Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20-39)
MR DAVID
BELL AND
MR JONATHAN
THOMPSON
14 JUNE 2006
Q20 Paul Holmes: In terms of the
various statistical charts—whether it is pupil/teacher ratio,
expenditure, people in higher education or whatever it is—should
there have been one consistent starting point instead of a lot
of different ones. Could I suggest that that consistent starting
point ought to be 1997 if we are going to evaluate how the current
Government is doing? The Department, insofar as it has used a
consistent starting point, it has used 1999 which was the very
bottom of expenditure after two years of continued cuts and so
it shows a better result—1999-2005—whereas if you
start at 1997 that is more realistic, that is the start of the
current government period. As I say, you have not even stuck to
1999; the tables start all over the place.
Mr Thompson: It would clearly
be more appropriate to start at one particular point. One of the
questions that was raised about funding for a full time equivalent
student in further education was why have we started in 2001-02
whereas government departmental reports started in 1997-98, we
wanted to start at some consistent point throughout this report
and in our written response we will give you the data going back
to 1997-98.
Q21 Paul Holmes: Should that consistent
point be 1997 or 1999 or do you not have an opinion?
Mr Bell: I think we will have
to look at that because there will be some issues about the availability
of data that I know of, but we would certainly be happy to look
at that and again we can make sure that that specific point is
addressed in the response from the Secretary of State to the Chairman.
Q22 Mr Chaytor: One of the aspects
of the report that is consistent year on year is the reporting
of PSA targets and the progress of PSA targets. In this year's
report it seems that there are 24 targets reported on but 12 are
slipping behind or have not yet been assessed. The Department
is only meeting 12 of its 24 current PSA targets. Does the fault
lie with the targets or does the fault lie with the Department?
What would you expect to do about that 50% success rate over the
next two to three years?
Mr Bell: I think you are right
to highlight the distinction between those that are slipping and
those that have not yet been assessed. I think that is an important
distinction but, having said that, there are some key targets
here that are against projectory. The targets in some cases—but
not all cases—are ambitious but we cannot just say, "Look,
they are too ambitious therefore we cannot meet them". One
of the tasks we have been doing recently within the Department
is taking each of those PSA targets in turn and really drilling
down to have a look at what we might need to do differently to
accelerate progress. For example, if you take the target on Key
Stage 2 achievement—the achievement of 11-year-olds—we
have been looking at all sorts of information and guidance given
to schools but I do not think we can just sit back say that we
have done this and done that and it is happening or not happening;
it is a real responsibility on us as officials to drill down to
look at that so we have gone through that process with all of
those targets and asked what we need to do to improve our performance.
I can assure you that there is no sense at all of complacency
about the targets and a real recognition that we need to accelerate
what we are doing in some areas.
Q23 Mr Chaytor: I want to move onto
the question of school funding because the Department is in the
middle of a major review of the way in which schools are funded.
From the financial year 2008 new three year budgets will be in
place and possibly a new system of funding. You had a consultation
recently during April and May about the possibilities for the
new funding methodology, but who was consulted? This was not a
normal formal public consultation on the methodology. Who was
consulted in this exercise?
Mr Bell: The usual group of consultees.
We can provide you with a full list but I can assure you that
it was those we would normally consult very widely and that would
include associations, authorities, local government associations
and the like. A lot of people would be consulted as you would
expect in an exercise like this. I cannot give you the outcomes
because you will recognise that the consultation just closed a
few weeks ago and we are just analysing that data. We believe
this is a really important issue and therefore it was important
to consult widely.
Q24 Mr Chaytor: What is your feeling
of the major problems of school funding that you are trying solve
by moving to a new system?
Mr Bell: I think in some ways
we have gone a long way to address some of the concerns that people
had, for example the move away from single year budgets which
was already started under the current system. I think that in
itself is a very important shift in how we do business, as is,
of course, the direct grant on the school side. We do recognise
that there are issues that we wanted to get views on. Our impression
is that for the budget of 2006-07—ie the current year we
are in—we have not picked up a lot of noise within the system.
There are clearly questions that people ask, but in terms of the
structure of the system it seems to have addressed many of the
concerns that a number of people had raised so quite a lot of
this has to do with the technical elements of taking it forward.
I think maybe Jon should add one or two details.
Mr Thompson: I think we feel there
are six specific things that we would want to have a look at.
One is the way in which the DSG itself is distributed across the
system. Secondly, the difference between DSG and the various specific
grants.
Q25 Chairman: Could you use the full
titles rather than acronyms, please.
