Education Spending

Michael Gove Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd June 2010 Written Statements

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

The Government have today announced a two-year pay freeze for all public sector workforces from 2011-12, but remain committed to honouring in full the three-year pay award recommended by the School Teachers’ Review Body. I can therefore confirm that the teachers’ pay uplift for this year will be implemented from September 2010, marking the last instalment of their three-year pay award.

Free Schools Policy

Michael Gove Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Ed Balls (Morley and Outwood) (Lab/Co-op)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Education to make a statement on the free schools policy, which was announced in a press notice on Friday 18 June.

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

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for this opportunity to update the House on our progress on reducing bureaucracy in the schools system, giving more power to front-line professionals and accelerating the academies programme, which was begun with such distinction under Lord Adonis and Tony Blair.

During the Queen’s Speech debate, I outlined in detail our plans to extend academy freedoms. I mentioned then that we had more than 1,000 expressions of interests from existing schools. I can now update the House by confirming that more than 1,700 schools have expressed an interest in acquiring academy freedoms, with more than 70% of outstanding secondary schools contacting my Department—a remarkable and heartening display of enthusiasm by front-line professionals for our plans. As I have explained before, every new school acquiring academy freedoms will be expected to support at least one faltering or coasting school to improve. We are liberating the strong to help the weak—a key principle behind the coalition Government.

As well as showing enthusiasm for greater academy freedoms in existing schools, teachers are enthusiastic about the opportunities, outlined in our coalition agreement, to create more great new schools in areas of disadvantage. More than 700 expressions of interest in opening new free schools have been received by the charitable group the New Schools Network, and the majority of them have come from serving teachers in the state school system who want greater freedom to help the poorest children do better.

That action is all the more vital, because we inherit from the previous Government a schools system that was as segregated and as stratified as any in the developed world. In the most recent year for which we have figures, out of a school cohort of 600,000, 80,000 children were in homes entirely reliant on benefits, and of those 80,000 children only 45 made it to Oxbridge—less than 0.1% and, tellingly, fewer than those who made it from the school attended by the Leader of the Opposition.

Given that scale of underachievement, it is no surprise that so many idealistic teachers want to start new schools, such as those American charter schools backed by President Obama, which have closed the achievement gap between black and white children. In order to help teachers do here what has been achieved in America, we announced last week that we would recreate the standards and diversity fund for schools, started by Tony Blair and abandoned under his successor. We are devoting to that fund £50 million saved from low-priority IT spending—less than 1% of all capital spending allocated for this year—and we are sweeping away the bureaucracy that stands in the way of new school creation, with the reform of planning laws and building regulations.

Five years ago, the then Prime Minister said outside this House:

“What we must see now is a system of independent state schools, underpinned by fair admissions and fair funding, where teachers are equipped and enabled to drive improvement, driven by the aspirations of parents.

We have pushed higher standards from the centre: for those standards to be maintained and built upon, they must now become self-sustaining to provide irreversible change for the better.”

That is the challenge that Mr Blair laid down, and this coalition Government intend to meet it.

[Ed Balls]

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for coming to the House, because his free school policy raises important issues of funding, fairness and standards—and it should not have been smuggled out in a Friday morning press statement. I should also say that Lord Hill has written to my colleagues in the other place confirming that the Academies Bill will, in fact, be enabling legislation for free schools. The Secretary of State should have the courtesy to inform this House, and those on the Opposition Front Bench, of his plans in that regard.

On funding, will the right hon. Gentleman confirm not only that his free school policy will establish a free market in school places, in which parents will be encouraged to set up taxpayer-funded new schools at will, but that he has secured no new money at all from the Treasury to pay for it? Will he confirm that he is using savings from cutting free school lunches for poorer children to fund his announced £50 million of start-up support, and that that is a drop in the ocean compared with the billions involved in the actual cost of his new policy?

Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm Professor David Woods’s finding that the proposal for a new parent-promoted school in Kirklees would

“have a negative impact on other schools in the area in the form of surplus places and an adverse effect on revenue and capital budgets”?

The question is whether existing schools will see their budgets cut and lose teachers to pay for the new schools, and whether the Building Schools for the Future programme is now on hold to fund his new free schools policy. On fairness, does the right hon. Gentleman agree with the Swedish Schools Minister that

“free schools are generally attended by children of better educated and wealthy families making things even more difficult for children attending ordinary schools in poor areas”?

How will he ensure that the losers from the budget cuts will not be the children of middle and lower-income families?

It is important that the right hon. Gentleman should answer this question. Has he put in place clear safeguards to stop existing private schools from simply reopening as free schools, with taxpayers taking over the payment of school fees? On standards, can he confirm that since the Swedish free schools policy was introduced, England has risen to the top of the TIMMS—Trends in Mathematics and Science Study—league table in maths and science, but Sweden has plummeted to the bottom?

Will the Secretary of State amend the Academies Bill to prevent parents from delegating the entire management of free schools to profit-making companies? Alternatively, can we look forward, as in Sweden, to the grotesque chaos of private companies scuttling around the country touting to parents, saying that they will set up a new school for them, and make a profit, at the expense of the taxpayer and other children’s education?

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his questions. May I seek to put his mind at rest? He asked whether the Academies Bill created the provision for the creation of free schools. I confirm now, as I confirmed during the Queen’s Speech debate, that it absolutely does. He specifically asked about free school meals and their funding. It is interesting that he should have asked that, because when he was at the Department for Children, Schools and Families, he did not secure the funding for the extension of free school meals; in fact, figures from the Treasury confirm that that was an underfunded promise, which raised the hopes of the poor without the cash being there to sustain it. It was a cynical pre-election manoeuvre, typical of the right hon. Gentleman.

I confirm to the right hon. Gentleman that under no circumstances will I take for the free schools programme money intended to extend free school meals to poor children. That money will go towards raising attainment among the poorest children. I rejected the idea that the right hon. Gentleman has attempted to advance. As I pointed out in my statement and on Friday, the money for the programme comes from low-priority IT projects. If he had simply read the press statement, rather than relying on unsubstantiated and unsourced reports, he would know that.

If the right hon. Gentleman is concerned about saving money and making economies, may I ask him this? Two weeks ago, I wrote to him asking whether he would help us to find economies in the education budget by releasing the Handover report, which he commissioned when he was in office to try to find economies in the schools budget. If he is serious about bearing down on costs and greater efficiency, will he now confirm that he will allow us to read that secret report on saving money? His silence is eloquent in itself.

The right hon. Gentleman was kind enough to refer to the words of the Swedish Schools Minister, Mr Bertil Östberg. Let me just say that the Swedish Schools Minister—[Interruption.] What a tongue twister that was. As the right hon. Gentleman will know, Swedish is a language, particularly given the diminution in the number of people studying modern languages under his Government, that fewer and fewer people can translate properly. He clearly cannot, because the Swedish Schools Minister said that the article from which Labour are quoting was

“very biased. It is taken out of context…I have not warned the British Government against introducing Free Schools. I clearly said to the newspaper that the Swedish Free Schools are here to stay and that is something positive”.

All the academic evidence from Sweden shows that more free schools mean higher standards. All schools improve when the number of free schools increases. A second study found that in a given municipality, the higher the proportion of free schools, the more standards rise all round. The evidence not only from Swedish free schools but from American charter schools shows that such schools help to close the gap between the poorest and the wealthiest children. It is that innovation in the cause of social mobility that lay behind the original academies programme introduced under Tony Blair, traduced by the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls), and brought back under a reforming coalition Government.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jane Ellison (Battersea) (Con)]

Has the Secretary of State had a chance to meet people from the neighbourhood school campaign in my constituency, who have already made considerable progress towards the establishment of a new secondary school in Wandsworth—a campaign that I note that the shadow Secretary of State supported prior to the election?

[Michael Gove]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. I have had an opportunity to meet that idealistic group of parents, and others in Wandsworth. I want to pay tribute to Mr Ron Rooney, Mr Jon De Maria and the other members of the group, who have done so much. My hon. Friend is right: the right hon. Gentleman was warm towards that group when he was in government. Warmth towards the group has also been extended by the local authority—Wandsworth borough council—and its leader, Edward Lister. Like so many other local authorities, it has warmly welcomed this initiative to introduce pluralism, diversity and high quality in the state education system.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Secretary of State agree that admissions policy is at the heart of any policy in terms of opening up schools to pupils in a fair way? Does he have any plans to change the admissions code or the power behind it that ensures that it works?

[Michael Gove]

I intend to ensure that all free schools and all academies continue to abide by the existing admissions code, that all schools that are currently comprehensive remain comprehensive, and that schools are as inclusive as possible.

[Mr Rob Wilson (Reading East) (Con)]

What can my right hon. Friend do to ensure that free schools can be set up quickly and easily in places such as Reading, where they will prove very popular indeed?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his question. I know how committed he is to improving education in Reading and elsewhere. We are ensuring that we reform the building regulations that hold schools back at the moment. Under the previous Government, we saw the absurdity of schools having to measure the distance between cycle racks before they could go ahead with construction; unless that was between 600 mm and 1 metre, the school could not be built. It is that sort of absurd, pettifogging, centralising bureaucracy that we need to sweep away so that money goes where it needs to go—towards the front line and towards children in Reading and elsewhere.

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

If the funding for academies and free schools is to come from the cancellation of low-priority IT schemes, does that mean that the Secretary of State is firmly committed to the Building Schools for the Future programmes and other financial support that was promised in my constituency to tackle the shortage of school places that exists, not only in primary and secondary schools?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady. I know that in Camden, the Conservative and Liberal Democrat-led council has been working incredibly hard to ensure that there are sufficient school places. I am grateful to her for her support for that programme, and to University College London for doing so much to help to support an academy. We are doing everything we can to ensure that we guarantee school places for children in Camden.

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

Will the Secretary of State apply a wider interest or public interest test when considering applications for free schools, and can he guarantee that he will give due consideration to local authorities’ views, whether they be favourable or unfavourable?

[Michael Gove]

Yes, and yes.

[Mr Tom Watson (West Bromwich East) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for announcing the number of schools that have expressed an interest in the project. Will he publish the list of schools so that we can see what the national picture is, and will he explain why not, if there is a problem with doing that?

[Michael Gove]

I am talking to all those schools now to ensure that we can all have as much information as possible about those that have expressed an interest, so that we can celebrate their moves towards greater independence.

[Nadhim Zahawi (Stratford-on-Avon) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend tell us what discussions he has been having with teachers? I believe that it was teachers who were the driving force behind the charter school movement in America.

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. One of the most heartening things has been the enthusiasm that teachers have shown for our extension of academy freedoms. Just last Friday I was talking to Jodie King, an inspirational assistant head teacher in Ealing who wants to set up a free school, and I have spoken to the Sutton Trust, which represents the interests of teachers who are keen to promote social mobility, and which wants to see free schools established.

I have talked to Mr Heath Monk, the head of Future Leaders, the programme that has done more than any other to encourage great young people to become head teachers, and found that it wants its alumni to support the extension of the free schools programme. I was also able to talk to Brett Wigdortz and a number of Teach First alumni, all of whom want to join in extending the free schools programme. That is all on top of the more than 2,000 head teachers to whom I spoke at the conference of the National College for Leadership of Schools and Children’s Services last week, who gave me a cordial response.

[Phil Wilson (Sedgefield) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State tell me how many free schools he anticipates will open in converted shops?

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

I hope that the schools will be set up in a variety of new buildings—[Interruption]—and in some old buildings as well. If we examine what has happened in Sweden, for example, we see that many new schools have opened in libraries, disused university buildings and observatories. They are model buildings, but I am sure we all agree that the most important thing about education is the quality of teaching and learning. That is why the enthusiasm of the teaching profession for the changes that we are making is so hot.

[Charlotte Leslie (Bristol North West) (Con)]

Could my right hon. Friend tell me what measures he will take to prevent the loss of land usable for education and schools, which we have seen over the past decade, so that free schools can be set up on the land of schools that have closed down?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. We are taking steps to ensure that D1 land, on which schools are built, remains there for school buildings and is not used for commercial reasons.

[Angela Smith (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Lab)]

Can the Secretary of State reassure the House that he will not at any time during the course of this Parliament use financial or political pressure to push schools into applying for free school status?

