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8.36 pm
Mr. Nick St. Aubyn (Guildford): For someone with a reputation for studying history, the hon. Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Marsden) shows remarkably little grasp of it when it comes to education. He seems to have forgotten that it was Conservative Members who dominated the debate on last year's School Standards and Framework Bill and who spoke day after day, while Labour Members sat like so many nodding donkeys doing exactly as their Whip required. The two Liberal Democrat Members who are present--the hon. Members for Bath (Mr. Foster) and for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Mr. Willis)--were the honourable exception: as always, they made their unique contribution to the proceedings. The debate follows directly from that Bill and the chapter after chapter of regulations, forms and rules with which the Government try to bind every aspect of education.
The Minister for School Standards put her figure on it, but she did not answer the challenge that she set herself. The question is not whether the Government have placed new burdens on the education system--that is beyond doubt; they have imposed massive burdens on our schools--but where the benefits are.
That is the question that Labour Members cannot answer. They attack the previous Government for their centralising policies, which we must interpret as an attack,
fundamentally, on the national curriculum. We all know that there were problems with implementing that curriculum--there are problems with implementing any bold new strategy--but entrenching into the education system the principle of a national curriculum was one of the previous Government's greatest achievements in their 18 years in office.
When the Minister attacks Government quangos, ultimately, she is attacking Ofsted. Whatever may be said about the implementation of Ofsted's work, I think that its introduction and the change in culture that it has achieved is another great educational achievement of the previous Conservative Government. It underpinned the rise in education standards and improvement in GCSE and A-level results year after year under the previous Government, so the Labour party is all over the place when it tries to attack the principles that underpin the education revolution that the Conservatives achieved in their 18 years in power.
The Government latch on to soundbites and initiatives--anything that sells well in the papers the next day--at the cost of any genuine progress in education attainment.
Mr. Vernon Coaker (Gedling):
The hon. Gentleman talked about the philosophical direction of the previous Government and, as an example of that, about the achievement at the top end of the academic spectrum and improved GCSE results. Will he talk about what that Government's philosophical commitment was to those at the other end of the spectrum?
Mr. St. Aubyn:
The previous Government greatly expanded the budget for special educational needs. Even the current Government, after entering office, were obliged to praise the previous Government's efforts in providing for the 3 per cent. who perform worst in school.
Since the current Government came to power, my constituency of Guildford, and the county of Surrey, has experienced one attack after another on our education standards. Our local education authority has one of the United Kingdom's best results in literary standards in primary schools. Nevertheless, our assisted places scheme--the subject was dealt with by the hon. Member for Blackpool, South--has been attacked. In abolishing the scheme, the Government essentially came into my town of Guildford and closed one of our best secondary schools. Overnight, almost 400 places of outstanding worth for local children were abolished.
It is true that, year after year, there has been an increase in Surrey's standard spending assessment, but the increases have come with a real cut in the cash that is supposed to pay for increased education spending in Surrey. That is the reality of our problem.
The Government's amendment to the Opposition motion claims that
A year after the Secretary of State's damning act pre-empting an initiative that would have built bridges between the independent and state sectors, no regulations for such initiatives have been proposed. Why have no such proposals been made? Why will such proposals, even consultative ones, not be made for another month or two? Why are the Government delaying making such proposals? Is the only reason for delay the fact that such proposals would be based on a bold Conservative initiative that would build bridges between the private and the state sectors? Conservative Members fervently believe that building such bridges is one of the ways in which we will raise education standards in the United Kingdom.
Conservative-controlled Surrey has, however, proposed one other initiative. So far, the Minister for School Standards has endorsed it, and the Secretary of State for Education and Employment has not seen fit to shout it down. Month after month, however, there has been only a wall of silence from the Department for Education and Employment when we have sought its guidance and advice on how we should proceed with the initiative.
Under the School Standards and Framework Act 1998, the Secretary of State takes so much power from LEAs. Although Surrey's initiative had to be approved by him, he remained absolutely silent when we asked him to do so. That is characteristic of the burdens placed on counties such as Surrey. Other than the odd statement of political play--such as the one at last year's Labour party conference, when the Secretary of State said that, if he did not like what we were doing, he would step into Guildford and take over running our schools, and other such nonsense; I had to explain to him that that would be against the law, even under the 1998 Act--we have received no guidance on the initiative.
Conservative Members, who want diversity in education, have a real problem. We believe that a broad range of educational talent is available, and that diversity will harness that talent. Diversity cannot be characterised by the uniformity and dead hand of the Secretary of State. An inquiry by the Select Committee on Education and Employment into highly able children described, for example, how the literacy hour is turning off the most able children because it is far too boring for them. It is destroying their education standards, which are just as important as the education standards of other children in the class.
Mr. Desmond Swayne (New Forest, West):
There is also the issue of imposing on schools something which might not suit their requirements. I can tell my hon. Friend about the experience of my son who came home from school explaining that the vicar would no longer be visiting the school because the literacy hour had left no time. That is a matter for schools and parents to decide, not Ministers.
Mr. St. Aubyn:
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. With all these initiatives the Government are creating an artificial world for education in this country. Teachers, heads and schools are being given artificial targets that do not answer the real individual needs of the children for
Dr. George Turner:
Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. St. Aubyn:
I will give way in a moment.
Another example is the spring revision classes for year 6. It is an £18 million scheme, and teachers up and down the country have been complaining that it is a great waste of time. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Mr. Paterson) will forgive me if I use an example from his constituency. In connection with the extra classes for year 6, the head of Belvidere primary school near Shrewsbury said:
Dr. Turner:
When £56 million is provided for extra teachers, I am trying to understand the logic of it being inevitable that a reduction in class sizes implies a doubling elsewhere. It sounds like Conservative logic to me--having to cut class sizes without any extra money to do so. The Government have committed themselves to providing the necessary funding to reduce class sizes for five, six and seven-year-olds. Why is a doubling in class sizes elsewhere inevitable?
"the Opposition has no proposals to raise standards".
When we proposed a genuine new partnership in Surrey between the independent and state sectors, initially, the Minister for School Standards praised it as a great advance and the type of scheme that she would like to be implemented across the country. Subsequently, however, her boss saw the small print. At the last minute, he whipped out an extra provision in the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 to deny us the power to
implement that bold Conservative initiative, at least until the introduction of regulations telling us how the Government thought we should implement it. That is exactly what the debate is all about.
"Although I would not wish to miss out on any extra funding, I am seriously concerned that this is far more to do with massaging key stage 2 SATs scores at a national level, than raising standards in levels of achievement."
I could not put it better myself, but I will give the hon. Member for North-West Norfolk (Dr. Turner) an opportunity to do so.
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