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Mr. Lansley: In South Cambridgeshire, the constituency which I am privileged to represent, we have a number of schools with assisted places. It would be very much to the benefit of parents who have children in assisted places in those schools if the Committee passed this group of amendments, thereby delaying by three years the coming into operation of the Bill.
There would be several benefits in such a delay. The first--which I hope that we shall discuss in greater detail--is that a three-year delay would significantly reduce the number of siblings of students in assisted places who would not be able to follow their older brothers or sisters to the same school. Moreover, parents would not be placed in the invidious and often very inconvenient and costly position of placing children in a different school, which may have a different ethos, orientation or geographical location.
St. Mary's school, in South Cambridgeshire, illustrates the second reason why delay would be advantageous. It is the only school available to parents in my constituency who want their children to be educated in a single-sex school--in this example, a girls' school--with a Catholic orientation. If assisted places were not available at St. Mary's for parents who want to send their children to a Catholic school in the maintained sector, no other school with the same character would be available.
It may not be possible, even if the Committee were to accept the additional delay proposed by this group of amendments, for the maintained sector to provide the same types of diversity. It is very unlikely, however, that the grant-maintained sector--or the voluntary-aided sector, in the case of St. Mary's--would be able to provide the same types of diversity in the time allowed by the Bill. A three-year delay, which may seem extravagant to some people, is not a long period in which to change a school's character, orientation and its ability to offer additional places offering a specific type of education, thereby enabling parents to make a choice.
Delaying the implementation of the Bill by three years would enable a significant proportion of children in assisted places at St. Faith's to complete their education at that school. Delay would not fulfil the reasonable expectations parents had when their children first took up a place in an assisted places school, but it would at least give parents an opportunity to plan ahead to their children's education at 13, when, through common entrance examinations, they would be able to take places elsewhere.
The Department for Education and Employment dispatched a letter to schools with assisted places, in which Ministers made it perfectly clear that parents with children in assisted places who expected to continue their education in the same school until age 13 were to be disappointed. A particular grievance of the parents and schools who will be affected is that, on 1 April 1997, the Parliamentary Secretary, Office of Public Service--who was then Labour's schools spokesman--wrote to the chairman of the Incorporated Association of Preparatory Schools, stating that places would be honoured until age 13. The letter from the Department, however, writes that support would be extended
Conservative Members have already mentioned the fourth reason for delay, but I should like to elaborate on it. In the maintained sector, it is difficult to plan the transfer of pupils from the independent sector and assisted places into the maintained sector. Moreover, I suspect that
the Government have little information about where parents with children in assisted places would like to send them in the maintained sector.
During the general election campaign, I visited St. Mary's school and talked to many children in assisted places who were doing extremely well under the scheme. I asked them which school their parents would like them to attend if they did not have an assisted place. In many cases, they said that, because of their parents' desire for them to attend a single-sex school, the alternative would not have been the school closest to their homes but perhaps the Herts and Essex high school, in Bishop's Stortford, which is a considerable distance from their homes.
It does not automatically follow that local education authorities in areas with assisted places will be the authorities that provide places for children leaving assisted places. It is therefore very important that hon. Members are given time to learn what choices parents will have, where parents are likely to send their children and where additional places will be provided.
The Government make much of surplus places, but those places may not be in the areas to which parents want to send their children. It is regrettable if the Government were proposing that parents of children on assisted places should be required to send their children to schools with surplus places, because those parents have the same rights of choice as other parents. There may therefore be additional pressure on currently over-subscribed schools--which brings me back to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Mr. Boswell), that there may be implications not only for revenue expenditure but for capital expenditure in the maintained sector.
The final reason for delay is that the Government do not have a formula for distributing the resources that would be released from abolition of the assisted places scheme. They have not consulted on any such formula, and there are considerable reservations and concerns among schools in my constituency about how that aspect of abolition will be implemented. It may well be that the released resources will be relatively small compared to overall resources in the education budget.
