Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Tuesday 18th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Adrian Ramsay (Waveney Valley) (Green)]

Today, I will concentrate on the important arguments for new clause 34 and amendment 173. New clause 34 would extend the provision of free school lunches to all primary school children. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Opher), who tabled this important new clause for consideration in Committee, with the backing of 42 hon. Members, and to my hon. Friend the Member for North Herefordshire (Ellie Chowns), who moved it.

To set the context for new clause 34, the children’s charity Barnardo’s is clear that we are seeing epidemic levels of poverty among children in the UK. Across the country, families are facing a desperate struggle to put food on the table, keep the lights on and heat their homes. Nationally, 4.3 million children are in poverty; in my constituency, 3,920 children are growing up in poverty—that is 21% of children. This shocking state of affairs was a political choice made by the previous Government and those who backed austerity, and we should not repeat it. The No Child Left Behind campaign, which underpins new clause 34, is backed by more than 250 civil society leaders, from unions to charities, medical bodies to faith leaders and mayors to councils. This widespread backing is unsurprising because the case for universal free school meals is overwhelming.

The need for free school meals is acute. We all remember Marcus Rashford igniting the campaign during the pandemic, pointing out that we could fill 27 Wembley stadiums with the 2.5 million children who did not know where their next meal might come from. The shameful legacy of child poverty continues. Poverty is embedded, with research from the University of Bristol showing that one in five schools run a food bank—a figure that is, I am told, even higher than the number of community food banks operated outside schools by the Trussell Trust and the Independent Food Aid Network combined.

The National Education Union has explained that its members see the struggles of children in poverty every day, with 80% of teachers asked saying that they have provided food for hungry children out of their own pockets. One NEU member said:

“So many of our children arrive tired and hungry. I find the issue with food so awful. I stock my school kitchen every week with fruit, cereal, milk, biscuits….the number of children who pop in to see me and then ask for food has grown over the last 2 years. It is heart breaking.”

A universal approach is the best policy for three key reasons. First, it is good for children. Universal provision helps children learn, grow and thrive in school. For example, research published in November 2024 evaluating London’s roll-out of free school meal provision to all children attending primary state schools found that the policy helped children’s readiness to learn and ability to concentrate. The Department for Education’s evaluation of the pilot undertaken by the last Labour Government found that pupils in schools where all children received free school meals were found to have made four to eight weeks’ more progress in maths and English over two years. In that pilot, the poorest children made the most progress, reducing the attainment gap. In areas with means-tested provision, the effect on the attainment gap was negligible.

On the health benefits, research published by the British Medical Journal found that less than 2% of packed lunches met school food standards, so this policy is a major opportunity to increase healthy eating. It would also reduce stigma and shame, giving pupils a better sense of belonging in schools. Means-tested provision leads to children feeling singled out and labelled as poor, impacting on their enjoyment of and engagement with school.

Secondly, providing free school meals for all is an effective investment. The evidence shows that universal systems reduce inequality and deliver economic prosperity beyond the classroom. A cost-benefit analysis of expanding free school meals by PricewaterhouseCoopers shows that for every £1 invested in universal free school meals, £1.71 is generated in core benefits, such as increased savings for the NHS and schools and increased lifetime earnings and contributions for young people.

Other expert research shows that the provision of universal free school meals increases pupils’ lifetime earnings, with the biggest increase being for the most disadvantaged children, thereby reducing inequalities for a generation beyond school. Work by the Food for Life partnership demonstrates that when food is sourced sustainably, more than £3 in social, economic and environmental value can be created for every £1 spent, mostly in the form of new jobs in the local economy.

Thirdly, universal provision is more efficient. We know that providing free school meals helps end a situation where children fall through the gaps. Means-testing will always miss some children and families. In England, the draconian eligibility criteria mean that one in three children living in poverty are considered too well off to access free school meals. Restrictive eligibility, complicated registration processes and stigma also block countless families from accessing support.

Universal systems are also more efficient, because they massively reduce administration. By putting an end to means-testing children for food, schools get back administration time, as all children’s meals will be funded together via one mechanism. Free school meals for all also eradicate problems of school lunch debts. Universal policies are also easier to defend and protect from erosion by future Governments who may seek to freeze thresholds or restrict eligibility.

In the UK, Wales and London are leading the way in providing free, universal, healthy meals at lunchtime for every child in primary school as a means of reducing inequality—not just in school but for entire lifetimes. England needs to catch up. I sincerely hope that the Minister will consider building on the excellent progress on breakfast clubs contained in the Bill.

New clause 34 makes the case for free school meals for all primary school children, but I want to be clear that I and my party support the extension of this policy to all children in school, because hunger does not stop at the age of 11. I hope to divide the House on this vital new clause, which builds on the excellent breakfast club provision. I urge all hon. Members to vote for the new clause, because we know that children cannot learn when they are hungry and that free school dinners for all is a winning policy for the economy, for families and for children.

I turn briefly to amendment 173, on local authority consent for the withdrawal of certain children from school. Home education is an option that works extremely well for some families, and indeed many children thrive in this environment. Nevertheless, for vulnerable children, there can be real dangers in dropping out of sight of public agencies. The Bill already rightly mandates that if a local authority has live child protection concerns about a child, because they are suffering or are likely to suffer significant harm, then their parent must obtain the consent of the local authority to withdraw the child from school. Our amendment would extend that mandate to children for whom the local authority has previously had concerns and taken action under section 47 of the Children Act 1989 in order to safeguard and promote their welfare. The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, supported by the Children’s Charities Coalition, has called for this strengthening of the Bill’s protections to safeguard the most vulnerable children, for whom withdrawing from school poses a risk to their safety and welfare.

Last year, the child safeguarding practice review panel published its analysis of serious case reviews involving children who have died or suffered serious harm because of abuse and neglect. Those children were not in school at the time, under the proviso of receiving an education at home. Of the 41 serious case reviews, 23 of the children —over half—were previously known to children’s social care, including being subject to a child protection plan prior to the incident. Under clause 25 as it stands, such children would not be safeguarded, which I am sure is not the Government’s intention. I therefore urge the Minister to seriously consider amendment 173 as a proportionate and necessary safeguarding measure.

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

As a member of the Bill Committee, I have had detailed oversight of the measures in the Bill. They are vital for safeguarding children across the country, as well as supporting children and families with measures such as free breakfast clubs, reduced school uniform costs and extra support for kinship carers. I am thrilled that three schools in my constituency have been chosen to pilot free school breakfast clubs. They will put more money back in parents’ pockets and ensure that all children start the day right with a healthy meal.

The Bill has been subject to healthy debate, both in this place and in Committee. It is a strong piece of legislation and one that has been strengthened through the parliamentary process. Looking through the amendment paper, I was interested to read new clause 1, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes), on auto-enrolment for free school meals. Parents have contacted me who are eligible for free school meals but are finding the application process difficult and are being passed between the school and the council. Auto-enrolment would help those children and families get the support that they are entitled to from day one.

