Schools Bill [HL]

Lord Storey Excerpts

Report stage & Lords Hansard - Part 2
Tuesday 12th July 2022 Lords Chamber

That sounds far too much like social engineering. I fear it could be divisive and inadvertently end up making young children far too self-conscious of caricatured views of what type of people end up doing different jobs. That might not be the end result, but it could be a minefield for teachers and inadvertently introduce stereotypes into the classroom about who works in what profession based on their characteristics. I would let them dream, play and be imaginative and leave the careers until later.

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, briefly, I do not know whether the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, taught in a primary school, but social engineering is not a phrase I would associate with them; I would associate imagination, sponges sucking up knowledge and getting excited about things, but not social engineering.

I want to raise another issue on mandatory work experience. The UK shared prosperity fund is a fund of £2.6 billion to develop people and skills. It also trains people to help with careers development. It is managed through the combined mayoral authorities and is for the next three years. I am a little disappointed that there is continuity in the fund for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland but in England it has ground to a shuddering halt. We have been told that the money cannot be spent until 2024-25. Can the Minister explain why? That will have repercussions for those who were employed to work on these areas.

[The Lord Bishop of Durham]

My Lords, I spoke in favour of similar amendments in Committee and will do so again. I will ask the noble Baronesses, Lady Chapman and Lady Wilcox, the same question as last time, as I did not get an answer. Proposed new subsection (1) in Amendment 113 says “all schools”, so can I presume that means primary as well as secondary schools? I am not sure what work experience looks like over 10 days of primary school; my understanding of

“a minimum of 10 school days overall”

would be over the period of life in that primary or secondary school. There is a lack of clarity there.

The noble Baroness, Lady Fox, and I are largely in agreement on some things this evening. I am absolutely with her on imagining, dreaming and so on, but I read the clause completely the opposite way around. I think it says, “Imagine what you can be, whatever your background”. The problem at the moment is that too many children do not think they can.

I had not heard the extremely good news that the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, shared. It is very welcome, so I thank the Minister.