Schools Bill [HL]

Lord Addington Excerpts

2nd reading & Lords Hansard - Part two
Monday 23rd May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Watson, said that the graveyard slot for Back-Bench speakers is a difficult one because everybody has already said everything. If I cast my mind back, I thought I had an original point, but at speaker 13 it was basically shot to pieces. The noble Lord, Lord Baker, pointed out that the Government are seizing incredible amounts of power. That is quite right. There are 20 examples of it, but that is not exhaustive, and we all know the old adage about lists. What do you stick on and what do you take out? You can carry on sticking on for ever. We are sticking on powers for ever for the Secretary of State to tell our schools about their structure. That is worrying. How we go about this will be fundamental to whether it stands any chance of working.

Making these regulations is going to be an affirmative process. That has been established. The affirmative process is an odd one, because we will debate the statutory instrument and have the possibility to vote against it, but if we dare vote against it, it will be a case of, “How dare you attack the constitutional system of government? How dare you say you are voting down regulations? It is just not on.” Effectively, we can have a debate about saying that we disagree with it.

If we are going to do this, I feel we should know the background for how each decision is made. What consultation took place every time one of these decisions was made? We should have it published somewhere. I will certainly be moving amendments to this end when the Bill gets to Committee. If the Government are taking on this responsibility and this power, we should know what it is based on. If they have consulted certain interest groups, let us hear that and see that. At least let us know what we are disagreeing with—if we are disagreeing. That would be a reasonable thing to have in this Bill. I hope we can proceed along those lines. If not, as the noble Lord, Lord Knight, said, what happens next? What happens to the next person going down with another set speech? I am not worried about this Secretary of State, but what about the next one? Who knows? Basically, he could have horns, a tail and cloven hooves coming in—and you always find somebody beside you who says, “He already has.”

It does not really matter what is said about this; we have to make sure we know where it is coming from at the very least. The Government should have a good enough case to present to us and say, “Here, we have taken information; this is our argument”, and at least they can stand by it. I hope that we get a better idea about this list of incredibly sweeping powers.

The funding of schools is something that virtually every second person has spoken about. We now have one funding system for an incredibly varied educational need, which is going to need challenge and examination.

We have got other bits of legislation going through and it is at this time I should remind the House of my interests in special educational needs: I am chairman of the British Dyslexia Association and of Microlink, which deals with assistive technology, particularly in the education and employment sector.

We are looking at this now, but then we also have funding going on and an arbitrary set of regulations going through. Can we make sure that the funding represents—or at least has some mechanism in it somewhere to represent—high need? It does not matter how you define it. It can be rural schools—indeed, rural schools will need something, unless you are going to invest a great deal more money in school transport. How we get school transport into this Bill I am not sure, but making sure it goes up to age 18—we are supposed to be in education until 18 now—might not be a bad idea. How are we going to get these things coming together? How it all comes together is probably the most important structure.

How are we going to bring in the work we are doing and the consultation about special educational needs? Somebody said that there is one correct way of teaching. How do we do it? I have already identified in my own little pet bit of that field that many people with dyslexia do not think the way English is taught, with systematic synthetic phonics—it has taken me about 40 times saying that to get it right—is correct. How are we going to ensure that we have enough exemptions so that other ways of teaching fit in? They are not the only show in town.

How do we fit these all together? It is important, and a degree of flexibility will be needed to make this work. On every occasion, arbitrary rules are set down, but you need flexibility to make them work. This is recognised in other bits of law, so how are we going to change that? How are we going to work it through? I look forward to hearing from the Government about this. It will be a challenge, but I am sure we are up to it.

Oh! The flashing clocks are slightly off-putting, but I am in the wind-up spot.

We then get towards the back of the Bill and the idea of the independent sector. Apparently, my noble friend Lord Storey has already had electronically some sort of expression of total hatred for what he has just said about certain religious schools. We should have done this long ago, so I congratulate the Government on that. If we are going to deal with this and make sure we go on, we need, again, an indication of the thinking that will go with it. We should recognise more publicly the idea that you are regulated and cannot just teach a narrow religious focus. It is mainly Abrahamic religions in these schools; I am sure we can find a few more if we look hard enough. Certainly, that type of thing is about not a philosophical basis but equipping people to go forward.

We then come to the idea of a school register and home schooling. I am afraid that I am with the noble Lord, Lord Nash, on this: it is the child’s right to an education that comes first; that is the important thing. I am also on the side of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, because that right education may well be provided at home, but we should know what it is because the schools have got it wrong in the past.

The noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, said that there were examples of people who say “Let’s push it away”. I too have heard those examples. Looking at this in the round and making sure that the child is the centre of what is going on is the way forward. If the school has failed or does not have examples or if—let us put it this way—the cock-up school history has applied, if a child who does not have normal educational needs or has been badly bullied does not want to go back into that school and you cannot find another place, home would be the right place. The state should give some support there. It requires us once again not to have an arbitrary look at this. There will be people who will go forward who will not be doing it properly. We must make sure that we realise that there are two patterns of behaviour there. If we do not, we will be letting people down. But if we take on the idea of what education is appropriate for that child, we probably will not go too far wrong.

That requires getting people who understand the individual needs to have a look, especially if we are dealing with special educational needs. If you do not understand autism, you will not know about teaching autistic children. If you do not know about attention deficit disorder or dyslexia, you cannot make that judgment. You are just not capable of doing it because you will not understand the context.

I hope that, as we go through the Bill, we will be able to bring out of the Government where they think the flexibility and give in this approach are, because, at the moment, we seem to have a Secretary of State who will decide and we will comply. It is a guarantee that we will get it wrong periodically, and sometimes classically badly, if we do not build flexibility into this approach—because, basically, the education requirements of individuals and areas are not the same as each other.