Schools: Admissions
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 5 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Massey of Darwen
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure a fair admissions policy in schools.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
My Lords, there are a number of safeguards to ensure that school admission policies are fair. The School Admissions Code sets out what is and is not allowed, and requires that places are allocated in a clear, fair and objective way. Anyone who feels that a school’s admission policy is unfair may complain to the Office of the Schools Adjudicator, whose decision is binding. Parents who are refused a place at a school of their choice have the right to appeal.
Baroness Massey of Darwen (Lab)
I thank the Minister for his response. Is he aware of a freedom of information request to all English local authorities to ascertain the number of children missing education? Is he surprised that 42% of those missing education are doing so because they have not been allocated a place? Is this not a shocking state of affairs and what will the Government do about it?
Lord Nash
My Lords, it is true that a high proportion of children missing education are awaiting a place but we have massive in-year movement in this country, partly as a result of immigration. We take the issue of school attendance very seriously. All local authorities are required to put in place a fair access protocol for their schools, which requires all schools to comply. Indications from local authorities are that fair access protocols are working well, indeed, better than in previous years, and we will continue to monitor their impact. I hope that the noble Baroness will be pleased to hear that overall absence rates are at their lowest since termly absence data were first collected in 2006.
Baroness Sharples (Con)
Does my noble friend accept that every school faces a problem because a year ago 6% of children had English as their second language when they went to school? That has now increased to 16%.
Lord Nash
It is true that some schools struggle with this. It is also true that a great many students who are technically classed as “English as additional language” are very high-achieving. However, it is a fact that we have a high number of pupils in this country who would be described as EAL, and it is our duty as a Government to ensure that all pupils are properly educated.
The Earl of Listowel (CB)
My Lords, will the Minister confirm that children in local authority care continue to have first priority in admissions? Does he not agree that children in the care of the state should at least be offered the very best educational opportunities by the state?
The Lord Bishop of Peterborough
Will the Minister join me in congratulating the four latest Church of England free schools to be announced, which between them offer nearly 2,500 places to young people of all faiths and none, especially in areas of severe shortage?
Baroness King of Bow (Lab)
Further to the last point, is the Minister aware that more state school places in England are allocated by religious selection than by ability, gender and private schools combined? Is he surprised, as I was, by this finding? Does he have any message for Simon Barrow, co-director of the Christian think tank Ekklesia, who says that he does not believe that children’s access to education should be so determined by their faith background, as this runs contrary to his Christian beliefs?
Lord Nash
As I said, faith schools and church schools are an essential part of our school system. They account for a third of our schools and perform generally very well. However, faith schools may give priority to children from faith, but many do not do so. All free schools and new-provision academies may prioritise only a maximum of 50%. We are keen to build a diverse system that offers parents choice but we believe that all schools should educate their children in the basic tenets of all main faiths practised in this country.
Lord Storey (LD)
My noble friend will be aware that many families, particularly those who can afford it, move house or rent a house so that they can get the school of their first choice. He will also be aware that the top 100 best-performing schools do not take disadvantaged pupils as measured by the pupil premium. How can we ensure that children and young people from disadvantaged backgrounds get the same opportunities as those more advantaged pupils? Do we need to provide more information and education to those families so that they can have those choices as well?
Lord Nash
The Government are intent on improving the schools system so that all pupils have the opportunity of a good place. It is clear that some parents are able to buy houses near better schools. We are not in favour of that at all. We believe we should make all schools of a much higher standard so that that kind of thing does not happen.
Baroness Perry of Southwark (Con)
My Lords, have the Government made any assessment of how many parents are managing to get their children places in the schools of their choice?
Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton (Lab)
My Lords, would the Minister care to comment on his repeated use of the term “better schools” and his comparing of schools—for example, his remark this afternoon about church schools by and large being better? My experience of church schools is that they want to be as good; they do not see education as a competition. But surely if schools are assessed by parents on the basis of Ofsted reports, among other things, those reports ought to be conducted on equal terms for all schools, with no warnings being given favourably to some.
Lord Nash
The noble Baroness and I probably disagree in principle on the concept of competition, but we are aiming for all schools to be as good as possible. Ofsted now gives minimum notice to all schools. It is quite clear that Ofsted conducted a thorough investigation relating to recently reported events. Its findings were very clear and it made a statement on that last night.
Schools: Careers Advice
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 5 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Prosser
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they have any plans to change the current system of careers advice for young people in schools.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
My Lords, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Education has made it clear that she wants to see improvements in the quality of careers advice and guidance available to young people, with many more schools and employers working together to provide excellent support. That is a clear priority for her. We have made a number of changes in this area, including issuing revised statutory guidance to schools; we are keeping the impact of those changes under review, and are considering what else we can do to improve the links between schools and the world of work.
Baroness Prosser (Lab)
I thank the Minister for that quite helpful reply. However, I am sure that he is aware that in providing careers advice, schools face an inherent conflict. The funding regime for senior schools depends in part upon numbers of pupils being retained in the sixth form to study GCSEs and A-level subjects, and of course the position of schools in the league tables is a hugely important pressure on them. Together, those two things deter many schools from advising pupils of the opportunities maybe to study BTEC subjects, applying for apprenticeships, or moving on to further education colleges. Can the Minister therefore tell the House what the Government intend to do about that conflict?
Lord Nash
The noble Baroness is right—there is an inherent conflict in this. Schools have a clear responsibility to ensure that their pupils achieve and progress to positive destinations, whether that is university or another, high-calibre, vocational route. Our revised guidance clearly states that schools should act impartially and recognise that some students would be better suited to educational training beyond schools, and it makes it clear that schools should give other providers the opportunity to inform pupils about the offer. We believe that our new destination measures will also help considerably in that area.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, may I once again urge my noble friend to contact all secondary schools and encourage them to appoint a careers advisory panel drawn from local businessmen and professionals who really know about jobs and careers?
Lord Quirk (CB)
With the school leaving age now raised to 18, is it not the case that all 16 to 19 year-old students are engaged in special 16 to 19 study programmes which are formally and specifically geared to career aspirations? How, then, can it be that Ofsted last week published a report complaining that there was very poor use of the extra time for 16 to 19 year-olds and, specifically, that careers guidance is poor “at all levels”?
Lord Winston (Lab)
My Lords, I declare an interest as the founder and champion of the Reach Out Lab at Imperial College, London. Each year we connect with around 7,000 schoolchildren from the state sector drawn from all over London, plus another 30,000 through collaboration with the Mayor of London. It is very clear, as the Minister accepts, that there is grossly inadequate careers advice. Does he not also accept that it would be much more sensible if universities were better integrated with schools, and is it not about time that we consider that all education should be under one government department?
Lord Nash
I am aware of the excellent programme to which the noble Lord refers. I am sure he is delighted with the increase in STEM subjects which has taken place under this Government. Schools should have a thoroughly close relationship with their local business professional communities and universities and, as far as his last point is concerned, it is one that I am sure all future Governments will consider carefully.
Baroness Humphreys (LD)
My Lords, a UNISON survey in June this year showed that 83% of schools surveyed were no longer employing a careers adviser. Have the Government made an assessment of this situation?
Lord Nash
Yes. We believe that one-to-one careers advice is appropriate in certain circumstances but obviously all schools seek to identify their students’ passions and interests at an early age and develop them. The evidence is quite clear from a number of reports, including those from McKinsey and Education and Employers Taskforce, that the best careers advice for young people comes through activities and contact with the world of work. For many of our young people, particularly those from workless households, careers advice these days is as much about inspiration as actual advice on detailed careers.
Baroness Uddin (Non-Afl)
My Lords, the Minister will be aware of the importance of face-to-face careers advice for pupils, but particularly for those with learning disabilities, special educational needs and conditions such as autism, only a small number of whom are actually able to access jobs. Can the Minister assure the House that all those disabled people requiring or requesting careers advice will receive it from fully trained careers advisers who are well trained on disability rights and matters?
Baroness Wall of New Barnet (Lab)
My Lords, having accepted the proposal and explanation by my noble friend Lady Prosser about the challenges faced by secondary schools, further education institutions and universities, how are the Government going to achieve their goal of having more apprenticeships—a major problem for employers—when most young people going into apprenticeships find out from family rather than from any other available careers advice?
Lord Nash
My Lords, we have an active programme to encourage people to consider apprenticeships. We have a range of marketing materials available from the National Apprenticeship Service, and Not Going to Uni is also an extremely good source of information. The National Apprenticeship Service funds the Education and Employers Taskforce, and more than 70 advisers from the National Careers Service, the National Apprenticeship Service and jobcentres are actively embarked on this at the schools show.
Social Justice Strategy
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 5 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
I think the noble Lord knows that all Ministers speak on behalf of the Government, of which the party opposite is constantly reminding us. This is, in fact, a cross-department matter. As the noble Lord has heard today, many of the points made—I would perhaps say the majority—relate to education matters, which are at the core of our social justice policy. My noble friend Lord Freud has apologised, and there has been no work on any of the background to the question that he was asked about the Department for Work and Pensions.
Lord McAvoy
I am grateful for those partial answers. I thought that I had finished speaking, but I am more than happy to take another couple of minutes. I am grateful for the limited response so far, but that does not explain why the noble Lord, Lord Freud, is not here. I ask again for a full and concise—if that is possible—explanation as to why he is not here.
