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UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 1170-ii House of COMMONS MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE EDUCATION AND SKILLS COMMITTEE
EDUCATION OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM
Monday 1 November 2004 MS HELEN WILLIAMS and MR STEPHEN CROWNE MR STEVE SINNOTT, DR FIONA HAMMANS, MS KATHRYN JAMES and MS CHRIS KEATES Evidence heard in Public Questions 75 - 218
USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT
Oral Evidence Taken before the Education and Skills Committee on Monday 1 November 2004 Members present Mr Barry Sheerman, in the Chair Mr David Chaytor Valerie Davey Paul Holmes Helen Jones Mr Kerry Pollard Jonathan Shaw Mr Andrew Turner ________________ Memorandum submitted by Department for Education and Skills
Examination of Witnesses
Witnesses: Ms Helen Williams, Director, School Standards Group, and Mr Stephen Crowne, Director, School Resources Group, Department for Education and Skills, examined. Q75 Chairman: Can I welcome Helen Williams and Stephen Crowe from the Department for Education and Skills who have kindly agreed to be here to answer some questions on what we have called an inquiry into the benefit of outdoor learning. This is an inquiry that we certainly take very seriously since three years ago some of us went to look at the Forest Schools Initiative in Denmark and saw the way in which even at pre-school the outside environment was used very positively as part of the educational experience of young children. There has been a whole number of issues that seemed to suggest that not only was it a time of change in outdoor learning but there were certain barriers to either its development or continuation. Stephen Crowne and Helen Williams, is there anything you would like to say about your responsibilities? Interestingly enough, when we looked at your background in the department it did not really point up the reference and the relevance of outdoor learning to your particular remit, so perhaps you could illuminate us on that. Ms Williams: I am a Director within the Schools Standards Group within the DfES. I am responsible, among other things, for policy on the national curriculum and on support for all subjects and themes within the national curriculum, including outdoor education as a context for teaching and learning across the curriculum. That is how I come to be here today. The department does see outdoor education as being a very important part of what schools should offer pupils to support a broad and rich curriculum. We know that some schools do use outdoor education pretty well but that there are other schools which, for whatever reason, are not fully exploiting the potential of outdoor learning. The department's policy is to work with a very wide range of partners to promote good practice in outdoor education and also to develop teachers' confidence and knowhow in planning and delivering outdoor education. We think it is absolutely key to getting outdoor education fully into the system to convince heads and their staff that outdoor education has a contribution to make to pupil achievement and development so that they can build it in at the start into the curriculum and timetabling. Mr Crowne: I am Director of the School Resources Group which is responsible for school funding, capital investment, school organisation, school admissions, transport and safety, the last of which is essentially the reason I am here. My particular interest, as Helen says, is in working with partners to identify what are the obstacles to outdoor education which can range across issues of safety but also funding, transport and so on, to see whether there is more we can do in partnership to help give a greater sense of confidence amongst all schools that outdoor education is a central part of the offer and that there are ways of delivering that offer consistently and with high quality in all schools. Q76 Chairman: Thank you. This is a department that believes in evidence-based policy. Have you got any evidence that opportunities for outdoor learning are of any value at all? Ms Williams: There is a considerable amount of evidence, some of which we refer to in the memorandum that we sent you. I have not got chapter and verse at my fingertips but I am sure we can produce a lot of evidence showing that outdoor education has a contribution to make, for example, in science and geography and giving pupils first-hand practical experience of doing things in the wild, as it were, adventure activities in terms of developing pupils' skills, extending their horizons. There is quite a body of evidence. Outdoor learning is a very wide topic. Perhaps that is a point that ought to be made at the outset. It covers a great variety of things from field work in geography and biology through to trips to museums or places of cultural interest through to the Outward Bound activities. Mr Pollard: And Parliament? Ms Williams: Indeed, Parliament, and also we included in outdoor learning community-based activities, for example, volunteering which we encourage through the citizenship curriculum. We think that in all of those various areas there is evidence that, properly planned, outdoor learning can make a contribution to outcomes, to pupil achievement, but the emphasis is there on proper planning. It needs to be integrated into the whole curriculum offer for pupils rather than just being something done as an optional extra. Q77 Chairman: Is that one of the problems, that it is too diverse, that you start looking at this subject and, as you said, it includes a whole range of activities for a variety of ages? Where does your responsibility in terms of age begin? Ms Williams: I do not think it is a problem that it is a very rich and diverse field. I think that is just a fact. My interests in outdoor education span the full range of the curriculum from the foundation stage through to Key Stage 4 in a whole variety of subjects. Mr Crowne: From our perspective the key thing is that the school needs to be very clear about how particular activities form part of a rich curriculum for the pupils involved. In a way it should not be for us to try and lay down how each style or activity contributes; rather to ensure that the school is very clear, learning from what works in other schools and in other contexts and drawing together the best practice. When we are talking about removing the barriers we are also talking about encouraging the spread of understanding of how particular activities support particular curricular objects or social objectives, pastoral objectives and so on, in the school. To repeat the point, there is a tremendously wide range of activity here and one where we essentially need to work with a broad range of partners to ensure that distinctive contributions of each kind of activity are recognised and integrated in the school's overall offer. Q78 Chairman: What I am trying to get at is that if we do not have a pretty clear focus on what the value is and what the variety of contribution can be it is quite difficult for the department to prompt schools to achieve high levels of added value for all the age ranges. Is that not the case? Mr Crowne: I am very wary of the department seeking to distil out as it were, in a kind of salami-slice way, what distinctively each area contributes because in the end it is about how the school looks at the curriculum as a whole and plays to its local circumstances, the particular contexts it has to work with and feeds those into its overall view of the curriculum. I think there is a balance in this and where we ought to be putting our effort is in encouraging and promoting what the wide variety of partners believe to be the best practice and giving schools a menu of opportunities from which they can then select and mould and adapt in the light of their own particular circumstances. Q79 Chairman: Should it not be the department's job to persuade by the evidence, by good practice, teachers in training, that this is a priority, that it is something that adds value to the life of the school and the life of the individual student? Is that not the level at which you should be taking a particular interest? Mr Crowne: It is a very good point and clearly this process has to start with initial training. The amount of time available for initial teacher trainees is limited and all we can expect is to give some basic tools around planning these kinds of activities. The real value added has to come during the early period of professional development in post when we should encourage all teachers to work together to see the benefits that can accrue from different types of activity and ensure that they are confident, through continuing professional development, in taking those kinds of activities forward. It is building the confidence and the understanding of the potential benefits where you get the real gains. You have to see it as a seamless development rather than focus specifically on the initial end. Q80 Chairman: How many people in the department will be working on this area? Ms Williams: In our curriculum area, for which I am responsible, we have a small team of four or five people which covers two or three subjects in the national curriculum - geography, design and technology, ICT - as subjects within the national curriculum and that team is also the focus for work on outdoor education. They are focused and mobilise other people in other subject teams. For example, people who work in science have an interest in outdoor education, as do people who work on citizenship. It is quite difficult to give you a figure but there is a significant staff effort in the department going into working with partners on outdoor education. Following on from what Stephen was saying about what we are doing, the department is doing quite a lot to promote, publicise and disseminate guidance about outdoor education. I will not take the committee's time up with reading off a lot of detail but there is guidance on the foundation stage curriculum which talks about the role of outdoor learning to develop young children. There is stuff in the primary national strategy materials on outdoor education. There is some material in the Key Stage 3 strategy. We also have supported the Growing Schools organisation which is an alliance that brings together some 25 organisations which are interested in outdoor education. That Growing Schools organisation we support in various ways but in particular we have supported them to undertake research on identifying good practice. There is a Growing Schools web site which has an enormous amount of material on it about what works in outdoor learning at different stages in different subjects, what advice is available to teachers, and that web site is a very well visited web site. Q81 Chairman: Do you think there is a problem that too often we discuss this, and perhaps even the department may look at this, as beneficial to a particular subject, like geography or one of the science subjects, as a practical aspect of getting out there and looking at real plants and so on rather than looking at it as a beneficial exercise for the ethos of the school, for the team building of the kids? Is it the less focused bit of it the bit that you are least comfortable with? You tend to come back to curriculum-related issues rather than the other thing that we are trying to tease out. Ms Williams: That is a very interesting question. My instinctive response would be that we value both the specific curricular contribution of outdoor education but also its contribution to the less tangible things like team building and developing pupils' horizons and experience. I very much hope that is reflected in the guidance and materials we put out. I am sure it is although I cannot quote chapter and verse. Q82 Helen Jones: I want to take up what you said about continuing professional development. How many teachers are undertaking or have undertaken continuing professional development which relates specifically to outdoor education? Mr Crowne: I do not think we can answer that. Q83 Helen Jones: That is exactly my point. Mr Crowne: If I could say a little more about this, there is a lot of continuing professional development which is highly relevant to this which covers different subject areas and covers the way school activities are organised. The key thing is that the school itself should have a clear overall view of how it wants to use outdoor education across a broad range of its curricular areas and the other aspects of the life of the school and it should ensure that the professional development necessary to realise that particular vision is in place. Often when it is said, "How do we ensure there is enough training?", you do that by being very clear at the school level about what you want to deliver and how you are going to deliver it. We could of course seek to collect more and more information about this. I am not quite sure that we could come up with a methodology for doing it that would fully illuminate the picture that you want, but I do not think we have that data at the moment. Q84 Helen Jones: That is my point really, that you cannot be sure because you say to us, quite rightly, that schools should do this. Do you have any information as a department on how many schools actually do it? Ms Williams: It depends what you mean by "do it". Q85 Helen Jones: I am taking up Mr Crowne's point. Tell me what schools should do. I would like to know if you know whether they are doing it. Ms Williams: We know that 10,000 schools registered last year in the Growing Schools programme. Growing Schools is an alliance which is promoting the use of the outdoors as a learning resource. It does not follow from that that in each of those 10,000 schools all the teachers have necessarily been very energetic in following up and getting relevant CPD but it is of some significance that that number of schools, which is more than 50 per cent of the total number, is positively participating in that programme. Q86 Helen Jones: I just want to be clear. You are not telling the committee that that necessarily means that their teachers have undertaken continuous professional development work in that area, are you? Ms Williams: No. Q87 Mr Chaytor: Can I ask about the impact of the Workforce Reform programme on the amount of electorate taking place? In your submission it says that the limits on cover introduced in September, the commitment to guaranteed planning, preparation and assessment times, together with enhanced roles for support staff, present real opportunities to make a difference. It does not say "a difference to outdoor learning". I thought it did. It says, "a difference to each pupil's learning". In fact, I am not sure why it is here because it does not say anything about outdoor learning at all. I will revise my question. Why is this paragraph in because it does not seem relevant to the inquiry? Previous witnesses have flagged up school Workforce Reform as an obstacle to the expansion of outdoor learning. The implication of this paragraph being here in this submission, even though it does not mention outdoor learning, is that school Workforce Reform could provide an incentive to outdoor learning. What is your view on the pros and considerations of the Workforce Reform agreement? Mr Crowne: We are aware of concerns that there maybe an obstacle