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Mr. Brady: I have a particular interest in the subject, as the father of a four-year-old daughter and as one of the beneficiaries of the nursery voucher scheme. I thought that it was excellent, as did the other parents who send their children to my daughter's private nursery. I am slightly baffled by the Minister's remarks. If the only plans that are to be approved are those that include the private providers who have been involved in the nursery voucher scheme, can the Minister explain the precise difference between a voucher scheme and a certificate of entitlement scheme?
Ms Morris: It is true that, in the interim plans for this year, we do not want to disrupt children's education.
Those who are in nurseries this term in the private and voluntary sectors on the voucher scheme, as the hon. Gentleman's daughter may be, will be able to continue as such if they are still attending the nursery in the autumn and spring terms.
One of the vagaries of the voucher scheme was the fact that 80 per cent. of children were in maintained provision. Their parents found that they had to give a voucher over for an education which previously they had just turned up at the school to receive. There was no justification for that. For those 80 per cent. in the maintained sector there will be no vouchers, no paperwork, no bureaucracy and no time, money and effort wasted. Within a year, we will be able to make sure that that is true for all children because we will have a development plan in every local authority area.
We accept that we gave local authorities just six weeks to prepare their interim plans. We did not want them to do that badly and to start off on the wrong foot. If there is an interim plan, the problem has been solved because the money will go straight to the voluntary and private-sector providers. In those areas that do not submit an interim plan, and because we want to honour our pledge of continuity of education for four-year-olds, we must have a short-term mechanism to operate until the next year when they have such plans. That will ensure that the money gets to the private and voluntary sectors. That is where the certificate of eligibility comes in; it is a short-term solution to a short-term problem and is not part of our long-term plans.
In the time available, I will be unable to answer all the points that have been raised today, so I will endeavour to respond by letter to those that I fail to mention. A number of hon. Members spoke about the notion of equality. If there is one thing that splits the Conservative and Labour parties--I am sure that the Liberal Democrats are with us, although they might sit on the fence--it is what equality means.
I have never thought that all children are the same, that they will reach the same standard of attainment or that they have the same skills or knowledge, but I have always been opposed to a structure that does not offer them equality of opportunity. That is what we are about. We want to try to create a structure--in this sense structure is important--to make sure that there is equality of opportunity. This country has never managed to achieve that. Historically, we had a structure that gave opportunity to the wealthy, and then one that gave opportunities only to males; it would have ignored me and the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton.
When I was at school, in a highly selective system, the structure valued some children more than others by having better qualified teachers in grammar schools than in secondary moderns and by not allowing children who failed at 11 to take examinations at 15. That is a thing of the past, but even in the structure set up by the previous Government, there was unfair funding in the grant-maintained sector and a belief that we needed only some children to succeed to survive as a nation. We want a structure that ensures equality of opportunity for every child, but we acknowledge that every child will achieve to different levels and show different skills and talents.
We received some criticism from the Opposition about targets, which are crucial to the work that we want to do. I go back to a comment of my hon. Friend the Member for Barking, which was supported by the Liberals. She said that part of the problem in the education system is the complacency of schools that are doing just about all right. They languish in the middle of the league tables; they manage by getting kids through their doors and churning out enough to get reasonable reputations in their communities. We must target our wish for improvement on them as much as on our best and worst schools. The only way to do that is to make schools set targets year on year, so that, each year, they aim to surpass their previous standards. There probably is a limit to the height that a school can reach, but that glass ceiling is always higher than the school thinks. Targets must notch standards up year after year.
Mr. Bercow:
We do not tackle the problem of failing to meet targets by levelling down and treading on institutions that are already doing well. Nothing in the Minister's speech so far has allayed my concern about the Government's likely treatment of grant-maintained schools, of which the Minister for School Standards is a long-time sworn enemy. Is there the slightest prospect that she will say something to allay my grievances?
Ms Morris:
I shall first continue to discuss targets. I cannot imagine how anyone could have interpreted what I have described as levelling down. It is about notching up. Local education authorities are important in target setting. Schools run, and are responsible for, themselves. They carry the burden of raising standards. The very fact that there are so many complacent schools means that we need a mechanism, a voice over the shoulder to say, "Come on, that target is not good enough."
Schools are setting targets that are too low. We have to make them set higher targets if we are to rock them out of their complacency. The role of a good adviser and of good local authorities is to do that and give schools benchmark information.To answer the hon. Member for Bath, that is why it is important that the information collected by Ofsted is made available to all concerned to notch up expectations. Unless we all, central Government and local authorities, work together to persuade schools that they can do better, we will not make it. The Opposition call that centralisation; we call it harnessing the forces for school improvement. Through our standards and effectiveness unit and the standards task force that is what we seek to do.
I value the standards and effectiveness unit and the standards task force highly because they are not there as a bureaucracy but as a bridge between central policy making and the schools that are delivering the goods to ensure that never again will a Government Department become so removed from the people affected by its decisions. We will form policy by listening to what is said out there. The standards and effectiveness unit has one leg in central Government, but a fair bit of the rest of its body out there with real schools, pupils and teachers.
There are some excellent grant-maintained schools. Long may they continue to be so. There are some excellent local authority schools, but there has been
unfair provision in terms of both capital and revenue. It was interesting that the hon. Member for Beckenham (Mr. Merchant) talked about the problem of admissions caused by people coming over the border into his area.
The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West (Mr. Brady) was concerned to ensure that his children could attend a school in another local authority area. There are problems involving admissions that need to be addressed. They were caused by the fact that individual schools were allowed to make separate decisions.
I shall address in due course other issues that have been raised in the debate. I thank hon. Members for contributing to the debate, which will be the first of many. Now is the time for us to join in a common agenda of raising standards. If Parliament and politicians do no more than attempt to give each child in every school the best possible education, we will have achieved a fair deal for children, parents and employers.
Mr. Greg Pope (Hyndburn):
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
Ordered,
Ordered,
That Standing Order No. 142 (Domestic Committees) be amended, in line 9, by leaving out the word 'seven' and inserting the word 'nine'.--[Mr. Pope.]
18 Jul 1997 : Column 662
Ordered,
That Standing Order No. 144 (Finance and Services Committee) be amended, in line 18, by leaving out the word 'nine' and inserting the word 'eleven'.--[Mr. Pope.]
Ordered,
That, in respect of the Ministerial and other Salaries Bill,--
(1) notices of Amendments, new Clauses and new Schedules to be moved in Committee may be accepted by the Clerks at the Table before the Bill has been read a second time; and
(2) if the Bill is committed to a Committee of the whole House, further proceedings on the Bill shall stand postponed; and that, as soon as the proceedings on any Resolution come to by the House on Ministerial and other Salaries Bill [Money] have been concluded, this House will immediately resolve itself into a Committee on the Bill.--[Mr. Pope.]
That in respect of the Law Officers Bill [Lords], notices of Amendments, new Clauses and new Schedules to be moved in Committee may be accepted by the Clerks at the Table before the Bill has been read a second time.--[Mr. Pope.]
18 Jul 1997 : Column 663
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