Mr Thompson: My apologies; I will
start again. First of all we want to look at distribution arrangements
for the dedicated schools grant. Secondly the balance between
the specific grants like the school standards grant and the dedicated
schools grant. Thirdly, the whole question of how we take into
account deprivation in this methodology. Fourthly, the question
of the minimum funding guarantee and where we should be placed
on the spectrum in terms of minimum funding guarantee. Fifthly,
the big issue of the accounting year versus the academic year
which is always an issue. I have to account for it in accounting
years whereas schools obviously run on academic years. Then lastly
there is the question of the multi-year budget. Those are the
six areas we think we want to probe into.
Q26 Mr Chaytor: Can the DfES itself
decide on these things? How do these issues relate to what is
being done in the ODPM and what may come out as a result of the
Lyons review? We have major work being done on wider issues in
local government and the whole basis of taxation and revenue.
Are you meshing in with that or is your exercise being done in
isolation.
Mr Thompson: We are obviously
talking to colleagues in the Department for Communities and Local
Government about this issue. For example, the specific difference
between specific grants and the dedicated schools grant. There
is a constant debate about general funding for local government
as opposed to specific grant funding and clearly colleagues at
the DCLG are in the lead on that but we need to work very closely
with them to make sure that policies do mesh. The answer to your
question is yes, we are talking to colleagues in that area.
Q27 Mr Chaytor: To what extent is
equity between schools and local authorities a factor in your
deliberations?
Mr Thompson: Equity in the sense
of the distribution per pupil?
Q28 Mr Chaytor: Currently we are
having enormous differences budgets that go to individual local
authorities and to individual schools. Is it a specific objective
to try to inject greater fairness into the system?
Mr Thompson: One of the things
we want to have a look at is the link between funding and deprivation.
There are various different models which you could develop between
those two, some of which potentially might lead to a greater differentiation
of schools funding around the system. Clearly that is something
which we want to have a look at because eventually the funding
is only really based on two major factors: one, the number of
pupils and secondly the whole question of how we differentiate
according to various measures of deprivation. It is that second
part which we want to have a look at to see what our options are
around the distribution of funding.
Q29 Mr Chaytor: Do you think we are
moving inevitably to a national funding formula or have we got
there already?
Mr Bell: I do not think we have
got there already because we clearly still have responsibilities
at local level, the forums that each local authority has to have
to look at formula allocation. This is a long standing debate
about the balance between what is done nationally and what is
done locally. It is worth just remembering that the dedicated
grant came out of a very substantial concern that money that the
Government had intended to be spent on schools was not always
being so spent. There has always been this tension between what
you enable to happen nationally by funding requirements and what
you allow local discretion over. If you mean by national funding
formula a single national model that would apply in every local
authority area that is certainly not on the cards.
Q30 Mr Wilson: In the budget last
March the Chancellor said it is his aim to close the gap in per
pupil funding between the private sector and the maintained sector.
Do you think it is meaningful to make any such pledge or commitment
of this nature?
Mr Bell: I think it is a fair
aspiration. I think there is also an issue about the amount of
capital investment that has gone in historically to independent
schools which is now being rebalanced by the huge investment under
Building Schools for the Future. As we pointed out earlier the
amount of money that is being spent in maintaining schools is
great. I think it is a fair aspiration to have in mind that we
want all children, wherever they are educated, to be benefiting
from substantial sums of money and achieving the best they can.
Q31 Mr Wilson: Just to be clear,
the Chancellor was not referring, I do not believe, to capital
spending, but it would mean raising funding from about £5,000
per pupil to £8,000 at current prices. The IFS estimate that
would cost £17 billion in real terms to close the gap between
the private and the maintained sector. Realistically this is la-la
land, is it not? It is a piece of headline grabbing and it is
not realistic for the Department to achieve this. If it is, what
plans have you already set in motion to achieve it?
Mr Bell: As I mentioned earlier,
the future plans are all tied up with the comprehensive spending
review so clearly the medium term funding for education is going
to be determined through that process, not through any other process.
I really cannot answer your question except to say that we are
looking at all aspects of education expenditure as I am sure is
happening right across government to determine what will be allocated
to education after the comprehensive spending review.
Q32 Mr Wilson: Surely the Chancellor
must be basing his opinion on something that this level of increase
is necessary. If that is the case what research has your Department
done to support that theory?
Mr Bell: The research is in relation
to we know what it is that is spent in the maintained system and
clearly we know broadly what is spent in the independent school
system. As I say, we are not doing anything now specifically on
that because all of the discussions about future education expenditure
are tied up in the comprehensive spending review so I do not really
think I can go beyond that.
Q33 Mr Wilson: So there is no research
undertaken, just a piece of politics that the Chancellor is engaged
in.