[Michael Gove]

I absolutely can. The legislation will be permissive, which is why it is so important that we rely on the enthusiasm and idealism of teachers to push it forward.

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

I used to be an education barrister, and my last case, in March 2010, was on behalf of the then Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families. It was probably his last ever success.

Does the Secretary of State see a place for rural schools in Northumberland receiving proper funding in future, as they have been underfunded for so very long?

[Michael Gove]

The right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood was lucky to have had such an effective brief to act on his behalf.

I appreciate that in Northumberland, as my hon. Friend and my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith) have pointed out, there are real problems with the state of the fabric of school buildings. One problem that we had with the Building Schools for the Future programme in the past was that far too often money did not reach the front line with sufficient speed. Local authorities had to spend an average of £7 million each before a single brick was laid or builder contracted. That degree of waste and bureaucracy was scandalous, and we will end it.

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give us an assurance that when a successful primary or secondary school wishes to pursue Government policies, the Government will support it even if the local authority decides not to do so for ideological or other reasons?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s support. We will do everything possible to support teachers, just as I know she would wish.

[Mr Don Foster (Bath) (LD)]

Given the Secretary of State’s very welcome assurance that before a free school or an academy is agreed to, the wider public interest test and the views of the local education authority will be considered, does he believe that in addition there may be a role for the schools adjudicators to evaluate areas of concern?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his point. I know that he, as someone who used to lead for the Liberal Democrats on education, is particularly concerned about the impact of changes on his area of Bath and North East Somerset. We have had fruitful conversations about the position in that local authority, and I hope that we will continue to have such constructive conversations.

[Mike Gapes (Ilford South) (Lab/Co-op)]

Can the Secretary of State tell us the position of the national curriculum in those so-called free schools? Do the proposals mean that religious extremists will receive state funding to carry out education not in accordance with the national curriculum?

[Michael Gove]

I share the hon. Gentleman’s commitment to fighting extremism in all its forms, and I pay tribute to the role that he has played, both as a constituency MP and on the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, in drawing attention to the dangers of extremism. He will be aware that as an Opposition Member, I was insistent that we do not give public money to extremist groups. That is why I have said that no school can be established unless the individuals who are setting it up do so with an ethos and curriculum that are in accordance with the democratic values of this country. More than that, we will operate according to the principles that were laid out in the Policy Exchange report, “Choosing our friends wisely”, which was endorsed by the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears), as a means of ensuring that not only violent extremists, but extremist groups, do not receive public funds and are unable to exploit the generosity of the state.

[Claire Perry (Devizes) (Con)]

Will the Secretary of State confirm that one of the first applications he received for new academy status was from the outstanding St John’s comprehensive school in Marlborough, which has just had an enormous, £25 million rebuild without a penny of Government money? Does he agree that the model it is proposing of a rural federation, whereby it has a suite of primary schools, is incredibly important in large rural constituencies?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend hits the nail on the head, as ever. It is critical that people realise that outstanding schools are going on the journey to acquiring greater academy freedoms in order to help other schools. That may mean underperforming primaries, or nearby faltering or coasting schools, and the example of St John’s, Marlborough, and everything it has done, is inspirational.

[Jonathan Reynolds (Stalybridge and Hyde) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the Secretary of State tell us why he is going to give £500,000 to the New Schools Network, an organisation run by his former special adviser?

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

I am giving that money to the New Schools Network because it is the organisation that is best placed to carry forward our programme of ensuring that we provide support. May I say that I am proud of the fact that the New Schools Network has among its trustees Geoffrey Owen, the former editor of the Financial Times—and a former employer of the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood. If Geoffrey Owen’s judgment is deficient in any regard, I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will tell me all about it.

[Chris Skidmore (Kingswood) (Con)]

In the United States, one of the greatest champions of greater school freedoms is President Obama. Can the Secretary of State tell us about the successes of the charter schools movement in the US, particularly in New York?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend is passionately committed to improving the education of the very poorest, and therefore I am sure he will be interested to know that in New York, charter schools, including the Knowledge is Power Program charter schools, have closed the attainment gap between children from African-American and white backgrounds, and that the Harlem Children’s Zone, an inspirational project led by Roland Fryer, has ensured that the gap in attainment between the very poorest ghetto children and white children in New York has been closed successfully. For those who argue that charter schools, academies or free schools cream, skim and select only the most aspirational or talented, the work of Caroline Hoxby and other academics proves that such schools recruit the very poorest children and then ensure that they go to the very best universities. That is an inspirational model that I hope to see established here.

[Liz Kendall (Leicester West) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give some reassurance to Babington college in my constituency, which I visited on Friday, and which has just become a national challenge trust school? As part of the bid to become such a school, it was promised money to provide extra one-on-one tuition, which is beginning to make a real difference in one of the most challenging and deprived parts of my constituency. Will he reassure that school that it will get that funding so that it can provide the necessary tuition?

[Michael Gove]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on being elected as secretary of the Labour party’s Back-Bench education committee. May I extend an invitation to her and other members of the committee to come to the Department, so that we can talk not just about the issues in Babington, but more broadly? We want to ensure that national challenge trust schools and those schools that have been in difficulty continue to receive funding and, more importantly, that they continue to receive the support that they need from national leaders of education, in order to drive up standards.

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

As we move forward on the innovative free schools idea, can we have an assurance that their responsibilities towards excluded children will be exactly the same as those of any other school in the state system?

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend is a former teacher, and a brilliant one at that. We will ensure that all academies continue to abide by the same rules on admissions, hard-to-place children and exclusions that apply to all state schools.

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State knows that I have spent the past five years trying to persuade the councils responsible for Dudley school to transform standards by introducing academies and producing a decent bid for Building Schools for the Future. Before the election I was promised that the Department had funds available if the councils were able to produce a decent bid. Does that promise still stand?

[Michael Gove]

I know how passionate the hon. Gentleman, who is the son of a head teacher, is about ensuring that that school moves towards achieving academy status, and he knows how keen I am on academy status. I suggest that he come into the Department, so that we can talk about exactly how we can advance that programme.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

There is a desperate shortage in some of the schools in my constituency. In particular, the other day I met a Navy wife, like myself, who has five kids who go to four separate schools, which must be an absolute nightmare logistically. Will the Secretary of State give more details about the planning changes that will be made to ensure that schools can set up quickly and easily to meet parental demand?

[Michael Gove]

I am hugely sympathetic to my hon. Friend. The number of children born in the past few years has risen dramatically, and as a result of that welcome baby boom, there is pressure on school places across the country—in Slough, in south and west London, and in Hampshire, too. We will ensure that we remove some of the obstacles that exist with regard to the use class order system so that buildings that can be transferred to school use are transferred more quickly. We will also change some of the onerous building regulations that currently inhibit the effective use of handsome buildings that could be brilliant schools.

[Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State explained earlier that the free-market schools programme was going to be paid for by savings from lower priority IT programmes, and he seemed to indicate that he had an idea of how much they would cost. Can he therefore tell the House what the budget will be in this financial year for that venture?

[Michael Gove]

Yes, we are devoting £50 million from the harnessing technology fund from lower-level IT projects, in order to recreate the fund that was set up by Tony Blair—the standards and diversity fund—which was abolished under the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown). I know that the hon. Gentleman was a keen Blairite before he became the previous Prime Minister’s campaign manager. Let me say to him that his earlier allegiance to standards and diversity is now being upheld by this coalition Government.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

Oral Answers to Questions

Michael Gove Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Dr John Pugh (Southport) (LD)]

2. If he will publish each representation his Department has received from (a) head teachers and (b) associations representing head teachers in favour of greater autonomy for schools.

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

My Department has received more than 1,100 expressions of interest from schools in relation to my offer to open up the academies programme to all primary, secondary and special schools.

[Dr Pugh]

I am grateful for that brief answer, but perhaps the Secretary of State will acknowledge, in these days of evidence-led policy, that there is limited evidence of schools demanding freedom from local authorities, as opposed to freedom from central Government tinkering. Also, the majority of schools targeted to become the new academies became “outstanding” schools within the local authority family. Finally, it is rather hard to become better than outstanding.

[Michael Gove]

Evidence shows that academy freedoms have a key role to play in driving up standards, and that academy schools have improved their academic results at twice the rate of other schools as a result of using those freedoms. Moreover, the specific freedoms that an overwhelming number of head teachers wish to acquire will be used not only to improve the education of children in those schools, but to help other schools which desperately need freedom from local and central bureaucracy in order to drive up standards for all.

[Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)]

I believe that the principle of autonomy will be supported in schools throughout the country, but how would the Secretary of State balance it with the need for fairness in terms of funding and admissions? In particular, what role does he see for local authorities under the new regime?

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Gentleman was a distinguished Minister for School Standards in the last Government. He will know that academies will have to abide by the admissions code, and that admissions will therefore be fair. He will also know that academies will not enjoy preferential funding, and that we are absolutely committed to ensuring that local authorities continue to play a strong strategic role. I was delighted to be able to write to the Local Government Association to affirm my commitment to working with it in order to achieve that.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

I am sure the Secretary of State will know that there are some excellent schools in my constituency, but there is also a fast-growing need for more school places at both primary and secondary level. Does he agree that Toby Young’s excellent and well documented campaign for a new free academy school in Acton deserves the fullest support at all levels?

[Michael Gove]

Thanks to my hon. Friend’s impassioned advocacy, I have been able to visit some of the superb schools in Ealing, and I know that they are currently led by a wonderful team of head teachers. I also know, however, that throughout west and south London there are increasing pressures on pupil numbers, and I therefore welcome expressions of interest from everyone who is dedicated to improving state education and creating new comprehensive school provision.

The gentleman whom my hon. Friend mentioned, Mr Toby Young, is one of the most fluent advocates of opening up the supply of state education. I note that the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls) said that he welcomed Mr Young’s proposal, and that he hoped to be present to open the school in due course. I hope to join him then.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

3. What plans he has for the Building Schools for the Future programme.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

5. What recent discussions he has had with local authorities on plans for the Building Schools for the Future programme.

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

My Department is currently reviewing the Building Schools for the Future programme to ensure that we can build schools more effectively and more cost-efficiently in the future.

[Bill Esterson]

Cancelling Building Schools for the Future would hit two schools in my constituency, Crosby and Chesterfield high schools. Does the Secretary of State agree that it would also damage the recovery by taking much-needed work away from construction workers and small businesses?

[Michael Gove]

I welcome the hon. Gentleman to the House.

I intend to ensure that we prioritise capital spending to ensure that in areas of real need, the taxpayer and teachers are given better value for money. The hon. Gentleman will be aware that under the last Government a significant amount of the cash that was devoted to Building Schools for the Future was spent on consultancy and other costs, which did not contribute directly to raising standards or to employing a single builder or plasterer, or anyone else whom he would no doubt wish to continue to see employed. I therefore hope that he will work with me to ensure that, in Sefton and elsewhere, we do everything possible to ensure that we obtain better value for money from this programme.

[Alex Cunningham]

The Secretary of State must be aware of the considerable anxiety in communities about the fact that their new secondary school programme remains very much in doubt. Some £5 million has been invested by Stockton borough council and partners, and they are hurtling towards appointing a preferred bidder. Will the Secretary of State please assure the people of my constituency, who have not had a new secondary school for 40 years, that children in our area can still look forward to their new and redeveloped schools?

[Michael Gove]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question, and welcome him to his place.

I know that in Stockton there are real areas of need and deprivation, and I know that the hon. Gentleman will raise his voice on their behalf. I also know that Stockton has reached the outline business case stage of the Building Schools for the Future programme, and that a significant amount has been invested—more, perhaps, than needed to be invested, because of the additional bureaucracy. I intend to ensure in future that the costs faced either by Stockton or by any other local authority are reduced to the absolute minimum, so that we can prioritise front-line funding.

[Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)]

Is the Secretary of State aware that Building Schools for the Future did not provide properly for schools that perform well but have buildings in a disgraceful state, such as the Duchess’s community high school in Alnwick, and can he offer any hope to schools in that position, whose record of good results impairs their ability to get buildings they desperately need?

