WEDNESDAY 28 JUNE 2000
_________
Members present:
Mr Barry Sheerman, in the Chair
Charlotte Atkins
Valerie Davey
Mr Michael Foster
Dr Evan Harris
Helen Jones
Mr Gordon Marsden
Mr Stephen O'Brien
Mr Nick St Aubyn
_________
MS MARGARET HODGE, a Member of the House, (Parliamentary Under Secretary
of State for Employment and Equal Opportunities, and MR ALAN
CRANSTON, Policy Manager for Early Years, Department for Education
and Employment, examined.
Chairman
434. Before I welcome the Minister may I welcome Dean James Fraser
and Dean James Stellar from the Eastern University of Boston. When there was
a previous Chairman but not the Chairman who is now Minister there was a visit
to the United States where the two Deans who are visiting us today went out
of their way to be both informative and hospitable and we welcome them to our
proceedings today. May I welcome the Minister this morning and say what a
delight it is to have her back here. Whether she is poacher turned gamekeeper
or gamekeeper turned poacher I do not know. We know that this is an area that
she has in a sense made her own but that does not mean to say we are not going
to push her hard this morning in terms of her responsibilities. Can I just
say, Minister, that we are getting towards the end of the inquiry and we are
getting quite dangerous because we think we know a lot. You will probably
find that that is not as true as we think it is, but certainly on this Chair's
part, I was new to Early Years and it has been such a pleasure learning about
it that I am reluctant to come to the end because it has been so interesting.
We have been to Denmark, we have looked at a lot of experience on the ground
around the United Kingdom and I think we are getting there. May I start by
asking you to give a two or three minute introduction?
(Ms Hodge) Thanks very much, Chairman. I am delighted to be here
talking about this and I am really pleased that the Select Committee is doing
this inquiry in what I consider to be a crucial part of education from cradle
to grave. For this Government the priority has been to ensure that children
do get a solid foundation on which they can then build effective learning.
I remember when I was sitting in your chair, Chairman, that we were very
concerned, if you look at OECD comparative figures, that we probably invested
less than any other country in the early years. I hope that by the action we
have taken in the three years we have been in government that we are turning
that round. Certainly in the recent visit we had from the OECD I felt that
they were looking at what we were doing as an exemplar of cutting edge
practice now and policy development, so there has been a real shift. Our
approach has also been to work very much in partnership with all the key
players, so that is partnership with parents, with the child's prime and most
important educator, particularly in the early years, and also in partnership
with all practitioners in the private, voluntary and statutory sectors, and
of course a lot of the early years professionals, some of whom I note advising
you, who also support the work we are doing as the Government. We all
recognise, and you will now be fully au fait with, the importance of the early
years in a child's development. There is an increasing body of research now
around both brain development and an assessment of early years' investment
which demonstrates that if we can get it right it really can make all the
difference to young children, particularly those who do not have the
advantages of background that others do. As a Government committed to
ensuring opportunity for all our children, if we can get it right in the early
years I think we really can enhance opportunities as they move through the
education process. We have put a lot of money into increasing access. Four-
year-olds now all have access. For three-year-olds we are doubling the number
of free places available in this period of government, working towards a
target of universal nursery education for all three- and four-year-olds. We
are also involved in a series of new ways of delivering services, trying to
get an integrated service across care, education and health with the Sure
Start programme and the Early Excellence programme, and there are some
interesting and very positive results coming out of that work. We have also
put a lot of work into enhancing the quality of the Early Years offer. It is
not just enjoying it that matters. It is the quality of what the children
experience which is absolutely crucial to later effective learning. There are
a number of measures we have taken there, such as the early learning goals and
the introduction of the Foundation Stage, and I have brought my copy of the
guidance which I hope you have all got too. We have invested in supporting
the establishment of national training organisations and the development of
a national framework of qualifications. We are bringing together the
regulation and inspection regime. In fact I spent yesterday in committee
taking through in the committee stage the establishment of the new and
distinct arm of OFSTED to bring together the best of care, regulation and
inspection with Early Years regulation and inspection. We are supporting all
the sectors to build on the diversity we have got to create a level playing
field, so there has been very generous support of the pre-school movement on
the one hand and money into reception classes on the other hand to do
something about the ratios there, where we want to move to a 1 to 15 ratio.
We have replaced the market driven philosophy of the previous government with
planning through the early years development and child care partnerships, and
I think they are now developing into a very powerful local community facility.
I never cease to wonder, when I go to visit partnerships, and I am sure you
have had that too, that you can get 200 people in the locality giving up a
Saturday to think about and talk about and plan early years in child care
services in their locality. We are developing partnerships with parents
through information services and through our Sure Start and Early Excellence
programmes. It is an unusually ambitious agenda, Chairman. We will need time
to make this work. I have never thought that this was a programme for one
Parliament. To get it right I think is a good five to 10-year programme,
particularly if improvements are to be lasting, but I think we have made a
fantastically good start in partnership with all those who are providing early
years education out there. I do not think there has been a more exciting time
to be in the early years world and I was just thinking about it this morning
on the way in. You and I are contemporaries. At our higher education
institution we both struggled I think to find appropriate early years settings
for our children. I just hope we can get it right for our grandchildren.
435. Thanks very much, Minister. I was remiss in not introducing
Alan Cranston. That is because he did not have a name plate. Welcome, Alan,
and you will be contributing, I know, to our session. Can I start, Minister,
by taking you up on the question of the Early Years partnerships? We have
found as we have gone round the country that where they work well they work
very well indeed. As you said, we saw in Bristol people giving up their
evening to go to hear this Professor Pascal talk about best practice and so
on. There were an enormous number of people there, great energy. You could
see in that instance the partnership working extremely well. But the fact of
the matter is that in some places we have been to it is not working very well.
I know you have approved all the partnerships but there are areas where you
can see that there perhaps is a dominance of one party that does not really
want to share. Sometimes they needed to go for an independent chair and did
not do that and perhaps diplomatically took a local government chair where it
could possibly have been better with an independent chair. In a sense what
I am saying to you is that where the partnerships are not working that well
what can you do as a Minister to shake them up and make sure that they learn
from best practice as quickly as possible?
(Ms Hodge) The first thing to say is that they are very young and I
think it will take time to evolve. The second thing is that we are bringing
together people from very diverse backgrounds and interests and professional
expertise and experience, and expecting them to focus perhaps on one
particular topic. That is I think releasing a lot of innovation but we have
got to get those relationships working well for it to be effective locally.
I want to celebrate the good, is really what I am saying. We are putting into
place a lot of structures to support partnerships and particularly to support
the weaker partnerships. For instance, we do hold regional network
conferences with chairs. We also hold them with the Early Years development
officers and with the members, so we have a series of those. We have best
practice guides. I hope the Committee has seen some of them but we have put
those out to partnerships. We are launching an award scheme with Cherie Blair
to help us spread good practice and celebrate innovation. We have an annual
conference which I went to last year where we were at the Business Design
Centre, and it was so overflowing with people that we decided we have to go
to the Millennium Dome this year. We are not quite going there but it was
incredibly good. We are running funding strategy workshops for the
partnerships. We are running seminars in rural areas where there are
particular problems. Probably most importantly, we are also in the process
of recruiting six consultants whose prime job will be to support the weaker
partnerships to bring them up to the quality of the best, and we are looking
at how we can twin partnerships so that those that are working well can
support and help those that are working less well to develop better. There
is a whole range of steps we are taking.
