---

9.58 am

Mr. Robert Atkins (South Ribble): I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Preston (Mrs. Wise), who represents a borough that is arguably even more incompetent than the county council.

I am delighted to be associated with the initiative taken by my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Sir M. Lennox-Boyd). It demonstrates again that on education, as on social services--about whichmy hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, North(Mr. Elletson) introduced a similar debate--it is Conservative Members of Parliament and county councillors in Lancashire who are really fighting for parents and children in the county.

The Government have in recent years increased the allocation to Lancashire year on year, yet the Labour-controlled county council has cut the schools budget by £5.1 million in 1994-95, by £19.2 million in 1995-96 and have proposed--we have heard nothing to the contrary to date--a £9 million cut in 1996-97. That information comes directly from the Conservative county councillors on Lancashire's education committee.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale said, we pressed my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment and other Ministers to ensure that the mean and politically motivated attacks on our children's education were overcome by a further substantial increase this year. I am delighted that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, together with the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment, my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Squire), and Treasury Ministers recognised the concern of Conservative Members. Eventually, we got a substantial increase of some 5.5 per cent.--almost double the current rate of inflation.

When we pressed our case, the Government listened. That demonstrates the authority with which Lancashire Conservative Members fight the cause of Lancashire parents. It is up to Lancashire county council and its education committee to pass on the increase. We have heard suggestions that it will do so, but it is not the

14 Feb 1996 : Column 932

information we have to hand. I would like to know what the county is going to do when it comes to the final decision on 22 February. The signs so far are that it will not. If it is to pass on the increase, it makes it even more reprehensible that Mr. Collier and the controlling group on the education committee have suggested that there will be one. If there is not to be a cut, they have been misleading everyone in the county.

Last year, every Conservative-controlled local education authority in the country met the teachers' pay rise and school budget increases, and some were even able to recruit more teachers. Why cannot Lancashire county council, which has one of the most top-heavy bureaucracies--across its whole administration--in the country, do the same? My hon. Friend the Member for Wyre (Mr. Mans) asked a pertinent question: why does Blackburn, for example, want to remove itself from the control of the county council? Whatever the hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw) may say in public, we know what he says in private. My hon. Friend hit the nail on the head.

To take one issue, when will the local education authority in Lancashire address the scandal of surplus places in secondary schools, especially in areas such as Skelmersdale and Burnley?

Mr. Greg Pope (Hyndburn): Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that Lancashire met the target set for surplus places by the Secretary of State in 1981 and 1987, which are the most recent targets for which figures are available?

Mr. Atkins: I am not going to comment in detail on the case, except to say that I am advised that there are surplus places in certain parts of our county. Our constituents are entitled to ask why the problem of surplus places in Skelmersdale and Burnley, which happen to be controlled by Labour councils or represented by Labour Members, is not being addressed, whereas in parts of the county represented by Conservatives it is. That question needs to be answered.

I congratulate Leyland St. Mary's school in my constituency, which went grant-maintained in January 1994 and has made great strides ever since. In the past,it was a good to average school, but it is now excellent.In the recent Ofsted report, inspectors picked out Leyland St. Mary's as one of the five best schools in the county. Lancashire Members know that Leyland is not the wealthiest part of the county. Inspectors described it as a school

"well above the national average"

and still improving. It was granted technology college status three months ago. I hope next month to open its new all-weather surface, funding for which has been obtained since grant-maintained status was achieved. That is a measure of what grant-maintained status can do for an ordinary school that has become an excellent school in Leyland. That was the parents' choice. I am pleased that they were able to make that choice, which I applaud.

However, in a recent ballot at Lostoch Hall high school in my constituency, there was the most extraordinary interference by the Labour county council and other Labour activists who had nothing to do with the school. It was not in the area that the person involved represented. A number of parents contacted me to complain about the

14 Feb 1996 : Column 933

activities of those Labour representatives. I do not quibble with the result; that is a matter for the parents to decide. That is the key point; the result is immaterial. The Government have given the parents the choice to be able to decide what they want to do about their schools. I hope that their decision not to go grant-maintained was what they really wanted.

I question the local Labour party's involvement, especially in sending leaflets--some without an address on them--which intimidated or misled parents. I and Conservative county and district councillors did not interfere in the process, which is a matter for parents, not politicians. Labour interfered in extremely dubious ways. I find that most reprehensible--especially when the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms Harman) was defying Labour policy by exercising her choice to send her son to a grammar school in a Tory borough 13 miles from her home.

The House may be interested to know that that action has been mimicked by Mr. Hindley, the Labour Member of the European Parliament for Lancashire, South, who represents my area and claims, with some justification, to be extremely left wing. Yet he sends his son to Clitheroe grammar school, in a Tory borough--just--a long way from his home.

Mr. Hawkins: The action of the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms Harman) in sending her child to a grant-maintained grammar school in a Tory borough was applauded by her mother-in-law, who is a constituent of mine and a Labour activist in my constituency.

Mr. Atkins: That confirms that it is not only the hon. Member for Peckham and Mr. Hindley who choose, and I do not decry it, to take the opportunity to send their children to the school, whatever sort it may be, of their choice. However, Labour is trying to prevent parents in my constituency, and in those of my hon. Friends, from doing the same. That is a classic example of "do as I say, not as I do".

All that adds up to rank hypocrisy, allied to rank incompetence. I was interested by the report yesterday of the Secondary Heads Association, which had examined the Labour party's education policy and described it as "simplistic and bland", short ofideas, unlikely to assist in raising school standards,poorly thought out, uncosted and lacking in detail.It questioned the Labour party's assurances that local council powers to interfere in local school management would not be restored. That sums up Labour policy on education and is similar to the history of Labour control of Lancashire's education. It was Conservatives who fought for the review of the area cost adjustment--and got it; pressed for substantial increases in the Government allocation--and got them; pressed, locally and nationally, for improvements in and standards for regular testing, for choice and for more information for parents--and got them all. We continue to press the case for reducing class sizes.

This debate is important because parents, teachers and governors, who, like Conservative Members, really care about children's education, can learn the facts of the policies of both new and old Labour in Lancashire and realise that it is only the Conservative party that has their real interests at heart.

14 Feb 1996 : Column 934

10.8 am

Mr. Peter L. Pike (Burnley): I am glad to have the opportunity to speak on this important subject, but I regret that Conservative Members have used it as an opportunity not to speak about education in Lancashire positively but to have a go at Lancashire county council.

The right hon. Member for South Ribble (Mr. Atkins) referred to the problem of surplus places in Burnley. The problem is much more complex than he suggested. Another school may need to be built, or additional places may have to be provided, at one end of Burnley where there is excessive demand, while a school at the other end of the town may have to be closed. Along with John Entwistle, a member of the county council, I have tried to draw attention to the issue in the press. He and I want to involve the people of Burnley in dealing with the secondary school problem. No quick decision should be made; we must ensure that whatever decision is made is in the best interests of secondary school children.

The hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale(Sir M. Lennox-Boyd) said that county councils had the right to determine priorities in their budgets. That is true in theory, but Conservatives tend to forget that local authorities have been capped for some time. In theory, additional money has been made available for education through standard spending assessments, but the Government grant is not rising proportionately. To meet the capping criteria, Lancashire county council must cut its budget by some £45 million, or 5.1 per cent.

---