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Martin Linton: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that some local authorities encourage high achievers from neighbouring boroughs to come into their schools, and export low achievers from their own borough to other schools?

Dr. Cable: I am sure that that happens. It is the opposite problem from the one that I am describing, where challenging pupils coming into a borough clearly need extra funding, but are not getting it. The border schools are therefore seriously under-funded and have serious educational difficulties. I raised the issue in a debate three years ago with the then Minister for School Standards, now the Minister for the Arts. She agreed that there was a problem and cited an experimental arrangement in Solihull, I think, to try to overcome the problem of cross-border movement and funding arrangements. I urge the Minister to give it his attention.

The third issue that I shall touch on is the broader philosophy of choice and what it means. We have had sufficient examples during the debate to show the ambiguous and confusing way in which the word "choice" is used. Most of us think it means parents on behalf of their children having the right, in some sense, to choose a school. The Conservative spokesman, the hon. Member for Upminster (Angela Watkinson), seemed to mean the opposite—the school having the right to choose its pupils. Even the choice of a school by the parents is an ambiguous concept, as we have heard. Preference and choice might mean quite different things—cross-border or not cross-border, faith or non-faith schools, for example.

I agree with the suggestion from my hon. Friend the Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey that we need if not standardised systems of admission, at least compatible principles. The only reasonable arrangement to reconcile the demands of different groups of parents applying for different types of school is a criterion based predominantly on distance and possibly on sibling connection, or some mix of those two factors. There would be significant drawbacks to any other arrangement, such as a lottery—it was recently proposed that applicants should be chosen by lot, which has enormous disadvantages because it breaks down any sense of geographical identity and greatly adds to
 
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transport costs and all the environmental problems associated with that. What is needed is a common set of rules based on distance and sibling relationship. If that principle were applied, much of the sense of injustice would be substantially diminished.

I shall mention two other points briefly and then allow another hon. Member to speak. On capital funding, I echo the cautionary words of the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Roger Casale). For many years my borough was unable to achieve any capital funding whatever. In the Conservative years it was effectively barred. With the new Government we have had a considerable amount of capital spending, which is welcome, but the only basis on which that could be arranged was the private finance initiative. No other vehicle was available.

On a purely pragmatic basis, I and my former Lib Dem council welcomed that and worked with the PFI programme. It has worked relatively well. Schools have been built and they have been completed on time. Ours is one of the few boroughs from which Jarvis emerges with a moderate degree of credit, but the programme is storing up problems. We should be frank about that. The hon. Gentleman spelled out the problems. Many schools have a commitment to a fixed set of repayment obligations, amortisation and maintenance costs that will have to be maintained, come what may.

We are currently in a good phase of school funding—that may be partly a reflection of the Government's resources being put into schools—but there will come a time when schools are seriously squeezed for funding and they will not be able to make any economies on the maintenance side. All the cuts will have to come out of teaching. I can see the crisis looming ahead. Many of our teachers are apprehensive about it. It may be useful to hear from the Government how they would deal with the rigidity in the funding of PFI schemes.

Finally, I shall ask the Minister about a sector of education that we have not touched on at all in the debate—the pre-school sector. There is a great deal of emphasis on the early years. I strongly support all the research showing how crucial that is to subsequent performance. My borough, together with Croydon, is one of the two that have not complied with Government requirements for free nursery education for three and four-year-olds. What action does the Minister intend to take to make sure that boroughs do comply? How does he intend to help them overcome their problem? There is a political issue. It is a Conservative-controlled council so I do not want to make excuses for it, but I am told that the council cannot meet the funding requirements for the Government's stipulations. Perhaps the Minister will explain the balance of the argument and how the council can be helped or made to comply with the statutory requirements for pre-school provision.

Geraint Davies: For the record, Croydon had a problem with compliance, but I understand that it now provides the pre-school places following negotiation with the Government.

Dr. Cable: In that case, my borough may be the last in the line. On that note, I shall allow another hon. Member a chance to speak.
 
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3.35 pm

Jon Cruddas (Dagenham) (Lab): Like the two previous speakers, I shall be brief, which should allow my hon. Friend the Member for Regent's Park and Kensington, North (Ms Buck) to speak.

I welcome this opportunity to discuss education and schools in London and want to examine empirical data on outcomes. Debates about public services are too often based on an abstract conception of the efficiency of public or private provision. In contrast, I want to examine what is happening locally on the ground, with reference to education and attainment in the London borough of Barking and Dagenham, where a dramatic change, which throws up important issues on the links between attainment and class, is occurring.