here but we are very clear - and this is working with our partners on the Workforce Reform agreement - that there are real opportunities. One of the issues for us is to ensure that the advice and briefing going to schools about the opportunities with Workforce Reform cover this and other areas. What we see as the opportunity essentially is that there is now a broader range of ways of organising and covering for activities of this kind. We are not and should not be wholly reliant on supply cover; there are different ways that we can use the evolving school workforce to help manage these kinds of activities. The first point is that we need to be clear in our guidance to schools in order to build their confidence about how it can be done. The other opportunity there is about what happens in the school while these trips and other activities are going on because that does open up opportunities for different kinds of provision with the groups of children that are left, and again, with a more flexible workforce, teachers and others, it should be possible to devise stimulating, interesting and different kinds of activity back in the school as well. I do see it as an opportunity but I recognise that there is a real job to be done to identify the practices that work and help and help all schools to understand what they can do to access the opportunities. Q88 Mr Chaytor: What you are saying is that the opportunities really are that teaching assistants and other support staff take on many of the functions of organising these activities? Mr Crowne: Absolutely. Q89 Mr Chaytor: But are you not then getting the worst of both worlds in your relations with the NUT and the NASUWT, because the NASUWT are saying to teachers, "Do not get involved in these activities at all", and the NUT were opposed to teaching assistants in the first place? How are you going to get out of all that? Mr Crowne: If I can answer that more in the general, we recognise that there are various kinds of concern. Certainly in relation to the NASUWT concerns, and we have been working very closely with NASUWT to see how we can take those matters forward, there are plenty of practices now in schools about the way different groups have started to contribute to these activities. All we are saying with Workforce Reform is that there is now a wider range of opportunities because we have a stronger cadre of non-teaching staff available and we just want to build on the experience of using the whole school staff to support these kinds of activities. Q90 Mr Chaytor: Leaving aside the impact of the administrative tasks and the use of non-teaching assistants, if a teacher is taken out of the classroom for a given period of time the Workforce Agreement means that supply cover will kick in earlier than it would have done before September 1, so there is going to be an additional pressure in terms of supply cover that was not there previously, is there not? Mr Crowne: That is only if you assume that that is the only way you can deal with the teacher absence. Q91 Mr Chaytor: The non-teaching assistants will be covering for absent teachers in addition to organising the trip in the first place? Mr Crowne: What I am saying is that because we are now developing the notion of high level teaching assistants there are different ways of providing for teacher absences. As I said before, those provide some opportunities back at the school to do some different things as well. I am not laying down the law on this. The way we have to proceed is looking with our partners at examples of where the different approaches work well and share those quite widely. In the end it does not matter what we say. It is the confidence that schools have in their ability to organise and deliver these things that matters. That above all is the obstacle to progress. It is about delivering that confidence and sharing the practice that seems to work. Q92 Mr Chaytor: There is not a specific funding stream directly to schools for outdoor learning, or is there? There has never been a strand of the standards funds? Mr Crowne: I could not say never. Q93 Chairman: Helen Williams, for the record, is shaking her head. Ms Williams: Within living memory we are not aware of there having been a specific strand. Q94 Mr Chaytor: If the department is so confident that this has advantages for pupils and their learning is there not a case for having a ring-fenced funding stream as there is for certain other parts of the curriculum? Mr Crowne: As you will know, within our overall strategy we are trying to get away from the ring-fencing of specific sums for specific purposes. That builds on the very solid consensus across all of our education partners that a much more effective approach is to give maximum flexibility at local level and encourage schools to be very clear about what their priorities are and then to use their budgets flexibly to deliver those. The challenge for the department is, rather than using a directed approach through ring-fenced finding, finding a style of leadership which encourages schools to want to take up these opportunities and to prioritise them within their overall budgets, and then we come in to provide guidance and support and access to best practice which will influence behaviour locally. It is getting away from what I call the regulatory ring-fencing approach which we have found over time has rather diminishing returns in terms of leading the system. It is a deliberate attempt to move away from that but we recognise nevertheless that there are some challenges in how you influence and provide the kind of leadership where it is clear that we want more schools to be able to benefit from these kinds of activities. Q95 Mr Chaytor: Finally, can I ask about academies? In your submission it says, "We expect as more of them open that many academies will be at the forefront of the provision of outdoor education". Is there any evidence that the first wave of academies have put particular emphasis on outdoor education? Ms Williams: I am not personally aware of the evidence but we can certainly let you have whatever evidence there is. Q96 Mr Chaytor: Has there yet been the review? I think when the Secretary of State was here last time he said there was going to be an internal review of the first year of academies to be published, as I recall, at the end of September. Ms Williams: We do not know about that but we can put in a note about that. Q97 Chairman: How would you take the notion that there should be a dedicated part of the budget to a school? There are two ways of looking at this, are there not? One is that every school spend X amount of its budget on outdoor education, or there can be an entitlement for every student to have so many hours per term in outdoor education. Which of those would you favour, or none? Ms Williams: Shall I comment on the idea of some kind of entitlement in terms of hours? We would be rather inclined against an entitlement expressed in terms of hours per pupil because that does not offer any assurance about the quality or the relevance of the experience. It is an input measure. The important thing, as Stephen has said and as I have said already, is to create the demand in schools to convince heads and their staff that outdoor education is something that can make a contribution. You have to create that sense of ownership and buy-in within the profession. Simply having a statutory entitlement for pupils to have so many hours per week or per month of outdoor education does not in itself carry the profession with you. Our instinct would be to stick with the approach of promoting the benefits of outdoor education to schools, to building up the capacity and confidence of staff through CPD and through information and by signposting the opportunities that already exist for schools to take advantage of that. Q98 Chairman: I would say that sounds a bit weak and waffly in the sense that if you were going to look for an energiser in the past you would look at the local education authority. A good LEA was at the heart of providing good outdoor education. Of course, the government has given LEAs relatively a weaker role in most of these things, or at least that is the view that some of us on this committee have. Is it all going to be done from Century House that you are going to encourage people or is there a mechanism? I gave you two possibilities, a certain amount of time that students should expect of outdoor education or a special budget like the e-learning budget. What about making Ofsted take it much more seriously? I am looking for ways in which you are going to convince me that the department takes it seriously. Ms Williams: Perhaps I can suggest a third possibility. Q99 Chairman: Do you not mean the fourth? I have given you three now. Ms Williams: This is something we have already talked to partners about, the possibility of developing with partners, including local authority organisations, including teacher union organisations as well as professional organisations, the idea of agreeing some kind of manifesto for outdoor learning on the lines of the manifesto that has recently been agreed among partners on school music. The idea of having such a manifesto would be that it would identify what the partners saw as the contribution of outdoor education within the curriculum to teaching and learning. It could identify some agreed key issues. It could set out a set of priorities and this would be a kind of agreed framework not just for the partners but also for local authorities, non-government bodies. Everyone who has a stake in this field could work together to promote outdoor education. Q100 Chairman: Who came up with the notion of calling it a manifesto? Ms Williams: The music manifesto? I suspect David Milliband may have been the author of the term "manifesto". Jonathan Shaw: He does write them, you know. Chairman: It is a very interesting use of the word "manifesto". I thought manifestos led to mandates and were used in a rather different context. We will come back to that. Let us carry on and look at the litigation and bureaucracy that allegedly dogs this whole subject. Q101 Paul Holmes: There is a well known phenomenon now in terms of European legislation whereby Europe passes some regulations and then the relevant body in Britain gold-plates it, makes it belt and braces, makes it really complicated and poor old Europe gets the blame. It seems, looking at this, that there is a similar process going on in that for example the DfES issue Health and Safety of Pupils on Educational Visits guidelines and then the LEAs add their bit to it, except that each LEA adds a different slant so you are not getting any consistency, and then the school governors add their slant and the poor old classroom teacher looks at all this stuff and says, "I don't think I'll bother organising that trip after all". Do you think that is a fair assessment? Mr Crowne: There is always a risk that we will end up with more complicated arrangements than we need as a result of that kind of process. What we are concerned to do, as in the other areas we have been talking about, is to build confidence at school level so that they know the best way to approach in particular the risk assessment side of this which drives a lot of the bureaucracy. What we have been doing is focusing the guidance that is prepared at national level on practical steps that can be taken. In fact, it has had pretty good feedback from the users. We have to recognise that at the end of the day it is the employers of the teachers and those with responsibility for the children who bear most of the legal responsibilities here, so there is always a risk that, with that responsibility and the onerous legal burden that places on you, you will want perhaps to go a little further than you might in protecting against risk. What we have to do is work with local authorities to ensure that that is not happening. We can use Ofsted, which will comment on these things in inspecting LEAs, and we need to ensure that where there is evidence local authorities may be going a little too far we can encourage them to look at best practice elsewhere. We have to have sympathy for those at the front line here because in the end it is the risk assessment that you do locally that is key to this. That determines how much effort, what kinds of resources, what kind of expertise you need to apply and everything that we do at local authority government level needs to support that. I am confident, as I say, that our guidance has been helpful but we are not complacent about this and I recognise that it is a big issue for schools and we need to continue to work to build that sense of confidence in how to approach the issues sensibly. Q102 Paul Holmes: You said though that you needed to try to work with local education authorities, for example, and heads and governors on this issue. Since you issue the initial advice through the Health and Safety of Pupils on Educational Visits guidance could you not also take a more proactive role in issuing the standard assessment forms to use? We heard from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds an example where they had prepared material to fill in these risk assessment forms but different schools coming from different LEAs had to have the information in all sorts of different formats because there was no standard process and that just creates more work for everybody. Why not produce with your initial guidance some standard forms as well? Mr Crowne: That is an idea we could well follow up. If the committee felt that was a fruitful avenue to go down we would be very happy to do that. I would be the first to recognise that there are almost inevitably going to be some inconsistencies of practice here across local authorities and we do need to make sure we are focused on what the best practice is, and if there is anything we can do to help that process I am sure we would be willing to consider it. Q103 Paul Holmes: We also had the suggestion from previous evidence that where you have adventure activity licensing authority licences issued to certain centres why then would schools which are using those already accredited and licensed centres have to go through the same hoops of risk assessment when those centres have already gone through a very rigorous process? Mr Crowne: The process of risk assessment is all about making a judgment from the point of view of the people who are actually responsible for the safety of the children as to what they should do. Obviously, if you are working with a licensed centre that will change the nature of your risk assessment because you know you have a quality assurance there in place. If you are working in some other context you will perhaps come to a different conclusion. I think you still have to go through the process of risk assessment. What I do not think you need to assume is that it is at the same level of detail in every case. I would hope that if you are working with a licensed adventure provider you will not have to go through the same degree of risk assessment as if you are working with a different kind of provider who does not have that kind of background. Q104 Paul Holmes: You said you would hope that and that would be the commonsense approach, but again are you aware whether that hope is realised? Mr Crowne: I am only saying "hope" because if we accept that there is a variation in