Select Committee on Education and Skills Minutes of Evidence


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 120 - 139)

WEDNESDAY 12 OCTOBER 2005

SIR DAVID NORMINGTON, MR STEPHEN KERSHAW AND MR STEPHEN CROWNE

  Q120  Chairman: Is there a stage where you say we have overdone the targets because targets do pull and they pull away from other things. When you go to schools, teachers say "not another target". David Miliband used to boast that he did not introduce any new targets during his entire time as Schools Minister as a bid for fame.

  Sir David Normington: I think there could come a point where you should move on or decide not to have targets. I think you should always have some targets. I do not think we have to have the same targets year in year out. I think that public services, like any other service or any other industry, ought to have targets and ought to be judged against them, but there is always the danger that they will have a distorting effect. I think you should think very carefully how you convert a national target into school level targets. In this phase we are not going to convert every national target into a target on schools. We are only going to bear down on a school where we and it has agreed it has a particular issue it needs to address and focus on that because I think it becomes too complicated at local level to focus on all the things.

  Chairman: We are not criticising targets, especially teenage pregnancy and many of the others, but one does hear about too many targets at the front-line. Can we now move on to further and higher education. My friend and colleague has been entirely uncharacteristically saint-like in his patience.

  Q121  Jeff Ennis: Patience is a virtue. Sir David, do you stand by the argument put forward in the Government's response to the Committee's Report last year that the funding gap between schools and colleges is closing? Is it 7% this year as forecast? How do you respond to the Learning and Skills Development Agency's research suggesting that the gap is over 13%? What is the reality of the situation?

  Sir David Normington: Well, I am aware of that. We think on our figures that it is narrowing and the LSDA research suggests it is not. The truth of the matter is whatever the precise figures it is not narrowing very much and has not really narrowed. We believe on our measure it has narrowed slightly but the gap is still there. I do not think we think it is quite as big as the LSDA but there is a sizable gap there.

  Q122  Jeff Ennis: This is obviously a major problem for our authorities based on tertiary college systems. It was about 18 months ago that a previous Secretary of State, Charles Clarke, told this Committee he thought that over the next five years—and that was 18 months ago—that that gap would close. We are now down to three and a half years from what Charles said at that time. Are we going to close the gap in three and a half years from now?

  Sir David Normington: I do not know if we will close it. We still have an intention of narrowing it and we have not given up on that. Some of the things we have been doing—

  Q123  Jeff Ennis: We have not got a target to close the gap, to go back to the previous line of questioning?

  Sir David Normington: Charles Clarke clearly made that commitment. I do not think it is a formal target but we will have more to say about this in due course. I think we have been giving priority to school funding and we have been protecting school funding and that has made it difficult at the same time to close the gap. There is no doubt about that. We have made less progress than we would want in that area.

  Q124  Jeff Ennis: As I say, it is really important in local authorities like Barnsley and Doncaster. I will give you a classic example: the over-achievement of student numbers in sixth forms. As I say, we have got almost a complete tertiary college system in Barnsley. The local college recruited an additional 100 students in the sixth form. As you know, the levels of staying-on rates in Barnsley and Doncaster are below the national average and we have got a target to get them up to the national average, which I am sure you would support. The LSC agreed with the target to be given for that particular year but they said they would not fund those additional students. If that had been a school sixth form there would have been no question of funding those students, that funding would have been there on the table. How are we going to get round problems like that which are causing real difficulties in Barnsley and Doncaster and other authorities which are based on the tertiary college system?

  Sir David Normington: Well, I recognise that description of what happens. As I say, within a limited funding pot we have been putting money into schools rather than into colleges. We have been increasing unit funding for colleges but nothing like to the same degree. The reason I am being a little hesitant is because we have a series of announcements in the next few weeks right through into November which will be about LSC funding, particularly about the priority areas like 16-19 funding. We have an announcement in due course about finalising the school budgets. I am hopeful that out of that we can address some of these issues. Of course, you can only do it within an overall funding envelope and that is ultimately what has stopped us closing this gap. That gap was there and it requires more resource than we have had to close it.

  Q125  Jeff Ennis: But the current envelope, Sir David, means that school sixth forms can recruit as many sixth form students as they can ad hoc but tertiary colleges are limited and they are being penalised. Students in Barnsley are being penalised and, after all, we are trying to increase the staying-on rate in deprived areas like Barnsley. We are penalising tertiary colleges from recruiting students into sixth forms?

  Sir David Normington: We would like to see this problem that you describe being tackled and I accept we have not done so yet. I hope some of the things we will be doing in the next few weeks will help at least.

