Children's Access to Books

Stephen Morgan Excerpts

Tuesday 6th June 2023 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Morgan (Portsmouth South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I thank the hon. Member for Rother Valley (Alexander Stafford) for bringing forward this important debate. Books are the cornerstone of our education system and how we learn, so it is a pleasure to speak on how we can improve access to books, close the literacy gap and ensure that every child has the opportunity to thrive.

I would like to open my remarks by paying tribute to all English teachers, librarians and literacy charities across the country, from Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library to the Pompey Pirates in my constituency. Behind school libraries and bookshelves is the hard work by teachers, teaching assistants, librarians, parents and volunteers to support child development and literacy attainment. The hon. Member made some helpful points on the value of reading, owning books and the importance of storytelling. I echo the remarks about his advocacy for reading. We have heard a number of interventions and speeches on investing in catch-up, the variety of forms books can take, the value of reading to children, and the importance of independent bookshops and libraries in our communities. I thank all Members for their good-spirited contributions to the debate.

As we heard, books are fundamental to a child’s journey in learning how to read and write, but they do not serve that purpose alone. Books open the door to our entire education system: to a world of learning from geography, history, English, physics, maths, music and beyond. Books enrich all aspects of our lives. They educate us, motivate us and inspire us. They open new worlds of exploration and imagination.

For many of us, it is hard to imagine a world without books. It is hard to imagine how we would function without the ability to read or write. Unfortunately, the National Literacy Trust has found that one in four children are still leaving primary school unable to read at their expected level. It also found that one in six adults in England have literacy levels below level 1, considered to be very poor literacy skills. It has been shown that lower literacy can go on to impact every aspect of an individual’s life, with negative impacts on personal relationships, wellbeing and further education, as well as a greater risk of unemployment or being in low-paid work. It is a skill as crucial as understanding road signs or price labels, dosage instructions on medicine, filling out a form or making sense of a bus or train timetable.

Unfortunately, in the past decade, it has become increasingly difficult to access books. Britain has faced the closure of almost 800 public libraries since 2010, a decade that saw local authority finances slashed. We know that in schools when budgets get tight, library resources are often among the first to get cut. Recent research by Penguin Books UK shows that one in eight schools in England do not have a library or dedicated reading space. That jumps to one in four schools in the most deprived communities in our country. Teachers up and down the country are using their own money to buy books. The problem is even bigger in primary schools, where one in seven state primary schools do not have a dedicated library or library space. That translates to 750,000 children in the UK who do not have access to books to read through a school library at a crucial age when children need to learn to read, a point made by the hon. Member for North Swindon (Justin Tomlinson).

It is no wonder that schools are being forced to make difficult choices when their real-terms funding still remains below 2010 levels. Yet again, it is the most vulnerable who are paying the price for this Government’s decisions. While better-off families may be able to provide home-purchased books, those from poorer backgrounds do not have the same luxury. One in three parents who are struggling financially because of the cost of living crisis have said that they are buying fewer books for their children as a result. Experiences of financial strain have a direct impact on literacy, with families not being able to afford books and having less time and energy to spend on reading. Two in five disadvantaged children leave primary school unable to read at the expected level.

The Government claim that literacy is a priority. Their levelling-up White Paper

“set a new national mission to ensure that 90% of children leaving primary school in England are reaching the expected standard in reading, writing, and maths by 2030.”

Yet the share of pupils leaving primary school meeting literacy and numeracy benchmarks fell from 65% in 2019 to 59% in 2020. The Government’s target is a far cry from reality. Children are moving backwards in their achievements, and the attainment gap is growing.

The problem is compounded by crisis in the recruitment and retention of teachers and the lack of budget available for specialist school librarians. Last year, more teachers left our schools than joined initial teacher training courses. The Government fell 16% short of their target for English teachers, and this year, the National Foundation for Educational Research predicts that the Government will fall 30% short of their targets.

[Matt Rodda]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent point. A headteacher in my constituency, which may be typical of many parts of the south-east of England, recently told me that she had one applicant for a job. Unfortunately, that is the level of difficulty that our schools face. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point, and I look forward to the Minister’s response and to hearing more about how the Government will tackle this severe recruitment and retention crisis.

[Stephen Morgan]

My hon. Friend is a tireless champion for schools in his constituency, and we absolutely have a teacher recruitment and retention crisis in our country. We need to look very boldly at some of the solutions to address that crisis.

The first step to addressing the problem is to ensure that children are taught how to read and write properly. That fundamental skill must be given the attention it deserves, which means schools having the necessary resources to do so, with children being taught by experts, not by overstretched teachers covering for their colleagues. That is why Labour has committed to ensuring that every pupil is taught by specialist teachers in each subject, including English. We will do that by recruiting thousands of new teachers across the country, making sure that schools are not understaffed, that English classes are not being taught by cover staff or other subject specialists, and that teachers are not burned out by doing multiple people’s jobs. Once in our schools, we will also support teachers with an entitlement to ongoing training.

We want every young person to have the opportunity to succeed academically and in life. As has been outlined today, central to that is developing their reading and writing skills, which open the door to our education system and to a world of further learning. Their ability to read and write is a bridge to the ability to explore, create, innovate, imagine and thrive.

As we have heard, all children deserve to have their lives enriched by books, for their health, for their future and their future life chances, and for their enjoyment. The importance of access to books to literacy levels is simply too great to be met with empty targets and empty rhetoric. In his response, I therefore hope that the Minister will outline what his Department is doing to improve children’s access to books, to decrease the number of children leaving primary school without the required standard of literacy, to recruit its target number of English teachers, and to retain the brilliant English teachers already in the profession.

I look forward to hearing the Minister’s remarks, and I restate my thanks to all Members who have contributed to this debate.