Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Watson of Invergowrie and Baroness Massey of Darwen

Monday 4th July 2016 Grand Committee

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

My Lords, these amendments, in the name of myself and my noble friend Lord Hunt, are to the clause relating to educational achievement. It is surely self-evident that educational achievement is absolutely crucial to the hopes of young people in or leaving care in building a life that offers opportunities to raise their own family and pursue a career. So everything that can be done should be done to maximise those educational opportunities.

Amendment 77 would expand the provision that states that the advice and information should be available to the child’s parents for the purpose of promoting the child’s educational achievements. The term “parent” is unnecessarily narrow because, by definition, many of the young people we are talking about will not have parents. Perhaps the Minister will come back and say that it is a legal term and it is not necessary, but children could be with foster carers, they could be under special guardianship orders or they could be in care homes. The main point is to make sure that they are provided with the necessary advice that they need and to which they are entitled.

Could the Minister clarify whether the provision of information about education is to be provided to the child’s parents alone? It is obvious, as I have said before, that it has to be broader than that. There is not a lot more to say on that amendment, and I hope that I can get a fairly straight response.

On Amendment 79, there is an issue here with simply saying that a local authority,

“must appoint at least one person for the purpose of discharging the duty imposed by subsection (1)”.

I hope that it would be more than one person—but even if it is only one person it is important to ensure that that person, whoever he or she may be, allocates not just the resources but the time to do the job properly. There are many examples in schools, obviously at a more local level—for instance, the special educational needs co-ordinator. In my experience, that person is in some cases just the person who is willing to come forward and take it on; they may or may not have the training initially—they may be the only person willing to do it, on top of his or her other duties. On a bigger scale, within a local authority, it is important that the person who is appointed to look after the educational achievements of children in care is not just given another duty to add to his or her job description and is expected to do that within the time available to them. Can the Minister clarify that the people given the job will be able to do that?

It has already emerged as a recurring theme, even in the two Committee days that we have had on this Bill, that more and more duties are being given to local authorities. In some cases, that is quite appropriate, if they have been properly resourced. I shall not rehearse the arguments about the stresses and strains on the finances of local authorities, because everyone is only too well aware of that but if more and more duties are laid on them, local authorities must have commensurate resources transferred to them to enable them to carry out the duties properly. I accept that that is a small aspect, but it is an important part of the Bill. As I said earlier, the educational achievements of looked-after children and children leaving care is crucial to their adult lives. I ask the Minister for those kinds of assurances and whether we can look with confidence at this part of the Bill, so that the person appointed to fill the post will have the ability, time and resources to do the job properly. I beg to move.

[Baroness Massey of Darwen]

My Lords, I speak to Amendment 86, which seeks to ensure that formerly looked-after children receive in their school,

“appropriate education in personal, social, health and economic skills, and citizenship”.

I find it really not that surprising that so many noble Lords have referred today to issues such as relationships, financial education, independent living, self-confidence and self-esteem. The amendment just backs up the need for us to consider those really very essential skills. All children should receive such personal development and economic education, as well as citizenship skills. Amendment 86 seeks to take account of the trauma and vulnerability that some children have experienced. Again, I include migrant children, although I am very aware that other children will have experienced varying degrees of loss, trauma and pain.

Education and Adoption Bill

Debate between Lord Watson of Invergowrie and Baroness Massey of Darwen

Tuesday 10th November 2015 Grand Committee

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

That is an interesting comment by the noble Earl. Flexibility is what I am looking for in this amendment because this part of the Bill contains none. It is interesting that the noble Earl referred to housing. A word which he did not use but was, I think, suggesting is nimbyism, where people say, “It is admirable that there should be such a structure or facility, but just not right next to my house”. I am always dubious in such situations. If the Minister has not looked at it already, he should look at the Housing and Planning Bill, which was launched in another place a few weeks ago, which seeks to close down a lot of people’s ability to object to those sorts of developments as well. That is something that I will say more about on another amendment. There is a pattern with this Government closing down discussion and dissent and getting their own way regardless of what people think. I think that that is undemocratic, and it is important that we should speak out against it wherever we encounter it, in legislation or in any other setting.

