Investing in Children and Young People

Navendu Mishra Excerpts

Wednesday 9th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Navendu Mishra (Stockport) (Lab)]

I pay tribute to every single teacher and member of school staff around the country who does so much to educate our children, as well as to the important role that parents fulfil as part of the education process. I also thank all the education unions, including the National Education Union, for their important work supporting and campaigning on behalf of school and college staff. I know that Dawn Taylor and the team at Stockport’s National Education Union branch are well respected in our town.

I am proud to have not one, but three maintained nursery schools in my Stockport constituency. Hollywood Park, Lark Hill and Freshfield do a brilliant job of serving children and parents in my constituency. Families across our country also benefit from our maintained nursery school system. However, research by the National Education Union reveals that there are only 389 such schools left in England, of which many are located in the most deprived areas of the country.

I pay tribute to the hard work of my good friend, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey). Much more needs to be done by the Government to support maintained nursery schools and properly fund them in the years ahead. As the all-party parliamentary group for nursery schools, nursery and reception classes made clear last year:

“Maintained nursery schools need long-term certainty about funding if they are to continue to provide vital services to disadvantaged communities during the pandemic and beyond.”

I would like to hear the Minister provide that reassurance to the House today.

In the country with the fifth largest economy in the world, no child should ever have to go hungry, but unfortunately, as we saw in the past year, that is exactly what this callous Government attempted to allow when they planned to scrap free school meals during the holiday period, despite many families being financially crippled by the pandemic. Fortunately for millions of children around the country, including thousands in my constituency of Stockport, the embarrassment caused by the brilliant intervention of the premier league footballer Marcus Rashford forced the Government to scrap those plans. That situation can never be allowed to happen again, which is why the Labour party has committed to extending free school meals over all holidays, including the long summer break.

I would like to say a few words about the challenge that our youth clubs face. These clubs are the beating heart of our communities, working day in, day out to empower, advocate for and educate young people. They also perform a vital role in our children’s wellbeing: one survey revealed that more than 80% of children and young people who attend youth groups consider themselves to be happy—a significantly higher proportion than among those who do not. Furthermore, youth clubs can help to combat the rise in antisocial behaviour and ease the burden on our police services.

However, youth services are on the brink of collapse because of this Government’s cuts. A staggering 73% of funding has been slashed since the Conservatives came to power in 2010. That flies in the face of the Conservative party’s own manifesto commitment to set aside £500 million for young people’s services in its much-publicised youth investment fund. Almost unbelievably, the chief executive of the National Youth Agency revealed earlier this year that the money had “gone missing”. Given that the fund was first announced two years ago, I find that completely unacceptable.

The Government have also suspended their requirement for councils to reveal their spending on youth services, leading to well-founded concerns that a fresh round of cuts may be on the horizon. After the Government have already presided over the closure of at least 763 youth centres since 2012, this latest kick in the teeth is shameful and leaves more and more young people isolated and unsupported. The funding is crucial not only for traditional youth services, but for community and volunteering organisations such as the Scouts, the Guides and the cadets.

Finally, Greater Manchester, where my constituency is, faces one of the highest rates of persistently disadvantaged children in the country. The situation has worsened dramatically during the pandemic: research by the Education Policy Institute recently revealed that the attainment gap between poorer pupils and their more affluent peers has stopped closing for the first time in a decade. In my local authority, Stockport, that means that the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged children ranges from six months at early years level to 10 months by the time they are at primary school, and almost two years by the time they reach secondary school. That is simply not good enough. The Government need to urgently address this rising crisis or risk long-lasting damage that will take years to overturn.