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£6.522 million for 1990-91. It is simply impossible to reach the minimum standards that the Government say should be achieved. Will Ministers cut the standards? Will they review the standards that they believe are necessary for education, or will they accept the fact that for the indefinite future teachers will teach in surroundings that are inadequate by the Government's own standards? On the current levels of spending, we cannot meet those minimum standards. Ministers have repeatedly refused to put in the extra money necessary to meet the shortfall. I do not deny that some money is going in, but in Cornwall we can now offer only lower standards for the future. Time after time, the Government have been warned that the crisis in our schools is weekly becoming more acute. Rather than recognise the problems and listen to teachers, the Government are obsessed with gimmicky initiatives such as the assisted places scheme and the city technology colleges, which fail to tackle the real needs. They have also heaped further burdens on to an already stressed and devalued teaching profession by the bureaucracy of an over-prescriptive and underfunded national curriculum. All the evidence and experience of the past year shows that the Government reforms are causing chaos. It is imperative that Ministers think again, slow the pace of change and give the education service the priority and funding it deserves. The miracle is that, despite the pressures and lack of resources from which they have suffered, teachers are still doing a superb job in our schools. On that at least I agree with the Minister. Their commitment to their pupils and their schools is unwavering. If the Government showed only half that commitment to state education, a debate on the crisis in our schools would not be necessary. Between now and the general election--and afterwards--my party will make it clear that if improving our education system means spending more money and raising taxes, we shall not flinch from doing so because we believe that investment in our young people is a priority for which raising taxes should not be dodged if it is necessary. I feel sympathy for Labour Front-Bench Members who are not allowed to say that in this debate but who believe that as well. I hope that they can persuade their leadership to allow them to say it too as they approach the general election.6.6 pm
Mr. James Pawsey (Rugby and Kenilworth) : The real crisis in our schools would be the one that would occur if Labour Members ever won power. The House was not surprised to learn of the negative attitude displayed by the hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw) because the whole of the Labour party's education policy is negative. Labour Members would abolish the grammar schools, the grant-maintained schools, the city technology colleges, the assisted places scheme and, as we have heard this afternoon, even the independent sector. The Labour party has become the party of abolition ; Labour Members would even like to abolish choice itself. They want the uniform greyness of mediocrity.
The Government remain committed to improving the quality and standards of the state education system in which the majority of our children are educated. I need hardly remind the House that in 1976 the then Prime
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Minister, Lord Callaghan, called for "a great debate" and that is what he got. There was no action, but plenty of talk. The present Government have acknowledged that there are problems and have introduced, alongside other measures, the Education Reform Act 1988. The thrust of the Act was to restore choice to parents.We believe that parents are the best guardians of education. Most parents know best what is right for their children, so parents should be trusted and involved in the education process. The Labour party seeks to thrust the nation's children into one type of school--
Mr. Pawsey : --irrespective of ability, preference or need. I hear Opposition Members endorsing that by saying "good".
Mr. Nellist : I said, "Good schools".
Mr. Pawsey : The hon. Member for Blackburn mentioned ambition. Indeed, the Labour party is ambitious ; it is ambitious for itself. Labour Members want office and they are prepared to promise anything and to jettison anything if it means that there is a chance of their gaining power. The Labour party has also discovered standards and Labour Members talk about introducing an education standards council. I must remind them that that idea has been dismissed by the teachers' unions as a gimmick. Labour Members talk about a parent-school contract, but they forget that the present Government have already enshrined in law rights for parents. The Labour party is talking about introducing five-subject A-levels, which would undermine one of the accepted and established beacons of academic excellence. Conservative Members stand for choice, and more parental choice will ensure an improvement in standards. Parents naturally want the best for their children. In the independent sector, for example, as we have been repeatedly reminded by the hon. Member for Blackburn, parents are prepared to pay for choice, and to pay heavily. In the state sector, parents are willing to invest their time, their interest and their commitment.
I believe that parents will be the great engine of educational change. The hon. Member for Blackburn criticised the introduction of grant-maintained schools. I believe firmly in grant-maintained schools and I am anxious that Ministers should drop the artificial 300-pupil threshold for entry. Let us see more schools, more smaller schools and more village schools applying for grant-maintained status.
We should remember, however, that such reforms take time and that it is now only two years since the passing of the Education Reform Act 1988. Only now are we beginning to see the introduction of local management of schools and only now are the first grant-maintained schools beginning to emerge.
