Curriculum and Exam Reform

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Michael Gove

Thursday 7th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right—that was the case with existing league tables. They were a good thing and helped to drive up standards, but they created perverse incentives and I hope that the reforms we have put forward today will ensure that young people are better advised about the options that will enable them to succeed.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Last, but certainly not least, Bob Blackman.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

It is clearly crucial that young people gain key skills at the earliest possible stage, particularly in mathematics. Can my right hon. Friend confirm that under the new curriculum, children will learn their 12 times table at the age of nine, rather than learning the 10 times table by the age of 11? Does that not demonstrate the huge shift that is going on to improve standards?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that. There is a higher level of ambition at every stage in the national curriculum and a decisive shift towards 21st-century subjects, so that mathematics is more rigorous and the computing science curriculum is more attuned to the demands of today. Critically, that curriculum will not only prepare people to be the programmers of the future, but help to keep children safe online by ensuring that e-safety is at the heart of how children are taught in primary school.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Well, at least we got 31 Members in in 32 minutes.

Sure Start Children’s Centres

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Michael Gove

Wednesday 2nd March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I was only trying to be helpful.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I think that we had better continue with the debate.

Education Bill

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Michael Gove

Tuesday 8th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order.

[Michael Gove]

Those of us who have family members with special educational needs will have found the hon. Lady’s outburst objectionable. Can the right hon. Gentleman tell us how many special schools closed under the Labour Government and how many more parents were forced to buy private education for their children with special educational needs over the past 13 years?

Education Maintenance Allowance

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Michael Gove

Wednesday 19th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Sit down. It is rank hypocrisy—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman voted for it; we all know the role he played.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. The Secretary of State is getting very excited. Members are trying to intervene, but I will decide when they have stood on their feet too long. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman would like to carry on putting his points across to the Chamber.

[Michael Gove]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker.

Yes, I am passionate about this. Why should young people be saddled with the economic mess left by that lot? That lot then come back here to say that we are taking opportunity away, knocking the ladder away and increasing youth unemployment, but who created this mess? It was the guilty men and women on the Opposition Front Bench. When the right hon. Member for Leigh was Chief Secretary to the Treasury—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

What I can say is that it is for me to keep order in the Chamber. I am glad that the hon. Gentleman has brought this to my attention, and I am sure that no hon. Member will be tweeting from the Chamber to let people outside know what is going on.

[Michael Gove]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making his point, but I do not know what it says about my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) or the right hon. Member for Lewisham, Deptford (Joan Ruddock) that while they were making their interventions, he thought his own Twitter feed was more intriguing than the points they had to make. However, he is a genial soul and I know they will forgive him everything, as will I.

Let me return to the central theme of many of the interventions we have just heard—the need to target support better on the poorest. In the context of everything we are doing in education, the coalition Government have already made a series of decisions, with constrained resources, to make sure that the poorest benefit from our policies. We are extending free child care to 15 hours a week for all three and four-year-olds. That did not happen under the previous Government and I had hoped they would support it, but we have introduced it. We are also extending free child care to 100,000 of the poorest two-year-olds. That happened on this watch. Those 100,000 children would not have received free child care and preparation for school if it had not been for the commitment of the coalition Government. I am grateful that some Opposition Members, such as the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) and the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field), support us, and I am sure that many others recognise that this is a progressive step that all should applaud.

We are also implementing a pupil premium—£625 million this year, rising to £2.5 billion by the end of the comprehensive spending review. As a direct result of that, every poor child will have thousands more spent on their education. That money will be invested in better teaching, one-to-one tuition and catch-up learning, all of which is additional money on top of the schools budget. That policy was rejected by the Labour party in coalition negotiations. In order to make sure that all those interventions to help the poorest could be funded, the coalition Government had to take some tough choices, one of which is to replace EMA with a new system of support.

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

I shall not give way at this stage. I am conscious of the amount of time that has passed, and conscious too that many hon. Members want to speak in the remaining part of the debate.

If we are to increase participation, and if we are to generate greater social mobility, we need to be clear: we need to remove barriers. We also need to ask who faces the largest barriers. How can we help them better and what are the other barriers, as well as the financial one? The research shows us that, yes, the cost of transport, the cost of equipment or the cost of some maintenance can be a factor for some students, but it also shows us that there are bigger barriers: poor guidance, with students not being offered the right advice; poor choices, with an inadequate range of courses available; and above all, poor attainment. The real barrier to participation in education after the age of 16 is the quality of education that a person has received up to the age of 16. Yes, half this country’s students are in receipt of EMA, but by the time that half this country’s students reach the age of 16, they do not have five good GCSEs. We discovered the other week that barely 15% of students have GCSEs in the five essential areas of English, mathematics, science, languages and the humanities.

If we really believe in generating social mobility in this country, we must ask ourselves how every pound is best invested. Graham Allen is quite clear: spend it at the beginning. Frank Field is quite clear: spend it early on. The coalition Government are quite clear—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. The right hon. Gentleman knows better than to refer to Members of the House in that way.

