Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

2nd reading
Thursday 1st May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to follow the noble Baroness. I offer a very warm welcome to and look forward to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Mohammed of Tinsley. I know that he will remind me of just how old I am by reflecting on his childhood when I was leader of Sheffield.

Over the last four months, there has been the most misleading rhetoric about Part 2 of this Bill. It is our job in the House of Lords to lower the temperature and get to the reality. If there are amendments to be made to clarify it, we should do so. That is our role, and I hope we can do that in the spirit of coming together in the interests of children.

I take up the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Shephard, that what goes on in the school and in the classroom is what really matters. I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Baker, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Shephard, Lady Morris and Lady Morgan—I will not pay tribute to myself—but I think they would accept immediately that we did not transform the ability of children to succeed or develop their talent, or their ability to shine through. It was the world-class leadership in schools and the first-class teaching and support staff who did that job. That is what we must build on.

Let us set aside the disagreements about whether multi-academy trusts or maintained schools have done better. The stats from the House of Lords Library are very interesting, but I have not got time to go into them. I can pay tribute to the sponsors and leaders of multi-academy trusts, because I was the Secretary of State who floated the academies in the first place. Let us get it right. We have put the record straight about minimum rather than maximum pay and conditions. We can put the record straight on what happens with schools that are failing their children and the interventions that are needed. We can put the record straight on misleading comments about admissions, where the drop in pupil numbers will be catastrophic and there will need to be co-ordination if massive resources are not to be wasted.

I hope we can also clarify issues around the basic entitlement to a national curriculum brought in by the noble Lord, Lord Baker, in 1988. He will speak next, and I pay tribute to him. I ought to declare an interest—I have two grandchildren at Sheffield University Technical College and one going there in September. I know we will be able to clarify during the course of this Bill that the basic entitlement to a national curriculum will not interfere with the innovation and creativity of UTCs.

Let us get it right. There is so much to be done, because absence is up. I feel so strongly about this. Exclusions are up, off-rolling is up and one million children leaving school between the ages of 16 and 24 are not in education, employment or training. In the PISA surveys on life satisfaction, we are second from bottom. There is so much to do, which we can do together if we put the rhetoric behind us and put children first.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 20th May 2025 Lords Chamber

I understand why the Start for Life offer has to be tightly drawn for local authorities, with far more patchy provision. However, where local authorities have pioneered good practice and blazed an innovative trail for other councils that has proven successful, they should not have to conform to a one-size-fits-all approach. I understand that a level of standardisation is essential to get timely scale-up of new approaches. What used to be known as the troubled families programme began in quite a clunky way, which attracted a lot of criticism, but it would never have got off the ground without tight controls around payment by results. However, a sizeable chunk of its success lay in its operation becoming more flexible for well-performing local authorities. The ability to gain earned autonomy from the strictures of payment by results gave local authorities lump sums to spend on early intervention and helped to float a fleet of family hubs. Deploying a similar approach with councils whose family hubs are being hampered in delivering excellence by command and control from the centre could similarly help greatly with progress of the whole national programme. Hence I will likely table amendments later in this Bill that would give councils earned autonomy in how they design and deploy family hubs.

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, we have heard some highly respected voices this afternoon, and I want to put two or three things on the record.

The noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, rightly draws attention to the fact that this kind of clause is now becoming commonplace at the beginning of Committees on Bills. I understand why people might want to raise specific issues, or even flag the amendments that they want to move in Committee, but if we prolong this stage to the point where our debates lose their purpose or we go on into the night—when, frankly, it is impossible to have rational and sensible debate—we will lose the purpose of the Committee itself.

I understand what the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, who I respect as a friend, said about Second Reading. I was frustrated to have only four minutes, and I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, was deeply frustrated because she was trying to get back to Britain and could not. But we cannot have Second Reading debates at the beginning of every Committee.

I make an appeal. I have amendments down, and I understand that we need to listen and learn. On Second Reading, my noble friend the Minister did just that, and listened to what I and the noble Lord, Lord Baker, and others from outside this House, were saying. There is a willingness to listen and reflect and to believe that we do not get things right the first time. There is real wisdom and experience in this House and beyond that can be brought to bear, and we can change the Bill and have a better result at the end of it. But, to pick up what the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, said, we will do so only if we respect each other, with no calling out of people due to ill will, and if Ministers are committed to working with us. That is the role of our House. Over the 10 years I have been here, I have understood, in a very clear way, how different it is from the House of Commons. If we are able to listen to each other, take well-meant amendments and see how we can provide a better outcome for all, so much the better for this House.

