Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(8 years ago)
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Mr Gibb
The National Teaching Service was established to second high-performing teachers to parts of the country with a history of recruitment problems. When a remote rural school is part of a multi-academy trust, that helps to recruit teachers, because they know that they can move, within the trust, from a rural to an urban school and back again. That makes recruitment and retention far easier.
Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
T4. According to Ofsted, the best educational settings in the country are maintained nursery schools, of which 58% are “outstanding” and 39% are “good”. Remarkably, they perform just as well in poor areas as they do in less affluent areas. What consideration has the Minister given to allowing them to become academies if they wish to do so, in order to ensure that these great institutions continue their work?
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(8 years, 3 months ago)
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Mr Gibb
We are certainly not burying our head in the sand. We have the highest number of teachers—there are now 455,000, so 13,000 more today than there were in 2010. We are also taking action to deal with the challenge of having a strong economy. We have introduced bursaries—up to £30,000 for top physics graduates. We have introduced the “Your future their future” advertising campaign. We have removed the cap on physics and maths recruitment. We have expanded Teach First. We have incentives for returners; some 14,000 returners came back into teaching last year, which is a record number. We are improving behaviour in our schools to improve retention, and we are dealing with the workload, which is one of the reasons why teachers say they leave the profession.
Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
6. If she will make it her policy to require all schools to work towards a quality award for careers education, information, advice and guidance recognised by the quality in careers standard.
Out-of-school Education Settings
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(8 years, 3 months ago)
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Mr Gibb
Those impact assessments will be done as we come to produce firm proposals. We, of course, assess the cost of all proposals as we develop policy.
May I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) on securing this debate on the proposals for regulating out-of-school education settings? I welcome the constructive debate we have had and the thoughtful and passionate speeches from my hon. Friends the Members for Congleton (Fiona Bruce), for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth), for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double), for Eastbourne (Caroline Ansell) and for Beverley and Holderness (Graham Stuart), as well as my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman). We also heard very good speeches from the hon. Members for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan), for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson), and the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms).
All of the speeches made today will be taken into account as we consider the responses to the consultation, which closed on 11 January after six and a half weeks and to which we received more than 10,000 responses. Notwithstanding the valid points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton, the consultation has been widely heard and responded to, and we will now consider all responses as we develop the policy in more detail.
Ensuring that parents have the freedom to decide how best to educate their children is a fundamental principle of our society and our education system. My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough referred to the long history of the churches’ role in education which, of course, predates that of the state.
Parents have always valued the education provided by religious organisations. They choose faith schools for their high academic standards and ethos and they appreciate the religious faith of those schools, which gives them confidence that their children will be taught to understand and respect the traditions and values of their faith. Responding to that demand, we have opened more than 300 free schools since 2010, of which 76 have a religious designation or ethos.
Out-of-school settings can also be of immense value. As my hon. Friend pointed out, many of those are run by religious groups and provide a distinctive education or activities that supplement and enhance that provided in mainstream schools. Such settings, including Sunday schools, can enrich children’s education and deepen their understanding of their own culture and heritage.
My hon. Friend made a powerful argument that the providers of this broader education, which is often staffed by dedicated volunteers, should be supported by the Government and not stifled by excessive regulation. I can assure him that we share that objective. The Government do, however, need to balance the need to protect and encourage high-quality out-of-school education with the need to keep children safe from any harm. That includes not only extremism, but the risk of physical punishment, unsuitable individuals working in some out-of-school settings and children being educated in unsafe or insanitary conditions.
A clear regulatory framework exists to protect children from those risks in childcare settings, and in state and independent schools. The call for evidence on out-of-school education, which closed last week, invited submissions on how to ensure that we are similarly able to safeguard children attending such settings—supplementary education —while avoiding disproportionate regulation. It reflects a commitment made in the Prevent strategy, published in June 2011, to reduce the risks of radicalisation occurring in out-of-school settings. It is the latest step in implementing the Prime Minister’s announcement in October last year that, if an institution is teaching children intensively, we will, as with any other school, make it register so that it can be inspected. He was also clear that, in addressing the risks that we have identified, we will uphold parents’ right to educate their children about their faith.
The call for evidence highlighted the fact that many settings already have robust measures in place to ensure safety. They may work under umbrella organisations that set high standards, be part of voluntary accreditation schemes or receive support from the local authority. However, that is not universal. We are therefore considering how best to address failures in the minority of settings that fail to meet their obligations while preserving everything that has made the vast majority of supplementary education so successful.
The responses to the call for evidence included many from Christian, Muslim and Jewish groups, and we will continue to discuss our developing proposals with those groups and others to ensure that they are proportionate and effective. Any final proposals will, of course, be subject to further discussions with interested parties.