It is important that children from all backgrounds have the same opportunities in life. I welcome measures aimed at tackling inequalities. I have spoken about the inequalities that arise from faith-based admissions to schools, where children are allocated school places based on the professed faith of their parents. I am pleased that the Government have confirmed the 50% cap on faith-based selection criteria for new academies and free schools. Faith-based schools are shown to be less diverse than their peers on a range of measures, including deprivation levels—measured by free school meals—the number of children with special educational needs and disabilities, and diversity of race and ethnicity compared with their local areas.

The evidence shows clearly that faith selection is social selection by proxy. In my opinion, selection by faith has no place in taxpayer-funded schools at all. The 50% cap on faith selection was brought in the previous Labour Government to address inequality, and at least ensures some regulation of that. However, I am still concerned that new schools opened by local authorities are not subject to the same cap. In cases of oversubscription, they could allow 100% faith-based admission. I have raised concerns about this directly with the Minister, and I thank her for taking the time to discuss it with me.

I am pleased that the Bill takes long-overdue action to tackle illegal schools. At least 7,000 children attend illegal settings—for obvious reasons, that is an estimate. Ofsted has been raising this problem for many years, because it does not have sufficient powers of entry and investigation into illegal schools. The Bill fixes that, granting Ofsted increased powers of entry and providing more powers to bring criminal cases against those schools and the people who run them.

Members may not be aware of illegal schools. They tend to be concentrated in specific local authority areas. Usually, they are run by religious groups, which tend to be fundamentalist, extreme, highly controlling or isolationist in their outlook. We know from former pupils of these schools that in many cases they only study religious texts and receive no other form of education. Instead of having a broad and balanced education, children are subjected to indoctrination. Children attending illegal schools have also been subjected to abuse, both physical and sexual. That is unacceptable and such settings must be regulated. If they are unwilling to be regulated and offer a proper education, they must be shut down.

I refer members to the contribution made by my hon. Friend the Member for North West Cambridgeshire (Sam Carling) in last week’s Crime and Policing Bill debate for a flavour of the attitude of high-control religious groups towards reporting abuse within their own communities. I also lay on record my thanks to Humanists UK for its work exposing the dreadful practices in illegal schools over the past decade. I welcome this Labour Government’s recognition of the severity of those problems and the swift action taken to safeguard those vulnerable children. I also welcome future discussions on how to manage the problem of part-time settings.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gideon Amos]

Does the hon. Lady accept that, in the tragic case of Sara Sharif, which my hon. Friend the Member for Woking (Mr Forster) has been pursuing, the murder happened in the school holidays and Sara was already known to social services? There is not much evidence that the parents said they were going to home-educate in the first place. Given all those facts, does the hon. Lady accept that there is actually no correlation in the data between home-educated children and children who are ultimately judged to need a care plan?

[Lizzi Collinge]

I acknowledge the complexity of that case and that the absolutely unacceptable failings before Sara’s death were abject across many organisations. However, she was removed from school partly so that her parents could prevent the detection of the abuse. I have recognised, and will continue to recognise, that that obviously does not speak to the vast majority of people who home-educate their children. However, as parliamentarians, we have a duty to protect the most vulnerable, and sometimes that includes regulating the majority, who are decent, honest people.

I want to reassure parents that the new regulations, such as registers for children not in school and the capacity to compel school attendance in certain cases, are not aimed at limiting home education as a whole or about policing how people choose to educate.

[Graham Stuart]

The intention is not the thing; it is the actual impact that counts. Let us take the example of someone who has taken their child out of school for the reasons that the hon. Lady has mentioned. Perhaps they have an autistic child who is miserable every day, and after letters to the headteacher and the local authority and failure after failure, they are forced to go into home education. Can she understand why parents are fearful of a representative of—as far as the parents are concerned—that failing local authority having the right to enter their home and sit in judgment over the child that they have been forced to home-educate? Can she understand why they would be fearful of the imposition a hard, top-down register, especially after so many years of successive Governments failing to provide any proper support for home educators?

[Lizzi Collinge]

I accept wholeheartedly the amount of parents of children, particularly with SEND, who have been absolutely failed by our system and by 14 years of Conservative Government. What I do not accept is that the proposal is somehow a major imposition. I do not believe that checking that children are receiving a decent education and are safe and well cared for is a major imposition on parents, and I think all good parents would welcome that.

These measures are being put in place to protect and safeguard vulnerable children. Having no oversight of children not in school is an unacceptable risk to children’s welfare. The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill is crucial, and cannot come too soon to protect our most vulnerable children and to support families up and down the country with rising costs. It has the welfare of children at its heart, and I am proud to have served on the Bill Committee and to have played a role in shaping this vital legislation.

[Gregory Stafford (Farnham and Bordon) (Con)]

Like VAT on independent schools and putting up costs through national insurance contributions, this Bill is yet another example of Labour turning children’s education into an ideological battleground. I have said it before, but I will say it again: Labour clearly hates any form of education that is not state-controlled, local authority-run schooling, and this Bill is another example of that. Under the Conservatives, pupils soared up international league tables, ensuring that every child, regardless of postcode—except if they lived in Wales—received the best start in life. Labour is intent on reversing that progress, attacking academic freedoms and dismantling a system that has delivered demonstrable results for young people. Indeed, it was a system that Labour used to champion, but now it has come back to power and is looking to dismantle it.

Most of this Bill is trying to solve a problem that does not exist. Like the Employment Rights Bill last week, it is bodged and being rushed through without proper scrutiny, and behind it all is the cold, dead hand of the union paymasters that fund Labour. I commented on it during debate on the Employment Rights Bill, and we have heard again today—I am afraid the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire and Glyndŵr (Steve Witherden) has just left his place—that the “Jurassic Park” of the unions is back. Like last week, it is not Jeff Goldblum—

[Lizzi Collinge]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Gregory Stafford]

I will finish my analogy. It is not Jeff Goldblum who is going to be savaged by the dinosaurs; it is our children.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire and Glyndŵr, to whom he referred and who has actually worked in schools as a teacher, might have a really good grasp of what happens in schools?

[Gregory Stafford]

It would be totally wrong of me to cast any aspersions on the hon. Gentleman’s teaching ability. I have not sat through one of his classes, but if it was anything like his speech an hour ago, I would perhaps be looking to find some other educational outlet for myself or my child.

While I acknowledge that some of the child protection aspects of this Bill are important, much of it represents a dangerous and unnecessary centralisation of power that will harm schools, teachers and, most importantly, pupils. In recent meetings I have had with the Last Wednesday SEND group, as well as with home education groups across Surrey and Hampshire, there has been overwhelming concern about the proposed legislation. Many of those I have spoken to feel vilified for choosing to remove their children from mainstream education in favour of alternative specialised provision tailored to the individual needs of their children.

I will take this opportunity to highlight five key amendments that I think are particularly important; I urge Members to give them their full consideration. The first is amendment 206, which would remove the requirement for all academies to follow the national curriculum. Clearly, a national curriculum can provide a broad and balanced education, but education is not a one-size-fits-all issue. The Bill seeks to stifle innovation, which is a dangerous and regressive move. It is particularly concerning for faith schools and alternative provision settings such as Pathways school, a SEND provision school in my constituency. Pathways school plays an invaluable role in educating vulnerable children and providing trauma-informed strategies alongside a high-quality, project-based curriculum. Excellent spaces such as those would struggle to continue under state-imposed education strictures.

