Oral Answers to Questions

Robin Walker Excerpts

Monday 11th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Damian Hinds]

On the condition of school buildings, the hon. Lady will know that there is £1.8 billion-worth of capital for maintaining and improving school buildings. On the broader questions about school funding, she might have been alluding—I am looking for some visual recognition—to figures put together by the National Education Union. If so, I have to tell her that we believe those figures to be flawed in multiple respects, including in assumptions they make about the money and the number of children in schools in previous years. I hope she will join me in celebrating the record resourcing rightly going in to educating children.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I welcome the record real-terms funding flowing into our schools, but will my right hon. Friend join me in looking very carefully at the case for extending funding for tutoring? It has raised attainment, in particular for the most disadvantaged, in many of our schools, and been seen as a great success story. When it was introduced, it was intended to be a long-term intervention. May I urge the Minister to continue to look at that and ensure we find money, in addition to the pupil premium, to support that noble aim?

[Damian Hinds]

I absolutely agree that tutoring is important in multiple contexts. In particular, in the years since the pandemic it has played an essential part. I will add that tutoring by undergraduates can help to introduce a wider range of people to the potential of a career in teaching. I want tutoring to continue. As my hon. Friend rightly mentions, part of the function of the pupil premium is to make such interventions and it can be spent on them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gillian Keegan]

There would be no childcare on the table if the Labour party were in charge, so I urge all working parents to support the Conservative party, which has a plan for them. Like everything we do, the £500 million will be fully funded. It secures the rates in the future so that businesses up and down the country have the confidence to invest. The Labour party has absolutely no plan for childcare and for supporting working parents in this country.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

T4. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has rightly championed childcare and early education. I congratulate her on the £500 million in this year’s Budget, on top of the billions committed last year to the sector—

[Bridget Phillipson]

indicated dissent.

[Mr Walker]

It is in the Red Book. I am happy to meet the hon. Lady to show her where it is.

I urge the Secretary of State to keep pressing on some of the Education Committee’s other recommendations, including on extending family hubs, removing rates and VAT from childcare providers, and reforming tax-free childcare to drive take-up.

[Gillian Keegan]

This Conservative Government are backing this country’s brilliant childcare providers as we roll out our historic childcare offer. As my hon. Friend has pointed out, that is on top of the roll-out of universal services in family hubs. To give certainty to the early years sector, we have confirmed that average funding rates will increase over the next two financial years—as he stated, the details are in the Red Book—giving them the confidence to invest and expand. Only the Conservatives have a plan for hard-working parents.

Kinship Care Strategy

Robin Walker Excerpts

Wednesday 6th March 2024 Westminster Hall

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Alistair Strathern) on securing this important debate. The turnout in the Chamber reflects the importance that MPs across the House place on this issue.

I have some brilliant local kinship carers and I pay tribute to the work that Enza Smith has done over many years on behalf of kinship carers in Worcester. I also pay tribute to a constituent, Julie Rose, who came to see me recently to raise some of the issues and some of the concerns of the #ValueOurLove campaign.

I do not want to repeat points that other hon. Members have made, because they made them very well, but respite care is vital and I have to say that in my constituency at the moment I am concerned by cuts to respite care. I hope the additional £500 million for children’s and adult social care announced in the Budget might help local authorities to redress some of those cuts, but that issue is undoubtedly important.

I also think kinship carers need access to other forms of support—bereavement support, in many cases. Even when a parent has not actually died, children face separation issues, having moved away from their original parents and into the care of another family member. Support such as counselling, which is offered to foster families in many cases, also needs to be considered specifically for kinship carers.

Of course, I welcome the fact that we now have the first kinship care strategy and I very much welcome the pilots; indeed, I have asked for Worcestershire to be considered as one of the areas in which those pilots take place. However, given the scale of what we know kinship carers are doing for children, we should be going beyond pilots and looking to fund and support kinship care more systematically across the country. The returns from doing so are pretty obvious and pretty clear.

Regarding the outcomes, we have already heard that the Education Committee has begun an inquiry into children’s social care; I do not want to pre-empt the outcome of that inquiry, because we are in the early days of receiving evidence, but we have already heard about the much better outcomes for children in kinship care, in terms of life chances, long-term employment and life expectancy. We should celebrate all those outcomes and the contributions that families can make to them.