At this stage, I hope I can provide assurances on some of the specific concerns raised by my hon. Friend and others.
Graham Stuart
Will the Minister deal with one of the practical points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh)? Those who wish to teach in this extremist way will effortlessly elude any regulation system that we set up. We will therefore have an expensive and burdensome system that captures so many organisations, but does not capture the very organisations that we need to capture. Is that not the central point? To me, it seems to be a rocket that explodes this whole policy and should cause the Minister to think again.
Mr Gibb
Well, no, because by not registering, such organisations are liable under strict liability to an offence, and we can then take much swifter action when we are made aware of those settings through our usual intelligence routes. That is why this has a double edge: we register the settings and only inspect settings where risks are identified; and we have very real powers to tackle the settings that do not register.
Let me go through some of the specific concerns that have been raised.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(9 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
7. What assessment she has made of which of her Department’s policies since May 2010 has been most successful in achieving its original objectives.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(12 years ago)
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Mr Gibb
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. Getting reading right in primary schools is fundamental to children’s future education. That is why we have introduced match funding for primary schools—£3,000 per school for new training and materials—and why every six-year-old will undergo a phonic check this June so that we can ensure that we spot the children who are struggling with reading. We are determined to end the scandal of one in 10 boys leaving primary school with a reading age of seven or less.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
We should celebrate and support the best teachers in our schools. Is the Minister aware of research by the Sutton Trust which shows that if a below-average teacher can be raised to the average, the impact on the lifetime earnings of that teacher’s classroom can amount to more than £250,000? The importance of teaching is critical not only to our society, to our culture and to social justice, but to the economy. What more can the Minister do to improve the quality of teaching?
Mr Gibb
My hon. Friend, who is the Chairman of the Select Committee on Education, is absolutely right. We are doing a huge amount to raise the bar both for entry to the teaching profession and for continuing professional development. That is what is behind the whole teaching schools programme. Already 218 schools have been designated teaching schools, which promote peer-to-peer training. The Government are determined to restore the centre of academic life to our schools.
Technology (Primary Schools)
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(12 years, 3 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (John Pugh) on securing this important debate and on his interesting opening speech. He need not apologise to my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles) or me for a second contribution on educational matters—these are important issues and it is always a pleasure to hear what he has to say.
My hon. Friend the Member for Southport is right to say—we need to reiterate this—that design and technology is absolutely not just an alternative for those young people who are not academically inclined; it is an important subject in its own right. Indeed, the expert panel that we appointed to look into evidence from around the world for our national curriculum review recommended in the report that we published before Christmas that design and technology should become a basic curriculum subject, with greater freedom for schools to teach what they want, free from the constrictions of a programme of study, to encourage innovation and an individual approach. The national curriculum review will consider that before providing final recommendations to the Secretary of State.
My hon. Friend has strong views about the importance of technology in primary schools and schools in general, and has voiced his concerns about the risk that too rigid a policy on the provision of technology to schools can stifle the very innovation that we all seek. Of course, technology can never supplant good teaching, but the effective use of digital technology can support good teaching and help raise standards in schools. We need to support the effective and innovative use of technology in schools, with good practice being developed and shared between them. That means not only exposing children to technology and encouraging them to feel comfortable with it, but promoting technology as a useful tool in itself and as a means to help develop general teaching in schools.
We do not seek to micro-manage the application of technology. As we stressed in the schools White Paper, it is for individual schools to identify their own needs and to address them as they think best. We need to encourage and enable teachers to take better advantage of the great opportunities presented by the burgeoning range of digital technologies, and to use them to improve their teaching and efficiency.
As my hon. Friend has said, the Secretary of State emphasised the fact that technology is a priority in his speech to the Schools Network conference last month and at the BETT technology show this morning. Like me, he wants to encourage the innovative use of technology both within and beyond the classroom. We need to equip our pupils with the technical skills and the knowledge to meet the needs of the 21st-century workplace.
This country has an exemplary record on the use of technology in schools. There is on average one computer for every seven primary school pupils, and one for every three in secondary schools. Primary schools spend an average of £12,400 each year on information and communications technology, and an additional sum of almost £1,500 on software and content. No one should doubt the importance that we attach to the use of technology to support our teachers.
I recognise that some will fear that the passing of Becta, to which my hon. Friend referred, has left a gap in the provision to schools of specialist advice on technology. We are in a period of transition, but this should be seen as an opportunity for the commercial sector and professional organisations to adapt their services to fill that gap.