Lord Nash
I am sorry; I did not appreciate that I was up and that the noble Lord had in fact finished. I think that I have answered the question concisely.
I start by thanking my noble friend Lady Tyler for so eloquently opening the debate on this very important strategy and our underlying ethos. Social justice is at the heart of this Government’s work. We have a two-pronged approach: education and welfare reform. These are the only ways that we can break—
Lord Nash
I think that I must continue. These are the only ways in which we can break that dreadful cycle of generational unemployment and/or family breakdown to which many noble Lords have referred. That is why this Government have the biggest programme of educational reform for 70 years in train, and substantial welfare reforms under way.
Over the course of this Parliament my department has brought in a substantial number of reforms to support better educational outcomes for all children, but particularly for the most disadvantaged. We have introduced the pupil premium to ensure that the most disadvantaged children realise their potential. Funding for this will reach £2.5 billion in the coming year: £1,300 for primary pupils, £935 for secondary, and £1,900 for looked-after children. More children from deprived backgrounds than ever before will benefit from free childcare at the same time as we strengthen the quality of early years education. From this September, every pupil in reception, year 1 and year 2 will receive free school meals, which will make a huge difference to ensuring that every child, regardless of family circumstances, is ready to learn.
Noble Lords will know how passionate I am about the academy and free schools programme. We have created more than 1,000 new sponsored academies, turning around schools that had previously been failing for years and which often serve the most deprived communities. We have approved 363 new free schools, including 39 alternative provision schools, 22 special schools, 56 university technical colleges and 46 studio schools. When open, those will provide 250,000 new places in total, the vast majority of which are in places of need. Some 25% of open free schools have been judged outstanding, making them our top performing group of non-selective schools.
We are also reforming the curriculum and exams, both academic and vocational. Increasingly schools are doing more EBacc subjects, giving pupils, particularly those from deprived backgrounds, the essential cultural capital they need, given that they do not get it at home. We have dramatically overhauled vocational qualifications and substantially expanded and improved apprenticeships. We are reforming teacher training with far more of it conducted in school. We have introduced bursaryships into teacher recruitment, and have introduced phonics into primary schools. We are also investing in the school estate and are arresting the sharp decline in our relative educational performance that took place in the first decade of this century.
I congratulate the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Ely on his excellent maiden speech and thank him for all the work he does in support of social justice, but particularly in the field of education, with academies and in general, and I wish him well in his new position as chair of the National Society. The church’s contribution to education in this country is long-standing, very substantial and highly impactful, as it is of course in its work on poverty in general.
So far as welfare is concerned, at the beginning of this Parliament it was clear that a new approach to supporting the most disadvantaged individuals in society was needed. Too many people spent their lives moving between different support mechanisms, never receiving the support to make a long-standing difference to their life. Too many people were faced with multiple barriers to improving; for example, poor education and lack of skills, drug or alcohol addiction, a criminal record, lack of stable family support, no stable home, problem debt and health problems. Those problems do not exist independently of each other. They can interact, and together create a vicious cycle which is hard to break out of. The piecemeal approach of the past did not effectively tackle the multiple problems people face, so this Government wanted to look for new ways to tackle these issues. We wanted to deliver real and sustained change.
First, we recognised that this was not something that could be solved by central government alone—the old top-down approach had not worked. We needed to involve local authorities, the voluntary sector and business; in other words, we needed a community-based approach. We needed to ensure that we got value for money—we knew that large sums had been wasted in this area in the past. We had to build an evidence base of which interventions work, solutions had to be on a payment-by-results basis, and we had to measure the progress we made against key indicators.
Most importantly, our reforms needed to achieve a long-lasting recovery rather than management of entrenched problems. That meant looking for and treating the cause of the problems rather than the symptoms. It also means intervening early in people’s lives to prevent problems in the first place. For example, we can work with a drug user to help them tackle their addiction. However, to turn their life around we need to ensure that they have stable housing and the skills to find employment, and we need to tackle other underlying health problems. Without that rounded support it is unlikely that an individual will be able to make a long-standing change to their life. We are delivering the strategy through growing the social investment market, using payment-by-results models and collaborating with local authorities, the voluntary sector and employers. These are not easy problems to tackle and there is no quick fix; making our vision a reality will take time. However, we have made great progress towards our goals. Our first progress report was published in April 2013. This autumn we will publish the second social justice progress report, giving details of how we are implementing the strategy and our achievements so far. This November also sees our third annual social justice conference. This brings together delegates from government, the private sector, the voluntary sector and most importantly the people whose lives we are transforming to work together to deliver social justice.
I will give a few examples of the progress we have made across the social justice strategy. The family environment is the foundation of a child’s life and we are committed to supporting safe and loving family relationships. Relationship support policy is being brought under one department, with DWP investing £30 million to successfully deliver marriage preparation, couple counselling and relationship education. However, when relationships break down, we are trying to minimise the negative impacts on children by promoting more collaboration. The child maintenance system has been reformed to encourage separated couples to agree their own arrangements and reduce disputes.
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope
In relation to child maintenance, has the Minister seen that the first results of the applications that have come in since charging began earlier this year indicate a drop of 38% in parents pursuing formal applications? The Government thought that it would be 12%. Is that not something of deep concern as it will exacerbate child poverty?
Lord Nash
My noble friend makes a particular point on a particular statistic. I shall take it away and write to him.
With the new Children and Families Act we are introducing a requirement to consider mediation before taking action through the courts. There is also better access to information for couples through the Sorting out Separation online service. Care leavers are at an increased risk of falling into a cycle of disadvantage, given the lack of support as they move into adulthood. JCP can now identify care leavers in the benefit system and offer more tailored support through earlier referral to the Work Programme. Following the launch of the first ever cross-government care leaver strategy in 2013, a further One Year On report will be published on 29 October and will set out how each department has met its milestones and what more will be done to continue the push for better services for care leavers. As part of care leavers week later this month, Ministers and care leavers will be undertaking exchange visits. These types of activities help to bring the voice of the people closer to policy-making. That is so important, as my noble friend Lady Tyler has said.
Earlier this year, it was my privilege to lead the Children and Families Bill, now an Act, through this House, a key plank of which was the new “staying put” duty on local authorities. It will mean that young people in foster placements can continue to live with their former foster carers beyond the age of 18, when that is what they both want to do, providing them with the opportunity to experience the stability and security of family life enjoyed by their peers.
Social justice is underpinned by work. This is the best route out of poverty. Work increases self-esteem; introduces routine into what can be chaotic lives; the individual becomes a valued member of society rather than sitting on the fringe, and they are a role model for their children. Work can replace the vicious cycle of disadvantage with a virtuous one. DWP’s innovation fund is working with 14,200 young people who are already or are at risk of becoming NEETs to improve their lifetime employment prospects. Each month’s labour market statistics bring new records. Employment is at a record high, with 30.8 million people in work. Unemployment fell by more than 500,000 on the year, the largest annual fall on record. The unemployment rate is at its lowest since 2008. Long-term unemployment, for those out of work for more than 12 months, is down 194,000 on the year, and 77,000 since 2010. The number of workless households is down over 400,000 since 2010 and that rate is now the lowest on record. In the past, the welfare system has been a barrier to people moving into work. Universal credit will restore the incentive to make the step into work, and to progress once there. It will remove the gap between out-of-work and in-work support. The Work Programme is providing specialist support for those furthest away from the labour market. So far, it has helped 330,000 people into sustained employment.
The Government are also providing support to make a sustained change to the lives of the most disadvantaged adults. Transforming Rehabilitation is changing the way the Government are working with offenders. Every offender released from custody will receive supervision and rehabilitation in the community. We are working in prisons to improve the prospects for offenders when they leave prison. Prisoners receive training aligned with employers’ needs, and advice from National Careers Service advisers. My noble friend Lady Tyler raised the question of a breathing space for those in debt. We support the principle of ensuring that people who fall into difficulties are given time to get back on their feet. The FCA has stringent rules about forbearance and how people in financial difficulties are treated. We have taken firm action to tackle those lenders who are exploiting those in difficulty. In April this year, the FCA took over responsibility for regulating all consumer credit firms, including payday lenders. It has demonstrated that it will take tough action, with Wonga recently being made to write off more than £200 million worth of unaffordable debts.
To deliver long-lasting outcomes for disadvantaged people, we need to engage locally with the people best placed to deliver real change. This is why we introduced social impact bonds, with the UK being a world leader in this area. In 2010, there was just one social impact bond, now there are 17. My noble friend Lord Kirkwood talked about social investment, which has grown over recent years. The social investment market was worth £200 million in 2012. Big Society Capital was also launched in 2012 with £600 million of funding to be both an investor in and a champion of the social investment market. We also established the Centre for Social Impact Bonds within the Cabinet Office in 2012 to encourage innovation in public service delivery, grow the social investment market and build an evidence base of what works.
Government will continue to work with localities to identify gaps in the national welfare system and reduce or remove duplication or fragmentation. Government will work with local enterprise partnerships to support their plans to strengthen their local economy by developing a response to the question of how integrating local services across geographical areas can provide value for money and improve outcomes for claimant groups.
Good evidence and data are essential to tackling social problems. The Centre of Excellence for Information Sharing, an innovative collaboration between central and local government, has been set up to break down the practical barriers to information sharing and is working across a number of areas, including troubled families, welfare reform and justice, to achieve practical, on-the-ground solutions to break down information sharing barriers.
