Technical and Vocational Education

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Commons Chamber

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

I beg to move,

That this House notes that the previous Government rescued the idea of apprenticeships and quadrupled apprenticeship starts; furthermore believes that a transformation in vocational education has eluded Governments for decades; therefore believes that the UK needs a new settlement for those young people who do not wish to pursue the traditional route into university and the world of work; and further believes that in order to achieve a high status vocational education system that delivers a high-skill, high-value economy the UK needs a new Technical Baccalaureate qualification as a gold standard vocational pathway achieved at 18, a new National Baccalaureate framework of skills and qualifications throughout the 14 to 19 phase, the study of mathematics and English for all to age 18, for all large public contracts to have apprenticeship places, new employer-led apprenticeships at level 3 and new technical degrees.

This motion is further testimony to the Labour party’s belief that education offers the surest means to deliver social justice, economic competitiveness and a route out of the fearful isolationist impulse adopted by the UK Independence party and increasingly by the Conservative party. Labour wants a skilled Britain, not a little England. In just under a month’s time, we shall mark the 70th anniversary of the Education Act 1944. The Minister for Skills and Enterprise likes to compare himself with the young Winston, but that Education Act was the product of a slightly more heroic coalition—a genuinely cross-party one-nation moment to broaden the focus of education and extend its emancipatory power to all classes. This, along with the national health service that the Conservatives tried to block, was to be the centre point of the post-war new Jerusalem. As Winston Churchill said, it would be a society in which,

“the advantages and privileges which hitherto have been enjoyed only by the few, shall be far more widely shared by the men and youth of the nation as a whole.”

Yet the sad truth, at least as far as education is concerned, is that we are still waiting for this new Jerusalem. In post-war Germany, Ernest Bevin implemented a new era of technical and vocational excellence, but in Britain, Rab Butler’s plans were stymied at birth and the technical school’s roots of the tripartite system never truly materialised.

Our ambition in office is to right that wrong and to do what this Government, with their narrow focus on free schools and curriculum tinkering, have signally failed to achieve. We do so because our economic future depends on it. Our shortage of technicians, engineers and skilled apprentices is hindering growth and a more balanced economy.

[Sir Peter Luff (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)]

I am slightly disappointed by the partisan note in the hon. Gentleman’s remarks. The truth is that apprenticeships were ignored by generations of politicians. The previous Government, to their great credit, started the process of rehabilitation. The present Government have continued the work. We should celebrate that consensus and that spirit of shared endeavour and not score party points.

[Tristram Hunt]

I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for his work with the engineering sector. The fact of the matter is that we are not delivering the results. The Royal Academy of Engineering forecasts that the UK needs an extra 50,000 STEM technicians and 90,000 STEM professionals every year just to replace people retiring from the work force. Similarly, new nuclear capacity could boost the UK economy by an estimated £5 billion and create more than 30,000 jobs, but the sector needs thousands of new recruits a year.

If we want to build a high-skill, high-wage economy, we need to build a recovery that delivers for working people. We need an education system that marries the vocational with the academic, and values what people can do alongside what they know. The modern workplace demands non-routine analytic and interactive skills. Businesses want employees who are innovative, flexible, creative team players. Sadly, that has not been the focus of Her Majesty’s Government. At exactly the point when we need a long-term economic plan, there is absolutely nothing in sight.

[Mr Brooks Newmark (Braintree) (Con)]

rose—

[Tristram Hunt]

Talking of which.

[Mr Newmark]

Will the hon. Gentleman explain why the number of people not in education, employment or training went up by a third under a Labour Government?

[Tristram Hunt]

We have a proud record of tackling unemployment and youth unemployment. We championed the delivery of young people into work with a future jobs fund which this Government scrapped when they came into office. As this week’s CBI—

[The Minister for Skills and Enterprise (Matthew Hancock)]

rose—

[Tristram Hunt]

I would have thought the Minister would want to listen to what the CBI has to say. This week’s CBI survey found that 58% of businesses are not confident that they will have enough highly skilled staff available for their future needs, which is up from 46% last year. [Interruption.] I know the Under-Secretary of State for Education, the hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss) is keen on maths, so let me tell her that that is a rise of 12% in a single year under this Government. The Government’s focus has been on tinkering with the curriculum, undermining teaching and introducing a mishandled free schools policy.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that simply converting short-term vocational training programmes under the apprenticeship brand only damages that brand? What employers want are highly skilled, highly motivated individuals to ensure that we have a world-class work force.

[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend speaks of what he knows, and he is absolutely right about the devaluing of apprenticeships under this Government, which I shall come to.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

I know my hon. Friend agrees that the lack of skills is one of the biggest impediments to our development as a country. Skills are essential to the prosperity of this nation. Does he agree that it is a great shame, and says everything about this Government, that the Secretary of State for Education is not in the Chamber for this essential debate?

[Tristram Hunt]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s intervention, and normally I would be 100% behind him and seek to knock it out of the park, but on this occasion the Education Secretary has organised an international conference of educators here in the UK, which is not a bad place for the UK to be. However, my instincts are with my hon. Friend.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

I urge my hon. Friend to continue making party political points, because they are rather good. Will he add that too many Government Members have no history of further education or technical colleagues, as I do? I did my A-levels at Kingston technical college.

[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend is exactly right.

Talking of political divisions, the Government’s focus, as we have seen, has been not on the vocational demands of our education system but on tinkering with the curriculum and a free schools policy. At the Skills Minister’s favourite school, the Swedish private equity free school IES Breckland, which he has supported so much, Ofsted discovered “inadequate” teaching, poor behaviour and declining student literacy levels. The Swedish for-profit model that the Government were so keen to import has been exposed and discredited in the Skills Minister’s own backyard—responsible for one of the biggest falls in educational standards anywhere in the world.

[Matthew Hancock]

I am grateful that the hon. Gentleman broke away from his overly partisan tone when mentioning the Secretary of State, who apologises for not being able to be here. My right hon. Friend made it clear that if the Labour party had made this the first and most important debate this afternoon, he would have been here at the Labour party’s request. He would have liked to have been here, but the Labour party chose to make this the second debate, and therefore he cannot, and so I shall be responding for the Government.

[Tristram Hunt]

The record will note that the Skills Minister did not want to defend IES Breckland and the free schools policy.

We are beginning to see a widening attainment gap, but it is on vocational education where the Government’s negligence hits hardest. The Government are failing young people who want a gold-standard technical education, and they are not securing our skills base.

Let us be clear about the Government’s record. The number of apprenticeship starts by under-25s has fallen by 11,324 since 2010. The number of STEM apprenticeships for 16 to 24-year-olds has fallen by more than 7,000 since 2010. Too many apprentices in England are existing employees, not new job entrants, and too many are over 25. Let us add to that the Government’s scandalous destruction of careers advice.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

The hon. Gentleman’s motion refers to the United Kingdom, but he will know that in Scotland vocational education and skills development is devolved and the cross-party Wood commission is looking at that very issue. Does he intend to overrule what has been proposed in the Scottish Parliament in favour of his proposals, or did he just get a bit confused when drafting the motion?

[Tristram Hunt]

We will devolve our skills budgets to a regional, local level in England, because we believe that those decisions are best made locally.

[Karen Lumley (Redditch) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman is being very talkative, but what practical steps has he taken? How many skills and apprenticeship fairs, such as the one I held in Redditch on Friday, have he and his Front-Bench team held in their constituencies?

[Tristram Hunt]

I pay tribute to the hon. Lady for the work she has done to promote skills in Redditch. I have seen some great schools there that are combining vocational and academic work, such as the RSA academy, and I know how important that is.

Sadly, this Government have undermined careers advice. Thanks to their reforms, prisoners now have more access to careers advice than school pupils. In 2013 the Education Committee raised its concerns about

“the consistency, quality, independence and impartiality of careers guidance now being offered to young people.”

Similarly, Ofsted has found that only one in six schools offer individual careers guidance from a qualified external adviser. For the Labour party, this is a matter of both social justice and economic efficiency. For those young people without the networks and internships, decent careers guidance is essential. Similarly, the complexity of navigating a vocational technical course, mixing an apprenticeship with further education provision, demands decent advice and information. All the colleges I have visited, from Dudley to Chichester, Manchester to Tamworth and Lambeth to Stoke-on-Trent, complain that they are not being properly promoted to potential students.

[Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman welcome the creation of university technical colleges across the country, including the one that is due to be built in my constituency? At the same time, apprenticeship places have more than doubled since the general election and youth unemployment has fallen by more than a third. Does he welcome those three things?

[Tristram Hunt]

The hon. Gentleman has clearly been reading the Adonis review, as we look forward to more university technical colleges opening under the forthcoming Labour Government, but we must keep a watch on the quality of provision in UTCs and ensure that they are rolled out appropriately.

The coalition Government’s third mistake was an overly restrictive approach to syllabus reform. I agreed with much of what the Wolf report said about cutting the number of semi-vocational qualifications with over-inflated GCSE equivalents. I also think that it is absolutely right that pupils from working-class backgrounds in Stoke-on-Trent and elsewhere have full access to academic courses, but the current balance within the Progress 8 attainment measures can often seem out of kilter if we want young people to pursue engineering, design and technology, and art.

Similarly, the destruction of practical learning in the curriculum is very worrying. From geography to physics, the move to a more knowledge-focused curriculum, although important in some respects, has seen a withering away of skills, whether field trips, speaking skills or project work. This Government are undermining a powerful component of English education.