[Michael Gove]

My right hon. Friend makes a very good point. The aim of Building Schools for the Future was to ensure that funding is prioritised for areas of need, and understandably so, but it is also the case that Building Schools for the Future amounts to less than half the total available schools capital, and there are funds available to repair schools such as the Duchess’s high school in Alnwick, which I and the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb), have visited, and which, having visited, I know are in need of repair. I will look sympathetically on the case my right hon. Friend makes, and I hope that I or one of my ministerial colleagues will have a chance to visit Alnwick soon to see for ourselves how the school is coping.

[Ed Balls (Morley and Outwood) (Lab/Co-op)]

I wrote to the Secretary of State last night to request that, two weeks on from the Treasury announcement, he give this House details of the £670 million of departmental cuts and the £1.2 billion of local government cuts he has announced. Twenty minutes before questions, I received an answer. That answer gives no reassurance at all to the hundreds of schools whose new building plans appear to be in limbo—and I must say that this is no way to make announcements to the House of Commons. In that letter, the right hon. Gentleman does confirm that he is cutting free school meals in primary schools, one-to-one tuition and the gifted and talented programme, but there are no details at all of how cuts to local government budgets will affect children’s services, including services for looked-after children and disabled children, youth clubs and action to reduce teenage pregnancy. Can the right hon. Gentleman confirm whether he was advised that by agreeing to smaller central Government savings than his Department’s equal share, he has knowingly shifted the burden to bigger and more damaging cuts for essential children’s services financed by local governments: yes or no?

[Michael Gove]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for avoiding the Labour leadership hustings in Southport and instead making his presence felt here today. I am afraid, however, that the points he made were, perhaps unintentionally, at variance with the facts. We are not stopping anyone who currently receives free school meals receiving free school meals. We are ensuring that funding is in place to cover the areas he mentioned. What we are specifically doing is cutting £359 million from a variety of budget areas that, in our judgment, are not priority and front-line areas. Details are in the letter I sent to the right hon. Gentleman, a copy of which will be available in the Library. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, we are not cutting front-line spending on schools, but before the general election he promised to cut 3,000 head teachers or deputy head teachers. Not a single front-line job is lost as a result of the economies the current Government have made. That is the difference between us.

[Ed Balls]

I showed the House the courtesy of coming to questions rather than going to a GMB conference, and I think the right hon. Gentleman should have shown the House the courtesy of making his cuts announcement in a written ministerial statement or oral statement to this House, in which he made it clear that children across the country in the pilot areas will be losing the free school meals that we announced some weeks ago.

Let me ask the right hon. Gentleman a second question, however, as we got no answer to the first. Last Wednesday, the Prime Minister told the House that the pupil premium will be additional to the education budget. In the formal post-election coalition talks, the right hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr Laws) and Chief Secretary told me that the Conservative party had promised the Liberal Democrats that the pupil premium would be on top of our announced spending plans not for one year but for three years, yet the Secretary of State told the House last week that his budget was protected for only one year. Who is telling the truth on education spending: the Secretary of State or the Chief Secretary to the Treasury?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for revealing what went on in those coalition talks between himself and the Liberal Democrats. Those talks were clearly a roaring success, and I am surprised that his recollection is so perfect in that area when it is hazy in so many others. Let me reassure him that funding for the pupil premium—so effectively championed by the right hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr Laws), and so effectively carried forward by the Minister of State, the hon. Member for Brent Central (Sarah Teather)—will come from outside existing education spending. As the Prime Minister pointed out at Prime Minister’s questions last week, we have not cut front-line spending, but the right hon. Gentleman would have. That is the difference between the Government and the Opposition.

[Mr Mark Spencer (Sherwood) (Con)]

4. What plans he has for the Building Schools for the Future programme in Nottinghamshire; and if he will make a statement.

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

This Department is reviewing the Building Schools for the Future programme to ensure that when we build schools for the future, we do so in a more cost-effective and efficient fashion.

[Mr Spencer]

Will the Secretary of State take the opportunity at some point to visit Sherwood? There are two schools specifically affected by this programme: Dukeries college in Ollerton, and Joseph Whitaker college in Rainworth. Is the Secretary of State aware that Nottinghamshire county council has spent £5 million on this scheme without a single brick being laid? What we really want is an indication of the time scale, so those schools can make plans for their future.

[Michael Gove]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question; if he continues asking great questions like that, he will very shortly be my right hon. Friend. I do sympathise with him—both Dukeries college and Joseph Whitaker college do a fantastic job for the young people in their care, and they are very fortunate to have him as an impassioned champion on their behalf. I am actively reviewing how we can ensure that the maximum amount of money goes to schools, and as he rightly points out, it is quite wrong that local authorities should have to spend so much money on bureaucracy before a single brick is laid or a single contractor is engaged. It is quite wrong that a bureaucratic system put in place under the previous Government should prevent money from going where it deserves to go—to the front line, so that all our children can be better educated.

[Christopher Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)]

There is a lot of concern in Nottingham about the right hon. Gentleman’s “review” of Building Schools for the Future. Can he get rid of some of that uncertainty by saying specifically by what date that review will be over, particularly of wave 5? Will it be in the next week, in two weeks, in three weeks—can he give us a date?

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Gentleman is of course a former Minister, and talking of dates, I would love to have a date with him so that we can discuss exactly how poorly Nottinghamshire was being treated by the last Government, and the fact that Nottinghamshire has just reached its outline business case—[Hon. Members: “When?”] I hope to have the opportunity very soon to explain to the hon. Gentleman and others exactly when the review I am conducting is being concluded.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

6. What progress has been made on the academies programme in the last 12 months; and if he will make a statement.

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[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

11. What recent assessment he has made of progress on the academies programme; and if he will make a statement.

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

There are currently 203 academies open in 83 local authorities. Academies with results in 2008 and 2009 showed an increase in the proportion of pupils achieving at least five A to C GCSEs, including English and maths, at 5 percentage points—an increase on last year’s academy improvement rate of 4.3 percentage points. That was, of course, double the national increase. Interest from schools in joining the academies programme has been excellent: as I mentioned earlier, more than 1,100 schools have already registered interest with my Department.

[Amber Rudd]

I know that the Secretary of State is aware that in Hastings we have two new academies scheduled for next year. We are very pleased to have two very important sponsors—Brighton university and BT. May I ask what plans he has, and what steps can be taken, to encourage a high quality of sponsors to participate in the academies?

[Michael Gove]

I thank my hon. Friend for her impassioned advocacy for improving educational opportunities for children in her constituency. I had a chance to see just how dedicated she is to supporting them when I visited her constituency during the general election campaign.

Those who wish to sponsor academies have repeatedly said to me, in opposition and in government, that the bureaucratic burdens laid on them by the previous Government acted as an impediment to their doing the work they wanted to do to help children in disadvantaged areas. The Independent Academies Association, under Mike Butler, wrote to a Minister of State in the previous Government and pointed out that the work he was trying to do to help disadvantaged children was directly impeded by the bureaucratic burden imposed on him by the then Secretary of State. I am confident that an increasing number of sponsors, philanthropists, charities and others who want to help our poorest children will find that the changes we are bringing about enable them to do a fantastic job, not just in Hastings but across the country.

[John Howell]

I congratulate the Secretary of State on his plans to revitalise the academies scheme. A great number of schools are looking forward to embracing the academies freedoms that will come with it, including the European school in Culham in my constituency, which is seeking to use its specialist multi-language curriculum for the benefit of the state sector. What plans does he have to make sure that more children have such excellent language education?

[Michael Gove]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for those words. I am also much in accord with him in believing that this Government should have a place at the heart of Europe. That is why I was so disappointed to read in The Observer yesterday that the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls) wanted to rewrite the treaty of Lisbon and the treaty of Rome.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Let me just say to the Secretary of State that I know he is enjoying himself, and I am delighted to see him enjoying himself, but he must not enjoy himself at the expense of people lower down the Order Paper who want to get in and whom I want to accommodate.

[Michael Gove]

I will do everything possible to ensure that other schools, like the European school, that are committed to increasing our understanding of the rest of the world, prosper.

[Hazel Blears (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

I know that the Secretary of State will want to be known as a Minister who keeps his word and who is consistent in his policy. Will he therefore confirm that the brand new academy linked to MediaCity in Salford, which is included in the £135 million Building Schools for the Future programme, will go ahead? Those programmes have got to financial close, and if he were not to proceed with that world-class academy it would give the lie to his party’s commitment to progress on the whole of the academies programme across the country.

[Michael Gove]

It is a pleasure to see the right hon. Lady in her place. If that programme has reached financial close, then I look forward to being able to visit it in due course with her.

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

Under the Academies Bill, the sole arbiter of applications for academies is the governing body. Will the Secretary of State ensure that the wider community has an interest in this matter? Not only the governing body should be included, but parents, local authorities and the wider community so that it understands the needs of the many and not just the few.

[Michael Gove]

It is because I am committed to the needs of the many and not just the few that I want to see this programme, which has done so much to raise attainment for disadvantaged children, move forward. I would like to see governors and head teachers working with other schools and other groups within the community to drive up attainment. That is why those who currently lead our schools will, I know, have those conversations. I prefer to give them the freedom to do so rather than to patronise and to busybody by insisting that they do so.

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

May I ask the Secretary of State whether the academies programme will continue to provide an alternative route to accessing funds for new school buildings? I am thinking in particular of Withernsea high school in my constituency. I wonder whether he or the Minister with responsibility for schools might be able to visit Withernsea, see the school and see how it might benefit from joining the academies programme in future.

[Michael Gove]

It is always a pleasure to visit my hon. Friend’s constituency and my ministerial colleague or I will look forward to doing so in due course.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

9. How much funding he plans to allocate to (a) Slough borough council and (b) other local authorities where there are insufficient primary school places in order to increase the number of such places available in the current financial year; and if he will make a statement.

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[Tony Lloyd (Manchester Central) (Lab)]

12. What his Department’s priorities will be in allocating funding for new school building.

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

I am currently reviewing the methods by which capital has been allocated to schools, to ensure that we can build schools more effectively and cost-efficiently in the future.

[Tony Lloyd]

I thank the Secretary of State for his answer. During the period of the last Labour Government, many roofs were repaired—when the sun was shining. Can he give an absolute guarantee that schools in a constituency such as mine, which were not part of that programme but still need some catching up, will be rebuilt or properly maintained?

[Michael Gove]

I know that the hon. Gentleman has a number of great schools in his constituency that have benefited from investment, not least Manchester academy, which is achieving outstanding results. Manchester is approaching the conclusion of its final business case for specific funding under the Building Schools for the Future programme. I want to make sure that before we go any further we strip out any bureaucratic costs with which either Manchester’s council tax payers or Manchester’s teachers might be saddled to ensure that we get the maximum amount of spending to the front line.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

May I thank my right hon. Friend for his commitment in general to driving up education standards across the country and in particular for his commitment, I hope, to the new academy to be formed by the merger of Central Technology college and Bishops’ college in my constituency of Gloucester? As he knows the timing insisted on by his predecessor on the other side of the House was incredibly tight and caused the academy to be formed in late July and to open next term. Parents, staff and pupils are all desperate for further information on progress that I understand depends on my right hon. Friend’s Department’s confirming absolutely that the academy is going ahead. Could he confirm that his Department will help with announcements—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman.

[Michael Gove]

I know how keen my hon. Friend is to make progress, as am I, so I shall be giving him an answer very shortly.

[Mr Geoffrey Robinson (Coventry North West) (Lab)]

Will the Minister confirm as soon as possible that two schools in my constituency—President Kennedy and Woodlands, where the buildings go right back to the late 1960s and early 1970s and one of whose buildings is being held up on all four sides by scaffolding—will figure in the programme, and when can he confirm that to them?

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Gentleman will be aware that funding under the Building Schools for the Future programme had been allocated on the basis of deprivation, not the state or dilapidation of the building. I will consider the two schools that he mentions and write to him.

[Mr Rob Wilson (Reading East) (Con)]

14. What plans he has for the operation of the pupil premium.

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[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

15. What recent discussions he has had with local authorities on the Building Schools for the Future programme.

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

As I mentioned earlier, we are currently reviewing the methods by which capital has been allocated.

[Heidi Alexander]

I thank the Secretary of State for his answers on the BSF programme, but I am afraid that I am still not clear on the detail. As a former director of Lewisham’s local education partnership, I should be grateful to him if he confirmed whether the funding commitments that underpin the strategic partnering agreements between local authorities and their private sector partners will be honoured. Lewisham council would be grateful for any reassurance that he could provide.

