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9.44 pm

The Minister of State, Department for Education and Employment (Mr. Eric Forth): After studying the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Kilfoyle), I can

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assume only that moustaches have been disappearing on the Opposition Front Bench so that contributions could be made to the Sedgefield replacement hair fund.

This debate will be remembered--if it is remembered at all--as the do-as-I-say-and-not-as-I-do debate. If anything, that attitude has been the consistent theme expressed by Opposition Members. I listened to the speech of the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett), and heard him say at an early stage in it that he wanted to take us down memory lane. He frequently mentioned the phrase "17 years".

Mr. Blunkett: I said 18 years.

Mr. Forth: Taking my cue from the hon. Gentleman, I should like to go back only 15 years--to Sheffield, the House will not be surprised to hear. I have been informed that, when the hon. Gentleman played a prominent part in Sheffield politics, he was instrumental in preventing schools from insisting on school uniforms. I assume that that will give us some clue to the background of the matter. Not content with that, he voted for the abolition of sixth forms at all secondary schools in Sheffield. His legacy remains even now, however, because Sheffield's funding formula provides for the lowest funding for sixth form pupils in the country. Sheffield also has a much lower staying-on rate for pupils at 16 than almost any other area in the country.

Mr. Blunkett: Other than mistakes on statistics and dates, perhaps the Minister will tell us what are the statistics for staying-on rates in Sheffield and in equivalent authorities, just so that we have it on the record.

Sir Jim Spicer (West Dorset): Go back 15 years.

Mr. Blunkett: I am not talking about 15 years ago; I am talking about 1996.

Mr. Forth: The figure is 57 per cent. for Sheffield, compared with 61 per cent. in Yorkshire and in Humberside and 68 per cent. in the United Kingdom as a whole. Perhaps that explains why, earlier this year--I shall deal now with the present day, having briefly gone down that memory lane--head teachers of secondary schools in Sheffield said:

"We no longer have any confidence in the processes which the council adopts in relation to its funding of schools. This lack of confidence applies to every stage in the process: to the leadership, to planning and to the allocation and delivery of funding."

I made that point because there has been one consistent theme in this debate: Opposition Members seeking to blame the Government for what they consider to be shortfalls in our performance on education. As we know, the reality is that the Government do not run schools; local education authorities run schools. When we examine the real evidence of what is happening in our schools--in the classroom--it becomes apparent that it is schools run by Labour-controlled authorities that consistently fail their pupils. That is the reality.

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We can consider the situation in places other than Sheffield, however, because I do not want to restrict our attentions to that city. As we know, Labour in action has another face: the element of parental choice. I shall not repeat the list that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State gave earlier, but I emphasise that we do not condemn the exercise of parental choice by Opposition Members. We welcome the fact that they exercise their parental choice to send their children to schools that they regard as superior to those provided by their authorities. I do not condemn that, but it is noticeable that Opposition Members have condemned their own colleagues.

The hon. Member for City of Durham (Mr. Steinberg) resigned as chairman of Labour's parliamentary education committee, saying that he could not stand the hypocrisy of what some of his colleagues had done. The hon. Member for Brent, East (Mr. Livingstone) described his colleagues' choice of schools for their children as a major error of judgment. The inimitable hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) said:

"If senior Labour politicians are sending their children outside their local education authority areas, people will say local schools are simply not good enough for their children."

I suspect that people in Islington and Southwark are saying that. Opposition Members and parents are saying that the standards and quality of schools provided by Labour-run local education authorities are unacceptable.

Mr. Blunkett: Will the Minister tell the House how many of the Cabinet have sent their children to--[Interruption.] They certainly don't like it up 'em. How many of the Cabinet have sent their children to state schools of any description?

Mr. Forth: It shows how desperate the hon. Gentleman is that he has to dredge up that old favourite. Conservative Members do not condemn the independent sector; they do not condemn selective schools; they do not condemn grant-maintained schools. Opposition Members, including the hon. Gentleman's colleagues, condemn all those schools, but they send their children to them.

I looked at the list of local education authorities in order of the numbers of pupils achieving five or more GCSEs at grades A to C. The House will not be surprised to learn that, of the 16 poorest performing authorities, 15 are Labour-controlled. I mention that because it has been depressing throughout the debate to hear Opposition Members assuming that, if there are selective and non-selective schools alongside each other, we can write off the non-selective schools because, according to Opposition Members, they will be educationally hopeless and unacceptable. Opposition Members always assume that because they have no expectations of schools located in what they regard as written-off social areas.

Conservative Members, such as my hon. Friends the Members for Gravesham (Mr. Arnold), for Dover (Mr. Shaw) and for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier)--as well as my hon. Friend the Member for Erith and Crayford (Mr. Evennett), who cannot contribute because of his Trappist vow as a parliamentary private secretary--are proud to point out a different phenomenon: that, in their areas, they have a combination of selective and non-selective schools that are all good in different ways.

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Opposition Members miss that point because they are stuck--blinkered--with the idea that any non-selective school near to a selective school is automatically written off and condemned as useless. By implication, they have lost all educational interest in such schools.

Conservative Members recognise that we can have good selective schools and equally good, but different, non-selective schools. We can have schools specialising in different subject areas, city technology colleges, Church schools, grant-maintained schools and independent schools, which pupils from less well-off homes can attend thanks to the assisted places scheme. That is diversity in action--the real choice that we are offering parents.

Mr. Kilfoyle: Was Lady Thatcher wrong to have closed so many grammar schools when she was Secretary of State for Education?

Mr. Forth: I find it difficult to imagine Lady Thatcher being wrong about anything.

My hon. Friend the Member for Rugby and Kenilworth (Mr. Pawsey) made an excellent point. With his expertise and usual accuracy he said that selective schools can have a beneficial and positive influence on the primary sector by encouraging it to raise its standards. We know that secondary school heads often say that the product of primary schools in their catchment area leaves much to be desired. That is something that we can put right with provisions included in the Bill such as target setting for self-improvement by schools and base line assessment of pupils in order the better to measure performance by schools as pupils go through their vital early years.

It struck me as breathtaking that Opposition Members today managed to claim authorship of the Bill's provisions and, indeed, of many of the improvements that have taken place in education in the past few years. However much they may want to deny it now, the reality is that the Opposition have systematically opposed every step that we have taken to improve education. For example, they opposed the Education Act 1994 which established the Teacher Training Agency specifically to improve initial teacher training. They also opposed the Education Act 1993 which established the Funding Agency for Schools. I well remember Opposition Members predicting "chaos and confusion" in the setting up of that agency, but nothing of the kind happened--that was simply the Opposition's usual pessimism and negativity.

Incidentally, as the hon. Member for Walton mentioned pupils with special educational needs, he may recall--or he may not--that one of the key elements of the 1993 Act was the special educational needs code of practice, something in which I take pride as I was connected with it. I do not believe that there is a case for further legislation on special educational needs. I am not saying that we have had the last word on it, but it was not necessary to include further related provisions in the Bill. I could go even further back, but I think that the point is made.

Several of my hon. Friends, especially my hon. Friends the Members for Croydon, North-East (Mr. Congdon) and for Rugby and Kenilworth, mentioned discipline. We asked teachers and their representatives what they wanted and what would assist them in implementing discipline in

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their schools. The Bill gives them what they asked for, a fact that I recently verified with a number of teacher organisations. They have told me that they are satisfied with the measures in the Bill. I therefore believe that the Bill is soundly based in terms of its disciplinary measures, which the teacher organisations endorse. Whether my hon. Friends wish to take the matter further is entirely up to them. They will make their case, but I rest on what is in the Bill and the fact that teachers support it.

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