[Mr Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab)]

I recently had the pleasure of taking my hon. Friend to visit the BRIT school in Croydon, which is sadly the only state school of its kind anywhere in the country. It has a very strong relationship with the music and performance industry. Does he agree with the young people we met there that the Government’s downgrading of vocational qualifications downgrades their hard work and their futures?

[Tristram Hunt]

I absolutely agree; dance, drama, art, design and creativity are among the most successful components of modern English in our culture and economic competitiveness. We need an education system that will promote and inspire that. Sadly, however, Ofsted, to which I would have thought the Ministers would have paid some heed, has stated:

“too many school leavers are not well-enough equipped scientifically with practical, investigative and analytical skills.”

That cannot be in the long-term interests of this country.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

I am slightly worried about the hon. Gentleman and others on the Opposition Benches who seem to have been overtaken by mass amnesia. Does he not remember that the Labour Government presided over an entire generation of 16 to 24-year-olds who are now likely to have fewer skills than their grandparents? We are the only country in the western world where that is the case. Will he apologise for that?

[Tristram Hunt]

The hon. Lady should worry no more, because in 10 months’ time we will have a Labour Government delivering a sustainable education and skills policy.

Our motion talks of

“a new settlement for those young people who do not wish to pursue the traditional route into university”.

Let me lay out the Labour party’s ambition for Government to deliver equal status for vocational qualifications from school to university and beyond, to provide clear routes for highly skilled technical or professional careers and to have a dynamic, modern education system that will ensure that Britain can compete as an innovative, productive economy. We shall start with technical baccalaureates for 16 to 19-year-olds, in order to provide a clear, high-status vocational route through education. That is a Labour policy. The tech bacc will include quality level 3 vocational qualifications and a work placement to provide a line of sight through education into employment.

Our next policy is to ensure, unlike this Government, that all young people continue to study English or maths to the age of 18. These are the most essential of all 21st-century skills, and getting them right is fundamental to future career prospects. That does not mean asking young people to redo their GCSEs over and over again. Rather, it means ensuring that applied, functional and useful English and maths will help them to succeed with their careers. We will have slimline English and maths courses designed to complement a student’s core programme of study.

Furthermore, we think that English and maths should be part of an ambitious national baccalaureate framework for all learners. Alongside core academic or vocational learning in English and maths, we want young people to undertake a collaborative project and a personal development programme, which would nurture the character, the resilience and the employability skills of all our young people. Much of the tech bacc route will be delivered through further education colleges.

[Mr Sheerman]

My hon. Friend will recall that the Skills Commission inquiry into pathways at 14, chaired by Mike Tomlinson and Ian Ferguson, strongly recommended GCSE papers in practical English and practical maths. Does he think that that would be a good way forward?

[Tristram Hunt]

We want an education system in which those young people who wish to pursue technical and vocational pathways have a grounding in English and maths that will allow them to succeed in their own fields, and in which there is a much greater interrelationship between the academic and vocational pathways. That kind of qualification would provide exactly that.

This Government have hammered further education provision. They can find £45 million for a Harris free school in Westminster, but they have done that by slashing funding for further education learners and sixth-form colleges. That is a scandalous set of priorities. We will work with FE providers to improve teaching and to ensure that colleges focus on local labour markets. Our highest performing FE colleges will become institutes of technical education with a core mission to deliver Labour’s tech bacc and the on-the-job components of apprenticeships.

I have laid out the Government’s mendacious record of spin and subterfuge on apprenticeships. We will deal with the devaluing of apprenticeships by introducing a universal gold standard level 3 qualification lasting two years. We will ensure that every firm that wants a major Government contract offers apprenticeships. We will also ensure that employers are involved in the development of apprenticeships by giving them support over standards and funding.

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

On apprenticeship figures, would the hon. Gentleman be interested to know that, according to the House of Commons, apprenticeship starts are up by 62.8% in Hexham? Indeed, apprenticeships are up significantly in every single one of the 29 seats in the north-east of England,.

[Tristram Hunt]

The fact is that the number of starts for under-25s has gone down by 11,400. Ministers can rebadge their apprenticeships and reconfigure the figures as much as they like, but people in the country know that on apprenticeships, this lot are not to be believed. [Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman may be making points that are not amenable to those on the Government Benches, but he must be heard, no matter what he wants to say.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tristram Hunt]

I think, Madam Deputy Speaker, that a national baccalaureate might enable the Minister to learn about character, self-control and resilience in these kinds of situations. If he wants to pursue life-long learning, that is an ambition Labour Members absolutely pursue.

[Matthew Hancock]

rose—

[Tristram Hunt]

I am trying to conclude.

The culmination of our vision for young people on a technical or vocational pathway is our new plan, announced by the Leader of the Opposition yesterday, for technical degrees. These courses will be designed by some of our best universities and our leading employers, teaching people the skills they need to prosper in the new economy. Currently, just 2% of apprenticeships are available at degree level. For the first time, those who have excelled in vocational education and training—those who have gained a first-rate tech bacc and completed a level 3 apprenticeship—will be able to take their aspirations further. For the first time, young people will have the chance to earn while they learn at university, with a degree that provides a clear route to a high-skilled technical or professional career.

At the next general election, we have a choice between a Labour party determined to equip an outward-facing Britain with the skills and education it needs to succeed and, on the other hand, coalition parties tinkering with the curriculum here and there, increasing the number of unqualified teachers, and promoting for-profit schooling. It is a choice between more young engineers and more IES Breckland free schools; between a modern curriculum focused on thinking and doing, building character and creativity and harnessing the aspirations of all young people, and the narrow exam-factory model of recent years; and between a low-wage, low-skill, business-as-usual race to the bottom and a high-skill, high-innovation economy that works for all. Only one party is offering this country an economy and an education system fit for the punishing demands of the 21st century. I commend the motion to the House.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. It is of course disorderly to refer to the Gallery, but I feel sure that the occupants of it will be revelling in the praise that the Secretary of State has generously conferred on them. On this occasion, his disorderly conduct is readily excused, but only on this occasion.

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

I fully associate myself with such disorderly conduct in the House and congratulate those inspiring school and college leaders who have rightly been recognised by Her Majesty the Queen. Teaching is a moral mission, and it should be celebrated as such.

In 2010, the Department for Education was warned of threats to schools in Birmingham, but for four years, on the Secretary of State’s watch, his Department failed to act. The chief inspector of schools, Sir Michael Wilshaw, is now urging the Government to provide greater public assurance that all schools in a locality, regardless of their status, will discharge the full range of their responsibilities. When will the Secretary of State accept that micro-managing schools from behind a desk in Whitehall does not work, and that we need a proper system of independent, local accountability?

[Michael Gove]

I suspect that that question will be shown not only on BBC Parliament but on UKTV’s Gold channel, because it is a magnificent repeat. The hon. Gentleman asked precisely that question in his speech last week. The truth is that we took action to deal with extremism in schools, which the last Government never did. We have also taken action to introduce no-notice inspections, which will ensure that Her Majesty’s chief inspector has the powers, which he was denied under the last Government, to deal with the problems that started under the last Government.

[Tristram Hunt]

The reason I am asking the question again is that we are still searching for an answer. Labour’s answer is absolutely clear: we need directors of school standards, independent of local authorities, to ensure a robust system of local oversight. The Secretary of State’s policy involves more Whitehall centralism, more unqualified teachers, and less collaboration and accountability. Is it not the case that even those on the Government Benches now realise that Birmingham has shown that his school model is bust?

[Michael Gove]

I have to say that the hon. Gentleman did rather better at reading out his question this time than he did last week, so I suppose it really was worth that exercise in déjà vu all over again. The truth is that Labour’s policy is opaque and unclear. At different times, the hon. Gentleman has been in favour of free schools and greater autonomy, and against them. He is currently in favour of abolishing the national curriculum in all schools, but David Blunkett, the man who advises him on schools policy, is in favour of imposing it in all schools. As I have said before: inconsistency, thy name is Tristram.

Birmingham Schools

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Monday 9th June 2014 Commons Chamber

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

The events in Birmingham reveal an education policy in disarray, a Government more concerned about warring egos than school standards and a Prime Minister unable to control his Cabinet. But while Ministers carry on their briefings, sackings and apology, the education and safeguarding of children in the great city of Birmingham must be this House’s priority.

I appreciate the anxiety which parents and pupils are feeling in the midst of this debate. Our focus now has to be on ensuring successful futures for the schools identified today, because what the recent weeks have shown is that the Education Secretary’s vision of controlling every school from behind a desk in Whitehall does not work; that Ofsted has to think much more carefully about the nature of its inspection system; that Birmingham city council has, as Sir Albert Bore acknowledged, some tough questions to ask of the quality of leadership in its children and young people’s directorate; that current systems of schools governance are open to abuse; and that there is a broader debate to be had about education and faith, underperformance among minority ethnic groups and the limits of communalism in multicultural Britain. In an age of multiple religions, identities and cultures, we need to be clearer about what a state education means for children of all faiths and no faiths.

Having read the Ofsted reports, Sir Michael Wilshaw’s letter and the report of the Education Funding Agency, for advance notice of which I thank the Education Secretary, I share the Education Secretary’s concerns about the provision of education and the safeguarding of children in certain schools in Birmingham. It cannot be right that children have been at risk of marginalisation from mainstream society, cultural isolation or even radicalisation. Similarly, the focus on narrow attainment at the expense of students’ personal and social development is a cause for concern. Some of the other Ofsted reports highlight invitations to inappropriate speakers, the downgrading or elimination of sex and relationship education, gender segregation, staff intimidation and a failure to prepare pupils to live in a multicultural society.