I know my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) wishes she could be here for this debate. On the Education Committee, she has already made the point about the need for kinship carers effectively to have parental leave and for a more systematic approach when people take on the responsibilities of kinship care, so that they can then have some time to spend with their new charges. We should make sure that businesses support that. The guidance mentioned in the kinship care strategy is a welcome first step in that direction. We will continue to work on this issue as part of our work on social care in the Select Committee. I look forward to hearing the evidence that kinship carers can bring to us, so that we can strengthen the evidence-based case for the Government to take further action.

Colleges Week

Robin Walker Excerpts

Thursday 29th February 2024 Westminster Hall

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Robert, and to speak in this debate.

It is right that we pay tribute to the hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) for securing this debate. I know that he is incredibly passionate about further education and the skills sector, and he has raised a number of very important issues, which I will address. I also acknowledge his work on the all-party parliamentary group on further education and lifelong learning—I am a passionate supporter of that group—and work of the Association of Colleges, as the secretariat to the group.

I thank all our colleges up and down the country for the vital contribution they make to our national skills system, and to young people and adult learners across the country. In addition to noting the support and advice from the Association of Colleges, it is worth our reflecting on the support and advice that comes from the Sixth Form Colleges Association, the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, and our qualification providers, including City & Guilds and others, which have also played an important role in the Future Skills Coalition. In addition, this week, FE Week and City & Guilds put on the annual apprenticeships conference, which played an important part in pulling everybody together during this important week.

I acknowledge the contribution made by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Andrew Jones), who made important points about engagement with employers and about how Harrogate College is helping to meet local skills and workforce needs. That is a story that all our colleges could share, so it was good to hear those examples.

The hon. Member for Waveney said that colleges play an important role around the UK in our skills system and are firmly embedded in our communities. They understand the needs of our local economies, and have played an important role in the development of our local skills improvement plans. Like many other college leaders, Tracy Aust, the principal of West Thames College in Hounslow, who also oversees the Feltham skills centre, has been pivotal in pulling together those voices so that we can better match the skills needs in our local economy with the provision coming through our colleges. That also helps local authorities and other players to develop a deeper understanding of the community learning requirements.

In that context, our FE institutions truly stand as pillars of knowledge and ambition, but they are also beacons of adaptability. They work together to foster an environment that encourages lifelong learning. One of the best parts of my role as shadow Minister is going to colleges across the country to meet and listen to learners and employers. That includes West Thames College and the Feltham skills centre, which do important wrap-around work on employability and mentoring. Logistics apprentices from the Institute of Couriers are in Parliament today to celebrate their achievements. I pay tribute to the chairman of the institute, Carl Lomas, for all he does, with great enthusiasm, including building links and investing in colleges. The apprentices I saw today feel they know him personally. Those relationships and that social capital around our systems are really important.

I have spoken to students studying T-levels, apprenticeships and higher technical qualifications, and adult learners upskilling, at City and Islington College. I have spoken to people working and learning at the National College for Nuclear, and health and aerospace apprentices in Milton Keynes, Newcastle and Liverpool. Last week, I visited South and City College in Birmingham to see the important new facilities for robotics, electric vehicles and so on. This is not just about connecting young people and adult learners with the content of learning, but about giving them hands-on experience with new technologies.

I am launching my colleges tour over the next few months, which will focus on how we are engaging with small and medium-sized enterprises in our communities and what the barriers are. SME apprenticeship levels have been dropping significantly—they have fallen by 49% since 2016—and we absolutely must turn that around.

As a nation, our No. 1 priority is to grow our economy so that we can invest in our public services and greater opportunities for all. To achieve that ambition for growth, we need to invest in human talent to grow our skills and our workforce across all sectors where there are skill shortages. Colleges play an important role in delivering skills for green infrastructure, our creative industries, our life sciences sector, our public services and our everyday economy, including hospitality. All those things require workforces with specialised skills. It is vital that people across our country have pathways into high- quality vocational training, secure, enjoyable work, and opportunities to upskill. I have talked to adult learners who have told me that the qualifications they did five or 10 years ago have left them out of date, compared with those coming through the system now. Given that nine out of 10 adults are likely to need some retraining in the next decade, that will be an important part of all our futures.

