Education: Return in January
Ruth Cadbury Excerpts(3 years, 4 months ago)
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Gavin Williamson
That is why we took action to ensure that the generosity of grading mirrors that of 2020 and have announced the exam subjects with advance notice, so that teachers and students, in the final months in the run-up to the exams, can focus on the topics and areas that will be examined. We believe that unless there are exceptional circumstances, exams are the fairest and best form of assessment. All the evidence points out that children from the most disadvantaged backgrounds and children from black and ethnic minority communities are most disadvantaged by non-exam assessment and are given the greatest advantage when they sit exams.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab) [V]
Headteachers at primary schools, and at all schools, are willing and able to be partners in ensuring that our children get a proper education, but the Secretary of State has said that some primary schools will not open next week. What will the criteria be for schools not opening? When will the headteachers of those schools be given the courtesy of advance warning and treated with respect by the Secretary of State?
Gavin Williamson
I am sure that the hon. Lady is aware of the gold command chaired by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, which looks at all the decisions on tiering and other measures that need to be taken to deal with the pandemic. Those decisions will be made as part of that health structure through joint working by the Health Secretary and me, because the powers to close sit with me as Education Secretary. The hon. Lady will be familiar with gov.uk; notice and details of the areas that will be put in the contingency framework are published on that website.
Free Sanitary Products in Schools
Ruth Cadbury Excerpts(3 years, 4 months ago)
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Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
It is my honour to have what might be the last debate in this parliamentary year, and I thank Mr Speaker for granting it.
Over half the population expect to have periods most months from roughly their early teens until some point in their 40s or 50s. If you are lucky, you know when to expect your period and what it will be like. You can have the pads, tampons or whatever you use ready to hand. If you are lucky, you can afford to buy supplies or have supportive parents to ensure that you do. If you are lucky as a young person, particularly when you have your first period, you will have someone supportive who you can trust to go to with all your questions.
But that is not true for everyone, particularly for too many school students, and this debate is about them. They need to have access to free menstrual supplies that are easily accessible when they need them, so that they do not miss school either through embarrassment or because they are not prepared to spend the rest of their day relying on toilet paper in their underpants.
I would like to start by thanking Members who attended the inaugural meeting of the all-party parliamentary group on period equality on 1 December. I was pleased to be elected as chair, and I thank the Father of the House, the hon. Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley), as well as my hon. Friends the Members for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) and for Luton South (Rachel Hopkins), who all agreed to be officers of the APPG.
I pay tribute to the amazing work done in this place on the issue of period poverty by my friend, the former Member for Dewsbury, Paula Sherriff. In considering the Government’s free period products scheme, I would like to pay tribute to those who have got us and the Government to where we are. There have there been so many activists, but I pay particular tribute to the charity Free Periods, including its founder, Amika George, and Gemma and Hannah, who have been campaigning tirelessly on this issue. I would also like to thank all the other groups across the country, often local and community-based groups. Yeliz Kazim, the lead volunteer with Hounslow Red Box project, worked tirelessly to ensure that schools and others local centres across the borough of Hounslow had access to period products from 2017 until last year when the Government scheme came in.
Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing such an important debate. Several campaigns were started some years ago, before the schemes from the Governments in Scotland and Wales, and indeed the UK Government, came in, and they included one called Wings Cymru in my constituency, which was led by several of my constituents. One who springs to mind is Ceri Reeves, who collected sanitary products and distributed them around schools. Wings Cymru became such a large organisation that it started to distribute them around the further education colleges as well. Those community campaigns—in Wings Cymru’s case, all women—have been out there collecting, delivering and ensuring that young women and girls have that security to be able to carry on their education, and it is those organisations and people who have made the difference, and who have made Ministers listen and ensured that we have the funding to support them.
Ruth Cadbury
My hon. Friend gives a brilliant description of a project in his constituency, and I know there are many others across the UK that, like the Hounslow Red Box scheme and Wings Cymru, are run by volunteers. They raise money, buy period products and deliver them in their distinctive red boxes, often with valuable and informative health leaflets. Hounslow Red Box also included clean new pants, tights and deodorant.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I congratulate the hon. Lady on bringing forward the debate. I have supported the campaign in my own constituency by making sure that Ards and North Down Borough Council is bringing in the procedures that it needs to. It might be of some help to her, and hopefully to the Minister, to know that my colleague, the Northern Ireland Assembly Education Minister, Peter Weir, will shortly be submitting a document on provision for tackling period poverty in schools to the Northern Ireland Executive, and is looking forward to its roll-out in 2021. Does the hon. Lady not agree that more Departments should assess their role in combating period poverty, and that perhaps even here on the mainland we should have the same thing as we are going to have in Northern Ireland very shortly?