As a parent, I draw attention to new clause 41, which would give parents the right to review school curriculum materials to ensure their children are fairly exposed to material appropriate for their age group. It is not controversial to say that parents have a unique and intimate understanding of their children’s needs, and it is only right that they have an active role in ensuring the quality and suitability of their children’s education.

Moving on to amendments 200 and 202 regarding home education, a key group in my constituency that have ardently opposed state-controlled education are the home educators. Home education is a provision used by many parents across Farnham, Bordon, Haslemere and Liphook, because it provides a more personalised approach to learning, which in some cases benefits certain children. Amendment 200 would mandate local authorities to submit a statement of reasons when they do not agree that a child can be home-educated. Families are deeply concerned that the Government’s proposals impose excessive state control over home education, failing to recognise the dedication and care that home-educating parents provide. The hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Lizzi Collinge) said— I think I am quoting her correctly—that “all good parents would welcome” this imposition on education. That is deeply unfair to all the good home-educating parents who have contacted me. They do not feel that this is a proportionate measure; they think it is a deep imposition, and they are good home-educators.

Amendment 200 is a more proportionate way to address concerns while ensuring the accountability that the hon. Lady wanted. That is especially important for families with SEND children awaiting education, health and care plans—a process that can take up to two years. In my local area, 17% of independent school pupils receive SEND support, yet only 6% have a formal EHCP. Therefore, home education, especially in that interim gap between realising a child needs SEND support and receiving an EHCP, is often the best option for them. Amendment 202 would remove the requirement for local authorities to approve and consent to the home education of children with special educational needs. Removing those bureaucratic hurdles would empower parents to make the best decisions for their children and would ensure inclusivity and equity in education.

I want to touch on amendment 192 on neglect and abuse of children that is related to home education. Although I strongly support home education as a valid choice, safeguarding must remain a priority. However, home-educating parents feel vilified by this Government, who treat them as if they were inherently suspect, as the hon. Lady did, rather than recognising their commitment to their children’s education. Amendment 192 would ensure that local authorities may withhold consent for withdrawal from school where there are concerns about neglect or abuse. The entire House was horrified by the tragic case of Sara Sharif, and the amendment is a necessary, balanced and proportionate response—far more so than the Government’s broader proposals, which unfairly target responsible home-educating parents. Instead of a sweeping punitive approach, the amendment focuses directly on children who are genuinely at risk, ensuring that they remain in a monitored environment where safeguarding concerns can be identified and addressed.

The Bill is an ideological attack on academic freedoms which will hurt the very children who Labour claims to support. It imposes unnecessary constraints on schools, weakens parental choice and undermines educational innovation. The poorest pupils will suffer the most. Academic freedoms have driven up standards, allowing schools to tailor their curricula to meet the needs of pupils. Labour’s insistence on enforcing a rigid national curriculum will stifle progress and limit opportunities. Its move to weaken the academy system will leave struggling schools in limbo, harming the very children who need urgent intervention.

The Bill tears down 25 years of progress—progress that has had a demonstrable impact on children, improving their educational outcomes, life chances and business and employment opportunities, and benefiting the country as a whole. I urge the House to reject this damaging Bill and to stand up for the best interests of our children. Let us protect parental rights, uphold educational freedoms and ensure that every child has access to safe, high-quality and inspirational education.

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Thirteenth sitting)

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 11th February 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Tom Hayes]

Thank you, Sir Christopher.

I have made my point about whether the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston has used his time here to press the case on behalf of survivors and victims. I have made the point about whether he has chosen to sit with survivors and victims and listen to their stories before calling for another national inquiry that discards the views that have been given by survivors.

I have talked about the importance of the money that could be spent on a second inquiry being better spent on the support that victims and survivors so desperately need. I really wish that the Conservative party, which did so little in government to implement the recommendations that were called for by survivors, would put down the politics of this issue and stop focusing on a desperate pursuit of Reform voters, rather than the other voters they lost to the Liberal Democrats and Greens.

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend share my puzzlement that, given that the independent national inquiry covered so many types of child sexual exploitation—so many horrors that have been visited upon our young people—only one aspect of it has become the focus of political debate? We should focus on all the children and young people who have been violated, abused and hurt, mostly by men, but they seem to be forgotten even though the national inquiry covered a whole range of child sexual exploitation.

[Tom Hayes]

I could not agree more, and my hon. Friend helps me make a point that I had forgotten. You urged me to exercise control, Sir Christopher, but as you and other Members can see, I feel deeply about this topic. I feel very strongly about the importance of standing alongside survivors, and I am prepared to work with anybody in this House, of any party or none, to enhance the support that survivors receive. But having sat with survivors, I am not prepared to allow people to play politics with their experience, and for those individuals then to feign disappointment, hurt and abuse. This is not about how Members of this House feel about the honesty and truth of the words I am speaking; it is about the importance of survivors out in our communities, who have been let down for 14 years, who have suffered exploitative, abusive practices, and who will be looking to this House today to do the right thing by them. I call on the Conservatives in this Committee and across the House to do the right thing, stop playing politics, actually read the report if they have not done so already, and as a consequence show some dignity.

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Twelfth sitting)

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 6th February 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Ian Sollom (St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. Broadly, the Liberal Democrats welcome clause 51 and its counterpart, not least because we desperately need new special schools. The previous Government approved fewer than half of the 85 applications from councils to open SEND free schools in 2022. This is a real part of unblocking that, so we agree with the Government. We tabled amendment 48 because a potential loophole is created in the now well-established rules on faith-based selection. Those rules apply to academies and will continue to do so, but under clause 51 not all new schools will be academies. The amendment would bring all new schools into line with the current established principles of faith-based selection for academies. It is a very simple amendment. I think the error was made inadvertently during drafting, and hopefully the Government will support it.

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

I rise to speak to clause 51, because there are some points I wish to raise about this part of the Bill allowing new schools to have 100% faith selection.

Clause 51 allows new schools to be opened without ideological restrictions on their type; they could be academies, community schools or voluntary aided schools, which in my view is extremely welcome; but it also creates the ability to open new 100% faith-selective schools, which worries me. The current 50% cap on faith selection for academies was introduced by the Labour Government in 2007, and further embedded into free schools in 2010 by the coalition Government. The Education Act 2011 mandated that all new schools must be free schools, extending the cap’s reach. That 50% limit was supported by all three main parties.

A scheme of local authority competitions similar to the one proposed in the clause operated from 2007 to 2012, in which we saw 100% faith-selective schools open. For example, Cambridgeshire county council ran a competition for a new school in which a 100% selective Church of England school won out over a proposal for a school with no religious character; the resultant school opened in 2017 and is still 100% faith selective. Another 100% religiously selective school was approved in the Peterborough council area. This has happened when the legislation has allowed for it.