My hon. Friend has spoken about the curriculum. We are in the process of reviewing both the national curriculum and the suite of qualifications. I think that we all agree that the current ICT curriculum, to which he has referred, is in need of an overhaul. It is outdated and needs to be reformed. We see the teaching of technology-related knowledge and skills as an important part of a broad and balanced curriculum that schools offer their pupils, but it is also our belief that, in a fast-moving and continuously evolving area such as ICT and technology in general, central Government are not necessarily best placed to define the knowledge that pupils need to acquire. As my hon. Friend has said of the early career of Bill Gates, he did not learn the skills that he used to build the Microsoft empire from technology lessons at school. He had a general, good education and he used it to develop his own work in understanding computers and software.
I have been fortunate over the past few months to meet representatives of those who work in the industry, particularly the ICT industry, who are concerned about the lack of a rigorous foundation in programming and the consequences of that for the wider economy. They are persuasive advocates and their detailed submissions to the national curriculum review have been very welcome.
As my hon. Friend has mentioned, the Secretary of State addressed the BETT technology show and took the opportunity to announce that the Department for Education will shortly open a consultation on the withdrawal of the existing national curriculum programmes of study for ICT from September this year. This is an interim measure that is intended to give schools more flexibility to develop their own programmes of study to meet the needs of their pupils more effectively. This move may have come as a surprise to many people, and we recognise that we are taking a wholly new approach.
Mr Stuart
I am grateful to the Minister. I, too, have met, in recent months, representatives who have made an impressive case. Can he explain—because I do not know the answer—why, until last year, there was not a single computer science GCSE? All we had were programmes of study and qualifications in, as he has said, operating programmes. The actual educational material was not in the courses. Why was that? How did we get into that position, and how will we make sure that we will not allow such things to happen in future?
Mr Gibb
My hon. Friend is right and that situation undermines the status of ICT. We have seen that in the GCSE figures. In 2000-01, something like 95,200 people took the GCSE in ICT, and last year that figure went down to 31,800, so something has gone very wrong with the content of the specification in ICT GCSE and in the programmes of study that were in recent reviews and that have led to this problem. There is a widespread belief that the existing programmes of study for the subject lack ambition, and that they serve to inhibit schools from engaging with innovative and inspiring ICT initiatives. We have heard that from so many sources—from teachers and pupils, from industry and, indeed, from my hon. Friend just now.
Some of the biggest names in the computer-related industries have told us that, in its current form, ICT is turning pupils away. That, in turn, is hampering the development of more relevant ICT-related GCSEs, with a focus on the more rigorous disciplines of computer science programming. That has had disastrous consequences for our digital industries, which face ever-increasing competition from emerging economies all around the world.
Eben Upton, a computer science academic at Cambridge university, was reported in yesterday’s Guardian as saying of applicants for degree courses whom he was interviewing:
“None of them seemed to know enough about what a computer really was or how it worked…Children were learning about applications, which are pretty low-value skills. They weren’t being properly equipped to think about how computers are programmed…Computing wasn’t being seen as the exciting, vibrant subject it should be at school—it had become lack-lustre and even boring.”
Our proposed change to the ICT curriculum will offer a chance for the subject to be rejuvenated, freeing teachers to explore and innovate, and hopefully to inspire a new wave of pupils to pursue computing and ICT. We need highly-skilled programmers if we are going to continue to compete in today’s and tomorrow’s markets, which will be increasingly dependent on, and driven by, the new digital technologies.
That is why the Secretary of State made the announcement that he did this morning. Pending the outcome of the national curriculum review, ICT will remain compulsory at all key stages in schools and it will be taught at each stage of the curriculum. The existing programmes of study will no longer be compulsory, but they will still be readily available for reference purposes on the web, although no school in England will be required to follow them. Subject to the consultation, from September this year, all schools will be able to use whatever resources they choose to teach the subject, and there is a wide range of excellent materials to choose from. I know that industry and specialist organisations, such as the British Computer Society, e-skills UK and Naace are already working on an alternative ICT and computing curriculum.
Education Bill
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(12 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Gibb
Yes, of course, but we are talking about the effect on individuals, and if there is just one case of someone suffering such publicity about what turns out to be a false allegation, that is one case too many, as such allegations can have devastating consequences on teachers both socially and career-wise. The publicity that just one such case receives also reverberates throughout the teaching profession, undermining teachers’ morale and making them unduly cautious about maintaining discipline in our classrooms. If we are interested in the welfare of pupils in our schools, we have to make sure they are taught in ordered and safe environments, free from bullying and other disruptive activities.