My noble friend Lady Tyler has raised some very important points today about listening to the voices of people with multiple needs and making local areas accountable for delivering effective, joined-up services. She also suggests building on the troubled families model with a troubled individuals programme and working with the voluntary sector. We will consider these points carefully. I will take this opportunity to say a little about the Troubled Families programme, which is an example of where the partnership between central and local government is helping to turn around the lives of 120,000 families with severe problems and multiple needs, thereby reducing the cost to the taxpayer. Working with local authorities, we are now helping 110,000 of the most troubled families in England. Of these, nearly 53,000 have had their lives turned around thanks to the intensive and practical approach. In August, we announced an expansion of the programme to an additional 400,000 families. The Department for Work and Pensions will double the number of specialist employment advisers—
Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)
Will the Minister kindly give us the definition of a troubled family whose life has been turned around? I think that he mentioned a figure of 53,000. What exactly is the proof that 53,000 families’ lives have been turned around?
Lord Nash
If I cannot provide the noble Lord with an answer before I finish speaking, I will write to him.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Truro mentioned that we have more than 100,000 young carers. I know all too well from my work in schools that too often we struggle to get pupils on residentials because of their duties caring both for adults and siblings. Sadly, home life has collapsed in recent decades for many children. We need to educate these children, supported by welfare reforms, out of this dreadful cycle. I agree with the right reverend Prelate’s good points about the glue of justice.
The noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, developed the right reverend Prelate’s thoughts in relation to disadvantaged families and breaking the cycle. I agree entirely. Character development and bringing up our pupils in schools to be part of a happy family is a subject dear to my heart and to that of the Secretary of State for Education. We are encouraging and setting expectations for all schools that soft skills, character development, grit and resilience are essential parts of school life. It is increasingly prevalent in the academies movement. The noble Lord mentioned boarding, and we are keen to ensure that more local authorities see this as a real option.
My noble friend Lady Tyler asked about the impact of welfare reform in relation to the Cabinet committee. It considers many different government policies, including welfare reform, disadvantaged people and how to join up policy to support those with multiple disadvantage.
The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, talked about regular SLCN assessment. We discussed this as some length during the passage of the Children and Families Bill. I can assure the noble Lord that the Government share his aim of identifying SLC needs as early as possible. We believe that our reforms are designed to do that. We are, of course, reforming assessment in primary schools in particular, and ensuring that all schools have proper baseline tests to benefit all pupils. Our phonics reforms are having a substantial impact on pupils’ word-reading skills.
I agree entirely with the noble Lord that many people in youth custody lack basic skills and present with insufficient outcomes. I know that he has concerns about this model but we hope that with our EHC plans the principal of the secure college with an SEN-qualified co-ordinator will help the matter. He talked about gang advisers and the good work of the St Giles Trust on recreating a good family. I entirely agree with him. I will pass his points about the criminal justice system on to that department, as well as his points about cross-departmental work. I am sure that he will be pleased to hear that this Government have narrowed the gap in attainment for children who have free school meals.
The noble Baroness, Lady Uddin, referred to the outlook for the disabled. We have seen 116,000 more disabled people in work in the past year alone. We are spending £50 billion a year on disability benefits and services—more than the previous Government. Our SEN reforms, I hope, will substantially improve the outlook for all children with SEN, from whatever background, including those with autism.
To close, I thank my noble friend Lady Tyler for bringing this debate to the House. I congratulate again the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Ely on his excellent and eloquent maiden speech. Social justice is about transforming the lives of the most disadvantaged people in society and is at the core of this Government’s reform. It is about intervening early to prevent problems becoming entrenched in the first place. We are working with local government and the voluntary and private sectors to provide the rounded support that individuals need to turn their lives around. Many interesting points have been raised and I thank all noble Lords and noble friends for their contributions to the debate.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Before the noble Lord sits down, will he please respond to point that my noble friend Lord McAvoy made? Where is the noble Lord, Lord Freud? Why is he not here today? My Question this morning was answered by the noble Lord, Lord Newby. There must be a reason why the noble Lord, Lord Freud, is not here. Please answer the question. I refer the noble Lord, Lord Nash, who refused my intervention earlier, to paragraph 4.31 of the Companion.
Schools: Class Sizes
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 5 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
My Lords, we are making every effort and are investing heavily to address the unprecedented increase in pupil numbers. The average class size remains below the statutory limit, despite a massive population increase. We are investing £5 billion of capital funding, which has already enabled local authorities to create 260,000 additional pupil places between May 2010 and May 2013. This includes 212,000 primary places. There are 300,000 more places in the pipeline for September 2015.
Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply which, although welcome, strikes me as just a tiny bit complacent when we see that the figures for primary school children being taught in classes of more than 30 have gone up more than 200% between 2010 and 2014. Does he agree that most educationalists and teachers consider that, generally speaking, children do better in small classes? Indeed, that is what people who can afford to pay for their education are generally looking for. Will he say what he and the Government regard as the optimum primary school class size and on what evidence he bases his view?
Lord Nash
I would be interested in the noble Baroness’s definition of complacency because, despite the massive population increase, the previous Government cut the number of primary school places by 200,000 and the money by 26%. We have more than doubled the amount of money invested in class sizes. The relevant figures are that the class size in key stage 1 is 27.4 this year as opposed to 27.3 last year, a tiny increase. The pupil-teacher ratio is 21 in primary schools. Of course we would all like smaller class sizes, although the OECD and the EEF toolkit tell us that a reduction in class size gives a very poor return on investment and that increasing teacher quality and training is much better. It is true that some private schools have very low class sizes, but generally they are not as low as people think.
Lord Storey (LD)
My Lords, my noble friend the Minister will be aware that the UK has bigger class sizes than most of its overseas competitors. He is also right to point out that the £5 billion being spent to reduce class sizes is more than the previous Government were able to provide. However, those resources take a long time to work through. Does he think that where class sizes exceed the so-called legal limit schools should be allowed to put extra resources in, or perhaps be given extra resources in terms of an extra teacher or a classroom assistant, or perhaps be able use the pupil premium in such cases?
Lord Nash
In fact, the OECD tells us that our secondary class sizes are quite a bit below the average international size although our primaries are somewhat higher. However, we have no evidence for the high numbers in class sizes that some people refer to—I saw 70 in the paper the other day which is clearly misreporting. The statistics I have given give us great comfort that we have the right amount of investment in the sector.
Lord Lexden (Con)
How does this Government’s record in building new schools compare with that of their predecessor?
Baroness Massey of Darwen (Lab)
Does the Minister agree that an absolute priority, as my noble friend said, should be reducing class sizes where possible and not spending money on new free schools set up in areas where excess places exist already?
Lord Nash
I cannot agree that an absolute priority should be reducing class sizes because I have already said that all the evidence is that that was a very poor return on investment. In fact, Andreas Schleicher tells us that there is no relation between class sizes and performance. I entirely agree that we should not be putting up schools in areas where there is no need and I can assure the noble Baroness that since I became a Minister, just over two years ago, virtually all the free schools we have approved have been in places of need.
Lord Tebbit (Con)
My Lords, can my noble friend tell me why it is that when I was at primary school a teacher could teach a class of 48 or 50 pupils to read adequately and in fact rather better than is done in classes of 30 these days? What has changed—the teachers or the children?
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)
My Lords, does the noble Lord not accept that all the evidence shows that smaller class sizes make a difference for younger children—for infants in particular—and actually that is one of the key markers of going on to have educational achievement. Does the noble Lord not recognise that the Government have now been missing their target for recruiting new teacher trainers for the last three sessions and that we are heading for the perfect storm where we do not have enough teachers and classes are getting bigger? That is inevitably going to damage children’s education.
Lord Nash
I am not rushing to take lessons from the party opposite on pupil place planning. The ONS data which came out at the beginning of the last decade made it clear that there was a pupil place crisis looming and it was not until 2008 that the previous Government even managed to produce predictions for the size of the school population. As I say, they actually cut the number of primary school places by 200,000 and slashed the funding by 26%. We are the first Government for a long time actually to increase the amount of money available and we have also invested in new free schools in places where they are needed.
Music Education for Children with Physical Disabilities
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 7 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
I thank all noble Lords for participating in this debate and in particular I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, for securing it. When this debate first came on the agenda, I was concerned, not so much because of its timing, but because I do not know a great deal about the subject matter. However, I have greatly enjoyed reading myself into this debate and listening to the eloquent speeches, which I found extremely interesting. I have been frankly humbled to learn about how much is going on in this area and how powerful music education can be, particularly for children with physical disabilities.
The Government have the same ambition for children with disabilities as they have for all children. We want pupils to achieve well at school, lead happy and fulfilled lives and have choice and control. I have no doubt that music is a key way of achieving this, particularly for pupils with disabilities and SEN. Several noble Lords attested to that today. I remember vividly that when I was doing research into the academies programme I visited a KIPP charter school in a particularly deprived area of New York City where every child is in an orchestra which travels across the United States to perform. It is renowned for its success.