practice there are bound to be some examples of where that is not the case and our job is to work with local authorities to make sure there is consistency based on best practice. Q105 Paul Holmes: In general terms do you think we need to step back and look at this whole area anyway, not just the specific examples I have been giving? We keep reading these examples of schools that ban playing conkers because it is dangerous, which sounds ludicrous. I can think back to four years ago almost exactly to this week when I was still teaching and I was taking my year seven form down to the local library to familiarise them with the library in case they had not been. These kids every morning walked up from the town centre to the school on their own and every night walked back and yet we had to fill in pages and pages of risk assessments to walk these kids eight minutes down the road from the school to the library. We have got stopping conkers, stopping playing contact sports, rugby, whatever, and doing risk assessments to walk down to the local library. Is it not all going a bit far? Mr Crowne: I am certainly not complacent about the need to continue to work on this because I think there are pressures in the system which tend to encourage people to err on the side of ultra caution, and you can understand that, given that we are talking about safety. We have to continue to work to get common sense applied at every level in this and we recognise that we have a role in doing that as well. The first thing we should do is make sure our guidance is clear and based on best practice and is encouraging straightforward common sense approaches and then we have to try and work with local authorities to make sure we are not overlaying that with more complexity than we need. It is just working away at the common sense approaches in partnership on a continuing basis. It is not a job that has been done fully yet. Q106 Paul Holmes: You keep saying this will be the logical thing to do and then you say it has not been done fully yet, so how proactively is the department doing this or planning to do it in the near future? Mr Crowne: We have worked on our guidance, we have produced updates, we work with local authority folk in their efforts to work with local schools co-ordinators' activities. We are encouraging professional development in areas like risk assessment. I would want to avoid us taking an overly prescriptive approach here. What we are interested in doing is making sure the best practice is identified and that we are working with our partners to ensure that that is fed down through the system, but when you have 24,000-odd schools that is a lot of partners to work with. We have to be sensitive to local circumstances and avoid being overly prescriptive where that might not fit the bill. At the same time we need, as I say, to drive through the common sense approach to make sure that people locally feel confident about the processes. It is not just about the schools, of course. The parents have to feel confident in these processes as well. Often I suspect we get these extreme cases because the school is bending over backwards to show to parents that they have taken this very seriously, that they are doing everything in the best interests of the child, so I think it is building confidence throughout: parents, pupils and the staff, that the approaches we want are the right ones. Q107 Paul Holmes: I have two final questions, both relating to the fact that you are at the centre of the whole process. You initiate it by issuing the regulations to start with; other people then respond to it and build on it. Are you aware from your central position of any hard facts about how far litigation arising out of activities of this kind are rising or falling or not? Again, we hear that schools ban conkers because they do not want to be sued because a kid gets injured playing with conkers. We hear of local authorities chopping down horse-chestnut trees so that kids are not putting sticks up to knock the conkers down. We hear of one of the major teachers' unions saying to teachers, "Do not get involved in this at all because of the dangers of litigation". From your central position does anybody collate figures on this? Is there really an increase in litigation or is it an urban myth? Mr Crowne: It is rather hard to answer those questions. We do not have detailed information covering all those different examples. Q108 Jonathan Shaw: Not every conker? Mr Crowne: Not every conker, no. What you can say is the amount of civil litigation in this general area does not seem to be going up. That tends to cover more serious cases though, so I would not like to speculate on whether the number of examples of conker banning, for example, is going up or down. I think we tend to see those as one-off reports in the press and it is difficult to get a sense of scale there. Again, I come back to the key point which is that for us it is about making sure that at every level of the system people are feeling confident that they know what is the right thing to do. If there was evidence that suggested there were particular areas of problem we would certainly be prepared to respond to those but I am not aware of evidence that shows that any particular area is becoming more of a problem than it has been. Q109 Paul Holmes: If you were aware of a particular problem then it would be your role to do something about it. Some of the evidence we have heard so far suggests that it is now becoming very difficult to get insurance policies in this area. Would you agree with that from your central position and should the government do something about that since they are issuing the requirements that are leading to the lack of insurance companies willing to do this? Should you do something about providing the insurance cover? Mr Crowne: I agree: I think there is an issue there. It is frankly part of a wider issue to do with school insurance where we have a current position which is of concern, that it is difficult and expensive to get insurance cover for a wide range of school activities and so we are working across government and also commissioning some studies on possible options for the future. As I say, it goes wider than this area because it is about the overall cost to schools of insurance which is becoming higher for a number of different reasons and it is about the availability of alternatives in the market places which again, for various reasons, has been rather restricted. We are looking actively at that. We have a study in progress now which we hope by the end of this year will illuminate some of the options that might be available. Q110 Paul Holmes: What possible options are you considering? Mr Crowne: There is a range of things, is there not? There are market development options using private sector employers, but there are also options around developing local authorities' capacity to insure for themselves. There are examples in larger authorities where these things happen. Of course, in some of the areas we are talking about, third party liability and so on, you would expect a market solution, so we want to look very carefully at the possibilities there. Q111 Valerie Davey: We seem to have come full circle. It seems to me that the insurance is based on the risk assessment; the risk assessment ought to be based on some factors which apparently we do not know. In other words, how many accidents on overseas, local, regional trips are there? What is the risk of taking a child on different types of trip? If we have not got that how on earth do we do a general risk assessment and does that not affect the insurance? Mr Crowne: The kinds of cases I suspect you are thinking about are the more serious ones where you are expecting a civil case or whatever to flow. We do have evidence in the sense that we do not see the overall numbers of those cases rising. What we have seen, of course, is a rising cost of the awards that are made where the cases have been successful and that tends to follow from the cost of medical treatment going up faster than inflation and some other factors. I do not think we should assume that the cost of premiums is necessarily only affected by the assessment of risk in the particular cases. There are other factors that tend to influence what the private sector charges for insurance. There is no doubt that, for a number of reasons, the private sector has not seen this market as a particularly attractive one, which tends to be why you get the higher premiums. I do not think that is driven only by an assessment of the particular risks and the costs to insurance. Q112 Chairman: Is it not the fact that it is a kind of fashion thing? Evidence to this committee is that the most dangerous place for your child to be is home with the parents, the stats show that, or being driven by the parents on the roads and all that, and children's likelihood of having an accident at home is far higher than at school. Though they are tragic when they happen these are very unusual accidents that happen when a school is in charge. Does the department not have a responsibility both to parents and to the public and to trade unions to come out with the statistics, to say, "Look: this is a very rare occurrence", and the nonsense you get in the tabloids you very rarely have in these sorts of committees because we use long words, so we do not get them here; we do not ever have a dialogue with those sorts of journalists. There is no counterbalance to the nonsense they publish when there is a tragic accident, as though this was something that was likely to happen every other weekend. Mr Crowne: I do agree. I think the department has got an important role to play in explaining what the situation is, what the facts are where we have them. The fact is that any serious incident involving children's safety is a serious matter and one should never denigrate that but there is no sign that there are increasing problems here. In fact, for the most serious incidents there are encouraging signs that the numbers of cases are going down. The various steps that have been taken, certainly working with trips co-ordinators and the rest, show that the system as a whole is taking this area very seriously and there are very few cases which reveal serious failures in the system. I do not want to sound complacent but I am responding to your point about the need to get the balance right. Of course, we will strive to ensure that we get a balanced view here in the interests of balance but also in the interests of encouraging the practice in the system that we want to see because it is often fear of repercussions and the way cases are treated that is deterring some of the schools and teachers from undertaking these important activities. Q113 Helen Jones: Can I ask you to clarify something for the committee please? You referred to having no evidence of the number of cases going up. Are you referring to cases that actually proceed to court, not to cases that are settled before they get to that stage and is there a fear amongst schools of what are often very minor claims which are often settled very early on, because, frankly, people do not want the bother of the litigation; it costs more than settling the thing? Mr Crowne: That is a good question. I was referring to the number of cases that proceed. I do not think we could estimate the numbers that are settled before but that is a good point. Q114 Mr Turner: Could I come back to a question that you answered earlier? You said something about the need to convince heads and staff of the value of outdoor education but you do not seem able to express it yourself. Ms Williams: There is a lot of material that the department has put out which defines the value that outdoor education can add in a number of subject areas generally. Q115 Mr Turner: As the Chairman said, it is very waffly. I do not argue with the idea that it might be a good thing but there does not seem to be any evidence that it is a good thing. Ms Williams: I think there is a lot of evidence. Maybe we have not done justice to the evidence in the memorandum that we gave the committee. We can certainly have a go at distilling some of the key facts from the evidence about what outdoor education can provide. I am quite confident that we have got that evidence base. If we could pull it out and present it in a summary perhaps the committee would find that helpful. Q116 Mr Turner: You rejected the Chairman's proposal for a guaranteed number of hours because it did not offer any assurance about quality or relevance. Do you have evidence that what is offered is of good quality or poor quality, and relevant to what? Ms Williams: We rely on Ofsted's report on the quality of the provision made in schools, including provision made for outdoor education where that is part of the curriculum. Ofsted, under the current inspection arrangements, do look at outdoor learning when they go to schools. Under the new inspection arrangements, which are going to be based more on school self-evaluation, the self-evaluation form which schools have to complete includes questions which invite the head to consider the contribution that outdoor education is making to the whole school offer. We should be able to rely on Ofsted to monitor this aspect of schools' provision. It would also be open to us to ask Ofsted at some point to do a special survey of outdoor education in schools. Q117 Mr Turner: But the fact is that you have not asked them and you are spending £35 million as far as I can judge from your report - maybe there is more - and most of that is coming from DCMS. It does not sound as if you regard this as a very high priority. Ms Williams: Outdoor education is one of a large number of priorities for the department. We do accord it a reasonable measure of priority and we have been extremely active with partners over the last two or three years in commissioning research, commissioning surveys, identifying what works. We have commissioned, for example, the Association for Science Education and the Geographical Association to produce CPD modules for field work for geography teachers, science teachers. We are supporting bringing money into Growing Schools which also enables them to have this much-visited web site. I can point to quite a long catalogue of things that we are doing to promote outdoor education. Q118 Mr Turner: Mr Crowne, if you were in the position where, for example, one of those advocates of abolishing the DfES and giving the money to the schools was saying to you, "Look: you are allowed to keep a small amount of money", how would you justify spending that money on outdoor education rather than one of the other myriad of priorities which the department appears to have? Mr Crowne: Do you mean if I was able to retain it in the budget centrally? Q119 Mr Turner: A small budget for one aspect. Mr Crowne: Our basic strategy is, as I was describing earlier, to provide a maximum amount of flexibility to schools to apply their overall budget in support of their priorities. The key thing for the department in areas like this where we are trying to signal a degree of priority is to provide some incentive and some encouragement for schools to prioritise locally and we are trying to move away from doing that by ring-fencing sums of money or defining the inputs, as Helen was saying. If I had a small central budget to do this, the way we would