John Bercow
Main Page: John Bercow (Speaker - Buckingham)Department Debates - View all John Bercow's debates with the Department for Education
(12 years ago)
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Stephen Twigg
A significant part of that extra money is actually the money for two-year-olds which the Government said was additional money. The figures in the Government’s own consultation showed that the cut would be from the £2.3 billion figure, which the Secretary of State has just given us, to £1.72 billion next year, which is a cut of 27%. Should not the Secretary of State be honest and listen to Merrick Cockell, the leader of Conservative local government, who made a clear point last week:
“this move…will force local authorities to cut early intervention services even further”?
Is that not what is really going on?
Mr Speaker
Order. Just before the Secretary of State responds, I am sure that the shadow Secretary of State would accept that the Secretary of State would always be honest with the House. There is no need to ask for a commitment to honesty; that is implicit.
Michael Gove
I am never surprised when I hear a kind word from the Chair. It is no more than I have come to expect.
Implicit in the hon. Gentleman’s question was the idea that we should reduce funding to extend early education to two-year-olds. I do not believe that is right. I believe it is right that we increase the amount we spend on early intervention from £2.2 billion to £2.3 billion, to £2.4 billion and then to £2.5 billion. That is an increase in anyone’s money.
Matthew Hancock
Yes. I am delighted to say that I have already taken some action, but there is more to do. The first round of the employer ownership pilots included funding for a bid by engineering companies across the country specifically to support engineering apprenticeships and engineering training. I entirely accept the size of the challenge in engineering and ICT. If we say that engineering is not for half of our population, we are never going to have enough high-quality engineers. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
The hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) has been chuntering from a sedentary position, to no obvious benefit or purpose—[Interruption.] Order. He was making his point sitting down. Would he like to make it standing up?
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
20. Indeed. Would the Minister accept that the withdrawal of funding for the Women into Science and Engineering campaign is not a good idea if we are to be serious about getting more women into engineering and science?
Michael Gove
That was a three-part question, and I shall use both sides of the paper. Yesterday was, in fact, a sad day for me: I was in mourning because, sadly, Queens Park Rangers lost to Arsenal, who, with 10 minutes to go, scored a goal that I can only conclude was offside. It was a day of mourning for the Gove household. The Schools Minister, however, is fully involved in all discussions in the Department for Education in every policy area. The two of us are singing from the same hymn sheet, which is, of course, what we should be doing every Sunday, whether or not the clocks go back.
Mr Speaker
The Arsenal result was extremely satisfactory and I was there to observe it.
Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)
15. What steps he is taking to improve the quality of mathematics teaching in schools.
Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
I am interested in the logic of the Secretary of State’s position. If he believes it is right that academies and free schools should be able to take on whoever they like on the strength of the opinion of the head teacher, why is that not right for local authority schools? And if he believes it is right that we make the teachers’ training qualification more difficult, why is it right that academies can opt out of that?
Mr Speaker
Order. The hon. Gentleman is supposed to be an egalitarian. One question will do—an equal distribution of the available fruits.
Michael Gove
I, too, am an egalitarian, which is why I believe that academy status should be extended to every school that believes in improving outcomes for its children.