In this regard, the Minister and the Secretary of State are just plain wrong. No one is infallible. The Secretary of State needs to accept that and, for goodness’ sake, give herself some flexibility. I hope that the Minister will now realise that in 2015 you cannot just gag people who care passionately about the education of their children and tell them, as you might say to one of their children, to sit down and shut up as if they were of no importance at all. That is what is effectively being said to parents in the Bill. That cannot be right, and I hope that the Minister will take on board the comments that I have made in this amendment.

[Baroness Massey of Darwen]

My Lords, I support Amendment 17 onwards. I was sorry to miss such a lot of last Thursday’s consideration of the Bill. I had to leave, as those present on Thursday will know, in order to get home before the bonfire celebrations in Lewes. That I did, just, dodging flaming torches, effigies and the burning of David Cameron, Sepp Blatter and Jeremy Clarkson among others. However, I have caught up by reading Hansard. As an antidote to fireworks and bonfires, I dipped into some of the former education Bills, such as the Education and Inspections Act and the Academies Act, as well as other Acts going through Parliament at the moment, such as the Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill.

Two things strike me about that reading. One is that we must have the most complex, baroque and byzantine education system in the world, and it does not seem to be getting us very far. The other is that education cannot exist in a vacuum. The noble Lords, Lord Addington and Lord Hunt, are right to have pointed out on several occasions the connections between government policies—for example, the involvement of communities in sport and, as I have said, the Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill, which emphasises devolution. That leads me to believe that there cannot be only one form of governance that is suitable for a school, and that local communities and institutions must have a say. We all know that parental involvement in a child’s education is a very good predictor of success for that child or those children. So local structures are important.

Amendment 17 raises several interesting issues and questions for the Minister regarding special measures for improvement and consultation. I repeat that not just one system for anything will work. My noble friend has pointed out the investigations and action by the Catholic Education Service.

The Minister may well say that the amendment would make things too complex and too long. The Bill of course gives all power to the Secretary of State for Education, and we are suggesting here that that power should be devolved and broadened. We have heard a great deal in Committee and at Second Reading about how a single day at a failing school is too long for a child. I agree that poor education is a terrible thing, but it is worth looking more closely at what that poor education means. I myself do not think that one day at a failing school will do all that much damage. Poor education might of course be happening in just one subject at the school, or it may be inherent in the school system, which is what we are concerned about. A change of staff may be required, but the amendment suggests taking care to get good governance arrangements to avoid it. I agree that sometimes the speed of change is of the essence, but as the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, said, that does not necessarily mean lack of consultation.

We have heard about the possibility of delays in sponsorships. Speaking of speed and change, I remember being a parent governor and the chair of the governors of a primary school in Wandsworth. We had—if I dare use the term—a coasting head teacher. We, the governors, persuaded him to leave. I will not go into the methods used. We then appointed a dynamic, ambitious head and within months the school became a dynamic, ambitious school. Parents and governors knew what had to be done and did it. I am not advocating that as a general theory for change, but there is more than one way of doing things and parents should be listened to.

Education and Adoption Bill

Debate between Lord Watson of Invergowrie and Baroness Massey of Darwen

Thursday 5th November 2015 Grand Committee

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to address the first group of amendments on the Marshalled List. In moving Amendment 1, I shall speak also to Amendments 2, 7 and 9 and make reference to Amendment 5 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Addington.

Amendments 1 and 2 would replace the term “coasting schools” with “schools in which pupils do not fulfil their potential”. We believe that that is essential, because coasting can be, and often is, seen as a pejorative term. There can be many reasons why pupils are not fulfilling their potential and it is wrong to start from a presumption that this is the result of a lack of effort on the part of the school. Currently the Bill provides for the definition of coasting to be set out in regulations. The draft is based entirely on performance data, a combination of pupil attendance data and pupil progress data. It allows for no other factors to be considered, but I am hopeful that that might change after the consultation.

At Second Reading the Minister mentioned—rather casually, it has to be said—that the Government will be launching a public consultation. Of course, that is to be welcomed; but he neglected to mention that the consultation was going to be launched the very next day. I heard about it only a few days later, by chance. It would have been helpful if the Minister had used the opportunity to fully inform all noble Lords, so that we could have been up to speed when the consultation was launched.

From Labour’s point of view, we will be contributing to that consultation, and I am sure that many noble Lords here today will also wish to do so. However, we await the outcome of the consultation, which it is said will be in the spring of next year. It should be drawn to the Committee’s attention that comment on the concept of coasting has already been made by both the Constitution Committee and the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee of your Lordships’ House. Both have been clear in their criticism of these aspects of the Bill.