Colleges are uniquely placed to deliver on this combined mission of economic growth and improved life chances for all. They provide an exceptionally diverse range of education and training courses to meet the needs of local economies. They are centres of lifelong learning for people of all ages and at all levels, as the hon. Member for Waveney so effectively highlighted. But just as it is important to acknowledge the successes of colleges this week, we must also acknowledge the challenges they face, a number of which were eloquently outlined by the hon. Member.

As examples, apprenticeship numbers have fallen, real-terms funding for the further education sector has fallen to record lows, and vital decision-making powers have been taken away from local communities. The Conservatives have also overseen more than a decade of decline in skills and training opportunities. I say that because apprenticeship starts have fallen by 200,000 since 2017—it is important to recognise the figures. In every region, apprenticeship starts have fallen since 2010, and small and medium-sized enterprise engagement with apprenticeships has fallen by 49% since 2016.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way. I apologise to the Chair, as I will not be able to stay to the end of the debate as I have a meeting with the head of the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service to talk about progression and issues of this sort.

With apprenticeships, it is very important that we compare like with like. It is a great thing that all apprenticeships now involve a year of work and a qualification. That was not the case under the last Labour Government.

I want to put on the record my tribute to the Heart of Worcestershire College and the Worcester Sixth Form College, for the fantastic work they do. I commend to both Front Benches the report from the Education Committee on post-16 qualifications, which made a number of recommendations, including increasing the number of youth apprenticeships and setting a target for the proportion of apprenticeships that lead people into work.

[Seema Malhotra]

I thank the hon. Member for his contribution and for sharing the work of the colleges in his area, with which I know he is well connected. I acknowledge his work as Chair of the Education Committee, including on that report.

It is important that we are clear about the figures, but it is also important to recognise that things have got harder, particularly for small businesses, since the implementation of the levy. We need to address those challenges. For level 2 and level 3 apprenticeships, the numbers are falling in proportion to apprenticeships as a whole—these are challenges that the Education Committee has rightly highlighted. It is important to make sure that there are pathways post-16 for those who may not have the same qualifications at GCSE. That is a point I will refer to further in my remarks.

It is also true that the Government are on track to miss the 67% achievement rate, with almost half of apprenticeships not being completed. There are a range of reasons for that. Level 2 and level 3 apprenticeships have seen some of the worst falls; there has been a 69% fall in the number of starts at level 2 and a 21% fall in the number of starts at level 3. In addition, too many young people and adult learners say they are not aware of the opportunities available to them. Colleges have also seen real-terms funding cuts under successive Tory Governments. Since 2010, spending per pupil has fallen by 14% in colleges and 28% in school sixth forms.

Labour will put colleges at the heart of our plans for breaking down barriers to opportunity and boosting Britain’s skills. Central to that is our plan to develop technical excellence colleges, enabling colleges in local skills improvement plan areas to specialise in the particular needs of their local economies and businesses, driven by LSIP priorities. We know that Whitehall does not have all the answers for what is needed in our local communities. That is why we will continue to build on the already begun process of devolving and combining power and budgets for skills and adult education to combined authorities and local areas, so that the right decisions and right priorities are led by those with the most local information, who are in the right places.

These plans will empower FE colleges to take a lead in responding to local needs. We see it as important that we reform the apprenticeship levy to become, in part, the growth and skills levy, giving businesses and employers the flexibility they need to invest in skills and training and to continue to support SMEs to take up apprenticeships, too. An estimated £3 billion in unspent levy has gone to the Treasury since 2019 that could have been spent on more training opportunities for learners and, through that, on training providers too, supporting capacity to grow the sector. The system is not working as it needs to be. Bringing more flexibility is a policy backed by the Manufacturing 5, the British Retail Consortium, techUK, the Co-operative Group, City & Guilds—the list goes on.