Music has been confirmed as a statutory subject for children between the ages of five and 14 in the new national curriculum, which comes into force in all maintained schools from September. The revised programmes of study for music have an increased focus on the need for activities to be undertaken musically, with reference to all children learning to play a musical instrument. The new, slimmed-down curriculum provides greater freedoms for teachers to use their creativity and professional judgment in how they teach to meet the needs of the pupils in their class. At key stage 4, the arts are one of four entitlement areas within the national curriculum. Maintained schools must provide all pupils with access to at least one course in the arts entitlement area, which includes music, art and design, dance, drama and media arts.
The Equality Act places a duty on all schools to support disabled children and young people. It includes making reasonable adjustments to prevent them suffering discrimination and supplying additional aids and services. Schools must have also accessibility plans which set out how they will improve access to the curriculum, improve the school’s buildings and environment to enable disabled pupils to take better advantage of the school and improve the availability of accessible information. This includes academies and free schools. Additionally, to make sure that all teachers know how to adapt teaching to respond to their pupils’ needs, part 5 of the teachers’ standards requires teachers to,
“have a secure understanding of how a range of factors can inhibit pupils’ ability to learn, and how best to overcome these”.
To support and encourage all children to experience excellent music education, the Government have set up 123 new music education hubs. Since August 2012, these hubs have been working to drive up the quality and consistency of music education across the country, with an emphasis on forging new partnerships. Hubs are required to develop four core roles, which include ensuring that every child aged five to 18 has the opportunity to learn a musical instrument through whole-class ensemble teaching and providing opportunities for them to play in ensembles and perform from an early stage. They are also expected to ensure that clear progression routes are available and affordable to all young people, and to develop a singing strategy so that every pupil can sing regularly in a choir or other vocal ensembles in their area. In addition, hubs may provide other services, such as professional development for teachers.
In answer to the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, about participation, I am pleased to say that 5% of pupils who participated in instrumental ensembles or choirs in 2012-13 had a statement of special educational needs, compared to 2.8% nationally.
There are some excellent examples of hubs working with children who have disabilities. Telford music education hub offers a bespoke version of its whole-class ensemble tuition programme for special schools. Camden hub integrates pupils from local special schools into the Camden music festival and Surrey music hub, with partner Rhythmix, has run a sound and motion lab looking at how digital technologies can aid music-making for children with movement impairment at the Orpheus residential centre for children with disabilities. In Telford, the hub’s Kreative Kidz programme offers specialist out-of-school arts and music sessions for young people with severe physical needs, under the short breaks duty introduced to local authorities in April 2011. The Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent hub’s strategic partner, Make Some Noise, runs training and mentoring programmes for musicians and teachers wishing to improve their skill set and confidence in delivering music activities for children with SEN and disabilities, through the use of assisted music technology specialists and equipment. Bradford music education hub offered training events for teachers of children with SEN and disabilities between November and March last year, covering topics such as song-writing, composition and developing choirs.
As my noble friend Lord German mentioned, schools are also demonstrating innovative practice in this area. At Great Oaks, a special needs school in Southampton, all students learn to use mobile devices to make music. In October 2013, the school held a mobile device concert for students to perform arrangements of popular music songs independently in iPad bands. Bradford music has also established a singing choir at Hanson secondary school, drawing on specialist expertise and advice from Music and the Deaf, a unique charity based in Huddersfield that helps people suffering hearing loss to enjoy music. In Ealing, a partnership on music and autism with the Orchestra of St John’s led to securing funding to develop a series of workshops and performances, led by members of the orchestra, in all the borough’s specials schools.
In response to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, I am delighted to say that the Government appreciate the benefits of the music and this type of work. I am very happy to make that statement. The Department for Education will look to publicise work of this type, whether it is led by music hubs, charities or schools, to help to give due recognition to these extremely worthwhile projects, and it will encourage other organisations to emulate this good practice in their work.
I am grateful for the comments from the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and my noble friends Lord Jenkin and Lord German about the announcement on 22 July that our music budget will increase by £18 million in 2015-16, with most of this money going to the hubs. This will bring the total that this Government are spending on music education for the period between 2012 and 2016 to more than £390 million.
Other programmes include In Harmony, which we sponsor alongside Arts Council England and others. In Harmony is transforming the lives of children through community-based orchestras for music-making in six areas of exceptional deprivation. Again, we are aware of excellent inclusion practices. For example, in a participating Nottingham school, a child with muscular dystrophy has had a half-size guitar adapted so that it can be tuned to the correct pitch, enabling her to carry out pizzicato alongside her classmates. In Newcastle, In Harmony has helped a child with a very severe speech disability to excel on bassoon. He has performed solo at Newcastle’s Literary & Philosophical Society and is now attending the Sage Gateshead centre for advanced training.
Our funding for Music for Youth is also enabling children with disabilities to attend and perform at regional and national festivals at world-class venues. Sixteen children and young people with additional needs from Beacon Hill Academy in Essex, a specialist college for sensory and physical needs, performed in a mass ensemble showcase performance at the Royal Albert Hall for the Schools Prom in 2013. This was part of an exclusive music project in Essex, delivered by Music for Youth in partnership with three music education hubs.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, for drawing our attention to the achievements of one-handed musicians and the extraordinary and pioneering work of the One-Handed Musical Instrument Trust. The Government have been clear that all pupils, whatever their individual needs, should benefit from an education in music, and through our work with the Arts Council and others we will continue to make sure that providing opportunities with SEN disabilities is essential to the work.
I enjoyed the comments of my noble friend Lord Jenkin about Douglas Fox and his wonderful work. I also thank him for highlighting the commendable work of Jessie’s Fund in helping seriously ill and disabled children through the therapeutic use of music. Through its Soundtracks programme it is running creative workshops in more than 80 schools for children with special needs. It is doing excellent work in supporting children to take part in the musical process.
I am grateful to my noble friend Lord German for his comments about the benefits of music as therapy and its ability to break down barriers. This is evident in the work of programmes funded by the department. In Cambridgeshire, there is an established music therapy programme providing clinical interventions, while Telford and Wrekin’s In Harmony programme has a specialist nurture group.
I noted comments about establishing an international paramusic competition, and I will discuss it with DCMS, as it seems like a very good idea. Technology is also crucial. I have already pointed to the innovative work with mobile devices at Great Oaks School in Southampton.
The noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, emphasised the importance of making sure that the money we have provided is well spent and reaches students with disabilities and SEN. We have been working with the Arts Council to support and challenge hubs. We have introduced a new requirement for hubs to develop school music education plans. They must clearly demonstrate how they are connecting with all the schools in their area and how they are planning to provide targeted support to schools where necessary. We have also set up a new hubs advisory group, which is providing strategic advice to the DfE on the effectiveness of hub networks. Members are drawn from organisations with an interest in the performance of hubs, including representatives from schools, music hubs, Ofsted and other music stakeholders. There is an SEN teacher on the hubs advisory group.
The Arts Council also analyses the data from hubs to ensure that children and young people with SEN and disabilities are engaged. Several hubs are currently undertaking specific research and activity with children and young people with SEN, and we will share this across the network as appropriate. The Arts Council runs a flagship Artsmark programme to enable schools and other organisations to evaluate, strengthen and celebrate their arts and cultural provision. Artsmark is nationally recognised as demonstrating excellence in arts and cultural provision, and any school, college or young justice organisation can apply. It is open to SEN schools. A specialist leaders in cultural education course has been developed by one of ACE’s bridge organisations and this is open to special schools.
The noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, asked about the national plan for music education’s monitoring board and whether this will continue. It continues to meet termly as the cultural education board, chaired by Ministers from DfE and DCMS, and Darren Henley. I will ask my officials to investigate the use of technology in music GCSEs and will write to the noble Lord on that issue.
I am very grateful to my noble friend Lady Nicholson who spoke so powerfully about the power of music for deaf children. She highlighted the excellent Mary Hare School for the deaf. I was very impressed to hear about the school and its arrangements in Romania. Schools with real expertise can make significant contributions by sharing their knowledge internationally. I would be very pleased to discuss this with my noble friend. I should be grateful if she could keep me informed and would be delighted to meet representatives from Romania when they are here.
The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, made the point that top-performing schools in music are often independent schools. Sadly, that is true. As we all know, the top-performing schools in this country absolutely, and in many areas, are disproportionately represented in the independent sector, which is why this Government are so determined to increase the performance of the state education sector.
I believe that the policies and programmes that I have described demonstrate our desire to ensure that no child is excluded from receiving a high-quality music education due to a physical or other physical disability. I am sure that noble Lords will agree that the impact of our programmes on disabled young people is evident from the examples that I have given throughout the country.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
My Lords, that concludes business in Grand Committee this afternoon. The Committee stands adjourned and I take this opportunity to wish all noble Lords and others a very pleasant recess.
Children and Young Persons Act 2008 (Relevant Care Functions) (England) Regulations 2014
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Nash
That the draft Regulations and the draft Code of Practice laid before the House on 24 June and 11 June be approved.
Relevant documents: 5th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, 6th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments (special attention drawn to the instrument), 3rd Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, 5th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. Considered in Grand Committee on 28 July.
Motions agreed.
Children and Young Persons Act 2008 (Relevant Care Functions) (England) Regulations 2014
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 7 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
My Lords, these regulations are permissive in intent. They would enable local authorities in England to delegate to third-party providers a range of social care functions, so far as those functions relate to children. This would modify the current position set out in Section 1(2) of the CYPA 2008, which already allows local authorities to delegate functions relating to looked-after children and care leavers. These regulations would enable local authorities to decide to delegate other functions, including those relating to early intervention and child protection to providers operating on a not-for-profit basis.