Charlotte Atkins
436. What are your criteria of a failing partnership? Where you
have a partnership effectively grafted on to an unenthusiastic and even
obstructive LEA, what action is open to you to take against that partnership
or against that LEA?
(Ms Hodge) I do not think they are failing yet. We approved 146 out of
150 plans. I know that yours was one of those that was not approved. At this
stage I would say that I would like to be two or three years down the line
before I described them as failing. Some are weaker than others. The sort
of criteria that we have regard to are whether or not they are working
effectively in partnership. There are some, let us be blunt, where the local
authority dominates the effort that takes place locally and we do want to see
diversity in the partners who come together to develop and create a local
offer. We would look at the partnership working as one, the ability to meet
the targets that we set for four-year-olds and now for three-year-olds and for
child care places as another. As they evolve we are setting them greater
tasks. Training strategies are important, looking at what they are doing for
children with special educational needs. We have put money aside for that.
Whether they have got their information services up and running properly is
important, which has been a really exciting development. Parents hopefully
will be able shortly to go into supermarkets or post offices and plug in what
their child care needs are in a kiosk and get out the local child care
provision. Those are the sorts of criteria. I am looking to Alan to see if
I have left anything out.
(Mr Smith) I think the only thing I would add is that they do of course
have to agree the plan. That is a requirement and clearly if they cannot
agree the plan there is a problem, but it is not a problem that we have had.
437. How would you expect them to conduct their meetings? Would
you expect at least some of the meetings to be open so that parents, governors
and others could attend or make representations, and would you expect an
agenda which involved sharing information rather than just a pre-set agenda
by the LEA?
(Ms Hodge) I can see absolutely no reason why the meetings should not be
open. The most effective partnerships have also developed sub-groups to look
at specific areas and that is a way of involving more people in each locality
in developing real partnership working. Again the most effective partnerships
take a number of steps to ensure that for example the time when they hold
their meetings are convenient and whether or not they provide child care.
Take child minders as an instance. A child minder having to attend a daytime
meeting of a partnership will have to find alternative child care for the
children in their care. Making arrangements for that sort of instance to
ensure real partnership working and participation is what the most effective
partnerships are doing. I cannot think of a reason why any meeting should be
held in private.
438. Also if a body of people wanted to make representations to
the meeting presumably they should be allowed to make those representations?
(Ms Hodge) Yes. We would not want to dictate from the centre how
partnerships work, but what we do want is genuine partnership, open working,
an inclusive mechanism which ensures that everybody feels that they have a
stake in the development of services locally.
Helen Jones
439. The QCA guidance made it clear that the elements of the
Literacy Hour and daily mathematics lesson ought to be introduced into
reception gradually and need not be taken in a one-hour block. Bearing in
mind that many children in reception classes are now very young, only four,
what do you believe is the best way of starting children to learn the elements
of literacy and numeracy at that age?
(Ms Hodge) Can I just say one thing before we come on to reception
classes? I am sure we will come back to this one as well. I genuinely think
it does not matter where children are. What matters is the experience they
are receiving. I hope that over time as we improve the quality of what
children receive the distinction of whether they are sitting in a reception
class, in a nursery class, in a pre-school or in a private nursery, will
disappear. It is the experience they are receiving which I think is of first
importance. That is why for instance we are putting money into reception
classes. We have put money into the 60 most deprived authorities to ensure
that the ratio there of adult to child is appropriate for that age, 1 to 15,
not the 1 to 30 that many were at when we came into office. Again the
curriculum guidance is littered with examples of the sort of good practice
which reception class and other teachers should employ to gradually introduce
the Literacy Hour so that by the end of the reception year the children are
ready to start effectively on Key Stage 1. First of all the children will be
of different ages in the reception class, and secondly they will be at
different stages of development. The effective teacher is one that responds
to those different ages and different stages. We have been very anxious that
in introducing the Foundation Stage and in introducing the early learning
goals we should not make reception class teachers think that they have to use
the literacy and numeracy hour to its full at the beginning. As I knew you
would ask me this question, Helen, somewhere along the line, I did bring two
documents. One was the press release I put out at the time that we produced
the guidance in which I said: "In the reception year teachers should teach
the different elements of the Literacy Hour and daily mathematics lesson
flexibly throughout the year, spread throughout the day and appropriate to the
age, and by the end of that final year of the Foundation Stage children should
then be ready for entry to year one." I have also written to the Chief
Inspector along similar lines in discussing how we see the teaching of
literacy in the Foundation Stage, where I have said: "What is in fact
required is that teachers plan and teach to the objectives in the two
frameworks, that the elements of the Literacy Hour and daily mathematics
lesson are taught throughout the reception year and that the full session is
established by the end of it. Earlier in the year it is perfectly acceptable
for these to be delivered flexibly across the day rather than together in a
single lesson. It is for schools to judge the pace of introduction
appropriate for children in their care, observing the framework objectives."
To reinforce that the national numeracy and literacy strategy are both
producing guidance specifically for reception teachers around how to introduce
literacy and numeracy strategies.
440. I think that is very helpful and it perhaps answers one of
the questions that we raised when we had the Chief Inspector giving evidence
to us. But while that is relatively easy to institute in schools, how will
you ensure that in the private and voluntary sector children are receiving the
same quality of experience? Are you convinced that all the staff operating
in those areas have the necessary expertise to introduce those elements of
literacy and numeracy in a way which is appropriate to the age and stage of
development of the children they care for?
(Ms Hodge) Not yet. We inherited a huge diversity of offer and that is
part of the United Kingdom strength and we want to build on that, but we need
to enhance quality and the early findings from the EPPE research, which I know
you have had before the Committee, demonstrate that there is diversity in the
quality of settings. I think the Inspector's own reports, although they all
demonstrate an improvement in quality, also give evidence of a diversity in
quality. How are we trying to tackle it? Through training and through
investing in the workforce. I am launching at the end of this week a campaign
to recruit more people into the early years sector. We are spending quite a
lot of money, three to four million pounds a year, on that. We need to invest
in training as well. It is a mixture of training, providing appropriate
guidance, encouraging recruitment. Sharing good practice I think is another
element of it. The Early Excellence centres, of which we have 29, are centres
where very good practice is currently going on and we want to extend those and
use them perhaps as training capacities for other settings within that area.
We deliberately this year put eight million pounds into establishing the
training programme around the early learning and Foundation Stages. Next year
there is œ13.5 million in the standards fund to that purpose, not enough but
it is a good start. A lot of that money is being focused on the private and
voluntary sector.
Chairman
441. Can we have a copy of that letter to Chris Woodhead?
(Ms Hodge) I will have to ask him. Is that all right?