It is vital that young people are aware of their post-16 options so that they know which routes are open to them and how to take them. That is why Labour wants to train more thsn 1,000 new professional careers advisers. I recognise the point made by the hon. Member for Waveney about fragmented advice and guidance, but we want to train those new advisers for students in our colleges and schools and introduce two weeks of compulsory work experience for every student to connect them earlier with the workplace.

There are real concerns about the chaotic roll-out of T-levels and the phasing out of many overlapping qualifications among college staff and young people—a serious issue that has been raised with me. The Protect Student Choice campaign estimates that 155,000 students could be left without an appropriate course of post-16 study if the Government go ahead with these plans in this way. That is why Labour will ensure that all students are able to complete their qualifications and will pause and review the proposed removal of courses until we can be sure that these reforms will not prevent young people from pursuing high-quality vocational qualifications.

In conclusion, boosting Britain’s skills will be a national ambition for Labour, led by our new body Skills England, which will help provide that overarching national skills framework, connecting that with regional and local need, and will bring together businesses, training providers and unions to meet the skills needs of the next decade across all our regions. I am proud to say that colleges will be at the heart of that ambition.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robin Walker Excerpts

Monday 29th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I very much welcome the fact that this Government are doubling investment in early years and childcare. As the Secretary of State said earlier with regard to special educational needs, early identification of need is absolutely key. From that perspective, will the Minister meet me to discuss the urgent need for a specialist assessment centre in Worcester, after the loss of the one in Fort Royal? It has gone out for commissioning, but unfortunately we have not had any bids to host the new one, and we need to get on with delivering one for next September.

[David Johnston]

I do not know the details of my hon. Friend’s specific case, but I would be delighted to meet him to discuss it further.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robin Walker Excerpts

Monday 23rd October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Education Committee.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I am grateful to the permanent secretary for writing to the Committee as soon as that recent funding error was identified, and for her apology for the concern that it caused. Although no actual money was lost to schools as a result, it reflects the complexity of the current system. We have promised a fair formula for funding, which will flow directly to schools. When do Ministers expect to be able to legislate to put that in place?

[Gillian Keegan]

It is our intention to legislate, but I cannot give a date for that at the Dispatch Box. I will keep my hon. Friend informed.

Core School Budget Allocations

Robin Walker Excerpts

Tuesday 17th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We come to the Chair of the Select Committee.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I am grateful for the apology and the letter that the Select Committee received on this issue, which we have published today. Clearly, it is deeply unfortunate that this error took place. It is a result of a complex and very difficult to understand funding system that provides schools with a lack of transparency as to how their funding works in the long run.

We were elected on a manifesto to deliver a fair national funding formula. There were plans in place to legislate for the direct funding of schools. While I welcome my right hon. Friend’s confirmation that this does not in any way affect the high needs block or take money out of the overall school budget, can he update the House on plans to deliver that direct funding formula, which, along with multi-year funding settlements, the Select Committee and the sector have been calling for over many years?

[Nick Gibb]

Yes, it is unfortunate, for which officials and Ministers have apologised. It is frustrating, particularly for local authorities that have to conduct their calculations—it was an error based on the coding of the pupil numbers.

My hon. Friend mentioned moving to the direct funding formula. That is the intention of the Government, and the latest edition of the national funding formula and high needs technical briefing does say that we want ultimately to get to direct funding. Many local authorities are moving their local funding formula ever closer to the approach taken in the national funding formula.

Early Years Childcare

Robin Walker Excerpts

Monday 16th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered support for childcare and the early years.

I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for granting this debate early in this parliamentary sitting period and for allowing the Education Committee to continue its work on this vital area of policy. I am also grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton), recognising the pressure on parliamentary time today, for having withdrawn her equally important debate. I hope that she secures another one on that subject.

When I ran to be Chairman of the Education Committee, I proposed an inquiry into early education and childcare, and I was very glad to get the support of a substantial majority across the whole House, as well as from individual members of the Committee in pursuing that. As the parent of a five-year-old and two-year-old, I should perhaps declare a special personal interest in this area, but there is probably no single subject more vital to the future success of our children than their earliest experiences of education, and the stimulation, engagement and support they can receive through high-quality early years education and childcare.

