rights and on LGBT issues in particular, we need to be having that conversation. We have to put that on the table and say it is unacceptable. Even LGBT employees of British companies going to work in countries with such dreadful records are not safe. I hope that we will take up that agenda as a group.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Monday 11th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

The relationship between employers and schools has never been more important, particularly in the STEM subjects, which are so crucial to British business. Whether we are raising standards in maths and science or whether the university technical college programme is formally connecting employers and education, the Government are looking across the board to ensure that that relationship is strong.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

T5. I very much welcome what the Universities Minister had to say last week about excessive pay packages for university vice-chancellors and the measures he is taking to try to get vice-chancellors to justify those packages to their university courts. Does he really think that that will make a difference given that vice-chancellors are paid so much more than the £150,000 talked about?

16-to-19 Education Funding

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Thursday 7th September 2017 Westminster Hall

[Nic Dakin]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The tragedy is that already the post-16 curriculum has shrunk so we are already in danger of getting to where my hon. Friend describes, and there is concern about where we might be going in future.

The funding that schools and colleges now receive to educate sixth-formers covers the cost of delivering just three A-level or equivalent qualifications, and little more. As a result, the wider support offer to students has been greatly diminished. That means it is increasingly difficult to address properly the concerns expressed by employers that young people lack the skills to flourish in the workplace. The CBI’s 2016 education and skills survey, for example, expressed concern about the current education system, with its emphasis on grades and league tables

“at the expense of wider personal development”.

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that we need to continue to commit and invest more in the sector to ensure that it does not shrink further.

I think everybody would agree that programmes of study in which students have too much free time are not effective at getting the best out of them. The students are in transition from a fairly directed pre-16 learning environment to the independent learning of HE and the world of work. That transition needs to be properly and appropriately supported.

On a recent visit to Scunthorpe’s brilliant North Lindsey College, the excellent principal, Anne Tyrrell, remarked on how the demands from students with mental health problems had grown exponentially in recent years. Many schools and colleges lack the resources to address the sharp increase in students reporting mental health problems. That is a real issue that has been compounded by cuts to NHS and local authority budgets. The charity Mind recently found that local authorities now spend less than 1% of their public health budget on mental health. We know that students with better health and well-being are likely to achieve much better academically and that participation in extra-curricular activities has a positive effect on attainment. Such things are interlinked and related.

It is clear that the student experience in schools and colleges is deteriorating as a result of the funding pressures that hon. Members have drawn attention to in their own constituencies across England. For example, two thirds of sixth-form colleges have already shrunk their curriculum offer; over a third have dropped modern foreign languages courses; and the majority have reduced or removed the extracurricular activities available to students, including music, drama and sport.

Even more concerning, almost two out of three colleges do not believe that the funding they receive next year will be sufficient to support students that are educationally or economically disadvantaged. So the underfunding of 16-to-19 education is fast becoming a real obstacle to improving social mobility.

As costs continue to rise, the underfunding of sixth- form education is becoming a major challenge for all providers. Schools increasingly find themselves having to use the funding intended for 11 to 16-year-olds to subsidise their sixth forms, which risks damaging the education of younger students. Small sixth forms in rural areas are increasingly unviable, lacking the economies of scale to provide students with the rounded education that we all believe in.

Grammar schools are increasingly raising their voices in serious concern about the underfunding of 16-to-19 education.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend acknowledge that sixth-form colleges such as St Brendan’s in my constituency are particularly hard hit because they do not even have the 11 to 16-year-old funding that might better enable them to support 16 to 19-year-olds?

[Nic Dakin]

Sixth-form colleges are particularly affected, as my hon. Friend describes, and they cannot claim back VAT in the way that schools do, so that puts them at a significant disadvantage overall.

The treatment of 16-to-19 funding is in stark contrast to the pre-16 funding that was protected in real terms under the coalition Government and protected in cash terms during the previous Parliament. The Secretary of State’s recent announcement of an additional £1.3 billion for schools does not apply to students aged 16 to 19; nor does the minimum funding guarantee for students in secondary schools. That puts them at a disadvantage, with 16-to-19 education being very much the poor relation.

Yet the average funding of £4,530 per student received by colleges and school sixth forms is already 21% less than the £5,750 per student that is received to educate 11 to 16-year-olds in secondary schools. That compares with average spending on students, once they go into higher education at 18, of £8,780 per student. Perhaps we can learn from the private sector. In private schools the funding of students actually increases post-16 to £15,300 per student to reflect the additional cost of teaching 16 to 19-year olds. As we approach the autumn budget, now is the time for the Government to focus on this very real problem and resist the temptation to hide behind the glib arguments they have used in the past. After all, the new Minister is well grounded, practical and sensible: the very antithesis of glib. We look forward to her response.