Chairman: That is fine.
Helen Jones
442. It is encouraging to hear about training and it is something
all the members of the Committee would support. In the meantime it is fair
to say that while the Committee has seen some examples of very good practice
we have also seen some examples of very bad practice where people genuinely
believe they are doing the best thing - children tracing out letters and so
on. How do you get the message across to people running the various types of
setting in the meantime that that is not necessarily the best way to teach
children the elements of literacy and numeracy, that that is not what we are
asking them to do?
(Ms Hodge) First of all I have seen good practice in all kinds of
settings, so I have seen good practice in reception classes and poor practice.
I have seen good practice in pre-schools and poor practice. That goes right
across the setting. I do not want people to think that one is better than
another, although on the whole in the Early Excellence centres I have seen
brilliant practice, absolutely wonderful practice in most of those, and in
many nursery schools I have seen really good practice. We are now working
hard and trying to see how we could maintain those nursery schools at a time
when they are financially threatened. How do you do it? I think it has to
be through training, it has to be through guidance, it has to be through the
inspection, it has to be through the support from local authorities, and it
has to be through sharing good practice. I do not think there is a magic
answer, I do not think there is a quick answer. I think we are getting it
better and again the Chief Inspector's annual reports on four-year-olds in
getting nursery education grant demonstrate an improvement but it will take
time. This was an undervalued area in the past. Nobody valued the early
years. It is not a highly valued area in the education world, it is not seen
as the place to go. Our job is to raise the status and to convince everybody
that actually the early years are one of the most rewarding and important
areas in which to invest your energy and best people.
443. You mentioned in the section something that we are concerned
with. Do you think that OFSTED has the necessary expertise in early years to
take on the extra role of inspecting for early years settings?
(Ms Hodge) Yes. They have not got it now. The new distinct arm of
OFSTED will have the expertise because we are building it in a way to ensure
that it does.
Chairman
444. It was a bit worrying though, Minister, when Chris Woodhead
came here last week and said he did not think it was necessary for the person
who might be the head of that unit to have any early years experience. We
thought that very disturbing as a Committee.
(Ms Hodge) We need a range of skills in the person who will be heading
that Early Years Directorate and we have yet to see who is in put in post.
The post has not even been advertised yet.
445. Do you not think that the person in that critical role should
have some experience of early years?
(Ms Hodge) I think that it would be absolutely crucial to have firmly
embedded in this new and distinct arm of OFSTED strong experience of the early
years. But just to explain what we are doing, it has always been a nonsense
to me to have separate regulatory and inspection regimes for care and
education. Kids do not distinguish and we do not distinguish and life has
changed. Bringing together the inspection and regulatory regimes for early
years is a huge advance. What we need to be very careful of when we establish
it is that we establish a presence which brings together the best of child
care, early years inspection and regulation with the best of early years
education inspection and regulation. If one says to you that this new arm of
OFSTED will be three times as large as the existing arm, I think it will be
difficult for it not to develop its own distinctive culture and presence
within the enlarged presence of OFSTED. Many of the people working in local
authorities who do the child care, the under-8s workers who do the child care
inspection, will transfer to OFSTED so it will be very much the same people
but working alongside and together with nursery education inspectors, so again
that will I think bring strength to the sector. OFSTED are changing the
guidance they do for their section 10 and their section 122 inspection reports
to introduce care there, and similarly, as they take over the inspection role
under the Children Act, they will change the guidance for that to bring the
two more closely together.
Charlotte Atkins
446. You have said that you have seen a range of provision in
different settings, some excellent, some not so good. Can you justify the
difference in child/staff ratios? It is 1 to 30 in reception classes, 1 to
13 in nursery schools, and 1 to 8 in play groups. How can we, if we are
trying to bring together early years, justify that difference in resources
because obviously it will have an impact on the experience of the child? That
is one thing they do notice. They may not notice whether it is the private
sector or the state sector, but they do recognise the ratio and their access
to the adults in that room.
(Ms Hodge) We intend over time to create a level playing field but it is
a very complicated issue and we are determined to get it right. Again we have
taken a number of steps to reduce ratios in reception classes to 1 to 15. We
are just starting on a pilot on ratios in the private and voluntary sector
where the Thomas Coram Research Institute are monitoring it for us, where in
50 settings in the private and voluntary sector we are looking at the impact
of a ratio of 1 to 13 with a qualified teacher.
Chairman
447. One to 13?
(Ms Hodge) One to 13.
448. We had heard it was 1 to 15.
(Ms Hodge) One to 26. I think it is 1 to 13, fitting in with the 1 to
26 ratio. There are all these ratios all over the place. It is 1 to 13 but
with a qualified teacher. We want to learn from that pilot before we make a
further move on ratios. The reason is that adult/child ratios matter but the
qualifications and the quality of the individual working with the child are
equally important and the very early research that we are getting out of the
EPPE research programme is beginning to give us further insight on that. We
are also doing a trail through the international research, Chairman, to see
what other evidence we have got on ratios. Two members of the Committee were
with us when we went to Switzerland and looked at what they were doing there.
Interestingly, there they worked on a ratio of 1 to 18 but with a highly
qualified and experienced teacher in charge of the class. I think the issue
of ratios is a complicated one. I think qualifications may matter as much as
if not more than numbers. We need to get it right before we move to the level
playing field.
Charlotte Atkins
449. So what will be the time span of the Government to achieve
that?
(Ms Hodge) I am trying to think when that report is due.
(Mr Smith) That is due in December.
(Ms Hodge) We are doing the trawl through of the research. We will get
the EPPE research by about the same time. We will have our pilots completed
by then, so hopefully we will be able to move forward in the new year on that.
450. Lastly, given that you are very keen on making sure that
staff are properly qualified, what will you do with those pre-school play
groups where you have unqualified staff and, be honest, sometimes very poor
provision? Would you be suggesting that that sort of provision should be
closed down if you felt it was inadequate?
(Ms Hodge) I do not want to close anything down but we are currently
developing a set of national standards for all settings against which the
Chief Inspector will then inspect those settings. We will be putting those
out for consultation hopefully in the next two or three weeks, something like
that. Within those standards we will be consulting on the qualification
levels of staff within all settings. Then we will set a timetable for
implementing that over time. We do not want to close anything; we want to
bring people up. As far as the pre-schools are concerned David Blunkett
announced an additional new œ250,000 and that is going specifically to
supporting particular pre-schools into moving forward so that they more
appropriately meet the changing needs both from the early education agenda and
also from the child care agenda.
Mr Marsden
451. We have heard a lot from the witnesses who have come before
us about the importance of play activities in a variety of settings and in a
variety of structures. I wanted to start by asking you, given the demands of
the Literacy Hour although you have already said that those can be delivered
quite flexibly, are you happy that the value of play is sufficiently
acknowledged and recognised in the new structures that you are putting
forward?