[Michael Gove]

I am sorry, Mr Deputy Speaker.

The hon. Member for Nottingham North—a Labour Member—and the right hon. Member for Birkenhead are quite clear that we should invest in the early years. That is what the coalition Government are doing, and at a greater rate and in a more powerful way than the previous Government. The investment in early years, the reform of education, the investment in the pupil premium and the range of reforms that I mentioned earlier—the right hon. Member for Leigh has remained silent about them—make up a powerful package to generate greater social mobility.

The question for all hon. Members is: are we going to be sufficiently grown up to acknowledge that we have a deficit, or are we going to be deficit deniers? Are we going to be progressive enough to target support at those who need it most, or are we going to say that the existing system is perfect and need not be reformed? Are we going to say, “Let’s get our whole school system right,” or are we just going to spend more on one unreformed benefit? There is a basic choice today: vote with the Opposition, and therefore vote for reaction, complacency and deficit denial; or vote with the Government, and therefore vote for progressive policies, an education policy that will really change things and an opportunity, at last, to kick-start social mobility in this country.

School Sports Funding

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Michael Gove

Tuesday 30th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I shall not give way.

We must acknowledge the reality regarding school playing fields. There cannot be effective school sport without school playing fields. A number of hon. Members have made the point that Labour has an at best ambiguous record on this matter. In 1997, the Labour party manifesto stated:

“A Labour government will take the lead in extending opportunities for participation in sports; and in identifying sporting excellence and supporting it.

School sports must be the foundation. We will bring the government’s policy of forcing schools to sell off playing fields to an end.”

That was an admirable aim. However, in January 2000, it was revealed that of 103 applications to sell playing fields, 101 had been approved.

Elsa Davies, director of the National Playing Fields Association, said that the previous Government did not even pay lip service to their election pledges:

“They have said one thing and done precisely the opposite. It is a very sad U-turn. These pieces of land are disappearing forever and they are part of our children’s heritage.”

In November 2000, the sell-offs had still not been stopped. Elsa Davies pointed out that 190 applications had come forward, and that only four had been refused. In February 2002, after more than 18 months in which £125 million had been due to be handed out to 12 partner organisations to support school playing fields, the Daily Mail and the BBC revealed that they had contacted all of those groups and found out that not a single one had opened new playing fields with the money. Kate Hoey, the then Minister for Sport said:

“Trying to stop the sale of playing fields was another uphill battle. No one wanted to admit”—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. The Secretary of State may not use the Member’s name. I think that he is referring to the hon. Member for Vauxhall.

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful, Mr Deputy Speaker. I am quoting from The Daily Telegraph. The hon. Member for Vauxhall said:

“Trying to stop the sale of playing fields was another uphill battle. No one wanted to admit that this was still happening… But again this didn’t fit the picture that Downing Street wanted to portray. They had begun to believe their own spin”.

She continued:

“Ministers should admit that what they are really doing is allowing sales to go ahead to subsidise the Education Department’s rising costs. The truth is that, in town after town, green spaces are being concreted over and it can be seen by everybody.”

By April 2007, Labour had presided over the loss of 2,540 school and community playing sites. I recognise that there are pressures on Governments and on schools, and that flexibility is at the heart of the effective delivery of Government policy. However, it is appropriate for the Opposition to acknowledge that when we look back at the record of the past 13 years, although there are successes to be applauded, there are also lessons to be learned.

I recognise that many right hon. and hon. Members want to contribute to the debate and I hope that it will follow the pattern that I hope I have set. I hope that it will be respectful of the facts.

Funding and Schools Reform

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Michael Gove

Wednesday 17th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The debate today is about schools, not about higher education. However, I would be delighted to have a debate about higher education. It would be interesting to know who would represent the Opposition in such a debate. Would it be the Leader of the Opposition, who believes in a graduate tax, or the shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, who denounces such a tax? Would it be the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden)—who is no longer in his place—who backs the Browne reforms, or would it be the hon. Member for St Helens North (Mr Watts), who opposes them? The truth is that, on higher education, there is a split in the Labour party as wide as the River Jordan between those who are genuinely progressive and back our reforms and those who are regressive and oppose them—[Interruption.] Hon. Members ask who introduced tuition fees. The Labour party did that, and in so doing, broke a manifesto promise—[Interruption.]

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I must remind hon. Members that this is a debate on schools, and not on higher education. I am sure that the Secretary of State would not want to open up another debate.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Michael Gove

Monday 7th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lindsay Hoyle (Chorley) (Lab)]

I am sure that the Secretary of State would like to agree that Sure Start has been a huge success. Can he guarantee not only that the funding will be there for Sure Start but, more importantly, that he will continue to expand the programme on the number of Sure Starts in constituencies?

[Michael Gove]

Yes.