The respect of this House is really important. I have never understood why, recently, those who are most committed to this kind of second Chamber go about undermining it. I did not understand when that happened on the Football Governance Bill and other Bills—this one is in danger of going the same way—where we prolonged debate rather than concentrating and focusing on improvement.

The noble Lord, Lord Farmer, is quite right—I am in favour of what he is saying, and of bringing back the old local Sure Start programmes. We will be able to debate that on amendments being put down. I would like to pick up the issue of what Part 2 is about. I think it is about raising standards, opportunity and life chances for all children, not just those who can jump through particular hoops. We touched on this with the 80 people who spoke on Second Reading. Let us try to get through Committee stage and to Report. At the end of it, let us all believe, whatever part of the House we are from—there should be no “sides”—that we have done a good job in making this Bill better.

[Lord Wigley (PC)]

My Lords, I sat through almost all the Second Reading but deliberately did not intervene in it because I was trying to ascertain how much of the Bill was to do with Wales and how much was not. In the context of her amendment, I ask the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, to clarify subsection (1)(c) of the proposed new clause, where it says, and I select the words deliberately,

“improve … standards … in schools in … Wales”.

Education in Wales is a totally devolved subject. I know that the Welsh Government and the Senedd have asked for certain provisions to be made via the Bill for application to Wales. I am sure the Minister can confirm that. Those are specific provisions that have been asked for and not a matter of generality. As I read the proposed new clause, there is a suggestion that it applies to the generality of standards in schools in Wales. The noble Baroness spoke of autonomy and accountability. That goes to the heart of the administration and provision of education in Wales, which is a devolved matter, and we must be clear in our minds why we are choosing those words.

Clearly, the term “England and Wales” can arise quite rightly when we are talking about the jurisdiction or the legal aspects of it. But here we are talking about the administration of education. Specifically, we are talking about schools and schools in Wales, and the Senedd has the right to know to what extent amendments such as this are meant to apply to them.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 3rd February 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sater (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 243C standing in my name and those of my noble friends in sport, the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, and the noble Lord, Lord Addington. I thank them for supporting this amendment.

My amendment follows up on an amendment previously brought forward so powerfully by my noble friend Lord Moynihan in Committee, which attracted cross-party support. I am delighted that he has rejoined our Front Bench, with responsibility for energy and net zero. We will miss him from debates on sport policy. I will do my best to match his energy.

We have an ambition across the House to raise educational outcomes and improve children’s well-being. The school curriculum is currently under review, and that makes this a particularly timely moment. My amendment is offered in a constructive spirit, as was my noble friend Lord Moynihan’s, as a way of supporting the Government’s wider aims by ensuring that physical education and school sport are considered in a coherent and strategic way.

This amendment asks the Secretary of State to publish within 12 months

“a national strategy for physical education and sport in schools”,

and to review and report on it annually to Parliament. It does not advise how schools should deliver provision. Instead, it brings together existing priorities such as daily physical activity, teacher training and inclusion for disabled pupils into a single framework, with clear outcomes and accountability. To be clear, it is intended to assist and not constrain government policy.

The evidence shows that regular physical activity and engagement in school sport not only improves health and well-being but supports concentration, behaviour, attendance and attainment in literacy and numeracy, with benefits that extend into later life. Many schools are already doing great work in this area, often under significant pressure. To make this work more effective, teachers need the right resources, training and support.

While the Bill has children’s well-being in its name, it has not addressed how schools could properly use physical education, sport and physical activity to support this and improve educational outcomes. This amendment seeks to offer a fully integrated national strategy to address that gap and monitor and evaluate the best way of doing it. Data, evaluation and analysis are so important to this endeavour.

It is a strong belief, which I know is shared across this Chamber, that physical education is not merely a subject; it is a cornerstone in the development of young people, fostering health, resilience, teamwork and confidence. When embedded effectively, it can also contribute to wider educational goals, supporting behaviour, attendance and attainment across the curriculum. This amendment also encourages collaboration between education, health, sport and the voluntary sector, and provides a framework to align existing efforts in this space behind a shared national vision. It identifies the leadership role of the Minister in bringing that collaboration together and ensuring consistency of approach.

Back in 2021, I was a member of the taskforce established by the Association of Physical Education. We published a report, which issued a clear call to government to put physical education at the heart of school life. If the Government are serious, as I believe they are, about improving well-being in schools and giving every child an opportunity to thrive, this amendment would offer a constructive opportunity to consider how a national strategy for physical education and school sport could help deliver those ambitions. I therefore hope that the Minister will see this amendment in that spirit and give it careful and positive consideration.