Having considered the fact that the definition of coasting is left to regulations, the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee says:

“We consider such a wide and open-ended delegation to be inappropriate given the fundamental importance of the definition to the operation of the new section, and the significant powers which become exercisable in relation to a school once it becomes eligible for intervention”.

The committee goes on to say that it finds the department’s explanation of why the definition is left to regulations unconvincing, and makes a distinction between the criteria and other factors that should apply in determining whether a school is coasting and the detailed data that are used to decide whether the criteria have been met.

The committee argues that if the data are more appropriate for regulations, this does not mean the criteria and other factors should not be included on the face of the Bill. It concluded with a stark warning that,

“there is nothing to prevent regulations being made in the future which completely change the basis for defining what constitutes a coasting school”.

That worry is felt rather more widely than the committee, which is non-partisan. If the Minister was less than happy with that, I imagine that he would have been no more so when he received a letter from the Constitution Committee dated 26 October. That letter pointed out that the committee had previously expressed its concern at the introduction of what it termed “vaguely worded legislation” that leaves much to the discretion of Ministers. The Committee said:

“We wish to put on the record once again our view that Bills should contain an appropriate level of detail and provide a suitable degree of legal certainty”.

I apologise to noble Lords for the extent of those quotes, but I believe that they are important, because the question of how schools are defined is fundamental to the Bill and the manner in which the Government are proposing to act has become the focus for stringent reprimand by two of the most powerful committees in your Lordships’ House.

We welcome statements in the illustrative regulations to the effect that where a coasting school can demonstrate that it can improve sufficiently it should be allowed to do so. This suggests that there may not be a default presumption of academisation—a word I seem to have difficulty in articulating. This point was reinforced by the consultation document. None the less, the judgment is at the discretion of the regional schools commissioner, who will decide on the sponsor where he or she determines that the school should become an academy and can make the decisions with no reference to governors, parents or other stakeholders.

The first two amendments in this group would ensure that the manner in which schools in which pupils do not fulfil their potential are identified and subsequently treated should be no different irrespective of whether they are in the maintained sector or the academy sector. That is why we argue that the provisions of the Act should take precedence over private contracts with academy sponsors. All schools should be treated equally; there should be no place for deals between Ministers and sponsors that are not open to scrutiny. No doubt the Minister will say that issues of confidentiality are involved, but that does not wash, because this is public money that we are talking about—and hefty chunks of it. The public have a right to know how their money is spent, and how both transparency and accountability are to be demanded of those in receipt of those funds.

Amendment 9 states:

“An Academy may be defined as coasting if it falls within the definition made by the Secretary of State by regulations”.

This is one amendment that the Minister must surely find acceptable because it has emerged that an academy can indeed be defined as coasting. This is something else that my team and I have learned by chance, because no announcement that we were aware of was made. It so happens that one of my colleagues came across the latest revision of the model funding agreement, published on 10 September. That document provides for an academy to be designated as a coasting school using the definition which will appear in the legislation when enacted. The wording in the agreement states:

“‘Coasting’ has the meaning given in regulations made under section 60B of the Education and Inspections Act 2006”.

That may not sound important, but it is—although I have to say that, following the Government’s stonewalling on more than 80 amendments in the other place, I believe that we can now claim that this is a government concession. It may not be the way that the Minister sees it, but it is a factor that there has been movement there.

However, if that is the upside, there is a downside to this as well, in that it begs the question as to whether this method is an appropriate use of parliamentary process. Section 60B of the Education and Inspections Act 2006 will not exist in law until and unless the Education and Adoption Act receives Royal Assent. Is it to become the normal practice for DfE officials to publish model legal documents which assume that Parliament will enact legislation before it actually does so? Can the Minister assure the Committee that the reference to Section 60B will now have a health warning attached to it just in case Parliament should decide not to pass the legislation, or if the provision becomes, for the sake of argument, Section 60C or Section 60D or whatever when the Bill eventually receives Royal Assent? As an aside, perhaps the Minister will be able to tell noble Lords when he expects all academies to have this provision inserted into their funding agreements.