We heard in the first evidence session that the Catholic Education Service would seek, in areas of oversubscription, to use 100% faith selection. We heard from the Church of England that nationally its policy is to stick to 50%, but its structure means that dioceses can put forward proposals for new schools, and they are not bound by that national policy. Members might be sitting here thinking, “So what? What is the problem with 100% faith-selective schools?” The problem is that 100% faith-selective schools are less socioeconomically diverse than might be expected for their catchment area, and less socioeconomically diverse than schools that are subject to the 50% cap. Compared with their 50% selective peers, 100% faith-selective schools are also less ethnically diverse than would be expected. Faith selective schools remain less inclusive across multiple factors. In my view, 100% faith selective admissions only exacerbate inequalities in the school system.

The Sutton Trust found that faith schools are less inclusive of disadvantaged children. The Office of the Schools Adjudicator found that faith-selective schools are less inclusive of children in care. The London School of Economics found that faith-selective schools are less inclusive of children with special educational needs and disabilities. Faith-selective admissions also disproportionately favour wealthier families, because they are socioeconomically more selective than other types of school. Compared with other schools, faith-selective schools admit fewer children eligible for free school meals than would be expected for their catchment area.

Many faith-selective schools operate a system of scoring for religious attendance and volunteering. In my view, this activity is simply easier for those with more economic or social capital—those who do not work weekends, nights or shifts, and who have a professional background where one is very happy and comfortable going into a new environment; perhaps one went to church as a child. At least since the 1950s, data shows that church attendance is higher among wealthier people. This religious activity is less easy to take part in for those who work shifts or weekends and those who do not have the cultural or social capital to enter confidently a situation that is new or perhaps culturally alien. I am focusing on church attendance because the religious majority in our country is Christian, even though actual religious belief is low.

Faith-selective schools encourage and embed educational inequalities, and that is why I am concerned about lifting the 50% faith-selection cap. I merely ask Ministers to consider this.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

I rise to speak to amendment 48, which stands in the name of the hon. Member for Twickenham. There are two main reasons people seek to limit school admissions on the basis of faith. The first is that some people do not like religion, organised religion, or the involvement of the state with organised religion. That is a matter of belief for some people. The second is that it is sometimes said that faith-based admission policies shut out others from good schools. There is sometimes a sense that it is academic or social selection by the back door. The hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale alluded to that. Some people—I am not saying this is the case with the hon. Lady—talk about the second issue when really they have in mind the first. One can be a proxy for the other.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Damian Hinds]

Before the hon. Lady corrects me, I did not say she was doing that.

[Lizzi Collinge]

I do not wish to correct the right hon. Gentleman. I believe he is correct that the two get confused. I have both of those beliefs.

[Damian Hinds]

I know! [Laughter.]

[Lizzi Collinge]

However I am very clear the evidence I am quoting is on the second of those. I would happily provide the right hon. Gentleman with the sources of evidence, should he like to peruse them.

[Damian Hinds]

I understand, acknowledge and respect what the hon. Lady says but, believe me, I do not need to see any more evidence on this subject, on which I have in my time perused large volumes. It is one of those issues—we talked the other day about another one—where the answer one wants can be found in the data.

Let us step back a moment. All liberal democracies permit freedom of religious belief, but the way it manifests is different in different countries. There can be an approach such as that in the United States or in France, where secularism in education is written into law or the constitution. We in this country have taken a different approach. We have always allowed denominational schools. In fact, we have not just “allowed” it; denominational schools and faith schools have always been a key part of the system. The biggest name in primary education in Britain is the Church of the England; the biggest name in secondary education in England is the Catholic Church.

It is not just in education that our country has this tradition. In international development, for example, the Government work closely with organisations such as Christian Aid, World Vision and the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development. In children’s services, the Children’s Society used to be called the Church of England Children’s Society, and Action for Children, formerly National Children’s Home, has its roots in Methodism.

Before there were state schools, there were faith schools, often attached to monasteries or cathedrals. The Education Act 1944 formalised this position, sometimes known as the dual system, whereby faith schools could be a full part of the state school system while retaining their religious character. There is a distinction between what are known as voluntary aided schools and voluntary controlled schools, and different degrees therefore of independence for those two. VA tends to be mostly associated with the Catholic Church, but there are lots of Anglican VA schools, and VA schools of five or six other religious denominations as well.

It is understood traditionally and generally, but not entirely correctly that with a VA school, the Church provides the land and the state provides the building, and that there is a sort of co-ownership—it is obviously minority ownership on the part of the religious organisation. In reality, over time that system was eroded and changed to a cash contribution in which, typically, 10% would come from the Church, which then became 5%. I think there were some cases in which it was 0%, but broadly that tended to be the situation. Sometimes Churches complain about that, saying, “Why should we have to contribute to this school, when any other school being created is fully funded by the state?” I think that is a good rule for two reasons. First, it is a privilege to be able to have a school that is fully state funded for pupils within a faith, but it is also a guarantee of independence. It means that no future Government can come along and say, “We are going to change all these schools into fully secular schools,” because they are part-owned—albeit a small part—by that religious faith.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the question of schools having a faith element, being run by a Church or by any faith group, is different from the question of whether, in their admissions policy, a school may discriminate against one child and in favour of another based on the professed faith of their parents? Does he agree that those are two separate issues?

[Damian Hinds]

They are different but related issues. For the avoidance of any confusion, when we talk about schools being “run” by a Church, there was a time when clerics ran schools, but things are not really done in that way today.

Some of the top-performing schools in the country are denominational schools with faith-based admissions. There are some very poor-performing faith schools and some brilliantly performing non-faith schools, and obviously it varies from year to year, but on average, faith schools tend to slightly outperform the average. The hon. Lady can correct me if I am wrong, but there is a feeling that this is where she and others get the idea that that is possible only if there was some unfairness in the intake of children the schools accept.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Damian Hinds]

I suppose, having said that the hon. Lady can correct me, I cannot really stop her.

[Lizzi Collinge]

The right hon. Gentleman is being very generous with his time. It is not a belief that the profile of faith schools is different from other schools: it is true. If we look at the rates of free school meals and the wealth profile of parents and compare them with peers—if we compare apples with apples—the data shows that. Does he recognise that?

[Damian Hinds]

As I said earlier, there are all manner of datasets. I do not have my full Excel complement with me today, but I can trade with the hon. Lady and counter what she said with other statistics. In particular, anybody who suggests that the intake of a Catholic school is higher up the socioeconomic scale than the average does not know a whole lot about the demographics of the Catholic population in this country. We have a remarkable amount of ethnic diversity because of immigration patterns.

By the way, there is no such thing as 100% faith selection; that happens only if a school is oversubscribed. If a state-funded school has spare places, at the end of the day, it is obliged to let anybody come along. However, if a school is oversubscribed and we lose the faith admissions criterion, the nature of the school will change. That goes to the heart of the hon. Lady’s question. There is something intrinsic to having a faith designation and a faith ethos in a school. Some people—I accept that the hon. Lady is not one of them—believe that such things contribute to what happens to those children, their education and their wellbeing, and they are reflected even in that small average premium in terms of results.

