Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to address the conclusion of the recent Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development report that 40 per cent of classrooms in England are "not favourable to learning" because of bad behaviour.

Good behaviour and discipline are key to effective teaching and learning. The recent OECD report identified that serious disciplinary problems in England are unusual and in most schools the learning environment is good. Just 21% of teachers in England agree or strongly agree that they have to wait quite a long time at the start of their class for students to quieten down. This is less than the median for all countries of 27% and below all but one of the high-performing countries. England is typically very close to the international average on other measures of classroom disciplinary environment, including disruptive noise and interruptions in the classroom.

This Government has never been complacent in trying to equip schools with the tools they need to manage discipline in the classroom. That is why we gave schools the powers to impose same-day detentions, extended their powers to search for items that could cause harm or offence, made clear that schools should not have a ‘no touch' policy and clarified the use of reasonable force. The Government also introduced a system of independent review panels which, unlike the previous system, cannot undermine schools' decisions on permanent exclusion. In September 2012 we introduced the New National Professional Qualification for Headship with more robust content on behaviour management. In addition, Ofsted have begun implementing no-notice follow-up school monitoring inspections where concerns were previously identified about standards of behaviour.

More recently, in February 2014, and following results from the Teacher Voice Survey (2013) which showed that one in three secondary teachers lacked confidence in their powers to discipline pupils, we:

· issued updated behaviour advice to make clear that tough but proportionate sanctions, including litter picking in the playground, removing graffiti, writing lines or an essay, are all valid punishments;

· produced a series of case studies showing how good schools manage behaviour, ranging from the use of inclusion art projects, having a specially modified curriculum, using Saturday detentions and increased visibility of senior staff around school throughout the day.

We remain determined to support schools in providing safe, calm and orderly classrooms where pupils can learn effectively.