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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Skills (Phil Hope): Of course they are.
Mr. Clappison: We can debate that in the context of the Bill's provisions on curricula and entitlements. However, one piece of worrying evidence is the drift from the study of subjects that some would say demand a high degree of academic rigour, such as science and modern foreign languages, and a move toward subjects that many would regard as less rigorous.
For example, since 1997 there has been a collapse in the number of students studying modern foreign languages at A-level, although Spanish has more or less held its own. That has happened under a Government who say that they want this country to play its full part in Europe.
Every bit as worrying is the decline in science. The number of students entering for science A-levels has been in steady decline since 1997. Last year, significantly fewer students began A-level studies in biology, physics and chemistry than in 1997, and the decline is especially marked in physics and chemistry. That has happened
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under a Government who have said that they want the work force of the future to be better and more technologically equipped, with more children going into higher education to study scientific and technical subjects.
Last weekend, we heard of the closure of the chemistry department at Sussex university, which followed hard on the heels of the loss of the chemistry departments at Exeter, King's college, London, Queen Mary's college, London, Dundee and Surrey. That is not a trend that is good for the future of our country, and it needs to be reversed. We hope that the Bill, and other measures to be introduced, will go some way towards changing that trend, but we must wait to see what happens. Will the Bill make a difference? Does the Minister believe that it will lead to a revival in school science? Such a revival would be evidenced by more children choosing to study science subjects through to A-level.
Mr. Clappison: The Minister says yes, but we shall find out in due course. We shall also debate the matter in Committee.
My next question deals more generally with trust schools—or foundation schools, or double foundation schools, however they may be camouflaged by the Government. Will the Minister say how many brand new additional schools of that type will be established as a result of the Bill? How many existing schools will choose to go down that route?
Many questions will have to be examined in great detail in Committee. We want the Bill to make a real difference. At present, it will not do enough in that respect, but we will take every opportunity to make as much difference as we can, for the sake of the futures of the children about whom we have been speaking.
I do not believe that the Bill as it stands will make a difference on the scale that is needed. For that, parents will have to wait a little longer.
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Mr. Gordon Marsden (Blackpool, South) (Lab): Labour Members have argued long and passionately over the past few weeks about how to transform the White Paper into this Bill, and those who belong to the Select Committee have done so in a way that I consider to be both constructive and positive. Our passion stems from something deep in our psyche, history and personal experience, as we all have people in our families who have failed the 11-plus or been the first to go to university. We know that knowledge is power, and that the ability to rise out of adverse circumstances can be delivered only by education, principally in school.
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett) made so clear, those factors are the rocks and stones on which our party is built. Of all this Government's achievements since 1997, we are most proud of the achievements in education. We must continue to get this issue right, and it is crucial that we go on talking about education, education, education.
Structures are important, but so are individuals—individual teachers, and individual schools and initiatives. The Bill contains important provisions in
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respect of personalised learning that deserve support, but we must also look at its community context. It is crucial to get the educational environment right, and that is why the proposals on transport and discipline are so important. The revolution that the Bill will promote in respect of school meals is also very significant, as is getting the curriculum right, with parental support. The proposals in respect of children aged 14 to 19 may not go far enough, but they are important as well. The Bill covers a big agenda, and we must get it right.
The Bill should be radical, as it is about taking us forward to the next generation. Its framework must be robust enough to be worth arguing about and not simply rejected. I have not found myself in agreement with Roy Hattersley very often in recent times, but he was right to say in his article in The Guardian that MPs who want to vote for the perfect Bill will wait forever.
The Second Reading of the Bill should be a debate about broad principles and aspiration, but it would be wrong if we did not look also at some of the specific concerns that I hope that Ministers are beginning to address. The devil is always in the detail, but we should look to replace that with a few angels in the architecture. The Select Committee report tried to achieve that, and the common theme of all its recommendations was that there should be co-operation and collaboration.
Labour Members have consistently advocated an approach based on co-operation and collaboration. In my constituency, that will provide a crucial test of whether the proposals usher in a progressive future or leave us in a dead end.
In Blackpool, we are proud of our specialist schools, but without them spreading their best practice to other schools in the area that have not been so fortunate, and converting those schools, the reforms would have been stillborn. Therefore, there needs to be far more leverage to achieve the sort of thing that the Secretary of State and others have talked about today.
The philosopher Thomas Hobbes said that
If hon. Members want that translated into 21st century language, it means that if the Government will the ends that they talk about for collaboration and co-operation, they must also will the means. In order to do that, there are a number of specific things that they must look at, such as making the model of trust schools a collaborative one, as so many have said today and as the Select Committee recommended in paragraphs 57 and 68 of the report. We need federations that will act alongside local authorities, which must be the overall commissioners of education and we must ensure that the Bill impacts positively on all children in a local area. If the Government are not prepared to place the statutory obligation on schools to collaborate, they must provide stronger incentives for collaboration and partnership.
Schools must all face the same rules, and that is particularly true of children with special educational needs. Parents of children with a statement should have the same right of access to trust schools as they should have to an academy or to any other school. I was pleased to hear my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State touch on this issue. We need action on this matter urgently
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because there is already anecdotal evidence that academies are not practising fair admissions for children with special educational needs. If we have trust schools, we must make sure that they do not go down the same route. It is important that schools should be subject to the same scrutiny under local authorities. Admission forums must be encouraged to work together. If they do not, the system will not work.
The role of the schools commissioner was referred to and we touched on this point in the Select Committee. Frankly, I do not believe that a schools commissioner who is purely and simply a civil servant within the Department will deliver the expanded egalitarian role that we have heard about. We need to look at that in Committee and the Government need to look for someone with a fresh viewpoint and a fresh mind.
That is particularly true in terms of ensuring that the needs of disadvantaged children are properly maintained and represented by the commissioner. It is instructive that the briefings that many of us have received from organisations such as the Children's Society, the National Autistic Society, Barnardo's and the Campaign for Racial Equality have all touched on this point. It comes back to leverage again; we need to make sure that local authorities focus on securing fair access for all pupils.
I want to say something about the Select Committee's comments on benchmarks. A lot of nonsense has been spoken about them, as if they were some form of Stalinist quota. That was never the intention of the Select Committee. The analogy should be with what happens in higher education and the Higher Education Funding Council for England; we should promote, encourage and, from time to time, name and shame. The idea that this is a Stalinist process of quotas should be thrown out of the window. If that is an issue of concern to the Government, they should revisit it.
Children with special educational needs need to given explicit priority in admissions criteria because two thirds of the exclusions at the moment are of children with special educational needs.
The Bill is all about providing a platform to progress our life demands. The Bill will be judged by the way in which nothing is done to chip away at that platform. We need to make sure that the direction of travel is one of collaboration, and not division. That is the responsibility of the Government team, and I expect to see it delivered in Committee and on Report.
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