Ruth Cadbury
The hon. Gentleman raises an important issue. This is about more than just schools and more than just one part of the UK.
My focus today is on education, but this issue has much wider implications. It is vital that free period products are available in all sorts of venues and facilities, from leisure centres and community spaces to workplaces and further education colleges—in fact, anywhere where there are likely to be people on low incomes who might be caught short and need access.
Scotland led the way last month by passing a Bill that will ensure that free period products are available in all public places. It was moved by Labour’s Monica Lennon MSP, but supported by all parties and passed with no opposition. In Monica’s recent speech in the Scottish Parliament, she was absolutely right to say that the passage of that Bill showed that Parliament could be a force for good. She said:
“Our prize is the opportunity to consign period poverty to history. In these dark times, we can bring light and hope to the world”.—[Scottish Parliament Official Report, 24 November 2020; c. 76.]
As chair of the APPG, I am looking forward to having Monica speak at our next meeting and seeing how something similar could be brought in in England.
In England, following the success of the Red Box schemes and campaigners, the Government finally brought in a scheme to introduce free period products to schools, which was rolled out in January. The schools have to ask to get access to the scheme. Our concern was that if there was insufficient take-up by schools, the funding would be pulled and the scheme would end, so we have been encouraging Members to contact their schools about this. It is not often I say that I am pleased with this Government lately, but I am really pleased that, last night, they announced that the scheme would be extended through the full 2021 calendar year. That is very welcome.
As I said, the scheme is being taken up by schools across the country, including many in my constituency. I know from speaking to young people that it has made a huge difference and they really appreciate it. There are fundamental reasons why the scheme is so important. We know what it is like to be in a toilet where there is no paper. Having no pad or tampon to hand when your period arrives is the same feeling. Of course, it is far worse for young people without the cash to buy them.
We need to ensure that any such free period product scheme has three key attributes: we need to remove the stigma around period products; we need to remove the postcode lottery that has meant that people have relied on charities and even teaching staff to provide free products—they should be available in all schools; and, most importantly, we need to ensure that no student misses out on time in the classroom because they have their period but no menstrual protection.
A 2019 report found that half of those who said they had missed schooling because of their period had done so because they could not afford to pay for period products. I am concerned that the coronavirus is fuelling this inequality even further. The problem might now be even greater, as the new figures coming in show that the pandemic has plunged more families into poverty. We know that we have a serious problem in this country when UNICEF is funding work here.
An important part of the scheme—and, indeed, of this whole debate—is tackling stigma and making it not only okay but perfectly acceptable and normal to discuss issues relating to periods. I am glad that this place has got much better in recent years, although I found out that the words “tampon” or “sanitary towel” were not used here until May 1987—and that was in relation airport security. Despite the title of this debate, Paula Sherriff reminded me today that we should not be using the word “sanitary”. Let us get away from the idea that menstrual products and menstruation implies uncleanliness; having a period is not dirty or unsanitary, although without protection it is messy.
Let me address the uptake of the Government’s free period products scheme in schools. The figures show us that by August only 40% of schools had signed up; will the Minister tell us the current level of take-up? In response to a written question, the Minister said,
“we are continuing to monitor orders closely”,
so I hope she will be able to provide further information. It is so important that schools sign up, which they can do so easily by going to the Free Periods website, which has a useful guide and toolkit to help schools. It also offers help on how to lobby MPs and on how MPs can encourage their local schools to take up the scheme. I have been working hard to make the scheme available in local schools, as have my colleagues, but MPs can do so much more.
Funding into next year would be much appreciated, but I have some other requests of the Government. It should not be left to charities such as Free Periods to do the heavy lifting in promoting the scheme when the Department for Education has a much louder megaphone to use. I know that the Department says:
“We intend to publish positive stories from organisations that have benefitted from the scheme”,
but I would like to know what the Government have been doing beyond that. What urgent work has been and is being done to promote the scheme directly in schools?