Mr Bell: No, I think there is
a recognition that if you invest wisely in education you can get
better outcomes. I think we have seen over the past few years
that the increasing effect of expenditure in education has secured
better outcomes. I do not think it is based on a whim and a fancy
that if you spend money nothing will happen. I think there is
a clear understanding that you need investment in all aspects
of our education system to bring about improvement. It is not
the only factor; I am not naive about that. Money is not everything
when it comes to improved attainment or outputs from education
but it certainly has made a difference in the sorts of things
that have been achieved in the maintained system.
Q34 Mr Wilson: The outcomes have
not been proportionate to the spending, but I want to move on
from that. You might have noticed that I proposed a number of
unsuccessful amendments to the Education and Inspections Bill
because I have been giving some thought to how we can help disadvantaged
children to get into better schools. One of the mechanisms I believe
is funding. Do you think a 30% increase in funding for children
on free school meals would help to make those children more attractive
to the better schools?
Mr Bell: I am obviously not going
to comment on what was discussed and voted on during the parliamentary
process. We have already got mechanisms in the system to some
extent. Jon alluded to funding additionally on the basis of deprivation
if you use free school meals as a proxy indicator, so I am not
quite sure of the specific argument you are making.
Q35 Mr Wilson: It is attaching the
money to the pupil, an extra 30% to children on free school meals
over and above what is being spent currently.
Mr Bell: I am not quite sure what
you would attempt to achieve through that because obviously the
bulk of funding, as Jon said, via the local management system,
is that money follows the pupil. There are two basic elements:
money following the number of pupils and money based on deprivation.
I am not entirely clear what you are getting at.
Q36 Mr Wilson: Let me tell you what
I think you can achieve. Has your Department considered, if you
were to increase spending by 36%, allowing this money to be spent
by parents of disadvantaged children say in the private sector.
Mr Bell: Government has been very
clear about its approach to this. It wants to ensure that we have
the maximum funding available to schools in the maintained sector
and we want all schools to improve what they do for all children.
I think the answer to that is clear. The Government has not considered
doing what you have described.
Q37 Mr Wilson: Do you not think that
vouchers, for example, is a way of helping poorer children to
get out of the educational apartheid they find themselves in?
Mr Bell: The most important priority
surely is to ensure that we have as many schools as possible that
are good schools so the parents will want to send their children
there. The Government's policy has not been to allow vouchers
in the form I think you are alluding to. Surely the priority for
us all is to ensure that we improve all schools so that parents
do not feel somehow that they are pressurised into making a different
choice. That has to be the aspiration of government policy, to
bring about school improvement across all 24,000 state schools.
Q38 Mr Wilson: Obviously in your
position you have to give very bland answers and what I am trying
to tease out of you is what your Department is actually going
to do in terms of helping these disadvantaged children directly?
What is your Department exploring that might be, for example,
along similar lines?
Mr Bell: That implies that the
Department has done nothing in relation to deprivation. I could
run off a whole number of things starting with Sure Start through
to Excellence in Cities through to gifted and talented programmes
through to making sure that more young people are supported to
achieve the appropriate qualifications at 19 and of course now
up to 25. I think it is quite misleading to suggest that somehow
the Government and the Department is not interested in dealing
with deprivation. There has been a huge swathe of activities to
ensure that we help to close some of those attainment gaps.
Q39 Mr Wilson: You did not directly
answer my question. You can also look at a lot of spending that
has been wasted, for example the spending on truancy that did
not get a single pupil to go to school more often; then the Connexions
card more recently. There is a lot of money that has gone into
failing schools that has not produced any real results. Just essentially
listing a series of what are quite often gimmicks does not actually
answer the question. What are you doing to fundamentally change
the lives of those disadvantaged children by directly getting
involved in their lives as a Department?
Mr Bell: I do not think by saying
the Government has funded this or funded that that somehow we
are saying that it has not achieved any results. We know that
the performance of students from the poorest socio economic backgrounds
has improved significantly but we also know of course that we
have not closed the gap. I cited that in what I said earlier,
there are still big attainment gaps. We know, if you talk about
the most deprived, we are dealing with some really substantially
difficult issues but that is why I think the continuity of approach
is important. You try to intervene at the beginning through giving
really good pre-school experiences, particularly targeting those
children's families in the most deprived circumstances, with absolutely
ruthless focus on literacy and numeracy at primary school. We
know the evidence is there; there are more and more children doing
better all the way through secondary and further education. I
think I can sit here and cite a number of very practical benefits
and achievements that have come on the back of that expenditure
that I have just described. Many more children and young people
are doing better as a result of that targeted investment.
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