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Rights of the Child
1.23 am
Dr. Ian Gibson (Norwich, North): I am delighted to present a petition from young constituents in Norwich who have drawn attention to an issue that is important to the Government and to the whole of Norwich and Norfolk.
The petition has been signed by 1,792 people and it states:
- To the House of Commons,
The Petition of the people in Norwich,
Declares that Her Majesty's Government has ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child and is therefore committed to children's rights and therefore has a responsibility to do all it can to help end the exploitation of child labour in overseas countries.
- The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons should urge the secretary of state for International Development that all aid to countries such as Indonesia, India, Mali or Pakistan where child labour is known to be an extensive problem should have a reasonable percentage of the aid linked to a programme of education for child labourers.
And the Petitioners remain.
Schools (Poor Behaviour)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Jamieson.]
1.25 am
Mr. Vernon Coaker (Gedling): Although the hour is late and many people are going home to bed, this is an important Adjournment debate because it touches on one of the most important issues affecting our schools and the Government's attempts to raise educational achievement.
I should start by declaring an interest as a member of the National Union of Teachers. Before I address the main topic of the debate, I want to set the context because it is important to realise that we have a Government who are committed to the education of our children and determined to put more money into our schools to raise achievement and to introduce policies that will improve standards. In particular, we can see the success that the numeracy and literacy strategies have had over the past two and a half years. They have started to have an impact on the quality of education that primary school children are receiving.
I praise our teaching profession. It is important that the debate sends out the message that we recognise the tremendous work done by the vast majority of our teachers, often in difficult circumstances. It is important to recognise that Ministers often acknowledge that. They are often criticised for not praising teachers but, when they do so, it is not reported as widely as when they sometimes say that there are challenges to be met. The majority of members of our teaching profession are doing an extremely good job.
The important point at the heart of the Government's policies is that they are tackling the social exclusion in many of our communities. They are prepared to take on social exclusion, and not to duck the issue.
In their agenda of raising achievement, the Government face the challenge of the disaffection of a sizeable number of young people which is evident in our classrooms. All hon. Members will have heard examples of that from our constituents. Poor behaviour includes shouting out in class, kicking out, fights that teachers are expected to break up, vandalism, intimidation of staff, increasing numbers of attacks of staff and serious verbal abuse that constantly challenges and undermines teachers and the school's authority. There is a basic refusal to co-operate.
It is important to recognise the difficulties and stress experienced by teachers who are trying to teach a group of children but who do not have the basic standard of behaviour or the teaching environment that we would want them to have. Unfortunately, when schools try to get the support of parents in dealing with poor behaviour, a small number of parents not only refuse to support the school but join in the undermining of its authority.
Recently, we have seen evidence of that from the National Association of Head Teachers, which pointed out that increasing numbers of parents challenge what is happening in schools. It is important to acknowledge that parents have a right to know what is happening and to ask questions but, where children and young people are challenging the school's authority, some parents support that. That is a crucial issue, because if we cannot address the poor behaviour and social disaffection in our schools, we will not prevent the massive exodus of pupils from many of our cities.
In my own city, Nottingham, as hard as some of our schools work, people flood out of the city to the suburbs, where they believe that they will find a better education for their children. However, it is not only an inner-city problem: in other areas, people try to avoid problem schools.
To illustrate the scale of the problem, I shall quote from "Young People", the social exclusion report published last week by policy action team 12. Each year, one in 16 young people--almost 40,000--leave school without qualifications; of those, 80 per cent. were not entered for examinations. In England and Wales, more than 30,000 children in year 11 truant for days or weeks at a time; in England, about 60,000 truant at least once a week. There are 1,500 permanent exclusions from primary schools and 11,500 from secondary schools each year; and, at any one time, more than 150,000 young people are out of school on fixed-term exclusions.
There has been a 400 per cent. increase in permanent exclusions from primary schools since 1990-91, although the rate has been stable since 1995. There has been a 350 per cent. increase in permanent exclusions from secondary schools since 1990-91, although, in the past year or so, there has been a small drop. Those massive figures reveal the scale of the challenge facing us.