It has been such a tough year for schools and staff, and heads have had more than enough to deal with, so the easier take-up is made, the better. When I met one local headteacher, she told me about the difficulty they had in understanding the reams of directives that arrive every week; let us make it easier so that this is not yet another hurdle they have to jump. I hope the Minister will take that back to the Department.
As we end this year, I wish to speak about the future of the scheme. I hope the Minister will outline in further detail the plans for next year. Will the same amount of funding be available as was available for this past year? If schools do not use all their allocated funding by the end of the year, will they be able to roll it over and use it in future? The success of the scheme rests on as many schools as possible signing up to it. When the scheme was launched, the Minister responsible at the time, the hon. Member for Chippenham (Michelle Donelan), who is now the Minister for Universities, said that the Government would consider making the scheme mandatory if take-up was not high enough. What level of take-up does the Minister think is acceptable? Does the Department have any plans to make it an opt-out rather than opt-in scheme?
Will the Government draw on our Red Box experience in Hounslow and consider extending the scheme to include other products, such as pants and tights? They are particularly valuable, because it is one thing to have a clean pad or tampon, but another to have to put back on the same pants and tights. That is certainly what the volunteers in our Red Box scheme put in, because of the feedback from students and schools. I hope that when the Minister gives her response, she will set out what the plans for the scheme are and what changes there will be.
While I congratulate the Government on their decision to continue the scheme, it is certainly not the end of the issue of access to free period products generally, as I have said. As the Scottish example shows, there are other venues and places where people, particularly those with no money or very little money, get help and support, such as food banks, citizens advice bureaux and those who support refugees. I have often visited these sorts of projects and places and they are wonderful people doing wonderful things—they provide food, they often provide razors and they provide toys for children—but sometimes they do not provide period products. I think that that needs to be considered because, as I say, period products are as necessary as food to eat and toilet paper.
Finally, Mr Deputy Speaker, as this is the official end of the parliamentary year, I wish you and your team, all the staff of Parliament, who support us, all our parliamentary staff and other Members here—those who are left—a happy, peaceful and restful Christmas. Here is hoping that 2021 is a happier year.
Oral Answers to Questions
Ruth Cadbury Excerpts(3 years, 5 months ago)
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Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
Nick Gibb
Our No. 1 priority is to make sure that we help young people catch up on their lost education. That is why we have allocated £1 billion to schools—the catch-up premium—to help students catch up and, of that, £350 million is allocated to disadvantaged pupils. We have delayed this summer’s exams—GCSEs and A-levels—by three weeks to free up teaching time. Ofqual consulted in the summer on changes to assessment on issues such as science practicals, field trips, spoken language and optionality in history and English literature, again to help reduce pressure on teaching times. We will shortly announce other measures to help to ensure that exams are fair, including the approach to grading to ensure that the 2021 cohort is treated fairly compared with previous years’ cohorts of students.
Ruth Cadbury
Secondary heads in my constituency told me last month that it was already too late to plan properly for even the delayed GCSEs and A-levels next summer, and they are still waiting. If the Republic of Ireland Government could give students and teachers a clear roadmap for summer 2021 back in August, and a plan B that went along with it if the situation changed, why can this Government not do the same and give students in years 11, 12 and 13 a fighting chance?
Nick Gibb
As I said to the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell), everything we are doing is about ensuring that every student has a fighting chance to do well in the exam. There is a broad consensus that exams are the fairest way to judge a student’s assessment. We want to ensure that that fairness is spread right across the country, regardless of the experience any individual will have had as a result of the virus. That is why we are delaying the exams, why there have been changes to the assessment and why we are still working with Ofqual and the exam boards on further mitigations and contingencies to ensure that every student is treated fairly. We will have more to say about those issues shortly.
Political Neutrality in Schools
Ruth Cadbury Excerpts(4 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Marcus Fysh (Yeovil) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered political neutrality in schools.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I should declare some interests in this topic. I have two children of primary school age and my wife teaches. Clearly, I am also a Member of Parliament, and I am chair of the all-party parliamentary group on education. The APPG plans to do some work on the mental health and wellbeing of our children in the classroom, which I will come to later.
We are fortunate in Somerset to have brilliant schools and teachers, and measures to level up funding for rural schools are welcome. As elsewhere, we need to ensure that support for special educational needs makes a difference for the children involved—that is something else I would like the APPG to focus on—but in general we have dedicated and highly professional teachers and support staff in our part of the country.
