Oral Answers to Questions

Michael Gove Excerpts

Monday 11th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)]

11. What steps he is taking to allow head teachers greater autonomy in their schools.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

The welcome growth in the number of academies has provided more freedom for more head teachers to raise standards for more students, especially the poorest.

[Mr Raab]

I thank the Secretary of State for that answer. Although a formal teaching qualification may be a bonus, with Ofsted’s rigorous new inspection regime and performance-related pay, does he agree that it would be dogmatic in the extreme to force heads to fire 15,000 teachers, regardless of their impact in the classroom, just because they do not hold a piece of paper?

[Michael Gove]

That is a characteristically acute point from my hon. Friend. The most important thing we need to do is ensure that the quality of teaching in our schools is improving. Ofsted tells us that it is, and I am delighted to report that to the House. That is a result of our reforms.

[Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)]

What will the Secretary of State do about Kings science academy in Bradford and the disaster that is that school? There are fines for admission policies, and it looks like criminality as well.

[Michael Gove]

There are certainly questions to be answered by those responsible for Kings science academy, but I stress that all academies and free schools are more rigorously audited and held accountable than local authority schools. I also stress that for many years the quality of education in Bradford has been appalling, yet it is only when new providers come in to innovate that we hear from Opposition Members. They are prepared consistently to turn a blind eye to Labour local authorities that fail, yet whenever there is any challenge to that complacency, all they can do is talk cynically about those idealists who are trying to improve state education.

[Sir Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)]

The Secretary of State will be aware from the recent Defence Committee inquiry that the education statements contained in the armed forces covenant clash with the Education Act 2011 on admissions to school. With that in mind, should head teachers of Army-focused schools have more authority over whom they admit to their schools?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that point. One thing that he has done consistently in his time in the House is to ensure that schools in garrison towns such as the one that he represents take appropriate account of the need of our armed forces and their children, particularly at times of movement and redeployment. I would be happy to talk to him more closely about how we can ensure not only that admissions arrangements but additional support are there for those families. We have introduced the service premium for the children of those in the armed forces. I hope that the introduction of that additional cash will help his constituents and those of every other hon. Member.

[Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State share my expectation that head teachers, when they exercise greater autonomy, take account of the needs of the area in which they teach and operate, which we are trying to achieve in Birmingham? Will he encourage them to do so?

[Michael Gove]

I absolutely would encourage them to do that. Let me pay tribute to the hon. Lady for her work in bringing teachers together in Birmingham to introduce the Birmingham baccalaureate, which is a perfect preparation both for the world of work and for further and higher education. One problem in Birmingham for many years has been a culture of underperformance in far too many schools, and that has been insufficiently challenged by the local authority. It should not have to fall to her to do the job that the council should have been doing, but if I would trust anyone to do that job instead of the council, it would be her.

[John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)]

14. What his policy is on oversight of free schools.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

Free schools and academies are held more rigorously to account than any other schools.

[John Cryer]

Well, that is a bit of a shock, because it is widely accepted that the democratic scrutiny and oversight of state schools is pretty intense but hardly exists at all for free schools. Does the Secretary of State not worry that that has led to the scandals of the past few months, which could well be the tip of the iceberg? We could see more scandals over the next few years because of that lack of democratic scrutiny.

[Michael Gove]

I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman was surprised by either the content or the brevity of my response, but let me spell things out in slightly greater detail. Academies and free schools have an accounting officer in the way that local authority schools do not; and academies and free schools have to file accounts every year in a way that local authority schools do not. The National Audit Office has pointed out that the scrutiny of schools by local authorities is not what we should expect. The hon. Gentleman is right that there are problems in individual academies and free schools, but there are also problems in individual local authority schools. We know what has gone wrong in academies and free schools because this Government have put in place an improved system of scrutiny for them.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

20. Does the Secretary of State agree that the problems at the school in Bradford highlighted earlier are nothing to do with it being a free school? Will he comment on the One in a Million free school, which recently opened in Bradford? It was over-subscribed and is doing a fantastic job of providing the education that is much needed in that part of Bradford.