The hon. Member for Upminster (Angela Watkinson) touched on that point when she discussed Robert Clack school, which is situated in the middle of a series of housing estates and has experienced an extraordinary transformation under the headship of Paul Grant and his senior management team. The school is an example of good practice, which I am sure figures heavily in the Minister's approach, and it has broken some assumptions on class and attainment.

I shall briefly rehearse a couple of economic statistics about Barking and Dagenham, which is traditionally seen as a predominantly white, working-class community, but which is now one of the fastest-changing boroughs in Greater London. With a population of approximately 150,000, however, Barking and Dagenham is the smallest borough in London. Only 3.5 per cent. of its adult residents have a higher education qualification, compared with a London-wide average of 18.5 per cent. Poor levels of adult numeracy and literacy are recorded among the borough's population—it is respectively the second and fourth worst borough in the country on adult numeracy and literacy.

The long-term track record on GCSE results in Barking and Dagenham is poor—in 1992, only 15.5 per cent. of pupils achieved five or more GCSEs at grades between A* and C. Overall, the borough may be characterised as having historically low levels of attainment. The consequence of that record has been the production of stocks of unskilled and semi-skilled workers, who work in car assembly or construction in the immediate community.

Dagenham and Barking sits at the centre of the so-called Thames gateway. East London is beginning to experience an economic and social transformation, and Dagenham is at the centre of that process. Ford has diversified from car assembly to high quality engine production, and tens of thousands of jobs have been generated in docklands and Canary Wharf, which throws up skills-based challenges for my constituents.

On the role of the state, the two key transmission belts to enable local people to plug into that economic transformation are first, capital infrastructure to enable people to travel to the sites where jobs are generated, and secondly, the creation of a training and skills profile to allow local communities to access those economic changes. The real problem is that that unique opportunity for my constituents will be missed if we do not secure the right balance between capital infrastructure projects, skills provision and investment in education and training.
 
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The evidence of change in the borough is overwhelming and dramatic. In 1996, 27 per cent. of pupils obtained five of more GCSEs at grades between A* and C. At that time, the national average was 45 per cent.—in short, the borough was 18 per cent. behind the national average. Last year, 49 per cent. of pupils gained five or more GCSEs at grades between A* and C and the national average was 53 per cent. The point is that the borough is only 4 per cent. behind the national average, and that the gap has been reduced by 14 percentage points since 1996. The key stage 4 results are paralleled by developments at key stages 1, 2 and 3. Overall, between 2002 and 2003 the borough secured a 7.4 per cent. increase in five A* to C grades—among the highest in Greater London and, indeed, the country. The average for Greater London was some 3.1 per cent.

Six of the eight secondary schools in the borough are in my constituency. I pay tribute to the heads—Des Smith, Paul Grant, Anne Brooks, Roger Leighton, John Torrie and Stephen Smith—for all their hard work. Last year, all those schools improved, and the A* to C grades of one, All Saints, improved from 68 per cent. to 87 per cent. Two others—Roger Clack and Sydney Russell—jumped by more than 10 per cent., and Priory and Eastbrook schools jumped by 5 per cent. Those statistics demonstrate that we are witnessing a major transformation locally. Our comparators now tend to have a different socio-economic profile from those of the past 10 years.

At the same time, a major push is occurring on adult learning. We are confronting the numeracy and literacy problems that I mentioned earlier, and the borough is working closely with the trade union movement to enhance the education and training that is available to its staff. For example, over the past 12 months, 75 out of 76 refuse collection workers signed up to a basic skills course. I pay tribute to the groundbreaking work of the borough's union learning representatives, especially those in the GMB.

A transformation is under way that is beginning to break the link between poverty and attainment—or at least to challenge some of the assumptions about that link. It is redistributing life chances to people in the borough and allowing them to plug into the process of regeneration that leads to better jobs and a material change in the conditions that they and their families experience. People often say that the Government are not radical, but what is happening as a result of the education and skills agenda in my borough is genuinely radical. I do not say that as a shameless advocate of all Government policy: I have problems with top-up fees and some aspects of academies, but those can be saved for another time.

I pay particular tribute to Roger Luxton and his team at our local LEA. They have done an extraordinary amount of work over the past few years and are trying to confront the long tail of under-achievement among many working-class white children in my community. There is a long way to go. It is a long-term process that takes time—there is no big bang—but the hard groundwork for implementing durable change year on year has been established. The focus is on basic literacy and numeracy, with resources and a strong strategic lead provided by the LEA. Staying-on rates are improving. Turning the situation around will take time,
 
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but we have found that change is possible. I believe that this agenda is consistent with the objectives of the Labour party in terms of delivering material, economic and social change for working-class people. For my constituents in London, our schools agenda fulfils that historic objective, and I very much welcome it.

3.43 pm

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