Mrs. Wise : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr Pawsey : No. The hon. Lady must forgive me, but many of my hon. Friends wish to speak.
The national curriculum is bound to encounter some teething troubles before it is accepted. But let no hon. Member doubt our commitment to improving the quality and standard of state education. On 7 June we debated teachers' pay and conditions. There is no doubt in my mind that the teaching profession
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is no longer as attractive as it was 20 or 30 years ago. In those days, teachers were on a par with doctors and architects. That is no longer the case and much of the responsibility for that loss of esteem must lie on teachers' own shoulders. As I have said before, if they wish to be treated as professionals, they must act as professionals, and professionals do not march, demonstrate, strike or obstruct.Like my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, I believe that the vast majority of teachers in Britain are committed both to their profession and to the children in their charge. It is unfortunate that the efforts of the majority are undermined by the efforts of a militant left-wing minority. Anyone who doubts that has only to remember the appalling scenes that recently occurred at the teachers' conferences, where the general secretary of the National Union of Teachers was howled down by a militant left-wing mob of his own members. Teachers are to education what the house is to home. One cannot have one without the other, and I should like teachers to occupy once more their old and coveted position in society. There are problems in our schools, and some of them have their roots in increasing indiscipline. Indiscipline and an attendant lack of respect are increasingly to be found both in the home and at school. But it would be wrong for society to place all the responsibility for school problems on teachers' shoulders. Parents must understand that they have duties and responsibilities as well as rights and that they cannot abdicate them as soon as their children go through the school gates.
Education is a partnership between parents and teachers. I am delighted to see my right hon. Friend the Member for Brent, North (Sir R. Boyson) in his place, because he has made just that point in many of our education debates. Too often the partnership between parent and teacher deteriorates into a casual association that takes place once a year. We need to restore respect for teachers, and respect must be earned. Boys of 13, 14 and 15 can be difficult and unpleasant--well able to turn a teacher's life into something of a nightmare. In such cases, firm discipline is required, and I fear that such discipline is missing from many of our state schools. Teaching is best achieved in a firm, disciplined framework, both at home and at school. When that framework is absent, chaos begins. We need to go back to some of the basics, both in teacher training and in the classroom. Over the past 25 years, teaching has suffered from too many experiments and too many theories--
Mr. Robert Hicks (Cornwall, South-East) : Hear, hear.
Mr. Pawsey : I am delighted to have my hon. Friend's support. Too many proven methods have been scrapped, on the scantiest of evidence, for the new fashion of the day, and children's education has suffered as a result. But my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is not a fashionable man and he is not a theorist. What we need now is not more innovation but a period of consolidation. Under my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, that is what we will get--to the benefit of our children and to the benefit of the nation's schools.
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6.15 pmMr. Win Griffiths (Bridgend) : It has been a revelation and a source of amazement to me to hear hon. Members' deliberations on the state of our education system. One has only to visit half a dozen state schools to realise that everywhere disillusioned teachers are struggling to provide a good education for the children in their charge and finding that their task is made more difficult by the Government's action.
In the past decade, we have suffered a cut in investment in the education service and in the future of our children. We spend less of our GDP on education today than we did under the Labour Government, and it is the under-resourcing of the service that is causing so many of the difficulties.
What state can our education service be in when we read of parents being asked by school governors to lob in £50 apiece for teachers to be employed? Do we realise the depth of the crisis when we read that parents in Harpenden, that citadel of Conservatism, have set up Harpenden Parents Against Education Cuts because of the way in which local management of schools is working?
Mrs. Wise : My hon. Friend referred to local management of schools. He may or may not be aware that, in the past day or two, chairmen of boards of governors have received letters from the National Association of Governors and Managers pointing out to them that, because of LMS, they now face a great risk of being sued for negligence, errors and omissions, and inviting them to take out insurance against such claims. Does my hon. Friend agree that that will create a crisis of confidence among school governors equal to that among teachers, and that it is greatly to be deplored?
Mr. Griffiths : I had heard about that, although I had not seen the document until my hon. Friend produced it. It appears in any case to be another unthought of consequence of the Government's reforms that will cause great aggravation in the education system. They are already causing aggravation for teachers and that is why we have a growing crisis of teacher supply in the United Kingdom. The problem is particularly severe in inner London ; indeed, in boroughs such as Southwark and Tower Hamlets it is a scandal. It is beyond belief that any Education Minister can stand at the Dispatch Box and not suggest positive solutions to the problem. It is a national scandal. The problem is steadily spreading its tentacles to other parts of the country.