do it is the way we are doing it, which is to identify, working with partners, what activities are unofficial, how we can promote the capacity of the system to make best use of them and how we encourage those responsible for defining school level priorities to make this a priority. The way you do that for schools is to point out the benefits, to draw attention to other schools who are getting the most out of them. That is the way we try to approach these things. I am the first to admit that it is the more indirect way than some of the approaches we have used in the past, which tended to involve identifying a sum of money for a particular purpose and limiting it to that purpose. Q120 Mr Turner: You appear to think that the LEAs cannot do it. Otherwise you would not be doing it. Mr Crowne: No, I do not think that is true. What we are saying is that we each have distinctive roles in this. The department has an important role in articulating the national sense of priority on what can be done. Local authorities are responsible in two senses: one, in working with their schools to help support them in providing the opportunities; two, very importantly on the health and safety side, as we have seen as employer of a great many, but we also work with a wide range of other partners, a lot of voluntary organisations, subject associations. Each in its own way has a contribution to make. I would describe our role as articulating that activity and giving it a sense of purpose and direction to influence priority decisions that are made at school level. Mr Turner: I think my problem is this. You are doing a fair number of things. The DCMS has clearly influenced one significant area, because they have put something like, as I said, not £35, £20 million into museums and galleries. I cannot quite see how much you have spent in any other area. I am wondering how we assess, which is one of our responsibilities, the value for money, albeit the relatively small amount of money, that you are spending on this and judge whether it would have been better if you had not got that money but somebody else had? Q121 Chairman: What have you to say to that? Mr Crowne: I think that is a very hard question to answer. We have something like £30 billion going into school budgets. The Department is committed to increasing the proportion of the overall resources going to schools, increasing the proportion that goes into school budgets as opposed to other levels of the system, so I think we are increasingly scrutinising the way we look at the need to retain money, whether it is at local authority level or, indeed, at national level, and I think our focus for money that we retain at national level is around three things: first, it is about promoting innovation and development in the system, second, building the capacity, trying to build the capacity of the system itself to take some of these things forward, and I think probably the third is to make sure we have got the right framework of incentives and accountability in there to move the system in the right direction. I think those are the kinds of tests you have to apply to any centrally retained expenditure. Of course there are lots of organisations who would like additional resources from us, but we have to be very careful about going down the road of what I describe as supporting the supply side in this, because in the end the test has to be whether these opportunities are ones that schools think are in the best interests of the children and they are prepared to support them from the £30 odd billion budget that is delegated through the system. So I think we have to be very wary of precisely how we use those centrally retained funds. I think I am rather supporting the point you are making about value for money. It is a real test whether we have got the right engagement and we are using that money for the right things. Q122 Chairman: Could I ask one other question? Hampshire County Council tells us that they have moved outdoor education facilities to a department outside the education department in order to protect them from "pressures created by the increasing devolution funding directly to schools". Clearly it is your policy to do the opposite, and you say so in paragraph 19. What will be the effect on schools of having more money delegated to them rather than having the LEA decide where that money will be spent on their behalf? Mr Crowne: I think one of the effects will be that we will have a much richer discussion between the school and the LEA about the benefits of delegating the money or retaining it centrally. As you will know, we set up schools forums which bring together all the local stakeholders to talk about school funding, and one of the big issues that every schools forum will be discussing is what is the case for devolving these resources to schools as opposed to retaining it centrally in the local authority to provide a service for schools as a whole. That is very important discussion, and, of course, it is entirely within the local authority's discretion working with its schools forums to decide to retain the resources if that is what the schools want, and what better test can you have of the need for service than if the main clients of that service want it. So that would be my answer. I think over the next few years, as schools forums become stronger and more confident, we will see more of those discussions going on and the level of retention and what it is retained for will be based on a really clear understanding between the LEA and schools about what the schools actually want and need. I think that is an important step. Q123 Chairman: Do you think there should be more of a champion, either at ministerial level or within the Department, for external implication. If there was someone really banging the drum for the... And I am surprised, because you have been a little bit reluctant to give us evidence, but we have heard some convincing evidence from a range of experts and also from Ofsted in written evidence on the value of outside education. This is a world where for most of us who have experience of a large town or city many children do not travel much outside the community in which they live, especially if they have come from an economically deprived background. If you then look at the work we have done on school meals and the Heath Committee have done on obesity, it all seems to be arguing that there is a champion needed here, because a lot of the activities that traditionally have been done as out of school activities are beneficial on a range of different criteria. Do you think there is a need? Do you think you have that ministerial spark there to guide you? Ms Williams: At ministerial level within the DfES Steven Twigg is the Minister who has responsibility for outdoor education within his portfolio, and he is very positive on the benefits of outdoor education. The Department's five‑year strategy that was published in July also contains some warm words about the importance of the value of wider activities. Q124 Chairman: That is the problem, is it not, "Warm words"? Tomlinson on 14 to 19 has warm words, but they are not very focused words, are they? Ms Williams: No. They were a carefully selected positive endorsement of the value of outdoor activities to enrich, to a hope to developing a whole chart both at primary and secondary level. It is not just warm words because there are a whole range of things that we are doing from the Department contacting our orchestral departments to build on those warm words. Q125 Chairman: If we have not seen the manifesto yet, can we have a look? We are interested in manifestos in this Committee. Could we have a look at the manifesto? Ms Williams: The manifesto for outdoor education is at the concept stage; we have not got one yet. I was suggesting this would be something we might work up as a shared agenda among departments. Q126 Chairman: I see. Okay. Ms Williams: What we could do is show you the music manifesto as an example of what we mean by this. Q127 Chairman: Music to our ears. Thank you very much for your attendance, Stephen Crowne and Helen Williams, and thank you for your time. Can I ask our next group of witnesses to join us? Memoranda submitted by National Union of Teachers, the Secondary Heads Association, NASUWT and Ofsted Examination of Witnesses
Witnesses: Mr Steve Sinnott, General Secretary, National Union of Teachers, Dr Fiona Hammans, Head of Banbury School, Oxfordshire and a Member of the Secondary Heads Association, Ms Kathryn James, Senior Assistant Secretary, Professional Advice Department, National Association of Head Teachers, and Ms Chris Keates, General Secretary, NASUWT, examined. Q128 Chairman: It is my great pleasure to welcome Steve Sinnott, the General Secretary of the NUT. This is your first appearance, is it not, Steve? Mr Sinnott: As General Secretary of the NUT it is. Q129 Chairman: Welcome indeed. Then we have Dr Fiona Hammans. Is that the right pronunciation? Dr Hammans: Yes, it is. Q130 Chairman: Who is here from Banbury School in Oxfordshire and a member of the SHA, Ms Kathryn James, who is Senior Assistant Secretary to the Professional Advice Department, NAHT, and we have Chris Keates, who is General Secretary of NASUWT. Welcome all of you. You will have had the beneficial of experience of listening to the Committee's questions so far. The bad news is we have got an entirely different set of questions for you. It is good to have you all here. Jonathan wants to lead the questioning, but before you start does anybody want to say anything? I cannot have all four of you saying something. Are we going to give pride of place to Steve Sinnott, only because it is his first appearance, or does Chris Keates, because she has been before us and has great experience, want to go first? Ms Keates: It is also my first appearance, Chairman. Q131 Chairman: I am sorry, Chris, I thought you had been here before. Ms Keates: I have been here before, but not as General Secretary. Q132 Chairman: I see. Who would like to kick off? Mr Sinnott: I would like to kick off by congratulating Chris Keates on being General Secretary. I look forward to working with Chris for a long, long time; so congratulations to Chris. Ms Keates: Thank you. Q133 Chairman: I think that is totally out of order, but we will let you! Ms Keates: I think we will go straight into questions. Q134 Chairman: Okay. The opener is: did you find it rather a surprise that we were looking at this subject? Is it on the periphery of your interest and you thought, "What on earth is the Select Committee doing dabbling around with this bit of peripheral stuff"? Mr Sinnott: I do not think it is peripheral at all, Chair, I think it is central to what goes on in education. As well as congratulating Chris and surprising everyone by congratulating Chris, can I praise the Government? One of the good things that the Government has done is to emphasise the relationship‑‑ Q135 Mr Pollard: Can you speak a bit more slowly; I want to get all this? Mr Sinnott: ‑‑is to emphasise the relationship between social class and education, and David Miliband, I think, has done a terrific job in raising the relationship, the achievement of youngsters and their social class, and there is no doubt in my mind that what teachers want to do, and what the Government and the local authorities should be encouraging to be done, is to ensure that youngsters have a rich experience of their time at school, and that will include giving an entitlement to children to go the theatre, to be involved in drama, to be involved in sporting activities, to visit a foreign country, to be involved in an outdoor activity of one form or another, to be involved in a residential activity ‑ all of those activities ‑ and there is real evidence of the way in which youngsters from economically deprived backgrounds benefit from them. The recent experience of September 2004 - Ofsted said exactly what I have just said. At the same time we do know that all youngsters, whether they are gifted or talented or whether they are struggling at school, benefit from those activities and schools benefit from having improved relationships between the youngsters and the teachers following residential activity. So the benefits are clear and real, and I congratulate the Committee for picking up this issue? Q136 Jonathan Shaw: A question to Chris Keates. In your evidence to the Committee you say that there is a significant number of schools that conduct visits to venues of dubious educational value. How many of your members take children to schools of dubious economic value? Ms Keates: Educational value. Q137 Jonathan Shaw: Educational value; thank you? Ms Keates: We think there is less than when we first started to raise issues about educational visits, the conduct of them and the risk that we felt needed to be minimised as far as possible because, we accept, there is no activity that is actually completely risk-free, but we have for some time been identifying a number of issues and one of the issues we have raised about minimising risks is about making sure that there is a clear educational value to the trips that are being taken. It has been our experience that quite a lot of schools are engaged, particularly in the summer term, although, as I say, our information back from our members is it is less now than when we first started to raise this issue, where you would get the annual trip to the Blackpool pleasure beach or Alton Towers ‑ things that we would say might be an interesting experience for the pupils, might be something they had not done before, but whether it should be the kind of visit that is conducted by a school and what curriculum relationship it has, we would have doubts about that. Q138 Jonathan Shaw: What I am slightly concerned about is the broad brushes that you are using, Chris, in your evidence, both written and what you have just said. "Quite a lot", "significant amounts". What we are trying to do is to drill down in this issue and to get to the heart of the matter. When you say "of dubious value educationally" ‑ you have decided that it is so important that you want to put it in the evidence to the Select Committee ‑ what are we talking about? What are the numbers? Does your union know? Ms Keates: If you are asking me for statistical evidence to back up for a percentage of schools, I cannot give you that. What I can give you is the issues that have been raised with us from our members are on a large‑scale across the country and we judge the impact of an issue by the response we get from members through our union's casework, and, since we have been raising the issue of educational visits, we have had, on a regular basis, from members in schools right across the country, the issues of concerns they have expressed to us about some of the educational visits; and so, if you are asking me for a percentage, I cannot do that. I think that it is perfectly legitimate for me to say that our casework evidence is demonstrating that this is a concern to some teachers, particularly arising from the risks with visits. They have been looking much more closely at the kinds of activities that a school should be involved in conducting. Q139 Jonathan Shaw: How many of your members, how many of the NASUWT members have been the subject of false allegations on residential trips? Ms Keates: Of the tracking that we have done, I think we have