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6.28 pm
Mr. Don Foster (Bath): As the Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment, the hon. Member for Croydon, North (Mr. Wicks), said in his opening remarks, the debate is important. It has certainly been wide ranging. After the introduction by my right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Inverness, West (Mr. Kennedy), we heard a thoughtful speech from the Minister, to which I shall return in a moment. We then heard a rather lengthy speech from the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow). I shall not be able to answer all the questions he put, because he asked for our views on a range of matters--from the new deal to red tape and bureaucracy in schools. We are in favour of one and against the other, but I can provide him with more details later if he wants them.
The hon. Member for Corby (Mr. Hope) and my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Mr. Willis) made impassioned speeches. Although they are on opposite sides of the House, I felt a great deal of sympathy for both of them. The hon. Member for Corby was especially concerned to achieve the best possible start for all his constituents. He wanted open and equal access, and I am sure that we would all agree with him on that.
The speech with which I was most in agreement was made by the hon. Member for Faversham and Mid-Kent (Mr. Rowe). He did not utter a word for which I would not offer wholehearted support. We should all support and be grateful for his long campaigns for Community Service Volunteers and for the right of young people to be heard.
The hon. Member for Harlow (Mr. Rammell) made an interesting speech. I agreed with some of his points and disagreed with others. However, may I point out in the gentlest possible way that it is important to carry out research before one makes a speech? He said that Liberal Democrats had not referred to the abolition of tuition fees in our recent statement on the Budget, and he said that we had not costed our proposal. Unfortunately for him, I have a copy of the statement, which categorically states that our programme includes:
- Abolishing university tuition fees up to and including undergraduate level and introducing "hardship benefit" payments in order to increase access.
My hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow) raised the important issue of age discrimination. I have also raised it from time to time, not least in relation to job advertisements. I am delighted that my hon. Friend is pursuing the issue with such vigour.
It has to be admitted that the Government were elected on a tide of good will and high expectations from many people in this country. They thought that they had elected a Government who would help the poor, the pensioners, the lone parents, the socially excluded, those stuck on run-down, crime-ridden housing estates, and those marooned in rural villages with no buses. They thought that they had elected a Government who would come to the rescue of all of those who had been sidelined in the Tory years.
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Inverness, West rightly said in his speech, the Government have taken action on some of those issues. Our concern--the principal concern of the debate--is that the Government's actions have been limited; they have not gone far enough. The Government have been too timid in their thinking and they have failed to grasp some of the real problems that exist. They have been too timid on the social justice agenda.
There appears to be almost a sense of partial denial by the Government. From time to time, they spot an issue and pick it up. The Minister, in his thoughtful speech, was willing to accept the genuine concern about the many elderly people who die from the cold. He said that that was a national disgrace. He also acknowledged that there
needs to be more joined-up Government thinking to address some of the issues. He added that unemployment was still too high, despite the work that has been done and he acknowledged that no one should be complacent and that much needed to be done. I welcome that.The problem is that the Government take a semi-myopic approach. They notice and recognise issues when that suits them, but they pretend that they do not exist at other times. As we know, the Prime Minister has tried to deny the existence of a north-south divide and he seems to think that everything that the Government are doing for pensioners is wonderful. He seems to suggest that those living in rural areas should be glad that they have such pleasant surroundings in which to live and that there is no crisis on our farms. The Government tell us that they are doing wonderful things in the health service, but why do we still have a postcode lottery three years into a Labour Government? Why can one receive certain drugs and treatments in some parts of the country, but not in others?
There are areas of selective myopia. However, when it suits the Government they invent a crisis for their own benefit. That is exactly what we had with the case of Laura Spence, when she could not get into Magdalen college, Oxford. Suddenly, the Chancellor of the Exchequer magically became an expert on how to choose the cleverest five applicants out of 23, all of them with top grades. The best reporting of that incident that I have come across was by my noble Friend Earl Russell in another place. He recently wrote an article which I thought I had here, but which seems to have disappeared. However, his point was simply that the Chancellor of the Exchequer appears to believe that there is a system that can perfectly select students merely on the basis of examination results, or even predicted examination results. Reality is not like that. We all know that, in a highly competitive system, we cannot guarantee that those with the best predicted grades will get the top jobs. If that were the case, the Chancellor of the Exchequer might be the Prime Minister, not the present incumbent.
The key point is that this issue should be left to the professionals to decide using their expertise. I am delighted that, in the two weeks that the Prime Minister has had off, he has had the opportunity to reflect. Although it was much derided by his audience, he made some very good points in his speech to the Women's Institute. He said:
- I think we in government--and that means me--have to trust people more.
Mr. Rammell: Let us put to one side the Laura Spence case. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that there is a real problem with the under-representation of children from state schools at Oxford and Cambridge, given what one would expect from their qualifications?
Mr. Foster: I do not disagree that an issue needs to be addressed. However, the problem is how the issue was addressed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. That is our concern.
The Prime Minister seems to have seen the light in his speech to the Women's Institute today--two weeks on paternity leave has had a great effect on him. He said:
- We don't have to fight over every headline.
It is clear to Liberal Democrats that the solution to that problem is to raise standards in the state education system. One reason why it is difficult to do that and create a level playing field is that the independent sector spends twice as much per pupil as the Government spend per pupil in the state school sector. They are partly tackling the problem with some additional money, but their announcement that they will spend £19 billion would make any double-entry bookkeeper blush.
The Government are making some progress but, despite that, class sizes in secondary schools are at their biggest for 20 years, and class sizes are rising in nursery and junior schools. As my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough rightly pointed out, and despite what the Minister said, the amount of money that is spent per university or further education student is falling under this Government.
There is the issue of how we solve the problem of entry into Oxford and Cambridge. The solution is increased investment in our education service and trusting the professionals in that service to get on and do their job. However, the problem also relates to how we can make more people interested in entering higher education institutions. It is a little odd for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to be so concerned about the issue when he is a member of a Government who introduced the very tuition fees that discourage some people from entering higher education.
I have referred to selective myopia, and it affects many different issues. My right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Inverness, West rightly expressed his concern about the plight of pensioners and the elderly. They--and many people who speak on their behalf--are angry at the pitiful 75p increase in the state pension. There is an urgent need to do more about that.
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