Examination of Witnesses (Questions 83
- 99)
WEDNESDAY 30 NOVEMBER 2005
CLLR ALISON
KING, CLLR
JAMES KEMPTON,
MR STEPHEN
MEEK AND
MS CHRISTINE
DAVIES
Q83 Chairman: Can I welcome our four
witnesses, Stephen Meek, Alison King, Christine Davies and James
Kempton and say that we are very grateful that you could join
us at quite short notice. This Committee is determined to give
a thorough appraisal to the education White Paper and, of course,
the White Paper impinges very much on the rights and responsibilities
and powers of local government in respect of education, so we
are grateful for your attendance today. I am loath to ask all
of you to say something to kick us off, but when we get into the
question session it is better if someone leads and one or two
people respond rather than every question all four people responding.
Would one of you like to say something to get us started or would
you like to go straight into questions?
Cllr King: Given the opportunity
to say something, Chairman, I would like to say that there are
aspects of the White Paper that we in local government welcome,
of course—the commissioning role, the end of the term "LEA",
which a lot of us have not been using for quite some time because
we like to feel that the whole of the local authority is involved
in the education of children, not just one department, and, of
course, we welcome the emphasis on improvement: improving the
ability to support failing schools, improving on the ability of
parents to be involved in their children's education, improvement
of academic standards, improvement on the behavioural front as
well. We are very keen to see those things in the White Paper,
and very pleased, but we do have some concerns, as I am sure you
are aware. We are worried that there is an inconsistency in the
White Paper that on the one hand local authorities are given a
much stronger role and more responsibility, in fact, to deliver
for children and young people in their area, and on the other
hand we have increased autonomy for schools, and the two do not
seem to link in every way they could. We are also concerned, of
course, about the ability to deliver on Every Child Matters,
which is something that we are going to be judged on, and we are
rather concerned that some of the schools in our areas will not
necessarily feel that they have the sort of obligation that in
fact we believe they should have and that the legislation believes
they should have. I will finish just by saying, the focus on structures
rather than on standards is something that is of concern to us
because we are heavily focused on improvement. There is also,
of course, the issue of choice as it relates to rural areas and
whether this is a White Paper that covers the entire country and
produces the same sorts of results for children right across the
land.
Q84 Chairman: Thank you very much
for that introduction. Could I start by asking you: your initial
reaction to the press release that we have received seemed to
be, along the lines that you have just said, pretty positive about
the White Paper, but, as you read the White Paper and re-read
it what seems to be rather unclear is what are the rights and
responsibilities and powers of local government? The boundaries
do not seem to be very clear coming out of the White Paper. Do
you share that uncertainty? Perhaps you can help us and tell us
what you think the boundaries are between local government and
the other players, especially schools.
Cllr King: As I said in my opening
remarks, we are concerned at the slight incoherence in the White
Paper dealing with the role and the responsibility of local government
and the way that we would be able to, for instance, intervene
very early if we knew that a school was experiencing difficulties.
There is not always great clarity about how we would address the
issues that would arise and how we would in fact either bend the
boundaries or breach the boundaries. Perhaps I can defer to Christine,
because she, of course, is a practitioner who has probably got
some very good examples of where she believes things are likely
to get difficult.
Ms Davies: Thank you very much,
Chairman. I think that much of the content of the White Paper
is excellent. I think it was unfortunate that the language that
promoted the White Paper suggested to the wider public and to
schools that they should be much more independent from other schools
and from local authorities, and this is the very time when, in
order to secure five outcomes of the Children Act and to secure
school improvement, we need to have schools right at the heart
of that agenda, and if some schools believe that they do not have
a responsibility for community well-being and all children and
young people in their area, that is unfortunate. I think the areas
where we have most concern are in the areas of admissions—and
I am sure the Committee will want to touch upon that—the
area to secure the outcomes of the Children Act, whereby we need
all schools to be working with all local services and the local
authority, particularly those that suffer the greatest disadvantage
in need, and in order to secure school improvement we need schools
to be working with other schools and the local authority, because
all of the evidence from years and years of work in both shire
authorities and urban authorities is that no one school alone
can secure all that it needs for its children, its parents, its
community and raising standards entirely in isolation. I think
the area of admissions, Every Child Matters and the well-being
of children generally are the issues of concern.
Q85 Chairman: Would you say that
for those of us who conducted an inquiry into Every Child Matters
and the Children Act, this is a very big responsibility, I have
to say, for this Committee but for local government it is a far-reaching
responsibility across several government departments. If you take
that responsibility with the responsibilities that will be yours
if and when this White Paper becomes a Bill and an Act, is that
an increase of the role of local government if you add it all
together, or is it a decrease? How do you see it? Is it a diminution
of local government or is it an enhancement of local government?