At one time, we were principally concerned about maths and science, but we now find that there is a shortage of skilled and qualified teachers of modern languages, design and technology, and music--half the subjects in the national curriculum. Is it any wonder that there is a crisis in our schools today? On DES teacher training targets, we are 27 per cent. short in maths, 23 per cent. short in physics, 16 per cent. short in modern languages, 42 per cent. short in chemistry, and 22 per cent. short in technology. There has been a failure to meet DES targets, and the problem will get much worse before it gets better. That failure can be seen in Wales, fabled for its teachers, where teachers are provided as if they were on a conveyor belt. In Wales, local authorities are experiencing difficulties in recruiting secondary school teachers, qualified Welsh language teachers, and science, maths and modern language teachers. They are lucky if one or two
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people apply for such posts. The difficulties are to be found everywhere. Morale is low and the profession overburdened. The praise that the Government heap on teachers is rather like the praise that the generals heaped on the soldiers in the trenches in the first world war. It came from people who were strategically inept, had a poorly paid soldiery and were poorly equipped. That is why, in the past six months, the so-called "escape committee" has increased the number of people wanting to join from the profession from 700 to 3,000. Teachers are disillusioned because they are being asked to do too much too soon and too quickly, when their pay is too little too late and too slow--staged payments of a cash-limited pay award. There is worse to come.In my county, teachers will lose their jobs as about half of our primary and secondary schools have had savage reductions in their budgets because of formula funding and the LMS scheme, which the Welsh Office forced on my local authority of Mid Glamorgan. That has adversely affected our schools.
LMS is not about giving parents and governors the chance to run their own show ; it is about exposing schools to formula funding, which means that they will be closed. There is no doubt that small schools will close in the near future.
On nursery education, poll tax-capped authorities will consider areas in which, at the moment, provision is non-statutory, so there will be cuts. It is salutary to think that poll tax-capped Labour authorities are among the best providers of nursery education. It is no coincidence that Tory education authorities are the worst providers of nursery education.
Throughout the education system, teachers are struggling to provide a high- quality service, when virtually everything that the Government are doing is counter-productive. We have a legacy of crumbling schools, crumbling teacher morale, teacher shortages, teachers not being taught, classes without teachers in front of them, and change for the sake of change. Parent governors are thoroughly disillusioned and say that their meetings are about finance and not about education. They can foresee the day when they will ask not who is the best but who is the cheapest when they appoint teachers. That is our education service--the cheapest.
6.25 pm
Mr. Robert Hicks (Cornwall, South-East) : I shall make just two general observations about the current position of education, based on my impressions in visiting schools and talking to parents, teachers and governors, and certainly not from the point of view of an expert. I shall also raise one specific requirement for Cornwall. First, as has been mentioned, there is no denying that our primary and secondary schools have been subjected to a period of significant change, not least because of the provisions of the Education Reform Act 1988. I have no objection to the majority of the measures. Indeed, I warmly welcomed the introduction of the concept of a national curriculum and local school management. Of course there will be teething problems and certain genuine difficulties, and they will all require careful consideration. It cannot be denied, however, that the changes have meant
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extra responsibilities and an increased work load for teachers, parents and children. That fact must be recognised by all of us who are anxious in the widest sense for the future education of our children.The scheduled time scale for the changes has always worried me. The rate of change demanded of teachers and children alike has been onerous. Furthermore, as a direct consequence of the time scale requirement, the necessary advice, information and procedures to be adopted have not always been available to schools. That has undoubtedly caused additional anxieties. That is why we now need a period of consolidation--indeed, tranquility--in our schools. As legislators, we owe that at least to our teachers and children. Fortunately, there is evidence that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State understands that requirement. His remarks about assessment today confirm that impression. Consolidation does not mean weakening or losing the basic objectives that we seek, or even the momentum that is essential to implement the changes. Common sense dictates that consolidation is required to maximise the effects of the changes.
My second general point is about teachers. I mean no offence, but we all know that a small minority of teachers, or perhaps their representatives, are a nuisance to the teaching profession. They do untold damage to the teachers' cause. I ask Ministers and colleagues to recognise that the great majority of teachers are hard-working, committed and anxious to provide the best possible standard of education for our children.
I hope that the independent negotiating machinery to determine teachers' salaries and conditions, whether it takes the form of a teachers' council or some other form, will soon be restored. Certainly we have been given some firm promises on that by my right hon. Friend. It is essential that the new framework provides the necessary ability to restore the morale of teachers. It is essential for public confidence that we are perceived as a Government who recognise the crucial work undertaken by teachers, as demonstrated by the establishment of the new framework.