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The highest-performing school in Bradford is, I believe, an academy. New free schools that have arrived in Bradford have, until recently, been welcomed by hon. Members on both sides of the House. Increased choice for parents and an increased range of schools have helped to drive up standards across the UK. It is striking that schools in England have consistently improved over the past few years in a way that schools in Wales have not. That is because we have not only parental choice, free schools and academies, but a rigorous inspectorate and league tables, which enable us to identify good practice and spread it more energetically.

[Margaret Beckett (Derby South) (Lab)]

I am pleased to hear what the Secretary of State has said on the rigorous oversight for financial purposes of free schools. The Ofsted report on the Al-Madinah school in my constituency has been published, but when does he expect to publish the report of the external funding agency?

[Michael Gove]

The report is by the Education Funding Agency rather than the external funding agency, but I take the right hon. Lady’s point. We have published more about the Al-Madinah free school than has been published about other local authority schools in Derby. It is striking that she raises the weakness of the Al-Madinah free school when, as Ofsted has pointed out with respect to Derby, it is in one of the weakest areas of school improvement of any local authority. In consultation with the EFA, we will ensure that every piece of information necessary about the fate of that school is published at the appropriate time, in the appropriate way. However, it must be stressed that the action we have taken to deal with the Al-Madinah free school was taken faster than any action taken by Labour-led Derby council to deal with any of the underperforming schools in that great city.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the case of Al-Madinah school in Derby shows that the Government will not tolerate failure in education establishments, whether they are free schools or local authority schools?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Schools, including Sinfin school and Grampian school, were allowed to fail in Derby. When they were taken over as academies under this Government, they all saw real improvement in performance. Derby was among the 20% of local authorities that were the weakest when it came to school improvement. The right hon. Member for Derby South (Margaret Beckett) said nothing about that then, but she turns a Nelsonian blind eye to failure by Labour local authorities. When this Government take steps to improve state education, she has nothing to say.

[Mr Speaker]

I do not know what the Secretary of State is having for breakfast, but it is obviously achieving the desired effect.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State sat on the damning report on the Kings science academy scandal for more than five months. When was he planning to tell us that the school had been fined an additional £4,000 for refusing to implement the direction of the independent review panel? Why is there so much secrecy around these schools? Is it because, as he said earlier, he seems to think that fraud is acceptable as long as those responsible are innovators?

[Michael Gove]

There is less secrecy around these schools than there is around local authority schools. We have published the internal audit report on what happened at the Kings science academy. We informed the Home Office of our concerns about that school, and the reason the hon. Gentleman knows so much about the school is that this Government have been far more transparent about institutional failure than the Government of whom he was a member. [Interruption.] However much he may prate and cry from a sedentary position, he knows that this Government have been more transparent about failure and more determined to turn schools around and generate success than his ever was.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

15. What plans he has for teacher supply and recruitment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Crausby (Bolton North East) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

Next year, my Department will be joining the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to ensure that all children have the opportunity to learn from, and commemorate, the sacrifice of those who fell in the first world war. We will be building on the work of the excellent Holocaust Educational Trust, which ensures that children have the chance to travel to Auschwitz, so that children in all state schools have an opportunity to visit the battlefields of the first world war.

[Mr Crausby]

The Secretary of State will know that there is no requirement on schools to have a defibrillator on the premises. Is it not time for such a requirement, to ensure that all children and staff are protected? It cannot be right to leave it to parent teacher association fundraising and charities, which have so much else to do. What plans does he have to put that right?

[Michael Gove]

I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s comments. My hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) has been campaigning on this issue and I will be meeting him shortly. There is much to be said for supporting schools to ensure that defibrillators are in place. I want to work with the hon. Member for Bolton North East (Mr Crausby) and my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole to do that in the most effective way.

[Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)]

T2. Last week, I was pleased to help launch “My Education”, a report produced by Teach First and Pearson, which surveyed 8,000 British teenagers on their education. The overwhelming majority said that more work experience and better careers advice would help them find the right future. Following that overwhelming response, can the Secretary of State assure us that the National Careers Service will be enabled to support the delivery of careers advice and guidance in schools to the betterment of our entire population?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. It is important to stress that we need to ensure more work experience opportunities for all young people, which is why we have changed how children are funded when they enter post-16 education to make it easier to offer the appropriate work experience. I also agree that we need to ensure that careers advice for young people is suitably inspiring and to see whether the National Careers Service or other institutions can help. In particular, it is important to work with businesses to ensure that young people have the opportunity to see and hear from the role models who will ensure they make the right choices in the future.

[Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State confirm that under his plans, students who study only the English language GCSE will be excluded from studying the great works of English literature?

[Michael Gove]

No, they will not be excluded from studying anything.

[Tristram Hunt]

The Secretary of State is not aware of his own GCSE reforms. He has introduced the soft bigotry of low expectations into our education system. He might have enjoyed studying the works of Jane Austen and Wilfred Owen, but he is denying England’s pupils the same access to our national canon if they take only the English language GCSE. If it was all right for him, at Robert Gordon’s college, why is it not okay for kids in Harlow and Blackpool today? Will he now urgently review the changes to English GCSE, or will he continue to dumb down our syllabus?

[Michael Gove]

Tragically, when I was a student at Robert Gordon’s college in Aberdeen, I was not able to take English GCSE, because I was in Scotland and GCSEs were not on offer at that time. As a historian, the hon. Gentleman could perhaps do with studying geography rather more.

Under our new accountability system, which I urge the hon. Gentleman to study and which his colleague, the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan), welcomed, English will not count unless students study both English language and literature, and the English baccalaureate, which the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt) supports, will be conferred on students only if they study both English language and literature. He talks about Jane Austen. One of the tragedies about the current English GCSE is that fewer than 1% of students who sit it actually read a word of Jane Austen. Before he asks another question in the House, may I recommend to him one particular text of hers—“Pride and Prejudice”? A knowledge of both things would certainly help him to be a more effective Opposition spokesperson.

[Mr Simon Burns (Chelmsford) (Con)]

T4. What precisely is being done to ensure the availability of high-quality early-years provision?

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

I will answer that one.

[Kevin Brennan]

Cummings is your hero.

[Michael Gove]

Thank you. The hon. Gentleman is my hero.

As I have pointed out in speech after speech—I will send them to the hon. Lady—we must always seek to ensure that accidents of birth or circumstances never hold any child back. One of the great things about education is that children can constantly surprise us with their ability. To the historians on the Opposition Front Bench, I would recommend the words of my predecessor in my role as Education Secretary, Margaret Thatcher: advisers advise, but Ministers decide.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

T6. I welcome the Minister’s earlier commitment to healthy school lunches. Will he ensure that head teachers retain the autonomy to establish high standards in the provision of these lunches and are not, because of shared contracts, left at the mercy of one particular provider?

--- Later in debate ---

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Today sees the launch of Juice FM’s Knives Wreck Lives campaign in Liverpool, which aims to raise awareness among people on Merseyside of just how damaging knives can be. Will the Secretary of State welcome the campaign, and tell the House what he is doing in our schools and colleges to inform young people about the perils of knife crime?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for drawing our attention to that exemplary campaign. I have campaigned against knife crime since before my time in the House. I worked with the widow of Philip Lawrence, who was the tragic victim of such a crime, in order to raise awareness of what could be done to tackle it in and outside schools. I also worked with two former Home Secretaries to ensure that combat knives were banned. I am delighted that head teachers in schools across the country are today using a variety of innovative methods and working with a variety of third sector groups to alert children to the dangers of carrying and using knives, but there is of course much more to be done and I look forward to working with the hon. Lady and other Members in that endeavour.

[Paul Burstow (Sutton and Cheam) (LD)]

This is the first Government to use Government time and Government Bills to advance the cause and rights of carers. Having already taken the welcome step of ensuring that a whole-family approach is taken to young carers and the people they care for, will the Government consider what further steps they could take to extend that approach to parent carers of disabled children?

[Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)]

Following the abject failure of the Secretary of State’s free school experiment at the Al-Madinah school in Derby, will he now give the local education authority the ability to scrutinise the school and make it accountable to the LEA? If the school closes, will he ensure that Derby city council has sufficient resources to accommodate the children in council-run schools?

