Education Bill

Debate between Lord Alton of Liverpool and Baroness Massey of Darwen

Wednesday 26th October 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Massey of Darwen]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 71, 72 and 73. First, I thank the Minister for his conscientious response to the last stage of this Bill. He has sent out a number of letters explaining the policy, which I found very useful. Indeed, the letter he sent to me referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, gave some reassurances on the amendments I am going to speak to.

My main concern is that some measures proposed by the Bill may further fragment education on the basis of religion or belief. I have serious concerns about how the Bill makes voluntary-aided faith schools the easiest type of school to set up. I am also concerned about voluntary-controlled schools converting to academies, then being able to choose to increase their religious discrimination in admissions.

Currently, when a proposer wishes, for whatever reason, to establish a new foundation, voluntary-controlled or aided, or foundation special school outside of a competition, they need the consent of the Secretary of State. Following consent, the local authority runs a consultation on the proposals. The Bill, if passed in its current form, will change this, as I understand it, so that consent from the Secretary of State would no longer be needed for voluntary-aided schools, but it would still be needed for foundation, voluntary-controlled and foundation special schools.

I see some problems here. Almost all voluntary-aided schools—99 per cent of them—are faith schools. Admissions are determined by the school, which can discriminate against all pupils on religious grounds. In voluntary-controlled schools, local authorities set admissions and only about a quarter of local authorities have chosen to allow some or all of their voluntary-controlled schools to discriminate religiously, either in whole or in part.

Mr Gove has made it clear that he wishes to make it easier to set up voluntary-aided schools, which can discriminate. Such a school can use a religious test in appointing, remunerating or promoting all teachers, and even some non-teaching staff. In voluntary-controlled and foundation schools, this is only one-fifth of the teachers. The religious organisation sets the religious education curriculum in accordance with the tenets of the faith of such a school. In voluntary-controlled and foundation schools, the locally agreed syllabus is usually taught, which is not confessional to a particular faith. The religious organisation appoints more than half the governors there. In voluntary-controlled and many foundation schools, it is a quarter. While I thank the Minister again for his letter, my concerns are still not diminished and I shall watch developments on this issue very carefully.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, I hope that the Minister, when he comes to reply to the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, and the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, will think carefully before agreeing with the premises which have been laid before your Lordships' House this afternoon. In the case of the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, I always feel some trepidation in opposing anything that he says, because he has been a noble friend in many respects for a long time. He knows that at 17 years of age I said—and I would never resile on it—that if ever I found myself elected to the other place, I hoped that I would be a Member of Parliament like him. I have always admired the positions that the noble Lord takes on many issues, and continue to do so.

Yet the noble Lord knows that a debate has also been under way in his party for a long time about faith schools per se. Indeed, it was the then Education spokesman in another place, Mr Don Foster MP, who said—I believe these were his exact words—that in an ideal world there would be no schools of a religious character. I know that the noble Lord agrees with that proposition, but it is one I fundamentally disagree with. I suppose I should declare an interest as someone who has been educated in faith schools and whose own children have gone through faith schools. I am also the governor of a faith school and I passionately believe that those who wish to opt for that kind of education for themselves or for their children should be free to do so.

There is not the problem, as the noble Lord suggested, of such schools being undersubscribed; they are of course oversubscribed. That is the problem in many parts of the country. I would say this to the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, on the possibility of creating new faith schools. In parts of London there are large faith communities—for instance, of Polish people or people from the African and Asian communities—and in the Borough of Richmond, for instance, a petition has been laid before the council urging the creation of a new faith school. To restrict the opportunity to do that would be to deprive us of something special.

This is an issue that was addressed in 1944, when perhaps the greatest of all social legislation in the last century went through Parliament. I think it would probably have united most of us. The then Catholic Archbishop of Westminster was in the Strangers’ Gallery for the Third Reading proceedings on that Bill, when RA Butler brought before the House the provisions that allowed for the state to contribute towards the creation of Catholic schools. The Catholic community of that time, as Members of your Lordships' House will be well aware, was mainly an immigrant community —many were from the west of Ireland, as my late mother was. Those were schools for impoverished communities. Indeed, Archbishop Griffin sent RA Butler a copy of Butler’s Lives of the Saints, so pleased was he with the resolution of the House in regard to that legislation.

Around 2,500 schools have been created in the years that have passed, mainly though the efforts of those local communities, and they have enriched our education system. I urge your Lordships not to tamper with the settlements that have been there ever since 1944: that these schools are normally over rather than undersubscribed and that there are already sufficient safeguards in place to ensure that denomination provision is not increased or decreased where it is inappropriate. It is also worth saying, before I conclude, that figures issued recently show that, certainly in the Catholic sector, around one-third of the children in those schools do not come from Catholic backgrounds and there are waiting lists for many of these schools up and down the country. This demonstrates that the ethos of those schools is something that many parents are opting for. That is something that we should celebrate, not in any way try to undermine.