Two years ago, almost to the day, I had an Adjournment debate on the county of Cornwall's school building requirements. Since local education authorities will soon be finalising their applications to the Department for next year's financial allocations, I want to use this opportunity to emphasise the need for Cornwall to receive a meaningful capital allocation to sustain a rolling programme of new school building, accommodate the rising number of pupils and bring about the replacement and improvement of existing school stock. I remind the Minister that there are 33 secondary schools in Cornwall and nine, including Liskeard in my constituency, still occupy split sites. In 1973 I took a delegation to see the Secretary of State for Education, now my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, on behalf of the Liskeard school. We are still waiting for results.
Mr. Ken Eastham (Manchester, Blackley) : Promises, promises.
Mr. Hicks : It is all very well for the hon. Gentleman to say that, but I remind Opposition Members about the delegations that one took to see their education Ministers : their promises were not delivered either.
I want my right hon. Friend to ensure that sufficient allocation is made so that we can make the maximum use
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of scarce financial and human resources. The problems caused by split-site schools do not allow for the maximum use of those resources.In 1992 Cornwall's primary school population will exceed 40,000 pupils--the highest figure ever achieved. Undoubtedly that will exacerbate an already difficult situation. Our chief education officer estimates that there are some 50 projects that would merit urgent priority if sufficient funds were available. He also estimates that 50 per cent. of those projects can be classified as major--costing more than £200,000.
Our county has always been a modest-spending area and it does its best to top up the Department's allocation. This year the county will spend £14 million thanks to the use of capital receipts and reserves, compared with the Department's allocation of £6.5 million. Last year the corresponding figures were £8.9 million and £6.1 million. Each year the council's education committee faces an almost impossible task --some might say that it is invidious--in determining priorities. I have not mentioned the new building regulation requirements that could add a further £70 million to our financial needs.
Mr. David Harris (St. Ives) : Apart from the problem of split-site schools, does my hon. Friend agree that the tremendous legacy of old schools from the Victorian era, particularly in our villages, means that it is necessary to get on top of that problem once and for all?
Mr. Hicks : My final remark answers the point that my hon. Friend has rightly raised. The current building requirements in Cornwall are the price we have had to pay for the relative lack of activity in that regard in the 1950s and 1960s. That does not absolve us, however, from our responsibilities to our children in the 1990s.
6.34 pm
Mr. Dave Nellist (Coventry, South-East) : The debate coincides with an article in The House Magazine by the Secretary of State for Education. The Secretary of State begins his contribution by describing his aims as follows :
"To encourage all children to achieve the highest level of their different abilities and discover and develop their own particular talents, thereby acquiring the wide range of skills and abilities they will need to deal with the many and diverse challenges which lie ahead."
If that was true, there would be no difference between us and we would happily agree on the definition of what education should provide for our children. However, there is no consensus between us, for three reasons.
The first is on philosophical grounds. The Government aim to create an education system that is designed not to develop the potential of each child, but to fit this generation of children to the short-term needs of their friends in business. That is what LMS and city technology colleges are all about : they are aimed at creating a generation of managers and technicians to run industry and commerce in the future. In recent years the privatisation and the orientation of education towards the needs of business have been the Government's themes.
Secondly, if what the right hon. Gentleman said was true, we would have a well-paid and well-motivated teaching profession, enjoying high morale. We have exactly the opposite. That profession is suffering a haemorrhage. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Mr. Flannery) has shown me an article which says that six out of seven primary school teachers in
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one school in Lambeth intend to leave that school in the next three weeks. Come September there will be one teacher for those children. Thirdly, there is no consensus between us because of the way in which the Government have dealt with the needs of local authorities to repair, renovate and even maintain the fabric of the schools in which our children are taught. The hon. Member for Rugby and Kenilworth (Mr. Pawsey), who comes from my part of the country, spoke about standards, grey uniformity and choice.One part of the national curriculum relates to the teaching of computers-- it is covered by the information technology section. I have a photograph from my local paper, the Coventry Evening Telegraph, that shows children of the Chace primary school in Willenhall, in my constituency, being taught computing in toilets. After 11 years of a Tory Government children are being taught in the loo. How can those children be assessed on their ability to absorb in those conditions? The photograph could not show the open drains, nor pass on the smell that will come with hot weather. How are teachers supposed to inculcate in those children the sense of wonder and awareness of the world when they are sitting in a toilet learning about computers? "Our Crumbling Schools" is not just the title of an article in that local newspaper or a campaign of the Labour party, but reality for children in the city of Coventry and elsewhere.