The previous Government's answer and the reason for the huge rise was that everything should be left to the market--the market would deal with it through the mechanism of parental choice. In fact, schools pushed out children who caused problems and we witnessed the creation of sink schools and a two-tier education system. This Government will not tolerate that and we will not allow sink schools. We want the best for all pupils in all areas.
We cannot simply tell schools to stop excluding pupils. We have to establish a framework to support schools and teachers as they try to deal with the problems. If we are to raise standards, teachers must be able to teach in an effective learning environment, and pupils must be able to learn. We cannot allow a small minority to deprive the majority in the classroom of their entitlement to an education. Parents understand the problems that some individual pupils have, but their view is that those problems must not be dealt with at the expense of the minority of pupils and in a way that undermines the authority of teachers.
Effective head teachers, good management and good-quality staff are key factors, but so are better training and implementation of sound policies to tackle the problems. If fresh start initiatives, city academies and our efforts to raise the achievement of all pupils in all schools in all areas are to succeed, we have to meet the challenge head on. In addition to improving teachers' training in dealing with difficult situations, we have to increase the number of learning support units in schools.
We should not underestimate the extent of the problem. There are problems with a small number of pupils not only in the inner cities, but in almost all our schools. If we are serious about raising standards right across the ability range, learning support units must be available to every school, whether they are provided in the school or whether schools have a collaborative arrangement. Every school in the country needs access to a learning support unit.
Pupils who are persistently disruptive or violent and who simply refuse to co-operate need a learning support unit off-site, not as a dumping ground--that was the policy of the Conservatives, who were prepared to throw difficult pupils out and were not worried where they went--but as a unit where an alternative curriculum can be offered and individual counselling can take place, with the aim of re-integrating those young people back into mainstream education. The objective should be their return to ordinary classrooms when they have learned to act in a way that is consistent with effective learning.
If we set up a system of learning support units across the country, that would make a real difference not only to the education of the young people concerned, but to the morale of the teaching profession, who would see the Government acting to support teachers in their schools.
There is an issue for society as well as for Government. One of the main problems in our schools and in society is that there has been an erosion of respect for what I call legitimate authority, whether that is represented by a police officer or a teacher. As a Government, we need to consider how we can restore legitimate authority to schools, head teachers and teachers, so that we get back the respect that many of us remember from our school days. Our parents often told us about the respect that the school teacher enjoyed in the community.
All parents want and demand decent education for their children. If we can start to restore authority to the teaching profession, we will have done a great service to the country. We must do that by working with parents and local authorities. We must lay down what is acceptable and hold to it, even when the rules and standards of behaviour in a school are challenged.
It is up to us as a Government to send out a clear message to our teachers and schools that, where they are sensibly implementing standards of behaviour and codes of conduct in a school which are designed to create an effective learning environment and to provide teachers and schools with the authority that they need, the Government will support them. We must reiterate that to teachers.
When I was a deputy head teacher and we had to enforce the uniform code, there were parents who asked why their children should wear a uniform to school and challenged our authority to impose a uniform. We must support schools in such circumstances. If a school has determined with parents that a school uniform and certain codes of behaviour are required, that should be respected by those who attend the school. If we do not enforce that, it will undermine the authority of the teacher and the school, and their efforts to create a learning environment.
The Government are concerned about rights for individuals, and also about responsibilities. They have an agenda to raise achievement, to put more resources into schools and to modernise the comprehensive principle. If we ensure that we create in all our schools--rural, inner city or suburban--the learning environment that is essential to achievement by all our pupils, we will raise achievement right across the spectrum of ability.
What a radical, hugely satisfying achievement that would be: city schools to which people flocked and to which, because they were beacons of excellence in their communities, they wanted to send their children. Education would play a part in regenerating communities that have been neglected for so long. We face that
challenge. To meet it, we must recognise that teachers in many of our schools face genuine difficulties in tackling the challenging behaviour of some young people. If we support teachers, we can raise standards together.
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