Examination of Witnesses (Questions 720
- 739)
WEDNESDAY 19 NOVEMBER 2003
MR STEPHEN
CROWNE, MS
CAROLINE MACREADY
AND MS
SUE GARNER
Q720 Chairman: Is there anything
your colleagues would like to add to that?
Ms Macready: No. I will wait for
your next question!
Q721 Jonathan Shaw: Mr Crowne, you
said that the satisfaction with the admissions process was very
important to the Department, and we have heard that there is lower
satisfaction in London, and London has particular issues that
the Committee are well aware of. Do the satisfaction statistics
take account of all applications to all secondary schools, or
is it just within the home LEA? Therefore, if you are a parent
in London applying for a school outside your home LEA, will you
know that?
Ms Macready: The figures I was
quoting from before were from national research. We do not at
the moment have annual statistics which measure how many parents
get the school of their choice; we have to do more research to
find that out. The way the research of 2001 worked was first to
establish which schools parents had applied for in or outside
their home LEA and, secondly, to ask them, of all those applied
for, which was your favourite and did you get an offer for it,
so LEA residence was not important to those statistics. The research
did look at how many parents applied for places at their nearest
school and how many did not: it also had some figures on how many
applications were outside the home LEA and how many were not,
which we can send if you like, but I do not think you would draw
any different conclusions from them than the 85% figure I mentioned.
Q722 Jonathan Shaw: If a parent chooses
three or five different schools, one to five, should each preference
be of equal value? Did the 2001 research take each preference—if
they got one of their preferences, between one and five—to
be of equal value?
Ms Macready: What the 2001 research
did was essentially to produce three figures. First, it just asked
the parents what schools they had named on an LEA preference form
or by applying direct to the school—one school for some
parents, several schools for other parents. It established what
percentage of parents had got offers of at least one of the schools
they named and that came out as 96%. Then they asked what percentage
of parents got a school that would appear to be their first preference.
At the time it was difficult to establish conclusively which was
the first preference, apart from going on to the favourites question,
because what they had to count as first preference for the survey
purposes was anything that the admission authority who received
the application might have thought was first preference, so that
was either a direct application to a school, or the top name on
an LEA form if the LEA form asked for ranking, or, if they applied
outside their home LEA, that counted as a survey measured first
preference as well. For those schools which the admission authority
thought the parent made first preference, whether rightly or not,
92% of parents got one or more of those. But then when it came
down to asking the parent: "Which one was your favourite?",
and looking at that and looking at the 25%, they did look at it
in various ways.[9]
If, now, you are asking what we think about whether parents should
have lots of equal preferences or ranked preferences, the law
says, as amended in the 2002 Act, that if a parent is invited
to express a preference or preferences and expresses several preferences,
they all count as statutory preferences which must, in principle,
be complied with. But then, of course, as no child needs more
than one school place, the co-ordinated admissions arrangements
come in to ensure that no child is offered more than one school
place, and the co-ordinated arrangements are the scheme agreed
locally—and I am sure you know about the Kent scheme. It
is still up to Local Education Authorities to decide when they
draw up their application forms how they will regard those different
school names on the application form when it comes to deciding
between potential multiple offers. When co-ordination is required
across the country, which will be from September 2005 intakes,
every LEA will have to invite the parents to name on their form
all their preferred schools in order, including the ones outside
the home LEA, but different schemes in different places may then
take a different view about how to deal with potential multiple
offers. The way we recommend in the Admissions Code[10]
is to start off by saying, "Well, let's look at whether this
child fits the over-subscription criteria of various schools regardless
of the order in which the parent has placed them", and only
if there look to be two schools who want to take this child, do
we then say, "Which do the parent rank highest on their list
on the LEA's form?" That is our model scheme: we think it
is good: we think it copes with lots of different situations,
but local education authorities who want to do something else
and who agree with their admission authority schools to work another
way are allowed to do that, and there is an example of an LEA
very near Kent which has decided that it wants to consider first
preference first in its co-ordinating scheme. It is allowed to
do that, and it is relatively simple and accepted in that LEA
because they have 25 schools[11]
and the LEA is the admission authority for 25 out of the 27, so
it works quite well there but it would not work very well in more
complicated situations. Have I answered your question?
Jonathan Shaw: Extensively!
Q723 Jeff Ennis: The aims and objective
section of the new Code begins by saying that, "School admission
arrangements should work for the benefit of all parents and children
in an area". Has the revised Code achieved that objective?
Ms Macready: We certainly hope
that it will have improved things. We do not claim perfection
and, indeed, it is too early to see what effect the new Code has
had because, although it came out in January or February this
year, the first admissions round to which it applies is the September
2004 intake, and some of the things it deals with will not come
in until 2005 intake. Co-ordinated admissions for secondary schools
are one of those.
