Social Mobility Commission: State of the Nation Report

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Thursday 23rd March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House notes the contents and recommendations of the annual State of the Nation report from the Social Mobility Commission; notes that despite welcome measures by successive governments to improve social mobility the Commission warns that social mobility is getting worse, the reasons for which are deep-seated and multi-faceted; and calls on the Government to lead a renewed approach in the early years, in education, skills and housing, to improve social mobility.

This motion stands in my name and those of the right hon. Members for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan) and for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg).

May I start by putting it on record that my thoughts are with the victims of the terror attack yesterday? I thank the emergency services for their dedication, bravery and service, and the House staff who looked after us so well yesterday. That we are meeting today shows that we can carry on with our democracy and debates in such times. It also shows that we often come together in this House, as we are doing today in the spirit of this important debate on social mobility.

This debate, with Members on both sides of the House joining together to champion social mobility, is welcome and timely. I have been delighted to work closely with the right hon. Members for Loughborough and for Sheffield, Hallam over recent weeks, and it is our hope and intention that we continue that work beyond today to truly build a cross-party consensus for a strategy to tackle social mobility. I also thank the Government’s Social Mobility Commission for all its important work. As it has consistently warned, by all measures social mobility is getting worse, not better. It recently said:

“Low levels of social mobility are impeding the progress”

of many in our society, “not only the poorest”. That is the context for our debate.

We need a better understanding of what we mean by increasing social mobility in the modern economy. Too often, social mobility is thought of in terms of plucking the one or two lucky ones out of disadvantage and taking them to the top—the so-called “council house to the Cabinet table” journey. That understanding is really unhelpful when we are looking at the challenges and opportunities that our country faces, and the strategy required to deal with them. In today’s context, social mobility is about everyone being able to make economic and social progress, unconfined by the disadvantages they begin with. With Brexit, automation, digitaisation and huge changes to work, that process is going to get harder and ever more squeezed. No longer can this just be about those who go to university, as everyone needs to gain a rich, stretching education and the skills to succeed.

To put it another way, if we look ahead to the needs of the economy in, say, 2022, forecasts by the Social Mobility Commission show that there will be 9 million low-skilled people chasing just 4 million jobs, yet a shortfall of 3 million workers for the higher-skilled jobs. That is before the effects of Brexit. The biggest barrier to dealing with this issue is known as the long tail of underachievement. At the same time, companies such as Google say that we are not producing enough of the right engineering graduates for their growth. Britain has the third highest proportion of graduates in non-graduate jobs in Europe, with only Greece and Estonia behind us. No wonder our productivity is so poor compared with that of other OECD countries. In fact, it takes a British worker five days to produce the same amount of work that a German worker can do in four days—that is the stark challenge we face. Any social mobility strategy must therefore also be inextricably linked to our industrial strategy.

These huge challenges require a new national mission built on consensus and evidence to turn them into real opportunities for the country, and that is what we hope to address with this debate and our work. But, let us be honest, although much progress has been made by successive Governments, the political cycle means that every party is guilty of looking for a quick fix or a new wheeze that might appeal to voters, rather than the more difficult job of putting in place a clear and determined strategy. Let us look at the evidence and stick with it, even if at times that means giving praise to our opponents, as we will be doing today.

We know from the Social Mobility Commission and others that when it comes to education, some areas are absolutely key. I will focus on a few of those now and I know that Members will pick up others in their speeches. First, I want to look at the facts on early years, which will not come as a surprise to those who know me well, because it is a personal passion of mine. By the age of five, children from disadvantaged backgrounds are already far behind their peers, with a developmental gap of as much as 15 months between those from advantaged and disadvantaged backgrounds. One study found that children in low-income households hear up to 30 million fewer words by the age of three than their better-off peers. The levels achieved by the time a child is five are still the biggest predictors of outcomes at GCSE.