I thought, however, that the hon. Gentleman was concerned in Committee less about the prevalence of such allegations and more about the question of whether these provisions should be extended to other sectors of the workforce. We have proceeded extremely cautiously, taking into account the fact that we must preserve press freedom as well as the integrity of teachers and their being innocent until proven otherwise.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
As my hon. Friend knows, I am sympathetic to the Government’s intentions in this regard as well, but I am concerned about press freedom and I would be grateful if he could set out the case for teachers alone being given this exemption from publicity. Such allegations could be equally devastating to members of a different profession. Might this provision prove to be the thin end of the wedge in that there could be a great deal more press censorship and the public will not be able to know about allegations made against people in their local community?
Mr Gibb
My hon. Friend, the Chairman of the Education Committee, makes a good point, but teachers are very much on the front line of maintaining discipline in the classroom. We conducted a survey of 116 local authority designated officers—LADOs—and its findings support the view that teachers are particularly vulnerable to false allegations. Some 23% of allegations against staff in all sectors were made against teachers, and almost half of those were found to be unsubstantiated, malicious or unfounded. The proportion that related to other staff in schools was significantly low: from recollection I think that it was about 14%, compared with the 23% that applied to teachers.
Mr Gibb
I am happy to think further about those issues. However, the point of the proposal is that it is difficult for schools to achieve from Ofsted the accolade of outstanding. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) have visited schools that are categorised by Ofsted as outstanding. It is clear why those schools have been so categorised. I was at a school last week in Wiltshire that had been categorised by Ofsted as outstanding in all 27 categories. I believe that it was the first school to be given such a grading.
Mr Graham Stuart
The Minister is absolutely right to have proportionate inspection. We need to be careful to ensure that outstanding schools that may end up coasting or dropping their standards are picked up. If the shadow Minister is suggesting that it would be a better policy to inspect every school, however outstanding, all the time, he is completely wrong. A proportionate approach with the right safeguards and triggers in place and with constant review of those triggers is the right way to go. The Government are right on this issue.
Mr Gibb
My hon. Friend is right that one has to be proportionate in these issues. Ultimately, this is a matter for the chief inspector of schools. If the results of an outstanding school start to decline, as was hinted at by the hon. Member for Cardiff West, it will be picked up in the risk assessment. He has made important points and we will, of course, reflect on them in the usual way.
Mr Graham Stuart
In the Lords, the Government accepted various amendments to limit the impact of such fines on global companies, which is welcome, but the measure was introduced with very little consultation. What is the evidence that we need fines to get awarding bodies to comply with Ofqual? What is the evidence that there is a problem to which fines provide an answer?
Mr Gibb
My hon. Friend will have seen over the summer some of the errors in the exams. They are unacceptable. We believe that the awarding organisations should not make the quantum and seriousness of those errors again. Other regulators have such powers, and if he bears with me, I will try to set out why we introduced those provisions.
The provisions in Lords amendments 16 and 17 are broadly consistent with the Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Act 2008. As many hon. Members will know, including my hon. Friend, the Act provides many other regulators with a toolkit of sanctions that are risk based, consistent, proportionate and effective. Ofqual currently has only two types of sanction available to it: the power to direct an awarding organisation; and the dramatic, nuclear option of partial or full withdrawal of recognition. In addition, before Ofqual can use its current enforcement powers, it must be the case that an awarding organisation’s failure to comply with a condition has prejudiced, or is likely to prejudice, either the proper award of a qualification or students who might reasonably be expected to seek to obtain such a qualification awarded by that organisation.
The Government believe that those tests unnecessarily limit Ofqual’s powers and could reduce its capacity to take timely and proportionate enforcement action. Removing the tests and giving Ofqual a power to fine will help to prevent the kind of mistakes in exam papers that we saw last summer, which undermine the hard work of the pupils who sat them. That is the purpose of Lords amendment 16, and Lords amendment 17 confers similar powers on Welsh Ministers as the regulators of Welsh qualifications.
Mr Stuart
I am grateful to the Minister for setting out the Government’s thinking, but I am not entirely persuaded. The currency on which awarding bodies trade is their reputation. Notwithstanding the problems this summer, they needed no fine or massive regulatory hammer to bring them to book. All awarding bodies would immediately seek to improve their systems following such errors—I believe they did so. It feels as if we are introducing sanctions that are unnecessary for the workings of that market. The Government have pledged to eschew unnecessary regulations unless there is an overwhelming case, but I am not sure that the errors last summer make that overwhelming case.
Mr Gibb
I must disagree with my hon. Friend, because the seriousness of the errors was not just in their number—I believe there were 13 errors in exam papers this summer. What was particularly serious was the fact that when we asked awarding bodies to check that there were no further errors, they affirmed that they had done so or that they would do so, but then new errors appeared. That is why what happened this summer was so serious rather than the initial errors in the papers.
On reputation and the market, all the main awarding bodies had errors, so there is no market mechanism—no one of them could say, “We had no errors but the others did.” My third argument is that all regulators have such powers. We cannot rely on the nuclear option of ending accreditation.