I did not seek the debate to suggest that classrooms are a hotbed of radicalisation. However, I have been approached by concerned parents—I am sure I am not the only Member in that position—about incidents, in the run-up to December’s general election and at other times, that I am told included the airing of strong and aggressive political views.
The issue received attention in the national press just before Christmas, when the musician Stormzy was criticised for telling a primary school class of seven-year-olds that the Prime Minister is “a bad, bad man” and, like the big bad wolf, would blow their houses down. That was not the first time Stormzy had attracted controversy. Given his previous homophobic rants on social media and the language and themes of his music, it is not unreasonable to question whether he was an appropriate guest at a primary school in the first place.
Stormzy—or Michael, to use his real name—has well-known political views. Most of us will have seen him getting the well-heeled crowd at Glastonbury hot under the collar with his support for Jeremy Corbyn, but those views do not belong in a primary school. I would say the same if he had a strong anti-Labour message; this issue is not about political parties, but about the abuse of a position of influence.
In the last few years we have seen a coarsening of our political debate. In too many cases, reasoned debate has given way to name calling and abuse. Politicians are thick skinned, and we are increasingly used to people firing abuse at us from the comfort of their own homes. Our young children, however, will not understand that, and they should not be asked to.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
I am listening with care to the hon. Member. I absolutely agree that children, and particularly seven-year-olds, should not be subjected to the kind of language and approach that Stormzy was reported to have used, but is it not true that guest speakers who come into schools can be expected to be asked their political views? Certainly, whenever I go into schools I am asked what I think of the Prime Minister, of Brexit, of plastic and of climate change, and whether I have ever met the Queen. Is not the issue more about the appropriateness of the speaker’s response and the respect they give to the children and staff in the school than about their political position?
Mr Fysh
I will come on to some of those issues, but the hon. Lady makes some valid points.
One of the big challenges facing us generally is why children are more likely than ever before to suffer from stress or have mental health problems. That is partly due to better diagnosis, which is a positive step, but there has undoubtedly been a rise in the number of young people with high anxiety. The role of social media and mobile phones in that is for another time, but being exposed to aggressive tribal politics and told that the country is being run by a very bad man certainly is not going to help.
This area becomes more complex when we consider that we want our young people to be interested in and engaged with politics. At a time when anything can be researched at the click of a button and the number of sources on any given subject is rising exponentially, it is more important than ever that children are taught the skills to make reasoned assessments and form balanced opinions. I am sure many of today’s politicians were inspired at school by certain teachers to choose the path of politics. The more people who choose to get involved and run for office, the better.
Mr Fysh
I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. I hope my right hon. Friend the Minister will address some of those issues in his response to the debate.
Teachers often bring the same positive attributes to elected office that make them effective in the classroom. Many become councillors or Members of Parliament, and our democratic institutions are richer for having them, along with the skills and insights into education that they contribute. Whether they should remain in education while they do so, however, is a valid question.
There may be no straightforward formula for how to inspire and inform without exerting undue influence, or for where being passionate about an issue undermines reason and constructive debate. Measures intended to ensure political neutrality may lead to schools being less stimulating. An important lesson for young people is to be tolerant and understanding of the views of others. It is also the case that some of our educational institutions, particularly universities, have a reputation for a particular political slant. I am not necessarily against that, but we must look at the age of the pupils and the extent to which they are able to critically assess the information put in front of them.
I do not wish to stray too far beyond the topic of the debate, but I am also concerned that some young people are encouraged into activism on environmental issues in a way that may not be entirely healthy. They may be better served by learning to assess rigorously how they know what they know, to delve deeply into the factual and statistical bases for various claims and to judge between them.
Ruth Cadbury
The hon. Gentleman, whom I thank for bringing forward the debate, may be interested to know that research among young people involved in climate activism has shown that their mental health improved as a result of their undertaking appropriate but self-generated activity to support a cause they believe in. I thought that was very interesting.
Mr Fysh
The hon. Lady makes a good point. I do not argue that activism should not be allowed; I just want people to be able to understand, on the basis of facts and statistics, why they might want to be activists.
It is hard to gauge the size of this problem and to compare it with previous times. The evidence tends to be anecdotal. I suspect there have always been teachers with strong views who have not held back in sharing them, although perhaps in the past those views were sublimated in interests in particular texts or topics. However, I can say that I have received complaints from constituents, and I doubt I am alone. I also know that those cases were less about the examination of political ideologies and focused more on personalities—an approach sadly reminiscent of Stormzy’s.