In the past three years my local authority has bid for £11.8 million, £16 million and £12.4 million from the Department of Education and Science for essential repairs. If those repairs are not carried out, it will severely impair the ability of teachers to deliver good quality education and, as a result, morale will go down.
My hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw) has already mentioned a school in Nuneaton, of which the Minister will be aware, where children have caught hepatitis A because there is no soap in the toilets and the paper towels have been cut in half. The north Warwickshire district medical officer said of the outbreak : "Financial cuts in education, where children are only allowed half a paper towel, no adequate soap and no, or poor quality, toilet paper made the problem more difficult."
The savage cuts in, and under-provision for, education are now to be exacerbated by poll tax capping. More than £200 million has been cut from the education spending allocation in the 20 authorities affected. In the past three years Coventry has bid for about £40 million--we were allocated £10.6 million. Last year we were awarded £1.96 million- -15 per cent. of what the council bid for. It was the lowest allocation to any council in the west midlands ; and of the 109 education authorities in England and Wales, only 14 are worse off than Coventry.
I was talking to parents in my constituency, and to governors of Chace primary school at Willenhall, over the weekend. The toilets, where computer studies classes take place, are out of date and smelly. When it rains, teachers have to put up with puddles inches from the computer terminals. The rain also comes into the school on to the carpeted areas where children are supposed to sit and listen to stories. The female staff toilet is now a store room for computer and games equipment and the caretaker's room is a storage area for science equipment. The library, where remedial teaching takes place for those with difficulty in learning how to read, consists of half the main hall. There is a curtain down the middle of the hall and physical education classes are conducted in the other half.
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It is hard to imagine how somebody like the elderly lady I spoke to the other night, who is a volunteer, going into that school to help with remedial teaching, manages to teach in half a school hall, separated from the PE class by a curtain.Her Majesty's inspectorate is worried about Chace primary school, which is one of numerous crumbling schools in our cities. It is not one of the schools visited by the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Mr. Howarth), the Under-Secretary of State for Education and Science, when he came to Coventry. He and other hon. Members from my area know that we are not talking about a left-wing authority or a city council that has ever disobeyed a single Government instruction during the past 11 years. It has never been anywhere near being rate or poll tax capped.
The local paper has provided the Under-Secretary of State with a dossier of what is going on in Coventry. What is he going to do about it? How do the Government decide on allocations that leave schools in Coventry lacking such facilities? Why is Coventry the area with the lowest budget in the west midlands and the 15th lowest in the country? How are such positions reviewed? How can we get the money this year so that bairns of five, six or seven years old in such schools in Coventry may have decent facilities in which to be taught this year? That is what the debate is all about for me. Those are the most important years in a bairn's life. It is when the mind blossoms and awareness develops.
I am proud and lucky. I have four healthy bairns growing up and being educated in Coventry. However, in Coventry there are parents with children at schools in which, according to the local newspaper survey, the stench from decaying toilets causes regular outbreaks of sore throats and stomach bugs. How are kids supposed to learn in such conditions? It does not happen in Harrow, Eton, Marlborough or Charterhouse and the private schools that I have visited as a speaker, where the walls are panelled in oak, as are the walls of this place.
The average spent on children's education in this country is just over £1,900 per child. In Avon, a poll-tax-capped authority, the figure is £1,870. The Government spend money on their assisted places schemes to send kids to the private school of Charterhouse. They spend £7,200 per child, four times what they say is too much to spend on our kids in state education. That is why an HMI report this January stated that one third of secondary schools, in which 1 million children are taught, have accommodation so unsuitable that the quality of the children's education was being "adversely affected".
This year, Coventry asked for £12.2 million. We were allowed--note the word "allowed"--to spend £1.96 million. But the Government are spending £7.65 million--four times that amount--on one city technology college in Nottingham. It is not that the Government do not have the money ; they are hypocritical. We have a Government education team that does not care about the 95 per cent. of children in the state education sector. Why not?