Ms Davies: It is undoubtedly,
if carried through effectively, an enhancement of local government,
and it is only local government that can bring all services and
partners together and wrap services around children, schools and
families and also to understand the needs of local communities.
It is only local government, working in partnership with all other
agencies and services, that can secure those ends, and, in my
view, it is a critical role, it is an enhanced role and, without
an effective local authority holding the strategic ring on behalf
of children and all local communities, can the Every Child
Matters agenda be delivered, and in local authorities across
the land the improvement in outcomes for children demonstrates
how critical the role of the local authority is.
Q86 Chairman: Can I ask the elected
membership then: if that is the case, if you look at the people
who are now going to be involved in very powerful ways, there
is going to be the schools commissioner, there is going to be
the chief schools adjudicator, there is going to be Ofsted, and
there is going to be the Learning and Skills Council at another
level. There is going to be a large number of non-elected people
as part of the mix. We are not prejudicing your answer, but there
are a lot of non-elected people with very powerful roles coming
out of this White Paper into the Bill. Is that a concern and a
worry for you?
Cllr King: Yes, it is. Could I
ask my fellow elected member, James Kempton, to respond on this
one.
Cllr Kempton: It is obviously
a concern, because we value very highly the relationship we have
with local parents and the communities that we serve, and the
fact that decisions are taken off to an adjudicator, for example,
is a concern; but, on the other hand, I think we would fully endorse
the role Ofsted has, coming in as an entirely independent scrutineer
of what is happening, and, however you regard it, a scrutineer
of what is happening. I think what we would say, though, is that
in the sense that Ofsted comes in to look at what local government
is doing, maybe one of the checks and balances in the system is
exactly that, but where local government is exercising its own
autonomy it is exercising that under the scrutiny of Ofsted, and
some elements that are currently proposed to be assigned to a
schools commissioner, for example, we think could be given to
local government to implement and Ofsted to review as part of
their general review of local government through joint area reviews
and also through the CPA process and the Audit Commission. Therefore,
I think there are opportunities there to possibly speed a line
from the proposals. Another area that we have had major concerns
about is the role of the Learning and Skills Council in relation
to post-16 education. I think what we see in the White Paper is
a shift in the right direction, which is now talking about a partnership
between the LSC and local government for that area, but I think
we have made the case for some time, and many people are agreeing
with us, that the idea that you can have joint leadership of the
16-19 phase is potentially quite difficult both in terms of delivering
the outcome to young people but also for schools and colleges
to know who to look to in the final analysis. Is it local authorities
with links with local community, with schools and with the local
business community, or is it the LSC which will still retain the
financial strings to pull services in the direction that they
would like to? I think there is a real danger in that dual leadership
role that is envisaged here.
Q87 Chairman: So you would like a
lot more clarity before this White Paper became a Bill and an
Act?
Cllr King: I would say, Chairman,
that whatever system comes out of all these deliberations and
out of the legislation, we believe that it needs to be simple,
transparent and have an element of local accountability, but that
needs to be at the right level as well; and we feel that the more
layers that you bring—the more layers of people, the more
layers of non-accountable bodies—the more the potential
for confusion and complexity and, of course, expense, and we all
have to have a mind to that too. I think that what we risk is
bringing in, as you have identified, any number of other layers,
other people, other roles, that really are not going to help parents
through what is already a fairly complicated maze. We would like
to see that complicated maze simplified, and I think that has
to be one of our prime objectives in all this: because not all
parents are equipped to cope with the sort of problems that the
education of their children throws up and they often want good,
sound, straightforward advice with a good, sound, straightforward
system available locally to help them. We are, of course, as Christine
has said, looking at a network here, a family of schools. Schools
have a great deal of autonomy already. We could be in a position
where we are looking at an autonomy too far when we start to worry
about schools considering whether they will supply a service to
their local communities, not how they will supply a service to
their local communities. We look at schools, we have federations
of schools, amalgamations of schools, all sorts of clustering
of schools for particular purposes, and those sorts of things
are best arranged locally. We have a responsibility across a wide
area. I cover a very large shire county and the arrangements that
we have there are agreed upon locally, but you cannot always rely
upon individual schools to have the time or the wherewithal or
sometimes the motivation to bring about these sorts of arrangements,
but that is why we feel that probably more local input and local
accountability so is crucial.
Chairman: Thank you for those opening responses
to my questions. Tim Farron
Q88 Tim Farron: Good morning. Do
you welcome the new powers to intervene in respect of failing
schools, and do you feel that the White Paper gives you confidence
that local authorities will be given the tools to intervene swiftly
and urgently?