I sought the debate because I wanted to reflect the concerns of my constituents and to express my own views about the importance of our children’s mental health. Surely, learning that we can disagree with one other without using the language of hatred is one of the most important lessons there is. I accept that there is fault across the political spectrum, but we have only to look at Momentum’s contribution to Twitter to see how corrosive it can be when abuse becomes a normalised part of political discourse.
I hope my right hon. Friend the Minister is able to offer some reassurance that the Department is active on this issue. Parents should have a route to voice concerns in a way that does not affect their children, and teachers should have guidance that helps them to be confident in judging where the line is between passionate and coercive.
I have seen rather colourful comments on social media by teachers, who should be mindful that their pupils may be on the same platforms. Whether online or at school, teachers must inspire and equip our children to make up their own minds not just on politics but across a whole range of issues. I end by paying tribute to the overwhelming majority, who do just that.
Oral Answers to Questions
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Damian Hinds
My hon. Friend is exactly right. According to the most recent OECD “Education at a Glance” report, published in 2015, the UK’s spending as a proportion of national income was the highest in the G7.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Nadhim Zahawi)
I will happily meet the hon. Lady and, of course, her colleague, but I remind her that SEND funding has risen to £6.3 billion. We recognised the pressures on the system, which is why we announced £250 million of additional funding.
Sure Start: IFS Report
Ruth Cadbury Excerpts(4 years, 11 months ago)
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Anne Milton
The hon. Lady rightly raises the issue of youth violence, which is behind much of the work done by Members on the first 1,000 years. [Hon. Members: “1,000 days.”] I mean 1,000 days. “The First 1000 days of life” is based on the premise that many life chances are set in those early years. I think that both the Department of Health’s healthy child programme and our Secretary of State’s focus on improving home learning, particularly family learning, are important. However, I shall be delighted to look at Edward Melhuish’s report when I am able to do so.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
I was Hounslow’s Cabinet lead for children and young people when the Tories, who were in opposition in this place, shifted their view and came round to fully supporting the Labour Government’s roll-out of universal Sure Start provision as a multi-agency service. They did so because of the vast body of credible evidence of the real benefits provided by fully funded Sure Start centres, not just in health and mental health—which are covered in the IFS’s report—but in, for instance, social mobility, educational outcomes, and the provision of domestic violence services. Where is the evidence that informs the Government’s change of policy, as a result of which Sure Start centres are withering on the vine—or is the Minister struggling to justify it in the light of the effects of Government austerity on her Department?
Anne Milton
No. Let me remind the hon. Lady that the report makes it clear that we are one of the highest spenders on early years—[Interruption.] It is in the report, on the first paragraph of the executive summary.
I can only reiterate that, while words like “austerity” can be thrown around, this is about the money we are putting into, for example, the free childcare entitlement. It all matters. It all goes towards giving young families and children the early years support they need.
School Funding
Ruth Cadbury Excerpts(5 years, 2 months ago)
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Royston Smith
I absolutely agree. How schools deal with children who have significant and complex special educational needs or disabilities has changed beyond all recognition from how things used to be. We are doing so much better. [Interruption.] Members shake their heads, but things are so much better than when I went to school and when my daughter went to school. The reality is that it could be better still. If all we ever do is refuse to acknowledge what is happening, we will never make the progress we all want.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The hon. Gentleman talks about the needs of children with special needs in school, but when he was at school, many of those children would have been in special schools—separated and with a different level of provision. We support the integration of children with special needs in our schools wherever possible, and that needs resourcing.
Royston Smith
That is exactly what I just said, but the hon. Lady decided to interpret what I said as not thinking that children with special educational needs and complex educational needs were being looked after in schools far better than they used to be. There is nothing wrong with putting the case for extra funding from Government, and I expect everyone to do that, but it has to be done within the envelope of public spending. Everyone is asking for money for everything.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) on leading this debate and Mr Ramanandi, who led the creation of the petition, as well as those who organised and signed it throughout the country.
This is the second debate on education this year that I have attended in this Chamber—the first was on college funding—and the pattern is the same: Government party Members wring their hands about the impact of financial cuts in their constituencies. When will they realise that what they are describing is a direct impact of their failed austerity project? We cannot do more with less.