Q724 Jeff Ennis: So what sort of
issues that were not included previously do you hope the new Code
addresses? What were the main problem areas that needed to be
addressed before the Code came in?
Ms Macready: One of the main problem
areas, which we have already discussed, was parents' experience
of the process of admissions. They found it, as our 2001 research
revealed, a real problem when they had to go to different admission
authorities to make applications and might all hear at different
times, and some parents could get several offers and other parents
might get none, because the first lot of parents were sitting
on several. So we tackled that by legislating for co-ordinated
admissions by saying that that should work so that the parent
fills in just one form, takes it to just one place, all the consideration
of the application then goes on, and the result is, hopefully,
a single offer for each child on a set day, so all children and
parents know at once. There were other aspects we also improved
in the latest round of admission forums: we made admission forums
mandatory in all areas, and we particularly hope that they will
make local agreements to help the admissions of those children
who sometimes can lose out—vulnerable children, children
of families who arrive after the admissions round, looked-after
children or children in care, and all those others who may not
have got the best deal from the system before.
Mr Crowne: Underlining that point,
there are some steps through the Code which are about tightening
up and strengthening parental preference and consistency across
the piece, and strengthening people's ability to challenge the
local authority and certain arrangements, but the key driver has
to be to get local collaboration and agreement to deal with local
circumstances. When you are talking about these vulnerable children
in particular it is very important that we are adopting a highly
collaborative and consensual approach, because these things do
need to proceed by local agreement. We should not seek to legislate
in every detail on how it should work because we will never get
that right. I think that is why the admissions forums, for example,
are so important. It is very important that everybody in that
circle plays their part in trying to get the best solution locally
for all of the children. It is very easy to think that legislation
can do it but it cannot, and we have to get that sense of local
collaboration in every area, and I think there are positive signs
of that happening.
Ms Macready: Another thing the
admissions forums will do is road-test the admissions literature
in draft and say, "We are parents, do we understand this?
Does it give realistic advice on how to work your way through
the admissions system and how to make the right choice for your
child?", and there are some other changes that we can come
back to, if you like. We have widened the circle of schools who
can object to the adjudicator, which has given the adjudicator
a lot more business this year because we could see there were
some practices going on which the previous Code discouraged but
nobody was picking up on, and from 2005 intakes it will not be
possible for church schools to interview—
Q725 Chairman: What do you do about
those practices? You only have to take note of the Code and not
obey it.
Ms Garner: You have to have regard
to the Code. Because we have a local system with local consultation
we do say in the Code quite clearly that Local Education Authorities
should object to arrangements that are incorrect. We did have
a case before we revised the Code where the local government ombudsman
was involved in considering a complaint from a parent, and they
found that they had been incorrectly operating interviewing and
that the LEA had not objected to this arrangement and the LEA
in question was fined. Coming back to the question about changes
to the Code, when we introduced the last Code in 1999 we kept
a record of all the letters we had where people said, "Well,
this part is not terribly clear; it is a little ambiguous; could
you explain it more carefully?", so those kinds of changes
were made, and things that come up in between, such as our local
government ombudsman case about measuring distance—those
kinds of things—we tallied up and kept so we revised those
and gave Local Education Authorities and other admission authorities
that information as well.
Mr Crowne: What we are seeing
with the Code in other ways is a ratcheting up of the local pressure
to ensure consistency and fairness and, as Caroline has said,
a number of the cases that adjudicators now deal with are a reflection
of that greater level of awareness of where there is inconsistency
and potential unfairness, and those are gradually being worked
through the system. These are things, however, that have to be
handled carefully and sensitively because these cases often have
good arguments on both sides, and you need to get to a position
that represents a balance in the interests of the children. I
am confident that we have the pressure in the system now to work
through and to deal with outstanding cases of unfairness, always
recognising that these are very complex issues and they do require
careful judgment. The record of the adjudicators in this is extremely
good.
Q726 Jeff Ennis: That leads me nicely
up to my next question because the Code again says, ".
. . admission authorities should aim to ensure that: . . . admission
criteria are clear, fair and objective, for the benefit of all
children, including those with special educational needs, disabilities
or in public care". Given that sort of grand aim or objective,
whatever you call it, how come you leave technology colleges outside
the co-ordinated admissions procedure? What is the raison d'être
behind that?
Mr Crowne: As you know, CTCs were
set up as independent schools at the time deliberately to be outside,
as it were, of the maintained system. Current government policy
is to encourage CTCs to participate in the local system, and many
are increasingly doing that, and indeed we are encouraging them
to consider becoming academies which, of course, through their
funding arrangements, are required to observe the Code and participate.