As many others have argued, there is enormous economic benefit from investment in this space. However, the last time I troubled the Backbench Business Committee for time to debate it was in advance of the last Budget, when I was very glad that the Treasury accepted the case for major new financial commitments in this area. I said then that investment in childcare and early education would benefit multiple groups: parents who wish to work; schools to have properly socialised children ready to learn; children who benefit from better stimulation; and those with special educational needs with earlier identification. It is a win to the power of four.

Our inquiry was launched before the very significant expansion in the Government’s childcare offer and their plans for substantially increasing investment in the funded hours. It is important to note, however, that our oral evidence was taken both before and after the detail of the announcements became known. We heard both the relief of the sector at the scale of the commitment being made and also many of its ongoing concerns about the complexity of the many schemes of funding, the overall level of funding going into childcare, particularly for three and four-year-olds, and the many serious and ongoing pressures facing providers.

I am enormously grateful to the many expert witnesses, parents, providers, academics, campaigners, childminders and nursery practitioners who gave evidence to us. Indeed, it is worth noting that this inquiry received more written submissions than any other in the life of my Committee and, in so far as my Clerks recall, any other inquiry in the history of the Education Committee. I put on record my thanks to the Clerks of the Committee and their apprentice, who had to handle an unprecedented quantity of material with calm determination and expertise.

Due to the very important list of other debates that have taken place today, I will not have time to re-present every one of the 21 recommendations that we made in the report on the back of the more than 10,000 pieces of evidence. However, I want to remind the Minister of the pressing nature of the challenge, reflected in the enormous public response to our call for evidence, and I will focus on three key recommendations.

The affordability of childcare is a key concern for parents, and before the Budget it was becoming clear that the sector was facing a crisis of both affordability and availability. I have no doubt that the additional hundreds of millions in funding this year and next will make some difference, and that the roll-out of funded hours for the under-threes over the next few years will make a big difference for working parents, but I urge the Government to consider very carefully recommendations 6, 8 and 11, as well as overarching recommendations 1 and 2 on the need to work across Government to ensure adequate funding. The additional billions that the Government have committed over the long term will succeed only if the sector is properly supported in the short and medium term and if we continue to have strong and thriving early years education across the public, private and voluntary sectors.

I know the Department for Education is not able to make decisions on taxation, but I urge my hon. Friend the Minister to consider very carefully the case for our recommendation on exempting childcare providers from business rates and the payment of VAT on building costs. Not only are these taxes a false economy for the Treasury, as the DFE’s evidence admits these costs have to be taken into account in a setting’s funding rates, but they are a barrier to much-needed expansion to meet the Government’s own ambitions. Worse, many childcare businesses pointed out to the Committee that the size of their premises is a matter not of choice but of meeting regulatory standards required by Government and Ofsted guidelines. They therefore find themselves having to pay more in business rates not as a result of a commercial decision to expand but as a result of wishing to meet the space standards set by public bodies.

I raised nurseries’ pressing concerns about their rapidly increasing business rates bills in a previous debate but, as our unanimous recommendations suggest, fixing this problem and creating a level playing field among providers on rates and VAT should not be used as a cost-saving measure; it should be used to ensure that more resources are available for paying, upskilling and retaining expert staff. In support of this recommendation, written evidence from the National Education Union said:

“Business rates for nursery schools can be over £100,000 in some areas, so the absence of a rebate is a significant pressure on already overstretched budgets.”

Written evidence from the National Day Nurseries Association said:

“Business rate property revaluation from April 2023 has seen providers report bill increases of 40-50%.”

In a survey of NDNA members, 782 nurseries across England were asked what they would do if they no longer had to pay business rates: 61% said they would increase staff salaries; 49% said they would reduce losses in their business; and 40% said they would mitigate fee increases to parents. If affordability and quality are as important to the Government as availability, I believe that they should take account of this evidence. I know my hon. Friend the Minister is passionate about social mobility and the benefits of early years education, and I urge him to ensure this continues to be pressed with the Treasury.

