Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40
- 59)
WEDNESDAY 6 APRIL 2005
DEPARTMENT FOR
EDUCATION AND
SKILLS AND
LEARNING AND
SKILLS COUNCIL
Q40 Mr Williams: It seems to me perverse
that there should be opposition from some supposedly knowledgeable
sources to the concept of testing. As we were not testing I assume
we did not know it was this bad, did we?
Sir David Normington: We did not.
Q41 Mr Williams: Have we discovered
anything as a result of tests?
Sir David Normington: In the late
Eighties we did not have a National Curriculum, we did not have
tests, we did not know enough about what people were achieving
against the national standard and that meant that we did not know
at all what the baseline was.
Q42 Mr Williams: We went through
all manner of political correctness in literacy and your children
picked magical ways of self-education and this was allowed to
dominate in so-called academic quarters for years. It must have
damaged the careers of numerous youngsters and their prospects.
Sir David Normington: I think
you cannot argue with the figures. Clearly not enough adults have
literacy and numeracy at the levels needed to succeed. In a sense
that is why the focus—I never apologise for it—in
school education is on, first of all, giving people the basics.
If compulsory education cannot do that then it is not achieving,
is it?
Q43 Mr Williams: I am agreeing entirely
with what you are saying. When you go back to the days of National
Service, at that time one did have a form of measurement because
much of the Army's education service was devoted to teaching people
to read and write. Someone I grew up with graduated and went into
the Army. I remember him saying how he could not believe the gratitude
you would get from big burly characters in uniform who could read
for the first time. We have known for a long time there was something
wrong and yet for some reason no one was willing to address it.
Everyone seemed to be afraid of those who were preaching the doctrine
of political correctness on literacy.
Sir David Normington: It seems
that people were not addressing that. I have been in this world
for 10 years and in all that time we have been addressing it and
it is one of the most important—
Q44 Mr Williams: I am not criticising
you for that.
Sir David Normington: I know that.
I agree with you really. That is why it is such an important priority.
Q45 Mr Williams: It is frustrating,
all those wasted decades.
Sir David Normington: It is frustrating
because when you are faced with a table like this it is very upsetting.
It is partly what has held the productivity of the workforce back
here over a lot of years.
Q46 Mr Williams: Even the Army does
not want these people now. It had to take them when we had National
Service. Everyone had to do their National Service and, therefore,
they had to take them, but nowadays it is more difficult because
of the nature of any equipment they have to use.
Sir David Normington: That is
true. That is why the Army has literacy and numeracy as one of
the central things that it provides new recruits with, particularly
the Army because it needs people sometimes to do quite a technical
job.
Q47 Mr Williams: It is not the day
of the universal Army when every young man went in.
Sir David Normington: They take
15,000 a year, that is all.
Q48 Mr Williams: It is more selective
and they are touching on a small group. Sorry, I meandered off
on a personal hobbyhorse there. Can we look at chart 18, page
30, the section on English for speakers of other languages? Obviously
this is an increasingly important subject. I have probably not
had the time to go in-depth into the report that I should have,
but do we have separate targets in this area for attainment?
Sir David Normington: No, we do
not. We do have performance indicators under the headline targets
to measure how we are doing on English as a second language. English
as a second language is part of the overall vision, so what we
are measuring is literacy, numeracy and achievement in English
as a second language.
Q49 Mr Williams: You cannot draw
comparisons because you are not dealing with comparable groups.
In the English for speakers of other languages you are dealing
with a high proportion of people who have a propensity to learn
and a disposition and motivation to learn, I would have thought.
Sir David Normington: Yes.
Q50 Mr Williams: I am not trying
to draw comparisons between one and the other. I see you have
talked of £3.7 billion somewhere, but what proportion now
goes into education for speakers of other languages? It is very
important to us.
Sir David Normington: Yes, it
is. I think Mr Haysom can answer that.
Mr Haysom: It is of growing importance,
as you rightly say. Back in 2001 it represented 22% of learners
going through; it is now up to 31%, so it is growing all the time.
One of our big challenges is to be able to respond to that increasing
demand.
Q51 Mr Williams: How actively are
we promoting the opportunity to learn in the market because with
some groups there is a much lower priority given to allowing women
to be educated than getting men educated? Are we making any penetration
into those who are otherwise treated with a sort of sexist non-integration
of a large proportion of the immigrant population who may not
be encouraged to learn the language? Are we trying to ensure there
is a degree of equal participation?
Mr Haysom: Yes, we are. We recognise
that is a very big challenge and very specific challenge. Personally,
I have seen some really good work on this. In some areas of Birmingham
there are some good examples, as there are throughout London.