(Ms Hodge) Yes, completely yes. I think if you do have the time to look
through the guidance play is very firmly embedded there in the activities that
we expect children to learn. Can I just say - I always say this but I will
repeat it here - that we need to stop putting learning and play as two
separate and competing objectives. They are very closely interlinked and we
increasingly should be seeing how children can learn through play. Equally,
if you want to create a predisposition towards learning, which is what the
Early Years is largely about, then you must make learning fun. I often think
it is a false distinction. I think the more helpful way forward is to see how
we can bring the two together and I hope the structures we are establishing,
both in the Foundation Stage and in the regulatory framework, will support
that thesis.
Chairman
452. We found far too many parents of infants not understanding
that creative play is hard work to organise. You have to do it well and we
saw some really good examples of best practice, but we saw other examples of
children just running around, doing their own thing, very little mediation of
that play or structure of that play, which did not look very good to us. It
seems to us that there has not been a job yet of really educating the parents
about the difference between children running around doing their own thing and
structured play in the right setting with absolutely, most importantly, a
highly qualified person who understands it and getting that message across.
(Ms Hodge) I agree with that.
Mr Marsden
453. Can I come back to the point we made about abolishing the
distinction? Most of us would share that view and it is a very noble
aspiration. What I would like to hear a bit more about, when you are at the
sharp end of delivering the (rightly) demanding curriculum which is now being
set up, is what safeguards have you got in there. We know from when the
national curriculum was introduced of the concerns that were expressed
initially about the literacy and numeracy hour crowding other important
aspects of the curriculum and obviously that has had to be developed and
modified. Are you sufficiently confident that you have enough safeguards in
the structures, in the advice so that when people are very much at the sharp
end of delivering, perhaps initially with relatively modest resources and in
a fairly sharp timescale, that they will not fall back on a rote response to
the Literacy Hour and neglect the elements of play which you quite rightly
said are so important?
(Ms Hodge) I think it is going to take us time to get to our objective.
We will not achieve this overnight. It is going to take time partly because
of the diversity of the settings that are out there and with which we are
working, partly because of the lack of qualifications and training within the
workplace. Forty four per cent of people in the last workforce survey we had,
which was 1998 and we are just about to commission a new one, did not have an
appropriate qualification, one in four in pre-schools do not, 70 per cent of
child minders do not. One in five in private nurseries do not. Those are the
figures. There is a huge task ahead of us in supporting and training those
who work with young children. There is a huge task in changing cultures in
a lot of settings. How do you make sure it happens? It is the practitioner
on the ground planning the activities properly and then supporting the child
and making sure that at every instance where a child is playing how you can
develop that particular experience into a learning experience, all that sort
of stuff which is absolutely crucial. I think we are putting into place the
essential elements of a framework which will support a raising of quality in
the early years and that is the regulatory regime, the curriculum, the
training strategy, the recruitment and the expansion of services. We have got
all those bits in place and we have now got to work jolly hard to make sure
that every practitioner in every setting comes up to the quality of the best.
454. Finally can I raise with you a very specific concern? I
think it was the Early Years co-ordinators who discussed this with us. That
is about the opportunities for external play. I think there is a widespread
disturbing view that because of the social and psychological pressures on
parents these days children simply do not get the experience of outdoor play
that perhaps they would have got 20 or 30 years ago. This is tied into all
sorts of things like fear of crime, fear of strangers and so on. Whatever the
reason for it, it does appear from evidence that we have received to be the
case. What are you going to do to make sure not that those problems can all
be solved but that the outdoor learning opportunities which you are talking
about in the new guidance will give sufficient opportunity for children to
experience that sort of playing outside element and what are the resource
implications for that?
(Ms Hodge) Across the Department there is a strong investment now in
ensuring not only that we keep the outdoor play facilities that we have in
education, but that we enhance them. I know that my ministerial colleagues
are working hard to both preserve what we have got and then in the
comprehensive spending review support a planned expansion of that. There is
a need for more capital investment in the early years. For the first time
there was a specific sum set aside in this latest New Deal round for
investment in early years and we have been able to distribute that to all
authorities, not a lot but it was a start. We need to ensure more capital
investment again subject to CSR negotiations and all that. The final thing
I was going to say which I think is quite important is that I hope that more
and more early years settings, particularly in the private and voluntary
sector (and this is a way forward), can co-operate with schools if there is
the space within the school to have a pre-school within the school. I have
seen them in secondary schools and it is a really good family support way of
running things. If you can get more early years activity within a school,
there is there probably still the opportunity for more outdoor play and then
our investment in making sure that it is appropriate to the age of the child,
I think we can provide that.
Chairman
455. But is it not an attitude of mind? When we were in Denmark
Gordon missed spending an hour in the pouring rain with lots of little tiny
tots - they were dressed for the weather; we were not. There is an attitude
there that the children go out every day in pouring rain, snow, tiny tots and
they have an attitude of getting out and it is important to their development.
We found a lot of pre-school experience here in poky old chapels rather than
going out, in make-do-and-mend buildings where it did not come across to many
members of the Committee that there was any role at all in pre-school of
taking a child out into the park, out into the woods, out for an experience
that would broaden their horizon. It just seemed to me and the rest of the
Committee, certainly the ones that went to Denmark, that their attitude (and
we could build this into the curriculum even) was to have an alertness to the
importance of this. We were very impressed, although we got very wet, by the
Danish experience.
(Ms Hodge) Chairman, if you have the time, and I cannot remember the
name of it off the top of my head, there is one Early Excellence centre which
basically takes the kids out into the forest.
456. I thought you were going to say "and then lost them"!
(Ms Hodge) I will let the Committee have the name of it because they are
also spreading their good practice elsewhere. The whole of the curriculum is
taught outdoors to the children in all weathers. I was petrified. I saw these
little kids with saws sawing away at the wood, and all their early literacy,
numeracy, everything, comes from their experiences in the forest and play.
There are the wild flowers and the little insects and so on that they find.
It was just fantastic. It is one of our Early Excellence centres. I cannot
remember the name. It is in the New Forest.
Mr St Aubyn
457. Minister, you said earlier that the diversity of provision in
this country is one of our strengths. Does that not mean that when all of
these children are in the same class by the age of five they will arrive there
at different speeds, at different stages of development? Are you not worried
that those who have benefited from the Literacy Hour will then lose the
advantage that that might have given to their whole education as their
teachers have to focus most of their time bringing the other members of the
class up to speed?
(Ms Hodge) My ambition would be that they are not all at the same level
because we are not expecting the Early Learning goals to be target or a test
in the same way that Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 are. The ambition is that
wherever they come from, whatever setting they have experienced before they
come into school will provide a very similar experience. We can ensure that
if there is a much greater uniformity of quality across the field then the
issue that you focus on should not be a problem. Some parents may prefer a
different setting before school and ought to have the choice to let their kids
do that and a knowledge that their children will get a jolly good experience
in that setting.
458. You obviously accept the right of parents to choose what type
of setting is appropriate for children. Some parents, for their own reasons,
may believe that a non-academic setting if you like, one which does not
include the Literacy Hour, is preferable for them. When I raised this matter
with the Chief Inspector the response from OFSTED was, "Only one of our 13
criteria in our inspection relates to the Literacy Hour. Most of what we are
inspecting is about security and other aspects of provision". Are you saying
here that in your view they must all have undertaken that Literacy Hour
component of early years provision? Without that there will be differences
in the stage they have reached once they get to school, will there not?