When the Minister was on the "Today" programme, he referred to this Bill as the reduction of class sizes Bill. If the additional resources are to be released only where schools have class sizes in excess of 30 pupil, the Government may miss out on what is, in the judgment of schools and education authorities, the most educationally advantageous distribution of resources.
In South Cambridgeshire, for example, some schools that have about 30 pupils in a class are able to maintain a high standard of education, despite the difficult circumstances. They struggle under less difficult circumstances than some village and rural schools that might not have 30 children in a class, but have to deal with more than one age in a class. Children of five, six, seven and even eight are together in one class.
We surely all recognise that, in those circumstances, it is important to give teachers the opportunity to have classes in which they can undertake differentiated teaching relevant not only to different abilities, but to different ages. A mature judgment may be that, in educational terms and for the benefit of children, it is sometimes better to make greater resources available to
village schools that have to deal with different ages and abilities in the same classroom, rather than to focus on the limited aspect of the absolute number of children in a particular class. That is especially true in South Cambridgeshire, which combines the urban schools of Cambridge city and the village schools beyond.
Those are all good reasons for delay, but they are reasons that the Government do not appear to have taken into consideration. That shows the undue and unreasonable haste with which the Government are trying to push through the Bill before any of the questions have been adequately answered.
Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold):
I am delighted to follow my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley). It is clear that he has a good grasp of the education sector.
I should be grateful to know, Mr. Martin, whether you expect me to keep strictly to the group of amendments, or whether you will allow a wider debate now and then a short debate on clause stand part. I shall temper my remarks according to your advice.
The First Deputy Chairman:
I should not have to educate hon. Members on procedure--they should know the rules before they participate in the Committee. The amendments are clearly laid down and are restricted to certain matters. The hon. Gentleman should speak to them. If he is out of order, I shall soon tell him so.
Mr. Clifton-Brown:
Thank you for that guidance, Mr. Martin; it is most helpful.
A great deal has already been said on this group of amendments, so I shall make just three brief points--first, the financial effect of the Bill; secondly, the disruption for the pupils involves; and, thirdly, the effect on the viability of the independent schools.
I want to deal, first, with the general principle of the Bill in regard to the savings from the abolition of the assisted places scheme and the cost of reducing class sizes for five, six and seven-year-olds. The amendments make a great deal of sense. I do not believe that, under the proposed timetable, the Government have correctly assessed the financial effect on the public expenditure round. The are a number of points about that, some of which have already been made and some which have not.
I do not believe that the savings from the abolition of the scheme will be £100 million; I think that they will be a great deal less. Furthermore, I believe that the cost of reducing class sizes will greatly outweigh any savings. As my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Mr. Boswell) said, the marginal cost of establishing extra places in the maintained sector can be very great. For example, if a new building is needed to house two, three or even a dozen additional pupils, the cost could be high. It would be slightly less in revenue costs if a new teacher had to be employed.
I wonder whether the Government have done their sums correctly. The Institute of Public Finance says that the net cost of reducing class sizes--over and above the savings from abolishing the assisted places scheme--will be about £150 million, and that assumes that the Government's savings estimate of £100 million is correct. Therefore, it makes a great deal of sense to delay the implementation of the Bill on financial grounds, if on no others.
Secondly, to minimise the disruption for pupils it would be sensible to allow all pupils currently involved in the scheme to finish their education at the schools they attend. It is dogma to take pupils away from their schools in the middle of their education and move them to different schools. Anyone who has been involved in that exercise, as I was when I was adopted as a prospective parliamentary candidate, knows that changing children from one school to another is disruptive. However bright the child, it sets back his or her progress in the new school. Therefore, I urge that the amendments are accepted so that disruption can be avoided.
My third brief point--before you call me to order, Mr. Martin--relates to the viability of the private sector schools that will be affected. In every one of the five years that I have been a Member of Parliament, I have tried to persuade my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs. Gillan) that St. Edward's school--an excellent school in my constituency--was up to the required standard to qualify for the scheme. I was always told that there were many more schools applying for places than there was finance, or even Government inclination to provide.
"to ease integration into the maintained sector in those areas where the normal age of transfer is later than age 11."
That will deny children's reasonable expectations.
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