had in the last... The percentage of false allegations on visits, I would say, probably is about 5% of the numbers that we have, and we have been tracking educational visits now ‑ I am sorry, false allegations now since 1991. Q140 Jonathan Shaw: On residential? Ms Keates: On residential things in terms of false allegations that have arisen, and there can be a variety. It is not just sexual abuse of people, which is what people immediately think of, it is actually physical abuse and a number of other things. Q141 Jonathan Shaw: You could provide us with a number of incidences? Ms Keates: I can provide you with the statistics we have on false allegations and the number of incidents on that, yes. Q142 Jonathan Shaw: Has that gone up? Ms Keates: Over the time that we have been tracking that, I would say that the proportion has probably stayed the same of those, but the whole issue for us, of course, of false allegations, is much wider than the visits. Q143 Jonathan Shaw: So you are not sure that the proportion has gone up; it has stayed about the same, despite your press release, which says, "Society is increasingly litigious and no longer appears to accept the concept of general accident." Therefore, you are advising your members not to go on these trips. So it is not going up, but it is increasing, the problem is increasing. My concern is are you, is your union, actually trying to find the solution to the problem or are you the problem? You do these press releases prior to coming before the Committee, you do not have the statistics to back them up and then we see headlines like this from your press release. Are you the problem? Ms Keates: No, we are not the problem. In fact, we have been raising these issues for a number of years. That is not the first time there has been press coverage of that. I am sorry if that has caused you concern. In our evidence, in section 28, we actually list the work that we have now been doing with the DfES on the issue of trying to find solutions to some of the issues we have identified, and the issue of false allegations is not the major issue in terms of the advice we are giving to members, as we detail in our evidence. In fact, last April the Government recognised the validity of some of our concerns and, as we detail in our evidence, we have been working constructively with DfES officials to look at a range of processes that might actually start to minimise the risks and address some of the concerns that we have about protecting staff that go on educational visits. So we are not at all the problem, but we have a responsibility to our members to give them clear advice about the risks they might face. We also have an equal responsibility to try and raise and put forward constructive suggestions as to how they can be addressed, and we have certainly done that with the Government and we have listed the areas that at the moment are in progress with the DfES on the areas of concern that we have listed. Q144 Jonathan Shaw: The final question for you, Chris. What is your union's assessment of the main findings of the Ofsted report "Outdoor Education: Aspects of Good Practice"? What is your assessment of the main findings? Ms Keates: As we said at the time that was published, we recognise the value of outdoor education and some of the activities that are taking place. The questions that we pose are: are all of those activities ones that schools and teachers and sports staff should be conducting, and, in that context, there are still the risks posed that we have been raising. We are not a union that is opposing educational visits ‑ that has never been our position and our evidence makes that quite clear ‑ but we have a responsibility to our members to point out concerns and we have a responsibility to make sure that we have put forward constructive suggestions to government as to how to address that; and we believe we have done that. Q145 Jonathan Shaw: There was very little in your evidence to suggest that you embraced outdoor education. It was mainly about the concerns about litigation and workforce. I have to say, that is in stark contrast with the other trade unions that talked about the benefits of outdoor education. As I say, in your evidence there is a lot that talks about increasing numbers and broad brush statements, and, when we ask you about the specifics, the numbers are not going up? Ms Keates: I did not realise that what the Committee was inquiring into was for us to tell you the benefits of outdoor education. I thought what you wanted us to do was to highlight things that you might want to take on board in your inquiry in terms of some of the issues that are facing teachers that conduct these issues. I could have written several pages about the benefits, but there is plenty of research and well‑documented evidence. My concern was to put to you issues that you might want to consider and also to show the progress that we were making on addressing some of those very taxing issues for schools, for teachers and for our head teacher members. Q146 Chairman: Can I just intervene. You would not be surprised that this Committee is particularly interested in your decision as a union to advise your members not to participate? Ms Keates: I understand that. Q147 Chairman: That is very important. In many ways it is quite a shocking decision. When was it made? Ms Keates: It was made over four years go, and we have reviewed it on an annual basis and raised it with the Government on an annual basis, and it has arisen out of casework, an increasing amount of casework that we were experiencing, some with some very tragic incidents. Some of the very high profile cases that have been in the press have involved NASUWT members and we reviewed the advice and we included that as an annex, which shows that we give that strong advice but we also do provide a check‑list for people who may say, "Despite that advice, we actually want to accompany these trips." We respect the position of people who do that, and that is why we have not been sitting back and saying we are not interested in educational visits, that is why we have been trying to engage the Government in looking at some of the things that we think can make sure that some of these valuable activities can go ahead but also minimise the risk to the staff that get involved in those. I think that is a perfectly legitimate position for us as a union to take. Q148 Helen Jones: Can I ask you to clarify one thing in the written evidence you have given us? You say in, I think, point six that society is increasingly litigious. We understand that. It says, "It also fails either to understand that perfect judgment, total attentiveness and faultless foresight are beyond normal human capacity or to accept that in the best ordered of activities things will occasionally go wrong. Schools, therefore, find themselves increasingly vulnerable to the growing compensation culture." I am not quite sure where you are coming from here, because that is not what the law says. The law does not expect perfect judgment, total attentiveness and faultless foresight; it expects people to take the precautions that a reasonable person would take. So how are you getting from one of those statements to the other: because that seems to me to be legally faulty - untrue, shall I say? Ms Keates: No, it is not untrue. Q149 Helen Jones: It is. That is not what the law on negligence is? Ms Keates: I am not arguing here the law on negligence, I am arguing on the feedback we get in terms of the casework that we have, reports that we get from our head teacher members and reports from teachers about what they are finding in terms of any accident, and, through your previous questions to the Dfes officials, you were raising the issue of the growing litigious nature of the accident culture, and educational visits are part of that. The feedback we get regularly from our members and from local casework is that accidents, whether they are on school trips, or in the school playgrounds, or in the classroom can often at the very first stages, simply things that we would probably at school ourselves have brushed off, a trip in the playground now can result in a solicitor's letter because there are people who are always looking for something to blame. That does not mean that all of them go as far as proceedings, but it is a symptom of a compensation culture that there is not a genuine accident any more. Q150 Helen Jones: I could write you a solicitor's letter today, but just because you get one does not mean people have to pay compensation. It might not be worth the paper it is written on, frankly. So is not your dispute rather with schools and LEAs who settle claims which have no real basis in law at all rather than with the law as it stands? Ms Keates: The issue... That is a different point than whether we have‑‑ Q151 Helen Jones: It is not? Ms Keates: No; it is a different point than whether we have evidence to sustain that there is a growing compensation culture. The fact that letters are now sent for things that at one time would have been dismissed as a childish accident in a playground is evidence of the compensation culture. The fact that people pay out, we are concerned and have raised it where we have come across it with schools or local authorities who, to avoid lengthy exchanges with solicitors, actually will settle because that does actually fuel the compensation culture. Q152 Helen Jones: But that does not mean your members are being taken to court, does it? Ms Keates: Our members quite often are enjoined in the first stages of litigation. Whether they end up in the full proceedings is an entirely different matter. Q153 Helen Jones: If these are cases that are being settled then your members are not being taken to court, are they? Ms Keates: It depends how the investigation is conducted by the local authority, whether the police are involved or where the people making the claims have gone to. There is a whole variety of circumstances in which that can happen. We do not make those kinds of comments lightly, and this has been generally accepted as a problem, hence the Government is actually working with us on some of these issues because they have had reports from schools, and I am sure my colleagues here can say about the pressure that many head teachers come under from solicitors who are writing letters at the drop of a hat that cause problems for schools. The other issue that we have, of course, is that our members may not be subject to criminal proceedings but can be subject to disciplinary investigations, which can be extremely stressful. Q154 Helen Jones: Have you any figures for us again on the number of these cases where people are writing to schools or sending them solicitor's letters after school trips or any other sort of outdoor education and the numbers that are settled, as opposed to the numbers that are totally spurious and do not even get this couple of hundred pounds pay out? Ms Keates: If I can say to you, I think it would be very unusual for a school nowadays not to have received at least one of these letters after some sort of accident. That would be extremely unusual. What the figures are in terms of settling, of course, that depends on a school and local authority policy. Some local authorities will not settle on these and they will take them forward. Only if our members are involved would we have any details of that case, but my colleagues in other unions have expressed the same concerns in meetings. They may take different advice in terms of what they ask their members to do, but the issue of teachers and other workers in schools and head teachers becoming increasingly vulnerable to legal action is a huge concern throughout the profession. Q155 Helen Jones: So how many of these cases have involved your members recently? Ms Keates: I have not got those figures. I will provide the figures for you. Q156 Chairman: The reason we are pushing you on this, it is fundamentally important to our inquiry, but on the one hand you said no cooperation. If all your members took your advice, basically out of school activity would cease, would they not, more or less? If they took your advice. Ms Keates: Yes, and, of course, one of the things I think we all regret is the fact that the number of visits for some of the things that are curriculum related and have an educational validity, there is more concern and caution about taking those now. That is why we think it is important that you do have this inquiry, because one of the things we propose is supporting schools through local authorities with a check‑list that can look at making sure that the risks are minimised by the trips that have been taken have got that direct curriculum‑‑ Q157 Chairman: Let us continue. What would make you as a union change your mind in terms of what assurances the Government could give or LEAs could give, or a combination of factors? This is a four‑year policy. We have had it for a long time, although it comes as a surprise, I see from the Daily Express. You have never had it! Ms Keates: Indeed. Q158 Chairman: They are not that clever at the Daily Express, obviously, because they blame the Government for this policy, but, tell us, we are trying to find out what would change your mind and make you cooperate? Ms Keates: All of the items we have listed in section 28 of our evidence. The consistent monitoring of the visits, the support from their employer for teachers who actually take these visits, because they are actually abandoned when litigation starts or there is a particular problem. We would like a much firmer application of the Government guidance on monitoring of the educational validity, because again there is a lack of consistency. Q159 Chairman: There is a difficulty there, Chris, is there not, because evidence that this Committee has had said there is nothing like the joy of seeing a child who has seen the sea for the first time, and you might say that for a child from a deprived background a visit to the Blackpool pleasure beach is wonderful. Q160 Jonathan Shaw: Dubious? Ms Keates: Or exotic! Q161 Chairman: I know for the first time when I was a shadow minister for that sort of area that going to the Blackpool pleasure beach was a wonderful learning experience, but would not people think you were being a bit Stalinist if you did only the things that NASUWT thought were of value? Ms Keates: I did not say only the things that NASUWT thought were of value; I said what we would get is a check‑list against which schools could do that measurement themselves. Q162 Chairman: But would a child's first visit to the seaside be educational or not? Ms Keates: It is very easy to put a circumstance like that. What I would say to you is of course it is important for children to have that kind of experience. I would not disagree with this. I think it is borne out of this premise that somehow we are anti‑educational visits, which I have tried to explain is not the case. Q163 Jonathan Shaw: You are. Ms Keates: No. Q164 Chairman: Jonathan, I will be handing back to you in a minute. What we are trying to push is it was you that mentioned Alton Tower, not us? Ms Keates: That is absolutely right. I am not sure. Q165 Chairman: You have got to make a list. Ms Keates: Yes, I am not sure ‑ as I often have on these things ‑ I am not sure that that is something I would say should be conducted by a school. The other point I