(Ms Hodge) The Foundation Stage gives them a framework. In a sense it
is the first time we have recognised the early years as a distinct phase in
its own right, so it gives them a curriculum. The Early Learning goals are
where we would expect most children to be by the time they start on Key Stage
1. Some will have exceeded it; some will not have got there. All settings,
wherever the child is, that attract nursery education grant will be inspected
by OFSTED on nationally set criteria and a nationally established framework.
Chairman
459. But Nick is right, is he not? I am glad he has brought us
back to literacy and numeracy in the sense that we found that out. Select
Committees with their ears to the ground do quite a good job of finding out
what is going on and perhaps everyone is not quite as well behaved and on
message as when a Minister visits. We picked up that there were very mixed
messages about the literacy and numeracy hour amongst teachers. On the one
hand there is a message going out from the Chief Inspector and a different
message going out from QCA. We really did find that on the one hand the
brave, well organised team in a school saying, "We are going to teach literacy
and numeracy the way we know is effective. We are not going to sit the kids
down for an hour at this young age", full of confidence. Others were less
confident about what they should be doing and worried about it because they
were getting this message from OFSTED and different messages from elsewhere.
We did find there was a distance there. It is not imagined; it is real.
Secondly, there was concern on the ground that some of the transition, the
movement of a child from one stage to the next did, not really connect up
sometimes. The stage that they were at did not lead to a progression. In
fact, you could get a non-progression if you like.
(Ms Hodge) We are not there yet. We are only three years into this. If
you take out the first settling in year it has probably been for two years
that we are really focused on what we are doing. I find when I go out primary
school parents who are worried that if they do not have a Literacy Hour fully
in place at the beginning from September onwards for four-year-olds upwards,
they are going to fail their inspection. Yes, that exists out there.
Equally, there are pre-schools who, when they start, if they are having their
first OFSTED inspection, are also thinking that what they have to do is show
very traditional literacy and numeracy activities. Of course there is a huge
amount of work to do to ensure that the framework and the objectives we have
established are right. The curriculum is only coming in in September this
year. We are only now training and that will support a much better move into
Key Stage 1. OFSTED will only start inspecting in September 2001. That again
will take time to lead in. The training and raising of the quality of
practitioners who work with young children will take a longer time for us to
get right. Yes, we could all find examples of people not understanding our
objectives at this point. I would like you to go back in five years' time,
let us say, and you will probably see a massive improvement.
Mr St Aubyn
460. If the agenda is that you are going to raise the requirements
across Early Years provision above where it is now, which may reduce some of
that diversity and may answer the problem we discussed originally, are you not
concerned that the cost of that early years provision may then become out of
the reach of some of the families who are taking advantage of it, and are you
not also concerned that some of those who in the past would have been drawn
into the world of early years provision will be frightened off because they
feel it is no longer for them because it is too professional and too
demanding?
(Ms Hodge) I am convinced that we are right on that because of the
importance of the early years in a child's life. I do want to retain the
diversity, so that what we have to get right is the investment in all the
sectors which will enable them to enhance the quality. We do not want to
over-professionalise the profession. Our recruitment campaign, which you will
hopefully see on your televisions from the beginning of next week - although
it is actually daytime TV so none of us will see it but I hope potential
recruits will see it - is all about saying, "You can do this if you have got
a way with kids" and bringing people in and then hopefully, through
professional development when they are in a particular setting, enhancing the
quality. It is a difficult balance to play. You want to bring people in, you
do want to enhance their professional capacity when they are in there through
competencies and training, and you do want to retain diversity. We have got
to get that. I am conscious that we are working hard to retain that balance.
The only other way thing I would say is that we are putting in lots of extra
money. For example, on the three-year-olds' places, there is 1160 per child
this year. Eighty per cent of the places in the first year of expanding those
went into the private and voluntary sector. Half went into the pre-school
sector. These are unprecedented resources that are going into sectors which
survived in the past without any public investment at all.
461. I hope you succeed in drawing these people in. The Committee
has found a number of Early Years providers on very low wages. Is it possible
to raise their salaries and at the same time provide the provision at a cost
which families can afford?
(Ms Hodge) Firstly, we introduced the minimum wage and I have to say
that from my postbag I was shocked by the number of MPs who wrote to me about
pre-schools in their constituencies where the minimum wage caused a problem
and one particular constituency where literally in a pre-school they were
paying 90p an hour. That I think is an outrage of how we value the early
years. We have done that. Over time as we raise the qualifications and
status of working in the early years sector that is bound to have an impact
on income levels for those working there. Part of that will be met through
the state, part will be met through the working family tax credit again to
support low income families, and part will be met through parents paying.
Again we need to get that balance right. At the moment 98 per cent of people
in the sector are women. That is not a totally appropriate role model we want
to give our young children. If we want to encourage more men into the sector,
again that is an issue of status and money, so we have to think about those
things.
Dr Harris: I just wanted to challenge the assumptions in the earlier
line of questioning from Nick that if a four-year-old was not getting formal
literacy training this would be a disaster long term and they would somehow
be felt to be falling behind.
Mr St Aubyn: I did not say that.
Dr Harris
462. Is there not evidence from abroad that even if you start
teaching literacy and numeracy at the age of five or six the children educated
in the economies of our European partners are not more backward compared to
the go-ahead British "teach them at four" children who, when they come to the
age of nine, 10, 11, 12, are not necessarily any further ahead?
(Ms Hodge) This is all about at what age do you start school really.
463. No: at what age do you start formal teaching of literacy and
numeracy.
(Ms Hodge) What I would say to you is, as I said in my answer to Gordon
earlier, that we have got to get rid of this distinction between learning and
play. My children learned from when they were born. I always tell this
story, that the very first toy I bought the children was a learning toy, which
was a post box which you different shapes into. That was far too
sophisticated a toy for the babies at the time. There I was, an over-
ambitious mum and I bought them this post box. Children learn through play.
Children acquire all sorts of skills which are important for later effective
learning of literacy and numeracy.
464. I know.
(Ms Hodge) And they acquire literacy and numeracy skills from a very
early age.
465. I agree with you and I do not argue with what you have just
said. I was arguing with the reasonable amount of concern that Nick
reflected, that parents feel that if their children are not getting what has
been advertised as very important, which is formal literacy and numeracy, even
in short bursts, at as early an age as possible, they are going to fall behind
never to catch up. Should we not on the evidence be sending messages that it
is not necessarily a bad thing for children to be asked to learn through play
and less through formal teaching and learning until they are five or six?
(Ms Hodge) I just do not accept the question in the way that it has been
framed. That is the difficulty I have. I do not accept that question.
Certainly when we get to Key Stage 1 the literacy and numeracy hour are
incredibly successful, very popular, and are helping to raise standards. What
we have said is that in the reception year, which is the year that you move
into the Literacy Hour, there should be flexibility in how that is introduced
over time. That is the advice that I hope is going through OFSTED, through
the QCA, through ourselves, through all the essential people to that effect.