[Michael Gove]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on her election, and she is fortunate to have many excellent schools in her constituency, including Haberdashers’ Aske’s Hatcham, which I have had the great pleasure of visiting. Lewisham was one of the first local authorities to enter Building Schools for the Future. A number of schools have been built already under BSF, and because Lewisham is so far advanced, I cannot conceive of any changes to the BSF programme that would be likely to impact on the many projects that she will have shepherded towards a close.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

16. Which grants to local authorities for children’s services and youth services will continue to be ring-fenced.

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[Elizabeth Truss (South West Norfolk) (Con)]

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

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

I thank my hon. Friend for her question. I have today placed a letter in the House of Commons Library detailing how the £670 million of spending reductions in my Department will be implemented. There will be reductions of £359 million in a variety of programmes, including the ending of “Who Do We Think We Are?” week, which started under my predecessor. Given his article in The Observer yesterday, in which he sought to win his party’s leadership by outflanking the leader of the Conservative party on both immigration and Euroscepticism—something not done since Enoch Powell was a Member of the House—I hope that those cuts will be of interest to the House.

I am also today lifting restrictions that have stopped state schools offering the international general certificate of secondary education qualification in key subjects. That means that, from September, state-funded schools will be free to teach a wide range of those respected and valued qualifications, putting them, at last, on a level playing field with independent schools.

[Mr Speaker]

I am sorry to tell the Secretary of State that his answer was too long, but I know that he will not repeat it at Question Time next month.

[Michael Gove]

I know how committed my hon. Friend is to raising standards in schools. The right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls) will be aware that Ofqual recently pointed out that some of the changes to the science curriculum had downgraded the importance of rigour, and the right hon. Gentleman and my hon. Friend will be aware that the Royal Society of Chemistry said that recent changes to the science curriculum had been a catastrophe. We will make sure that the finest minds in the country of all parties are invited to join us in reshaping the curriculum.

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

T4. The ContactPoint database that was championed by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children and Barnardo’s is to be scrapped. What assessment has been made of the impact that the removal will have on safeguarding children?

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

T2. Does the Secretary of State agree that whether or not Building Schools for the Future continues in its present form, schools such as Carshalton Girls, Carshalton Boys and Wandle Valley will still need substantial investment—about £70 million—to help them improve buildings and deal with demographic pressures?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I know that in parts of south London, including those that he represents, demographic pressures are a real concern. One of the reasons that we are reviewing the allocation of school capital is to ensure that every pupil who needs it gets a school place. That was not true under the previous Government.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

T8. I am sure the Secretary of State will know of the considerable success that we have had in my constituency, Wigan, in creating apprenticeships, jobs and university places for young people. Can he tell us what measures he will introduce to help young people who are not in education, employment or training?

[Michael Gove]

We will increase the number of apprenticeships. I am pleased to see that the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes), who has responsibility for apprenticeships, is in his place. We will increase the number of apprenticeships by reallocating funding that is currently going on the Train to Gain programme, and we are increasing spending for further education colleges, which—given what happened to the Learning and Skills Council under the previous Government, when building projects were cancelled halfway through and young people who deserved to be in education and training were denied training places—will at last ensure that we give young people the chance that they deserve.

[Amber Rudd (Hastings and Rye) (Con)]

T3. I have received a number of inquiries, as I am sure other Members have, from teachers who would like to get involved in starting up free schools but are concerned about confidentiality issues. Can my right hon. Friend advise where they should go to find out more about how to go about setting up free schools without revealing too much about their personal details?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for asking that question. She will be aware, as I am sure are Members on the Opposition Benches, that some of the finest schools in the world, such as the Knowledge Is Power Program schools in America, were set up by teachers, and those teachers would not have been able to set up schools anything like as good under the regime that prevailed under the previous Government. I recommend that anyone my hon. Friend knows who wants to get involved in improving state education contact the New Schools Network, a not-for-profit charity organisation dedicated to improving state schools.

[Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

T9. What provisions will the Secretary of State make in the Academies Bill to safeguard the interests of parents of children with special educational needs or hard to place and other children with specific and complex needs, such as the children currently supported by EDPIP, the East Durham positive inclusion partnership in Easington in my constituency?

[Michael Gove]

The interests of all children with special educational needs, particularly those who have the most acute disabilities, are at the heart of my thoughts and those of my ministerial colleagues. That is why we are reviewing the whole provision of special needs education, so that we can ensure that whether children are in academies, voluntary aided schools or other local authority schools, they have the highest possible level of support and nurture so that they can achieve everything possible.

[Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)]

T5. The Secretary of State will know that there are some excellent schools in Stroud. He has visited one of them, Amberley school. What provision, guidance or support will there be for schools that want to become academies which are not so good and are struggling, but see a future for themselves as academies?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend has been a fantastic champion of both schools and further education. We will make sure that schools that are in real difficulty are teamed with an education sponsor with a track record of excellence in order to improve circumstances. We will ensure that schools that aspire to become academies but are not yet in a strong enough position are teamed with people who can help them achieve their ambitions for all their children.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

T10. The safeguarding of our children and young people, which is of paramount importance, has received an unprecedented profile in recent times—but for the wrong reasons. What are the Secretary of State’s plans for supporting local authorities and social workers in that crucial work, and for ensuring that all our children and young people are protected?

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[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Secretary of State agree that the CPD—continuing professional development—of teachers is absolutely essential, particularly in science and maths? Is he aware that the fine centre at the university of York, where teachers can go for CPD, and the nine other centres are being starved of visiting teachers because of the interpretation of the “Rarely Cover” work force agreement? The unions interpret it so strictly that we will not be able to maintain those centres.

[Michael Gove]

As ever, the former Select Committee Chairman makes a brilliant point. He is quite right: John Holman’s work in York is outstanding and we should do everything that we can to support it. I note the split between the enlightened voice of Opposition Back Benchers, challenging what the unions say, and the position of Opposition Front Benchers, who will do everything possible to ingratiate themselves with organisations such as Unite, including indulging in anti-immigration rhetoric.

[Mr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)]

T7. Many schools in my constituency find it necessary to implement personal security measures, paid for by parental contributions and budget delegations. How do the coalition Government intend to address the future cost of the capital and revenue for security funding in such schools?

[Michael Gove]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend and congratulate him on his election. Both he and his predecessor have been impassioned champions for the interests of the Jewish community and other faith communities in the London borough of Barnet, and I am deeply concerned that parents of Jewish children have to pay out of their own pocket to ensure that their children are safe in school. It seems to me quite wrong that, simply because of the faith or community from which a child comes, their parents should have to pay extra to ensure that they are safe. That is why I have asked for talks with the Community Security Trust and the Board of Deputies of British Jews—to ensure that we can do everything possible to safeguard those children.

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

I think that I have discovered why the Secretary of State was so disparaging about the recipe book that the previous Government produced, which as you will recall, Mr Speaker, included recipes for proper English food, such as Lancashire hotpot and cottage pie. The right hon. Gentleman might not have heard of those, because I understand from The Times this morning that his favourite meal is something called “scaloppine with parmentier potatoes”. I am afraid that we cannot get that in Dudley, so I asked somebody more familiar than myself with the fancy foreign food available in expensive London restaurants, and apparently it is veal. Is that what the pupils of Britain can look forward to eating now that the Notting Hill elite are running the Government?

[Michael Gove]

I am enormously grateful to the hon. Gentleman for paying such close attention to my wife’s column in The Times. I should point out that the issue is not about fancy London restaurants; I do not have time to eat in them. The dish is cooked by my wife, and, if he and his wife would like to come round for dinner, scaloppine will be on the menu. I shall make sure that I have some Banks’s Mild, as I know that it is his favourite tipple, and we will have an opportunity to discuss together how I can help the black country.

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

What plans does the Secretary of State have for the process of revising the funding formula for local authorities? I represent two local authorities, both of which are in the lowest 40 authorities for educational revenue funding.

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising her concerns on behalf of the F40 local authorities. It is our intention to try to ensure, consistent with making provision for the very poorest children, that all local authorities, including those that have been most disadvantaged, have fairer funding.

[Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)]

Stoke-on-Trent was in phase 1 of the Building Schools for the Future programme, and my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Labour Front Bench will know full well the number of times that I have raised this issue. We were within a hair’s breadth of securing the BSF programme—there was just the issue of the 20:20 academy to be resolved. May I urge the Secretary of State to look carefully at the situation in Stoke-on-Trent and to try to give us some certainty about ensuring that we get the much-needed and much-deserved BSF programme through?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. His colleague, the newly elected hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt), recently said on Radio 4 that he wanted money available for school buildings to go to Stoke rather than to vanity projects for yummy mummies in west London. I defer to the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central when it comes to knowledge about yummy mummies in west London; however, we have been, and are, looking very sympathetically at the case for specific additional spending in Stoke.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Will any attempt be made to revisit the proposed changes to the nursery grant provision system introduced by the previous Government and due to come in this September, which could have a very bad impact on private nursery provision?

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[Mr Lindsay Hoyle (Chorley) (Lab)]

I am sure that the Secretary of State would like to agree that Sure Start has been a huge success. Can he guarantee not only that the funding will be there for Sure Start but, more importantly, that he will continue to expand the programme on the number of Sure Starts in constituencies?

[Michael Gove]

Yes.

Education and Health

Michael Gove Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd June 2010 Commons Chamber

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

It is a great honour to be asked to speak in support of the Gracious Speech this afternoon. As the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls) will know, there are few greater honours and few more daunting invitations than being asked to lead the Government Department responsible for the country’s schools. I am grateful beyond words for the chance to serve my country in this job.

I am grateful also to have a team alongside me that is distinguished and dedicated to ensuring that every child has a better start in life. I am grateful that my hon. Friends the Members for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb), for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) and for Brent Central (Sarah Teather) have agreed to serve in this partnership Government. I look forward to working with them in the years ahead.

This Gracious Speech contains two education Bills. Those measures will grant more freedom to teachers, give more choice to parents, reduce bureaucracy for all schools and provide additional help for the weakest. They will ensure that standards rise for all children and will specifically target resources on the most disadvantaged, so that we narrow the gap between the rich and the poor.

[Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Michael Gove]

In due course. This is a progressive programme and, as I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) appreciates, it comes from a partnership Government. I know that our programme commands support from hon. Members on both sides of the House. It also owes a great deal in its design to someone I am proud to call a right hon. Friend. Before I say anymore, may I therefore say a few words about my right hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr Laws), who was for three years the Liberal Democrat spokesman on education? During that time I, like the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood, got to know, like and admire my right hon. Friend. In all our dealings, he was unfailingly honest, considerate, thoughtful and principled. He never, ever sought personal advantage, but instead sought at all times to do the right thing, consistent with his principles.

My right hon. Friend always sought to deploy his considerable personal gifts—his intelligence and capacity for hard work—in the service of those who were less fortunate. In particular, he championed the interests of poorer children, making the case for more investment in their education and for more freedom for teachers to close the gap in performance between the poorest and the rest. It is thanks to him more than anyone that a commitment to investing more in the education of the poorest—a pupil premium—is at the heart of this coalition Government’s plans for schools. In securing that reform, he has already secured an achievement in government of which he and his many friends can be proud. It is my profound hope that he will very soon have the chance to serve again, and I am sure the whole House will join me in wishing him well at this time.

Although we might disagree about much, I know that the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood is wholeheartedly in agreement with me on that issue. I pay tribute to him, too, for the work he did in office. He is a pugnacious political operator, as his rivals for the Labour leadership—including the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham)—are about to find out if they do not already know. Having shadowed him for three years, I know that his pugnacity is matched by passion. He came into politics for the right reason: to help the underdog. During his time at the Treasury, although we may have argued with much that he did, it is to his credit that he never forgot to prioritise the fight against child poverty.

During his time as Secretary of State, the right hon. Gentleman secured real achievements. He secured a better deal for children living with disabilities, with more respite care for parents and progress on improving the education of children with special needs. The separation of exam regulation from curriculum design, with the creation of a new regulator, Ofqual, which has the potential to play a part in restoring confidence in exam standards, was a real step forward. He also showed real leadership on child protection, with swift action in the aftermath of the terrible tragedy of baby Peter Connelly’s death. The right hon. Gentleman also took constructive steps to help social workers in the vital task that they perform. The coalition Government will build on his initiative in this area, in particular taking forward the recommendations of the social work task force.