I concur with many points made already by Members in this debate, so I will focus on how the cuts in school funding have impacted in my borough, Hounslow. I have seen at first hand the great work that our schools are doing—23 of our schools are rated outstanding by Ofsted; our secondary schools perform above the UK average in Progress 8 scores; and our primary schools exceed the national average in reading, writing and maths—and that is in a community where the majority of children do not speak English as a first language at home and with high levels of churn in its schools. Hounslow Council has also invested £177 million in capital funding for the expansion of primary, secondary and SEN schooling, but that is all happening despite the steeply rising and unjust cuts being imposed on our schools by the Government.
Other Members have talked about the experience of their constituencies. In Hounslow we have seen cuts in total spending per pupil since 2010, and real-terms cuts in per-pupil funding between 2015 and 2019. Local authority spending on school services has been cut, so that—if they still exist—they now have to be bought back by schools. Before, schools had them for free and yet now school budgets have been cut, as we have heard so many times. The range of extracurricular and curricular activities supported by councils has gone down and down. This year, schools in Hounslow have lost teachers, teaching assistants, support staff, auxiliary staff and the essential additional support that children in crisis or trouble need in particular.
To give some numbers, we have had an additional 5,640 primary and secondary places in the borough, and a 51% increase in children with special needs or an education, health and care plan since 2012—that is the third highest increase in London—and we face £27 million in funding cuts in 2018-19, with £4.5 million savings in education and early-years provision. Added up, that has a massive impact on the ability of our children to learn with good quality. As others have said, many schools, teachers and parents have expressed concerns about children with special needs in particular.
Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)
My hon. Friend’s experience in Hounslow is mirrored in other parts of London, including in my constituency. The headteacher of an outstanding special needs school in my constituency wrote to me, knowing this debate was to take place, to flag that in order to balance her budget she faces having to drastically reduce staffing ratios in her school.
Ruth Cadbury
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that it is both the numbers and the quality of staff at special needs schools that make such a difference to children’s outcomes. But that is for the children who get into the special schools: I hear again and again from parents, teachers and governors about children who desperately need to be assessed. Even once assessed, they desperately need the right support either in their mainstream school or in a special school, but they are not getting it. They have to wait—not because of a lack of will, but because of a lack of professional support and places. In London, we have the additional problem of a massive shortage of professional psychological and psychiatric support in child and adolescent mental health services. Children with special needs who are not supported not only are suffering, with an impact on their future; their troubles have an impact on the other children in the class, affecting their learning. That is unacceptable.
Teachers and governors have written to tell me about a number of things, including the inability to provide maintenance to replace air conditioning—in Hounslow under the flight path, the windows cannot be opened in summer. Another cannot replace an inclusion mentor and children are not getting the high-quality art and technology support because the technician has had to be cut.
Oral Answers to Questions
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Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The Minister for Apprenticeships and Skills (Anne Milton)
The Department works closely with Her Majesty’s Treasury on the challenges that the further education sector faces. We are currently considering the efficiency and resilience of the sector and assessing how far current funding and regulatory structures enable high-quality provision.
Ruth Cadbury
We know that the Government want to bring in T-levels, but the funding for that is almost immediately offset by the ongoing £3.3 billion real-terms cuts for our colleges and further education. Will the Minister’s review include addressing the 38% cut in construction skills training and the 68% cut in engineering courses that have been experienced recently?
Anne Milton
The hon. Lady is right that T-levels will bring in an extra £500 million a year when fully rolled out. I know the Construction Industry Training Board is putting a substantial amount of money into improving skills in that industry.
College Funding
Ruth Cadbury Excerpts(5 years, 3 months ago)
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Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone. I too congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) on introducing this Petitions Committee debate today. I will try not to repeat the many points that have been made by hon. Members on both sides of the Chamber.
On her first day, the Prime Minister promised to tackle the “burning injustices” of society, with the implication that everyone in Britain, whatever their background and age, would be able to succeed. Here we are confronted with another example of deed not following word: the cuts to our further education system.