Back in the days of the free schools and before them, as the hon. Lady mentioned, a 50% cap was put in place, known commonly as the 50% faith cap. That reflected the fact that with free schools there was a different situation, because now any group could come along and say, “We want to open a school.” It seemed a sensible safeguard to have a cap. However, all the way through it has remained legally possible—not a lot of people know this—to open a voluntary aided school. That proposition was tested in law in 2012, after the coalition Government came into office, with the St Richard Reynolds Catholic college in the constituency of the hon. Member for Twickenham. Once a VA school is opened, it can convert to an academy.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Stephen Morgan)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I turn to new clause 2, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Dr Opher), on the important topic of expanding eligibility for free school meals, specifically universal provision, which the hon. Member for North Herefordshire has moved today.

Under the current programmes, all pupils in reception, year 1 and year 2 in England’s state-funded schools are entitled to universal infant free school meals. That benefits around 1.3 million children, ensuring that they receive a nutritious lunch-time meal. In addition, 2.1 million disadvantaged pupils—24.6% of all pupils in state-funded schools—are eligible to receive benefits-based free school meals. Another 90,000 16 to 18-year-old students in further education are entitled to receive free school meals on the basis of low income. Those meals provide much-needed nutrition for pupils and can boost school attendance, improve behaviour and set children up for success by ensuring that they can concentrate and learn in the classroom and get the most out of their education.

In total, we spend over £1.5 billion on delivering free school meal programmes. Eligibility for benefits-based free school meals drives the allocation of billions of additional pounds of disadvantage funding. The free school meal support that the Government provide is more important than ever, because we have inherited a trend of rising child poverty and widening attainment gaps between children eligible for free school meals and their peers.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the value of school meals is much more than the nutrition that they give, and even more than children’s educational achievement when they are properly fed? It is also about building a set of behaviours, a sense of community and an ability to interact with others. It is absolutely vital that when children sit down for a school meal or a packed lunch, that is part of their social development.

[Stephen Morgan]

I know my hon. Friend is a real champion of children and young people in her constituency, and she is absolutely right. When I visit schools across the country, I see the benefits of school meals. Not only do children sit and eat together, but they learn how to use a knife and fork. She is absolutely right to point out the wider benefits that the free school meal programme brings.

The number of children in poverty has increased by over 700,000 since 2010, with more than 4 million now growing up in low-income families. We are committed to delivering on our ambitious strategy to reduce child poverty by tackling its root causes and giving every child the best start in life.

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Ninth sitting)

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 4th February 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Neil O’Brien (Harborough, Oadby and Wigston) (Con)]

I could pick this concern up in our next debate, on clause 31, but a related issue is linked to my concerns about this clause, so I will give the Minister a moment to reply. He mentioned the list of excepted institutions, which we find at clause 30, page 70, from line 17, and various types of institution are exempted: local authority schools, special schools, 16-to-19 academies and further education colleges, but not academies and free schools. Why? I want to check that that is a conscious choice by the Government and to get an explanation of why that is the case.

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

With your permission, Sir Edward, my remarks apply to clauses 30 to 36, because I thought it was more convenient to speak to them all together. Clauses 30 to 36 are extremely welcome to tackle illegal schools. Such schools are mostly, but not always, faith-based—

[The Chair]

Order. We are debating clauses 30 and 37, so as long as you stick to that, that is fine.

[Lizzi Collinge]

I believe my remarks apply fully to clauses 30 and 37, Sir Edward, if you are happy with that—please let me know if not.

[The Chair]

I am very easy-going—within limits.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Thank you, Sir Edward. The measures to tackle illegal schools, which are often but not always faith-based, are very welcome, and they will protect children from severe harm. The reasons for the need for the measures contained in clauses 30 and 37 are often hidden, and they are often clustered in certain local authorities. The so-called education that takes place in some of those unregistered settings is often deeply intolerant, not aligned with British values, and not of good quality for young children.

I have a question for the Minister about the definition of “full-time” in clause 30. I have a slight concern that we might be creating loopholes. Although clause 36 allows for multiple inspections where there are suspicions of links to part-time settings, I worry that we might create a situation in which illegal schools could get around the legislation by going part-time. Will the Minister consider that and perhaps whether, once this legislation has settled in, there may be need for action on part-time settings? Obviously, we do not want to capture Sunday schools, or a bit of prayer study or some study of the Koran after prayers, but I think we might need to look at this in future.

[Stephen Morgan]

I thank the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston, for his constructive response. He made a number of points and asked whether the clause applies to academies. It will not change the way in which academies, as state-funded independent schools run by not-for-profit charitable status trusts, are regulated. Academy trusts are accountable to the Secretary of State for Education through their contractual funding agreement, the terms of which already require them to comply with the regulatory regime established by the 2008 Act. All academy schools are subject to regular inspection by Ofsted under the education inspection framework.

--- Later in debate ---

[Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I have a couple of brief questions for the Minister.

Sir Martyn Oliver, His Majesty’s chief inspector, raised the question of additional resources for Ofsted because of the administrative burden of applying for warrants. I think he would like the powers to go further so that he would not have to apply for a warrant; I can see merit in needing to do so. Will the Minister confirm whether that additional resource will be provided to Ofsted?

We are considering two clauses in this group, but with regard to the whole section on unregistered provision, why has alternative provision been exempted from the powers? Again, Sir Martyn Oliver raised concerns that he does not have the powers to go in and inspect. Ofsted regularly finds unsafe provision. The Government should take action in this area, because some of our most vulnerable children who are excluded from schools are being put in unregistered alternative provision, where they are not necessarily provided with a broad education and attendance records are not always taken. Real questions and concerns have been raised about alternative provision.

[Lizzi Collinge]

I very much welcome the clauses. The strengthened powers of entry for Ofsted are important. As I have said, a lot of the problems in illegal schools are hidden, and they are often clustered geographically. In one local authority, we may never see this problem, but in some local authorities we see it repeatedly. Illegal settings have been the scene of widespread neglect and abuse—sometimes serious sexual abuse—and the powers of entry and for a court to prevent someone who has been convicted of running an illegal school from ever doing it again are very important. I urge the Committee to support the clauses.

[Stephen Morgan]

On the hon. Member for Twickenham’s points about Ofsted, the powers are available only to investigate the commission of specified relevant offences. Our experience is that the majority of inspections of unregistered schools are conducted under Ofsted’s existing powers process and on the basis of consent and co-operation. We anticipate that that will continue even after Ofsted has been granted the enhanced powers in the measure. The powers will not be available to Ofsted when inspecting private schools against the independent school standards. The hon. Member asked about resources for Ofsted; we are working closely with Ofsted on what the powers will mean, as Sir Martyn set out in the evidence session.

I will take away the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale and write to her on those matters.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 32 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 33

Material changes

--- Later in debate ---

[Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

rose—

[Lizzi Collinge]

rose—

[Amanda Martin]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Ellie Chowns]

rose—

[Lizzi Collinge]

rose—

[Damian Hinds]

Colleagues and friends, forgive me; it happens all the time in clubs and in schools. It happens in after-school football clubs and before-school football clubs. If the club starts five minutes after half-past 3 or finishes five minutes before half-past 3, I am not quite sure I understand how that individual’s ability to help kids to learn how to play football is materially affected.