Mr Stuart
Yes, and Alison Wolf suggested in her report that more 14 to 16-year-olds should attend FE colleges, so this provision would affect them as well as 17 to 18-year-olds, for whom the provision might be less relevant. I hope Ministers will think about this anomaly and find a way of equalising the situation.
The Government make what seems like a very reasonable case on strengthening Ofqual’s enforcement powers. Ofqual does not have as wide-ranging powers as other regulators, and there is a very quick step from its making requirements on awarding bodies to the nuclear option of removing their ability to provide awards at all. It therefore seems reasonable to have more moderate powers in the middle, such as the power to make fines, but this Government are committed not to following such easy logic unless there is a very strong—nay, an overwhelming—case for giving new powers to some non-governmental, unelected quango, such as Ofqual, so in an intervention I asked the Minister to make the case. He made a brave effort, as he always does, being a highly esteemed colleague and an excellent schools Minister, but he really did not make the case.
We did not hear about the number of times that awarding bodies have deliberately flouted Ofqual’s requirements—that OCR, when required to do something by Ofqual, just ignored it, left it as long as possible and did it only if it felt like it; or that the lack of anything other than a nuclear button meant that OCR did not want to comply.
Following this summer’s examination paper errors fiasco, no one was more embarrassed and determined to put it right than the awarding bodies. They collectively and individually felt that it was embarrassing, and they wanted to put it right as quickly as they could. The numbers were somewhat higher than in previous years, but the attention paid to them this year was rather greater than the increase in problems, and I know at least one case in which there was only one error in 100,000 questions.
I want to see all such errors eliminated and to know that those bodies are straining every sinew to put the situation right, but I am not yet convinced that a fining regime, however conveniently it may fulfil the Prime Minister’s promise to do something about the situation, is the right approach.
Mr Gibb
The measure is about incentives. If a not-for-profit or commercial operation seeks to ensure that there are no errors, the exponential cost of ensuring that there are zero errors is a cost to that organisation, so the fining powers provide an equal and opposite cost to the organisations that do not incur those costs to do their best to eliminate errors. That is the purpose of the fining provisions.
Mr Graham Stuart
My hon. Friend is right to quote the Prime Minister, who in turn is right to identify this issue. What practical steps can be taken under the current regime to target those schools that are above the floor targets for five good GCSEs and that have limited resources for Ofsted? How will it be possible to ensure that they get the focus that the Prime Minister, the Minister and I would like to see?
Mr Graham Stuart
Can my hon. Friend give examples of instances in which such a measure might have been triggered in the past?
Mr Gibb
The incidents I would cite are those from this summer when there were persistent errors. The persistence came, in particular, after we had asked the awarding organisations to check that there were no further errors. They did those checks and confirmed that there were none, but then further errors were discovered and damage was caused. That is an example of persistence in the errors we are trying to eliminate from the system.
The hon. Member for Cardiff West asked for an explanation regarding Lords amendments 89 to 91 about land. The Bill introduces new powers to transfer the publicly funded land of foundation and voluntary schools and academies to free schools and academies when those schools close or the land is to be otherwise disposed of. Lords amendments 89 to 91 reduce the reach of those new powers so that they do not apply to land that is leased to a new academy by a private landlord. Where we are engaging in commercial negotiations with private landlords for the lease of land to new free schools, we think it is more appropriate to protect any public investment in that land by contractual means rather than in statute.
The hon. Gentleman also raised the PFI issue and I am happy to restate the purpose of amendment 34. Under section 6(2) of the Academies Act 2010, a local authority “must cease to maintain” a school once it converts to academy status. Some banks and local authorities have asked whether that prohibition on maintenance might prevent a local authority from making a payment under PFI or other contracts. Our view is that local authorities have always been able to use their own resources to provide assistance, including financial assistance, to academies and to enter into contractual commitments and incur liabilities on their behalf. We are clear that section 6(2) of the Academies Act does not prevent the continuation of those activities. All academies are and will continue to be maintained by the Secretary of State under funding arrangements entered into under section 1 of the Academies Act, and any assistance provided by local authorities to academies, whether financial or otherwise, will only ever be a proportion of the total expense. Amendment 34 therefore confirms that local authorities can continue to make payments for academies under PFI and other contracts.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bedford and the hon. Member for Cardiff West raised the issue of direct payment pilots. The Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Brent Central (Sarah Teather), who has responsibility for children and families, wrote to peers in the other place explaining the importance of introducing this new clause and consulted on the text of the draft clause, including in relation to special educational needs and disability organisations as well as local government interests. The principles behind the clause—greater choice and control for the families of children with SEN—are shared across the House. Indeed, the clause is modelled on legislation on the direct payment health pilots that were introduced by the previous Government. Let me reassure hon. Members that the orders needed to give practical effect to the clauses are subject to the affirmative procedure. These are, after all, powers concerning pilots rather than a national scheme and the clause has a sunset provision of four years.
My hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness asked about anyone being able to refer complaints to the adjudicator. We do not believe this change will lead to many more complaints. The regulations on which we are currently consulting will ensure that repetitive, vexatious or anonymous complaints cannot be made. I hope that will provide him with some reassurance. On the issue of spite, which he also raised, “anyone” does mean anyone, so it could be a school or a charity. The only proviso is that they must be willing to put their name to objections and to refer matters that are new or substantially new to the adjudicator.
My hon. Friend asked about consistency in the referral of misconduct cases by schools to the regulator. Evidence suggests that there is already variation in referrals despite the blanket duty on employers to refer all cases, and this duty has not been affected. Employers will know when a case of misconduct is serious enough potentially to require a referral from the profession, and they can use the draft prohibition guidance, which I can send to my hon. Friend, to help them make this decision. If a member of the public is not happy with the decision, they can refer a complaint to the Secretary of State.
My hon. Friend also asked about Ofsted’s capacity to deliver more rigorous assessments. We have discussed and agreed the more rigorous risk assessment, and Ofsted has the resources necessary within its budget to achieve this. Every organisation has to prioritise its resources in the current economic climate and Ofsted is no different.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Bedford for his continued and vocal support for academies and free schools. I assure him that it is right that admissions at academies and free schools must comply with the admissions code as set out in their funding agreements. As with all other state-funded schools, complaints about admissions will now go to the adjudicator.
My hon. Friend also raised concerns about particular families who do not adopt personal budgets—one third is the figure he cited—and the support they require. He argues for having pilots, and that is what the new clause does. I share his concerns about the possible burdens on families. That is why the pilots will look at the support available to families and how the system can be as straightforward as possible to use, as well as at which families take up those payments and which do not. On the point that the hon. Member for Cardiff West made, cost-cutting is not a driver for this policy—it is about having greater choice and control.
On the issue of Ofqual and how the Conservatives could support a regime of fining by a regulator, my hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire set out the reasons why the qualifications market needs to be regulated. I should like to make it clear that turnover will be determined in accordance with an order made by the Secretary of State and that Ofqual will consult on how the fining regime is to operate.
I listened carefully to the comments of my hon. Friends the Members for Bedford and for Stevenage about primary schools. Primary national offer day will be 16 April. The idea is to co-ordinate the date rather than to put any new pressure on parents to get their children into certain primary schools. It merely makes things easier and less stressful for parents rather than more stressful.
Let me deal briefly with some of the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Cardiff West. He will know that we have listened carefully to the concerns expressed in this House and in the other place in response to our original intention to withdraw schools and colleges from the duty to co-operate. The evidence of that engagement is clear in these Lords amendments. We have removed the “duty to co-operate” clause as well as the clause that the hon. Gentleman seeks to amend regarding the children and young people’s plan.
The hon. Gentleman’s amendment (a) to Lords amendment 23 relates to our plans to allow anyone to refer an objection to the schools adjudicator about the admissions arrangements at any state-funded school in the country. The amendment would require admissions authorities and others to comply with the adjudicator’s decision within 14 days of receiving written notice of that decision. Current legislation in this area, which was introduced by the Labour party, requires compliance to be forthwith. Let me assure the House once more that our changes to admissions do not affect the adjudicator’s power to consider and decide on the matter put to him and other matters as he sees fit, or to make binding decisions as a consequence. The amendment would impose a stringent national timetable for the implementation of such decisions. It is based on two false assumptions—first that schools do not wish to put things right, which they do, and secondly that all situations are the same, which they are not. On that basis, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not press his amendment to a Division.
Education Bill
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(12 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
I share the sentiments expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Mr Gyimah) about the need to put the interests of the children first, but, as he said that it was a probing new clause, it would not be right to weaken the protection of those who teach and work in some of our toughest and most challenging schools. We have to send out the message—I think my hon. Friend the Minister has just done so—that, although we will protect and support the rights of the people who work in the toughest schools, we will ensure that we have a performance management framework that challenges underperformance, and we will not be afraid to restructure when putting new measures in place.
Mr Gibb
My hon. Friend is right, and the Government are committed to protecting those employment rights.
The underperformance of teachers is not necessarily the only reason why schools underperform; there is a whole host of reasons, one of which is that schools are burdened by bureaucracy. One key measure that we implemented in the opening months of the Administration was a reduction in the amount of bureaucracy and prescription that has been heaped on teachers over the past 10 years. With those few comments, I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey will not press his probing new clause any further.