would‑‑ Q166 Chairman: So a visit to Scarborough is on the list or not? Ms Keates: I would say, depending what they are doing at Scarborough. If they are going looking at coastline features and various other things to do with a field trip, then that might be. Q167 Chairman: Not to have a paddle and see the sea for the first time? Ms Keates: Of course you want children to have those particular experience, but, I have to say, I also think that you need to do some investigation into how many of the trips that are run actually get to the children that you are identifying, because there are a number of trips that take place that actually parents cannot afford for those children to go and they are often the ones that you want to have that first experience. My view is that the more that a trip is related to the curriculum the more opportunity pupils will have to go, because you cannot charge for trips that are necessary as part of the curriculum. Too many of the visits that go rely on voluntary contributions, and some of them are horrendously expensive, and parents get into the position of either they cannot afford for their own child to feel guilty or the voluntary contribution letter says, "If you do not make a voluntary contribution then other people may not be able to go either", which is a double whammy for some parents who have poor economic circumstances. So whilst I would never disagree that for a child to see the sea for the first time is a wonderful experience, I do not think we should get carried away on that wave of emotion that that is somehow what is happening in all these visits that take place and the bad old NASUWT is stopping these wonderful children having these wonderful experiences because that is not true; but I think I have a responsibility to draw to the attention of this Committee the real concerns that my members in schools face around these issues. Q168 Chairman: But it is our job also to assess the evidence from NASUWT. A policy, on the one hand, that would stop all schools trips but, on the other, you seem to be in favour of school trips and out of school education. A lot of people that we represent ‑ as elected politicians we have got to explain a policy and that is our difficulty with your position, is it not? On the one hand the logic of your four‑year policy would be the end of all out‑of‑door education for schools? Ms Keates: It would until the issues were addressed that we have listed in our evidence that are currently being considered by the Government, because they had clearly thought there was validity to the arguments we put; otherwise I do not think Charles Clarke would have made a public statement at our annual conference that he recognised the validity of them, and he immediately set up meetings with senior officials to look at all of those issues and we are making really good progress because we want to be in a position to say that the risks have been minimised. Q169 Chairman: That is excellent, Chris. So you are saying that the Government is putting in place a dialogue that could change‑‑ Ms Keates: Absolutely; and that is what we say in paragraph 28 of our evidence. Q170 Jonathan Shaw: Let me ask Steve Sinnott about the Workforce Agreement. Do you think that these have made school trips more expensive? Mr Sinnott: More expensive? Q171 Jonathan Shaw: Yes, given that they have placed a financial burden on schools and perhaps having to pay for supply teachers to take them out? Mr Sinnott: I have no evidence of whether the Workforce Agreement has made the school trips more expensive or, indeed, less expensive. I have no evidence at all, Jonathan, in relation to that. Q172 Jonathan Shaw: What about classrooms assistants? Could they be trained to undertake the risk assessments? Mr Sinnott: They could. I think all sorts of people could be trained to undertake risk assessments, but to some extent I think, Jonathan, you are asking the wrong question. I think the right question‑‑ Q173 Jonathan Shaw: Help me; you are a teacher! Mr Sinnott: If you will permit me. The right question is to ask some of the centres that offer outdoor activities for them, for example, to provide generic risk assessments, and they would be of great assistance to schools and in that way reducing the burden, the bureaucratic burden, and, indeed, the work load on teachers, on head teachers and on appropriate support staff. So we think that could be done. Indeed, in activities that the NUT nationally has organised jointly with the NASUWT nationally to support the global campaign for education, we have used and we have undertaken joint risk. We have paid for joint risk assessments to be carried out and provided them with schools who have been sending them on activities that the NUT and the NASUWT have jointly organised? Ms James: In terms of risk assessment, I think it is quite important to remember the involvement of local authorities carrying out risk assessments, though, again, I would strongly support the notion of teachers receiving training and all staff receiving training in terms of actually running, planning and moving forward with any outdoor education activity. I think that is absolutely essential. We mention in our evidence the OCR training course, which is actually very valuable, and I think the more people that undertake this the better, or something similar. Dr Hammans: In terms of risk assessments, I do not think that there is any need to explain to school and college leaders the importance of them, and most schools already have a bank of their own generic risk assessments which then link with LEA activity centre and association risk assessments, and they are used within schools all the time. Q174 Jonathan Shaw: Can I ask you, Kathryn James, do your members have concerns about dubious trips? Ms James: You will see in our evidence that we talk about the necessity for learning objectives, and that is for any lesson, and that would also include the necessity for the learning objectives for outdoor education. We think this is an essential part of the planning system. In terms of whether dubious activities, I think any activity that takes place within or without a school needs to have to a strong basis upon which the learning is to be forthcoming. By that I am not just tying it directly to curriculum learning, because you talked about the social aspect and the education of children in terms of their growing up, and particularly children from deprived areas need that rich experience that actually can only come from activities that take place out of school, and this is why we are very much in support of outdoor activities. Chris and I, I think, probably sit on different sides of the same line in terms of where we are coming from because we too see the necessity to make sure that there is adequate safety; that people are secure in what they are doing. We have talked about the concerns about litigation and they may be unfounded, but these concerns are still very real, and that can be off-putting for teachers and for support staff when they are looking at planning these particular activities. Q175 Chairman: Dr Hammans, who are these people in schools, heads or governors, or whoever, who are they, who are planning ridiculous excursions to things that have no value? Who are these people? Dr Hammans: I genuinely do not think, Chair, that there are any dubious excursions or planned trips; because the bureaucracy and the risk, whether it is real or not, associated with those in people's minds who are organising the trips and taking the students out is so great that there has to be a genuine agreed set of objectives for it. For instance, if it is Alton Towers, it may be a trip to reward students who have done particularly well, or it may be an entitlement for every Year 7 student to go to do some practical physics which is then built on throughout the whole of their visits curriculum in school, but the amount of work that needs to be done in advance has to be quite clearly worth it, otherwise what is the point? We do not go on trips that take hours of planning with the risk associated just in case something goes wrong for just a jolly; it does not happen like that any more. It is not like that in schools and colleges. Q176 Chairman: So these unnecessary value trips are a sort of urban myth? Dr Hammans: Our impression certainly would be that they do not occur these days. They may have happened ten, fifteen, twenty years ago where teachers decided, "It is summer term, let's take the students out for a walk down the river bank", but these days with the pressure from national curriculum, the wider agenda for personal development for students, team‑building, leadership skills, there is no spare time. Teachers do not have the time, students do not have the time to waste and parents certainly would not support us. Q177 Chairman: Kathryn, is that your take on it? Ms James: I would agree. I do not think that you ought to underestimate the actual planning time and the commitment that all of the staff need to give to make an outdoor activity valuable for all concerned. When Steven Crowne and Helen Williams were here before, they commented about strengthening relationships with the school. Actually outdoor activities can even work in terms of strengthening relationships with the community, and, particularly in the more deprived areas, again, that can be a very, very strong element in terms of how schools function within their community; but that takes time, it takes effort, it takes a lot of resources, and I think the staff who give their time for this want to see that they are valuable and that the activity is valuable and that it is of value to the pupils who undertake them. Q178 Chairman: You both say then that the concern that NASUWT have that is really central to their objection, one of the central concerns, does not exist. It is figment of someone's imagination? Ms James: I think that there have been problems. Chris herself has said that in fact the dubious nature of school trips ‑ I think she herself said that they think that this has decreased in NAS terms. From our perspective, we would say that the learning objects which are central to any activity actually mean that this has to now be defined before anything can go forward. So, yes, I would say that in fact they have been minimised, if not wiped out. Dr Hammans: Could I add something there. I agree very much with what Kathryn says, but it is that fear of litigation, particularly for our members. So in terms of calls to the Secondary Heads Association hotline, the HQ, then there will be calls each week from members who have received a solicitor's letter or are outraged or intimidated either by the receipt of those, or disciplinary action from their own governing body or through the LEA or even the Health and Safety Executive. So whether it is real or not, whether it gets to a court of law or not, it is something additional on our members which needs to be borne in mind. Q179 Chairman: So what is it, Dr Hammans? I am going to ask Chris Keates. What is it that would put your members' minds at rest? What kind of support do they want which would mean that they felt better about participation in out of school activities? You heard the civil servants talking about the manifesto, and so on. What should be in that manifesto that would put your minds at rest and lead to a greater level of cooperation? Dr Hammans: There needs to be something which is definitive. So if you are looking at the bureaucracy that everybody has to fill in there is the DfES guidelines which need to be met, there is then the local authority set of guidelines which, as has been indicated earlier on, will change and will change somewhat, then you have got again school's interpretations, plus whichever group you may be going with, whichever partner you will be working with ‑ so you have got a huge amount of bureaucracy ‑ but even when you have dotted the "I"s, crossed the "T"s and something might have gone wrong, the view is somebody has to be responsible for what has happened to my child or that child; and it does not matter what you have done, the sense is that you as an individual, if you have been involved in that school party, or myself as head of a school, is the one who will be in court. Real or not, that is the fear. So something where the bureaucracy ‑ if you want the guidelines, the safety, the nets, everything is filled in, that is the end of it and an individual is not identified but the authorities who have been giving you the guidance are the people who then are answerable. Q180 Chairman: Would you favour getting rid of this responsibility. A specialist organisation in the private sector could take this all over and take the load totally out of schools? Dr Hammans: Our view is very much that it is about holistic education of youngsters and it is not about, "We will deliver national curriculum plus a couple of options." It is about seeing a youngster when they arrive at 11 at our schools through to when they finish at 19 even, their complete growth from the eleven year old through to the 19 year old; and if we start parcelling it up so that behaviour is to do with one group of people, outdoor education someone else, classrooms to do with this, I think we lose sight of what is unique about the UK education system. Q181 Chairman: What is your view on that, Steve? Mr Sinnott: I think a lot of commonsense has just been spoken, and what I think we have started to see is considerable agreement on those people who represent teachers on this issue. The fear is a real fear. The fear of litigation is not something that Chris Keates is inventing; it is a real fear in the part of schools. So I share what my colleagues have said about that fear. I also say that that places an enormous responsibility - because you are asking the questions and we are answering them ‑ it places a considerable responsibility on the Committee here in its report to do something about assuaging the fear that is out there on the part of parents and others. By asking the questions you really are placing a tremendous responsibility on yourselves. The way in which we do it, I think, is by a good report from you, about all the teacher organisations. Helen Jones: All our reports are good! Q182 Mr Turner: Another good report! Mr Sinnott: I would only say it because I have got absolute confidence in the type of reports that you produce. Q183 Chairman: It is very nice of you to say things like this, Steve, but our reports have a curt reputation for being quite good? Mr Sinnott: They have. Q184 Chairman: I say that reasonably modestly, and our reports absolutely reflect the quality of evidence that we are given. We have been given good evidence today. Some unions sometimes have been relatively reluctant even to come to see the Committee, but that is not the situation today and the quality of evidence we get we can pick up the resonance, and what we are being given today is a very interesting amount of evidence; it is very positive; so do not worry about it. Mr Sinnott: Can I steer you in a particular direction? Q185 Chairman: It depends upon which direction! Mr Sinnott: The direction is to... This is in terms of looking at the value of the types of activities that you are looking at, and it is to look at what was developed in Birmingham LEA and in terms of their secondary guarantees and primary guarantees in which they outlined specific