The reason the education team do not care is that the Government are at present engaged in precisely the same pre-privatisation rundown that has occurred in every nationalised industry prior to privatisation during the 11 years of this Government. It is a simple exercise designed
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to make the product--the Government call it a product--the education system, unworkable and unpopular among parents so that they cry out for privatised control. That is not yet working. The Secretary of State has offered parents of this country an opportunity to opt out, but out of 4,257 secondary schools in England and Wales, only 40-- less than 1 per cent.--have asked to go private, and not a single primary school has done so.During their period in office, the Government have cut the proportion of public spending on education and science, and increased money for private schools. They have closed 1,575 primary schools and 312 secondary schools, and opened a handful of elite city technology colleges. They have cut back expenditure on text books, and put up the price of school meals ; and, according to The Times Educational Supplement last Friday, there has been a 3.2 per cent. fall in the average reading ability of seven-year-olds. Millions of ordinary families cannot get nursery education or care, which would not only be good for the children, but would open opportunities for parents, particularly women. Only one quarter of the three and four-year- olds in this country receive any form of nursery education.
Education should be about a lifetime for people to go in and out of education as they need it. But it is not. There are few nurseries for our bairns to attend, and colleges, polytechnics and universities, where grants have been cut by one quarter, then frozen and--if the regulations are passed--from this summer, even benefits will be taken away from students. When dealing with our children's education, the Government cut funds, but when dealing with their children's education, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hillsborough said, they are prepared to spend an extra £0.5 billion on assisted places. Socialists believe that education is a right. The Government believe in privilege. As soon as we get rid of the Government and have a decent, socialist Government, we can once again make education the right that it should be.
6.46 pm
Mr. Derek Fatchett (Leeds, Central) : This debate is about the crisis in our education system. The view that there is a crisis is held by parents and teachers throughout the country. A striking factor in the debate was the utter complacency of the Secretary of State. The way in which he described our education system and the activities taking place in our schools would not be instantly recognisable by teachers and parents. That shows the great divide, the gulf, that exists between the Government and the teachers and parents of this country.
I suspect that there is one point on which we can agree with the Secretary of State, but he comes to that position with a record behind him. He has, to use the criminal jargon, some form. Nevertheless, we welcome the fact that he now holds a slightly different view. He told us that teachers were a key resource and we had failed to sing their praises. He should go back and read all the education debates during the past few years because he would then realise that Labour spokesmen, on each and every occasion, have sung the praises of teachers and recognised the tasks and burdens carried by them.
The Secretary of State now says that teachers are doing a good job. This is where his form is relevant because it is this Secretary of State's Government who have done so
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much to undermine the morale of teachers throughout the country. The Secretary of State's Government--we must remind ourselves of this, because it is an essential part of the current malaise in schools--took away from teachers the basic human right to bargain and negotiate freely with their employers. The Secretary of State's Government took every available opportunity in the House and outside to denigrate teachers' professionalism. That reached its height in the middle of the last decade and has had a remarkable impact on morale. The Secretary of State's Government have, on every possible occasion, refused to work with teachers and go with the grain of teachers' professionalism in developing the systems of both testing and the national curriculum.The hon. Members for Crosby (Mr. Thornton) and for Truro (Mr. Taylor) said that there was a need for a general teaching council. We echo those views because we believe in teachers' professionalism, and have been saying so for some time. We welcome the Secretary of State as a partial convert, but he has a long record to get rid of before he becomes a true convert.
A key element of the debate involves resources. The picture painted by the Secretary of State was that all was well in our schools and there was no problem. When my hon. Friend the Member for Peckham (Ms. Harman) asked about schools in Southwark, he had a simple response. He said that the Government did not generalise, Southwark had its own peculiar problems and so we could not argue about teacher shortages there. I wish that the Secretary of State would put that argument to the parents of those children in Southwark, who do not know whether they will have teachers in the classroom this autumn. Why does he not go down to the east end of London and visit the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Mr. Shore), and talk to the parents of the 300 children in Tower Hamlets who still do not have a school place because of the teacher shortages?
Mr. Peter Shore (Bethnal Green and Stepney) : My hon. Friend rightly referred to the national scandal that more than 300 children are now out of school who have the right to education in our school system. Is he aware that, exactly a year ago, I took a deputation to the Secretary of State's predecessor to explain to him in detail the problems and the shortages, and that nothing has happened since? Will he join me in pressing the Minister to give an immediate, serious pledge and guarantee that a target date and timetable will be set, at the end of which my constituents' children will have the right to the proper state education that is guaranteed for all children in this country?