At present, there are few options open to local authorities that wish to consider alternative ways of managing their social care functions. Apart from the limited powers of delegation already in existence relating to looked-after children, the only circumstances in which alternative delivery plans are currently possible are those where an authority is failing and subject to intervention by the Secretary of State under Section 50 of the Children Act 2004. It cannot be logical that only where a local authority fails are such flexibilities available.
I should also make it clear that several local authorities are now waiting eagerly for the passing of these regulations; they are gearing up to innovate and are anxious to make progress with their plans. These forward-looking local authorities are ambitious to improve their services and their ways of working, and these regulations would enable them to fulfil these aspirations. I anticipate that, over time, others will begin to consider how the new freedoms might support their own improvement strategy. As noble Lords will recognise, in too many local authorities improvement is all too urgently needed. The Government are having to intervene in one in seven authorities.
During the consultation on the draft regulations, it was asserted that only the public sector should carry out functions such as child protection. I simply do not believe that this is the case—not with the potential of the voluntary and charitable sector, and the proven success of public service mutuals or the number of public sector failures so clearly before us. I am by no means saying, “Public sector bad, private sector good”. What I am saying is that there should be a willingness and an openness to look at different approaches and options. That is the possibility opened up by these regulations.
Noble Lords will be aware that the consultation elicited widespread and ardent comment. That is entirely appropriate for such an important measure. The number of responses was very high, at 1,315, and there were several petitions and an e-campaign, which resulted in some 58,000 e-mails. By far the most responses to the consultation related to the question of privatisation and profit-making, which was the sole focus of the petitions and the e-campaign. The Government have responded both swiftly and decisively to these concerns by making a significant modification to their original proposals and amending the draft regulations to rule out the possibility of profit-making. This change has been widely welcomed.
It was not the Government’s original plan to include such a restriction, nor was it our intention to see widespread delegation of children’s social care to profit-making companies. The local authorities that are currently exploring their plans in detail are not looking to set up facilities that entail profit-making, so this amendment will not hamper their plans. Of course, this policy never concerned privatisation. This is a permissive agenda, not a centralising regime.
Noble Lords will know that the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee has drawn these regulations to the special attention of the House and raised particular concerns about the consultation arrangements. First, the SLSC said that the consultation proposals were not clear. The volume and sharp focus of the responses show that they were. One might argue that the responses to the consultation were overwhelmingly about an issue that was not the focus of the Government’s plan. Nevertheless, under the original proposals profit-making would have been possible, so those commenting were making an entirely valid point. We have listened to those responses and made changes accordingly.
Secondly, the timescale for responses was deemed to be too short. It may be that a longer consultation would have been preferable, yet in the light of the number of responses and the degree of public scrutiny that the proposals received, my view is that the timescale for responses did not hamper proper scrutiny. Our desire to open up opportunities as soon as possible to local authorities that are seeking them drove the timescale and, on balance, I think that we have been able to bring forward valuable proposals in good time, while allowing significant and influential representations to be made.
On a much less prominent question than that of profit, some during and since the consultation have questioned the evidence base for this change. It is of course true that the direct evidence base for something that has to date not been possible is limited. Noble Lords may be aware that under the Children and Young Persons Act 2008 the previous Government enabled a small number of pilot social work practices to be set up. These were small, practitioner-led practices taking responsibility for specific cohorts of children on behalf of the local authority. The evaluation of the first few social work practices identified evidence of positive change for looked-after children and care leavers. It is true that the evaluation found variation across the pilot sites, but it none the less showed that the practices operated at least as well as, if not better than, the control authorities.
In addition, the Government’s wider mutuals programme has seen the benefits to services, both to the staff working in those services—through reduced absenteeism and staff turnover—and in savings and efficiencies linked to significant improvements of user outcomes. There are now 100 public service mutuals already delivering more than £1.5 billion-worth of public services in sectors such as health and youth services. Local authorities will be able to apply to the Children’s Social Care Innovation Programme for support to make use of the new freedoms that the regulations would allow, and the impact of activities funded through the programme will be robustly evaluated.
These regulations will enable a positive change in the delivery of children’s social care services. They will establish a framework in which local authorities can make their own innovative decisions on how best to manage their children’s social care functions. The experienced and well respected charity, Action for Children, said:
“The freedom to outsource children’s services will allow local authorities to innovate and improve support provided to families”.
That is exactly what we are aiming to achieve and I commend the regulations to the House.
Lord True (Con)
My Lords, I declare an interest as leader of Richmond Council which, along with the Royal Borough of Kingston, has been one of the authorities using the freedoms extended by the previous Government under the 2008 Act. We have established jointly a community interest company, a social enterprise, called Achieving for Children, to deliver these services across the two authorities. When I say “we”, I am referring to a Conservative and a Liberal Democrat authority working together and seeing the opportunity—as we saw it—to improve services. Therefore, I greatly welcome the Minister’s announcement that this is to be extended. It will certainly be welcomed by the professionals in our authorities working on behalf of young people.
It is right that the Minister put beyond doubt the fears raised about privatisation. For my own part, I do not think that the private sector or private carers are incapable of providing professional, high-quality care, but given the response to the consultation, I think my noble friend has acted wisely, as always, in that regard. I hope that that having been done, everybody from all sides will be prepared to put wind behind this and to give support to the professionals involved. This is not about privatisation; certainly it was never about privatisation in the case of my authority or Liberal Democrat Kingston. It is certainly not about moving away from a public service ethos. That is fundamental and held dear by all those who work in the community interest company. Nor is it about a move away from democratic accountability. The local authorities remain statutorily responsible. Our outstanding director of children’s services, Mr Nick Whitfield, who is the chief executive of Achieving for Children, remains statutorily responsible. As I see it, it is freeing up professionals to think differently and to innovate without the constraints that local authority procedures can sometimes cause. It provides freedoms to allow them to maximise the value of the contributions they make, to create new partnerships and fundamentally it puts the professionals who know better than anybody in the driving seat of how to achieve the best outcome for those involved. Local authorities remain ultimately accountable—indeed, the next business contains a whole range of requirements that remain on local authorities.
The regulations will allow the completion of movement of staff into the community interest company. That is an important signal and it is very practical that all staff can be managed in one way and are not having to be transferred under TUPE back from one activity to another when the range of activities ought to be part of supporting young people and part of a seamless whole. I hope that if it agrees to these regulations the Committee will put it beyond doubt that this approach is sanctioned as an appropriate way to provide children’s care.
The launch of Achieving for Children was attended by people from all political parties. I think everyone there was inspired by the professional vision and dedication of those involved and indeed by the speeches made by the young people who saw hope in what was being brought to them and hope in this future. Let us not be afraid to be creative. Let us not be afraid to experiment in improving care while retaining the basic public service needs and statutory responsibilities that continue. I hope that we will support the regulations and I thank my noble friend for bringing them forward.
Lord Nash
I am grateful for noble Lords’ contributions and to my noble friend Lord True for his points, which, given his experience, carry particular weight. I very much welcome the innovation behind Achieving for Children, whose launch I was privileged to go to. As my noble friend said, the presentations made at that launch, particularly by young people, were powerful.
The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, made a number of comments. I am grateful for his welcome for the intent behind the proposals and that he is taking some comfort from the changes made to the adoption regime by the previous Secretary of State for Education. The noble Earl made a good point about the capacity and quality of the workforce in social care. We are determined to raise the status of social work and to attract highly qualified people into it. We have a wide programme of reform of social work under way. Sir Martin Narey reported recently on improving social work training, the chief social worker is bringing strong leadership to the system and we have new training programmes in Frontline and Step Up to Social Work to attract the best to the profession.
The noble Earl mentioned the possibility of fragmentation of services. There is no intention for this to happen. Indeed, we have seen examples, such as Achieving for Children, where we may, in fact, see consolidation of services into single structures. He made a very good point on the importance of the contract. It will be for local authorities to give extremely careful thought to the structure of the contracts to make sure that they lead to quality care and that the KPIs are well thought out and not too short term. His points about engaging with young people are well made. The consultation process received comments not directly from young people but from organisations representing them, including Barnardo’s, Kids Company, Children England and many others.
I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, for her support. She is of course vastly more experienced than I am on this subject, as it was part of her brief as a Minister while it is not directly part of mine. Local authorities will retain overall accountability for provision and they will be able to gain access to random sampling under the contracts they put in place with their providers. They will also have their own complaints procedures in place, which will be there for parents to go through.
Ofsted’s common inspection framework makes provision for taking a sample of looked-after children’s cases where functions have been delegated. It considers the experience of these children as it would any others in the care system when making judgments on an authority’s effectiveness. Ofsted will speak directly to children and families. It is important to be clear that where functions are delegated, the authority remains the corporate parent and is responsible for the children in its care through its management of the contract with the provider of social services. There is a single inspection framework that looks at the effectiveness of services for children in need of help and protection, looked-after children and care leavers. In addition, there are separate inspection frameworks to ensure high standards for those providing residential placements of various kinds. The same inspection arrangements apply regardless of whether functions are delegated.