Sir Michael reports governors

“trying to impose and promote a narrow faith-based ideology in what are non-faith schools.”

He says:

“They do not ensure that a broad and balanced curriculum equips pupils to live and work in a multi-cultural, multi-faith and democratic Britain.”

This is an issue for faith schools as well as non-faith schools. We cannot have such situations in any English schools, and the report by the Education Funding Agency on the culture, ethos and governance of Oldknow academy has raised similar concerns about a restricted curriculum and the furtherance of conservative Islamist views.

We now have at least four investigations into what is occurring in Birmingham schools and today the Education Secretary has announced yet another, but this is an attempt to evade his own responsibility as Secretary of State. It seems to be everyone else’s problem—the Home Secretary’s, Charles Farr’s, the city council’s—but not his own. The truth is that if he had been in charge of the management of his Department, these issues would not have arisen in recent years. The Secretary of State has said that he has acted with speed on the issue, but the truth is that Ministers have been ignoring it for four years. In 2010, the respected Birmingham head teacher Tim Boyes made a presentation to the Department for Education highlighting the risk of a radical agenda infiltrating Birmingham schools, but nothing was done.

Will the Secretary of State confirm today which Ministers were present at Mr Boyes’s presentation, when he was first informed of the details of Mr Boyes’s presentation, when Ofsted was informed of the details of Mr Boyes’s presentation and when the Government’s extremism task force met to discuss Mr Boyes’s presentation? Or, as the Home Secretary has put it, is it true that the Department for Education was warned in 2010 and, if so, why did nobody act?

We do not need another massive review by the permanent secretary. Mr Boyes has provided the Department with information on his 2010 meeting and we need to know what steps the Ministers took and why the Secretary of State did not act. We need those answers here today, because the Labour party’s answer is absolutely clear. We need a local director of standards and accountability.

We know that Park View Educational Trust, the academy chain essential to the controversy, had a free school application turned down in 2013 on security grounds, yet the Secretary of State allowed the trust to take over Golden Hillock the same year. Can he explain why the trust was unfit to set up a free school but was still allowed to take over the Golden Hillock school, despite those security concerns? Who made that decision and what due diligence was undertaken?

The truth is that events in Birmingham point to a strategic failing in the Government’s education policy. The Secretary of State’s agenda has been an ideology of atomisation and fragmentation: teachers without qualifications; every school an island; a free market of provision; and an attempt to oversee it all from behind a desk in Whitehall. Birmingham has shown that that model is bust. Sir Michael Wilshaw speaks of successful schools in Birmingham having

“too few opportunities to share their successful practice with others.”

That is because of Government policy, and Sir Michael recommends a review of the education funding arrangements for auditing governance in academies and free schools, but the Education Secretary’s mantra of centralism and secrecy remains. He has learned nothing from this event. He says that he will personally look at funding agreements, once again from behind a desk in Whitehall, when what we need are local systems of oversight and accountability, with a system of local checks and balances.

The dramatic change in Ofsted rankings from outstanding to inadequate has also brought into sharp focus the need for inspection criteria that look beyond the exam factory model of recent years. We need young people to excel in their academic and vocational attainment, but to come out of school career-ready, college-ready and life-ready. That is why the Opposition welcome Sir Michael Wilshaw’s request to have a broad and balanced curriculum added as a further criterion to the inspection framework. We think that it should go further, to look at the development of character, resilience and grit in our school system. The Labour party believes that sex and relationship education should be a part of that.

The events in Birmingham have brought to light a desperate weakness in Government thinking. On the one hand, there is an education policy designed to fragment and divide, isolate without oversight and increase the risks of radicalisation—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I think that the shadow Secretary of State is bringing his remarks to a close in this sentence.

[Tristram Hunt]

The Education Secretary speaks of requiring all schools to promote British values; all well and good. Among the greatest of British values is an education system that welcomes and integrates migrant communities, builds successful citizens in a multicultural society and secures safety and high standards for all, and the Education Secretary is failing to do so.

[Michael Gove]

I thank the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt) for his comments and I agree that we need to focus on successful futures for these schools. I also agree that we need a broader debate, to ensure that all schools—faith and non-faith—make sure that children are integrated into modern Britain. But I regret the fact that in his comments he was not able to let us know the Labour party’s position on no-notice inspections. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr Mahmood) for stressing that he believes that no-notice inspections are right; I am also grateful to the right hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Dame Tessa Jowell) for stressing that. But I am still none the wiser about the position of the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central. I am afraid that I am also none the wiser about his position on whether or not it is right to promote British values in schools and right to take the other steps that we have taken.

The hon. Gentleman asks about meetings between the Department for Education and the Birmingham headmaster, Tim Boyes, in 2010. I can confirm that I was not at that meeting, nor was I informed about its content. That is why I have asked the permanent secretary to investigate, and I have also asked him to look at other occasions before 2010 when warnings were reportedly given. The hon. Gentleman has previously alleged that I was warned by Mr Boyes in 2010 and did not act; that is not the case and I hope that he will make it clear in the future, and withdraw that allegation.

The hon. Gentleman asks about local oversight of all these schools. It is important to stress that when Tim Boyes raised these issues in 2010 all these schools were facing local oversight from Birmingham city council, and as Sir Michael Wilshaw has concluded, Birmingham city council failed. As Ofsted makes clear, repeated warnings to those charged with local oversight were ignored. Indeed, it was only after my Department was informed about the allegations in the Trojan horse letter that action was taken, and I thank Birmingham city council for its co-operation since then.

The hon. Gentleman asks what action was taken overall since 2010. It would be quite wrong to allege, as he does, that the Department has taken no action on extremism since 2010; the opposite is the case. As the Home Secretary pointed out, we were the first Department outside her own to set up a counter-extremism unit. Unreported and under-appreciated, it has prevented a number of extremist or unsuitable organisations from securing access to public funds.

The hon. Gentleman asks about academies and free schools, and the autonomy that they enjoy. First, I must correct him: none of the schools that Ofsted inspected are free schools and all the evidence so far is that free schools in Birmingham are proving a success. I must also correct him on the matter of oversight of academies. Academies are subject to sharper and more rigorous accountability than local authority schools. They are inspected not just by Ofsted but by the Education Funding Agency.

The hon. Gentleman also asks about curriculum inspection. Let me stress that it is already a requirement that schools have a broad and balanced curriculum; the question is enforcement. That means giving Ofsted the tools it needs, such as no-notice inspections and suitably qualified inspectors.

The problems identified today are serious and long-standing. They require us all to take action against all forms of extremism. I have been encouraged throughout my career by support from Opposition Members—the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), the hon. Member for Dudley North (Ian Austin), the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears) and the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr, among others—for a non-partisan approach to fighting extremism. I hope that, after his comments today, the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central will reflect on the seriousness of these charges and recognise that this is not an appropriate vehicle through which he should make wider criticisms of the school reforms with which he and his party disagree. I hope that, in the future, we can count on him and others working across party boundaries to keep our children safe.

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.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Monday 24th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

We are consulting on exactly how we should distribute the additional cash in order to ensure that it goes to the very poorest families, but I am aware that in the west midlands generally—and in Solihull particularly—there are families in desperate need of support, and I hope we will be able to extend that to them as quickly as possible.

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

More and more research shows the importance of early-years development in a child’s education. The Labour party’s Sure Start programme was focused on supporting those vital infant years—a policy of prevention, rather than cure. We know that the Tories do not support Sure Start, but in 2010, the Secretary of State pledged to create 4,200 new health visitors. Can he tell the House how far he is from meeting that target?

[Michael Gove]

We extravagantly support Sure Start and I am a great advocate of the great work that Sure Start children’s centres do, but the provision of additional health visitors is a matter for the Secretary of State for Health.

[Tristram Hunt]

That is exactly the problem with this Government—no cross-departmental thinking about having health visitors focus on early-years development. [Laughter.] The Tories may laugh at the impact that health visitors have on early-years education, but the Opposition think that the early years are vital. As the hon. Member for Reading East (Mr Wilson) suggested, research published by the Sutton Trust on Friday reiterated the impact that good parenting has on school readiness, educational attainment and progression into continued education and work. Will the Government’s commitment to 4,200 new health visitors be matched this Parliament, or is it another broken promise, like Sure Start centres?

Oral Answers to Questions

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Monday 10th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend raises a very specific case, although I understand why she has brought it to my attention. I hope that we will have the opportunity to talk afterwards so that I can ensure that the Dorset local authority is provided with all the support it needs to make sure that children’s educational standards improve.

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

As my hon. Friends the Members for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) and for Halton (Derek Twigg) have shown, the Opposition recognise the essential role that Ofsted plays in driving up standards in schools. I want to place on the record our continued support for Sir Michael Wilshaw. However, since we last met, the Secretary of State has, in the words of Sir Michael, unleashed a “smear campaign” against the chief inspector. He has also sacked Baroness Morgan as chair of Ofsted, despite the fact that the Minister for Schools thinks that she has done a “fantastic job”. Why is the Secretary of State so intent on undermining England’s independent school inspectorate system?

[Michael Gove]

I am sure that the chief inspector will be touched to hear the hon. Gentleman’s words of support, but I think that he will also be disturbed to hear that he is alleged to have uttered words that he did not utter. This is not the first time that the hon. Gentleman has sallied forth without being in secure possession of the facts. It has been the case beforehand that his facts have been wrong about the situation in the South Leeds academy, and it has been the case that his facts have been wrong, on broadcast, about the number of unqualified teachers in our schools. His facts are wrong again in the allegations he makes about the chief inspector. I hope that he will take this opportunity to ensure that the House knows that he has unfairly and wrongly put words in the chief inspector’s mouth that he did not utter.