  Q126  Chairman: I hope the message goes through. The great failing, it seems to me, over these last eight years of the Government's policies is that we still seem to reward the "haves" in educational terms and not the "have-nots". It is true what was said about the Sutton Trust Report yesterday. The social mobility argument that came out in research done by the London School of Economics. It still seems that we have not made a dent on transferring resources to those people who have not had the chance of a decent education in the past from those who have everything. This is the argument that Jeff Ennis is making, that it is crystal clear in Barnsley that there is an immense prejudice against those people who have less chance of getting a stake. You said at the beginning of this conversation this morning that where you have not been doing as well as you could is at post-16.

  Sir David Normington: I actually think the Government has put a lot of extra resources in various ways into both people from poorer families and also into areas—

  Q127  Chairman: I was speaking to Peter Lampl of the Sutton Trust yesterday and he said the real problem still is the goodies in education are distributed unfairly. That is the central problem that this Government has and it still has not faced up to that.

  Sir David Normington: There are two issues here: the money that we distribute for schools has a major factor in for deprivation, and that has been increased over this Government's life. That is the first thing.

  Q128  Chairman: Is it working?

  Sir David Normington: That is true. Secondly, there is a specific issue, and I am putting my hands up to that, about the gap between sixth form funding and further education college funding.

  Q129  Chairman: You can put your hands up but you do not seem very repentant. What are you going to do about it? You have got three and a half years, why is the gap not going to be closed? You have not said a word this morning saying, "Yes, we are going to put it right".

  Sir David Normington: Our aim is to close that gap, as Charles Clarke said. Over the next few weeks we will be saying something which I hope will help in that direction but the Government has decided to give priority to school funding rather than college funding. The other thing I was going to say was we have been increasing funding to colleges and we have been increasing the funding to 16-19 provision in colleges and to some of the priority areas for adults, like getting everybody up to Level 2. There have been substantial extra resources, but because substantial extra resources are also going into the school system that gap has not closed. Overall both sectors have had substantial extra resources and we are completely clear, particularly in the phase when we were concentrating on 14-19 education and training, that this is a major issue for us.

  Q130  Jeff Ennis: It is linked in with the SEN issue of further education. There have been examples of institutions having to close or severely restrict courses for adults with learning difficulties and make staff redundant because they are no longer included in the Learning and Skills Council's funding priorities. What is the DfES's view on this? Should education for adults with learning difficulties not be a priority?

  Sir David Normington: Yes. We have a major priority which we give to the LSC related to basic skills which includes people with particular learning difficulties. We have put huge extra funding into improving basic skills, so I am a little surprised at that. It should not be the case that we are seeing large amounts of that provision closing down. I would have to look at the individual case.

  Q131  Jeff Ennis: You would look at that?

  Sir David Normington: I would happily do that, yes.

  Q132  Stephen Williams: Can I link us back to another target, the Government's target of 50% participation in higher education and how this links into that. Over the summer I have been around the FE colleges, Bristol City College, one of the largest in the country, and St Brenda's, which is the largest catholic one, and the number of people who take A-level courses at those colleges dwarf provision by any sixth form, but their social intake is broad while the sixth forms, as the Chairman has just alluded to, are largely middle class. How is this disparity in funding, which you recognise but do not seem to be setting a target for bridging or closing completely, contributing in an adverse way to meeting the Government's target of getting more people from disadvantaged backgrounds into higher education?

  Sir David Normington: I have admitted that there is this funding gap and what you say about the intakes of sixth forms and further education colleges is broadly true, although it varies. Obviously sixth form colleges are in a different position from general further education provision. I think we are very aware of the issue. I said earlier that we are increasing resourcing for both sectors but we are not closing the gap very much, and I accept that, and I think the Government accepts that. When ministers have come here, as Charles Clarke has, they accept that we have to try to make progress here. I am saying to you we have not made enough progress and I agree that in order to encourage more people from the lower socio-economic groups to gain A-levels or vocational equivalents you have to support them in that. Many, many of them do that in colleges. I am saying that we have to try to close that gap or make substantial progress in that direction, I agree with that, and we have not done so.

  Q133  Stephen Williams: Can I make another point about widening participation, students who are in higher education, particularly part-time students. The Act of 2004 treats differently full time students and part-time students. Are there any plans to have similar funding arrangements for part-time students who are in higher education and also to give part-time students themselves the same financial support that a full time student now gets under the top-up fees regime?

  Sir David Normington: I cannot say that today but we are very aware of the issue and the Minister is having a serious look at it. It is a disparity at the moment in the way funding works and we are having a serious look at it.

  Q134  Stephen Williams: When might we hear the outcome of this serious look?

  Sir David Normington: I cannot tell you for sure, I am afraid that is a ministerial issue. I can tell you for sure that is being looked at.

  Q135  Tim Farron: I am sure you are aware that 27% of pupils, students of further education colleges, come from the poorest 15% of wards in the country, so the funding gap clearly does exacerbate the problem and flies in the face of the Government's stated widening participation objectives. That point being made, I want to come back to the issue raised earlier with regard to the LSC priorities. I wonder whether the Government has made any consideration of the likely impact on the viability of courses counted under other provision of adult education in setting and revising the new LSC priorities and, if so, what is that likely considered impact?