It is welcome that there is now a single national funding formula for 16-to-19, but that does not compensate for its inadequacy. There is still inequality, as I have mentioned, between schools that can claim back VAT and colleges that cannot, leaving the average sixth-form college with £385,914 less to spend on their students. There is no evidence base for the Government’s assertion that the funds provided are sufficient. That is why I support the joint call from the Association of School and College Leaders, the Association of Colleges and the Sixth Form Colleges Association for the Government to conduct a proper review of sixth-form funding to ensure it is linked to the realistic costs of delivering the rounded full-time education that we all want our young people to have.

The Government’s other assertion that success in school is the best predictor of outcomes in 16-to-19 education has not been supported by any evidence either. I know from my own experience how students who have struggled pre-16 can make spectacular progress with the proper support post-16. Bluntly, the Government have provided no evidence to justify reducing education funding by 21% at age 16. The chronic underinvestment in academic sixth-form education is bad for students, for our international competitiveness and for social mobility.

It is the students that matter. We are at real risk of letting them down. That is why I am calling on everyone to get behind the ASCL, AoC and SFCA’s excellent Support Our Sixth-formers campaign, and I ask the Government to respond positively to their two clear, simple asks: first, to introduce an immediate £200 uplift in funding to improve the support offered to sixth-form students; and secondly, to conduct a review of sixth- form funding to ensure it is linked to the realistic costs of delivering a rounded, high-quality curriculum. A modest annual increase in funding of £200 per student would help schools and colleges to begin reassembling the range of support activities required to meet the needs of young people.

The uplift is affordable. It would cost £244 million per year to implement, and it could be largely funded by the underspend in the Department for Education’s budget for 16-to-19 education, amounting to £135 million in 2014 and £132 million in 2015. At a time when 16-to-19 education is in dire need of additional investment, schools and colleges should at least receive all the funding that the Government put aside for 16 to 19-year-olds. As funding rates for sixth-formers have been fixed since 2013, such a modest uplift would also help schools and colleges to deal with the inflationary pressures and cost increases that they have faced during that time.

It is time for all of us, including the Government, to support our sixth-formers and give them a fair deal. In her response, the Minister can make a good start by saying that she is determined to champion high-quality general sixth-form education as well as T-levels and apprenticeships. She could also commit to ensuring that both the £200 funding uplift and the fundamental review are carefully and properly looked at as part of the autumn Budget process. She is tenacious and determined. She is capable of ensuring that the Government stop letting sixth-formers down and start investing in them properly for the future of all of us.

Schools Update

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Monday 17th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

Many young people in Bristol choose to go to St Brendan’s Sixth Form College in my constituency rather than stay on at their school sixth forms. Will the Secretary of State categorically assure us that those pupils will benefit from fairer funding? At the moment their choices are being restricted, as are their facilities, because of cuts to sixth form colleges.

[Justine Greening]

Today’s statement is, of course, about the core schools budget and high needs funding. There will be higher per pupil funding for every school and every local area. That will enable schools to do a better job in their local provision. The hon. Lady sets out some of the challenges of sixth form funding, but I want to reassure her and the House that we are absolutely committed to ensuring that children stay in a well-funded school system. I know that Bristol has successfully focused on education in recent years, and it is important that we work together to see that success continue.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Monday 19th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Robert Halfon]

My hon. Friend is right: we need to do everything possible to ensure that young people do STEM subjects and that we encourage them to do so. That is why we are investing a lot in STEM apprenticeships. It is also why the get in, go far campaign focuses heavily on STEM subjects and encourages more women to do apprenticeships and to have the skills we need.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

I am glad to hear the Minister’s support for young people studying STEM subjects. Does he therefore share my disappointment that GCSEs in environmental science and environmental and land-based science have now been discontinued?

[Robert Halfon]

There are alternative qualifications, but I would add that we are creating a state-of-the-art technical education system with 15 different pathways, which will have important technical routes and qualifications. They will have prestige and give employers the qualifications they need.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Thursday 8th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Welfare Delivery (Caroline Nokes)]

By 2030, over 3 million women stand to gain on average £550 extra per year as a result of these changes. For women reaching state pension age in 2016-17, their median net income in retirement is estimated to be approximately £207,000. This is more on average than women have ever received.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

T6. According to Age UK, there is clear evidence that older people with cancer are too often under-treated, owing to judgments made on the basis of their age rather than their overall health and fitness. Age discrimination in the NHS is illegal under the Equality Act 2010, so will the Minister tell us what discussions she has had with colleagues in the Department of Health about a plan to improve cancer survival rates for people of all ages?

[Caroline Nokes]

As the hon. Lady will know, the Department for Work and Pensions has recently published the work and health Green Paper, and we are looking at working very closely with the Department of Health on a whole range of issues to make sure that older people and our pensioners are treated fairly by all Government Departments and services.