We have heard strong arguments from the Treasury about the benefit to parents of being able to work, where there is affordable childcare provision. This has been a key rationale for the expansion of so-called free hours, which we have recommended should be called “funded hours,” down the age groups. It was a key rationale behind the very welcome changes to childcare costs within universal credit. However, in that context, I urge the Minister to press his Treasury colleagues on recommendation 11 for a fundamental review of the tax-free childcare system to improve both understanding and uptake.

Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs tax-free childcare report and survey of 2021 found that 43% of people found the name confusing or unclear. Of these, 58% said it prevented them from looking into tax-free childcare and 54% said it prevented them from signing up to the scheme. The Institute for Fiscal Studies said that

“in the four years after introducing tax-free childcare, the government spent £2.3 billion less on the scheme than it had planned.”

In the written evidence we received from parents, they said:

“The tax free childcare system is confusing and onerous to use, and complicated to calculate.”

Childminders told us:

“Not enough parents know about Tax-Free-Childcare, especially not the self-employed. Many parents also find it…difficult to set up the payments.”

My biggest disappointment with the announcements made at the Budget is that the tax-free childcare system was not touched, yet we know that the theoretical benefits of this policy are not reaching a very substantial proportion of the parents it was designed to help.

Worse, in answer to my written parliamentary questions, we have seen that even those who have gone to the trouble of registering or re-registering for support through the current cumbersome system, only around half actually claim anything from it, which does not suggest a system that is living up to its promise.

The Select Committee made a number of other suggestions for supporting affordability for parents, not least our call in recommendation 13 for better support for stay-at-home parents.



The last area I want to press particularly hard with my colleague on the Front Bench is the logic of our recommendation on offering funded support to parents in training or study. The logic is that elsewhere across education policy the Government are going out of their way to encourage people to upskill, supporting lifelong learning and investing in the long-term productivity of our country by ensuring people are better skilled. It is, therefore, counterproductive to disincentivise parents from pursuing higher qualifications by making 30 hours of childcare available only to working families on a particular income, and explicitly not to those in study. The recent report by the all-party parliamentary group for students on the cost of living and its impact on students highlighted the severe challenges facing parents in study. Addressing that, as part of our recommendation 18, would make a massive difference to that group of parents.

Supporting the workforce, expanding family hubs, not just in some areas but across the whole country, expanding the early years pupil premium and investing in early intervention and training to identify and meet special educational needs are among the other key recommendations of our report. I could speak passionately in favour of every single one of our key recommendations and, when the Select Committee meets tomorrow, I look forward to the detailed consideration of the Government’s response, but I know many other Members want to speak in the debate.

I end by commending the whole report of my Committee to my hon. Friend the Minister. Having served in the Government, I appreciate that he may not be able to accept every one of our recommendations straight away, but I hope he will recognise the weight of evidence that sits behind them, the incredible importance of getting policy in this area right and the immense value of continuing to invest in our children.

Our Prime Minister has described education as

“the closest thing we have to a silver bullet”

for improving productivity. I welcome his commitment to making education the main funding priority in every spending review—early years education needs to be at the forefront of that. Having worked with my hon. Friend the Minister over a number of years, I know how passionate he is about evidence-based policy to improve life chances for children, closing the attainment gap and tackling disadvantage. There can be no greater impact on each of those than investing effectively in early years.

I am hugely grateful to colleagues from across the House who have supported the debate and I am delighted that we have a maiden speech to look forward to from one of the House’s newest Members. I commend this report and debate to my hon. Friend the Minister.

[Mr Speaker]

I remind Members that this is a maiden speech and there will be no interruptions.

School Building Closures

Robin Walker Excerpts

Tuesday 19th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Education Committee.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I am grateful to the Minister with responsibility for the schools system and the permanent secretary for spending two hours this morning with the Education Committee on this issue. They were able to provide a number of useful answers, including on the provision of temporary classrooms.

I have to say that I was very disappointed last night to receive what was a non-answer on that question about temporary classrooms, which had already been asked at the Public Accounts Committee. I am glad that Baroness Barran was able to go further with the Select Committee today. The information that she provided us with was that there were seven cases from before the summer requiring temporary buildings. The Department is now aware of 29 schools that will require some form of temporary accommodation. Eleven have that temporary accommodation in place. As of Friday, there is the potential for as many as 180 single classrooms and 68 double classrooms to be needed as temporary accommodation.