I just do not accept the question.
Chairman: Minister, I am sure you used to have to say this when you
were sitting in this chair. We have got half an hour left so I am going to
ask for short questions and answers because I want to get through quite a lot
of territory before we finish.
Mr Foster
466. What is the best month for entry to reception for summer-born
children?
(Ms Hodge) The best month! What a difficult question. This is not
fair.
Chairman
467. The special advisers are all ears here!
(Ms Hodge) I suppose what I would say is that it depends on the stage of
the child's development as well as their age. There is concern about summer-
born children going in in September. We did do this survey to see whether
parents felt they had been forced into the choice, where we took out a sample
of just summer-born children in a much larger cohort so it was a statistically
valid survey, and that demonstrated that parents were happy with the choice
and felt they had enough information. Parents on the whole do not feel forced
into it. We put advice out to local authorities saying, "Stagger your entry",
and over half of the local authorities are now doing that and are not taking
in the children all in one go. We have got some interesting experiments
taking place which we are watching. In York they are not admitting any child
until they are of compulsory school age, so we will watch how that impacts and
we are doing some work with that. Where is the other one? In either Bradford
or Kirklees, and we will tell you which one, they now enable parents -----
468. Is this a positive experience or not? If it is positive it
is in Kirklees, my area.
(Ms Hodge) It is. It is a positive story. What they are doing there is
giving parents a choice as to whether the child should go into reception year
or year one. Again we are watching that. There has always been an issue
about summer-born children and they catch up over time and all we must do is
to ensure that teachers teach flexibly so they respond to the different needs
of children.
Mr Foster
469. I am interested in your answer. I say it with a vested
interest in that my son is four next month. As a parent I can tell you there
is enormous pressure to go to reception in the September, allied with the fact
that most schools will only take one intake and that is in September. Some
schools offer an intake in January. From what you are saying your advice is
for LEAs to be more flexible in that sense.
(Ms Hodge) Yes, but it has to be a local decision. You would all be the
first to denounce us if we were to prescribe that from the centre.
Helen Jones
470. But is it not right that effectively, although we have a
compulsory starting age for school of five, the decisions that many LEAs are
taking mean that parents do not often have a real choice because if they want
to get their child into the school of their choice they have to send them at
four? Is that not in effect changing the compulsory school starting age
without us having any real debate about whether that is the best thing for
children?
(Ms Hodge) No. I will keep bashing away on this. I think the argument
over the school starting age is actually a redundant argument. I feel that
strongly about it. We have a tradition here going back 58 years of children
having compulsory school a age of five. What matters is the nature of the
experience the child has, that it should be appropriate to their age and their
stage of development. In all these countries where they may talk about the
compulsory, formal starting age being later, they all have a very well
developed kindergarten, pre-school, call it what you like, phase in which most
children, 90 per cent to 100 per cent of the children, are engaged. It does
not matter. It should not matter whether the child is in a reception class
or in a nursery class. What matters is that what they are enjoying is
appropriate to their age and stage of development. That is what the
Foundation Stage is about. That is what the Early Years is about.
Mr Foster
471. Given the experience that parents are currently going through
one of the things that we are finding is that when you talk to teachers about
the starting at reception class they will say, "If you do not start in
September you will miss out on the important induction period. By all means
your child can start later in the year, say at Christmas, but of course you
will not get the induction period that those children who start in September
have". Would you urge schools to say that they have to be able to provide
similar induction periods at other times so that parents do have a real choice
when it comes to starting in the reception class?
(Ms Hodge) Yes.
Valerie Davey
472. You can hear from people round the table, whether they are
parents or experts, that we all have a view about an area of education that
you started by saying is crucial, so why have we not got the experts, well
paid, invested in this part of the education system as opposed to later on?
(Ms Hodge) Because we have not invested in it in the past. That was in
my introductory remarks. I said that our investment in early years as a
proportion of the education budget as a whole was abysmally low. It is two
per cent of budget. I cannot remember the OECD figures now but the Danes,
whom you went to see, spend 12 or 14 per cent, it is very much higher. We are
putting that right as both the education budget goes and the proportion on
early years education expands. That takes time. You cannot grow a cohort of
well experienced, early years educators overnight.
473. But is the Department looking to develop a career structure
for those involved, and indeed for the expertise - and we have three excellent
examples here in the people who have been advising this Committee - of people
in higher education who indeed are able therefore to complement that career
development for those on the ground in both the voluntary and private and of
course the state sectors?
(Ms Hodge) Yes. They are all sitting on hugely expanding departments,
I hope, within their universities. This has been a really important bit of
work that we are almost through. We have developed what I always call our
climbing frame of qualifications where somebody can come in, as into a
parent/toddler club, without any qualifications at all and start working
through NVQs. The NVQ 4 is now finally available in child care and early
years education, and we are negotiating with three or four higher education
institutions so that from that NVQ 4, with a couple of modules that they would
have to do for the intellectual underpinning, they can then move straight into
the third year of a degree course. The NVQ will take them into the third year
of a degree course and then if they can do the relevant teacher practice they
could move into becoming qualified teachers. Interestingly enough, this whole
framework that we have established is beginning to have an ill effect as well
as a good effect. One of the reasons we have found a decline in child minders
is that many of them now are using that to step out into other careers in
health education and teaching and social work.
474. I just want to emphasise the need, which I hope the
Department appreciates, for family support. We have heard of the need for the
parent to be the first teacher (and you perhaps were an over-enthusiastic one
as you have described yourself), that is, the understanding that there is
parental involvement but that those people who are taking a professional lead
are also there to enhance the quality for those children in their family
context as well as the more structured early years settings that we have been
talking about this morning.
(Ms Hodge) Yes, and we are making important advances there, particularly
from what we are learning from the Early Excellence centres and beginning to
learn from Sure Start. I do not know whether the Committee has had the
opportunity to look at the Early Findings Report that we have done on the
Early Excellence centres. What that has demonstrated is that where you do put
in place family support as well as care and education, for every pound you
invest in family support services you save eight pounds on alternative family
support expenditure, which is very much in line with the American experience,
and children with special educational needs are much more likely to go into
mainstream school and the unit cost of everything you provide is 40 per cent
less.
Mr O'Brien
475. Pursuing the line of these qualifications, which clearly is
the trend that you are seeking to push forward, my concern is that there are
qualified teachers and child carers who are even today doing a less effective
job than many gifted amateurs. I can see where the trend is taking us but I
am concerned that this is actually to the exclusion and even the detriment and
perhaps even over time the condemnation of gifted amateurs who played such a
crucial role in the past and, to use your words, may well be very good with
children and hence very important for pre-school times.
(Ms Hodge) There are more people working in early years education and
child care than there are teachers. It is a bigger workforce. It is 460,000
or something like that. There are also about 43,000 volunteers working there.