I also thank the right hon. Gentleman for the robust way in which he made the case for the continuation of key stage 2 tests to mark and monitor the achievement and attainment of children in primary schools. These are a vital accountability measure, and his robust case for their continuation ensured a consensus across the House for more data, greater parental accountability and a relentless drive for improvement in early years education. We are all in his debt, and I hope that we can maintain that consensus in months to come.

The right hon. Gentleman also always made the case robustly for his Department in budget rounds. He fought with determination, and he was never reticent in letting the Treasury know just how it should discharge its responsibilities towards our schools. That is perhaps why the shadow Chancellor has today come out in favour of the David Miliband leadership campaign.

[David Wright (Telford) (Lab)]

On the subject of negotiations with the Treasury, can the Secretary of State tell us what negotiations he is having about the future of the Building Schools for the Future programme? Four secondary schools in my constituency are waiting for a decision. They badly need to be renewed and rebuilt: will he deliver?

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

We will seek to deliver at every stage. I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman is in his place and that I had the opportunity to visit two superb schools in his constituency, including Madeley school, which has recently been rebuilt. I know that Building Schools for the Future makes a distinguished contribution to ensuring that we renovate and refurbish the schools estate, but I have concerns that under my predecessor the programme was not allocating resources to the front line in the most efficient way. It is critical that we ensure that taxpayers’ money is spent on the front line improving education, and not on consultants, architects or bureaucracy. I am sure the hon. Gentleman will agree that we all have a duty to ensure that money goes to the front line, and I am sure that the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood will agree that we should congratulate the Chancellor and the Treasury on the agreement that was reached in the spending round just concluded. For the remainder of this financial year, we will guarantee that there will be no cuts in front-line funding for schools, Sure Start and sixth forms. I hope that both sides of the House approve of that.

[David Tredinnick (Bosworth) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend is setting out his stall eloquently and is being generous in his remarks. He mentions his discussions with the Treasury. Will he accept that the county of Leicestershire is bottom of the pile when it comes to funding, and will he reconsider the funding formula, as we asked the previous Government to do throughout the last two Parliaments?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes a passionate case, and I know that Leicestershire is one of the F40 local authorities that have had to do a remarkable amount with not enough. I will listen sympathetically to him and to other colleagues from both sides of the House who represent areas that need a fairer funding formula.

[Bob Russell]

Will any revenue and capital funding for the so-called free schools come from existing education budgets?

[Michael Gove]

I know how committed my hon. Friend is to the education of children in Colchester and, indeed, to that of children throughout the country. He will be relieved to learn that we will ensure that front-line funding for existing schools will not be damaged by the reforms that we intend to make.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State confirm that he is aware of some of the successful pilots that have been attempted in recent years to provide free school meals on a universal basis in some of our primary schools? Will he confirm that the educational and health gains that have been seen as a result of those pilots will now be taken forward, and that his Government will commit to continuing the pilots that the previous Government announced?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her question. I know that in her previous incarnation, in the Child Poverty Action Group, she was a committed fighter for the very poorest children. We are now looking to ensure that we can guarantee that those children most in need receive support with free school meals, and we are examining the evidence that has come in from the pilots that she has mentioned.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Can the right hon. Gentleman comment on the closure of BECTA, the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency, and the QCDA, the Qualifications and Curriculum Development Agency, in Coventry, costing probably 600 jobs, and the potential impact not only in Coventry but on education for poorer families? A letter was sent out announcing the closure arbitrarily, so what will happen to those staff?

[Michael Gove]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. He, too, is a dedicated fighter for his constituency, and I know how hard he has fought for the interests of the people of Coventry. However, given the difficult state of the public finances and the situation that we inherited from the Government whom he supported, we have had to make some tough decisions. My judgment was that we had to prioritise spending on the front line. That has meant that those bodies—BECTA and the QCDA, which were responsible for spending money not on the front line, but in an arm’s length way, as quangos—have had to accept that economies are necessary. I have ensured, by writing to those responsible for both organisations, that we handle any redeployment and any redundancy in the most sensitive way possible.

[Ed Balls (Morley and Outwood) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his kind words. Before the interventions started, he confirmed that he had agreed with the Treasury to match the previous plans for spending in the current financial year—2010-11 —for Sure Start, schools and 16-to-19 education. Can he confirm to the House that he has reached a similar agreement with the Chancellor of the Exchequer to match funding for 2011-12 and 2012-13 as well?

[Michael Gove]

The right hon. Gentleman, I am sure with admirable zeal, wants to look into the crystal ball and find out what will happen in future. However, I have to remind him that just six weeks ago, during the general election campaign, he was engaging in his own form of future forecasting. Just six weeks ago, he said that if we took office, there would be 38,000 fewer staff working in our schools, 6,900 fewer teachers in primaries and nurseries, and 7,300 fewer teachers in secondary schools. Those redundancies have not taken place. The Nostradamus of Morley and Outwood was found out. His predictions did not come true. For that reason, I will not enter into any forecasting about what will happen in future years.

What I will say is that unlike the right hon. Gentleman’s Government, we have secured additional funding from outside the education budget, as confirmed by the Prime Minister at this Dispatch Box just an hour ago, in order to fund our pupil premium—something that the right hon. Gentleman was never able to do, but that we have been able to do in partnership—to ensure that funding goes to the very poorest children. I would have hoped that he would find it in himself to show the grace to applaud that achievement for our very poorest children. I would also have hoped that he would applaud the Chancellor for protecting front-line funding for Sure Start, 16-to-19 education and schools.

[Christopher Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State has been talking about protecting front-line spending in education. Can he confirm that that includes important services such as special educational needs provision and school transport, which are of great value to our constituents?

[Michael Gove]

I could not agree more. School transport is covered by the revenue support grant in almost all circumstances and has not been affected. With respect to special educational needs, we are ensuring that the commitment is there to fund the services that our most vulnerable children need.

What I would say to all hon. Gentlemen on the Labour Benches—[Interruption]—and hon. Ladies too—is that in their requests for more spending, however passionately constructed, they should remember one thing. Who were the Government until just a few weeks ago? Who was responsible for the financial situation that we inherited? Who was responsible for writing a letter to the Treasury saying, “There is no money”? None of us in this House wants to see front-line spending on our schools reduced, but none of us on the Government Benches would have wanted the public finances to be reduced to the state that we inherited after the election. As the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) put it, in a rare moment of candour when he left the Treasury, there is no money left. In fact, as the markets are all too aware, there is less than no money left. We are currently spending £163 billion every year more than we take in taxes—

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

[Michael Gove]

And that is thanks to the financial mismanagement of the hon. Lady’s Government.

[Meg Hillier]

In the right hon. Gentleman’s desire to be sensible about money, which we would all want to see, will he think about the extended schools programme? What connections is he making with other Departments? That extension to school hours really helps working parents, and working parents help to tackle child poverty. That should be at the centre of his agenda, and I hope that it is.

[Michael Gove]

I pay tribute to the hon. Lady’s commitment to fighting child poverty, both in her role as a Minister and also, previously, as a member of the Greater London assembly. She will be aware that my Department is working with the Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Communities and Local Government to carry forward the good work that is already in place as a result of the extension of hours, but it is critical to recognise that everything that is happening in and around our schools to support young people is taking place against a backdrop of dire economic news. That backdrop is one that she played a part in constructing when she was a member of the Government who left us with the desperate economic situation in which we find ourselves. Our debt is growing at a rate of more than £300,000 per minute. That money could have been spent on the front line—on our schools, on teachers and on teaching assistants—but it is not being spent in that way, thanks to the profligacy and inefficiency of the Labour Government.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

The right hon. Gentleman might be having a bonfire of the bureaucracies, but will he acknowledge that many of them are not just bureaucracies and that they actually do an important job in education? We still need curriculum development capacity, for example, and we still need technology to be applied in our schools to advance good learning. There is a rumour sweeping through the corridors that he is about to announce the abolition of the General Teaching Council for England. Is that true? What would be the purpose of that?

[Michael Gove]

Lots of teachers are asking what the purpose of the GTCE is; they have been asking that question for years. I must ask the hon. Gentleman to reflect on where the resources should go. Should they go to quangos or to the front line? He listens to teachers, and I listen to teachers. They want resources on the front line, in the classroom, raising attainment; they do not want them spent on the bureaucratic bodies that have for too long siphoned money from where it needs to be spent.

Critically, I know that many hon. Members will want to ask why we are not honouring their commitment to spend £250 on the child trust fund. Let me take that question head on. When the Labour Government left office, they ensured that every single child was paying £23,000 of debt every year in order to deal with our deficit. Why is it progressive politics to saddle children with £23,000 of debt in order to give them a financial product worth just £250? That is not progressive politics; it is Maxwell economics. Instead of seeking to defend its financial mismanagement, the Labour party should apologise to the House and to the next generation for saddling them with a national debt so huge that it undermines our capacity to make progress.

[Stewart Hosie (Dundee East) (SNP)]

The Education Secretary is right about the level of debt that the Labour party left behind: £1 trillion of national debt is a huge amount. However, to use that as a justification for doing away with the child trust fund is wrong. The child trust fund is the only savings product I can think of with a 71% voluntary take-up rate and, given that savings ratios in this country were so low for so long and that the fund goes directly to help children when they leave school, it is a false economy to butcher the scheme, notwithstanding the chaos and mayhem that the Labour party left the economy in.

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Gentleman answers his own question: the Labour party did leave chaos and mayhem, and the tough decisions that it relentlessly avoided now have to be taken. By refusing to state exactly how it would deal with the public spending mess that it left behind, the Labour party is placing itself outside the European mainstream—[Interruption.] In every major European country, including Ireland, Italy, Germany and Spain, steps are being taken to deal with the deficit. The right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood was a noted Eurosceptic, when he was at the Financial Times and when he was at the Treasury. I note that he is now taking a similarly Eurosceptic position by refusing to join the European consensus that we need to deal with our sovereign debt crisis by bringing down public expenditure. The longer the Labour party is in denial, the longer it will consign itself to irrelevance and the longer it will stay in opposition.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for giving way, and I congratulate him. In suggesting that other countries are, to use his words, reducing their sovereign debt, is he not admitting—given that he is the Education Secretary and that he can therefore add up—that the previous Labour Government cannot have been responsible for those countries’ debts? Does he acknowledge that they took action in the same way as our Government did to protect us from a meltdown in the system?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for making the point, as I was arguing, that other countries are taking action now—in this year, even as we speak—to deal with these problems. He stood on a platform, as did the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood, saying that it would be “folly” to take action this year. That view—that action was required this year—was not put forward only by Conservative Members, as it was the view of the Governor of the Bank of England, who backed early action to deal with the deficit. He said that we needed to

“tackle excessive fiscal budget deficits”

and added:

“I am very pleased that there is a very clear and binding commitment to accelerate the reduction in the deficit over the lifetime of the Parliament and to introduce additional measures this fiscal year to demonstrate the importance of getting to grips with that before running the risk of an adverse market reaction.”

How wise were those words and how welcome is such robustness from the Governor of the Bank of England. Indeed, one newspaper columnist has argued:

“That is why Bank of England independence, once a controversial idea, is now accepted across all parties and by both sides of industry.”

The columnist in question is, of course, the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood, writing in the Wakefield Express.

[Ed Balls]

It is a great column!

[Michael Gove]

It is a great column and a great newspaper—never was a truer word said. It is against the backdrop of the terrible fiscal position left us by the previous Government, in which the right hon. Gentleman played such a distinguished part, that we have to make our judgments in this Queen’s Speech.

Hard times require tough choices, and we have chosen to put health and education first, not just in terms of spending, but in terms of reform. Unlike the last Prime Minister, we recognise that investment in the front line has to be matched with trust in the front line. That is why, in both health and education, we will devolve responsibility down—away from Whitehall towards schools and hospitals. Power will be taken out of the hands of politicians and bureaucrats, and placed in the hands of teachers, nurses and doctors.

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

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend and congratulate him on his new post. The single most important way to raise standards in education is to attract, retain and motivate higher calibre people in teaching and school leadership. What steps will the new coalition Government take to make teaching more attractive and to ensure that we increase the motivation and support of teachers?