I urge the Secretary of State to ensure that those are provided as swiftly as possible and that schools and responsible bodies have certainty about when those will be in place, so that we absolutely do what she said—to minimise disruption of children’s education. A key concern of the Select Committee is children not in school, and anything that can be done to minimise that disruption, to create greater certainty for the teachers and the leaders who have done such an amazing job of responding to this, will certainly be welcome.

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank my hon. Friend, the Chair of the Education Committee. I apologise about the written answer the previous night; we had more recent information at the Education Committee. The cases are always being assessed and the numbers are always being updated, which is why we choose a date to publish the latest information. The numbers are moving very quickly. He is absolutely right: 11 RAAC schools already have temporary buildings that are installed or in use. There is a further 28 sites, I think, that have made inquiries and requested potential orders. As he rightly said, there are 180 single classrooms, 68 double classrooms, plus a mixture of toilet provision.

On the portacabins, I would just like to say that I have been to a number of these schools and met the children. At the first school I visited, the children were all petitioning me to stay in the portacabins, because they actually preferred them to the classroom. The portacabins are very high quality—[Interruption.] That is true. I advise the shadow Secretary of State to visit some of them herself.

Further and Higher Education Students: Cost of Living

Robin Walker Excerpts

Tuesday 19th September 2023 Westminster Hall

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate, Sir George; I congratulate the hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) on securing it. He and I have worked together over many years. His careful stewardship of the APPG inquiries is typical of his attention to detail and his passion—shared, I know, by the Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon)—for education as an engine for social mobility.

I was very pleased, both as Chair of the Education Committee and as a local MP with a large university and many excellent colleges in my patch, to be able to serve on the inquiry and contribute to it. There are a number of strong recommendations, which I want to endorse, including more targeted bursary funding and an increase in the earnings threshold for the first time since 2018. I hope my right hon. Friend on the Front Bench will be able take some of those up.

The two reports from the all-party group highlight several concerning trends for students, which look set to fundamentally alter how young people see the comparative value of different further and higher education routes. Where that increases the attractiveness of earn-while-you-learn approaches such as apprenticeships, it might in some senses be welcome, but where it reduces students’ ability to complete their courses or participate in the wider life of universities, including clubs, volunteering and community engagement, and where it risks increasing drop-out rates or requires students to spend so much time working that their studies and mental health suffer, it is a concern.

Local students at the University of Worcester wrote to me with a number of concerns that they wanted to be raised in this debate. They point out that the cost of living is acutely affecting those who live on their maintenance loans and feel that a number of the existing schemes to support people with the cost of living specifically exclude students. They say that student accommodation costs have risen 60% in our area in the last decade, and 68% of students who responded to their survey say that they can no longer afford course materials. One third of students have considered dropping out because of finances, and one third—compared with the quarter highlighted in the all-party group’s report—have been left at the end of the month with less than £50 after rent and bills. They call for an increased student finance package and tailored cost of living support for students. In that respect, the recommendations of the all-party group are very welcome.

The Education Committee has also heard concerns that students taking T-levels find that they cannot complete their courses because of cost of living pressures on their families; in many cases, they are transferring to apprenticeships to earn while they learn. I highlight the recommendation, which echoes the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous), about FE funding in our report “The future of post-16 qualifications”; I gently say to my right hon. Friend the Minister that the figure cited in the Government’s response—that there is an increase of 2.2% for the FE sector—is clearly not enough. I know that he will want to make the case to the Treasury for more, and I hope that he will use the reports from the all-party group to strengthen that case.

I also highlight very briefly the Select Committee’s recommendation on allowing students and people in study to access the 30 hours of childcare. We think that that is an important part of the offer; it would ensure that people with parenting and caring responsibilities do not drop out of education and out of the opportunity to increase their earnings potential through upskilling.

I am grateful for the opportunity to have spoken.

Safety of School Buildings

Robin Walker Excerpts

Wednesday 6th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate, and I am grateful to the Opposition for giving us the opportunity to debate this issue, which is of urgent concern across the country. The Education Committee has requested Ministers to attend a session, and I am glad to report that we will have a Minister attending the Committee the Tuesday after next to give evidence on this important issue.