guarantees or entitlements on children at different ages and the way in which all youngsters would benefit from having those guarantees met; and they relate to a whole range of activities, as I have mentioned, from artistic to sporting, residential or foreign visits. For youngsters whose parents cannot afford to do those things or whose parents are not interested in providing those things for their children, it is schools who decide to pick up those pieces. No private sector agency can do that in relation to your question earlier, but it has to be the schools and the teachers who make professional judgments about what is best in the interests of their school and in the interests of those children. What Birmingham did there, I believe, should have been taken up more nationally. It is tremendous evidence and I think there is evidence of youngsters, in particular from the economically deprived backgrounds, who have benefited from that. But there are a range of measures that may take place in the future that will make it for difficult for youngsters to go on some trips. It may be that some of the developments in relation to the Gershin review and the Lyons review may impact on staffing in some libraries or museums, and it may be that at the same time some of the pressures that will flow from the Lyons review in terms of local authority staffing, but local authority resources and local authority sites and local authority amenities, there may be pressure on them getting rid of sites and amenities that benefit youngsters. So that is an area in which you might want to have a look too, Chair. Q186 Chairman: If you could write to us about the implications of the Lyons review, because that is a relatively new one for us. Mr Sinnott: We will do? Q187 Chairman: We spent a week not very long ago in Birmingham, so some of the questions I was asking civil servants really come from that experience in Birmingham. Can I bring all of you back quickly, before we move on to education events coordinators. What is your general view of this as an initiative that will... When I was asking the civil servants should there be a champion in the Department or a champion minister, what about champions in schools or someone who has a specific role in seeing if the school is really up to good practice on these issues and energise them? Let us start with Dr Hammans and move across. Dr Hammans: From our point of view, and I am speaking now as the head of a school, it has been a very useful addition to us being able to persuade staff that they are safe; because it is the fear of litigation, not necessarily the reality, which is the real concern. So we have our education visits coordinator. I will say that we would not let staff go unless we were fully convinced we were complying with everything such that if there were an incident it would not be the individual, it would be me that ended up in court. So the EVC, which is somebody who is nominated, trained, etc, is another layer to reassure those staff who do want to take students out on trips for good and valid educational reasons. Q188 Chairman: Chris, does that help you in terms of having that? Ms Keates: We have actually identified some very good practice that has come out of the national agreements, and the DfES is currently circulating to schools a video, which one of the examples they give from a Pathfinder school is an Educational Visits Coordinator, that is a highly qualified member of sports staff who has actually taken a huge burden off teachers in term of planning, coordination, identifying if risk assessments have been done, liaising with the local authority outdoor educational advisers, and we think that is very good practice to look at that, because teachers, quite frankly, with a full teaching load, one of their concerns is having the time to do those kinds of things properly, and we are very pleased in the way the remodelling of the school workforce is bringing on board other staff who are qualified to do those kinds of things and relieving that kind of administrative and coordination burden from teachers. Q189 Chairman: So if there were not any of your members, if someone else was doing the job, you would be happier, would you? Ms Keates: We think that it is better that there is somebody, given the issues that have to be addressed in the planning of these kinds of activities because, I think my colleagues have emphasised, a great deal of the time and effort needs to go into these if they are going to be done properly. We do not think that it is appropriate to do something that a teacher can do on top of a full teaching commitment and that they are better focused on concentrating on the teaching and learning, look at the curriculum needs in terms of what kind of visit might support some of the curriculum and having somebody on the school staff who can devote some time to that. Certainly the feedback that we are getting is that where people have looked at remodelling of the workforce seriously, that is one of the issues they have looked at and staff are reporting that it has taken quite a considerable burden off them in that respect. Q190 Chairman: Would you not miss out that sort of bonding that students get with staff when they do things outside the school? Ms Keates: We are not taking it. I am talking about somebody who is doing all the preparatory work, providing all the information, making sure risk assessments are done. That is not necessarily, in fact quite often is not, the person who will conduct the visit. That can either be teachers or support staff. Q191 Chairman: You still prefer your members to go on visits? Ms Keates: I think if they are totally curriculum related and things like field work, and so on, you have to have a qualified teacher who is relating that back to the classroom issues. Some of the other visits that might not be quite such a subject based link, it might not be necessary for it always to be teachers. What we have said is in terms of teacher workload the big issue of administration, risk assessment and various other things, there are other people who can do that and have the time to do that. In terms of conducting the visits, we think there has to be an appropriate mix of people. What we do not support is the automatic assumption that every aspect of a school visit must be done by a teacher. Q192 Valerie Davey: I think in this session I need to register my continued membership of the NUT. A slight change. In terms of the Government and its involvement, I would like to ask the two head teacher representatives, first of all, whether they feel that the recent Government initiatives, and particularly, I guess, the Growing Schools initiative, has been successful in highlighting the value of outdoor activities and, indeed, promoting them? Ms James: Do I think it has been successful? I think it has been partially successful. I think it has been part of a growing move on the part of the Government in that there are lots of conversations taking place, if I can phrase it in that way, in terms of seeing how outdoor activities can benefit education and can be promoted. We talked before about the holistic nature of education and the use of outdoor activities within it, and I think we need to continue to see that being promoted so that all staff and parents and the general school community can see the value of the outdoor activities and, therefore, again positive promotion, I think, is an important aspect. Dr Hammans: I would agree with that. Anything which comes from any central source which says that this aspect is part and parcel of education, it is not just about sitting in the class room and doing your book work or doing some work on the inter‑active white board, it is about a whole range of experiences which have educational outcomes, and I think anything is going to be positive. Q193 Valerie Davey: So if the school were going to take this forward, do you think the decision to expand outdoor activities is more likely to happen if it has got the head teacher's backing, if it has got the LEA's backing, if it has got Ofsted's backing or the Government's backing. Where is the pressure going to come from that would be most effective in recharging the batteries in terms of outdoor school activities? Dr Hammans: I think it needs the head teacher's backing, because that is the person who is likely to end up in court. So if we are talking about that fear, if the head is going say quite clearly, "These are valuable educational activities which we will run at minimum risk for the very best interests educationally of our students", then you are going to take your staff with you. You inevitably will have the backing of your governors anyway for that. If the LEA supports it, plus there are national initiatives and agendas to support it as well, then it is a winning situation, but I think it has to start with the school, much as the evidence from the DfES officials earlier on saying that it is for the school to determine its priorities locally, but, if it can link in with other national priorities, including Ofsted, then that is a stronger argument. Q194 Valerie Davey: Would you agree with that? Ms James: I would in the main, yes, though, again, we keep going back and I know we keep returning to this fear of litigation, but until we start to unpin that and actually almost start to try to remove some of that fear... Fiona referred before to the fact that the head is always the one that fears that they are going to land up in court. That is still there. If we want to promote a positive attitude towards outdoor activities being wrapped up within education, absolutely essential, then I think head teachers must be secure in saying, "Yes, I know that I can promote this, I know that this is safe, I know that this secure and I am going to be the one that ends up in court if anything goes wrong, but I know that I am secure in saying this", and I think that really needs to be‑‑ Q195 Valerie Davey: It is really rather ironic, is it not, that we are using the word "fear" and yet many of these outdoor activities are there to help children overcome fear of climbing, or all the other things. It has to happen. We have to overcome it. I would like to come back very specifically because I know Banbury from old. There is a lot of overseas work, indeed, international European visits? Dr Hammans: There is less now. We no longer do European work experience on the advice of the Education Authority. We do a number of overseas trips, which are the day trip to France or the Christmas shopping trip to Germany, which is two or three days, or a week in France residential, or Spain, including expeditions to more exotic places in the summer holidays for a month, but we are very clear that one of the things we offer as a very large school, which makes us distinct from other schools in the area, are staff who are keen and interested in running those sorts of activities, plus it is something value-added for education at our school. So we are fully committed to it as a school anyway, but that is a different starting point, I think, to other schools. Q196 Valerie Davey: But clearly that is potentially the largest risk when you are taking children abroad and you are committed still, even if perhaps to a lesser degree you are still committed, to that work and you have overcome personally, as you must have done, the fear which says this is more important than me sitting here worrying that the world will collapse? Dr Hammans: If I am honest, the fear is still there sometimes. Certainly when you are getting to the end of a month's expedition in Madagascar, for instance, and you get a phone call at 3.30 in the morning and they are saying, "Actually things are okay; we had forgotten the time difference", there is always a moment of panic then, but it is about as a school we do believe we should be doing it. It is about something special and distinct that we can offer our students. There is a risk there, but our parents have opted into the fact that we will do everything we can and more to minimise that risk, but there is no learning without some risk. Q197 Chairman: Steve Sinnott wants to come in on that question, but can I push you on what do you give up on the advice of the Educational Authority? Dr Hammans: We gave up European work experience. Q198 Chairman: Why is that? Dr Hammans: We were effectively sending students solo to places that we had not visited ourselves, were not able to risk assess in advance, had not met the adults, were not aware of the work situation. So in terms of the tick‑list that we had to fill in, there were too many blanks and we were being too trusting, so we were not up for that. Q199 Chairman: Steve Sinnott? Mr Sinnott: Thank you. I wanted just start by correcting Valerie in terms of the way in which she viewed her union. The NUT is a head teachers' organisation and we claim to have the second highest number of head teachers in all the teacher's organisations, and I think I am speaking for Chris Keates here, because she cannot speak for herself this afternoon, as you will have noticed, so I will say they also have head teachers members in the NASUWT. So we are head teacher organisations as well. Valerie Davey: I take rebuke from the leader of my union! Q200 Chairman: Have you received her membership? Mr Sinnott: She has paid her membership, Chair; she has done that! The Growing Schools initiative, which I think Valerie was referring to, they identified the range of barriers to schools becoming involved or taking forward that particular initiative, and a range of them were specified, and I do not think it included fee litigation, but they did specify a range of others, including lack of resources, lack of training, lack of confidence amongst teachers, I think also head teachers, in the way in which they were looking at this particular activity. Similar programmes where schools have specified an interest in the past but have seen - and I do not know whether you have looked at this as well - other barriers to schools becoming involved in this type of activity, one of them being the pressures of the national curriculum and national curriculum assessment and testing and, in particular, the way in which it impacts at Key Stage 2 in youngsters being involved in a variety of activities, because schools really do feel the pressure of wanting to have a good place in any published league table locally or nationally. So that is an area where I have not heard it specified as a barrier this afternoon, this evening, but I think we needed to draw your attention to, Chairman. Chairman: That is a very good point. Q201 Mr Pollard: We have been talking all afternoon about risk. Have we got a duty to prepare children for risk in the world, because, after all, the real word is full of risk each and every day? I give two quick examples. We were in Norway a week or two ago and we were told there children could be sent outside to play as long as the temperature did not go below minus 15 degrees centigrade! There are fairly clear guidelines. There is no way we would allow them out at those temperatures. The other thing that excited me was that this kindergarten that we were in was using very sophisticated tools: hammers and nails, for example, three-year old kids, sharp chisels and proper saws, and I was quite excited by that. I thought, "God almighty", this filled me with dread thinking, "What were these