[Tristram Hunt]

We see that the Secretary of State has refused to condemn the campaign against the chief inspector. Is not the truth of the matter this: Ofsted is inspecting his free schools without fear or favour, and he does not like it? The chief inspector wants to inspect academy chains, and he does not like it. On Friday the Al-Madinah secondary school closed, and on Sunday we learned of a new Ofsted purge. Surely the Secretary of State should focus on raising standards, not politicising our school inspectorate system.

[Michael Gove]

If the hon. Gentleman wants to be taken seriously, he must pay close attention to the facts. The facts are these: I have been zealous in ensuring that we apply a tighter and more rigorous inspection framework to all schools—free schools, academies and maintained schools—and in so doing I appointed Sir Michael Wilshaw and I appointed Sally Morgan. I have been the person who has been leading change in our schools. I have been the person who has been insistent that we hold our education system to the highest standards. I am the person now demanding once again that the hon. Gentleman withdraw his earlier statement when he put words into the mouth of Sir Michael Wilshaw that he did not utter. If he does not, we will draw the appropriate conclusion, as the New Statesman already has, which is that his policies are both “timid” and “incoherent”.

Teaching Quality

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2014 Commons Chamber

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

I beg to move,

That this House believes that no school system can surpass the quality of its teachers; and therefore resolves that all teachers in all state-funded schools should be qualified or working towards Qualified Teacher Status, be undertaking ongoing continuing professional development and have their skills and knowledge re-validated throughout their careers in order to support them to excel in the classroom, to improve learning outcomes for all children in all schools, to uphold discipline in the classroom, to tailor their teaching to children with special educational needs and to close the attainment gap between disadvantaged children and their peers.

The motion—which flows on from those very powerful words of the Secretary of State for International Development about the power and purpose of education—begins with a clear statement of principles that were first enunciated by Sir Michael Barber.

This should be a moment when—just as in the previous debate—the House comes together, to extol the virtues of a highly qualified, self-motivating and dedicated teaching profession. It should be a moment when we undertake a shared commitment to give teachers the best possible training, so that we equip them properly for the demands of the classroom, and it should be a moment when we unite in praising all the hard work that teachers and head teachers do on a daily basis, while also acknowledging that we currently have one of the best teaching cohorts that the country has ever seen. I see the Secretary of State nodding in agreement and I hope that when he steps up to the Dispatch Box he will acknowledge the last Labour Government’s role in delivering that cohort and in raising teaching standards. We know of his enthusiasm for debating the past. Today should be the perfect opportunity—

[Mr Gordon Marsden (Blackpool South) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way so early in his speech. Does he agree that it is curious that we have a Secretary of State who wants to micro-manage discussion of the first world war but is not prioritising continuing professional development of teachers who might be able to instruct their pupils rather better?

[Tristram Hunt]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention, which leads me perfectly on to my first point, which is about education focusing on the professionalism of the teacher in the classroom, rather than being micro-managed from Whitehall. It was the Prime Minister himself who in 2010 said—[Interruption.] I would have thought that Conservative Members would like to listen to the words of the Prime Minister. He said:

“The quality of a teacher is the single most important factor in a child's educational progress.”

Moreover, he said,

“children with the best teachers”

learn

“four times as fast”

as those taught by the least effective. He was absolutely right. He also offered a solution that drew on international evidence and best practice:

“Finland, Singapore and South Korea have the most highly qualified teachers, and also some of the best education systems in the world because they have deliberately made teaching a high prestige profession.”

[Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)]

I have been listening to the hon. Gentleman with considerable interest. Last Friday, I was in a debate with Carwyn Jones, the Labour leader of the Welsh Assembly, who admitted that the Welsh Government had, to use his words, “had its eye off the ball” and for that reason the standard of education in Wales is among the worst in Europe. What advice could the hon. Gentleman give the First Minister of Wales to help improve the standard of education in Wales, which is now lower than that of Hungary?

[Tristram Hunt]

My advice is to not have unqualified teachers in the classroom and to keep going with the reforms that have been introduced recently on league tables and the literacy and numeracy strategy. We know that the surest way to improve children’s attainment is to boost the status, elevate the standing and raise the standards of the teaching profession. Therefore, today, let us put our differences aside and send a clear message to teachers, parents and pupils that the House understands the importance of teacher quality to improving the performance of our education system.

I saw it first hand last week when I attended the annual prize giving at St Thomas More Catholic school in Wood Green, north London, the most improved school in England. As we saw from last week’s analysis of GCSE results, much good work is being done in schools throughout the country.

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

Can the hon. Gentleman tell me whether he draws a distinction between teachers who have gained qualified teacher status through the study of a PGCE and teachers who have gained QTS through the graduate teacher programme or Teach First? Do international jurisdictions consider those qualifications gained in a different way? Do they value them differently in international comparisons?

[Tristram Hunt]

As ever, the hon. Gentleman is a master of his profession. We were happy to introduce, under a Labour Government, the wonderful Teach First scheme, which was about the road to having qualified teachers in the classroom. Gaining QTS, as I will explain, is not the be all and end all of focusing on teacher quality, but it is an important plank of the minimum standards that we would expect. The attainment gap between children on free school meals and those whose parents can afford to pay actually widened in 72 out of 152 areas last year. There remains a worrying attainment gap between less advantaged pupils and those from more affluent families, and current policy is failing to address that. The most worrying disparities were in the affluent areas of Wokingham and Buckinghamshire. There is therefore much work to be done.

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

When my hon. Friend visited St Thomas More school—the most improved secondary school in the country—did he have an opportunity to discuss with the head teacher, Martin Tissot, the way in which he had rigorously ensured that teaching in the classroom had raised standards in the school? Did my hon. Friend also hear about the commitment of the staff who come in on Saturday mornings as well as taking part in a great deal of activity after school to raise standards further?

[Tristram Hunt]

Such examples prove the power of leadership, of purpose and of camaraderie among teachers. It is the teachers and the head teachers who are the real agents of change, as Martin Tissot at St Thomas More school has shown. Labour’s academy programme was about delivering that sense of autonomy and leadership, which can prove instrumental in that regard.

[Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)]

The hon. Member for Lichfield (Michael Fabricant) mentioned Wales, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) has just talked about the importance of leadership. The hon. Member for Lichfield was dissing Wales, but I should like to inform him that Rhyl high school in my constituency, which was a failed secondary school five years ago, is now the best school in Wales. That is down to the leadership of the head teacher, Claire Armitstead. Will my hon. Friend pay tribute to Claire and to Rhyl high school?

[Tristram Hunt]

I would be delighted to pay tribute to the leadership of Claire Armitstead. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend for promoting mindfulness and attentiveness in the classroom. Those are the kind of disciplines that help to achieve results.

What happens in the classroom is essential, and the point is simple: good teachers change lives. They engender curiosity, self-improvement and a hunger for knowledge. It is they who awaken the passion for learning that a strong society and a growing economy so desperately need. They are the architects of our future prosperity, not the enemies of promise.

[Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)]

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will be seeking his own teaching qualification if he is still planning to give lessons himself. Both my parents were qualified teachers, and I am very proud of that fact. Will the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that there are fewer teachers without qualified teacher status in state schools under this Government than there were under Labour?

[Tristram Hunt]

The hon. Lady admits an important point, on which we can agree. We both want to move towards having more qualified teachers. I am glad that we agree on that, and that she will be supporting that part of the motion tabled by her coalition colleagues. Under the Labour Government, teachers working on a permanent basis in the classroom were working towards qualified teacher status. That is the vital difference: we believed in working towards qualified teacher status, whereas this Government believe in deregulation and de-professionalisation.

The first plank in Labour’s schools policy is to focus on standards and not structures. We do not think that the job is done simply because a school has changed its name to that of an academy or a free school. We think that the most important relationship is between a teacher and a pupil, and we would therefore ensure that all teachers in state-funded schools were qualified or working towards qualified teacher status. We currently have a deregulated, downgraded system of professional teaching standards. Shamefully, under this Government, a person needs more qualifications to work as a burger bar manager than to be in charge of the education of our young people. We believe, as the Prime Minister did once and as the Deputy Prime Minister might still do—it is always difficult to tell—that our young people need highly qualified, highly motivated teachers in their classrooms.

[Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman will know that there are many unqualified teachers in the independent sector. If that is such a bad thing, can he explain why so many parents make such financial sacrifices to send their children to those schools?

[Tristram Hunt]

The most recent evidence I have seen shows that more than 90% of teachers in the independent sector have qualified teacher status, so that is the vast majority. I suggest that the remaining number should be working towards qualified teacher status so that they can transfer their skills to the state sector.

Under a Labour Government, we would not have the scandal of an academy school in Leeds advertising for “an unqualified maths teacher” with just four GCSEs. We would not have the scandal of the Al-Madinah free school where the presence of so many unqualified teachers did such damage to those pupils’ learning. We would not have more than one in 10 teachers in free schools being unqualified.

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

I have taken the opportunity at the Dispatch Box before to draw to the attention of the hon. Gentleman the fact that the South Leeds academy was advertising for trainees under a provision that has existed since 1982. The letter that acquainted me with those facts was also shared with him. Why has he repeated something that is simply untrue in this House and on other public platforms?