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, I apologise to the House and to the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, for not being here at the beginning of this group. I have a member of staff who lives a normal life, and I quite rightly agreed that she should go home. As a consequence and because there is no Braille on the annunciator, I was a bit late getting in, so I will be incredibly brief.

I support Amendment 206, to which I have added my name. In the light of the Curriculum and Assessment Review, I hope that my noble friend the Minister will ensure that, now, the Department for Education gives its full and comprehensive support to the proper teaching of democracy and citizenship all the way through the curriculum, which the Government committed to in their response to the review; and that we engage with every school in the country to ensure that young people are equipped for the future, not least for the traumas and difficulties they now face.

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak on my Amendments 231 and then 232. Amendment 231 may be familiar to the House, as it reflects the substance of the Bill I previously brought forward on this subject, which is on spiritual, moral, social and cultural education in assemblies.

The amendment is simple in intent: it would remove the legal duty on schools without a religious character to provide daily collective worship that is wholly or mainly of a broadly Christian character. This would not prevent any school holding acts of collective worship if it wishes to do so, and, despite some misunderstandings, it does not ban prayers, Christmas carols or the marking of religious festivals. It simply ends the mandatory requirement of Christian worship in schools that are non-faith schools by designation.

This is about freedom of choice and respect for the diversity of our society. When the 2021 census shows that over a third of the population of England and Wales now have no religious character, it cannot be justified that schools are still legally obliged to provide daily Christian worship.

This is not a matter of abstract principle; there is clear evidence from the profession itself that reform is wanted. A 2024 Teacher Tapp poll of senior school leaders found that around seven in 10 oppose the legal requirement for daily collective worship, with only a small minority in favour of the current law. Likewise, in its submission to the Curriculum and Assessment Review’s call for evidence, the NAHT argued that the current legal requirement for daily broadly Christian worship should be removed because it is “too prescriptive and narrow”, while emphasising the value of inclusive assemblies that reflect the diversity of the school community.

It is sometimes said that families who object can simply withdraw their children. It is true that parents have a statutory right to withdraw a child from collective worship, but in practice that can be a poor substitute for an inclusive approach. It may mean that children are separated from their peers, miss shared parts of school life or sit apart while others take part. It is notable that, in JR87, the Supreme Court considered precisely this point in the context of religious education and collective worship in Northern Ireland, recognising that reliance on withdrawal can place

“an undue burden on parents”

and risks stigmatising the child—hardly the hallmarks of a meaningful and equal choice.

Of course, I recognise that many noble Lords hold sincere views about the value of Christian worship in schools, and I respect those convictions. That is precisely why this amendment is carefully drawn. It would not change the position of schools with a religious character but would simply ensure that non-faith schools are not compelled by law to provide worship that does not reflect the views and beliefs of many of the families that they serve. In place of a daily worship requirement, schools would still provide regular assemblies that support pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development in a way that is inclusive of pupils of all faiths and none, mirroring the approach set out in proposals previously considered by this House.

Maintaining a blanket duty of daily Christian worship in schools without a religious character is increasingly out of step with the country we serve and insufficiently respectful of families with no religion. This amendment would provide more genuine choice, not less, and allow non-faith schools to be properly inclusive community schools for every child.

Amendment 232 proposes a new clause for the inclusion of non-religious beliefs in religious education. It would put it beyond doubt in statute that religious education must include teaching about non-religious beliefs, such as humanism, across all key stages. At the outset, I acknowledge that we are in the midst of the Government’s Curriculum and Assessment Review. The review is highly relevant because it concludes that

“RE’s importance is not currently reflected in its standing in the curriculum”.

It recommends that RE should be moved

“to the national curriculum in due course”,

with a staged process involving

“faith bodies, secular groups and experts from the teaching and wider education sector, to develop a draft RE curriculum”.

I welcome this direction of travel.

The review is also clear about why reform is needed, stating that RE is currently

“a basic rather than national curriculum subject”,

with content that is “not nationally defined” and local support arrangements that are “complex and fraying”, producing “uneven provision”. However, “in due course” is doing a lot of work here. Unless and until those recommendations are implemented, we will still have the present patchwork of locally agreed syllabuses and widely varying practice. It is in that context that Amendment 232 is needed. It is a modest, clarifying amendment that ensures that, whatever the structure of RE, pupils must learn about non-religious beliefs as well as religions.