One of the strengths of the pre-school movement is that it brings parents in
very much as partners in the early years experience so they develop their
skills and they may hopefully go on and work in child care. We are all for
ensuring that everybody with a gift or an interest in working in this sector
should be encouraged to do so. Having said that, clearly, as we try and raise
standards, ensuring that the practitioners learn how to deliver the Foundation
Stage appropriately, we learn how to ensure that children's potential is
really realised, and that needs support. Of course we want to encourage
volunteers into it, we want to bring more in. We think a lot of the best
people come through being a parent of a toddler but we also want to enhance
the quality of what they can give to children by in-service development.
476. Moving on in the light of your answer, at a recent visit to
a pre-school in a very deprived area where the catchment area clearly had a
lot of social problems attached to many of the families, the head teacher was
concerned about an over-prescriptive approach and said the only thing that
really mattered was trying to develop the toddlers' confidence and that was
their ultimate aim over the period that they had them, and very often this
confidence evaporated and indeed was attacked the minute they reached the
school gate when leaving the school because they had single parents who would
then use language and an approach to their own children which was counter-
productive to say the least. What steps do you really think can be achieved
to try and harness the overall approach to, if you like, training of families
or the single parents where you have such a culture often in very difficult
catchment areas?
(Ms Hodge) Self-esteem and confidence are very important. It is not the
only thing that matters but it is a key attribute that we want to develop in
young children and will make them happier people and better learners. I think
this Government is actually doing a huge amount to support families in that
most difficult job that we ever do in our lives, which is being a parent. I
do not know if the Committee has visited an Early Excellence centre.
Chairman
477. We have.
(Ms Hodge) There are the beginnings of some very exciting practice.
478. But, Minister, with great respect, what we were so enthused
by -----
(Ms Hodge) Which one did you go to?
479. We went to one in Oxford, Haringey and Bristol. We have seen
so many places. We have visited at least two. What we are concerned about
is that we want them everywhere where they are appropriate. We want lots
more. We have particularly changed the terms of reference of this Committee
inquiry to be from birth to eight, not three to eight, because we immediately
saw as we started talking to the people who know about the subject that you
cannot divide at three. The early years, as you have been saying, are
crucial. We saw early excellence. We saw the children coming in, tiny
babies, pregnant mothers coming in, the whole focus being on right from
pregnancy through to the early years in school. Yes, we thought it was
wonderful, but when are we going to see the resources to expand it?
(Ms Hodge) Both that and the Sure Start programme are very innovative
ways in which we are trying to tackle particularly children in areas of
deprivation. I suppose the answer has to be, "Watch this space" in terms of
the comprehensive spending review.
480. You are getting on well with your friends in the Treasury?
(Ms Hodge) Trying.
Mr O'Brien
481. The only other point, a point on which I have corresponded
with the Minister, is the undermining to a degree of these initiatives by a
sense of inequity in some schools in my constituency which I have visited
where there is a certain disparity between the provision for those who are
getting one term or two terms or in some cases three terms from the age of
four before the compulsory starting age of five. This is dividing parents
against each other and it is causing a great deal of harm in terms of these
intiiatives. I wonder whether you could comment on that.
(Ms Hodge) Every child is entitled to three full terms of nursery
education, as I have written to you, depending on their compulsory school age,
and we are down to the admission arrangements of individual local education
authorities and schools. All we have done is urge that they adopt
flexibility. There is a real issue which I probably have not dealt with which
is that they are a declining cohort in this middle group. Ironically the
market out there is changing and money follows the child. There is an issue
we are thinking about there about funding arrangements, as to whether, in
reviewing those, we can make it less pressure to transfer children because of
funding arrangements.
482. How long might that process of thinking that through take?
I am sensing quite a sense of anxiety on the part of parents. Of course every
parent is concerned that their children should not just be in that period when
a consultation is going on rather than action.
(Ms Hodge) There are real problems around it because if you fund places
and they are kept empty that is not a sensible use of resources and we are
trying to expand this sector. There is not an easy answer to this, if I am
honest, Chairman. We are looking at this at the moment. I think probably as
we start in the next financial year we will begin to have a better idea of
what we can do.
Chairman
483. The funding formula is not perfect, the Committee has seen
the logic and celebrated the fact the money follows the child and that leads
to diversity. We did find some worry that a three year old in certain
settings had special educational needs, the funding mechanism was a bit blunt
there. They were saying "How do we know we are going to get the resources at
that age both for identifying special educational needs and meeting those
needs".
(Ms Hodge) I think there is not sufficient investment in the special
educational needs of children in their early years. We deliberately this year,
for the first time, gave partnerships a ring fenced three million pounds
specifically to identify and support children with special educational needs.
That is not enough, it is a start. Again, as part of our spending review, we
have put proposals forward which will ensure a much better and stronger
infrastructure to support children with special educational needs.
484. Does that not go to the heart of it in a sense? I started
off listening to Stephen O'Brien, he is passionate about the role of the
gifted amateur. I was with him at the beginning of this inquiry. We are
getting towards the end of this inquiry and I am less with him because I think
the real nub of this, surely, is well paid, well motivated, well qualified
staff. I would not trust the amateur to identify a child with special
educational needs, certainly an amateur that who poorly trained, poorly paid
in certain settings that we saw. It is about pay and it is about training, is
it not? There is a dichotomy, is there not? On the one hand we met parents
who would put their children into a pre-school setting with no training,
people with no training, poorly paid minimum wage, whereas they would not hire
a plumber who had no qualifications to come and fix a problem in the kitchen
with the washing machine or the dishwasher.
(Ms Hodge) Hopefully the work that you are doing here in this Committee
and the work I am doing will raise the status and the importance of the early
years. When we get that right we will hopefully start seeing more very good
people. There are lots and lots of good people out there, do not let us
diminish that, more and more of the good people are choosing to work in this
sector.
Chairman: Right. Can I move on to the last section of our questions.
Evan wants to come in.
Dr Harris
485. I want to ask you about the relationship between child care
and early years, particularly nought to three year olds. A child born, let
us say, on 1 May 1997, to choose a date at random will be ---
(Ms Hodge) I have got to work this out, go on.
486. I will help you. --- will be three now, Minister, by my
calculations.
(Ms Hodge) Yes.
487. What percentage of those children will have guaranteed access
to even a part-time state funded nursery place?
(Ms Hodge) By?
488. Now, by the time they are three, having lived all their life
under a Labour Government, putting education first.
(Ms Hodge) I have to say we are the first Government ever to have put
money specifically into three year olds. Some local education authorities
have done it before but it has never come from Government. In this financial
year, 50 per cent, half of the children, will have access to a free nursery
place. By the end of next financial year it will be up to two-thirds.
489. That is part-time?
(Ms Hodge) Yes.
490. If I can look at full-time, what are the prospects for a
child born, say, in May 2000, naming no names, who perhaps does not have
wealthy parents, having access by the time they are three to full-time state
funded nursery education?
(Ms Hodge) We are in the process of setting targets to ensure universal
funding of nursery education for three or less.
Dr Harris: By the time they are three, let us say, 2003, which is six
years in, I suppose you would say Lord willing, to a Labour administration,
would you say that at that point three year olds would have access to a full-
time ---
Chairman: Is this a new Life Peer that I am looking at.