I turn to the new clause tabled by the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field). We welcome the many initiatives in the independent schools sector, assisted by the schools themselves through bursaries and scholarships and by many charities, to support children who would not otherwise be able to receive an independent school education. The right hon. Gentleman may have seen the article in The Times today by Lord Adonis and Anthony Seldon, the headmaster of Wellington college, urging the independent sector to sponsor more academies, and we share the views of those two contributors. That should be happening, and we want to see more independent schools sponsoring academies, but the Government’s priority is to transform the state education system so that all children are able to access a good-quality education regardless of their background.
Our independent schools provide some of the best education in the world, according to the OECD and other commentators, and we are keen to encourage greater collaboration between the sectors so that best practice can be shared and schools can work more effectively together in the best interests of pupils and staff, but the right hon. Gentleman’s new clause is neither desirable nor necessary.
An academy is free to further its education objectives by using any funds it is able to raise through charitable donations or other similar sources, but academy funding agreements regulate the way in which such schools can use taxpayer funding. The general annual grant paid by the Secretary of State can be spent by an academy only on its normal running costs, and we have no intention of changing that. That does not mean academies cannot buy in additional support from independent schools or collaborate with them on joint provision, but the bulk of state funding should rightly be used to raise educational attainment and standards for the benefit of all pupils in the academy.
Mr Graham Stuart
May I express my gratitude to my hon. Friend for listening to the representations from me and from home educators? That is precisely the way in which the Government should operate, and I know that there is great gratitude out there among home educators who are afraid that there will always be malign forces at work whenever the Government come anywhere near them. As for the local authorities that misrepresent their powers and are, according to home educators, overstepping the mark, can the Minister give any reassurances about what can be done to protect the rights of home educators? Where there is evidence that children are not receiving a suitable education, local authorities should act, as the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) said, but outwith that they should respect the right of home educators to direct their children’s education.
Mr Gibb
My hon. Friend makes a good point, just as he made a good speech on those issues. Local authorities are public authorities. They should provide accurate information about their powers and duties, and they are open to challenge if they fail to do so. I hope that that reassures my hon. Friend.
Mr Stuart
I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way again. If, with the help of home educators, I compiled a dossier of evidence about local authorities, would it be possible for me to meet the Minister and talk further with him about ways to ensure both that local authorities are aware of the law and that they observe it?
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
I share my hon. Friend’s enthusiasm for UTCs, but is he confident that the English baccalaureate will not have a cramping impact on the power of innovation in institutions such as UTCs, so that we can ensure the most appropriate education for all their pupils?
Mr Gibb
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question. The English baccalaureate is designed to leave ample time in the curriculum for other subjects, including vocational subjects. In the countries around the world that have the best technical education systems, core academic subjects are taught alongside, not instead of, technical or vocational subjects until their students reach the age of 15 or 16. Subjects such as modern languages are critical for the technical and vocational success of young people.
Academies Bill [Lords]
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Graham Stuart
The hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Glenda Jackson) made an important point about the need to ensure that communities, parents and schools feel that they are in control and making decisions, which is why the power is properly permissive.
What consideration did the Minister give to whether a school that becomes an academy could reverse that process? I bring that up, I hope in order, because smaller primary schools might find that the academy freedoms do not work for them. It is important that the system makes communities and schools feel in control, not forced down a particular channel. We will get much further with the policy if people feel that way.
Mr Gibb
No primary school is being forced down any channel, that is the whole essence of the proposals. We will not let academies fail, and if they are struggling intervention measures and monitoring will take place to ensure that different sponsors can take them over.
We want all schools that want academy status to be able to apply for it, and we do not intend to deny certain schools that option. Nor do we believe that a delay of two years before primary schools can apply to convert is necessary or appropriate. However, we will see whether any lessons can be learned from the primaries that convert this September. Furthermore, we encourage federations or partnership arrangements that wish to convert, as well as proposals for all-through academies.
I should also point out that when there are challenges with primaries—for example, with shared or co-located services such as children’s centres—we intend to work through them with all the relevant partners to ensure that services are maintained without interruption. That may mean that the process of conversion takes a little longer, but it is important to do things correctly.
The hon. Member for Gedling seemed to express no principle objection. He cited all-through academies, but said that things were different for stand-alone primaries owing to their size and the fact that their location communities could be at risk, but why? In another place, the Under-Secretary of State, Lord Hill of Oareford, said:
“The local primary school is very much part of the village where I live and I know that that is true throughout the country…If an outstanding local primary were to become an academy, it is not clear why it should automatically become less of a part of the local community, village or town life. It will have the same head, staff, parents and children with some additional freedoms. I am not clear why the change of status should suddenly make those people in their villages, towns and communities suddenly start to behave differently.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 6 July 2010; Vol. 720, c. 125.]