Neither we nor Ofsted believe that registration adds particular value to the system. The registration process can be only relatively light-touch and may imply a more robust validation or assurance process than is intended. There is also potential duplication of effort as many of the key checks are those that would automatically be carried out by local authorities as part of their contractual arrangements with the provider. There is no relationship between registration and Ofsted inspection. Ofsted will inspect third party provision as part of its normal inspection arrangements.
I admire the noble Baroness’s suspicion about putting the not-for-profit element beyond doubt. Someone from my background of course believes passionately that the profit motive is always, in every case, a very good discipline. However, as noble Lords can see from the consultation, we have bowed to the responses on this. There is no intention to allow for any back-door profit-making in this. In the academies programme we have in place very clear regulations to ensure that anyone in any kind of governance arrangement with an academy cannot make a profit. Of course it will be possible for a large organisation to set up a not-for-profit subsidiary, but I find it hard to believe, given the risks involved in the provision of services of this kind, that it would be worth doing that on a not-for-profit basis. We will make sure that this is not any kind of back-door arrangement to make a profit on the sly.
I hope that I have dealt with all the points made by noble Lords, but if I have missed anything I will be delighted to write to them. We do not expect an immediate flood of delegated arrangements as a result of these regulations. I have indicated that a few local authorities are waiting in the wings, and we think that others will develop their thinking over time. The regulations will allow the freedom and flexibility for new arrangements to come into place over time and have the real potential to improve services for vulnerable children. That is the framework we are putting in place, underpinned by both an unchanged system of local authority accountability and a robust Ofsted inspection framework. I hope that noble Lords will support the regulations.
Special Educational Needs and Disability Code of Practice: 0 to 25 years
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 7 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Nash
That the Grand Committee do consider the Special Educational Needs and Disability Code of Practice: 0 to 25 years.
Relevant documents: 6th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments (special attention drawn to the instrument), 3rd Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
My Lords, the draft code of practice gives guidance on Part 3 of the Children and Families Act 2014. The code has been approved by the other place and I welcome the opportunity to introduce the debate in Committee today. First, I want to acknowledge the extensive time that many noble Lords have given to discussion of the Act and the emerging code. Together we created an excellent Act, one that will transform the way in which support is provided for children and young people and their families. The code of practice will bring added impetus to achieving that aim.
Our vision for children with special educational needs and disabilities is the same as for all children and young people—that they achieve well in their early years, at school and in college, and lead happy and fulfilled lives. The new code will play a vital role in underpinning our special educational needs and disability reforms. The reforms will bring a new approach, one that places the views of children, young people and parents at the heart of the system and joins up education, health and care services for children and young people. These important principles run right through the code. For children and young people this means that their experience will be of a less confrontational and more efficient system. Their needs will be identified early with support put in place quickly, and parents will know what services they can reasonably expect. Children and young people and their parents or carers will be fully involved in decisions about their support and what they want to achieve, with an increased focus on life outcomes, including employment and greater independence.
The Department for Education and the Department of Health have worked to ensure that local authorities and local health partners work together to plan and commission services for these children and young people. The code is the result of more than a year of extensive consultation, and we took great care to listen to those who must have regard to the code to make it truly accessible. Additionally, we offered stakeholders the opportunity to comment on revisions of the code before running a final consultation in Spring 2014. I am grateful to the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments and the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee for their consideration of the draft code. Each raised one particular, and different, issue.
The Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments reported a concern in relation to local authority decisions on personal budgets. I wrote to the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes of Stretford, on the same issue following our debate on the personal budgets regulations. I can now confirm, in response to the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments’ report, that we will be amending the regulations to give greater clarity to the decision-making process, meeting the point raised by the Committee. The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee expressed concern that the code may be too long and complex to be of use to families. I should point out that parents are not the code’s key audience. The chief audience is the range of bodies with statutory duties to fulfil and which must have regard to it. The changes that we have made to the code, including ones that have added to its length, respond to specific feedback on promoting clarity from those who need to have regard to it. The code covers most of the statutory provisions of the current system as well as significant new duties. It replaces three separate sets of guidance and contains a stronger emphasis on and links to the Equality Act 2010. It was absolutely clear that interested parties did not see shortening as a priority. Having a code that gave a clear explanation of the law and guidance that would speak to the wide range of statutory audiences was what mattered.
However, supporting parents in understanding the new system is of course key. The legislation ensures access to information, advice and support. We have provided £30 million over two years to recruit and train independent supporters, and we are co-producing with parents’ organisations a separate guide to the code specifically for parents, and separate materials for young people, both for publication as the reforms come into force.
Baroness Hughes of Stretford (Lab)
My Lords, a number of the points I was going to raise have already been raised so I am going to be brief. There are just a few points I would like to rehearse. First, I welcome the code of practice. It is long and complex but I have great sympathy with the people who have tried to put it together. Its language is certainly a big improvement. It is written in plain language, even if some issues about implementation still need to be a bit clearer. The Minister said rightly that this document is mainly for practitioners and managers. It has been the practice, certainly in the Department for Education and its predecessor, to produce slimmer, accessible versions for parents and young people and I wondered whether the department would consider doing this or at least commissioning someone else to do it.
Secondly, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, that the document is still a bit unclear as to what children without an EHC plan can expect. Worryingly, I found the following sentence on page 48 in relation to the local offer:
“In setting out what they ‘expect to be available’ local authorities should include provision which they believe will actually be available”.
By implication, that might include some provision that in fact will not be available. There is a lack of clarity there about what parents who have to rely on a local offer rather than an EHC plan can expect in reality. I wish the document had been stronger in its emphasis on the local authority making sure that what is in the local offer will be available to people.
Thirdly, on accountability, as the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, said, we are still waiting for the inspection framework that Ofsted was going to review and publish. I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Nash, indicated to my noble friend Lady Wilkins that an initial report would be out in late May. We have still not seen that from Ofsted, which makes it difficult to make an assessment about the accountability framework that Ofsted is going to apply.
Fourthly, I welcome the section on nought to two year-olds, and the fact that it is there, but I wonder whether the Minister could clarify something. It is written only for service providers, saying that they must do this and must do that, and does not say anything about the role of local authorities in relation to nought to two year-olds. Would he be prepared to put on record that local authorities are accountable for nought to two year-olds in terms of identifying and ensuring provision there, in the same way that they are for other age groups?
I also wanted to ask something about further education. It has come to my attention—this may be wrong, so I want to check it out—that the person designated as a SENCO in a further education college does not have to have special educational needs qualifications. Is this the case and, if it is, would the Government consider requiring those people to have those qualifications? My second point about FE is about inclusive provision. Having gone round a number of further education colleges and talked to young people, it is quite depressing, to some extent, to see what some FE colleges are providing for children with special educational needs: lots of preparation for living courses, but no identifying and enabling of those young people who could go on a mainstream vocational course. It is an option not often available to young people with special educational needs and disabilities. FE colleges should not be able simply to provide the kind of courses that they think are suitable and shoehorn people into them but should try to include disabled young people on mainstream courses for other students, where they can be included with support.
My last point is about the need for a review of the code and how it is being implemented. The Minister said that the Government would keep the code under review. The problem with that is that, if the department keeps it under review, the rest of us will really not know much about implementation. There needs to be a specific review at a point in time, the results of which are then published for us all to see.
Lord Nash
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords for their comments and questions. I will try to address the points raised but I doubt whether I will manage to cover them all. Where I do not, I will write to noble Lords.
The noble Baroness, Lady Uddin, talked about inclusive education, particularly higher and further education. The code reflects the current position, which includes the general presumption that children with SEN should be taught in mainstream settings. That principle is extended to young people in further education through the Children and Families Act 2014. The code also highlights that schools and colleges have important duties under the Equality Act 2010 to prevent discrimination against disabled people, to promote equality of opportunity, to plan to increase access over time and to make reasonable adjustments to their policy and practice, which, since September 2012, has included providing auxiliary aid and services such as specialist computer programs et cetera. However, I note the point made by both the noble Baroness and the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, and I would be interested to discuss further at the end the point she made to ensure that these colleges are taking their duties seriously.
The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, is to be commended for reading all 270 pages. He must have done so in order to pick up the typographical error. The publication of the final code will not be determined in advance—he is right about that. However, in communicating with schools, colleges and local authorities on the implementation of the reforms, we have always made it clear that the version of the code issued for consultation on 16 April this year was sufficiently near to the final code for implementation-planning purposes. Key duties remain as they are currently for schools and early year providers. They will start to put in place from September the new approach to identifying and supporting children with SEN set out in the code and record those with SEN under SEN support in the January 2015 census. FE colleges will have a duty to use their best endeavours to ensure that young people with SEN get the help they need as they have always done, and will have regard to the approved code of practice.
We believe that the guidance provides a robust framework for supporting those without EHC plans which focuses on the impact of the support rather than how children access support according to the category they fit into. It will also challenge schools to improve the quality of teaching and learning for all pupils rather than inappropriately labelling some pupils as having SEN. The guidance makes clear that schools should involve parents in shaping the support that is provided, be more transparent about what support is available at the school, monitor the progress of all pupils and respond quickly where children are making inadequate progress. School leaders will be expected to include the quality of SEN support within their approach to school improvement, professional development and performance management arrangements.
More generally, we will keep the guidance and the code of practice under review, allowing proper time for the reforms to bed down, particularly as they are being implemented gradually from September. We made provision in the Children and Families Act for subsequent versions of the code to be approved under the negative procedure precisely to enable the code to be kept up to date more easily.