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend served in a distinguished way on the Select Committee that deals with these matters, and I am sure that he will continue to serve in a distinguished way in the future. He will know that many of the Select Committee’s recommendations chimed with those that we made in opposition, but we need to learn from countries like Finland and Singapore that have succeeded in attracting an ever-more talented group of our graduates into teaching. In fairness to the Government, we have seen over the last 15 years an increase in the number of talented people coming into teaching. We have among the most talented cohort that any of us can remember, but we need to build on it and ensure that organisations outside the reach of Government such as Teach First are given the opportunity to expand; the Government must support them. Unlike the last Government, who refused to fund their expansion to the north-east of England, we will support that expansion while ensuring that the current graduate teacher programme, which is too bureaucratic and puts barriers in the way of those who want to enter teaching, is expanded by turning it into a Teach Now programme. I see from the nods coming from the former Chairman of the Select Committee that he appreciates that there is room for consensus and for constructive work in this area, which unites everyone who is serious about raising teacher quality. [Interruption.]

As well as mentioning the support we enjoy from the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), I should say that it is across the piece of public sector reform that our belief in trusting professionals and attracting more talented people into the front line guides our hand. That is why the Health Secretary has said deliberately that our reforms to the health service will be led in future by clinicians and not by bureaucrats. He has called a halt to the reorganisation of health services promoted by his predecessor, so that we can ensure that every change is driven by professional wisdom and not by bureaucratic convenience. That should mean that in communities across the country, the maternity and A and E services that are cherished by our constituents are protected, because clinicians put their needs first. It is also why my right hon. Friend has ensured that in place of the more than 100 targets insisted on by Ministers in the past, we will have a health care system driven by results, not by processes, by clinical evidence, not political whim, and by patient choice, not top-down diktat.

[Bob Russell]

In the spirit of an holistic approach to education and health, may I ask the Secretary of State to look at early-day motion 25, entitled “Fitness of Children”, before the end of the debate, and may I ask whoever sums up the debate to reflect on it? It clearly states that children who walk or cycle to school are fitter than those who are driven in a car or school bus, but everything that the Secretary of State is proposing is literally driving children out of their communities into cars and buses to travel to schools at the other side of town.

[Michael Gove]

I thank my hon. Friend for another constructive contribution. It is true that as I listened to it, the words “On your bike” passed through my head, but I have to say that I agree with him. It is because I believe in community schools and want them to survive that I believe we should work together to ensure that they are saved from the pressure—whatever it is and from whoever it may come—that may lead communities to be robbed of the schools that they love. One of the aspects of the reform programme that we are proposing, which I hope will commend itself to him and to many of my hon. Friends, is our determination to ensure that small schools, urban or rural, can survive where there is strong parental support for them.

The vision that we have for our education and health reforms is driven by the shared values of this partnership Government. We believe in devolving power to the lowest possible level. We believe that the function of the state is to promote equity, not uniformity; to enable, and not to conscript. We also believe that the power of the state should be deployed vigorously to help the vulnerable and the voiceless, those who lack resources and connections, and those who are poor materially and excluded socially.

However, we also believe that those most in need will never be helped to achieve all that they can unless we harness the full power of civil society, the initiative of creative individuals, the imagination of social entrepreneurs, and the idealism of millions of public sector workers. That means reducing bureaucracy, getting rid of misguided political intervention, respecting professional autonomy, and working in genuine partnership with local communities. It is that genuinely liberal, and liberating, vision that unites every Member on this side of the House and gives our reform programme its radical energy, not least in education.

We have—we have been bequeathed—one of the most stratified and segregated school systems in the developed world. The gap in exam performance between private schools and state schools grew under the last Government. That was a reverse for social justice, and an affront against social mobility. In the last year for which we have figures, just 45 of 80,000 young people eligible for free school meals made it to Oxbridge. More students went to Oxbridge from the school attended by the Leader of the Opposition, St Paul’s, than from the entire population of poor boys and girls on benefit.

I know that the consciences of Opposition Members who are motivated by idealism will have been pricked by those figures. No one contemplating that record can be in any doubt that reform is urgent. That is why we are pressing ahead with the sort of changes that will drive improvement across the whole of the state school system. We are cutting spending on the back office to prioritise spending on the front line.

As was pointed out by the hon. Member for Coventry South (Mr Cunningham)—who, sadly, is no longer in the Chamber—we have already saved millions of pounds by taking steps to abolish BECTA and the QCDA—two bureaucratic organisations with their own chairmen, their own chief executives, their own boards, their own communications teams, their own strategies and their own stakeholder groups—so we can ensure that money goes to the classroom. Today I can announce—as the hon. Member for Huddersfield anticipated—that we will take steps to abolish a third quango, the General Teaching Council for England.

The GTCE takes more than £36 from every teacher every year, and many of them have told me that it gives them almost nothing in return. I have listened to representations from teacher organisations—including teaching unions such as the NASUWT—which would prefer that money to be spent in the classroom, and I have been persuaded by them, the professionals. The GTCE does not improve classroom practice, does not help professionals to develop, and does not help children to learn. In short, it does not earn its keep, so it must go.

To those who argue that we need a body to help police the profession, let me say that this Government want to trust professionals, not busybody and patronise them; but when professionals dishonour the vocation of teaching, action needs to be taken. When the GTCE was recently asked to rule on a BNP teacher who had posted poisonous filth on an extremist website, it concluded that his description of immigrants as animals was not racist, and that therefore he could not be struck off. I think that that judgment was quite wrong and that we need new proposals to ensure that extremism has no place in our classrooms, and I also believe that the bodies that have failed to protect us in the past cannot be the answer in the future.

[Mr Blunkett]

There may well be an argument about the role of the GTCE, especially in respect of the example the right hon. Gentleman has just given, but does he agree that it does not behove him as the new Education Secretary to abolish the GTCE on financial grounds, given that the sum of £36 per teacher to which he referred will not be taxed on teachers and therefore will not be money that can be made available to the front line as he stated just a few minutes ago? Is this not the kind of nonsense that got us into having the pledge that £2.5 billion would be saved by doing away with biometric passports, when it turns out that the correct figure is £86 million over four years?

[Michael Gove]

I have great respect for the right hon. Gentleman, but I must point out to him that £36.50 per teacher goes to fund the GTCE, and much of that money actually comes from the Department itself, although some comes from teachers as well. I believe that the money the Department currently spends supporting the GTCE should instead be spent on supporting the front line, because I believe that overall we need to ensure that money that is currently spent on resources such as bodies, institutions, protocols and frameworks that do not raise the quality of teaching and do not improve the experience of children in the classroom should be shifted so that it is spent in the right direction.

[Ed Balls]

Just for the record, can the right hon. Gentleman tell us how much he will save for the public purse by abolishing the GTCE?

[Michael Gove]

I have asked officials to calculate exactly how much we will save. [Interruption.] Well, we will bring forward legislation, but there is a sum of £36.50 for every teacher, which will save us hundreds of thousands of pounds. [Interruption.] Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that the GTCE is the right organisation to keep in place? Does he believe that this money is better spent on the GTCE than in any other area? Does he believe that the hundreds of thousands of pounds that I think we should have spent on the front line should continue to be spent on that body?

[Mr Sheerman]

I rise to try to educate the right hon. Gentleman. As he is very well versed in educational matters, he must know that what he is telling the House is a fiction. The fact of the matter is that he will not be saving £36.50 for every teacher. Many teachers pay the £36.50 themselves.

[Michael Gove]

Some do, but many do not. It is precisely because the Department pays the fees for so many teachers—it pays £33 of the £36.50—that I have asked officials to work out how much we can save. If, instead of simply carrying on objecting to saving this money, the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood wants to tell me how he would spend it, or whether he would keep the GTCE going, I would be delighted to hear from him.

[Ed Balls]

I remind the right hon. Gentleman that it is he who is now the Secretary of State, not I, and therefore he is the person who has to take the decisions and is responsible. It is not proper government for him to come to the House to make an announcement and for it to turn out that he has not even seen the advice on which the announcement has been made, and then for him airily to say, “Well, I think the figure is hundreds of thousands of pounds.” The right way to do it is to get the information first, then make the decisions, and then report them to the House; that is a better way of doing things.

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his kind advice, but the one thing he has not done in his question—or statement, even—is point out whether he agrees with the policy. If he will tell me whether he agrees with it, I will be interested to hear his views. We do know, however, that money will be saved, and that introducing this change in respect of this organisation is in the interests of teachers and of making sure that money that is otherwise spent on bureaucratic bodies can be spent on the front line. [Interruption.] I have had the opportunity to read the advice, and I know that this is the right thing to do. [Interruption.] I would be interested in advice from the right hon. Gentleman about whether or not he thinks—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am very sorry to interrupt the flow of the eloquence of the Secretary of State, but may I just say, particularly as we are discussing education, that we all believe in the importance of role models, and I am already finding that the behaviour of some senior Members is starting to be imitated by new Members? That is very undesirable, and I know it is not a precedent that the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) would wish to establish.

[Michael Gove]

As I am sure the Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood, knows—[Interruption.] Forgive me, I should, of course, have said the shadow Secretary of State. How sweet those memories are. As the right hon. Gentleman the shadow Secretary of State knows, the Department provides about £16 million every year to reimburse teachers for the cost of that membership. I believe that that £16 million is better spent on the front line. If he believes that the money is better spent on the GTCE, perhaps he will say so in his forthcoming remarks.

As well as getting rid of that bureaucracy, we will reform other bureaucracies. We will reform Ofsted, the schools inspectorate, so that instead of inspecting schools on the current 29 tick-box criteria, it will examine just four: the quality of teaching; the quality of leadership; pupil achievement and attainment; and pupil discipline and safety. We also want to free outstanding schools from inspection, so that more time and resources can be devoted to helping others to improve. The absurd practice of “limiting judgments”, whereby great schools can be ranked as “poor” because of clerical errors, will end, and inspections will be driven by an in-depth look at teaching and learning, rather than by the current endless paper chase, which deprives classes of teacher time.

[Lindsay Roy (Glenrothes) (Lab)]

I congratulate the Secretary of State on his appointment to a very challenging Cabinet post—it is becoming more challenging by the minute. Does he accept that a key factor in improving attainment and achievement is the quality of learning and teaching? Why would any graduate be able to opt out of a teaching qualification, given that, in my experience, some of the most gifted academics are not the most gifted pedagogues? Is this not a dilution that could have a negative impact on standards and quality?

[Michael Gove]

That was a beautifully read question from the hon. Gentleman. As we know, he is a former headmaster of some distinction—indeed, he was headmaster of the school that the former Prime Minister attended—so I shall listen to what he has to say. It is crucial to ensure that we have high standards of teaching and learning. As I pointed out in a reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart), we are taking steps to ensure that we improve the quality of both recruitment and teacher training—that is central to our reform programme. That is why we will expand Teach First, institute a new programme called Teach Now and invest in continuous professional development to ensure that those who are currently in the classroom—they are doing a fantastic job—have the opportunity to enhance their skills and accept new responsibilities.

It is because we want to attract more talented people into the classroom that we will also remove the biggest barrier to people entering or staying in the teaching profession; we will focus relentlessly on improving school discipline. We will change the law on detentions so that teachers will no longer have to give parents 24 hours’ notice before disciplining badly behaved pupils. We will change the law on the use of force and enhance teachers’ search powers so that they will be able to prevent disruptive pupils from bringing items into school that are designed to disrupt learning. We will change the law to enhance teacher protection by giving teachers anonymity when they face potentially malicious allegations, and we will insist that allegations are either investigated within a tight time period or dropped. We will also change the law to ensure that heads have the powers that they need on exclusions, and we will ensure that there is improved provision for excluded pupils to get their lives back on track.

I hope that the hon. Member for Glenrothes (Lindsay Roy), and others who believe in protecting teachers and ensuring that we have good standards of discipline and behaviour, can support all those measures. I take it from his headshake that we have his enthusiastic assent. In addition to improving discipline, we will strengthen our exam system. We want to have fewer and better exams. We want to reverse the trend towards modularisation, reduce the role of coursework in certain subjects and ask universities to help us to design new and stretching A-levels that can compete with the best exams in the world.