Dr Harris
491. I do not want to lose the thread of this question. It is out
there, your own research, papers by Prior and the Day Care Trust, which show
that access to child care and, indeed, to a certain extent full time nursery
education for three year olds is as much about child care, setting people free
to work, is dependent on affordability. That is DfEE's own evidence.
(Ms Hodge) There is quite a lot jumbled up in that. We are in the
process of setting targets for universal nursery education for three and four
year olds. We are well on target, in fact exceeding our targets, in terms of
developing child care places. We said we would provide sufficient places for
a million children in this Parliament and I think we will probably exceed
those targets. We have introduced the Working Families Tax Credit which will
support low income families in ensuring that they can have quality affordable
child care. But in building, again, a national child care infrastructure, as
well as building an early years education infrastructure, it takes time. There
are huge issues that we are still needing to tackle: workforce issues,
ensuring we respond to children with special educational needs, ensuring that
we get appropriate facilities in rural areas, ensuring that we sustain
provision in deprived areas, expanding the services for nought to three. All
those things are issues that we are thinking about, planning for and seeking
resources for.
Chairman
492. Evan has made a very important point. We all know you are
passionate and concerned with early years. I think you said earlier it would
take five to ten years really to get there. How confident are you that the
commitment will remain in early years? We have seen the commitment, we have
seen the resources, how confident are you that this will remain a priority of
this Government?
(Ms Hodge) No doubt. Absolutely no doubt. It is a top priority right
across Government.
493. You might move on to greater things, Minister.
(Ms Hodge) The priority will remain. It will stay there.
Dr Harris
494. I am just a little concerned. We are going to do a report on
early years, it would be nice for the Committee to give a view on whether the
targets you set are appropriate. I know you have not provided - yet - 100 per
cent access to part-time nursery education for three year olds but can you
give us an idea of the sorts of targets we should be looking at so that we can
come to a judgment on whether that tackles this access to child care and early
years for people regardless of their means?
(Ms Hodge) No, not at this point is the truth. What we have done is we
are meeting the targets we have set ourselves for this Parliament. On four
year olds we replaced the nursery voucher scheme with a planned system of
places for four year olds within a year of coming into Government, which is
not bad going. We are now setting on the expansion of free places for three
year olds. We will reach two thirds of three year olds by the end of 2001-02.
We are now in the process of setting a further set of targets. On child care
there is such a dearth of provision in this country. You went to Denmark, I
have not been there for years and years and years but I went there ten years
ago and it just is a different scale of provision.
Chairman
495. It is a different culture.
(Ms Hodge) Completely different culture. You cannot build that up
overnight. It will need a lot of public investment, it will need massive
increase in workforce, all the things we have been talking about this morning.
Dr Harris
496. Clearly you started from a low point, and I certainly accept
that, but on new initiatives, if you look at Denmark, then there have been
criticisms that have been made, I think you will recognise this, of existing
Government policy. Denmark has a co-ordinated system to encourage the high
participation of women in the workforce and one of those is the fact that
parental leave is very generous and paid. People have criticised this country
for being, I think, one of only two countries in the European Union that do
not offer funding for parental leave which puts it out of the reach of people
in low paid jobs who do not have the resources of a second big earner to pay
for that parental leave. Has the DfEE got any pressure it can put on
colleagues in other departments to have a more joined up policy?
(Ms Hodge) We do have a joined up policy. As you know, Stephen Byers is
chairing a group of ministers, of whom I am one, where we are looking at the
whole range of maternity rights and parental leave and other arrangements to
see how we can get a better work/life balance whilst maintaining our
competitiveness. That also will report in due course. If I can just say on
a very personal point here, when children are little it is far easier to
manage that balance between work and home because when you come home they plug
in to you immediately and quality time is easier to give. It is when they get
to 12, 13 and 14 you come in and say "I am here for you now" and they are busy
watching Eastenders or Coronation Street that the problems really start. It
is not something which is contained in the first three to five years of a
child's life, important as they are.
Chairman
497. I must say that most of us who went to Denmark did not want
to transplant it here. The system certainly has its own problems.
(Ms Hodge) Yes.
498. In a system where many, many children go into care or
education from seven in the morning until five in the evening and then what
is known in Denmark from five to seven are called the wolf hours because they
are always so beastly to each other. We found actually when we looked at the
system it was a system going through transition and some of them are looking
at us in terms of what we are doing in terms of greater diversity and choice.
(Ms Hodge) Yes.
Mr St Aubyn
499. Just on that very point, Minister, we actually met a mother
out there who happened to be English, her husband worked out there, who was
saying even from the age of 12 to 18 months she felt under enormous pressure,
both social and financial, to put her child into day care. What assurance can
you give to those mothers, and indeed fathers, who firmly believe that at
least one of them should be with the child until a much older age, that the
system that you are building here is not going to create those social and
financial pressures as well?
(Ms Hodge) It is quite the opposite. I think this needs banging firmly
on the head. We are not about in any way forcing mothers into work. What we
are about is ensuring that those mothers who need to or choose to work, and
eight out of ten mothers now do so, are given the appropriate support in the
child care infrastructure so that they do not have to choose between children
they love and jobs they need. It is providing choice to those mothers that
underpins what we are doing in all these policies around children and family.
It is not about changing or forcing mums to go into the work place. I have to
say, Nick, when I was bringing up my kids there was hardly anything out there,
you had to work hard to find high quality appropriate child care when you were
working with children. What I am hoping is that for my grandchildren there
will be proper choice for parents so that you are not torn apart by feeling
the needs to have your children in a high quality situation and the demands
of your job. That is what it is about. It is all about providing choice, it
is not about forcing anybody into work.
Chairman
500. Right, Minister, in the very last couple of minutes, I can
only ask you this because you were the chair of this Committee, and this is
the last of the oral evidence - and thank you for that - and we are going to
be writing up this report now. Where are the areas you think we could add
value in terms of how you have seen the early years from both sides, both in
this chair and as a Minister in the Department?
(Ms Hodge) My goodness, dare I presume.
501. You can presume. We are giving you a licence.
(Ms Hodge) I think the challenge is how we maintain the diversity and
enhance the quality whilst we are expanding the services. Adding value to that
debate, that is the challenge that I think about all the time. How do you
keep the diversity you want, enhance the quality and expand the services and
make sure that they are truly accessible to everybody: rural areas, children
with special educational needs, all those groups that are currently vulnerable
as we extend the offer.
502. Minister, I can assure you that we have done a thorough job
on this inquiry and we will write it up.
(Ms Hodge) Good.
503. I expect a very good report which will be, I hope, of use,
both of advice to the Government and really some information to the public.
Just as a housekeeping matter, you did mention and I did mention your letter
to the Chief Inspector. If it is possible to get your letter to him and the
reply you get back, it would be most useful, if it is possible.
(Ms Hodge) Right.
504. Thank you very much.
(Ms Hodge) Thank you very much. I look forward to seeing your report.
