Free Schools (Funding)

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Monday 12th May 2014 Commons Chamber

[Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Education to make a statement on the allocation of funding for the free school programme.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

I am delighted to be able to update the House on progress in providing new school places. Just last week, the Public Accounts Committee congratulated the Department on the clear progress that had been made in delivering new school places through the free school programme, with costs significantly lower than under the last Government’s school building programme.

Free schools cost about half what schools built under Building Schools for the Future cost. Thanks to the savings we have made, and thanks to the success of our long-term economic plan, we have been able to invest far more than the last Government in creating new school places, especially in areas of need.

We are investing £5 billion over the lifetime of this Parliament in giving money to local authorities for new school places. That is more than twice what the last Government spent over the equivalent preceding period, despite repeated warnings that the population was increasing. We plan to invest even more in the new Parliament, with £7 billion allocated in the next Parliament for new school places. As a result, we have delivered 212,000 new primary school places between 2012 and 2013, and we are on course to deliver another 357,000. Thanks to the efforts of many great local authorities, we now have fewer pupils in overcrowded primary schools than we had in 2010.

As well as the expansion of existing local authority provision, we have also, on top of that, created 83,000 places in new free schools. The budget for these schools has been just under 10% of the Department’s total capital budget, but free schools are so far outperforming other schools inspected under our new and more rigorous Ofsted framework. Schools such as Dixons Trinity in Bradford and Canary Wharf free school in Tower Hamlets have been ranked outstanding within months of opening. Free schools are now over-subscribed, with three applications for every place. Indeed, the longer that free schools are in place, the more popular they are, with schools such as the West London free school and the London Academy of Excellence becoming the most over-subscribed schools in their area.

It is important to remember that while we have met the demand identified by local authorities for new school places, we have also set up seven out of 10 free schools in areas of significant population growth. Indeed, as the National Audit Office has pointed out, £700 million of the £950 million spent on free schools so far opened has actually augmented the money given to local authorities for new school places. Other free schools have been set up to provide quality provision where existing standards are too low, or school improvement has been too slow.

We should never be complacent about educational standards, but we should today take time to thank good local authorities and all our school leaders and teachers, because no child in this country is without a school place, fewer children are in overcrowded schools and Ofsted reports that more children are being taught good and outstanding lessons by more highly qualified teachers than ever before. In short, thanks to the rigour with which we have borne down on costs, the innovation unleashed by the academy and free schools programmes and the success of the Government’s economic strategy, we have been able both to provide all necessary school places and to drive quality up across the board. I commend the free school programme to the House.

[Tristram Hunt]

This afternoon, young people are sitting their exams, and we wish them the best of luck. They will be showing exactly the kind of self-control and focus so woefully lacking in Education Ministers. Indeed, the Minister for Schools has not even deigned to turn up.

The question today is: when we face enormous constraints on the public purse, how do we best prioritise spending for new school places? For every parent wondering why their child is taught in a class size of over 30 and for every parent angry that they cannot get their kid into a good local school, we now have the answer: the coalition—both parts—has raided the schools budget to pay for pet political projects in expensive, half-empty and underperforming free schools.

Will the Secretary of State confirm that he has reallocated £400 million from the targeted basic need programme to fill a black hole in the free school programme? Does he accept National Audit Office data showing that more than two thirds of the places created by the free school programme have been created outside areas of high and severe primary need? Why has the free school programme been so heavily weighted to secondary places during a time of national crisis in primary places? Does he agree with the Treasury that spending on this programme, like his leadership of the Department, is spiralling out of control?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his questions. He asks where responsibility lies for a shortage of school places. The responsibility lies with the previous Government, whose Chief Secretary to the Treasury left a note to his successor saying that there was no money left. The responsibility lies with the Labour Government who, when they were in power, cut primary places—cut them—by 200,000 between 2003 and 2010. The responsibility lies with the Labour Government who cut funding for new school places by £150 million, or by 26%, between 2004 and 2009. The responsibility lies with the previous Labour Government, whose primary capital programme told local authorities to cut primary places, not to increase them.

This coalition Government have increased spending on primary school places and local authority need and, at the same time, we have provided excellent new provision through the free school programme. I note that the hon. Gentleman was silent on Labour’s position on the free school programme. Where is the consistency of Labour’s position on this policy? In May 2010, he said that free schools were a

“vanity project for yummy mummies”.

In May 2013, he reversed his position, saying that he wanted to put “rocket boosters” under the programme. In October 2013, he reversed again, saying that free schools were a “dangerous ideological experiment”. Later the same month, he said, “If you are a parent interested in setting up a free school, we will be on your side.” He has had more contorted positions on free schools than some Indian sex manuals that I could name.

The truth is that the hon. Gentleman has betrayed his inconsistency on free schools and the inconsistency in his support for the additional money that we have put in to provide not just local authorities but free school sponsors with the places that our children need.