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Miss Melanie Johnson: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Clappison: Yes. Perhaps the hon. Lady will tell us about the difficulties experienced by schools in her constituency.

Miss Johnson: I want to ask the hon. Gentleman the question that I asked the hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May) earlier. Does he support the present Tory leader of our county council, who proposes not to send an extra 6 per cent. of funding to schools next year? Those schools include ones in the hon. Gentleman's constituency and mine, which will have to make cuts as a result of the failure to send on the extra money that the Government are spending on education, or that they would spend if Tory-run councils would let them.

Mr. Clappison: The hon. Lady knows that the budget for Hertfordshire was set by the so-called administration group, which was Liberal-Labour controlled. The Secretary of State had to write to that group to complain about the amount of money that it was withholding from schools.

Schools have suffered up and down the country. The Secretary of State prayed in aid the words of Mr. Bob Lloyd of the grant-maintained schools joint monitoring group. That is the same Mr. Lloyd who provided us with an analysis of the position this year, rather than next year, which the Secretary of State was talking about. Mr. Lloyd describes the present position in grant-maintained schools and the practical consequences of the Government's policies. The average grant-maintained secondary school on cash protection--two thirds of them are on cash protection--is £96,000 worse off, which equates to approximately four teaching posts. Grant-maintained primary schools are, on average, £22,000 worse off, which equates to one teaching post.

Wroxham school in my constituency is aware of the Secretary of State's announcement about next year, and it is hardly dancing with glee about his alleged generosity in providing the school with barely enough of an increase to match inflation, when the school is already suffering a serious deficit in its budget and the classroom and learning support assistants have already gone. That is the overall picture for grant-maintained schools and, if that is prosperity, goodness save us from this Government and their idea of prosperity.

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The Prime Minister has clearly moved on from his promises about grammar schools made before the election. He said:

"The reason why I don't say it's part of the Government's policy to get rid of all grammar schools is that I think if a school's doing a good job, then you don't want to get rid of that school."

Having listened to this debate and heard speaker after speaker express hostility to grammar schools, I know that the Prime Minister's sentiment is not shared by the vast majority of his Back-Bench colleagues or, apparently, by many Labour activists.

Dr. George Turner: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Clappison: No. [Hon. Members: "What about ballots?"] Hon. Members mention ballots. The Prime Minister told us today that there was no need to worry because there had been no ballots and there was no need for scaremongering. In fact, ballots cannot be helduntil September. The Department for Education and Employment has received inquiries from campaigners against grammar schools, many of whom are Labour party activists, about petitions to get rid of grammar schools. The Minister will be aware of newspaper reports about Labour activists throughout the country using Labour party offices, presumably with the blessing of some of the MPs who have spoken this evening, for their campaign to get rid of grammar schools.

I agreed with the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury. What do those activists think will be the effect on children and teachers in those schools of the prospect of upheaval of months and months of campaigning? Nothing could be more calculated to damage the provision of education in those schools.

What will be the consequence in the long run? [Interruption.] Hon. Members do not want to know, but let me remind them of the likely consequences of the upheavals that they propose. Eric Hammond, former union boss and governor of Gravesend grammar school, who is battling to keep selection in Kent's grammar schools, said:

"I wouldn't like to see selection by merit replaced by selection by purse."

That is one of the possible outcomes.

The hon. Member for Croydon, North talked about free school meals and gave us a sociological analysis. There could be no clearer division than the one that we face if those activists have their way because, if those schools become independent, the only people who will go to them are those who can afford to pay full fees. The Government are delivering educational opportunity for the few at the expense of educational opportunity for the many, as Labour Members might say.

When one looks at the picture and sees what the Government have done to take away opportunities, by abolishing the assisted places--[Interruption.]

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin): Order. I appeal to hon. Members to calm down and listen to the hon. Gentleman. I also appeal to the hon. Gentleman to calm down.

Mr. Clappison: Labour Members are displaying the vigour with which they wish to abolish grammar schools.

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That is how the Government pursue their ends--often by stealth, but always with vigour, but so that the Prime Minister can hold up his hands, say, "Not me, guv--it's all scaremongering," and give bland reassurances about the future. Meanwhile, his Back Benchers and his party outside Parliament work and campaign to undermine the promises he solemnly made to voters before the last general election.

When I look at what the Government have done to take away opportunity, especially from those who are less well-off, by abolishing assisted places and attacking grant-maintained schools and grammar schools, I have to ask, what is it that the Labour party has against the less well-off that it wants to take educational opportunities from them at every turn? This debate has highlighted the real threat that the Labour Government pose to choice, opportunity and diversity, with their almost Cromwellian determination to sweep across the country attacking any adornment or centre of excellence in the state education system.

I invite Ministers and Labour Back Benchers to think about the damage that they are doing to schools, the uncertainty that they are causing and the teachers and classroom assistants who might have to be made redundant. The Secretary of State boasted that the Government are making a difference, but, for all too many children in our schools, that difference is that they will receive an inferior education because of the Labour Government's policies.

9.47 pm

The Minister for School Standards (Ms Estelle Morris): I congratulate the hon. Member for Hertsmere (Mr. Clappison) on his appointment to the Opposition Front Bench. In the past two years, there appears to have been rapid turnover in the shadow Education and Employment team. I think that this is the third team we have faced; let us hope, for their sake, that they do better than the previous two.

It would appear that one of the qualifications for appointment to the Opposition Front Bench is selective amnesia extending back over the 18 years of Tory rule. In his first speech as an education spokesman, the hon. Gentleman spent nigh on 15 minutes talking about two subjects, and two subjects only: grammar schools and grant-maintained schools. From their speeches today, I gather that the great thing that the Conservatives achieved during 18 years in office--the thing that they most want to defend, the thing that they most mind losing and the thing that, to them, encapsulates diversity--is their policy on grammar schools and grant-maintained schools. Let us see what they achieved with that policy.

The result of the Conservatives' policy on grammar schools was not a grammar school in every town or an expansion of grammar schools, but a steady contraction of grammar schools as the Tory years rolled on. When they left office, they left 160 grammar schools, compared with thousands when they took office in the 1970s. If grant-maintained schools were the second strand of their diverse education system, it amounted to only 1,000 schools. So what the Tories are celebrating today is having left a system that was meant to be diverse and was made up of two elements--160 grammar schools and 1,000 grant-maintained schools. All that after 18 years! If that is what the Tories come to the House today and talk

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about with pride, with not one word about the 23,000 other schools that make up the English education system, it is not surprising that they lost the last election with such great force.

The Conservative Government fiddled with creating 1,000 grant-maintained schools and thought that that would solve the nation's problems, but they left the nation not an education system rich in diversity but one in which four out of 10 11-year-olds could not read and write properly; in which more than half of 16-year-olds could not achieve five or more higher grade GCSEs; in which 2.3 per cent. of schools were failing; and in which one in 10 schools had serious weaknesses and a third were not as good as they should have been. They left a £4 billion backlog of repairs and an expensive and wasteful nursery voucher scheme. They put a standstill on the expansion in higher education numbers. Schools had to cope with reduced budgets year after year under the Tory Government.

There was no system for dealing with failing LEAs. The Conservative Government had no levers to raise standards. That was what their vision of diversity brought about. That was what Tory diversity and choice was all about--a system that let down too many of the nation's children.

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