Mr. Fatchett : My right hon. Friend has made a powerful intervention. Certainly I join him in asking the Secretary of State whether he is prepared to make that timetable commitment. We noticed earlier that he was not prepared to give parents a commitment about the availability of a teacher in every classroom this autumn ; will he now give a commitment to the parents of Tower Hamlets, and to the 300 children who have no teachers? I shall give way if he wishes me to, but once again the House and my right hon. Friend will notice that he has no interest in these matters, and is not prepared to give any commitment. [Interruption.] I repeat that, if the Secretary of State wants to make the commitment, I shall give way-- but, by pointing a finger, the Secretary of State suggests
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that the Minister of State will do it. We look forward to that, and I am sure that my right hon. Friend will want to intervene. The argument about resources was not addressed by the Secretary of State. We all know why he was appointed. The previous Secretary of State was full of ideas, none of which--as we all know, and as the Conservative party regrets--worked effectively in practice. This Secretary of State was appointed to do the Prime Minister's bidding. While he is doing that, he himself is never bidding for education, or for resources for the education system.Let us have a look at what the present Secretary of State has agreed to. He has agreed to standard spending assessments for education : if they had been followed by local education authorities, that would have meant a £1.4 billion cut. That is how hard the right hon. Gentleman fought for education. He said that my hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw) was wrong to compare levels of expenditure in the maintained sector and on the assisted places scheme. However, he is never prepared to argue for the children in rate-capped authorities who, halfway through the school year, will have their educational resources cut. Where has the Secretary of State been? He has simply rolled over for the Treasury and the Prime Minister.
This afternoon, the Secretary of State made a major announcement. The nub of his speech--his pot of gold--was the amount of money that he had for the system. He said that he was announcing expenditure for 1991-92 of £364 million, through the educational support grant system. I thought that he was being generous to the education system, so I went to the Library and examined the figures for this year's expenditure. They come to £357.7 million. The right hon. Gentleman has therefore announced an increase of £6.3 million--or 2 per cent.--when inflation is running at nearly 10 per cent. As always, he has announced a cut in real terms. Again, if he wishes to intervene I shall gladly give way.
This is the Secretary of State who tries to give the impression that he argues with his ministerial colleagues on behalf of education. Hon. Members who heard his opening contribution will remember that he said that he had argued for the success of TVEI and for additional resources. Where was he when the 22 authorities embarking on TVEI had their expenditure reduced by 50 per cent? Was he knocking on the door of the Department of Employment, saying that it was crucial education expenditure? We have not heard a squeak from the Secretary of State : yet again he has failed to stand up for the education system, and for what is good in it.
Against that background of a lack of resources, we must make another criticism of the Government's record. It concerns the confusion and lack of clarity in their thinking. With the complacency that was characteristic of his speech, the Secretary of State said that there were no problems with the local management of schools. Obviously, neither he nor any of his hon. Friends has been to any of the schools that my hon. Friends and I have visited, and talked to teachers, governors and parents. If they had, they would know that there are massive problems, and that schools are finding it increasingly difficult to meet their budgets. The Secretary of State knows that the Coopers and Lybrand report warned him that local management of schools could work effectively only if there were adequate resources in the system. Those resources are not available.
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There is also confusion about testing and the national curriculum. In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph at Easter, the Prime Minister said that she had never expected the national curriculum to work out as it had. That is typical of the Prime Minister : it is abundantly clear that she does not lead her own Government when there are any difficulties. However, she has one advantage over the Secretary of State : I suspect that he still has no idea how the national curriculum will work out in practice.There is a problem in every school in the country. Teachers are being bombarded by material without any sense of direction and purpose from the centre. On top of that, children are to be tested at the age of seven. There seems to be a difference of opinion between Ministers on that point. The Minister of State--who may be making a valedictory speech in a few minutes--said, in an interview with the Today newspaper a few weeks ago, that testing was being piloted and that no decisions were being taken, although she did seem to favour a rigorous, detailed system. Last Friday I was delighted to see the Under-Secretary of State in Leeds. I suspect that, if the newspaper reports are correct, he is the only junior Minister in his Department who can be confident about his future. He said that testing was to be slimmed down. Whose version is the reality? Which is the Government's version? Is it the Minister of State's version, or the
Under-Secretary's? Why do we not hear a word from the Secretary of State? The reality is that teachers do not know what is expected of them in the autumn of next year.
Our indictment against the Government is a powerful one. It is about resources, confusion, drift and a lack of leadership. Any country that wants to build for the future realises that education is the investment for the future : investment in education today is the guarantee of economic success tomorrow. That is recognised by the French and the Germans and by people in the developing countries of south-east Asia. It is recognised by all economically successful countries. The only people who fail to recognise the importance of education are the Government and their Education Ministers. The clear message is that we need a change of education policies and a Labour Government to safeguard the future and our children.