Q727 Jeff Ennis: But is that enough,
Mr Crowne, if we are to have a co-ordinating policy encouraging
them? Should we not make them?
Mr Crowne: I think you might want
to pursue that with David Miliband when he comes but certainly
I think—
Q728 Jeff Ennis: But does it make
sense from your point of view as an official trying to deliver
a co-ordinated admissions policy?
Mr Crowne: Anything that aids
local collaboration between schools in these areas is helpful
and in the interests of parents and their children, but CTCs are
starting from a different position and I think we have been encouraging
them increasingly to take part and accept, as it were, their share
of responsibility for the effective operation of the whole system,
and that would be a process that will continue. I certainly hope
it does.
Ms Macready: We will certainly
look to see how many CTCs are participating in local co-ordinated
admission arrangements. In fact, a very high proportion were going
to their local admissions forums where they existed even before
we made them mandatory and said that CTCs should be invited. I
hope that when we do that count we will find that they have participated
in local systems. If not, we will have to come back to your question.
Q729 Jeff Ennis: Is it the intention
to monitor statistically the number of appeals that may arise
in areas where the CTCs stay outside the system, and compare it
with CTCs that come within the system?
Ms Macready: We hope there will
not be too many of those, but we do get annual appeal statistics
which tell you for each LEA how many appeals there were and how
many succeeded, so we have the basis for monitoring that.
Q730 Jeff Ennis: So from a statistical
point of view we can identify the main admissions authorities
that are creating the problems, whether it is the foundation schools
or the LEA?
Ms Macready: The only complication
perhaps is that the CTCs' own statistics will not be part of the
national statistical collection.
Q731 Valerie Davey: Very specifically,
when you are doing a survey on the CTCs, would it include analysis
of how much of their funding they use to provide their own transport?
Ms Macready: That thought had
not occurred to me. I will take it back to my colleagues.
Valerie Davey: Can I place it with you
very firmly, because it does affect the admissions criteria for
those schools.
Q732 Chairman: What was the original
rationale for leaving city technology colleges out of the system?
Ms Macready: When they were set
up it was not the same system. For instance, the system of local
consultation on admission arrangements and of adjudicators was
not there then, let alone the further additions to the system
in the 2002-03 round. When city academies were set up those things
did exist and, as a result, the government and legislation that
set them up made sure they would be part of the family of schools.
But the CTCs came from an earlier era; the CTCs sponsors and those
who run them had rather different contracts from the ones that
have now been entered with the academies. Ideally all the CTCs
will become academies, and we can only hope that that will happen
soon.
Mr Crowne: That is a matter for
their choice, of course.
Ms Macready: One of the original
fifteen already has; another one is thinking about it.
Q733 Mr Pollard: The Chairman has
charged me this morning with not mentioning how good the schools
in my constituency are, and how well led they are, and how we
have three in the top one hundred in the country, so I am not
going to mention that! I am going to go on to appeals. We have
been talking to local education authorities, and they do not know
how much appeals cost. The Audit Commission on Monday told us
they did not know how much appeals cost either, yet in my own
area we have hundreds every year, so somebody must know how much
they cost. Is there a way whereby we could make it easier for
people by, for example, having a system so that when schools get
full they cannot accept any more? This then leads on to training
for appeals panels. I sat on appeals panels years ago and I was
not trained at all apart from listening very carefully and using
my best judgment, which meant generally I would err on the side
of the parents and not on the side of the school.
Ms Garner: I was not quite sure
where the first part of that question ended! If the question is
do we know how much appeals cost then, no, we do not.
Q734 Mr Pollard: Does anybody know
how much they cost?
Ms Garner: I would have thought
local education authorities do. I am surprised that they do not.
Q735 Mr Pollard: No. I asked the
other day and two LEAs did not have a clue, and the Audit Commission
asked the same question—not a clue. Somebody must know,
because it costs an arm and a leg.
Ms Garner: We do not know because
we would have to get it from local education authorities.
Q736 Mr Pollard: Should we know?
Mr Crowne: That is a good point.
We are interested in two aspects of this, are we not: one is whether
the process of appeals does the business as far as parents are
concerned—and we have data on that—but I think you
are right, we ought to have a better understanding of what are
more effective and less effective arrangements in terms of cost
and administration, and I think that is a fair point to make.
Ms Macready: Adding to that, one
reason why we do not know how much appeals cost is that they are
not like tribunals like the Special Education Needs Tribunal,
with paid members and legally qualified members. Everybody who
is a member of an admission appeal panel is doing it voluntarily
with no pay, so there is just the cost of setting up and arranging
the panels, which is the sort of thing that may not be separately
identified in the administrative costs of admission authorities.