[Lizzi Collinge]

rose—

[Catherine McKinnell]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Hinds]

No, no, no; he may be well aware of many things, but he is certainly not well aware that what he is saying is not correct. He is totally aware that what he just said is correct: that people who do not have a PGCE or QTS may still form a valuable and useful part of the staff at a school to help kids to learn in a variety of disciplines, including non-academic ones such as sport and art.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Damian Hinds]

I am starting to attract a little bit too much attention from Sir Edward, who I think may be becoming impatient with me for the length of my speech, but I will give way one last time.

[Lizzi Collinge]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his patience with our multiple interventions. However, I believe they are very necessary. Does he agree that the experiences of hundreds of thousands of parents during covid lockdowns, when schools were closed, show very clearly that having professional knowledge and experience in the workplace is no substitution for being a teacher? As someone who home-schooled a two-year-old and a six-year-old, trust me when I say that that experience gave me even more respect for the qualified teachers of this world. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that there is a fundamental difference between subject-matter expertise and the ability to teach?

[Damian Hinds]

I agree with the hon. Lady 100%, just as I agreed with what the hon. Member for Southampton Itchen said entirely. Of course, there is not just a material difference between not being a qualified teacher and being a qualified teacher. It is like night and day, and what teachers learn about pedagogy and the experience they get during that time cannot be replicated on an online course or by reading books. She is right, too, that during covid millions of people up and down the country quite rightly developed, renewed or enhanced their respect for the teaching profession and for what teaching is capable of doing.

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Tenth sitting)

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 4th February 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Damian Hinds]

I do not know whether the hon. Member has a copy of my notes, but that is what I was just about to say.

I argued on Second Reading that the ability of academies—which are now the majority of secondary schools and a large number of primary schools in this country—even if most of the time hardly any use it, to deviate somewhat from the national curriculum is a safety valve against politicisation. I remind colleagues on the Labour Benches that their party is currently in government with a whacking great majority, but it is possible that it might not be forever. We all have an interest in guarding against over-politicisation.

As we have heard, and as my hon. Friend the shadow Minister rightly said, it can be an instrument of school improvement to ease off from some aspects of the national curriculum while refocussing on core subjects.

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that freedoms in respect of the curriculum have also been used to hide information from children—for example, to avoid giving a broad curriculum on personal, social, health and economic education and so avoid giving full sex education to children? Does he accept that freedoms have been used in ways that could negatively impact children?

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Third sitting)

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 23rd January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Neil O’Brien (Harborough, Oadby and Wigston) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. As this is the first amendment on the first day of our line-by-line consideration, I will briefly say that although the Opposition have lots of serious questions about the second part of the Bill, there is much in part 1 of the Bill that we completely support.

In fact, a lot of the Bill builds on work that the last Government were doing. To quote the great 1980s philosopher Belinda Carlisle, we may find that

“We dream the same thing

We want the same thing”.

It may not always seem like that, because we are going to ask some questions, but they are all about improving the Bill. A lot of them are not our questions, but ones put to us by passionate experts and those who work with people in these difficult situations.

The relevant policy document sets out why it is so important to get this clause right. It highlights the number of serious case incidents, which was 405 last year, and the number of child deaths, which was 205—every single one a terrible tragedy. Around half of those deaths were of very young children, often under 2; they are physically the most vulnerable children, because they cannot get away.

Our amendment 18 seeks to make clause 1 work in practice. It reflects some, but not all, of the concerns that we heard in oral evidence on Tuesday from Jacky Tiotto, the chief executive of the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service. The clause states:

“Before a local authority in England makes an application for an order…the authority must offer a family group decision-making meeting”.

In general, those meetings are a good thing, and we all support them—the last Government supported them; the new Government support them. They are already in statutory guidance.

However, we have two or three nagging worries about what will happen when, as it were, we mandate a good thing. The first is about pace. As I said in the oral evidence session, I worry that once family group decision making becomes a legal process and right, people will use the courts to slow down decision making, and that local authorities will sometimes worry about fulfilling this new requirement—although the meetings are generally a good thing—when their absolute priority should be getting a child away from a dangerous family quickly.

A long time ago, when I used to work with people who were street homeless, I met a woman who was a very heavy heroin user and a prostitute. She was about to have—[Interruption.]

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Neil O’Brien]

I will give way; I have finally managed to get my train of thought in order again.

[Lizzi Collinge]

How common does the hon. Gentleman think the situation that he describes is across our constituencies? Does he accept our understanding of that situation? We see it ourselves in our constituencies and in our inboxes.

[Neil O’Brien]

I thank the hon. Member for the intervention. A lot of us will have seen such situations where there is not a minute to lose. To complete my sentence, the woman was about to have—I think—her third or fourth child. This is not to criticise her, but a child would not have been safe with her for a single minute. The priority has to be getting children away from people who are dangerous to them.

I worry about pace, and our amendment 18 makes the importance of pace clear. It would insert:

“Nothing in this section permits an extension to the 26-week limit for care proceedings in section 14(2)(ii) of the Children and Families Act 2014.”

I was struck by what the head of CAFCASS told us on Tuesday. She said that the Bill “probably could move” the requirement for the family group decision-making meeting

“down to the point at which there are formal child protection procedures starting so that the family can get to know what the concerns are, work with the child protection plan for longer, understand what the concerns are and demonstrate whether the protection can happen.”––[Official Report, Children's Wellbeing and Schools Public Bill Committee, 21 January 2025; c. 31, Q68.]

This is the bit of her evidence—she knows a lot more about this than I do—that struck me:

“if the Bill were to stay as drafted at the edge of care, I think there are risks for very young children, and babies in particular. The meetings will be difficult to set up. People will not turn up. They will be rescheduled”.––[Official Report, Children's Wellbeing and Schools Public Bill Committee, 21 January 2025; c. 31, Q68.]

She went on:

“For very young children when you are concerned, if they are still with the parents, which is sometimes the case, or even with a foster carer, you want permanent decisions quickly. That does not negate the need for the family to be involved. You can have it much earlier because you have been worried for a while at that point.”––[Official Report, Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill Public Bill Committee, 21 January 2025; c. 31, Q70.]

Our amendment does not encompass all those concerns, but it does seek to ensure that this very sensible provision in clause 1 does not slow down measures to keep children safe.

Given that there we were told a few other things by CAFCASS, I should also be clear about what our amendment does not do. It does not address my concerns about people and families—indeed, extended families—using the move to primary legislation to bring about legal action, such as a judicial review, against the decisions of local authorities, or using lawfare or the threat of legal action against local authorities, perhaps to force their way into a room when most of the social workers and other people involved would much rather they were not there because they are inappropriate people. Protecting against that risk is legally much more complicated, which is why the Government have not tabled an amendment on that point.