[Tristram Hunt]

I read the advert and it said, “an unqualified maths teacher.” It was there in black and white. I had at this point—[Interruption.]

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. My hon. Friend on the Front Bench was accused of lying. Is it right for the Secretary of State to accuse him of lying?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)]

I most certainly did not hear that, and I would have done. As far as I can see, there is a dispute with regard to the accuracy of each Member’s interpretation of the said advert, but the Secretary of State most definitely did not accuse the hon. Gentleman of lying. He has put very forcefully exactly why he is of the view that he is with regard to the said advert. I am afraid that that is not a point of order.

[Tristram Hunt]

I had hoped at this point in my speech to unite both sides of the House by quoting the words of Sir Michael Wilshaw, the head of Ofsted, who said:

“I would expect all teachers in my schools to be qualified.”

However, after last Friday’s remarkable briefing war by the Department for Education against Her Majesty’s chief inspector, I realise that he is not the unifying force that he might once have been. The achievement of qualified teacher status is not on its own a guarantee of teaching excellence; it is merely a starting point. We need to look at new ways of getting the best candidates into the teaching profession and the best teachers into underperforming schools.

[Mr Sheerman]

Does my hon. Friend agree that a very good chief inspector of schools such as Sir Michael Wilshaw may find such a situation very difficult—I am not making a party political point here. Going back to the foundation of the chief inspector, he is not allowed to look at a chain of schools. If he cannot do that, he has to look at an individual free school and an individual academy. That is restrictive because he cannot see the environment in which that failing school, in some circumstances, can be supported.

[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend, the former Select Committee Chairman, makes a powerful policy point. It will be policy under a Labour Government that Ofsted will be allowed to inspect academy chains so that we can root out underperformance.

We need to ensure that initial teacher training is preparing teachers properly for the pressures of the classroom, especially when it comes to discipline and behaviour management. Similarly, retention rates are a cause for concern and so too is the loss of talent to the classroom. The second plank of Labour’s drive to enhance teaching quality is effective training and new career pathways for teachers.

In England, the most effective teachers are often encouraged to go for leadership promotion and are therefore out of the classroom within a relatively short space of time. The Labour party will develop pathways to allow teachers to pursue their own particular strengths and interests whether in pedagogy, leadership or in an area of specialism such as behaviour management or curriculum development. Just as the medical profession allows for the development of consultant-level expertise, that must be our ambition in education.

[Chris Skidmore (Kingswood) (Con)]

rose—

[Tristram Hunt]

I will give way in a moment.

I must put on the record that we have reservations about whether School Direct, as constituted, has the capacity to deliver that excellence. The story of the programme for international student assessment is that those teacher training systems that have a connection to a strong academic base produce more effective outcomes for learners. We also know that effective training in understanding child development delivers the discipline and attentiveness that many classrooms require. We fear that the important partnership that excellent higher education institutions can play in training teachers is being undermined and nothing I have seen from the international evidence says that that is the route to raising standards.

The most effective teachers are those who can combine excellent practical skills with the ability to understand and use research for the development of their teaching. That is particularly the case when they are dealing with children with special educational needs and troubled learners who are seeking to navigate early adulthood in the modern landscape of social media and the internet.

[Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)]

I declare an interest, as my wife is a special educational needs co-ordinator, and I absolutely support the points that my hon. Friend is making. My wife, like many teachers I know, undertakes regular professional development. It must be right to say, as we propose, that every teacher should undertake such development and that the Government will support that.

[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend puts his finger on the point. The vital challenge for education reform is trying to keep teachers’ skills up to date. As the Education Committee has said

“successive education ministers have neglected continuing professional development (CPD) and focused overly much on initial teacher training”.

That is why the third plank of the Labour party’s schools policy is a profession-led programme of revalidating teachers on a rolling basis to ensure that teachers are up to date on subject knowledge and classroom technique.

[Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)]

That one-size-fits-all approach does not work across the school curriculum, particularly in arts and music and other such areas. A teacher in a school in my constituency has been a first violinist in an orchestra for all his life and now spends a lot of time in the music department of his school. He has no interest in professional development or in continuing his development, and although I appreciate what the hon. Gentleman is trying to say there are many areas across the curriculum in which expertise other than the development about which he is talking is relevant and useful to children.

[Tristram Hunt]

The hon. Lady makes an excellent point. There has always been a role for instructors coming into a school—for example, outside experts, lecturers and those who teach sport and music—and we would retain that. However, if someone is permanently in charge of the curriculum outcomes for young people in a class, it seems to me that as a minimum they should be of qualified teacher standard. There is no way that we will block the creativity and excellence coming into schools, but we want the best possible teachers, with minimum guarantees of teaching standards, to look after the education of our young people.

The Sutton Trust and the London School of Economics have concluded that if we raised the performance of the bottom 10% of teachers only to the average we would see a marked improvement in performance in our schools. That is especially the case when we consider that disadvantaged children suffer most from poor teaching. Without home support and social capital to fall back on, children from disadvantaged backgrounds suffer disproportionately from poor teaching.

[Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman has been very generous in giving way and I am grateful to him for doing so. May I ask him at the very least to nuance his policy on non-qualified teachers? I do not know whether since the last debate, three months ago, he has sought evidence on the quality of non-QTS teachers in our schools. If he has, perhaps he could share it with the House. If he has not, will he at least undertake to carry out a piece of research to consider the quality of those teachers before putting in train a system that could ultimately lead to their removal, if not sacking, from the classroom?

[Tristram Hunt]

I thank the Chair of the Education Committee for his intervention, but I am always bemused by his blind spot on this policy. He makes a curious transition from being a rather inquiring, cerebral Chair of a Select Committee to being a rather more partisan figure when he sits up on the Back Benches pursuing party policy. I would welcome research from the Education Committee on the role of qualified teacher status nationally and internationally. I know that his Committee frequently travels to Finland and Singapore, so perhaps on his next trip he could do some research into that policy area.

[Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend recall that, very often, a finding of Ofsted inspections is that teachers who are unqualified or who are teaching subjects in which they are unqualified produce the poorest results? Does he agree that people need to focus on the use of teachers in particular subject areas and their need for ongoing training to ensure that they are not unfamiliar with those subjects?

[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend makes a valuable point. All we are asking for when we talk about qualified teacher status are minimum safeguards to ensure quality.

That is only part of the story. A Labour Government would demonstrate our commitment to elevating the standing of teachers by expecting them to undertake regular professional development, which would sit alongside any internal appraisal structure or the intervention of Ofsted. That is vital to raising standards, and it would bring teaching into line with other high-status, mature professions such as lawyers and doctors. It is also vital for future-proofing our education system. Technology is transforming education—it is remarkable how the internet is allowing access to so much of the artistic and historic creativity of humankind—but I was shocked to receive a letter from Microsoft telling me that, according to one of its surveys, 74% of teachers believe they do not have the skills to teach computing properly because the subject is moving so fast. That is exactly where we want teachers to be up to date with continuing professional development.

Just as doctors are revalidated on their knowledge of new medicines and trials, so teachers have to be up to date with the latest research and pedagogy. We need teachers to share expertise, to observe lessons, and to collaborate across schools and trusts.

[John Pugh (Southport) (LD)]

I think the hon. Gentleman said—it will be in his script—that successive Secretaries of State have not been interested in continuing professional development. I think that is exactly what he said. Can he explain to me why inset days used to be referred to as Baker days?

[Tristram Hunt]

Because they were introduced by Lord Baker, as the hon. Gentleman knows.

The best continuing professional development produces remarkable results for young people, and the process needs to be profession-led. If we are interested in serious professional development, it cannot be a bureaucratic box-ticking exercise. I am encouraged by what the Prince's Teaching Institute says in its proposals for a royal college of teaching:

“Certification will be the process by which teachers’ standards are assessed by the College.”

As the former Secretary of State, Baroness Morris, has written:

“The idea of a Royal College of Teachers, fast gaining support from all sides, is the obvious organisation to lead on developing the idea”

of revalidating or recertifying to ensure that teachers are up to date with their professional development.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

I know today’s debate is mainly about teachers, but has my hon. Friend given any thought to the development of teaching assistants, for example, and what sort of future they might have?

[Tristram Hunt]

Where teaching assistants are used appropriately, effectively and professionally, they can make a transformational difference in young people’s learning outcomes. Again, it is about having the skills and understanding of how to use teaching assistants.

Our idea to revalidate teachers and to promote continuing professional development has been welcomed by head teachers, business leaders and prominent educationalists. Teacher Mike Cameron—I see the Conservative party does not want to hear from everyday teachers working in the classroom—says that

“Teachers would control the teaching profession… and part of that involves making sure, by re-validation, that as an individual, I am still worthy of calling myself a teacher.”

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

Is my hon. Friend as surprised as I am that the Schools Minister is not in his place?

[Tristram Hunt]

I am decreasingly surprised by the absence of the Schools Minister. When anything tricky comes up in public policy, we have a rather small cohort of Ministers from the Department for Education. As we can see from the amendment to the motion, they are in a neither fish nor fowl place on this.

The CBI has welcomed our policy. Katja Hall said:

“we need to create a culture where teachers are continually developed in the classroom to support them raising standards in schools. A licence system deserves serious consideration”.

From Brett Wigdortz of Teach First to the leading teaching trade unions to Russell Hobby of the National Association of Head Teachers, there is clear engagement and support for the idea. Even the Secretary of State’s old employer, The Times—before he spurned it for the Daily Mail group—has called the policy “courageous and correct”. I would hope for similar support from the coalition parties today.