What happens in the first few years of life is massively critical, yet that still does not demand nearly enough Government and policy attention. We have made some progress under successive Governments. The Labour Government did so through the extension of maternity leave, Sure Start centres, the integration and expansion of health visitors—that was continued by the Conservative Government—and the introduction of quality early education for three and four-year-olds. The introduction of the two-year-olds offer was much championed by the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam, and the right hon. Member for Loughborough developed the beginnings of a real life chances strategy. However, I worry that the recent focus has been on childcare and the demand of maternal employment rates alone, and less on social mobility reasons for investing in the early years.

A greater focus on what works and on joined-up working does not actually need to cost more money. For example, the quality and outcomes in Ofsted ratings do not match. After looking at this recently, I found that 91% of early years providers are rated good or outstanding, yet a third of children are not leaving those settings school-ready—that does not match up. There are other ways in which we could incentivise quality providers to work with—not in competition with—others in their locality. There could be more support for parents through regular contact, as well as things such as the ages and stages requirements. We have been doing some interesting work on this in Manchester. Remarkably, some of the most deprived communities in many parts of the country have some of the highest quality early years provision—this is often what we think of as the silver bullet in education—through maintained nursery schools and some of the nursery places attached to schools. Let us cherish those and not put them under threat. A proper focus on narrowing the gap before the age of five would have a real impact on social mobility.

Let us now consider slightly older children. By the age of 16, just one in three disadvantaged children gained five good GCSEs including English and maths, and that figure has remained stubborn over the past few years. We know what works in schools and we have seen it happen. It was epitomised by the London challenge, when leadership, collaboration, resources, the attraction and retention of outstanding teachers, and the development of Teach First all came together.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

Would my hon. Friend like to thank Lord Adonis for all the work that he did on the London Challenge? Throughout all my time during the Labour Government, I found him to be the most effective and passionate Minister when it came to improving schools. He has a truly brilliant record.

[Lucy Powell]

I very much thank Lord Adonis for all his work and, indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), who was a Minister at the time of the London initiative.

The London challenge was one of those Government initiatives that achieved real change, including the biggest rise in attainment we have seen in an area. The opportunity areas developed by the right hon. Member for Loughborough during her time in office are good successors, but they need to be matched by resources and the ability to attract and retain the best teachers. The pupil premium has been a remarkable development that has allowed those who are behind to begin to catch up during their time in school. Let us follow these learnings and not get distracted by things that do not work.

By the age of 25, many of these children will be in low-skilled, low-paid jobs. Only one in 10 low-paid workers will ever escape low pay. That is a pretty terrible outcome for them and our country and, as I said, those jobs are disappearing, too. Our skills strategy for post-16 and in-work training needs strengthening. I welcome the Government’s moves in this area. Proposals such as T-levels, the apprenticeship levy and the skills plan linked to the industrial plan are all very much to be welcomed. Although I have some criticisms of the way in which initiatives such as university technical colleges are working, they are a good idea, but they do need more focus and work.

Let us not implement some of these good initiatives badly, however, and lose what we know works. For example, on T-levels, we need to make sure that we continue to have the blend of technical and academic that will be so important for the jobs of the future. If we look at all our OECD competitor countries, it clear that it is critical that children continue to work on maths and English to a high level right to the age of 18. The post-16 reforms also need matching with other reforms, such as pathways out of university. As I said earlier, the underperformance and under-skilled jobs of many of our graduates fundamentally need addressing. Access to the professions is key, and other Members will talk about that.

Those are just three of the key areas that can drive social mobility—the early years, what happens in schools, and post-16—but we also know what does not work in terms of social mobility, and I want to talk about that for a minute. One thing that does not work is grammar schools. Unfortunately, under the current Prime Minister, grammar schools and selection seem to take centre stage in her vision for dealing with social mobility. They are sucking up all the oxygen in the debate, yet the evidence is clear: they do nothing for social mobility; in fact, they make it worse.

