Schools: Curriculum Update

Lord Bishop of Leeds Excerpts

Thursday 8th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I really hope that I did not give the impression that any element of preaching was going on. I absolutely recognise the description that the noble Lord gave. I just ask the House to reflect on this idea of radical improvement being needed in the curriculum. England just came fourth in the PIRLS global reading survey; we are, as we like to say in the DfE, the best in the West. That does not sound to me like a curriculum that needs radical overhaul.

[The Lord Bishop of Leeds]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that resilience is not something primarily that is taught? It is something that develops as you take what is thrown at you in the experiences of life. To that end, is any thinking going on in government about future curricula which allow for children in our schools, particularly secondary schools, to be exposed to opinions and things with which they do not agree in order that they are able to live in a world of conflicting dogmas and opinions, and do not have to run away from them?

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

The right reverend Prelate makes a very important point. The House is obviously familiar with the emphasis we have put on freedom of speech, particularly in our higher education institutions, but the skills of critical thinking, analysis and debate—which data will feed into in coming to objective and balanced views and an ability to listen to others—obviously need to start in our schools and homes.

Skills and Post-16 Education Bill [HL]

Lord Bishop of Leeds Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments
Thursday 24th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, I start again by thanking the Minister for meeting with myself and colleagues and with the Minister for the Department of Work and Pensions. I think we are all agreed that we want to ensure that every young person, whatever their circumstances, situation or abilities, is given the opportunities to study and to develop the skills that they need and that, presumably, we as a society need.

In meeting with the Ministers, I was impressed with the number of schemes for support that the Department for Work and Pensions provides. In recent years, we have seen a coming together of the Department for Education and the Work and Pensions Department in a way that we have never seen before. I was interested to see that the Department for Work and Pensions offers young people the intensive work-coach support through youth employability coaches, 160 youth hubs, training progress, expansion of sector-based work academy programmes, the restart scheme, the access to work scheme, providing personalised support to the disabled, and of course through Kickstart. However, I have to say that I have always been surprised that, although Kickstart has been a successful programme, a 16 year-old cannot join it unless they are on universal credit, and of course most 16 year olds are not.

Although I said how impressed I was at the joining up of the two departments, I was rather concerned when, in a Written Question to the Department for Work and Pensions, I asked how many young people aged 16 to 19 are currently studying for a post-16 qualification and the answer came back: “That information is not available.” I then asked:

“how many young people aged 16 to 19 who are receiving Universal Credit have successfully completed a post-16 qualification.”

Again, the answer came back: “We haven’t got that information”, which I was slightly concerned about.

Perhaps the most vulnerable—if I may use that term—with regard to education must be those students who either have learning difficulties or who are disabled. I want to highlight, as the Minister has done, the problems that disabled students face. Under the current rules, to start a claim for universal credit while in education a disabled person must already have limited capability for work status, as the Minister said. But, of course, to get that status a disabled person must have a work capability assessment, and the main way to access an assessment is by starting a claim for universal credit.

In practice, disabled people in education are in a Catch-22 situation. They need limited capability for work status to start a claim for universal credit, but they need to start a claim for universal credit to get limited capability for work status. Currently, the only way a disabled learner can get an assessment and therefore limited capability for work status while studying is by applying for a contributory new-style employment and support allowance instead of universal credit. Because claiming ESA involves an assessment, it can establish a young learner’s limited capability for work, so they can go on to claim universal credit. Is the noble Baroness following me? However, the oncoming rules will close off the ESA workaround route because they require assessments to have taken place and limited capability for work to have been established before a claimant starts studying. The new rules close off the only route young disabled learners have to universal credit.

Additionally, it would probably be helpful to address the Government’s assertion that the welfare system is not designed to fund maintenance support for those in education and training and that financial support for students comes from the current system of learner loans and grants. The problem is that, currently, there is extremely minimal financial support for those seeking to train and retrain in further education colleges, which might at best contribute to travel costs but which is nothing like enough to support wider living costs. As such, adults who are forced to forgo their universal credit in order to study have to be supported by family or live off savings they might otherwise have been able to obtain.

I know we discussed the amendment from the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham on Report, and I am conscious of the Minister’s detailed reply, but for disabled people particularly, the situation is very precarious. I hope the Minister might agree to look at this matter with her colleagues and see how we can further support them.

[The Lord Bishop of Leeds]

My Lords, this House carried an amendment in the name of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham, who cannot be in his place today, concerning universal credit conditionality—this has been referred to several times—but it was not accepted when the Bill was considered in the other place.

If the Government are to achieve their levelling-up ambitions and enable individuals to secure better-paid employment with improved prospects, then it is essential to achieve greater integration of the support provided for skills development and training by the Department for Education and the Department for Work and Pensions.

The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham wishes me to say that, on these Benches, we are most grateful to the noble Baronesses, Lady Stedman-Scott and Lady Barran, for their very constructive and helpful meeting with the right reverend Prelate and their subsequent letter setting out how this better integration is being actively pursued, the range of provision open to universal credit claimants seeking to retrain, and how work coaches are able to exercise appropriate discretion when applying universal credit conditionality rules.

I know that the right reverend Prelates the Bishop of Durham and the Bishop of Coventry—the latter now in his capacity as lead bishop for FE and HE—welcome the opportunity to contribute to the consultation on equivalent or lower qualifications, which will engage Peers in more detail, along with the outworking of the detail behind the lifelong learning guarantee. In the light of these assurances, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham is content not to press the matter.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, as we all struggle through this slightly unfamiliar process, the amendment I have down was inspired by the letter we got from the Secretary of State. I was told, as the noble Baroness has said, that we do not need to do it because the occupational standards will cover it. Great. But what really made me table the amendment was the body that the Government consulted: the Universities’ Council for the Education of Teachers.

My declaration of interest probably comes in here. I am president of the British Dyslexia Association, and my various other interests are on the register. I spoke to that association—the biggest group involved here—which also covers dyscalculia. It has had no contact with that body—and it is giving the advice. Dyslexia is the biggest of the groups involved, but it is not the only one. Dyscalculia is right up there, along with dyspraxia—that is all those beginning with “dys-” covered—and then there is ADHD, autism and the others. Those are the main, non-obvious groups that will occur in an ordinary classroom. This is what the duty was aimed at. Are those doing the teaching capable of understanding the needs of the people they are teaching? Are they giving advice and creating strategies, so that the people they are teaching actually succeed in what they are doing?

All I am talking about is making sure that the duties we have are acknowledged, and jolly good too. We are so well prepared for these duties that we have a growth in law firms making sure they are enforced throughout the education system. The law is so clear and so well provided for that for parents—tiger parents—the best way of getting through the education system is by paying lawyers to make sure they get through.

It is a mess. It is said that you cannot impose standards, but if you are part of the standards, you can update them, and this duty can be updated as well. We are dealing with about 20% to 25% of the cohort—probably more in further education. These are people who do not get the plan. They have a problem that means they will probably underachieve and not handle the classroom well. Expecting the teaching workforce to have a clear understanding of this is not too much to ask.