Just as we plan to learn from the rest of the world in order to improve our exam system, so we will learn from the rest of the world in order to improve our school system. In America, President Barack Obama is pressing ahead with radical school reform on the model that we believe in. He is attracting more great people into teaching, demanding greater accountability for parents and welcoming new providers into state education. He has insisted on having more great charter schools—the American equivalent of our academies—to drive up attainment, especially among the poorest. He, along with other reformers, such as the Democrat Education Secretary Arne Duncan, the Democrat in charge of New York’s schools, Joel Klein, and the Democrat in charge of Washington DC’s schools, Michelle Rhee, wants more schools like the inspirational Knowledge is Power Programme—KIPP—schools, which are raising attainment in ghetto areas. Such schools are founded by teachers and funded by public money, but they are free from Government bureaucracy. They operate in neighbourhoods where, in the past, most children did not even make it to the end of high school. Now, thanks to these KIPP schools, a majority of these young people are going on to elite universities. These schools have a relentless focus on traditional subjects and a culture of no excuses, tough discipline and personalised pastoral care. The schools have enthusiastic staff, who are in charge of their own destiny and work hard to help every child to succeed. Such schools are amazing engines of social mobility, which is why we need more like them in this country.

That is, in turn, why we need to expand and accelerate the academies programme and why we are reforming state education to help groups of teachers, charities, philanthropists and community groups to set up new schools. It is also why I have been determined to give professionals more scope to drive improvement by inviting all schools to consider applying for academy freedoms. We have invited outstanding schools to lead the way.

I believe that heads and teachers, not politicians or bureaucrats, know best how to run schools, which is why I am passionate about extending freedom. Since I issued my invitation last week, I have been overwhelmed by the response. In less than one week, more than 1,100 schools have applied for academy freedoms, more than half of which are outstanding—626 outstanding schools, including more than 250 outstanding primaries. More than half the outstanding secondary schools in the country have applied, and more than 50 special schools have expressed an interest. That is a vote of confidence in greater professional autonomy from those driving improvement in our schools—inspirational head teachers.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

Does the Secretary of State acknowledge that it is dangerous, and certainly misleading, to use terms such as “outstanding” to describe schools when the evidence and research show overwhelmingly that the single most important determinant in success and attainment is the deprivation levels among parents of the children in a school?

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

I take my hon. Friend’s point that deprivation matters, which is why we have secured a partnership agreement guaranteeing that deprived pupils receive more for their education. I believe in the pupil premium and the progressive alteration to education spending. However, deprivation does not automatically mean destiny. As has been pointed out, there can be outstanding schools with challenging intakes, and what marks them out is the quality of their leadership, which is why it is so inspiring and encouraging that so many great head teachers, including of schools in some of the most challenging circumstances, have endorsed our proposals.

[Bob Russell]

Does the Secretary of State consider that the rush for freedom, as he would describe it, is perhaps more a vote of no confidence in local education authorities, which are predominantly Conservative—for example, Essex county council, which totally ignores the views of my constituents?

[Michael Gove]

Once again, my hon. Friend makes the sort of constructive contribution that I know will make our encounters over the next few years things to cherish. I say to him that it is across the board, whether under Conservative, Liberal Democrat or Labour-led local authorities, that schools want to embrace freedom. Many of them want to do so, not because they resent or are critical of local authorities, but because they relish the additional autonomy and freedom to disapply parts of the national curriculum, and because they want to work in partnership with existing schools. I want to encourage that sort of partnership, between our two parties and between academies and local authority schools. That is why I have requested that every outstanding school that acquires academy status takes with it an underperforming school on its journey, so that the process of collaboration, with the best head teachers driving improvement, continues, and so that schools can use academy freedom and head teachers can use additional powers to ensure that every child benefits.

In addition to asking that of outstanding schools, we will ensure that the academies programme delivers faster and deeper improvements in deprived and disadvantaged areas. Many more of our weakest schools will be placed in the hands of organisations such as ARK, the Harris Foundation and other academy sponsors best placed to drive improvement. We will also ensure that parents have more information about all schools, so that pressure grows on schools that are coasting to improve, and work in partnership with local government, from Essex to Cumbria, empowering strong local authorities to continue to drive improvement. Most importantly, as I have pointed out, we will target resources on the poorest. Our pupil premium will mean taking money from outside the schools budget to ensure that those teaching the children most in need get the resources to deliver smaller class sizes, more one-to-one or small group tuition, longer school days and more extracurricular activities.

[Lindsay Roy]

Apart from outstanding schools, special needs schools and some failing schools, what are the criteria for acceptance to the academy programme?

[Michael Gove]

Schools must demonstrate that the acquisition of the freedoms will help drive attainment for children in that area, and that it will also work for other schools.

This is a comprehensive plan to ensure that our state education system is the best in the world, and it is informed by what is happening across the world. Sadly, in the past 10 years, we have fallen behind other countries: we have slipped from fourth to 14th in the world for the quality of our children’s science; from seventh to 17th for the quality of their literacy; and from eighth to 24th for the quality of their maths. We cannot go on like this. While other countries accelerated their reform programmes in the past three years, we went into reverse. In the past three years, the outgoing Government added thousands of pages to the bureaucratic burden faced by schools. They robbed academies of vital freedoms and tried to abolish traditional subjects such as history and geography in the primary curriculum. They created an inspection regime that stifled innovation, failed to take proper action against extremism in the classroom and prevented teachers from searching for disruptive mobile devices and hardcore pornography on so-called human rights grounds.

The previous Government did make progress in certain areas. The former Secretary of State published his own cook book, “Real Meals”— two, in fact—which was distributed to every school in the land. In the words of the Speaker, when opening the debate on the Queen’s Speech, I have “obtained a copy” for the better understanding of the House. Right hon. and hon. Members may wish to read it during our deliberations this afternoon to get a better understanding of just what he was doing for much of his time in office. Certainly, time spent familiarising oneself with his recipes will not be wasted. I am sure that many of us will be captivated by the eye-watering sight of his mighty muffins in full colour on these pages. I have to say that the shadow Secretary of State certainly has a beautiful set of buns. May I congratulate him for striking a blow against elitism with his cook book? For the first time in history, a socialist Government’s response to poor achievement was, “Let them eat cake.”

[Mr Kevin Barron (Rother Valley) (Lab)]

I welcome the right hon. Gentleman to the Dispatch Box. He will know that the last Conservative Government stopped nutrition in school meals. Is it not true that that cook book and many other things that have happened in the past 10 years have put it back in for the benefit of children?

[Michael Gove]

I am delighted that the right hon. Gentleman believes that the first responsibility of the Secretary of State for Education is producing mighty muffin recipes. I take a different view. I do not want to take anything away from the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood’s achievements in the kitchen.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

I support the outline that the right hon. Gentleman has given for freedoms for schools, but how will he ensure that there is not too great a burden on schools when he wants to find out how they spend their money, how they are governed, whether they have raised standards, how they select pupils and a whole list of other things? How will he ensure that that does not lead to a lot of interference by his Department requiring information from schools that seek freedom?

[Michael Gove]

I have a great deal of sympathy with the hon. Gentleman. I know, of course, that there is a separate Minister who is responsible for education in the Province that he so ably represents. Earlier in my speech, I mentioned briefly—and I am happy to expand on this in a private meeting—that we will reduce the bureaucratic burden on schools by asking Ofsted to focus on teaching, learning and three other areas. In many of the areas in which it currently acts as a bureaucratic, box-ticking, information-collecting body, the requirements on it will be scaled back.

Returning to the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood, I do not want to take anything away from his achievements, because the most stinging criticisms of his record have not been made by me but have come from his own side. The shadow Foreign Secretary has complained again and again in the past few weeks that in the past few years Labour “lost focus on education”. He has also complained that Labour lost the mantle of reform and therefore forfeited its claims to be progressive. In the spirit of cross-party co-operation, I have to say that I agree with David. The Department did lose focus, reform did go backwards and progress did stall. The radical energy that infused the Labour Government’s programme in 2005, which was embodied in the White Paper of that year, was lost and in its place came the Brownite politics of dividing lines, partisan positioning and misplaced aggression. We are determined to put that to one side and push forward a programme of radical reform.

What do we want to do? Let me quote:

“We need to make it easier for every school to acquire the drive and essential freedoms of Academies, and we need to so in a practical way that allows their rapid development to be driven by parents and local communities, not just by the centre…We want every school to be able quickly and easily to become a self-governing independent…school”.

Who said that? [Interruption.] Not me, but as the former Minister for Schools, the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) has just said—10 out of 10—it was the former right hon. Member for Sedgefield, who is sadly no longer in this place, Tony Blair. He said:

“In our schools…the system will finally be opened up to real parent power.”

He argued that all schools would be able to have academy-style freedoms and should be able to take on external partners. He said that no one should be able to veto parents from starting new schools, or veto new providers coming in, simply on the basis that there were local surplus places. He promised a relentless focus on failing schools and that Ofsted would continue to measure performance, albeit with a lighter touch. He said that schools should be accountable not to Government, but to parents, with the creativity and enterprise of teachers and school leaders set free. Those promises were made in 2005 but, sadly, they were never honoured, because of the opposition to the White Paper and the legislation that was led from the Back Benches by the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood and his allies.

Presciently, the former Prime Minister anticipated the criticisms that he would face, and which were mounted by the right hon. Gentleman. He said:

“The reforms will naturally come under sustained attack…Parts of the left will say we are privatising public services and giving too much to the middle class.”

He added that

“both criticisms are wrong and simply a version of the old ‘levelling down’ mentality”

that kept Labour in opposition for so long. As long as the Labour party continues to stand in the way of reform, it will condemn itself to continued Opposition.

Labour Members have a choice: will they continue to be a party of no, of the status quo, of carping, nostalgic, backward-looking criticism, always resisting innovation in the name of vested interests instead of pressing for change in the interests of the poor? Or will they join us in a forging ahead, after five wasted years, with a resumption of radical reform? Will they join us in giving professionals more power, the poor more resources, and every child a better chance?

I commend this Gracious Speech to the House.

[Ed Balls (Morley and Outwood) (Lab/Co-op)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove) on his new role as Secretary of State for Education. It is a huge honour and a great privilege, but also a great responsibility.

I know that driving up education standards is a goal that we all share. The words “children” and “families” no longer appear in the name of his Department, but I hope that the Secretary of State and his Front-Bench team will commit themselves to giving every child the best start in life, and to breaking down all the barriers to the progress, safety and well-being of all children in our country. I can tell the House that, when the Secretary of State gets it right—when he acts to open up opportunities for more children and drive up standards for all—he will have our full support.

We did not agree on everything over the past three years—and neither does it seem that I will get his nomination in my party’s leadership election—but we always had an open and honest relationship. I am sure that the whole House will join me in wishing him all the best in his new role.

I thank the Secretary of State for the generous remarks that he made about me, at least at the beginning of his speech. On behalf of all Ministers at the former DCSF in the last three years, I pay tribute to all those with whom we worked so closely to implement our children’s plan. I think that the right hon. Gentleman will find that the civil servants in his Department are the very best in Whitehall, and that his permanent secretary is second to none. He will also find that our country’s social workers, and those working for local authorities and in the voluntary sector, as well as those in the children’s and family services, are distinguished by their dedication and professionalism. He will discover too that, in our head teachers, teachers, teaching assistants and support staff, our country has the best generation of educators that it has ever had.

While I was worried by the new-found enthusiasm of the right hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr Laws) for cutting the youth jobs fund, and for immediate and rather drastic cuts to local government spending this year, over the last three years he was a dedicated and wise spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats in opposition. I am sure that the whole House will join the Secretary of State in wishing him well, and I expect that we will see him back on the Front Bench at some point.

Indeed, the children and teachers of our country have rather more to thank the right hon. Member for Yeovil for than they probably realise. For the past two years in opposition, the new Education Secretary was unable to pledge to match our education spending for 2010-11, let alone for future years. We all know why: the former shadow Chancellor would not support him in making that pledge.

In this debate, we will hear from my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), the shadow Health Secretary, who achieved great things in protecting our vital national health service for the future. He will set out why he fears that the reforms proposed by the Government in this Queen’s Speech will be a backward step for the NHS. The NHS and international development were protected by the then shadow Chancellor from spending cuts this year. In his speech, the Secretary of State tried to divert attention from the threat in future years to the schools and children’s budgets by pointing to our economic record.