Ministers may say that the legal worries are less than I am supposing, but will they agree to look at this issue? The last thing we want, once this goes from being guidance to being statute, is people saying, “I’ve got a right to this meeting. You didn’t have me in the meeting. I am going to challenge this decision,” and all that sort of stuff. Hopefully, there is no risk, but I would love to see Ministers consider that point.

Nor does our amendment address moving meetings earlier in the process. As drafted, the clause encourages LAs to put pretty much all their cases to a meeting at the pre-proceeding stage—it has to be done before it goes to court—but lots of the people we heard evidence from think it would be desirable to have the meetings earlier, before the case enters the much less consensual pre-court process. By the time the case gets to the pre-proceedings stage, it is normally pretty clear that it will be hard to reach an amicable solution.

As I said, these questions do not come from us, but from people who know more about the issues than I do. I would like Ministers to respond to the points made by various experts and official groups. The head of CAFCASS said on Tuesday that we should move the point at which the Bill applies to when a section 7 report is ordered. I was really struck by her saying that, because it would be quite a big change to the Bill. She was very specific, however, and she knows a lot about the issue. She said:

“One suggestion I would like to make on CAFCASS’s behalf is that family group decision making should be offered to families where the court has ordered a section 7 report—a welfare report that, if ordered to do so, the local authority has to produce for the court in respect of what it advises about where children should live and who they should spend time with. I think the opportunity for a family group decision-making meeting for those families is important.”––[Official Report, Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Public Bill Committee, 21 January 2025; c. 32, Q72.]

That is a big proposal, but it comes from someone with huge experience, who clearly has some real concerns. Will Ministers agree to take that away and consider it further as we make progress in Committee and in the Lords?

The head of CAFCASS made a second big proposal on Tuesday:

“The Bill tends to focus on those who are in public law proceedings. Two thirds of the children we work with are in private law proceedings, where there are family disputes about who children spend their time with and where they live. Very often, those children are in families where conflict is very intense. There are risks to them; there is domestic abuse. The Bill is silent on children in private law proceedings, and I think there is an opportunity for that to be different.”––[Official Report, Children's Wellbeing and Schools Public Bill Committee, 21 January 2025; c. 32, Q72.]

My second question to the Ministers is: have the Government reflected on that suggestion, and do they have any plans to respond? They might not be able to give us a full and final answer today, but what is their basic reaction to that?

Another expert made some significant and specific suggestions about the clause. Will the Government respond to concerns put forward in the written evidence from the Family Rights Group, a charity that helped to introduce family conferences, which were used in New Zealand, to the UK in the 1990s? It said:

“we are concerned that the family group decision making offer in the Bill is too ambiguous and state-led in the way it is framed, with the state determining how, who attends and even if it happens. Without strengthening the provisions, we fear in practice it will not deliver the Bill’s ambition, to ensure fair and effective opportunity across England for children and families to get the support they need to stay safely together.”

Essentially, it is worried that the form will be followed but the spirit will be lost. It goes on:

“We are already seeing evidence of local authorities claiming to use such approaches, including reference to ‘family-led decision making’ to describe meetings which are led by professionals and where family involvement is minimal. Without clear definition of terms, and a set of principles and standards for practice, it is likely that in many authorities, such meetings will be professionally-led, with the child and family engagement peripheral…If the legislation does not specify what is expected, we are also concerned approaches unsupported by evidence will proliferate.”

Education, Health and Care Plans

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd January 2025 Westminster Hall

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Huq. I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the register of interests as a corporate parent in Lancashire.

In the past six months, I have had to intervene in dozens of EHCP cases. Children in Morecambe and Lunesdale are being held back by the abject failures of the system. We know we cannot fix this in six months—it is a problem that has been building for 14 years—but it is fair to say what the Labour Government are doing, because we are taking action. Stable, longer term funding for local government is absolutely vital to making sure that systems work and changes can be implemented properly.

We are changing the Education Department so that SEND sits with the Schools Ministers, increasing education spending and earmarking £1 billion specifically for SEND and working on public health, including on early intervention and the wider determinants of health and poverty. All these things together will help the SEND ecosystem. I hope to goodness we can get it done quickly enough for my constituents because they are suffering right now.

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (First sitting)

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 21st January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Amanda Martin (Portsmouth North) (Lab)]

For the record, NAHT—National Association of Head Teachers—was my previous employer, before I came to this place.

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

For the record, I am still a Lancashire county councillor. The council has responsibility for children’s services.

[Matt Bishop (Forest of Dean) (Lab)]

Currently, I am a member of a union and was a workplace representative for a school before being elected.

--- Later in debate ---

[Munira Wilson]

Q Dr Homden, you have talked about the lack of provision for children with special educational needs. What do you make of the power in the Bill for local authorities to refuse parents the right to withdraw their children from a special school to home educate if they do not feel that the special school is meeting their children’s needs?

Dr Homden: That is a really complex area to consider because of the circumstances of individual children such as my own child, who was not withdrawn from school but had no available provision for two years of his school life despite being fully known and documented. I sympathise with parents who feel that the risks facing their child in a setting, as well as out of a setting, might lead them to that position. I sympathise strongly with the driver within the Bill, but much more consideration needs to be given to that question because of the lack of provision. At Coram children’s legal centre, we are constantly representing parents where there is significant failure to fulfil the education, health and care plan, which is a child’s right and entitlement.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Q Anne, you said that family group decision making can be fantastic if done well. What are your thoughts about how prescriptive the statutory guidance should be on the format of those family group decision meetings?

Anne Longfield: It has to be. If this is to be the cornerstone of our ability to move towards a kinship model, intervene earlier and get alongside families, it has to work properly. All the evidence is based on a full family group conferencing system. Of course, you would want to take any opportunity to work around families, but this is about planning, being there at the right time and having the involvement of children and families. That is not something that local authorities themselves can decide on.

It is also about the commitment to do something with it. Without that, it could just be a meeting with families, which would be an absolute missed opportunity. I am not a specialist in this; I went along and found family group conferencing about 12 or 15 years ago. I used to call them magic meetings. Out of nowhere came solutions that changed people’s lives. I do not want to become too enthused, but it has to be done right, and the principles need to be seen through.

[Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

Q You have enthused about family group decision making. Do you think it would be useful at other stages in the process, particularly in approaching families for unification at the point of discharge for care leavers?

Dr Homden: Yes, we would support that. We would also call for specific coverage in the statutory guidance on how children with family members abroad can benefit, and for consideration in that guidance on contact, particularly with siblings.

Anne Longfield: I would also look at the mechanism at other points, such as when children are at risk of becoming involved in crime and the like. But for now, yes.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

We still have six keen people wanting to come in, so can we have brief single questions and answers, please?

[Lizzi Collinge]

Q I draw the Committee’s attention to the fact that I am a corporate parent in Lancashire. I am interested in the powers on financial oversight and profit caps on residential children’s homes in particular. What impact do you foresee that having on the resources you have available to look after children?

Ruth Stanier: We very much expect that these measures should, over time, lead to a reduction of some of the extremely high costs that have been set out in recent research we have done. That should free up some additional funding for all the other things councils need to be doing.