kids going to get up to." But apparently, as long as they are told properly how to use it and are supervised, they turn out some top quality toys. I was very impressed with that. Getting back to where I started from, we have a duty, do we not, to prepare kids for the world outside and to show them that you try and minimise risk, you try and do the very best you can. Is that not the right approach? Ms Keates: From our point of view, I think I said very early on, there is no activity really that is without risk. I think the issue is the context in which schools are working, and there has been a lot made in the papers, for example, about schools actually stopping pupils playing conkers, that sort of thing. On the surface of it, that seems ridiculous ‑ we would all say that ‑ but in the context of what we have been saying about the fear that schools have of the solicitor's letter and the litigation, that is the concern that schools have got. So in terms of letting children have a variety of experience, and so on, I think schools would be the first to say, "Yes, that is correct", but from the point of view that we come from as well, which is obviously about the concerns our members have, both head teachers and teachers, then we have to point out that at the moment we have that huge fear of potential litigation. So I think it is a balance there. We would certainly like to be in a position where children running across a playground and tripping up did not become the subject of a solicitor's letter. We certainly would like to be in the position where schools are not having to provide goggles to anybody who is playing conkers, or even banning it altogether. Our members would say that, but the fact is that is the climate that they are working, as you have heard from everybody giving evidence here. Q202 Chairman: Is that really the climate, or are you just playing to the tabloid agenda? Ms Keates: Not at all. Chairman: You keep coming back to these examples that seem to most of us really‑‑ Mr Pollard: Barmy? Q203 Chairman: ‑‑only the sort of things that the Daily Express and other tabloids produce. Ms Keates: Everyone who has given evidence here today has raised with you the concern of the fear of litigation. You have heard SHA saying‑‑ Q204 Helen Jones: Give us one example? Ms Keates: Fear of litigation is not the same as somebody being sued. It is about the issue‑‑ Q205 Helen Jones: It should be based on fact? Ms Keates: The fact‑‑ Q206 Chairman: You just talk to the Chairman. I have asked you a question. I will bring Helen in if she wants. Ms Keates: The fact is, as all of us have said in one way or another, that for things that we would all in a sensible world simply dismiss as being a genuine accident that has occurred schools are now getting solicitors letters as a minimum and then finding they are subject to some sort of investigation, and so on, leading up to potential litigation as the end point on that. We have had people who have undergone, and I can give you an example from Wales, which is one we have publicised, raised with the Government and provided the details of, a teacher on an educational visit walking across a room in a residential place, the pupils were eating food, she walked across with some orange juice that spilt on the head of a child. There was a six‑month police investigation in Wales for that of assault. Clearly that is the sort of thing that is totally ridiculous that anybody goes through, and there must be a process whereby at a very early stage and very quickly, the fear can be reduced by somebody saying this is clearly a totally frivolous action that has been brought here. Q207 Chairman: Whilst the Committee is learning from these anecdotes and illustrations, we do get the feeling that you have a rather different attitude to what is going on than some of your colleagues here today. It seems to me some of your colleagues know that that goes on in some schools, but seem to put it in a better sense of proportion than you do. I get the feeling from listening to Fiona and Kathryn and Steve that, yes, they know that is going on but they do not really put it to such a high level of prominence in terms of the way that you see the changes. Ms Keates: I can only speak for my union's experience and my union's view. Other people will express it as they feel from the point of view of their union. Perhaps if you examine details of casework, the level of casework that is involved with teachers and that perhaps we have been involved, in these issues may vary. I do not know. I cannot speak for others on that. The point that has been made about head teachers, our experience is even having head teachers in membership, they are not the ones that conduct the trips, take the trips away and so are not the ones who are the subject to these investigations, so there may be different perspective from that. I can only tell you as we find and why we have found the need to give the advice; and all I can say is that fortunately the Government recognises there is some validity, having talked to teachers themselves, having got reports from NUT, and they are working with us to address our concerns; and I am hopeful we can move forward in a way that produces much better procedures and gets rid of some of the nonsense that schools are having to face and the time and effort that goes in from a head teacher having to deal with a solicitor's letter that comes in. That is not a simple issue; it involves time and effort and liaison with the local authority, liaison with solicitors, investigations at the school. These are huge issues. The Government is actually looking now at something that at a very early stage might be able to identify something that could be dismissed as a frivolous claim without everybody having to go through that difficulty. Q208 Mr Chaytor: I am surprised any NASUWT members turn up for work: they are either frightened about being poked in the eye with a conker or having a glass of orange juice poured over their head! I really wanted to ask about the three‑day Christmas shopping trip to Germany to see if there are any places left on this year's trip! What are the specific learning objects behind that? Dr Hammans: Students taking GSCE German are invited in Year 9 ‑ so they have already made their option selection for Key Stage 4 ‑ are invited in Year 9 to do it and it is sold to the children. The parents want them to go, but they do not want to go to Germany, they do not want to talk in German because it might be embarrassing, but when you say, "Actually, you are going to the Christmas markets. It will be great. You will be staying with your friends and then you will learn German as well. You will be able to practice and improve your German" ‑ and that is how we sell it to the students. Q209 Mr Chaytor: Can I link that with the point that Steve Sinnott made earlier, and this relates to the NUT's submission, because there is this paragraph - all the unions continuously refer to this - about the pressures of meeting the demands of the national curriculum and the pressures of assessment and testing, and so on, but the NUT's submission then goes on to spell out the benefits of outdoor education. It seems to me that none of the associations are linking these two together. Surely if you are convinced of the benefits in terms of the motivation of pupils and the development of confidence, maturity, team work and leadership, this will have a spill over in the class room which will reduce the pressure that you say your members are under because it will make teaching an easy job to do. No‑one seems to be making that connection because you are so defensive or paranoid about being hit over the head with a conker. Am I missing something or is there not an obvious point to be made there, that if you can get the benefits of more outdoor learning, then this will reduce the pressures in the class room by producing better motivated pupils? Mr Sinnott: David, I thought we were making exactly the same points as yours. If we have not expressed it in that way - the point you are making - then we should do. Do you know what would happen? If the Government issued guidance which said, "We advise all schools not to undertake outdoor visits and outdoor activities", if the Government issued that advice, schools would still do them. They would still do them. The reason why is because the teachers make a professional judgment that it is worthwhile. It is a worthwhile activity for the youngsters in their care. That is the professional judgment of teachers, and it is hard-pressed teachers who are still organising these activities because they believe that they are valuable, but we know that there would be more and there would be better activities taking place if we did more to reduce the work load on teachers and, if we freed up curriculum time to do it and if we had a less prescriptive national curriculum and we addressed issues to do with assessment and testing, we would have much better organised and more valuable activities taking place. Dr Hammans: I was just going to say, that is essentially what the Secondary Head's submission said, that it is valuable and therefore we continue do it despite fears or worries or concerns. Q210 Mr Turner: I was going to ask a similar question actually, because someone implied that schools, I think it was Chris, should be doing things which have curricular value as compared presumably with things which do not, and Kathryn said that the learning objectives have to be defined before anything goes forward. It pretty sad, is it not, that schools are limited to those things? Ms James: Can I take that one. Actually I do not agree with you. I do not think it is sad at all, because I think you are actually enabling people to plan and to put in place an holistic view of education by building those activities within the whole teaching and the whole education system. Picking up David's point before about seeing the benefits of outdoor activities, actually I would pick up your point about not supporting outdoor activities as seeing the spill over into the classroom. I think we do. That is why we are so ‑ we would wish to see them continue, we would wish to see them grow and to see those benefits actually underlined. Q211 Mr Turner: Steve was nodding when you said that, but when I made my initial remark I got the faintest glimmer of a nod from Dr Hammans. Did you agree with me or do you agree with Kathryn? Dr Hammans: Tricky. I would be really nervous about setting up additional bureaucracy for any trips or anything which is not classroom based that said, "Tick off your learning objectives first", because we lose some of the creativity, some of the by‑chance, the what‑ifs that happen in class but also would happen outside class that we then say, "Sorry, that was not in the objective. We cannot follow that. It might be really naive but we are not able to pursue it because we planned it to meet these objectives. So I think too much prescription is entirely wrong, but being aware of what the students may benefit from that trip at the outset I think is very important, but please do not put tick boxes in and say, "You must do this. What is the personal development target for this trip? What is the curriculum link for this trip?" Q212 Mr Turner: Is there some additional value in Dr Hammans opinion, because of all the teachers in this room, as far as I know, she is the only one who is teaching? Ms Keates: I would be happy to answer that. I do not think that is the case at all. Who SHA chose to send to represent them is up to SHA, and I think that is absolutely fine, but the fact is we are accountable, elected people to our members and we do not make assertions or give evidence or develop policies without our members actually being included in that process. I think we are entirely representative and have hands‑on experience from people right across the country in schools throughout the country. Q213 Chairman: Before we finish, one last thing. We have had a very good session and we have gone on a little longer, and thank you for your perseverance, but much of what we have said has been couched today, the second session particularly, in terms of the 11 to 16 age group. Our inquiry covers really the early years as well, early years, pre‑school and through. Would anybody like to mention how important this sort of activity is at the earlier stages of education. Ms James: What I would say is that everything we have said this afternoon applies across the board as to how vital outdoor activities are. You only need to experience it from Key Stage 1 visiting, I do not know, a museum, or a farm, or whatever, and it is the most incredible experience both for those who are accompanying and for the children themselves, and it is a vital and valuable piece of education. Q214 Chairman: Thank you for that. Ms Keates: Quite often in the early years, of course, they are less dubious and less exotic than some of the things they do with older pupils, and so the concerns we have apply right across the board in terms of where teachers are taking these, but some of the issues around the primary sector is often that context, that curriculum context, because of the more flexibility within the primary curriculum than there is with some of the secondary more special list based issues. Q215 Chairman: It is interesting, Chris, you have again used the vocabulary "dubious and exotic", whereas Fiona Hammans and Steve and Kathryn all said to your original assertion that they do not know any dubious or exotic out of school activities from 11 to 16. Ms Keates: Just because my colleagues and I differ on an issue does not mean to say that NASUWT will change its views, and I am not sure you would want to us you want us to; you would want us to come here and be as honest as possible. Q216 Chairman: We are still worrying about your "dubious" and "exotic" and trying to find out whether it exists! Mr Sinnott: I have been scrupulous in not criticising colleagues in NASUWT. I do not want to do that. I have got a good relationship with the colleagues in NASUWT. The way you introduced this particular question, Chair, was to talk about 11 to 16, and an important point I want the National Union of Teachers to make is that some of the real benefits from Tomlinson and 14 to 19 education may be put at risk if we do not deal with some of the barriers that are clearly there that are part of your particular study. I think that is extremely important. At Key Stage 2, and this relates to David's earlier question, I know primary schools who, early in the school year of Year 6, undertake a residential activity, and they do it deliberately because they know that at that particular age youngsters will benefit from being on a residence activity with the youngsters, the youngsters are interacting together in a residential activity, because the relationship between the teachers and the support staff but also the relationship between the teacher and the youngsters really does benefit from that residential activity and that they believe that is the best way of setting them up for Key Stage 3 is to have that type of residential‑‑ Q217 Jonathan Shaw: Early on? Mr Sinnott: Early on in Year 6. So the benefits are clearly there. Q218 Chairman: Steve, as you said that, memories of St Margaret's Bay and the Romney High and Dimchurch Railway came flooding back! We finish on that note. Thank you. |