The Opposition’s call is simply put in the first sentence of the motion: no education system can outperform the quality of its teachers. So instead of the relentless energy spent on endless structural reform, instead of the confused tinkering with the curriculum, instead of telling teachers how to teach chunking or whether they should use exercise books or not, our policy is altogether more ambitious—to work towards a world-class teacher in every classroom. I hope that Government Members will join us this afternoon in supporting the motion.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)]

I have to inform the House that Mr Speaker has selected the amendment in the name of the Prime Minister.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tristram Hunt]

Name him.

[Michael Gove]

I will name him in due course.

The motion states:

“That this House believes that no school system can surpass the quality of its teachers; and therefore resolves”.

My friend said:

“A clause following a semi-colon needs an expressly stated subject (as opposed to a merely ‘understood’ one, just as a complete sentence does. In other words, either the semi-colon must be replaced by a comma or the clause after it must be changed to something like ‘and that this house therefore resolves’ or ‘and that it therefore resolves’. As it stands, the construction is ungrammatical.”

He went on to the next phrase, which refers to

“all teachers in all state-funded schools”

and stated that

“one or other of the two ‘alls’ is redundant and should be deleted”.

He then looked at the phrase

“should be qualified or working towards Qualified Teacher Status”.

He acknowledged that it was

“better, because less awkward-looking”,

but suggested that “should” as well as “be” should be at the beginning of each of the clauses.

He then pointed out that the reference to “ongoing continuing professional development” was tautologous, because continuing professional development is, by definition, ongoing. He also noted that the claim that that was

“in order to support them to excel in the classroom”

was an example of “Shocking grammar.” One cannot support someone to do something—following the word “support” with an infinitive. Rather, one supports someone in his or her attempt to do something. He went on in a similar vein and concluded: “Regrettably, this motion is, in total, a shocking piece of English.”

The reason I mention that is that I have enormous respect and affection for the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt). He and I are fans of both George Eliot and George Orwell. George Orwell wrote that

“the fight against bad English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional writers”

because

“the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts… Political language”—

of the kind we see in the Opposition’s motion—

“is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”

Sadly, that is what the Opposition’s case today is—pure wind without solidity.

The Opposition appear to be arguing that there is some sort of crisis in teaching, specifically recruitment to teaching, but the number of graduates with top degrees is up. Almost three quarters of graduates starting teacher training in this academic year have a first-class or 2:1 degree. That is the highest quality of graduates starting teacher training since records began. It is also the case that the number entering the teaching profession from top universities is up. Some 14% of graduates leaving Oxford in the past three years have chosen teaching as their profession, making it the single most popular destination for students from that university.

The quality of teaching has never been better. Ofsted figures show that it has improved significantly since 2010. Under Labour, the percentage of teaching that was “good” or “outstanding” in primary schools was 69%, but recent figures show that it is now 79%. Under Labour, the percentage of teaching that was “good” or “outstanding” in secondary schools was 65%, but now it is 72%. That is significant improvement under this coalition Government.

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Gove]

It might, or it might not, but the point is that the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central said in his speech that teachers in the independent sector who did not have QTS would have to acquire it to work in the state sector. That means that state schools could not poach great teachers from independent schools, there could be no effective collaboration between them and we would not be able to lift standards in all state schools by using the expertise that others pay for.

[Tristram Hunt]

I was at the London Academy of Excellence on Friday with Richard Cairns and its excellent headmaster Rob Wilne, both of whom expressed great support for Labour’s policy of focusing on continuing professional development and raising the status and enhancing the standing of teachers. If I were the Secretary of State, before I talked about the London Academy of Excellence I might actually go and visit it.

[Michael Gove]

I note that the hon. Gentleman did not respond to my point about Richard Cairns not having QTS, and that he did not take the opportunity of returning to the Dispatch Box to apologise for stating things in the House that were not true. We will draw our own conclusions about his reliability as an expert witness.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Stuart]

I would welcome such research, but the fundamental position of the Secretary of State is that, within a strong accountability system, we should trust head teachers. The number of non-QTS teachers is reducing. There are many fewer now than when Labour was in power, and the shadow Secretary of State’s refusal in successive debates to acknowledge that is mildly irritating. We have fewer of them and there is strong accountability, yet we keep hearing this proposal to get rid of them.

That point echoes the comments by the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson):

“If you find someone who is a great musician but they can’t spend three years getting the proper teaching qualifications, I think you should use them”.

He gets it; it is a shame that the Opposition Front-Bench team do not appear to do so. When it comes to the evidence for their campaign, the Opposition are quieter than the library of a Trappist monastery.

Is the shadow Secretary of State in favour of evidence-based policy making? I know that he would not want to score political points if it were to hurt our children’s education. He has had three months since the last debate to find evidence that non-QTS teachers are damaging schooling. He has had three months to find evidence that moving a teacher without QTS to QTS on the job improves learning in their classes. Has he found any evidence? If so, where is it? Why does he not share it with us? If he could point us in the right direction, I am sure my Committee would be happy to pursue the matter. If unqualified teachers are doing harm, let us move fast to get rid of them.

[Tristram Hunt]

The Chairman of the Select Committee will know, from the work of Andreas Schleicher of the OECD, that data from the programme for international student assessment have made it clear that educational jurisdictions with the highest qualified teachers—from Finland and South Korea to Singapore and Shanghai—perform most effectively. Can he give us the evidence that unqualified teachers are the route to improving standards and closing the attainment gap?

[Mr Stuart]

Before teachers without QTS, whose number has reduced, are removed from the system, the shadow Secretary of State needs to show why that is a good idea. When Charles Parker, the chief executive of the Baker Dearing Trust, came before the Committee this morning, he said of people who taught in university technical colleges, including those with PhDs: “They’re amazing people, they are highly professional, but they may not be highly professional in the sense of being qualified teachers.” Before they are got rid of, let us check that there are not more good than bad; let us ensure that they are not doing good. If they are doing good and the hon. Gentleman gets rid of them, it will damage not just his conscience, but the education of the children whom he is duty bound to protect.

I understand that the hon. Gentleman has to make an impact in his new brief, and to secure his place in the shadow Cabinet. It cannot be easy having to mollify the resurgent left of his party, let alone the trade unions which bankroll almost every aspect of his party’s actions. However, I urge him not to put politics ahead of the evidence, and I know that he would not put ambition ahead of principle.

For those of us on the Back Benches who are trying to work out how best to improve educational opportunities for our constituents, this debate is bizarre, and I ask the shadow Secretary of State to change his policy.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Skidmore]

That is a good point and I welcome its being placed on the record.

Another problem is the Labour party’s definition of “working toward QTS” including a two-year cut-off. I would appreciate the shadow Secretary of State putting it on the record whether the axe would come down at the end of that period. Would the 14,000 who are still unqualified simply lose their jobs because they had not gained QTS in that period?

There is an elephant in the room in this debate in respect of QTS, which is that there are plenty of bad teachers who have QTS. The problem is that defining a good teacher as one who has QTS is nothing short of protectionism. The General Teaching Council estimated under the previous Government that there were 17,000 teachers with QTS who were underperforming and should not be in the classroom, but in the past 15 years, and even up to this day, we see bad teachers not being removed from the classroom or sacked, but instead being managed out. Up to 2010, only 18 teachers had been removed altogether from the teaching profession for poor teaching standards. What we see is this “dance of the lemons”—teachers moving from one school to another, into deprived areas, which are the areas that suffer the most. That is a national scandal. We need transparency—

[Tristram Hunt]

What about revalidation?

[Chris Skidmore]

I will come to that in a moment, but we need transparency so that we can work out these teacher flows. I encourage the Government to establish a review to find out the patterns of where poorly performing teachers are not removed, but instead go to the worst performing schools in the most deprived areas of the country.

The shadow Secretary of State shouted from a sedentary position about revalidation. I want to ask him some questions about the process. He has stated that it should happen perhaps every three years—

[Tristram Hunt]

Where?

[Chris Skidmore]

According to the time frame I have seen in the media, it is possibly every three years. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman could say how often the revalidation process should take place. We have 500,000 teachers in place; how many of them will have to go through the process, and how often? Who will administer the process? Will it be led by Ofsted or by head teachers? Surely revalidation happens all the time—that is the role of the school leadership team and the head teacher. Adding the process of revalidation simply adds extra bureaucracy. Would the hon. Gentleman make extra resources available to schools to continue the re-evaluation process? What will the paperwork look like? These are all valid questions to which teachers watching this debate need to know the answers.

The hon. Gentleman compares teacher revalidation with what happens with doctors and consultants, but consultants’ revalidation is very different from doctors’ revalidation. Will there be a revalidation process for head teachers and one for Ofsted inspectors? All these questions need to be considered. Will teachers who fail the process lose their qualified teacher status altogether? Will there be revalidation in the private sector?

Oral Answers to Questions

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Monday 6th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I share my hon. Friend’s concerns absolutely. We all know that, despite the occasionally brave forays into no-man’s land by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt), who has tried to defend parent-led academies, the majority of Labour Members—as we can hear from their catcalls and jeers—oppose free schools and greater parental choice and support the attempt of the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan) to undermine those schools. We will fight them every step of the way.

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

On behalf of the Opposition, I should like to thank you, Mr Speaker, for your words about our colleague, the right hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Paul Goggins), and his wife, Wyn. Our thoughts and prayers are with them for a speedy recovery.