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[Nicky Morgan]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The importance of families and of having two parents or two important role models in life—and of both boys and girls having a strong male role model—should not be underestimated. It is no secret that I disagree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith) on some policy issues, but the work that he did at the Centre for Social Justice and the work that my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) is doing now on the importance of family relationships and public policy should not be underestimated.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

On the issue of working hours, I find in my south-west London constituency that the bigger determinant is ethnicity. If people have travelled a long way to get here, an education is the most important thing for them. In my experience, their children do exceptionally well whatever hours they work, because they imbue them with the importance of education. The young people who go to the grammar schools in south London, other than the privileged ones, are overwhelmingly from particular ethnic minorities. In my experience, that particularly includes children from the Tamil community.

[Nicky Morgan]

The hon. Lady makes a really interesting point. There is a broader point, which is that we are sometimes reluctant to explore too far the differences in social mobility between different communities and people from different ethnic backgrounds. She is right, in that anyone walking around Chinatown on a Saturday morning will see children sitting there, often in their parents’ restaurants, actually doing their homework. I do not need to tell the Minister about the successes, particularly in maths, of students from the far east.

The hon. Lady is absolutely right to talk about drive and aspiration, and I will come on to aspiration in a moment. It always struck me when I was Secretary of State for Education that around the world young people and their families are fighting for education, and sometimes in this country we have parents fighting to take their children to Disneyland. That tells me that education is not given the importance in everybody’s lives that it should be given. I suspect that part of the success of the London challenge—it is difficult to unpick exactly what was behind it, because there were lots of factors in the London challenge that made a difference—was due to the diverse ethnic backgrounds and the importance that people from different ethnic backgrounds attach to education, and everything that goes with that.

As I was saying, there are parts of the country that feel they are very much left behind other parts. That is picked up in the commission’s report, which also says that

“today only one in eight children from low-income backgrounds is likely to become a high income earner as an adult.”

Politicians and the Government have to find a way of renewing that social contract; otherwise, we are playing into the hands of those who would feed on the dissent and take advantage of it at forthcoming elections. That means that we need to focus on communities and areas where social divisions are at their widest and where social mobility has stalled or is going backwards.

Recently, I have been studying the Louise Casey review of opportunity and integration. We are awaiting the Government response to it. It is a fascinating report, in which she says that integration is a key part of a successful immigration policy. I do not think we have used the word “integration” in our immigration discussions enough. I do not expect the Minister to respond to that point, because he is not a Home Office Minister, but Louise Casey goes on to say that social mobility is a key part of integration:

“As well as providing economic advantages, social mobility also provides knock-on benefits such as reducing grievances, heightening a sense of belonging to a country or community and increasing geographic mobility and social mixing too.”

As I said, schools and education are the great driver of social mobility. It is worth drawing attention again to what the Social Mobility Commission report says:

“Despite a welcome focus on improving attainment in schools, the link between social demography and educational destiny has not been broken”.

The hon. Member for Manchester Central was right to say that that is not the fault of one Government, but has happened over successive years. However, it cannot be right that that link between social demography and educational destiny has not been broken. The report states that

“over the last five years 1.2 million 16-year-olds—disproportionately from low-income homes—have left school without five good GCSEs.”

It goes on to say:

“A child living in one of England’s most disadvantaged areas is 27 times more likely to go to an inadequate school than a child living in one of the least disadvantaged. Ten local authorities account for one in five of England’s children in failing schools.”

We know where the problem is; we must work out how to fix it. What does that mean in practice? Those of us who have talked about choice in education must realise that for families who are surrounded by inadequate schools, “choice” is a hollow word. There are no good or outstanding schools in those areas, and the families cannot afford to buy their way out of poor services or even the transport to a different area.

The focus on areas is right. In the White Paper that the Department published last March, “Educational Excellence Everywhere”, areas of entrenched educational underperformance were announced, where access to high quality teachers, leaders and sponsors was insufficient. They are now opportunity areas and I hope that the Minister will say more about them in his concluding remarks. It will be helpful to know the plan for investing in them, the services that will receive attention and how we will tackle getting high quality teachers, leaders and sponsors into them. We can be more directional. That is where Government can give a lead.

The hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) said that it is about not just academic attainment but aspiration. One of my most formative experiences—I have probably shared it with hon. Members previously—was visiting a primary school in Lancashire. It was a good primary school. It would be fair to say that the staffroom was not inclined towards my politics, but we had a robust discussion. I was struck by the fact that the headteacher had moved to this rather nicer area and this good school from an inner-city primary school. She said of the latter, “Oh well, those children were never going to be more than ‘requires improvement’”. How can someone write off children before they reach the age of 11 as never amounting to more than “requires improvement”? What a waste of human potential. What a waste for our country. That attitude must be overcome.

Attitudes in families of, “My child can access a profession, go to university, get a great apprenticeship”, even though perhaps the parent did not, should be encouraged. We must also foster the attitude in schools that children will fulfil their potential.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I believe that all parents aspire for their children, but some do not know how to make things happen. We know that doing more homework on more evenings is more likely to get children to where they aspire to be. The inability to connect reality and the required work with the aspiration is a problem.

[Nicky Morgan]

I agree. It is not that parents do not want the best for their child. If you ask most parents on the birth of a child, they want their child to be happy, healthy and successful in life. I will talk about extra-curricular activities shortly because again, there is a social injustice in access to those activities. The hon. Lady is right about support. All the nagging that middle-class parents do about homework, or chivvying children to read more books, often does not happen elsewhere, not for lack of wanting to do it but perhaps because it was not done to those parents. Going into a child’s school and challenging teachers is anathema to someone who has had a very unhappy school experience. Attendance at parents’ evenings is indicative of the support that children get at home.

Aspiration is about aiming high for young people. I did not have a chance to look up the name of the school, so I apologise for not remembering it, but I went to a fantastic primary school in Northamptonshire, where a high proportion of children had free school meals, but it was working with the Royal Shakespeare Company and every child had access to Shakespeare and his language. I heard the tiniest children talk about Shakespeare’s characters and watched the older children perform complicated scenes—I would have had difficulty remembering all those lines, but they were doing brilliantly. The headteacher there had high aspirations. He said, “All my children will be able to do this and benefit and learn.” They were doing incredibly well.

I pay tribute to the National Association of Head Teachers for setting up its “Primary Futures” campaign, which is about getting adults into schools to talk about their careers and broaden horizons. When I was in the DFE, we set up the Careers & Enterprise Company. Broadening horizons, and aspirational and inspirational careers advice, are important. There will be a difference of opinion in the House about work experience, which we have debated. One week’s dry work experience in an office will not necessarily set the flame alight, but I remember talking to some apprentices, who told me that a week at Rolls-Royce, where they could see how the maths they were learning would be applied in the workplace, does set the flame alight. People then go back to school more determined to do better in their maths classes.

There is a changing labour market. In the article at the weekend that the hon. Member for Manchester Central and I wrote, we talked about the number of high-skilled jobs that will be around. The Teach First briefing says that, by 2022, the British economy is expected to experience a shortage of 3 million workers to fill 15 million high-skilled jobs. At the same time, there will be 5 million more low-skilled workers than there are low-skilled jobs. I did not want to mention the “B” word this afternoon—it is very nice not to be talking about the European Union—but, if we are to change our immigration policy in this country and have fewer people coming in from overseas, we must ensure that all our young people are training for the labour market of the 21st century.

That is my problem with the Government’s focus on introducing more selection. We do not live in a world where we need only the top 20% or 30% to be highly skilled. We need everybody to have access to a knowledge-rich, excellent academic curriculum. A renewed battle over selection distracts from what is needed in our education to deal with the demands of a 21st-century labour market, to give everyone a chance to close social divisions, and to build a consistently strong school system.

Research from the Education Policy Institute talks about the negative effects on those who live in the most selective areas but who do not attend grammar schools. The negative effects emerge around the point when selective places are available for around 70% of high-attaining pupils. The research says that there are five times as many high-quality non-selective schools in England as there are grammar schools.

