Education, Skills and Training

Debate between Victoria Atkins and Rushanara Ali

Wednesday 25th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister told the House that, at its heart, the Queen’s Speech has bold reforms to remove all barriers to opportunity for our young people. Let us see whether his rhetoric matches the reality.

Nearly 4 million children are growing up in poverty, and 500,000 of them live in London. In my constituency, 42% of children live in poverty—the highest rate in the country. Social mobility is in reverse, with young people suffering from what the Equality and Human Rights Commission says are

“the worst economic prospects for several generations”.

More than 850,000 young people remain not in education, employment or training. The reality is shocking, given that the UK is the fifth richest country in the world. Fighting inequality is not just about social justice; it is also in our economic interests.

If we look at the Government’s record over the last six years, we see that they have cut work experience entitlement and independent careers guidance and advice, and they have cut further education budgets by 24% since 2010. As my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) highlighted earlier, that has devastated the lives of many people. Some 4 million people study in further education, and a high concentration of those are from working-class backgrounds. The cuts have hit ethnic minority students from London extremely hard, because of the disproportionate concentration of those groups in further education. In view of the work that the Minister for Universities and Science is doing on monitoring, transparency and tackling inequality, I ask him to look at the impact of those cuts on the FE sector. Many further education colleges, including Tower Hamlets College, have had to shrink student numbers and courses that many of my constituents attend.

The Government have tripled university fees and scrapped the education maintenance allowance. The Secretary of State and Ministers heard earlier about the devastating impact of those measures over the years and across the country on some of the poorest students, including those in my constituency. Student nurses’ bursaries have been slashed, as have maintenance grants for poorer university students.

The focus in the Queen’s Speech on life chances will prove to be meaningless without a parallel attempt to eradicate child poverty. Tired, hungry children cannot learn effectively, and it is shocking that millions of children come from families who rely on food banks. Poverty is not inevitable, and the Government have the tools to fix the problem if there is the will to do so. The last Labour Government cut child poverty by almost 1 million to the lowest level since the 1980s, but increases over the past six years under this Government have undone much of that progress. I call on the Schools Minister and the Secretary of State to continue to pay attention to this important issue, because it will affect educational attainment and the achievements of young people.

Let us look at the education for all Bill. As my hon. and right hon. Friends have mentioned, real-term cuts will be about 8% of funding per pupil by 2020, despite the Conservative party’s manifesto commitment that funding would not be cut for schools and children. That is a betrayal of that manifesto commitment. Last year, more teachers quit than entered the profession. Almost 50,000 teachers quit—the highest figure since records began. Applications to teach are falling in every region, and they are down in key subjects such as English, maths and IT.

London’s schools face unique challenges. London has some of the highest levels of inequality and child poverty in the country, and school budgets and classrooms are at breaking point, with one in five London secondary schools full or overcrowded. Yet London shows that it is possible to create outstanding urban schools in demanding circumstances. Thanks to the work of the last Labour Government, nine out of 10 schools in London are now good or outstanding. That is a huge achievement, which took a generation. The changes to the funding formula put that achievement at risk, so I ask the Schools Minister to look carefully at the funding formula to make sure that we do not go back on those achievements. London schools will lose nearly £240 million a year under the proposals. Schools in the midlands and the north of England will also be hit hard by the changes. We need to look at the needs of children in those schools and ensure that fairness genuinely means fairness.

On academies, the Government’s obsession with structures rather than attainment is wrong-headed. The climbdown is welcome, but it is clear from what the Universities and Science Minister said earlier that the attempt to academise all schools still exists, although it will be done via a different route. That is likely to cost £1.3 billion—money that could be focused on tackling underachievement rather than obsessing with structure. Where there is a problem and a need for innovation, of course that innovation should happen, but it should not be a wasteful process.

[Victoria Atkins (Louth and Horncastle) (Con)]

Does the hon. Lady greet with the same happiness as I do the fact that 1 million more children have gone to good or outstanding schools since 2010?

[Rushanara Ali]

Any improvement in attainment is welcome, but I am making a point about London, where huge amounts of work has been done to improve schools. When I was at school in the east end of London in the 1980s and 1990s, most schools achieved a rate of less than 20% for GCSEs. It took over a decade to transform schools, and that was not just in Tower Hamlets. In Tower Hamlets, we have only four academies, which shows that there are different models of improvement.

I call on the Secretary of State to look at how such improvements have been achieved through different approaches, including collaboration, investment in teacher quality and standards, and training and leadership. She knows very well that the model used in Tower Hamlets and across London is recognised around the world, and I hope that the new funding formula will not put that at risk.