For the record, first, it was our Government who made the Bank of England independent in the face of opposition from the Conservatives, and took the tough decisions to get our national debt down lower than that of France, Germany, Japan and America before the financial crisis. Secondly, it was our Government who led the worldwide effort to stop a global financial collapse turning recession into depression, again in the face of bitter and wrong-headed opposition from the Conservatives. While the right hon. Gentleman may now pray in aid the loyal support of the Governor of the Bank of England and the German Finance Ministry in advocating immediate and deflationary spending cuts to reduce the deficit faster this year, he and his Chancellor are out of step with worldwide opinion and are running grave risks with the recovery, jobs and our vital public services.

For the past two years, the right hon. Gentleman was unable to match our schools spending this year. Then came the intervention of the right hon. Member for Yeovil who, in the days after the general election, stepped in and saved the day by securing ring-fencing for 2010-11 for the schools budget. Let me give the Secretary of State some gentle advice based on experience. It is rather dangerous to rely on the Chief Secretary to the Treasury to fight his public spending battles for him. Moreover, with the right hon. Member for Yeovil now out of the Treasury, let me say to the Secretary of State—this may come as some surprise, although I mean it sincerely—that I stand ready. If he needs a little help with how to win arguments with the Treasury in the next couple of years, I am here to help.

In office, the Labour party achieved, as I think the right hon. Gentleman generously acknowledged, some good things in education over the past decade. We doubled spending per pupil, we had 42,000 more teachers and the biggest school building programme since the Victorian era, and we went from one in two schools not making the grade in 1997 to just one in 12. We had more young people staying on in school, college or an apprenticeship or going to university than at any time in our history. That is a record of which Labour can be very proud indeed.

However, in the tough current financial climate in which we need to get the deficit down steadily, I agreed last December with the Treasury that there would be rising spending above inflation for schools, Sure Start and 16-to-19 education not just for one year, but for three years to 2013 because I was determined to fight my corner for the future of the children and young people of our country. I can assure the Secretary of State, now that the roles are reversed and he, not me, is doing the negotiating, that if there is anything I can do to help him secure the best deal for children, schools and families, not just this year but in the next three years, I will play my part, although it is his responsibility.

From what we heard today, no assurances at all for 2012 and 2013 have been communicated to the right hon. Gentleman by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Nor does he seem to have received any assurance that the pupil premium, his free schools and his new academies will be met with additional funding from outside his departmental budget. I hope he has some assurances from the Chancellor. If I were in his place, I would make sure I had them in writing.

[Michael Gove]

I know that the right hon. Gentleman may have been otherwise engaged during Prime Minister’s questions, but the Prime Minister pointed out that funding for the pupil premium would come from outside the education budget.

[Ed Balls]

But I asked whether the funding for schools, Sure Start and 16-to-19 education would be guaranteed to match our rising spending above inflation in 2010-11, 2011-12 and 2012-13. What we discovered from the right hon. Gentleman was that he does not have those assurances for the next two years—this year maybe, thanks to the right hon. Member for Yeovil, but for the next two years he said we would have to wait and see.

I shall come to the issue of funding. Given that the Secretary of State spoke for 50 minutes and rather a lot of hon. Members want to make their maiden speeches, I will be briefer, but I will take a couple of interventions and try to resist promising a meeting with the former Schools Minister.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ed Balls]

Yes. Back in February, we thought that it was one of the shadow Schools Minister’s flights of fancy. We never realised that he was serious when it was suggested that, despite schools being almost at the point of signing the forms, when the work had been done and the contractors pretty much hired, at the last minute all would be put on hold. That dashes expectations for children and it takes away contracts and jobs. All we heard from the Secretary of State was that it was important that we built new free schools somewhere else. It is no satisfaction to know that there will be a new school down the road for some parents, if another school, which was planned to be rebuilt, is suddenly put on hold. That is a reality for 700-plus schools all round the country.

[Michael Gove]

The right hon. Gentleman painted a devastating and damning picture of people who had been expecting capital funding but were denied it. That is exactly what happened under his Government, when the Learning and Skills Council left colleges unbuilt and denied principals cash. Precisely the picture that he paints, and which he says is bleak, was delivered under his Government.

[Ed Balls]

And the right hon. Gentleman is not the only one who can abolish quangos, but I have to say to him that back in 1997 no money was being spent on further education. There is £2 billion-plus being spent on further education capital projects now, so we are not going to take any lectures from the Conservatives on new school buildings or new further education colleges. Under their previous Governments, such schools and colleges were starved of resources.

Then we hear that, along with the free schools and the new academies, they are going to fund the new pupil premium. However, people will ask, “Where is the money going to come from?” I have seen some of the past advice, and I know how difficult it is to find the money to pay for such measures, so if I had to make an estimate I would say that an additional £1 billion a year is going to be needed if the pupil premium is to have any meaning.

Where will the cuts fall to pay for the pupil premium? Will the right hon. Gentleman scrap the extension of free school meals? Will he scale back one-to-one tuition and the Every Child a Reader programme? Will he cut education maintenance allowances? Will he cut the budgets for disabled children, for children in care, for youth services, for school sport and for school music? Will he scale back the 15-hour offer for three and four-year-olds? Will he abolish free nursery care for two-year-olds?

Where is the money going to come from? I do not expect answers today, but we will need answers soon. The difference between the right hon. Gentleman in opposition and now in government, as we found earlier, is that there is nowhere for him to hide. He will have to answer those questions and my advice is to him is, “Read the advice before you start making statements in the House,” because if he does not he will find that he gets into trouble very quickly indeed. Indeed, he can no longer rely on the right hon. Member for Yeovil being in the Treasury to bail him out on spending issues.

The right hon. Member for Yeovil might have ridden to the rescue to support the Secretary of State on protecting schools spending, but on other aspects of Conservative education policy he was withering: he called the right hon. Gentleman’s free schools policy a “nonsense”; he said that having a strict national curriculum for some schools while letting others opt out was “dotty”; and we all recall his views on the elitist policy whereby only people with a 2:2 or above would be allowed to go into teacher training. The new Schools Minister, the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb), seemed to go even further down the elitist road in recent weeks. He said:

“I would rather have a…graduate from Oxbridge with no PGCE teaching than a…graduate from one of the rubbish universities with a PGCE.”

We need to know whether that is a statement of Government policy. If so, which are those “rubbish” universities? We need to see a list.

I agree with the Minister for Universities and Science, the hon. Member for Havant (Mr Willetts)—I hope the Secretary of State does, too—that we can be proud of our university sector in all its diversity. My advice to the Education Secretary is, disown the Schools Minister—it probably will not be the last time that he has to do so during this Parliament—and join me in saying that we welcome as teachers excellent graduates from all our universities.

Whatever university the Secretary of State attended, however, he is a very intelligent man, and I know that he will be delighted, as always, to show us all once again just how very, very clever he is. For that reason, I have prepared for him another Queen’s Speech quiz. I know how much he enjoyed the last one, but given the Schools Minister’s presence why do we not play “University Challenge”?

Here is their starter for 10—no conferring on the Front Bench. Who this weekend said:

“The free schools are generally attended by children of better educated and wealthy families making things even more difficult for children attending ordinary schools in poor areas”?

Gove, Lady Margaret Hall? It was Mr Ostberg, Mr Bertil Ostberg, as the right hon. Gentleman should know, the Swedish Education Minister.

Let us try again. I have an easier one this time. Here is their starter for 10—definitely no conferring at all this time. Who in April described the new Conservative-Liberal Government’s proposed free schools policy as a “shambles” and went on to say:

“Unless you give local authorities that power to plan and unless you actually make sure that there is money available…it’s just a gimmick”?

I am going to have to hurry them. Yes, Teather, St John’s, Cambridge. It was in fact the hon. Member for Brent Central (Sarah Teather), the new Minister for Children and Families. In recent months, the Education Secretary’s new Front-Bench colleague has made some notable speeches—notable in retrospect, at least. Back in March, she told the Liberal Democrat spring conference:

“The Tories don’t know what they are talking about. They have no idea how the other 90% live. Scratch the surface and the old Tory party is alive and well.”

[Interruption.] There is more. She also told her party conference last September that the Tories’

“only motivation is that they think it’s their turn. They don’t really think they can make things better. All they believe is that they have a right to rule.”

Of course, they are ruling only because the hon. Lady and her Liberal Democrat colleagues put them into power. I only wish I was attending the ministerial team meetings to see the sparks fly. There is a serious point here. As we now know, on education policy this Government are divided from the start. It is not only the new Minister who needs to be persuaded that this new-schools policy is not an uncosted shambles, to use her word.

It will be no surprise to the Secretary of State that we Labour Members have very serious reservations about his lurch in education and academies policy. It is reported that he has written to 2,600 outstanding schools, inviting them to become what he calls academies. They are told that they will get extra funds—funds that are currently being spent on special needs, school food, transport and shared facilities such as music lessons, libraries or sports facilities. At no point in his proposal does the Secretary of State explain the impact that that may have on other local schools.

Where our academy policy gave extra resources and flexibility to the lowest-performing schools, the new Secretary of State proposes to give extra money to his favoured schools by taking money away from the rest. Where our academies went ahead with the agreement of parents as well as of local authorities, the new Secretary of State is proposing in legislation to abolish any obligation on schools to consult anyone at all before they become academies—no one will be consulted, including parents and local authorities.

We brought in external sponsors such as universities to raise aspirations, but we were clear that profit-making companies were not welcome to sponsor academies. However, the right hon. Gentleman is abolishing the requirement to have sponsors at all and encouraging private companies to tout around the country to parents, offering their services for profit to provide education. Our academies were non-selective schools in the poorest communities, but his new academies will be disproportionately in more affluent areas and he will allow selective schools, for the first time, to become academies too. Where we used accredited schools groups to encourage school-to-school collaboration to raise standards, he is allowing schools to opt out and go it alone.

The policy is not an extension or even a radical reshaping; it is a complete perversion of the academies programme that the right hon. Gentleman inherited and that my noble Friend Lord Adonis and I drove through in government. It is not a progressive policy for education in the 21st century, but a return to the old grant-maintained school system of the 1990s. It will not break the link between poverty and deprivation, but entrench that unfairness even further, with extra resources and support going not to those who need it most, but to those who are already ahead. My very real fear is that that will lead to not only chaos and confusion, but deep unfairness and a return to a two-tier education policy as the Secretary of State clears local authorities out of the way and then encourages a chaotic free market in school places.

I am not the only one who is concerned. Let me quote the chair of the Local Government Association, Margaret Eaton. I am sorry; I should have said the new Conservative peer Baroness Eaton, who said:

“Safeguards will be needed to ensure a two-tier education system is not allowed to develop”.

Those are very wise words, and such concerns are widespread in local government and across the school system. Will schools that do not become academies pay financially for those that do? Will the admissions code apply to new academies and be properly enforced? Will academies co-operate, as now, on behaviour policy, or will the Secretary of State allow high-performing schools to exclude pupils as a first resort, without any role for local authorities, Ofsted or children’s trusts? Will he step in if things go wrong in what will be a massively centralised education system and how can he reassure us that disadvantaged children will not lose disproportionately from the resources for wider children’s services that will be transferred from local authorities to high-performing opt-out schools, as they take the money away with them? Those are the questions to which we will want answers. We will return to these issues in much greater detail in the coming weeks as he tries to rush his Bill on to the statute book.

I want to make clear to the House what sort of Opposition we will be on education and children’s services. There are cuts that have to be made, and we will support them, as I did before the election in outlining cuts to a range of non-departmental bodies. When the right hon. Gentleman gets it right, we will support him. When he is genuinely supported by teachers and parents, we will support him too. On some of the very difficult issues that will pass across his desk—some of the most sensitive issues that the Government have to deal with on a daily basis, as I know—he will have our understanding and our support. However, I have to say to him that every school building that this Government cancel, this Opposition will fight against tooth and nail; every programme vital to ensuring that every child succeeds, this Opposition will defend; and every individual child’s future that this Government put in jeopardy through their programme of immediate cuts, whether directly by abolishing the child trust fund or indirectly by attacking local government funding, this Opposition will oppose. That is because we believe that every child matters, not just every other child. The right hon. Gentleman may have changed his Department’s name, but we will not let him duck his responsibilities.