7 pm
The Minister of State, Department of Education and Science (Mrs. Angela Rumbold) : The substance of the debate, couched in terms of aOpposition motion that does nothing to value teachers' efforts or to encourage parents and children, should have given the Opposition an opportunity to outline some new policies. However, not one Opposition Member has offered a concrete suggestion that would lead to any change for the better. They said that the most important anouncement by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on education support grants and education authority training grants was rubbish. Without exception, Opposition Members have dwelt on their determination to put the clock back. They say with pride that history will repeat itself. They would diminish parental choice, as they did before, by the abolition of the direct grant schools which many of them were privileged to attend. They would threaten local education authority maintained grammar schools, the very schools which
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provided education for children whatever their background and parentage. They would undermine the reforms that have been broadly welcomed by schools and parents alike. The hopes that schools and what is taught in them would take the direction that many teachers have been looking for for years would be dashed.My hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Thornton) was right to condemn Opposition rhetoric. He was also right to emphasise that time is necessary to repair the damage that has been done over years to the education system, and right to dash the assumption that only socialists send their children to state schools. That is a disgraceful assumption, and it is absolutely untrue. It is in the interests of all hon. Members to strive for excellence in every school.
My hon. Friend the Member for Crosby spoke about the local management of schools and said that local authorities themselves must be given the opportunity and urged to deliver to the schools the most that they can. The only way to ensure that our reforms work is to allow schools to govern themselves and use the resources that are available to them. He said that we must ensure a sufficiency of teachers for the system. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has done that by properly addressing the problem with great urgency and giving it high priority.
The hon. Member for Truro (Mr. Taylor) made an interesting point on the national curriculum. I am glad to know that he is in favour of the concept of the national curriculum but sad to learn that he has not troubled to study the way in which it is being introduced to our system. There is much flexibility. Much of the national curriculum produced by the working group is on the established principles and methodology that teachers have been using for years. The curriculum draws together into a coherent programme study and syllabuses for children throughout the years that they are at school from the age of five to 16. It certainly enables teachers to use their skills and their own style of teaching. Those who seek to slow the pace of reform simply wish to prevent the children of this generation from benefiting from our reforms.
My hon. Friend the Member for Rugby and Kenilworth (Mr. Pawsey) was right to point to the uniform mediocrity of a blanket system. He was also right to draw attention to the measures that successive Conservative Governments have introduced. Parents are the key to improvement, and if they are allowed to choose what they want for their children they will choose academic standards.
I direct the attention of the Opposition to an Islington school that has recently had a change of head teacher. It is in one of the inner-London areas that we have heard about in the debate. Parents are flocking to that school to which the head teacher has introduced old-fashioned ideas of academic standards, uniform, and good behaviour. [Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Miss Betty Boothroyd) : Order. There are many meetings going on in the Chamber. The hon. Lady deserves to be heard.
Mrs. Rumbold : That boys' school in Holloway deserves to be seen as a model for parents who are considering what kind of school to choose for their children. I was delighted to hear my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby and Kenilworth supporting the grant maintained schools.
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The hon. Member for Bridgend (Mr. Griffiths) rather mischievously misunderstood the principles of local management of schools. The Welsh Office does not deliver the formula for such management. The county sets the formula and delivers the money to the schools. The hon. Member for Bridgend should be sure of his facts before he makes mischievous statements to the House and to the wider world. My hon. Friend the Member for Cornwall, South-East (Mr. Hicks) will be glad to know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State recognises the importance of allowing schools to have lighter burdens within the reforms. He accepts that in the schools and for teachers there must be a lightening of the burden. We also recognise that our teachers are professionals. They can be sure that the Government are committed to the return of their negotiating rights as and when agreements have been reached.I have visited a number of schools in inner London. I admit that I have not been to schools in Southwark, but I have certainly visited Hackney, Camden and Tower Hamlets. The right hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Mr. Shore) does a great disservice to the elected members and the director of education in Tower Hamlets who have been working ceaselessly to ensure that they will have sufficient teachers.
Mr. Shore : It will not do to pretend that I am blaming my local education authority. I am not. It is doing its best, as ILEA did before it. The real trouble is that the Government have not backed the authority's efforts and given it the resources to take children off the streets and into the schools so that they can receive the education not only that they deserve but to which they have an absolute right.
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