In December, I visited West Thames College in Isleworth in my constituency, which was largely rebuilt thanks to the decision of the Labour Government in 2010 and now has amazing student and technical facilities from that major capital build. The college provides a wide variety of courses, including world-renowned specialist hair and make-up degrees, whose graduates get jobs in the west end and in the film and TV industry; a range of vocational courses designed in conjunction with local employers, such as in aviation and logistics, where we have a local skill shortage; and courses in English as an additional language to enable young people recently arrived in the country to make progress in education and employment. There is specialist support for those who need additional support to access mainstream courses, and specialist courses for students with severe or complex disabilities. There is also a programme for 14 to 16-year-olds who have not coped in school for various reasons, such as health or family problems.
When I visited in early December, I met a number of students on a variety of courses—students such as Page and Rosie, who were aged 18. Each had struggled for different reasons when younger and had missed a lot of school, but West Thames is providing them with the focus to catch up on their core skills and giving them career hopes—Page in bridal hair and Rosie in car mechanics. I met 32-year-old Katrina, who is doing an access to social work course. As the lone parent of a disabled child, she has struggled to pursue a career or even, at times, to get a job. She told me how the course will enable her to apply to university and hopefully achieve her dream of becoming a professional social worker.
Uplifting as their stories are, the students on the different courses raised concerns with me about problems they had experienced recently: cuts to the teaching hours that are needed to cover the breadth of the curriculum on their courses; cuts in courses such as employability, which are so important in helping them to get a job; concerns about the provision of up-to-date specialist equipment and software, because they are changing all the time and the college needs to keep up with the changing needs of employers; and overstretched special needs and mental health support. The college is also suffering from the decimation of adult learning, with fewer and fewer adults able to attend the college.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
I was lucky enough to benefit in 2008 from retraining through adult education. Does my hon. Friend agree that the great benefit of further education is the richness and breadth it can provide, and the diversity of courses that does not exist anywhere else? We are seeing 30% cuts at Warwickshire College Group, which has 29,000 students and provides a huge benefit across Warwickshire.
Ruth Cadbury
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The decimation of adult courses has been brought about partly through the ending of student support for over-19s. The students and colleges are dealing with that cliff edge, which comes when students reach 19. Aviation and ICT course students told me that more than half the students left at the end of level 2, because they no longer got funding. They therefore missed out on level 3, which is the best gateway to jobs.
West Thames College, like many others, has lost 30% of its funding in the last 10 years, while costs, as other hon. Members have said, have been rising. Students told me that they respected their tutors greatly and could not understand how they earned £7,000 less than equivalently experienced schoolteachers. The West Thames principal, Tracy Aust, made it clear to me that this situation, with all these problems, is not sustainable and ultimately impacts not only on students but on staff, businesses, our communities and our wider economy.
How can Government Members wring their hands about UK productivity and then oversee the decimation of the education and skills training that is fundamental to the productivity that this country so badly needs? How can they wax lyrical about social mobility and then withdraw or underfund the options that enable people to aspire and achieve?
Oral Answers to Questions
Ruth Cadbury Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
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Damian Hinds
You are very kind, Chris.
There are many different angles to our social mobility approach. As I mentioned in my opening answer, our focus on social mobility means that, at every phase of education, we have seen a narrowing in the attainment gap between the rich and the poor of at least 10%—in early years, in primary school, in secondary school and in entry to higher education. It is our school professionals, our teachers and other staff who have made that happen, supported by our reforms, by the fact that more children are going to good and outstanding schools, by the free schools programme and by the availability of quality new places and rigorous standards in schools.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)
We are fully funding the teachers’ pay award by providing a teachers’ pay grant worth £187 million in 2018-19 and £321 million in 2019-20. This funding will be over and above the core funding that schools receive through the national funding formula.
Ruth Cadbury
That is not the experience of heads and governors in Hounslow. The pay award is not fully funded. Schools are expected to pick up the tab for the first 1% of the cost of the pay award, so they are having to make further cuts to school provision and staffing. Also, schools have not been told how the pay award will be funded after 2020. Will the Minister come to meet heads and governors in Hounslow to explain how he thinks they will be able to achieve this?
Nick Gibb
The pay award is being funded over and above the 1% for which schools have already budgeted. Incidentally, the 3.5% pay award for teachers on the main pay scale takes the pay range to between £29,600 and £40,300. The 2% pay rise will be funded over and above the 1%, and the 1.5% pay rise for headteachers will also be funded over and above the 1% that schools have already awarded. Pay scales for headteachers, for example, now range up to £111,000 a year for some heads, and £118,000 for headteachers in inner London, although I accept that those figures are not as high as the pay of the general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, which is over £200,000.