  Sir David Normington: There is about to be another statement about this because we are about to allocate money to the LSC for the next period, and also at the same time we will be setting out the priorities which the Government believes this sector should have. I think that already there is built into the assumptions for some of the other provision an assumption that there will be a large contribution from the individual to the fees of that course. I think previously the assumptions were that the Government would fund in its funding formula 75% of the cost with the expectation that fees would raise 25%. We have put that up to 27.5%. I referred to this earlier. I think this issue of who pays for what courses is quite an important issue for us, accepting that the Government will always seek to protect and support those who cannot afford to pay. That is an issue that is very much being debated at the moment and very much affects the other provision, which is not a priority in a way for the Government compared with its other priorities but obviously for individuals can be very important for them.

  Q136  Tim Farron: You must have had feedback since the priorities have been put into place. The impact has not been that prices have gone up a bit and private individuals pay a little bit more, the impact has been that courses have closed down and whole adult education centres have been put under serious threat, job losses and so on. In any area, but in an area like mine with older people who are retired, they are not just interested in gaining Level 2 qualifications, they are interested in keeping the grey matter going and this is a terrible blow to communities. I cannot imagine the Government did not realise this might be an outcome.

  Sir David Normington: The Government was clear that it was expecting colleges, where they could, to raise more money through fees. All colleges have their own decisions to take about what they charge for and what not. We do not tell them what to do but we do include something in the formula. In fact, our estimate is that colleges forego about £100 million of income by not charging fees. Many colleges decide to charge no fees at all. We think that is wrong really. Our surveys show that where a course is valued, people who can afford to pay are very willing to make a contribution to a course. They do not understand why they should not but they do expect the Government to make a contribution as well. I have had the feedback that you have described. I do not think it is as yet a national issue in terms of closures everywhere but we are looking to colleges to look for alternative ways of raising some of the money. I am talking about a quarter to a third of it. There is a lot of Government money going into adult learning and in the end governments have to say, "I have got this money, how can I get the most value for it?" 16-19 is a priority, getting adult basic skills up to an acceptable level is a priority, getting adults to Level 2, which is the vocational equivalent of five A-C GCSEs, is a priority. You have to have your priorities and some provision, therefore, will be squeezed.

  Q137  Tim Farron: The larger colleges are able to absorb some of these costs.

  Sir David Normington: I am aware of that.

  Q138  Tim Farron: Certainly in an area like mine we are talking about lots of small, perhaps school-based, adult education centres that have no fat to draw upon and they are seriously in danger of closing down.

  Sir David Normington: I am aware of that and I will take that point back to the others.

  Tim Farron: I would be grateful if you would.

  Q139  Mr Marsden: Sir David, you made the point that it is for colleges to make their own decisions and the LSC is arms' length in that respect from them but also from the Government in the sense that you give them the pot and they decide what to do with it. Is not the point that is emerging from this debate about funding of adult education, and I accept the Government has done an enormous amount in this area, is that there is a law of perverse consequences. Many of the things that we are hearing about, certainly in my own neck of the woods in Blackpool, these cuts in adult education, are going to affect not just people who want to keep their grey matter going but people, particularly women in their 30s and 40s, who need to re-skill themselves in order to remain in the workforce. We have broader targets as a Government for meeting that. If I could give you a very specific example of the perverse consequence of this. In my particular patch it is going to result in a potential reduction in the number of trade union learners. That cuts directly across the Chancellor's state aim to expand the whole union learning environment. Do you not have a broader responsibility in terms of overall Government policy when discussing and deciding these things with the LSCs and should you not have given clearer guidance, particularly in respect of what the impact was going to be in terms of Section 98?

  Sir David Normington: I am in danger of repeating myself. First of all, this sector will get substantial extra resource and the Government will be very clear what its priorities are for that resource and it will describe them. It will include getting an entitlement for all adults to get up to Level 2. It will include new sorts of re-entry courses particularly for those who have not got basic skills. In the end this is about how much money is available. One of the things that is happening in the skills sector is because of the emphasis that we are putting on raising the standards of 16-19-year-olds, we are beginning to see many more staying on. We have not yet got the outcomes but many more are staying on. That is putting enormous pressure on that bit of the budget. Similarly, our success in getting many, many more people coming back into basic literacy and numeracy courses is also putting pressure on that budget. We have to make those choices with the LSC and the LSC ultimately has to make the choices locally about what it will fund. We are very clear about this issue of trying to protect the valuable provision locally and the LSC is very clear about that. As we make the funding allocations in the next few weeks we will be trying to ensure both that we have a clear set of national priorities but that the LSC will be trying to ensure that it is sensitive to these local issues.


 
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