Also, if you ask LEAs I would expect them to have some idea about
how much it cost them to arrange the admission panels for schools
for which they are admission authority, but I would not necessarily
expect them to know how much their foundation and voluntary aided
schools, who set up their own appeal panels, were spending on
those.
Mr Crowne: It is important that
we understand better what good practice, cost effective practice,
looks like in this area, and that is why I am very happy to take
away your point because cost and user satisfaction are two sides
of the same coin really. There must be better and worse ways of
organising the process to deliver satisfaction in a cost effective
way, and I think you are right—we ought to have a better
understanding.
Ms Macready: But I think I would
not like to go down your road of saying that in certain circumstances
the schools should be able to say, "Sorry, we are full, no
more appeals". We think it right for a parent to be able
to appeal any time that a school rejects them, and the way the
appeal process works, certainly once you get past infant classes,
at the first stage is to say, "Was it right according to
the school's oversubscription . . ."—
Q737 Mr Pollard: Can I stop you because
I know exactly how it works because I sat on them for years. In
primary school class sizes we are saying they cannot have more
than thirty unless maladministration took place—that is
generally the truth of it. Why can we not say the same for secondary
school class sizes? In my area I have class sizes of 35-37 and,
if you ask any teacher, they would say that is too many to deal
with.
Ms Macready: The principle you
are mentioning is, of course, related to the fact that it has
been thought right to have a clear limit on infant class sizes,
because it was thought that it was more important in those younger
age groups to be taught in small classes and not as important
to performance once you got past seven. So there is not the same
need for a limit from that point of view for the older age groups.
It is not, therefore, as clear-cut that adding one more child
to the class will spoil the education of all the rest. At the
moment the second stage of the appeal, which you know all about
but it is possible that you have colleagues who have not been
on appeal panels so much so they may not, does enable the parent
to say, "All right, I know this class is full but it is more
in the interests of my child to have a place at this school than
it will hurt the others to budge up a bit". It is only fair
to allow parents to make that case to an appeal panel if they
have been turned down and, if the appeal panel does not think
it is strong enough, they will not accept it. I would also add
that I hope that training for appeal panel members has got much
better since you sat on panels. We have certainly produced the
Admission Appeals Code which, hopefully, all panel members read.
Mr Pollard: I was not good enough!
Q738 Paul Holmes: Quickly, and carrying
on partly with Kerry's question, you are saying that obviously
the emphasis for the appeals panel is on the individual set of
parents saying in their child's case we should allow them into
the school, but is there not a flaw here because the appeals panel
therefore are not looking at the school overall? For example,
one school in my constituency is very popular, its catchment area
is bulging at the seams with lots of new housing, lots of families
with children, and lots from outside the catchment area who want
to get in there as well, and year after year it has taken over
its planned admission limit and it is just bursting at the seams,
yet every year the appeals panels are overriding their decisions
and putting more pupils in until the whole school is bursting
at the seams and simply cannot take more people, but the appeals
panel just does not take any notice of that at all.
Ms Garner: The whole point about
appeals is that not only do you hear the parents' case but also
the admission authority's case for why the children cannot be
admitted to the school. We have been talking to various admission
authorities about this, because they quite often just say, "Well,
this is the admission number and it has been reached and we cannot
take any more." They do not explain to the panel in the same
passionate terms that the parents do why they cannot take any
more pupils and what would be the consequences for other children,
for the school—those factors are not made to the appeal
panel in quite the same way. We have paid Information for School
and College Governors, an organisation that has been working for
us before on appeal panel training, to devise training for presenting
officers, as well as chairs and clerks to panels, so that presenting
officers do their job better and get that information over to
the panel in a stronger way.
Q739 Paul Holmes: Certainly that
is not the case in the school I am talking about. For example,
since all the schools reorganised in Chesterfield in about 1992
and year after year since then the number has gone up and up and
it just physically cannot take more pupils, but every year the
appeal panels say that we must, and yet this case has been made
strongly every year to the appeals panel.
Mr Crowne: In individual cases
there is a balance to be struck, but in general terms what we
are trying to do is find a way of maximising parental satisfaction
and, if demand for a particular school is growing, to provide
more flexibility for individual schools, but we all know that
there is a practical constraint on that in the short term, so
there is always a difficult balancing act in any one year about
how you can best accommodate parental choice within the resources
you have. I cannot comment on individual cases but you are always
going to get that tension locally of what is in the interests
of all children and how you can accommodate the interests of particular
children who want to go to that particular school.
9 Note by Witness: 85% of parents got their
favourite choice, not 25%, as stated. Back
10
Note: School Admissions Code of Practice, DfES, January
2003. Back
11
Note by Witness: There are in fact 27 schools, not 25. Back
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