In December, we learnt that the Prime Minister’s flagship Discovery free school will be closed. The failings of this episode have let down the people of Crawley, who will hold the Government to account. We know that the Discovery school was opened against the advice of the Montessori Schools Association, so will the Secretary of State tell the House how many free school applications Ministers have approved against the advice of Department officials?

[Michael Gove]

The advice of officials in this case was quite clear, and we accepted it. That is why the Discovery free school was opened.

[Tristram Hunt]

That says it all, does it not? We in the Opposition are in favour of innovation and autonomy in schools, but all we ask is that that is underpinned by basic safeguards and standards. National Audit Office reports reveal that low-scoring applications were waved through by Ministers against official advice, so let me give the Secretary of State another chance to set the record straight. Did Ministers approve applications for the Al-Madinah free school, the Discovery free school or the Kings Science academy free school against the advice of officials—yes or no?

[Michael Gove]

If the hon. Gentleman had been listening, he would know that I answered the question that he has just asked first time round. I pointed out that the advice from officials was to open the Discovery school. It was also the advice of officials to back Kings Science academy and to back Al-Madinah school. In all three examples, we took the advice of officials, but let me make it clear that it is entirely appropriate for Ministers to overrule officials at any given point. Officials advise and Ministers decide. But in these three cases, we took the advice of officials and appropriate safeguards were in place. One of the problems that Opposition Front Benchers have is that they support free schools in the abstract, but when it comes to the tough decisions necessary to improve education in this country, at the first whiff of grapeshot, they shy away and surrender.

PISA Results

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd December 2013 Commons Chamber

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

I thank the Secretary of State both for making Government time available to discuss this important topic and for his statement, which I received 11 minutes ago. I am disappointed that he has adopted—both today and in various media outings—such a partisan approach to the data from PISA. Rather than throwing chum to his Back Benchers, he should concentrate on the lessons we can learn from today’s important study.

The Secretary of State cannot have it both ways. If, as he said in The Daily Telegraph, the Labour party should take its share of the responsibility for these results, would he not agree that it should also take responsibility for, in his words, delivering the

“best generation of teachers this country has ever seen”?

It is clear that for all the hard work of our head teachers, teachers, parents and learning support staff, whom the Secretary of State rightly praised, we have a long way to go in English, maths and science to match our global competitors. These findings are a wake-up call for our schools. The PISA data reveal the continuing strength of east Asian countries and although there are important cultural differences that we should seek to understand, there are also pointers to reform in our schools system. So, can the Secretary of State confirm that part of the success of Singapore and Shanghai is down to the high quality of teachers in the classroom?

In Shanghai, all teachers have a teaching qualification and undergo 240 hours of professional development within the first five years of teaching. Under the Secretary of State’s deregulation agenda, the South Leeds academy can advertise for an “unqualified maths teacher” with just four GCSEs. We have seen a 141% increase in unqualified teachers in free schools and academies under this Government, so will he join the Schools Minister and me in working to secure qualified teachers in our classrooms?

Secondly, can the Secretary of State confirm that part of the east Asian education system is that schools work together, collaborate and challenge each other? Under their system, no school is left an island. Will he now abandon his aggressive discredited free-market reforms to schools and follow the Labour party’s lead in developing the kind of middle tier that brings schools together to work with, challenge and collaborate with one another?

In 2008, the Secretary of State informed the Daily Mail, his journal of choice:

“We have seen the future in Sweden and it works.”

Will he confirm today that that is no longer the case? In fact, no other country has fallen as abruptly as Sweden in maths over a 10-year period. Across all three measures—reading, maths and science—since 2009 Sweden has performed very poorly indeed. Many in Sweden regard the ideological programme of unqualified teachers and unregulated free schools as responsible for the drop in standards. The lesson from PISA is clear: we need freedom with accountability, autonomy with minimum standards, or else we end up with the chaos of the Secretary of State’s Al-Madinah school.

Finally, does the Secretary of State believe that a culture of zero tolerance for low expectations in other education systems produces high results across the board and that no child should be left behind? Will he use this opportunity to join the Deputy Prime Minister and me in condemning the unpleasant whiff of eugenics from the Mayor of London and instead use the opportunity provided by the PISA data to pursue excellence for all, academic and vocational, in all our schools?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his comments. He taxed me for demonstrating partisanship and indulging in personal attacks. I am glad that we had the opportunity to witness four minutes entirely free from those sins.

First, let me turn to the whole question of qualified teachers. It is the case that there are now fewer unqualified teachers in our schools than under Labour. In 2009, there were 17,400 unqualified teachers, in 2010, just before Labour left office, there were 17,800 and there are now only 14,800, a significant reduction. Indeed, those teachers who are now joining the profession are better qualified than ever before. In 2009, just before the Labour party lost office, only 61% of teachers had a 2:1 or better as their undergraduate degree. Under the coalition Government, the figure is 74%, which is a clear improvement that has been driven by the changes that we have introduced. It has been reinforced by the introduction of the school direct system, which I invited the hon. Gentleman to applaud and welcome—he declined to do so—and which has secured even more top graduates with a 2:1 or better, including a first, in our schools.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned Sweden. Unfortunately, it is the case that in Sweden results have slid, but as I said earlier, not only do we need to grant greater autonomy, as has been done for school leaders in Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea and elsewhere, but we need a more rigorous system of accountability. We heard nothing from him on how we would improve accountability. There was no indication as to whether or not he supports, as he has indicated in the past, our English baccalaureate measure. There was no indication from him, as there has been in the past, as to whether or not he supports A-level reform, and there was no indication, as there has been in the past, that he believes in a rigorous academic curriculum for all. The terrible truth about the situation that we face in our schools is that Labour does not have a strong record to defend, and it does not have a strong policy to advance. That is why the coalition Government are committed to reform, and that is why, I am afraid, the hon. Gentleman must do better.

Child Care

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Tuesday 19th November 2013 Commons Chamber

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

I beg to move,

That this House recognises that families are facing rising childcare costs; notes the reduction in the availability of early years childcare; and calls on the Government to help work pay by extending from 15 to 25 hours the provision of free childcare for working parents of 3 and 4 year olds funded by an increase in the Bank Levy.

I welcome Ministers to the Front Bench. Today, once again, the Labour party is highlighting the cost of living crisis that is affecting communities up and down the country, because under this Government the historic link between growth and living standards is being split apart as never before. Growth without national prosperity is not economic success, and the first and last test of economic policy is whether living standards for ordinary families are rising. Official figures state that, on average, working people are £1,500 a year worse off than they were at the general election. The Labour party is determined to shine a light on that quiet scandal of collapsing opportunity and stretched family budgets.

[Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)]

While the hon. Gentleman is explaining that collapse, he might want to say why between 1996 and 2010 there was a collapse in the number of childminders from more than 100,000 to 57,000.

[Tristram Hunt]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. Conservative Members may think they can get away with their appalling record in office by worrying about the classification system for previous childminders, but that is a dead end to go down. As I will explain, the Labour Government have a hugely proud record on provision for the under-fives.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that since this Government came to power the cost of child care has gone up by 30% while wages have been cut by 5%?

[Tristram Hunt]

That is exactly the crisis we will be highlighting today because it is affecting so many families in our constituencies. After energy prices, pension costs, the living wage, rail fares and payday loans, today we will put to the vote the child care crunch facing parents. We will also set out Labour’s plans to ease the child care burden, to deliver the kind of universal, affordable and high-quality child care that secures a strong future for some of the most disadvantaged young people in our country, and to build an economy that allows women to return to work if they want to. [Interruption.] I am delighted that we are already seeing Government Members coming to our side and making it clear that we are building a progressive politics of change.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

The shadow Secretary of State talks about appalling records, but will he clarify why, when Labour was in government, the cost of child care in the United Kingdom was the second highest among OECD countries, behind Switzerland? If he is talking about appalling records, surely he should refer to his own party’s record in government.

[Tristram Hunt]

Today we are concerned with highlighting the record of this Government, and, as I have said before, Labour is the party of Sure Start and of increasing fourfold the provision for under-fives. The values of this party are to ensure that young people have the best start in life, and today we are considering the total disconnect between living standards and the cost of child care.

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

Should we not be frankly appalled that although the Prime Minister pledged at the last election not to close Sure Start centres, since the election an average of three Sure Start centres a week have closed? There are now 35,000 fewer child care places at a time when there are 125,000 more under-fours.

[Tristram Hunt]

On the 150th anniversary of the Gettysburg address, my hon. Friend delivers an intervention of such succinct clarity that Lincoln himself would be proud.

[Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend also agree that Labour is the party in government in Wales, where Flying Start shows the changes that can be brought to children’s lives if we invest in joined-up child care provision, and quality that parents can trust?

[Tristram Hunt]

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention because that takes me to the next stage of my speech, which is to lay out the importance of early years provision. Labour is the party of Sure Start, and we increased expenditure on the under-fives nearly fourfold between 1997 and 2009-10. We know the value of early years provision.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

I am interested in the to and fro between the two contending sides, but, as the hon. Gentleman said, this is a serious topic that should cut across party politics. When we look at the situation in Wales, as in other regions, we find that 16% of Welsh local authorities cannot provide sufficient holiday child care for working families. That is an indictment on any Government, and we must address it across the whole United Kingdom.

[Tristram Hunt]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, which is why I will draw on the work of the Government’s Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission. It is clear that high-quality child care can improve child development for the most disadvantaged children, yet nearly half of low-income parents say that cost, rather than quality, was the main factor in choosing child care. As the chair of Ofsted, Baroness Morgan, recently pointed out, getting children school ready by reception year is fundamental to their life chances. We also know that access to universal and affordable child care can lift employment rates. Having both parents in work for long enough is the best guarantee of a life free from poverty.

