Educational Settings: Reopening

Debate between Nick Gibb and Kate Osamor

Tuesday 26th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nick Gibb]

The reason why schools have been asked to restrict access to children other than vulnerable children and the children of critical workers is nothing to do with the safety of the schools themselves. It is about reducing community activity. That in turn will help to reduce transmission risk in those communities. That is the reason behind adding school closures to the other closures in the economy that took place prior to that decision, which we were advised to take in January. My right hon. Friend rightly asks: what are the criteria that will determine whether and how soon we will move out of the national lockdown position? As he reminds me, I mentioned those in my opening comments about hospitalisation rates, mortality, the rate of vaccination and the challenge of new variants. We do rely on the advice of SAGE, the Joint Biosecurity Centre, Public Health England and the chief medical officer as well as the deputy chief medical officer, Jenny Harries, when those criteria are assessed and whether they believe that it is right to start to undo some of the national restrictions that we are now facing.

[Kate Osamor (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op) [V]]

In Edmonton, almost 7,000 children live in poverty, and families living in multigenerational, crowded homes, experiencing food and job insecurity, are really struggling. What is the Minister doing to ensure that all vulnerable children are able to access the support and services that they need during this lockdown?

[Nick Gibb]

The hon. Member raises a hugely important issue that has been at the forefront of our decision making right from the very beginning of the pandemic. When we closed schools for the first time, we allowed vulnerable children and the children of critical workers to attend school, but the attendance rates were quite low—certainly compared with those children’s rates of attendance today. We took action to ensure that local authorities and schools made contact with the families of those children to find out why they were not attending school—whether there were good reasons for that—and to encourage the most vulnerable children to attend school. That remains our position now.

School Admissions Process

Debate between Nick Gibb and Kate Osamor

Thursday 27th February 2020 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Buck. I congratulate the hon. Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) on securing the debate and on her excellent opening speech.

I listened carefully to what she had to say, and she said that there are not enough high-quality school places in our system. I have to say to her that we have raised the proportion of schools graded by Ofsted as good or outstanding from just 68% in 2010 to 86% today, and in the period between May 2010 and May 2018 we created 920,000 more places in our school system. We have also changed the admissions code to allow schools to prioritise in their admissions arrangements, their over-subscription criteria, children who are eligible for free school meals, those who qualify for the pupil premium, so there are incentives on schools to actively seek children from disadvantaged backgrounds. That is particularly the case with the pupil premium. It pays £935 per pupil in a secondary school and £1,320 per pupil in a primary school. And of course in the national funding formula we allocated significant sums to children from disadvantaged backgrounds.

In relation to the school admissions system, only about 1% of schools are referred to the Office of the Schools Adjudicator, which administers the school admissions system to ensure that they are fair. Anyone can object, if they think the admissions arrangements are unfair, but only 1% of schools are referred to the Office of the Schools Adjudicator. In her annual report, Shan Scott, the chief schools adjudicator, said that it was

“an admissions system that as a whole works effectively in the normal admissions rounds and that in those rounds the needs of vulnerable children and those with particular educational or social needs are generally well met.”

We are concerned about children in need who are known to social workers and seek their support. That is what our review of children in need was about. Our forthcoming changes to the school admissions code focus on in-year admissions and the fair access protocols, to ensure that they work better for the most vulnerable children, including children who have been excluded.

Our system is producing more good school places, which has been the thrust of everything that we have done with our school reforms since 2010. The academies programme has been at the heart of this Government’s reforms. Today, over 50% of pupils in state-funded education study in academies, the number of which has grown from 203 in 2010 to over 9,000 today. Our vision is for a world-class school-led system, which gives headteachers the freedom to run their schools in the way they know best. We believe that the academies programme can provide opportunities for that through its key principles: autonomy, accountability and collaboration. Therefore, we do not agree with Labour’s policy to bring academies under political control or with its hostility to the free schools programme.

Some 75% of sponsored primary and secondary academies that have been inspected are now good or outstanding. Those are sponsored academies, which are schools that have underperformed for years. Only one in 10 of those schools were judged good or outstanding before they became sponsored academies. Pupils at those schools are getting a significantly better quality of education thanks to that academies programme.

Through the free schools programme, this Government have funded thousands of good new school places and opened schools across the country, and we are committed to delivering choice, innovation and higher standards for parents. We want it to challenge the status quo and drive wider improvement, injecting fresh, evidence-based approaches into our education systems. Free schools are created to meet the need for pupil places in areas that need them and to address the concern about low- quality provision.

[Kate Osamor]

The Minister says that the Government are providing enough spaces for parents and their children. If there are enough spaces of high quality for all parents, why has the number of children in home schooling gone up by 13%?

--- Later in debate ---

[Kate Osamor]

The Minister did not answer all my questions. Is he prepared to receive a letter from me?

[Nick Gibb]

Or we could meet.

[Kate Osamor]

I appreciate that. It is a very important issue to my constituents. I am sure that I will speak to the Minister about admissions again.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the effectiveness of the school admissions process.