Select Committee on Education and Skills Minutes of Evidence


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 420 - 426)

MONDAY 10 NOVEMBER 2003

DR IAN BIRNBAUM AND MR PAUL ROBINSON

  Q420  Mr Chaytor: Mr Robinson, do you think that the current arrangements for the appeals panels are satisfactory, or do you think there ought to be a greater distance between the appeals panel and the local authority?

  Mr Robinson: I know that the Council on Tribunals have talked about regional appeals. It works reasonably well from my experience for community schools where effectively parents come to the town hall to have appeals heard independently. There is a perception amongst parents that when you apply to a voluntary aided school or a foundation school and the appeal is heard in the school itself, even though the people are appointed by the governing body and are not the governors themselves, that maybe does not provide the distance and independence they want. There may be an issue there to look at. I think it is a question of perception rather than there being anything particularly wrong with those appeal panels but I know that some parents are worried by it.

  Q421  Mr Chaytor: Does each of you have a figure for the cost of the appeals process in your own authority? It would be interesting. I do not know whether research has been done on this across the country, but I suggest it is a staggeringly high figure which would surprise most people. Can you give us an indication?

  Mr Robinson: I had a feeling this might be asked, but having said that and having talked to my people, I have not been able to find a figure yet.

  Q422  Mr Chaytor: Would you be able to, if you went back and gave it some thought? Would you be able to write to us with a reasonably reliable estimate, because it would be valuable information?

  Mr Robinson: I shall do my best.

  Dr Birnbaum: I am sorry, I do not have a figure. Obviously I have the number of appeals and certainly I know that less resource is being expended because of the reduction in the number of appeals, but I do not know precisely what that resource is.

  Q423  Mr Chaytor: Could you let the Committee have something?

  Dr Birnbaum: Yes, I could do an estimate.[7]

  Q424  Chairman: This has been a very good session. May I finish by saying that one thing coming through is that you have a fund of knowledge which we want to continue tapping into? If you would not mind, we will follow up this session with some queries from our staff and special advisers. A last

question I want to ask is that many people in this complex world of education say that if it is not broken why fix it? What are a couple of advantages you see in the system which make it better? You are still going to have a whole range of schools people who are less likely to want to go to and a whole range of schools they really would like to go to. What is the purpose of all this hard work creating a new system?

  Dr Birnbaum: From my point of view, the objectives are limited but they are very beneficial. One person's multiple offers is another person's lack of offer. There is no more anxious time for a parent than that transfer of the child from primary to secondary. If it is going to take months for them to find out what place they have and if they are being told on 1 March there is actually no place at all and they cannot be told where they are going, that is not a very good way to treat parents and to treat kids. What the system does is to reduce that to a minimum. It does not eradicate it, but it reduces it to a minimum.

  Mr Robinson: I cannot really add anything to that. The system may not be broken at the moment, but it has been creaking for a while in London and this will oil that a little.

  Q425  Chairman: You are both public servants. If you were a politician, would you not be a little worried that the most articulate and able grouping of your population which can manage to work the system so well that they get four or five offers, is suddenly going to be stopped from doing that? Are they not the very chattering classes which can make your life as a politician very difficult?

  Dr Birnbaum: I experienced this first hand because I introduced the system in Sutton and Sutton parents are known to be fairly chattering.

  Q426  Chairman: Not as bad as St Albans.

  Dr Birnbaum: No, probably not. We will have to compare notes on that. Yes, it is difficult, but it is a matter of explaining that actually you are not taking away choice, the situation is the same. It is just that they have to decide up front what they most want rather than being a bit more leisurely about it and deciding when they know what they are being offered. That is the main difference. Once you get that across, it is not as radical in relation to choice as it first seems.

  Mr Robinson: My experience is that when you explained things to people they apply common sense and they can see that it is right, that this is what we should be doing. In part why we did not do it before was because we did not have the technology. Now we have it I believe people will support it.

  Chairman: This has been most informative and we are all very grateful for your attendance. Thank you very much.





7   Note by witness: See Ev 107. Back


 
previous page contents next page

House of Commons home page Parliament home page House of Lords home page search page enquiries index

© Parliamentary copyright 2004
Prepared 13 September 2004