There is some really good, very targeted work to encourage some
of the harder to reach groups. In overall terms, we have a high
proportion of ethnic minorities taking part in the skills monitoring,
so we are reaching lots of them.
Sir David Normington: Obviously
as a way to reach those groups you have to use the community groups.
It has to be very local.
Q52 Mr Williams: Tell me about that.
Sir David Normington: In fact,
an important component of this programme is to work with local
community groups who can reach these hard to reach groups like
Bangladeshi women, for instance. That is an important part of
this programme and it has been quite successful. Obviously it
is in certain parts of the country. Do you want to say a bit more?
Ms Pember: We did a large survey
two years ago that went down to ward level about how many people
need support in literacy, numeracy and language, which we had
never done before. We can match that with data about participation.
There have been some absolutely first class projects, one done
in the Medway in Kent where they were able to identify that certain
Asian women were not participating so they went and found a community
group that could give them access to those women. There is some
really good work there.
Q53 Mr Williams: That is very encouraging.
How far is that sort of information disseminated more widely around
the UK? This is a good example but is it a good example that is
now being promulgated and how is it being promulgated? How is
it being stimulated?
Mr Haysom: If I may pick up on
that?
Q54 Mr Williams: Please, I do not
mind who answers.
Mr Haysom: I think it is fair
to say that because of the speed with which this programme was
put in place and the journey that David described earlier about
how far we have travelled, perhaps the Learning and Skills Council
was not as smart as it could have been about sharing best practice.
We are now doing that very actively. We now have regional plans
which describe exactly what we are doing in each area and we share
across the regions the examples of best practice to make sure
that we learn from each other. That is a very important part of
the way forward.
Q55 Mr Williams: The particularly
good example you quoted, did you say Chatham?
Ms Pember: Medway. It is Chatham.
Q56 Mr Williams: Would it be possible
to let us have a note on this so we can put it as an annex in
the information and we can draw it to the attention of our own
local communities as well? That would be very helpful.[3]
One final point: we dealt with prisons and one of our colleagues
came up with a very original solution as far as prisons are concerned
and the low attainment of literacy. He is not here today but he
said that they should not be allowed out until they had reached
a certain standard. We did point out that this would mean in many
cases pickpockets would be sentenced to life! You will gather
it was not one of our recommendations as a Committee but it was
an interesting side view. Jobcentre Plus: what are they doing
that is different from what the colleges for further education
are doing and how cost-effective is one as opposed to the other?
Sir David Normington: For quite
a lot of people claiming benefits and Jobseeker's Allowance, Jobcentre
Plus is the frontline service and they now do the initial screening
to identify people who they think have literacy or numeracy needs
at the point of claiming benefit. Then they refer them to a more
detailed assessment if they judge that is needed and behind that
is the provision. Some of that provision might be further education
colleges, it will depend, it might be a community group. They
will look for the best type of provision. It is not very easy
to answer your question because Jobcentre Plus is the frontline
point and then there will be a referral to a number of different
agencies.
Ms Pember: If I could just expand
slightly. Jobcentre Plus advisers are now all trained to help
diagnose where somebody has got literacy or numeracy need. They
can refer them for a further assessment and then they signpost
them to a programme. Some of the programmes are funded by Jobcentre
Plus. The short intensive programme where the adviser thinks it
will make a difference means they can go in, have the programme
and go off to work. The new White Paper expands on the Jobcentre
skills course, so we have people in Jobcentres whose main job
is to make sure that people turn up for the learning, make sure
people stay in learning, and if they get a job—this will
be piloted next year—they make sure that somewhere in the
community that learning continues so we do not have an example
of what we have just heard from this side.
Mr Williams: Thank you very much, that
was most interesting.
Q57 Mr Allan: I would like to follow
up on precisely that area. To understand from the customer's point
of view, if I turned up at Jobcentre Plus in Sheffield next week
and I did not have Level 1 skills, Jobcentre Plus would contract
to provide me with those Level 1 skills from DWP money, would
they? Potentially I could go to Sheffield College funded by Jobcentre
Plus.
Ms Pember: In Sheffield they have
got quite a good network that is quite mature. You would be funded
under what we call the 16 hour rule, so you would be funded by
the Learning and Skills Council but at Sheffield College.
Q58 Mr Allan: If I turned up at the
Learning and Skills Council because I was in work or I was a spouse
at home not on benefit, therefore not Jobcentre Plus, I would
get the same service?
Ms Pember: Absolutely.
Q59 Mr Allan: But the 16 hour rule—
Ms Pember: For Jobcentre Plus
clients they must be available for work and, therefore, they should
be putting work first. What the new Skills Strategy is about is
saying training for that individual can be as important as work
and it might be better to put them in training and to pass the
course so that when they go into a job that job is sustained,
they are not made redundant.
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