As regards the point about the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill, the Ministry of Justice has indicated that it will consult later this year on its approach to secure college rules. This will provide a further opportunity to contribute to the development of secure colleges and ensure that the needs of young people, in particular as regards their welfare and safety, are met. However, I will pass on the noble Lord’s remarks to try to ensure that when the Bill comes back later in the year he gets a better answer than the one he got last time.
The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, also talked about enforceability and accountability. For the first year we will ask local authorities and parent carer forums to complete implementation surveys on a termly basis. These will focus on whether the key elements of the new statutory framework are working. We will take action, including appropriate support and intervention, where it is clear that a local authority is struggling to implement the reforms. For the longer term, we are developing an accountability framework for monitoring delivery of the reforms. We expect this to be in place from September next year. It will include an agreed approach for challenging poorly performing local authorities and taking more formal intervention action where necessary. The noble Baroness, Lady Howe, the noble Lord, Lord Low, and other noble Lords asked about Ofsted. Ofsted is now completing its survey of how local areas are working on the reforms and will make recommendations soon about the possible role of inspection in monitoring and accountability.
The noble Baroness, Lady Howe, also asked about the disabled students’ allowance. The noble Baroness will recognise that higher education institutions must meet their duties under the Equality Act. Students can challenge their institution under internal procedures if they do not get the support they should and can ultimately go to court. Currently, they would have to use the Student Loans Company procedures and, as I say, ultimately the courts. As far as appeals are concerned, the outcomes in the EHC plan are much broader than the objectives in the statement as they cover health and social care as well as education and training. Local authorities need to be able to take an integrated approach in describing outcomes in the EHC plan which reflect how a number of services may need to work together to deliver a particular outcome. Making the education and training outcomes themselves appealable could prevent local authorities taking an integrated approach in describing outcomes, but, of course, it remains the case that the special educational provision in an EHC plan is appealable through the tribunal.
My noble friend Lord Addington talked about encouraging charities to make their own version of the code in relation to their particular issues. We know that some organisations are already doing this, an example of which is the Communications Trust. I agree that such organisations are particularly well placed to do this. We are also working with the voluntary sector and other organisations to develop guides to the code of practice, particularly for parents, schools and NHS bodies. My noble friend also talked about training. In order to gain qualified teacher status, trainee teachers must meet national standards which require them to vary their approach to meet the different needs of children, including those with SEN. In 2012, some 76% of newly qualified primary school teachers and 89% of secondary NQTs rated their SEN training as “very good”. It is up to schools to decide what professional development their staff require, and it is true that the code sets out a range of sources of training materials.
For their part, the Government have supported improvements through the teaching schools programme, through their funding for the National Association for Special Educational Needs and its SEN and disability gateway, an online portal that provides access to a range of training resources, including on dyslexia, autism, speech, language and communication needs. We have also funded the training of more than 10,000 new SENCOs and are supporting Achievement for All 3As to provide leadership to help 1,200 schools in developing their provision for children with SEN. The code of practice makes it clear that school leaders should ensure that staff receive appropriate professional development, and the national training of new SENCOs includes an understanding of the main types of SEN, including dyslexia, speech, language and communication needs and autism.
The noble Lord, Lord Low, referred to special services for deaf children. The code recognises that it is up to the local authority to decide, with local children, young people and parents, what services to commission and to include in their local offer. That will include services for deaf children and those with other types of SEN. He asked whether the system will be ready in time for September. We have always been clear that the reforms will be implemented from this coming September. The key elements of the reforms were set out in a Green Paper in 2011. We have regularly been asking all local authorities in England how well they have been preparing, and local authorities are ready to go. Over 90% have reported that they are ready and the department is working closely with the others. Implementation will be gradual, and we have put in place a range of support, including the £70 million SEN reform grant in 2014-15 to help with plans for the reforms, along with £45 million in 2014-15 and £32 million in 2015-16 for the recruitment and training of independent supporters. We also have the regional SEN champions, drawn from the local pathfinders who have been testing the reforms in practice and from a range of delivery partners with specialist expertise in key areas such as person-centred planning.
I am extremely grateful to my noble friend Lord Storey for his supportive remarks. The noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, mentioned the guidance on mental capacity. We think that the guidance in the code on mental capacity is about right. It sets out how cases where young people and parents lack the mental capacity to take certain decisions under the Children and Families Act should be dealt with. We have provided a link to further advice on the Mental Capacity Act and have listed all the sections under Part 3 of the Children and Families Act in the regulations where mental capacity considerations come into play. However, I have listened to the points made by the noble Baroness and I will reflect on them. We will be able to consider this issue in a further review of the code.
Lord Ramsbotham
Could the Ofsted accountability framework be made available to the House as soon as it is published, so that we can see it?
Lord Low of Dalston
May I, too, ask a question of the Minister? May I take him back to the question of disabled students in higher education and their ability to challenge the provision that is being made? I think that the Minister said that they would need to go to court. I assume that that would be by way of judicial review; and, of course, that is going to be much more difficult now that the scope of judicial review is being so much curtailed and the availability of legal aid for judicial review is so much reduced. That is going to significantly undermine the ability of disabled students to use the courts to resolve these problems. I wonder therefore if the Minister would be willing to give further consideration to a more substantial right of redress for disabled students in higher education.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (The Countess of Mar) (CB)
My Lords, it might be helpful if I tell noble Lords that there is no need for them to say “Before the noble Lord sits down” in Grand Committee. The only time that one uses it is at Report stage.
Schools: Local Oversight
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to increase local oversight of schools.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
My Lords, arrangements for the management of academies and free schools will be enhanced by the collective expertise and wisdom of eight regional schools commissioners supported by their head teacher boards. Two RSCs are already in situ, and the other six start in September. We have also strengthened the guidance for local authorities on intervening in maintained schools, and inspections are undertaken using a risk-based approach, with more frequent inspections for those schools not performing well.
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)
I thank the Minister for that reply. Last week, when dealing with the Trojan horse Statement, he conceded that the department has to take its fair share of the blame for the failings that occurred in Birmingham. However, does he realise that, at the heart of the situation, people have lost confidence in the Secretary of State’s ability to manage thousands of schools from the centre? Does he not see that the proposed regional commissioners for academies who he has just mentioned just add a further level of confusion, as they will not apply to all state schools? Surely what is needed here is a strong system of local oversight for all schools, such as our proposed directors of school standards, that would give parents, teachers and governors real confidence that their voices will be heard and that poor standards will be addressed.
Lord Nash
I do not recognise the picture that the noble Baroness paints. We believe that this system is efficient; in devising it we were advised by people who have set up national and international organisations. We find that the position of the party opposite is confusing. On the one hand its leader tells us that nobody wishes to revert to the local authority system, while on the other its policy adviser, Mr Blunkett, says that he wants to have between 80 and 150 directors of school standards, all supported by their own bureaucracies, and many of whom will be recycled local authority people. We do not think that that is the way forward. There is no role for RSCs on maintained schools; that is a role for local authorities, and, as I say, we have clarified their role.
Baroness Williams of Crosby (LD)
My Lords, my noble friend will recognise, I think, that a substantial number of academies very much regret the lack of clear local accountability. Can he therefore tell us whether the new Secretary of State will consider a method under which local accountability can be more clearly established so that problems such as those arising from the Trojan horse story in Birmingham will be obviated at local level and not have to turn into a national horror of one kind or another?
Lord Nash
Our solution to ensuring better local accountability is to have a system of regional schools commissioners which is run by head teachers. Personally, I trust head teachers to be better wired into their local systems than bureaucracies and bureaucrats are, any time. We are also increasingly seeing the emergence of regional multi-academy trusts, which are proving particularly effective.
Baroness Bakewell (Lab)
My Lords, after the Trojan horse allegations, it has been reported that teachers who spoke out at the time are now suffering harassment and the threat of losing their jobs. What do the Government propose as a way of protecting whistleblowers locally so that they are given enough courage to come forward and speak out?
Lord Nash
The noble Baroness raises a very good point. We are doing all that we can to ensure that that does not happen. Indeed, there are some teachers we are particularly concerned about who had themselves been causing harassment and who have now been suspended from their jobs. We are talking to Ofsted about expanding its whistleblowing arrangements to cover exactly this kind of situation.
Baroness Howe of Idlicote (CB)
My Lords, will the Government ensure that mandatory training is introduced to reduce the risks associated with school governance? I declare an interest as president of the National Governors’ Association.
Lord Nash
We have not yet gone as far as mandatory training. We have a high expectation that all governors will be trained where necessary and that they should be chosen for their skills. We brought in this big focus on skills rather than representation: governors may come from all walks of life, but they must have the expectation that they will be trained. We have also brought in tightening regulations so that where governing bodies feel that one of their governors needs training and they refuse to take that training, they can be suspended.
Baroness Perry of Southwark (Con)
Can my noble friend confirm for me and for the House that the overwhelming success of the vast majority of free schools and academies is the best evidence that allowing autonomy and freedom to schools and heads is the best way of raising standards?