Ms Davies: Yes, we certainly welcome
the powers to intervene, and to intervene at the earliest possible
opportunity. I think if you look at the Ofsted reports on the
effectiveness of local authorities, you will see that much school
improvement has been driven by local authorities that support
and challenge at the earliest possible stage. I think where we
would have one concern, though, is the expectation about failing
schools, that schools that are facing the most difficult of circumstances
can be rectified within one year. It is absolutely right that
it is children's one chance of education and that where there
is poor performance it should be remedied in the shortest possible
time, but experience shows that actually it takes sometimes a
little longer than one year to rectify a school in difficulty.
I can give an example, if I may, please, which is one that the
Department for Education and Skills would use. In Telford we have
one of the country's most poorly performing schools and we placed
it in a federation with the country's most highly performing school,
Thomas Telford. Within the first year, although there was considerable
evidence of improvement and parental aspiration and motivation
rose significantly, school standards were not seen to improve
by the end of the first year; in fact they declined. By the end
of the second year, however, because of all the work that has
been undertaken in the school, that school has improved by 34%
in terms of the number of A*- Cs, and the number of parents who
want to go to that school has quadrupled. In effect, it took two
years, not one year, but the expectation that we turn schools
round quickly is absolutely right and those powers are welcomed.
Q89 Tim Farron: You feel you have
been given the tools to do so in the White Paper?
Ms Davies: We currently have the
tools to do so. Those tools, however, will need to be available
to us whatever the category of school, and I think there has to
be a concern that academies, for example, are not necessarily
subject to the same levers of support and challenge as other schools
in the local area. It will be critical if we are to secure the
well-being for all children and young people and their parents
that those tools are available to us to use and there is demonstrated
success for all schools in the local area regardless of category.
Q90 Tim Farron: The White Paper talks
about local authorities becoming the champions of choice, diversity
and fair access. Do you think that the White Paper provides you
with the power to do those things? As a kind of supplementary,
I represent a rural constituency. If you live in Coniston your
second nearest school is a 15-mile drive down country lanes and
a ferry ride away. How do you fulfil that role generally but specifically
with regard to rural areas?
Cllr Kempton: Choice, diversity
and access are probably at least two different issues.
Q91 Chairman: Only two!
Cllr Kempton: Choice and diversity
maybe are interlinked, but I think access is a different one.
If I start with access, I think we have got major concerns, as
we have already indicated, over the whole area of admissions and
what is proposed here. The idea that we work with a code of practice
to which schools have regard but one which they can chose to ignore
is one about which we have some concerns.
Q92 Chairman: You do not agree with
the Select Committee's report earlier this year?
Cllr Kempton: We think there should
be a statutory code to which schools are bound, and you will have
seen the very recent comments by the schools adjudicator, who
said from his perspective that "schools need to be reminded
that admission arrangements are drawn up for the benefit of local
parents, not for themselves. We are still seeing too many cases
where arrangements are not clear enough. We are also still receiving
cases where schools are accused of selecting children by ability
and social group", and I think that is under the current
set of admission arrangements where there are clearly a number
of different admissions authorities in which local authorities
are significant players. The idea that we will move to more admissions
authorities and that move will address the concern of the adjudicator
in a positive way, I think is something we do not actually believe.
We think having more admissions authorities will lead to more
cases where the adjudicator believes, and where parents believe,
because they are making complaints to the adjudicator, that there
is an accusation of children being selected by ability and social
group; so we have a particular concern over that. Local authorities
are significant complainers to the adjudicator over admission
arrangements at the moment. I think there were 74 complaints in
2003-04. Sixty of those were upheld, 14 were partially upheld
and none were thrown out. I think there is evidence out there
that the current arrangements are not necessarily working in the
interests of young people and their parents, and our concern is,
if you to move a more diverse system where local authorities have
a less significant role, it could well be harder for parents in
working their way through the complexities of the system, and
the opportunities for people to manipulate their system seem to
us to be increased rather than diminished. What we would like
to see, clearly, is a system where there is a statutory code that
people and schools are bound by but which local authorities have
a role to enforce locally. I think rather than where there is
a fear of things going wrong there is a complaint to the adjudicator
to decide and that takes quite a long time, we would like to see
a position where local authorities, where they think something
has gone wrong, could put that right and the school would then
have the right to appeal if they felt that the action was inappropriate.
I think that would be a much fairer and a much quicker system
rather than the rather elongated position we have got at the moment,
which only works against the interests of young people where something
is not right.
Q93 Chairman: I will move on, because
there are a whole range of issues, but thank you for that. What
do you think the future for currently centrally provided services
might be? We are looking at pupil referral units in particular,
given that they will provide a role if the local authority is
to go. Will PRUs now be attached to schools, and, if so and either
way, will it improve matters?