[Mr Mark Spencer (Sherwood) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman recognise that only 1% of child care provision is provided by those child care centres?

[Tristram Hunt]

I am so glad that the hon. Member for Ipswich (Ben Gummer) has finally found a customer, having scurried round the green Benches for 10 minutes seeking out a pliant Member. I will come to the point about the 1%.

Employment among women with children is lower in the UK compared with our OECD competitors and is much more likely to be part-time. If we want a successful economy and school-ready children, we need decent and affordable child care.

[Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making an important point. The principle behind Sure Start was not just about child care provision. He talks about the importance of social mobility and other factors, and Sure Start was also about opening up training, employment and volunteering opportunities to parents so that they could participate in the workplace. It can be very isolating, especially for single parents, and having a child in nursery can make a big difference to those families’ lives.

[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. The provisions offered by Sure Start centres were part of a socialisation process, including parenting and getting children school-ready, that was vital to those families’ prospects. We know that children who do well at school also have parents invested in them doing well at school, and the Sure Start provision was part of that.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

We have to be careful because many people in the press misinterpreted Baroness Morgan’s statement as meaning kids sitting in rows learning at two. It is early years stimulation we want, and we get that—it is affordable on the Danish model—if we employ people who are well trained to do it, like the social pedagogues in Denmark.

[Tristram Hunt]

As ever my hon. Friend makes the point for a broader understanding of education, for play, for creativity and, above all, a high quality of provision. That is about making sure that we have high-quality childminders, those involved in nurturing, education and play for young people.

Sadly, what we have had from the Government is a sustained assault on early years provision. The coalition’s child care crunch means that since the last election the cost of nursery places has risen by 30%. There are 578 fewer Sure Start centres, with three being lost on average every week. The cost of a nursery place is now the highest in history, at more than £100 a week to cover part-time hours, and parents working part time on average wages would need to work from Monday to Thursday before they paid off their weekly childcare costs.

[Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) (LD)]

The shadow Secretary of State makes some dire claims. How does he explain that in the past year more than 1 million families and children used children’s centres and that the numbers are higher than they have ever been?

--- Later in debate ---

[Tristram Hunt]

Part of that is the result of a markedly increased birth rate, so we are seeing greater demand on these centres—[Interruption.] I know that those on the Government Front Bench do not believe in demographics or planning for the future, which is why we have a primary school place crisis. It is because of their inability to understand the consequences of people giving birth for provision and for schools.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I find it extraordinary that the hon. Gentleman accuses those on our Front Bench of creating a primary places crisis when it was the Labour Government who failed to invest in new primary school buildings and places, and who predicated all the capital budget for education towards the secondary sector.

[Tristram Hunt]

It was called Building Schools for the Future, and what the Labour Government were involved in was building schools for the future. We were investing in future school provision. The hon. Gentleman has to get a grip on this: the Government have been in power for three and a half years, and they have to start taking responsibility for the dire situations that we are seeing.

The position is equally tough for families with kids at school. Under the last Labour Government, 99% of schools provided access to breakfast clubs and after-school clubs, but more than a third of local authorities have reported that this has been scaled back in their area under this Government. That is what we get from the coalition. We get tax cuts for millionaires, but cuts in child care places for millions of families; billions of pounds wasted on botched NHS reorganisations, while parents struggle to pay for nursery places; and a hapless Royal Mail flotation filling the coffers of Lazard, rather than wraparound child care for hard-pressed parents. Those are the wrong priorities for working people—financial incompetence while families struggle.

As ever with this Government, it has been a case of say one thing and then do another. It was a great Conservative, a real Conservative, a true Conservative, Edmund Burke, who once said that

“those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it.”

But how could he know of today’s Tory attempt to obliterate the past? Whereas once they revered the wisdom of their elders, now they try to wipe the truth off the internet. For what did the Prime Minister say on the eve of the last general election? He said:

“Sure Start will stay, and we’ll improve it. We will keep flexible working, and extend it.”

He also accused my right hon. Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), the former Prime Minister, of scaremongering, saying:

“Yes, we back Sure Start, It’s a disgrace that Gordon Brown has been trying to frighten people about this.”

Well, with 35,000 fewer child care places under this Government, three Sure Start centres lost a week, and not enough provision for disadvantaged two-year-olds, my right hon. Friend was right to warn the British public of the dangers of voting Conservative or Liberal Democrat.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

Is not that litany of horrors the hon. Gentleman has outlined from the Government in Westminster the very reason many in Scotland will take the opportunity to vote for independence on 18 September next year, so we can have child care standards like any good Nordic country? Would he applaud such a step by Scotland?

[Tristram Hunt]

Part of Labour’s programme for schools includes creativity and innovation, and that was an extraordinarily creative way of moving from child care to separatism. I will not follow the hon. Gentleman down that route because we are looking at the Conservative party’s past on this issue.

What did the Education Secretary say while grubbing around for votes before the last general election? He said:

“I personally believe we need to do more to provide affordable childcare”—

by which, of course, he meant less. On a Mumsnet webchat, he told “Singalong mum and others”,

“gotta go in a second but on surestart we won’t cut funding”.

No wonder the Government wanted to wipe all records off the internet. No wonder the Education Secretary is too frit to come to this Chamber to defend his appalling record.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

When the Education Secretary talked about more child care, did he perhaps just mean more cheaper, lower quality child care, rather than the quality child care that we support?

[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point. We are not interested in the warehousing of children. We are interested in the growth, the creativity and the education that comes from high-quality child care provision. Unfortunately, with this Government, it is a record of broken promises, misinformation and double speak. Thankfully, the memory of the British people is longer than that of the Tory party’s web server, and they will not forget such a shoddy past.

[Mr Spencer]

If the hon. Gentleman believes in quality child care, why was it not necessary under the Labour Government for anybody setting up a facility to provide that child care to have a qualification?

[Tristram Hunt]

We are delighted to work on a cross-party basis to make sure that we have as high-quality of child care provision as possible. All parties understand that those who look after toddlers and young people should have as much experience and training as possible, and we are always delighted to work with Ministers to see how we can go up the value chain.

[Mr Sheerman]

In the early days of being the Chair of the former Education Committee, I remember visiting settings just after the minimum wage was introduced. Many people were horrified, because up until then they had been paying £1 an hour. That was the desperate situation we were left with in 1997.

[Tristram Hunt]

What a valuable point, which reminds us that the Conservative party opposed the national minimum wage and proper payment for child care workers.

It is the Labour party that has a response to the cost of living crisis. In government, we will deal with the child care crunch by expanding free child care for three-year-olds and four-year-olds from 15 hours to 25 hours per week for working parents. The value of that child care is worth £1,500 per child per year. It would be paid for by increasing the bank levy, charged as a proportion of their liabilities, to raise an extra £800 million. In the past financial year, the banks paid a staggering £2.7 billion less in tax overall than they did in 2010. The Government have given the banks an extraordinary tax break and we would reintroduce some fairness into the system to support our child care plans. [Interruption.]

I hear laughter from the Government Benches about our plans for the financial services industry, so I will quote from this Saturday’s Financial Times:

“Good times return as City gets in Christmas spirit,”

reported the paper.

“After years of yuletide austerity following the financial crisis, party organisers and venue owners are seeing a resurgence in the market for festive frivolity.”

Well, good luck to them. We on the Labour Benches like to see the return of some animal spirits, but all we are saying is that some of that festive frivolity could be spent on securing affordable child care. That is called progressive politics, and the Government parties should try it.

To give parents of primary age children peace of mind, Labour will set down in law a guarantee that they can access child care through their local school if they want it. Parents of primary age children will benefit most from a new guarantee, as this is when families most require child care support. Of course, parents will have to pay for that, just as they do now, but this is an opportunity to deliver sport, music, healthy eating and after-school clubs alongside child care support.

The truth of the matter is this: high-quality child care and early years services are the foundation stone of a successful approach to tackling child poverty and improving social mobility. The Labour party has a costed and effective plan to deliver both. The coalition has broken promises, has poor priorities and has arrogantly refused to deal with the cost of living crisis. I commend this motion to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Elizabeth Truss]

I will come to that point later, but first I need to correct some factual inaccuracies that the leader—sorry, I mean the shadow Education Secretary; I am promoting him already—made.

The Labour party claims it will fund extra child care places for three and four-year-olds through the bank levy. I think we have heard that somewhere before. To be precise, we have heard it 11 times before, because it is to be spent on: the youth jobs guarantee, which will cost £1.04 billion; reversing the VAT increase, £12.75 billion; more capital spending, £5.8 billion; reversing the child benefit savings, £3.1 billion; more regional growth fund spending, £200 million; reversing tax credit savings, £5.8 billion; cutting the deficit, no amount is specified; turning empty shops into community centres, £5 million; spending on public services, question mark; more housing, £1.2 billion; and now child care, £800 million.

[Tristram Hunt]

rose—

[Elizabeth Truss]

The hon. Gentleman had plenty of opportunity to make his point and I am keen to answer the question from the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) about what the Government are doing.

Let us not forget what Labour said about the bank levy when we introduced it. The right hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling) said:

“This is an industry though that employs over a million in this country and it is taking a hell of a risk, the Tory approach, in saying well actually they seem to be slightly indifferent to that… I think, frankly, the Tory approach is pretty misguided, it’s not thought out”.

So Labour has gone from being against the bank levy to spending it 11 times. How do those numbers make sense?