Andy Smith: If you look at the breadth of measures in the Bill around having the right placements for the right type of child in the right part of the country, and having regulations to try to move away from unregulated placements—we have seen the proliferation of those in recent years—over time we should start to see a more consistent provision of accommodation and placements across the country. There is a focus on fostering, kinship care and prevention as the continuum that we need for children, and there is a real focus on trying to keep children out of care in the first place.

[Ellie Chowns]

Q Clause 8 specifies that local authorities need to set out a local offer. You have talked about the need to avoid fragmentation, and about corporate responsibility across the country and across Departments. Would you like to see the Bill amended to require a national offer of support to care leavers, and what do you think should be in it?

Ruth Stanier: We certainly would want to see corporate parenting duties extended at a national level to Government Departments and relevant public sector bodies. We think that is incredibly important. Otherwise, we are very much supportive of the measures in the Bill in respect of the kinship offer, though we think it is important that there is a clear threshold for that support so that it is realistic and affordable and can be implemented.

Andy Smith: I would support that. A national offer for care leavers is an interesting concept. There should be some absolute minimum requirements we expect in an offer, and I think you would broadly see that in many councils in what is provided for children in care and for care leavers. It is usually co-produced with representatives who were care leavers, and with councils and so on. I think that would be an important reflection within the context of a much broader understanding of corporate parenting.

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Second sitting)

Lizzi Collinge Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 21st January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Before we take evidence from further witnesses, we have a declaration of interest.

[Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)]

I want to make the Committee aware that I am the chair of the all-party parliamentary humanist group. That may become relevant because of evidence submitted to the Committee.

[The Chair]

Thank you. I am a vice-president of the Local Government Association, but as I will not be making any comments, that may not be relevant.

Examination of Witness

Dame Rachel de Souza gave evidence.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Hinds]

Q Finally, on the different subject of elective home education, quite a lot of detail is proposed in the Bill about the way the register of children not in school will work, including some requirements on the registration of providers of education to those individuals, whether that be online education or some other form of tutoring. How much consultation has there has been with Ofsted about the drawing up of those provisions?

Sir Martyn Oliver: We have been involved in that for quite some time, even with previous Governments, whether it was about online education or all these aspects. I think that all our intelligence, for years, has carried forward into this Bill.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Q I want to talk about unregulated schools and the register of children not in school. I have seen evidence outside the Committee that shows that there are serious concerns about poor education in unregulated settings, as well as abuse and neglect. If you have any comments about what the problem is that the Bill is trying to solve, I and other members of the Committee would like to hear them. How will the new powers relating to unregulated schools allow you to protect children at risk of harm, specifically? Will they be an improvement on the current powers that you have?

Sir Martyn Oliver: To answer your last question first, absolutely: it is a significant improvement on our powers. Since 2016, we have carried out almost 1,400 criminal investigations into almost 1,300 unique unregistered settings. Not all investigations lead to an on-site inspection. We have carried out almost 900 on-site inspections and issued 200 warnings, meaning that in over one fifth of on-site inspections, we were able to secure sufficient evidence that a crime was being committed, despite our limited powers at that point and under the current legislation. We have worked with the Crown Prosecution Service to successfully prosecute seven cases, including a total of 21 individual convictions.

The new powers will significantly improve our ability to do that, and the speed at which we can do it. It is very difficult to carry out those investigations. It is incredibly resource-reliant and takes significant time—regularly between 12 and 24 months—if we can get it to that position. The changes will help to address those loopholes in the law, but we think that there are some areas for improvement. As I have said, the need to get a warrant in all cases will be incredibly bureaucratic and expensive for Ofsted. Obviously we want to do it with care—we do not want to break into people’s homes and inspect them—but on commercial premises we think that there is a more proportionate response, which will reduce bureaucracy, reduce the cost to Ofsted and allow us to focus on keeping children safe.

[Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

Q On balance, do you welcome the provisions in the Bill to ensure that all schools follow the national curriculum?

Lee Owston: Obviously there is a review, from Professor Becky Francis, of what the national curriculum will contain, and we are speaking frequently with members of that review. From an inspector’s position, it will always be about how providers are adhering to the legal requirements set by Government and Parliament. Obviously, we look forward to seeing what the Bill produces in how we then interact with it. In terms of a broad legal requirement, and what all children as a minimum should be able to access, I would support that statement.

--- Later in debate ---

[Munira Wilson]

Q Nigel, I was interested that you said that 65% of small rural primaries are Church of England schools. The Bill’s provisions state that breakfast clubs will be a universal offering. Will those small rural primary schools have the capacity to deliver what is laid out in the legislation?

Nigel Genders: That is a really important question. Broadly, all our schools are really supportive of the breakfast club initiative and think it is helpful to be able to provide that offer to children, for all the reasons already articulated during the previous panel. You are right that there will be particular challenges in small schools in terms of staffing, managing the site, providing the breakfast and all those things. As the funding for the roll-out of breakfast clubs is considered, it may be that there need to be some different models. The economies of scale in large trusts serving 2,000, 3,000 or 4,000 children are quite different from those of a school that has 40 or 50 children, one member of staff and probably a site manager. The ability to provide breakfast for every child in a fair way needs further consideration. The legislation is right to endeavour to do that, but the detail will be about the funding to make that possible.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Q I want to follow up on a couple of previous questions and make sure that I have clarity about something that I appreciate is complex. This is about faith selection, particularly in relation to clause 51. Do you expect that Church of England and Catholic schools—if you have any information about other faith groups, I welcome it, but I appreciate that you do not represent other faith groups—in the short, medium or long term will use the changes brought in by clause 51 to open new schools with 100% faith-based selection?

Paul Barber: Clause 51 does not change the parameters within which we can open new schools. As drafted at the moment, the Bill leaves that possibility exactly as it is today. I have outlined my position on when we would seek to open new schools. The idea of opening new schools and creating new places is to satisfy all the parental demand. The provision of places and admissions are two things that work together. If an area has insufficient places in Catholic schools for all the families who want to take advantage of that education, obviously the longer term solution is to create more places, but in the shorter term it has always been part of the system—in our view, very reasonably—that if there are insufficient places, priority should be given to the community who provided the school in the first place, with others afterwards. That has always been part of the system that we have operated in since the 19th century.

[Lizzi Collinge]

Q May I clarify? In certain circumstances, yes, you would like to have schools with 100% place selection?

Paul Barber: We are talking about oversubscription criteria, which only kick in when there are insufficient places to satisfy parental demand. In those cases, we would wish to continue to give priority to Catholic families.

Nigel Genders: Again, Paul has identified a difference in policy area between the two Churches in this space. My answer is the same as previously: that would not be the case for the Church of England. We are much more interested in some of the other parts of the previous consultation, which have not come through yet—around special schools and the designation of special schools with religious designation. The Church of England would love to be able to provide special schools in those circumstances. In the provision of new schools, whether voluntary-aided free schools or voluntary controlled, we would not be looking to do 100%.

Paul Barber: We would also welcome having more. We already have special schools, but we would like to have more.

[Damian Hinds]

Q I would like to go back to the curriculum—