[Michael Gove]

There are certainly serious issues at the Al-Madinah free school, as we all acknowledge, but it is important to put them in context. Of the first 24 free schools to be inspected, 75% were good or better, whereas in the first tranche of new local authority schools set up in the same period, only half reached that quality threshold. It is also important to recognise that the local authority in Derby has a poor record of helping to challenge underperforming schools, and that outside providers such as Barry Day of Greenwood Dale have done far more to improve education in Derby than the local authority has ever done.

[Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

Primary schools in rural communities face special challenges. In our recent report on rural communities, the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee urged Ministers to give back to local authorities the flexibility to spend the most on those primary schools in the greatest need. Can we have that flexibility back?

[Michael Gove]

There is flexibility in the current approach. There is a lump sum attached to every school that ensures that smaller schools that are doing a great job can continue to provide high-quality education for children in rural areas, but the changes we are making to introduce a national fair funding formula will go even further to meet my hon. Friend’s concerns.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

Local head teachers tell me that Bristol city council is advising them to offer funded early education in just the mornings or just the afternoons so that they can avoid the cost of providing free school meals to eligible children. Does the Secretary of State share my concern that these children are missing out on their school dinners and that statutory guidance to offer education at times that best support the child’s learning is being breached?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for drawing that to my attention. I would love to have a chance to know more about the particular situation that she rightly raises. It is important that all children get the nutrition and the education they deserve.

[Sir Nick Harvey (North Devon) (LD)]

Some 1.2 million children living within the Government’s own definition of childhood poverty do not get a free school meal. Why do the Government consider it a higher priority to give free school meals to all five, six and seven-year-olds, 1.3 million of whom can perfectly well afford to pay?

[Michael Gove]

I am pleased to be in a coalition Government when the Deputy Prime Minister has made a commitment to the extension of free school meals to five, six and seven-year-olds. We should never make the perfect the enemy of the good. Let me take this opportunity to praise Liberal Democrat colleagues who worked with us in order to ensure that more children have the opportunity to enjoy high-quality lunches. Let me say, too, to the hon. Member for North Devon (Sir Nick Harvey), with whom I normally agree, that on this occasion I have to part company with him and say that his leader has done the right thing, with which I am delighted to be associated.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State has said that circumstances should never hold any child back. How, then, does he plan to respond to this week’s Institute for Fiscal Studies report that showed that grammar schools are five times less likely to admit poorer children than their state counterparts?

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Lady makes an important point. The introduction of academies and free schools is making sure that more children have the chance to attend academically excellent schools. For those living in areas where there are grammar schools who feel that the quality of education they enjoy is not good enough, we are providing choice through the growth of academies and choice through the growth of free schools. Through the pupil premium we are investing £2.5 billion for the very poorest children—a commitment to social justice of the kind to which I know Mr Speaker believes we should all be committed.

[Mr Speaker]

The right hon. Gentleman is quite correct. That is quite a convenient way of trying to keep onside when time is pressing.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Is it appropriate for either teachers or pupils to wear the full-face veil in the classroom, and if the answer is no, what regulations are in place to proscribe the wearing of such?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend raises a very important point. Matters of school uniform are rightly questions that head teachers should decide on, or college principals should be responsible for. I hope it is clear that the wearing of any item that impedes effective teaching or effective learning is something that we should all ensure does not happen in the classroom. I am working with both the chief inspector of schools and officials within the Department for Education in order to ensure that schools and individuals receive an unambiguous message about the vital importance of ensuring that cultural or other barriers do not impede the capacity to learn of children from whatever community.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State agree with his most trusted adviser that “real talent” is rare among the nation’s teachers. If not, was it an error of judgment to give him free rein over education policy?

[Michael Gove]

I agree with all my advisers that real talent is rare on the Labour Benches, which is why it is so important that we ensure that this Government are re-elected in a few years’ time.

[Annette Brooke (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

May I be assured that the asbestos in schools steering group will continue, given the importance of developing a clear, up-to-date policy and strategy regarding asbestos?