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the Government’s decision to leave academies outwith the Bill was at least in part designed to avoid some embarrassment to Ministers if those schools do not perform as it had been hoped that they would. If that is the case, it is hardly a sound basis on which to make law. The amendments also place the assessment of whether a school is in this category in the hands of Ofsted. This is to avoid the confusion of having both Ofsted and regional schools commissioners making judgments about a school. It would be entirely possible as the Bill and the regulations are drafted for Ofsted to find a school good or outstanding and the regional schools commissioner to find it coasting and therefore eligible for intervention. That is a recipe for confusion and not a situation that is in anyone’s interest.

Amendment 2 sets out a broader range of criteria to be considered by Ofsted rather than simply relying on performance data. It recognises that there are factors that will affect outcomes that do not relate to how hard the school is working. For example, it is known that pupils from deprived backgrounds on average make slower progress than others. Pupils with special needs often make slower progress than others. Being located in an area where teacher supply is difficult will affect how well pupils do. Data from small schools are much less reliable than those from larger schools. Surely all these factors need to be taken into account when making a judgment about a school. For that reason, Amendment 2 would require Ofsted to consult local authorities and academy sponsors before reaching a decision. It surely makes sense to get the views of those who know a school best and have the ability to explain whether particular circumstances have affected it.

Being designated as a coasting school—or, more accurately, a school in which pupils do not fulfil their potential—should not lead to an academy order. There is one good reason for that. As will arise in discussing various amendments, there is no evidence that academisation leads to greater improvement than remaining in maintained status. The most important factor is to begin the process of bringing about improvement in a school, not concentrating on legal structures.

The Bill rests on the assumption that school improvement can be achieved only by turning a school into a sponsored academy, but there is no evidence that academisation alone improves educational standards. Last year, the National Foundation for Educational Research published research that concluded that the amount of attainment progress made by pupils in sponsored and converted academies is not greater than in maintained schools with similar characteristics.

It is wrong to pursue a one-size-fits-all approach when the evidence that academies are automatically high performing does not stand up to scrutiny and when other options are available. Schools in which pupils are not fulfilling their potential deserve the opportunity to improve without being told that they have no choice in the matter. The same applies to staff, parents and governors. That last issue is for another day; I hope that the Minister will take on board the arguments advanced in support of this group of amendments. I beg to move.

[Baroness Massey of Darwen (Lab)]

My Lords, before I speak to the amendments, I must apologise to the Committee because I have to leave early this afternoon—for a rather strange reason. I live in a small town in East Sussex called Lewes, where there are bonfire celebrations. There are six bonfire societies, six guys, six processions and general mayhem and chaos in the town. The town will therefore be closed down any minute now and I have to get back. I do apologise.

Now to be serious. All of us in this room and in the House generally are concerned about the welfare and education of our children. We are all concerned about having good schools, of whatever type. We are all concerned about pupils reaching their full potential. I want to talk mainly about the issue of coasting, which I would define as not reaching potential, but coasting is the word in the Bill. Much of the Bill is about coasting: who is responsible for the schools, who consults whom, what collaboration takes place, and so on.

First, I thank the Minister for his letter of 21 October, and for calling a meeting the other day which, unfortunately, I could not go to. In the letter, the Minister talks about the Bill making important changes to deliver social justice—I shall come back to that—and to ensure that every child deserves an excellent education. He goes on to say that the Bill provides measures to tackle coasting schools and that illustrative coasting regulations, including a proposed definition of coasting, were published on 30 June. But, to my disappointment, the letter goes no further with defining what we might mean by coasting.

The definition given is fixed on achievement at GCSE. This is a very dangerous definition for schools, teachers and young people, and for school ethos and performance. I will say why, and why I hope that the definition is broadened substantially and put in the Bill, not just in regulations.

We have heard about the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee’s criticism of the substance of the Bill being in regulations. This is what happened in the Childcare Bill and it was criticised then. The Government produced regulations that were far longer than the Bill, which is not good enough.

I am surprised that the Minister seems content with a purely academic definition of coasting, because he and I have had several interesting and very valuable conversations about the importance of personal and social skills in education and the importance of school policies which support those skills. Those skills include communication, teamwork, citizenship, knowledge of health matters and school policies about issues such as bullying and behaviour. I believe that the Minister supports all this and I hope he will exercise his influence to redefine with the Department for Education what we mean by a good school where pupils reach their potential.