Every child is entitled to an academic curriculum. Like the Minister, I have seen some great schools in some very unexpected places. I remember my visit to King Solomon Academy in London—the Minister will have been there too—and to the Rushey Mead in Leicester. They have a higher proportion of children on free school meals but are doing incredibly well in terms of the exam results they are achieving. I also pay tribute to the Harris academies and Ark in Portsmouth.

The hon. Member for Manchester Central mentioned the secondary heads in Surrey who had written about selection. The Leicestershire secondary heads, too, wrote to the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Education. Impressively, every single headteacher in Leicestershire signed the letter. If the Minister has not seen it, I hope he can get hold of a copy. One paragraph states:

“As professionals who have dedicated our lives to educating children across Leicestershire, our concern is for all the children in our region. Removing the most able pupils in our schools will have a negative impact on those who remain. Removing the option of ambitious, all ability comprehensives, with a scarcity of academic role models, will impact most particularly on the least affluent and least able. Therein lies the most significant injustice of this policy.”

Academic attainment is important and we should set high aspirations and ambitions for all pupils, but pupils in the best schools gain something else, and I want all pupils to gain it. This was one of the things I tried to champion when I was in the Department for Education. I am thinking of the character traits—persistence, resilience, self-confidence, self-esteem—and the values and virtues of integrity, honesty and whatever it might be, that help to build a whole pupil. I was at Elizabeth Garrett Anderson School in north London recently. The school focuses on building social capital among its pupils. It is conscious of the fact that its pupils will have to compete with the independent school down the road. I visited the King’s Leadership Academy in Warrington, which is a new free school, now over-subscribed, where behaviour is excellent, and where aspirations are incredibly high. All the young people are trained for leadership. Kings Langley School in Hertfordshire and Gordano School near Bristol are fantastic schools—I could go on.

Educating young people is about not just what happens in the classroom, but access to other schemes. I pay tribute to the former Prime Minister and the current Government for their focus on the National Citizen Service and other schemes: social action, volunteering, uniformed activities such as the cadets, the guides and the scouts, and the Duke of Edinburgh award. They all help to build up experience and confidence in young people. Those of us who have been employers and have interviewed see the ability of some young people to walk through our door, look us in the eye and shake us by the hand. Some children are taught that and encouraged in school, but some are not. These things matter in helping young people to get on.

I mentioned extracurricular activities. The commission’s report specifically talks about the effect different social backgrounds have on how people participate:

“One study found that 43 per cent of children whose mother had a postgraduate degree had music lessons, compared with just 6 per cent of children whose mother had no qualifications. At the age of 11, 85 per cent of children whose mother had an undergraduate degree participated in organised sport outside of school, compared with 56 per cent of children whose mother had no formal qualifications.”

I was very pleased that in last year’s Budget the then Chancellor announced funding for a longer school day. It would be helpful to know what emphasis the Department will place on that to help schools provide such activities. It is not necessarily about the schools themselves providing the activities; it could be enabling all young people in their schools to take up a place and participate.

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[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

I associate myself with the comments of all Members in relation to yesterday’s incident. It still seems completely unreal, and my thoughts are with the brave police officer outside defending us who lost his life just doing his job—it is hard to come to terms with that. Without prejudging the person who did this, I suspect that issues of social mobility might apply here. I particularly reference Louise Casey’s report on the need for social integration among all peoples.

I thank the right hon. Members for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan) and for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg) and my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell) for securing this important debate. As a girl who went to a secondary modern, I wholeheartedly support their article in The Observer last week making it clear that grammar schools are not the answer to social mobility.

I was proud to be part of the previous Labour Government, for whom social mobility and education were absolutely priorities. Earlier, I was able to give thanks to Lord Adonis who, in my assessment, was one of the best Ministers we ever had. I note today’s figures on teenage pregnancy rates. The Labour Government’s efforts to reduce teenage pregnancy were so successful that those figures suggest that that is at its lowest ever level.

