Schools Bill [HL]

Viscount Eccles Excerpts

2nd reading & Lords Hansard - Part one
Monday 23rd May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Eccles (Con)]

My Lords, I shall try to follow with some thoughts on the speeches of the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, and the noble Lords, Lord Baker and Lord Knight—but first a short excursion into history. My father was Secretary of State for Education twice, the first time as a result of having provided Harold Macmillan with the materials to build 300,000 houses in a year. The second time, he went to see Harold, who was of course by then Prime Minister, and said that his department was suggesting that he should put forward a Bill to do certain things. Harold Macmillan said, “Oh, I wouldn’t do that, particularly not if it’s an education Bill, because there’s absolutely no chance that anybody will agree with anybody else.” We need to recognise that there is some wisdom in that comment.

Historically, over many years, there has been a stand-off between those who see education as a means to an end and those who see it as an end in itself. I have to admit to being more in the second than in the first camp, and therefore I am in a minority—but we must carry on with whatever we are trying to do. In this Bill, for me the most important thing that is being done is the transfer of academies from contracts to a statutory system. There are many reasons for looking at that very carefully. It may or may not be the right thing to do—I am not at all certain—but there are some things about it which worry me.

The first is that the Government claim they will achieve more consistency. Well, I am not sure that consistency is a good idea if you are indulging in education. The variability of what the pupils going through their education may want to do and how they may want to come out is such a muddle and so deeply variable that I doubt very much whether consistency is a good ambition. You have to be prepared to deal with great variability and, in dealing with great variability, you will of course trouble the Civil Service, which is always in favour of tidying up and never in favour of too much exceptionalism or variability.

The second thing that bothers me is about the people who are—as the noble Lord, Lord Knight, said—the trustees and indeed, I would say, the heads of schools? It is all very well having a very tidy and consistent system, but the people who do these jobs—for reasons of public service, let us hope—like a bit of independence. They think they can contribute something by using their own judgment; they see themselves as doing things which do not imply that the divide between policy and day-to-day management will be eroded to the point where they are not in charge of anything. Ultimately, I think, if one puts too much pressure for political correctness or conformity or consistency on to the sort of people who are willing to do these jobs, it will become—as the noble Lord, Lord Knight, said—quite difficult to find them. There are quite a lot of examples in areas of our political life other than the Department for Education where we can see that that has happened.

So my plea to my noble friend on the Front Benches is that when this system—this long progression, as the right reverend Prelate said—from contracts to a statutory system gets under way, it is not too prescriptive. Yet, with 20 subjects in Clause 1 and a promise that there will be more because they are only examples, it is quite difficult to be optimistic that the system will not be too prescriptive. But I do urge that it is not and that, as it goes forward, people are listened to very carefully and we go ahead with a light touch and without any conviction that we have exactly the right answer.