That is a very well expressed answer to the questions asked throughout the debate on the Bill on whether academies will continue to be part of the community. Of course they will. There is no evidence from the 203 academies, other than the one cited by the hon. Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns), that they are any more or less involved in their communities than maintained schools. I am sure that the hon. Member for Gedling did not preside over the 203 academies with a view to them being islands unto themselves and isolated from the community.
Mr Gibb
Absolutely. That is the whole point. It is in the Bill. Any school that sought to establish itself without talking to and consulting local people would not fare well in trying to attract pupils.
Furthermore, clause 9 requires the Secretary of State, when deciding whether to enter into academy arrangements with an additional school, an entirely new or free school, to take into account the impact of such a school on the existing schools and colleges in the area. That will ensure that in making decisions on any free school proposal due consideration will always be given to its wider implications. Clause 9 is included in the Bill following helpful debates in the other place where noble Lords expressed concerns over the impact that any brand new academies—free schools—would have on other schools and colleges in the area. We agreed that in making decisions on any free school proposal, due consideration should always be given to its wider implications. That was our intention even before we tabled that amendment in the other place. We were happy to place that duty in the Bill.
Amendment No. 50 seeks to define “impact”, which the Secretary of State would be required to take account of when considering entering into arrangements for an additional free school. I fully understand hon. Members’ concerns, but we do not wish to prescribe the matters to be considered in each case. Every school is different and its case should be considered on its merits. The problem with a list is that people tend to focus on what is not on it, and that risks other considerations that are not included being considered irrelevant and unimportant. In fact, they could well be quite important.
Lord Adonis said:
“The idea that parents should not be able to access new or additional school places in areas where the schools are not providing good quality places simply because the provision of those places will cause detriment to other schools fundamentally ignores the interests of parents and their right to have a decent quality school to send their children to. If there is not such a decent quality school and someone is prepared to do something substantive about it, they should be applauded”.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 21 June 2010; Vol. 719, c. 1264.]
We agree with Lord Adonis’s sentiments.
Mr Graham Stuart
Although I agree with my hon. Friend that the amendment should be rejected, may we expect the Secretary of State to come forward with an explanation of the approach that he will take to the assessment of this impact? Otherwise it could appear that the Secretary of State was making such decisions without a framework that the public in a local area could expect to understand.
Mr Gibb
We need to try to get away from reams of guidance and secondary legislation. The wording of clause 9 is clear. It states:
“The Secretary of State must take into account what the impact of establishing the additional school would be likely to be on maintained schools, Academies and institutions within the further education sector in the area in which the additional school is (or is proposed to be) situated.”
It is clear what is intended, and what has always been intended by the Secretary of State because he is under a duty to act reasonably. The clause just reinforces the duty that already exists.
Mr Stuart
If the Secretary of State will not produce a framework to show how he will approach such cases, will he publish the assessment that he makes in order to come to a conclusion? People deserve to be able to understand the logic behind a decision, even if it is just precedent and looking at different schools in different places at different times. That might also help people who want to come forward with proposals. If they do not understand the Secretary of State’s thinking, they will not know whether or not to make a proposal.
Mr Gibb
I will ponder my hon. Friend’s point. I personally think that it is clear what sort of issues the Secretary of State will take into account when deciding whether to accept a proposal for an additional school in an area. To be too specific in setting out guidance would be a mistake, because it could end up luring future providers into not considering issues that they should take into account when assessing the impact that their proposal would have on the local area. As I say, I will ponder my hon. Friend’s points and perhaps write to him on this issue.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nick Gibb and Graham Stuart(13 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
T6. The Children, Schools and Families Committee report on the national curriculum called for a five-year cycle of review and reform of the curriculum. Will the Secretary of State put in place such a cycle and ensure that the early years foundation stage, the national curriculum and the arrangements for 14 to 19-year-olds are viewed as a continuum? Will he also tell us whether he plans to implement the Rose review in the meantime?
The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question. Teachers do not welcome perpetual revolution in the curriculum; schools need some stability, and we will shortly make some announcements about the review of the curriculum. Thereafter, it will not be our intention to have five-yearly-cycle reviews.
Regarding the Rose review and the decision by the previous Government to implement a new primary curriculum from September 2011, as both parties in the coalition made clear in opposition, we do not intend to proceed with the proposed new curriculum. We believe that the Rose review’s proposed approach was too prescriptive in terms of how schools should teach and diluted the focus of what they should teach—