I want to raise some of the specific concerns we are hearing from school leaders about the way in which the announcements came about and their timing. I think we all agree that it is deeply unfortunate that changes had to be made so late in the school holidays, and before. I understand from conversations that I have had with Ministers today and from public statements that some of the information came to light only very recently. The Select Committee will push for a more detailed timeline on when information came to light and when decisions were made.

I heard many times when I was a Minister the concern of heads and leaders in education about announcements made late in the holidays, just before schools return, and I think we all agree on that. It is deeply unfortunate and troubling in this case. However, I do understand Ministers taking a zero-risk approach on roof collapses and children. From what I have been told, it seems that the estimation of risk—the idea that there were lower-risk and higher-risk forms of RAAC—fundamentally changed. It is important that we get more detail on that so that we can scrutinise the decision making.

On the consequences for schools, we now need to ensure that there is the minimum disruption. I welcome some of the steps set out by the Secretary of State in that regard. I welcome the fact that there are dedicated caseworkers working with those schools where issues have been identified and that more surveys are taking place where there is uncertainty. I would gently say that there is deep concern over the fact that responsible bodies are many and various in this respect, and their capability in understanding their buildings is highly varied. What works for a large multi-academy trust or a local authority managing a number of schools and has a dedicated estates team can be different from a more isolated school and single-academy trust. In particular, small primaries will not necessarily have the expertise to manage these issues. I seek assurance from the Secretary of State that there will be extra support for those more needy schools and that the Department will cover the costs where there is uncertainty of surveying. It is important that we have that assurance in the coming weeks.

I am grateful to the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, the hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Dame Meg Hillier) that I was able to join that Committee’s session on school capital before the summer and to question the permanent secretary at the Department for Education over RAAC. At the time, it seemed that visits relating to RAAC and the gathering of information were being accelerated, but given what we know now, in the light of the risk changing, it is a great shame that all those visits had not been completed by that time and we did not have a more complete risk picture. An update on the figures given to that Committee would be useful. I look forward to joining the Public Accounts Committee in our scrutiny of this issue when it meets next week.

There are many more questions to ask. Crucially, we need to ensure that lessons are learned from this for the long run and that when we build public buildings, we do so with materials that have a life that will match their use. That means multiple generations, not 30 years or 50 years.

[Andrew Western (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Walker]

I will give way briefly to the hon. Gentleman, but I want to conclude shortly.

[Andrew Western]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. Given the concern he is now expressing about how public buildings were built in the past, does he stand by his comments about Labour’s motion on school buildings in May that he described at the time as scaremongering?

[Mr Walker]

That motion was similar to this one—a Humble Address—which, for the reasons already set out, I do not think is an effective way of going about getting the relevant information. I think that proper parliamentary scrutiny is the way, and I absolutely intend to provide that proper parliamentary scrutiny. There are huge risks in the approach that the Opposition are taking with repeated Humble Addresses, undermining the confidentiality of advice given by officials to Ministers. The idea that a future Labour Government would want to disclose all submissions in spending reviews is, I am afraid, for the birds. We have to be realistic about making sure we have a proper process of scrutiny.

I will hold Ministers to account on this, and as Chair of the Select Committee I have a lot of questions to ask. My members do as well, and I know that a number of them have affected schools in their constituencies. We will want to press Ministers on those issues. I do not think that a Humble Address is the right way to go about it, and that is why I will not support the motion, but I do fundamentally believe that we must ensure there is more investment in replacing school buildings and increased investment in the quality of the school estate. Yes, that is to address issues such as RAAC, but it is also to address issues that have caused real harm, such as asbestos, which we may not have much time to talk about in the debate. It is important to take into account the point made by the Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee, the right hon. Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms), in that respect as well.

I will not detain the House longer because I will have my opportunity with the Select Committee to ask Ministers much more. This is a hugely important issue and we need all Governments to get it right. I urge Ministers in the UK Government to work with the devolved Administrations to ensure that they can take the proactive measures needed to make schools across the UK utterly safe.