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Mrs. Laing: It is true that the Conservative Government blamed certain local education authorities for many things that went wrong with education--as the hon. Lady is well aware. However, can the hon. Lady give any examples of anyone blaming children for problems in education? That is what she asserted.

Ms Hodge: I can remember many instances when Ministers did just that. Even this morning, the Opposition education spokesperson referred to equality and said that some children could not achieve. That was part of her thesis on why equality would reduce, rather than raise, standards. Children are being blamed for not achieving. There are many other examples of the previous Government apportioning blame: they never accepted responsibility for raising educational standards for all children in Britain.

The new agenda defines the end of an era when success was measured only by the undoubted success of a few children in a few schools. It highlights the Government's determination that all children in all schools can, and will, succeed. That is a real change of emphasis. It also heralds the end of an era when people thought that input--how much money was spent in schools--was the only variable that affected educational standards. The obsession with input, admissions policies and children's backgrounds has bedevilled education debates for too long.

The White Paper introduces the idea that outcomes count and that whatever a child's background, he or she can and must achieve more. That is a vital point.

Another crucial principle underpins the White Paper and, I think, strikes a chord with many parents in Britain. We hear much about the schools that excel and those that are failing. However, most children attend schools where they just survive: they just get by. They may achieve a little, but they fail to achieve their full potential. I know that from my experience of my four children who have attended a range of primary and secondary schools in London.

My children have had head teachers who are inspirational leaders of their schools, and head teachers who refuse to recognise that there are any problems and allow their schools to decline or not achieve their capacity. I have seen class and subject teachers who, through their teaching, have enthused my children and others and have brought out the best in their students. There are other teachers for whom the children have no

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respect and in whom they have no confidence. Those teachers succeed merely in turning children off a particular subject.

As the Minister said, we have only one chance at childhood and one chance to learn in childhood. We must not throw away that unique opportunity by tolerating failure or mediocrity. That is what the White Paper is all about--promoting excellence for all.

The White Paper covers a range of issues, but I shall focus on just two, not because they are the only two that matter but because I believe them to be of crucial importance. The first issue is head teachers. The second is children in their early years.

There is widespread recognition that the role of head teachers is crucial in raising the standard of education. That is not a big surprise, as any organisation will prosper depending on the quality of its leadership. Quality of leadership is the most essential ingredient in any successful organisation, including schools. It is a necessary condition to achieve success. Without a first-rate head teacher, one cannot achieve all the other things that we know make up a good school--a culture of excellence, the recruiting of other good teachers in the classroom, good management, both financial and administrative, and effective partnerships.

Yet only now, under the Labour Government, are we really beginning to take seriously the business of raising the quality of our head teachers. We need to reflect a little on the legacy that we inherited. In its 1995-96 annual report, Ofsted said that leadership was poor in one in seven primary schools, and in one in 10 secondary schools. I have not included the category of "satisfactory", because we should be going for excellence of leadership. The fact that so many schools have poor leadership is an indictment of the current system.

I was looking recently at figures on recruitment compiled by the Teacher Training Agency, which undertook an analysis of advertisements for head teachers in the national press. From 1 January to 30 May in the years 1995-97, the number of advertisements for primary school head teachers increased by 61 per cent. That tells us something about what is happening to the confidence of people in the job. In the same period, the number of advertisements for secondary school head teachers increased by 51 per cent. Worse still, in January 1997, 21 per cent. of the advertisements that appeared in the national press for primary school heads, were readvertisements. Schools have been unable to recruit people to run those schools from the supply of teachers. In London, 50 per cent. of advertisements for primary heads that month were readvertisements.

Mr. Don Foster: The hon. Lady is raising an issue which concerns all of us. I have just received a written answer from the Minister which tells me that the number of premature retirements of head teachers has continued to increase. In 1996-97, a total of 1,283 heads and 1,089 deputy heads took premature retirement. That figure is up on that of last year, which was also very high.

Ms Hodge: I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving the House those figures. I was, of course, aware that the previous Secretary of State's announcement of the ending of the facility for early retirement led to an immediate influx of head teachers choosing to retire. That has created

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a massive crisis for the incoming Government--an enormous challenge for them if they really wish to make a reality of raising education standards.

There is not only a crisis in head teacher recruitment; the situation has not been helped by the attacks on teachers that took place under the previous Government. That is why I warmly welcome some of the measures in the White Paper, and the fact that we have put education at the top of the agenda. That, in itself, sends a message to all the professionals working in the field that we care about the job that they do for our children and for future generations.

Mr. Don Foster: I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way to me a second time, and I promise not to intervene again in her speech. She talked about the attacks on teachers, but does she agree that the Minister for School Standards was right to say that the best person to judge teachers and their performance is the head teacher? Does she agree that it does not serve the profession well if, as announced by the chief inspector only two days ago, a crude three-point scale is to be used to judge teachers' performance? In particular, is it not wholly wrong for a teacher to be graded in the bottom of those three categories on the basis of what could have been observation of only one lesson, possibly not even the whole of that lesson? Does the hon. Lady agree that a stop must be put to that immediately?

Ms Hodge: I agree entirely that, in the end, the judgment of whether a teacher is competent must be made by the head teacher. However, various mechanisms can be used to encourage the head to have a look at the performance of a particular teacher and come to that judgment. One of those could be an Ofsted inspection. An inspector could draw a head's attention to what he or she believed was an inadequate performance, but, in the end, the judgment must be that of the head teacher.

I shall digress slightly, to tell the hon. Gentleman a story about my own children. Two of the siblings, who were at the same school, came home and complained about the quality of a teacher who taught them both for a certain subject. One child found the quality of teaching so poor that I was having difficulty in getting her to attend the school. She felt that her time would be better spent in working for her GCSEs in the library than in attending the class.

I therefore wrote to the head teacher, which was an appropriate thing to do. I drew her attention to the fact that my daughter felt that the teacher lacked quality. I was an external person, a parent, and I had never observed the teacher. I was simply responding to my child's views and drawing the head's attention to the quality of the teaching.

I think that that was an appropriate thing to do, and I would not put it in a category very different from what is done by an inspector who may spend an hour or so observing a teacher and then draw the head's attention to the quality of the teaching.

In my case, the head wrote back saying that I had made a serious allegation, which I had better substantiate. I replied with an angry letter saying that it was not my task to substantiate the allegation, but the head's task to observe the teacher in the class and find out whether there was any substance in my daughter's feeling that she was not being properly taught. There is a role for the inspector, but, in the end, the responsibility is that of the head teacher.

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I said earlier that putting education at the top of the agenda would inspire renewed confidence and, I hope, ease the way to our being able to recruit better head teachers. Introducing a general teaching council will be vital if we are to restore self-confidence in the profession and encourage competent teachers to come forward and become heads.

The extra money that this new Labour Government have injected into the education service is vital as part of the restoration of confidence and, therefore, of our ability to raise standards. The support that we have given does not, however, mean that we can tolerate mediocrity or failure. That is why the introduction of a statutory qualification for head teachers is welcome and crucial. I hope that Ministers will consider widening the field from which we recruit head teachers.

Recent research shows that head teachers spend only a small amount of time teaching in the classroom. A primary head will spend about 12 per cent. of his or her time on teaching and a secondary head half that.


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