Ms Davies: I think to some extent
there is something of an illusion in the White Paper in the description
of local authorities being purely commissioning bodies and not
providing any services or areas of support: because for those
children who present the greatest challenge, or have the greatest
need, there has to be a safety-net and there has to be provision
to meet their very specific needs, and by and large, for children
who have really difficult behavioural problems, understandably,
the vast majority of schools are not equipped to meet their needs,
and, in all likelihood, local authorities will need to continue
to secure either a range of private providers or provide pupil
referral units and, where it is necessary, special schools for
children with very severe and complex learning disabilities and
difficulties, and so I think the local authority will continue
to be both commissioner and provider. What the local authority
has to be able to secure is a school place and a first-class education
for every child regardless of ability and need. If I can add one
more point to James' response. I think we would like to see an
additional duty on all schools to cooperate with the local authority
and other schools in the local area to find every child a school
place, and that is particularly important for children who are
hard to place, for a range of reasons, have special educational
needs or present the greatest challenge.
Q94 Chairman: Thank you for that.
You have moved on to the area of special educational needs and
you have talked in general about how you think the reality will
be, that the provider role will stay to an extent, but what confidence
do you really have that the White Paper will permit that? I suppose
in general terms I would be interested to know what you think
the future for special educational needs will be under the White
Paper and service provision. I am looking at you; it does not
need to be you.
Ms Davies: There is obviously
the code of practice in place for pupils with special educational
needs, and the vast majority of children with special educational
needs are and should continue to be educated in their local schools
or in their reasonably local schools. It will be absolutely vital
that all schools, regardless of category, not only are under a
moral obligation to cater for the broad range of special educational
needs but actually have a duty to cater for a range of special
educational needs. There is no doubt in the White Paper, there
is no intention that pupils with special educational needs should
not be catered for in trust schools, or foundation schools, or
community schools. I think where we will have a concern, however,
is the arrangements around academies, that there is no requirement
for an academy to be named in the statement of a child with special
educational needs, and I think that to us is a serious flaw. All
schools must take responsibility for children with special educational
needs and schools will continue to need the support of a highly
effective local authority and specialist support services—behavioural
support, learning support, speech and language therapy, and so
on—if they are ably to meet that range of needs.
Q95 Mr Marsden: Christine, I wonder
if I could briefly pull you back to the pupil referral unit situation.
You have indicated your assumption, or your hope, that local authorities
would retain a significant role in that sphere. Is it not the
case that pupil referral units are critical for dealing with local
authority-wide issues, such as behaviour, truancy and attendance,
and what is your estimate of how successful you would be able
to perform that role if, in fact, these units were devolved to
individual schools or into clusters of schools?
Ms Davies: Personally I would
have no concern about the responsibility for pupil referral units
and any specialist provision being devolved to either an individual
school which is servicing the needs of the wider community or
to a cluster of schools, but the local authority has to have both
the power, the influence and the levers in place to ensure that
there is a breadth of provision across a local authority area.
We will not be able to have a situation where money is devolved
to schools to meet a range of special educational needs for those
schools to take a decision unilaterally to use that money in different
or other ways: because if that happens, self-evidently there will
not be the provision in place to meet the needs. It is the duty
of the local authority to secure full-time education for children
who are permanently excluded from school. It is absolutely vital
that the local authority has both the resource, the capacity and
the duty to hold a group of schools to account to provide that.
Q96 Mr Marsden: Are you saying, in
those circumstances, that it would be appropriate and necessary
actually to ring-fence that funding for PRUs?
Ms Davies: Yes, I am. I am saying
very clearly that if there are individual schools or groups of
schools who have the capacity and the will to provide for that
broad range of needs—if finances are to be devolved to them
for that purpose—the local authority must need to be sure
that they will provide for the needs for which they have the money.
Q97 Mr Marsden: Perhaps I could now
take some of the broader implication of expenditure, and I put
this question particularly to the elected members: one of the
traditional duties of local authorities has been the duty to avoid
unreasonable public expense, which has a fine Victorian sounding
ring to it. What are the implications in practice? Are there any
of the White Paper proposals that might affect your ability to
do that avoiding of unreasonable public expense?
Cllr King: I suppose it depends
on the definition of the word "unreasonable", does it
not?
Q98 Mr Marsden: Indeed?
Cllr King: We can probably argue
about that forever, unreasonable public expense.
Q99 Mr Marsden: What about transport,
for example. That is a key issue for you in a rural area, is it
not?
Cllr King: It is. I was going
to say that local authorities, of course, tend to spend over and
above what the Government has told them to spend on educational
services in their area. I think the most recent figure is about
£200 million across the country spent on children in schools,
which shows a level of commitment, and I do not feel, certainly
speaking from my own authority's point of view, that we would
ever regard that as an unreasonable amount of money, money that
we have spent over and above. Obviously transport is a particular
difficulty and particularly, as you have identified, in rural
areas. I think my authority's school transport bill is 24 million
and rising.
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