As the Social Mobility Commission’s “State of the Nation 2016” report sets out, under the current Government we are slipping back decades on the progress that has been made. Those born in Britain in the 1980s are the first generation since 1945 to start their careers on a lower income than their parents. A child living in one of England’s most disadvantaged areas is 27 times more likely to go to an inadequate school than a child in an affluent area. Just 5% of children who receive free school meals will secure five A grades at GCSE. Children from low-income homes are 30% more likely to drop out of education than their wealthier classmates with similar GCSE grades. Overall, by secondary school age, pupils on free school meals lag behind their wealthier counterparts by around 20 months.

For working people in my community, the link between social class and professional success is more entrenched than ever. Only one in eight children from low-income backgrounds is likely to earn a high salary as an adult. Working-class people make up only 4% of doctors, 6% of barristers and 11% of journalists—a whole generation of talent is being frozen out. But I wish to make it clear that grammar schools are not the answer. A House of Commons Library research briefing from earlier this month states:

“Pupils at grammar schools are much less likely than average to…be eligible for free school meals”.

Indeed, only 2.6% of pupils at grammar schools are eligible for free school meals—a well-understood signifier of poverty—whereas nationwide 14% of all students are eligible.

Part of the reason why poor students are so under-represented at grammar schools is that the attainment gap between richer and poorer students is clear even when they are only a few years old. The Library briefing states that

“of the 6.9% of pupils eligible for FSM with high prior attainment who are near selective schools, only 2.4% actually attended a grammar school.”

Let us be clear: grammar schools do not work for even the very brightest poor students, never mind the average or below-average student. Grammar schools educate a minority—just 5%—of state school students, so while the Government waste time banging on about grammar schools, the needs of 95% of our state school students are being ignored.

When I talk about social mobility, I am not just talking about the brightest poor students; I am talking about the poor students who are average but who deserve no less to succeed in life through hard work. We really need to prioritise comprehensive school education; if we do not, we will never address the national scandal of white working-class underachievement in this country.

Let us be clear: underachievement is a class issue and an ethnic issue. White British boys and girls who receive free school meals are consistently the lowest performing group at GCSE level, and the genders show no difference. It is not about boys; it is about boys and girls. Last year, only 32% of working-class white British students who receive free school meals achieved the GCSE benchmark, compared with 44% of mixed-race students, 59% of Bangladeshi students, 42% of black-Caribbean students, and 47% of Pakistani students receiving free school meals. Over the past 10 years, the educational attainment of white working-class students has improved much more slowly than that of almost any other ethnic group.

A good school can be life changing. I had the honour of being on the Education Committee and to play a part in a report that looked at white working-class underachievement. What we learned was how much we do not know. The one thing that stood out is the truism that a poor child does so much better at a good school. The benefit of being at a good school is a much more important driver for them.

This is where I get to pay tribute, as always, to the Harris academy chain in south London. I am forever grateful to it for having two secondary schools in my constituency. Last year, Harris Academy Merton achieved some amazing GCSE results, with a staggering 77% of students achieving five A to C GCSEs including maths and English, compared with the national average of just 54%. These schools, not grammar schools, should be our ideal. The pupil premium needs to be used to ensure that disadvantaged pupils receive the focused support that they need. We need to give academically average students from poor backgrounds better alternatives to university. Social mobility is about not just the children at the very top doing well, but all children being able to aspire and surpass expectations, including the average and below-average student.

If I have a couple of minutes—I do not want to take any time from other Members—I would like to address housing in not only south London, but all of London, as it is a major dampener on social mobility. If someone is in temporary accommodation and they live miles away from their home area, they do not get to school. Every Friday at my advice surgery, I meet families who are being fined for non-attendance at school, simply because they now live two or three hours away from their schools. I have letters that would make Members cry about clever pupils missing their exams because they physically cannot get to school to take them because of their housing situation.

Social housing is not fashionable. It is not something that everybody will come together about, but unless people have a secure and consistent roof over their head, the possibility of their not achieving is huge.