Lord Nash
I am grateful to my noble friend for her comments. The overwhelming success of the programme is unarguable. Some 24% of free schools are rated outstanding, which makes them by far our highest performing group of schools; converter academies are far more likely to retain or increase their Ofsted rating at the next inspection; and sponsored academies are increasing their performance at a rate approximately twice that of other schools.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford (LD)
Can the Minister please tell the House what are the responsibilities of the members of the local governing board when the academy chain has trustees who appoint the head?
Lord Grocott (Lab)
Whatever the arguments—and they are substantial—between the two sides of the House on the merits of the Government’s policy of allowing so great a range of different administrations for secondary schools, what is unarguable, as I am sure the Minister will agree, is that the Government’s programme has resulted in a huge increase in the Secretary of State’s personal responsibility—whoever he or she might be—for the ultimate management of so many secondary schools. Given that no individual could possibly do this on their own, can he tell us what structures are in place within the Department for Education, how many people are employed within those structures, and how much it costs? We might then get some sort of measure of how this awesome responsibility is being undertaken and who on earth is undertaking it.
Lord Nash
The Secretary of State, to put it simply, has always been responsible for schools in this country. I cannot put it better than this:
“If a school is not delivering sound education for its pupils, and a different way of running the school would yield a different and better result, it is our duty to institute the change”.
I could not have put it as well—and not surprisingly, as that was a former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, speaking last week. We believe that the regional schools commissioners are the right structure. As for cost, this Government inherited a department from the previous Government that had no concept of value for money. We have halved the cost of running it in real terms. I will write to the noble Lord if he would like the figures. However, the actual cost of running the regional schools commissioners will be something like £5 million, compared with the huge expense of the bureaucratic system that the party opposite proposed to put in place.
Baroness Sharples (Con)
Can my noble friend say how many of these schools have children arriving at them for whom English is their second language?
The Earl of Listowel (CB)
My Lords, the Minister has pointed to the importance of head teachers in his answers. Can he say whether we have a sufficient number of head teachers in secondary and primary schools now?
Lord Nash
It has always been the case in the recent past that we have appeared to have a shortage of head teachers. We are increasingly seeing younger heads coming forward and academy chains growing their own senior leadership teams. Teaching schools are now, of course, also playing an increasing part.
Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes (Con)
Does my noble friend agree that the previous Secretary of State for Education has been a hero in this field in introducing and carrying out policies that have greatly enhanced educational opportunities for children throughout the country?
Lord Nash
I entirely agree with the noble Baroness’s comments. He is the first Secretary of State for many years, I think, to stop the decline in school standards. His changes, which are dramatic, will take years to have effect, but we are already seeing quite significant early signs of the positive nature of their effect.
Schools: Careers Guidance
Lord Nash Excerpts(11 years, 8 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Nash) (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Sharp for securing this important debate and for her excellent summary of the history and status quo of the Government’s position on careers advice. I also thank other noble Lords for their valuable contributions.
There seems to be an assumption underlying the debate that there was once a golden age of careers advice and that we have to go back to it. I do not recognise that. Even if it was the case, I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, that the careers system that the Government inherited was clearly a long way short of that. I think that we all recognise that the Connexions model did not work. As Alan Milburn said, hardly one person had anything good to say about it.
I do not believe that we have ever had it right in this country since the days of choice emerged, probably about 60 years ago—before which people basically went into jobs that their parents did or that their parents organised for them. The system of careers advice that I recognise is one that I saw on a bookstall once, when I was in an airport in New York late one night—I cannot remember which; all airports look the same. It was a book written by Jack Welch and his wife. He was the inspirational head of GE. He had written a book about his experience as a manager. Then he and his new wife had gone around the world promoting the book for 18 months. When they came back, they wrote a small pocketbook on the best questions that they had heard. The best chapter was entitled,
“What am I going to do with the rest of my life?”.
He said that basically what you do is: you get a job; you do not like it very much; you get another job; and after about five jobs, if you are lucky, you find something that you enjoy. That was certainly the pattern of careers advice that I recognise in this country for the past 50 years, and certainly that experienced by many of my friends.
Of course we can do a lot better. We in this Government believe that people in jobs they love are best placed to enthuse and inspire a young person. For too long, careers guidance in our schools has been weak, characterised by an expensive, top-down approach and one-off careers interviews that did not prepare young people to take their place in the world of work.
The noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, referred to Ofsted stating that the links with employers are weak. Frankly, for many schools, the links with business and the professions have been extremely weak for years. In our view, it is clearly getting better. Evidence from the McKinsey report on youth unemployment conducted across Europe was absolutely clear that the best careers advice is active engagement with business, but that face-to-face careers advice experience was extremely patchy. As for the head teacher to whom he referred who could not see the value of careers advice and was focused only on core standards, in my experience, for many successful head teachers in the country, the one way to get their pupils working for those exams is to engage them with work so that they have a clear line of sight and understand why they are working.
I certainly agree with my noble friend Lord Shipley that schools should have responsibility for that advice, because they know their pupils, their aptitudes, interests, passions, strengths and weaknesses. Through our reforms, this Government are driving closer working between schools and employers. We welcome business input into our schools—probably more so than anywhere else in the world.
We need to equip our pupils with an understanding of how their learning will help them to progress in a rewarding career, and schools and employers can do this by investing in the workforce of tomorrow through careers talks, mentoring, coaching, work tasters and work experience. From September, our guidance will encourage all schools to do what the best schools are doing: securing innovative advice and guidance on a range of ambitious careers. That is why this Government have given responsibility to schools and colleges.
Evidence from the Education and Employers Taskforce highlighted the positive relationship between the number of employer contacts that 14 to 19 year-olds experience in school and their outcomes—including the likelihood of their being NEET and their earnings if salaried. I am delighted to see a growing number of excellent organisations already working with schools to facilitate greater business involvement—organisations such as Business in the Community’s Business Class, which has 300 clusters around the country, as well as the Cutler’s Made in Sheffield programme, the Glass Academy in Sheffield, Make the Grade in Leeds, career academies, U-Explore, Barclays LifeSkills, the Education and Employment Taskforce’s Inspiring the Future, and the Speakers for Schools programme. All those organisations are building those vital links—the plumbing between schools and business.
At Pimlico Academy, my own academy, we have a substantial raising aspirations programme, bringing businesses and professional people to speak at the school. At Westminster Academy they have transformed the schools performance with the help of 200 business partners. At the Bridge Academy in Hackney the sponsor UBS runs a huge mentoring programme for the students and at Stoke Newington School and Sixth Form in Hackney, they have an excellent programme of engagement with businesses including a speed-dating careers fair.
The guidance gives schools a responsibility to act impartially and make sure pupils can find out about the range of options available. The accompanying non-statutory guidance paints a clear picture of what good careers guidance looks like, highlighting case studies and examples of good practice. To further support schools, from October the reshaped National Careers Service will expand its offer to schools and colleges, making it easier for employers and educators to engage. Importantly, schools will now be held to account for the destination of their pupils, be that an apprenticeship, university, job or further study in school or college. The Chief Inspector of Schools has made clear his commitment to give careers guidance a higher priority in school inspections. We are strengthening our focus on that, to answer the point made by my noble friend Lord Cormack.
We have set out a clear vision for careers guidance, clarified responsibilities for schools through new statutory guidance and enhanced the role of the National Careers Service, alongside Ofsted’s tougher scrutiny.
On the point made by my noble friend Lady Sharp about the recommendations from Ofsted and the Select Committee, we have considered these and implemented a number of them. We published our action plan on the same day as Ofsted published its response to all the recommendations. We have strengthened the guidance in relation to a clear framework for schools. We have made it clear to schools that they must build relationships with other education and training providers.
As for the money—on a point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, and the noble Baroness, Lady King—we are in a difficult economic climate, as we all know. We have protected the school budget, which is a fairly remarkable performance given the state of the public finances that we inherited, and we believe that there is money there for this, compared to other sectors.
My noble friend Lord Cormack referred to the culture—that unless one goes to university one is seen as a failure. We are determined to change this ethos, which is why this Government’s reforms have ensured that vocational qualifications are rigorous and can be as highly valued as the alternatives. That is why our new guidance focuses so clearly on apprenticeships. My noble friend referred to his concept of a careers panel, which is an excellent idea. As was noted, we have updated the guidance for school governors this year, which makes it clear that governors can play a key role in helping to connect schools with the local business community, since we know that governors from an employer background can help schools in this way. As for the citizenship ceremony, perhaps the idea could be promoted by forming a new charity or a co-operation with other charities, or through a pilot with a certain number of schools. I know that my noble friend has some interested schools.
The noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, referred to the fact that not all schools have a complete set of destination data. The DfE is publishing key stage 4 and 5 destination data annually, and Ofsted is using this in school inspections to inform judgments on schools’ career guidance.
The noble Baroness, Lady Morris, referred to work experience. Hundreds of employers are offering work experience, including major national companies, and the offer of work experience has risen over the last couple of years from 63% of employers to 81%.
I think that the real picture is somewhat different from the one that has been painted. We have never had this right and we think that the model of engaging with business is the way forward. We need to get it developed—I have referred to a number of excellent organisations that are doing this. I am sure that noble Lords will agree that giving young people a clear line of sight to the workplace, particularly those from intergenerational unemployment backgrounds, is important in enabling them to fulfil their potential. It is not just economically important but also, as my noble friend Lady Sharp said in opening, a moral imperative. Once again, I am grateful to all noble Lords for their contributions.