Education and Opportunity

Peter Swallow Excerpts

Wednesday 24th July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)]

It is privilege and a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Dr Sullivan), who, like me, worked in teaching and the university sector before entering this place. My background is in humanities while hers is in science, and I know that we will both have to resist the urge to tell anyone off for speaking at the back of the class during our time here.

It is the honour of my life to rise and offer my maiden speech as the Member of Parliament for Bracknell, Crowthorne, Sandhurst and Whitegrove. I am the first ever Labour MP to represent this corner of Berkshire. I offer my thanks to my constituents who have put their trust in me, and in this new Labour Government, to serve them. It is now for me and colleagues on the Labour Benches to deliver the change that we have promised. I take that duty seriously, and although change cannot come overnight, it is time to begin the steady task of building a better future for Bracknell and for the country.

My predecessor, James Sunderland, represented Bracknell through a challenging Parliament dominated by a global pandemic and two major international wars. I pay tribute to the manner in which he served during that difficult period. James was an advocate for the eradication of malaria, a disease that he saw in action while serving overseas in the Army. He was also a champion for special educational needs—a cause that I will be proud to take up as his successor. In his maiden speech, James remarked that

“politics is ultimately about service.”—[Official Report, 9 March 2020; Vol. 673, c. 98.]

We disagreed about many things during the election campaign, as Members would expect, but on that we were and are agreed: politics is ultimately about service.

This year is the 75th anniversary of Bracknell being designated a new town. In 1949, after the war, Britain was facing a housing crisis, and a Labour Government established new towns such as Bracknell to address a burning need for more social housing. I am proud that in 2024, a new Labour Government facing a new housing crisis are again committed to developing the next generation of new towns, in order to build a better future for families struggling to find safe and secure housing. This next generation of new towns would do well to look at the success of Bracknell: a sense of community has been embedded by good town planning; transport links and active travel have been designed into the fabric of the town; and we are home to many national and international businesses, including in the tech and life sciences sectors.

My constituency’s long and proud history did not start in 1949. The new town of Bracknell was originally a small market town in the parish of Warfield, some of which lies within the new constituency boundaries. I am also proud to be the MP for Crowthorne, which is a beautiful, peaceful village, yet one that has a long history of automotive innovation. Everyone in this House will have benefited from the new road signs, mini-roundabouts, zebra crossings and speed humps that were designed and tested at the Transport Research Laboratory based in Crowthorne. In the south of my constituency lies the town of Sandhurst. It is, of course, home to the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, where British Army officers receive their training. The close relationship between the academy and the town is commemorated every four years with the Sandhurst freedom march, marking Bracknell Forest council’s decision in 1997 to grant the freedom of the borough to the academy. I was privileged to attend this year’s march, which happened to take place in the middle of the election campaign; it was an important opportunity to pause and honour those who serve.

As I have said, before my election I was a university lecturer, and before that I was a secondary school teacher. I have also been a primary school governor, so I have worked in education at all levels. Given that, it is no surprise that I would be keen to make my maiden speech on a topic that is of great importance to me and to this whole House: that of education. I welcome the Secretary of State for Education’s commitment to breaking down the barriers to opportunity for all children, her announcement today of a pause and review of the defunding of technical qualifications, and her laser-like focus on raising standards in early years education. We are lucky to have a number of excellent schools across Bracknell Forest, and as this week is the start of the school holidays, I take this opportunity to thank teachers, teaching assistants and the wider school staff across my constituency for another year of hard work and dedication, and wish them a pleasant summer.

The measures set out by my right hon. Friend the Education Secretary are badly needed in my constituency. Despite their heroic efforts, teachers are finding it harder than ever to offer an excellent education while supporting the increasingly complex mental health needs of their students. Alongside that, there has been growing child poverty and real-terms cuts to funding. Nowhere is education reform more needed than in the area of special educational needs provision; a long-term failure to grapple with SEND has threatened local government finances and has meant, frankly, that we are letting our children down. During the election campaign, I was privileged to get to know a young man called Fred. Fred is 13 years old. He has autism and ADHD, and for the past 18 months, he has been out of school because mainstream education is not suitable for him and he is still waiting on a place in a special school. Fred wants to go to school. He wants to learn—he is an inquisitive kid. I know that because Fred helped me with the research for this speech. But because the system is not working, he has been locked out.

Fred is not alone. There are far too many children like him in Bracknell and across the country—so-called ghost children who are missing education because the right support is not in place. This is a national crisis and requires national solutions. I welcome the Secretary of State’s acknowledgement of that fact today, since the first step towards solving the problem is admitting that it exists. Let me conclude with this commitment: for as long as I serve in this place, I will do everything I can to fight for better educational opportunities for all, and to speak up for kids like Fred, who just want a chance to learn.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call Al Carns to make his maiden speech.