The
Committee consisted of the following
Members:Chairman: †
Miss
Anne Begg †
Brokenshire,
James (Hornchurch)
(Con) †
Burrowes,
Mr. David (Enfield, Southgate)
(Con) †
Campbell,
Mr. Ronnie (Blyth Valley)
(Lab) †
Clark,
Greg (Tunbridge Wells)
(Con) †
Donaldson,
Mr. Jeffrey M. (Lagan Valley)
(DUP) †
Drew,
Mr. David (Stroud)
(Lab/Co-op) †
Foster,
Mr. Michael (Worcester)
(Lab) †
George,
Mr. Bruce (Walsall, South)
(Lab) †
Gwynne,
Andrew (Denton and Reddish)
(Lab) †
Hanson,
Mr. David (Minister of State, Northern Ireland
Office)†
Hermon,
Lady (North Down)
(UUP) †
Kennedy,
Jane (Liverpool, Wavertree)
(Lab) †
Lazarowicz,
Mark (Edinburgh, North and Leith)
(Lab/Co-op) †
Lidington,
Mr. David (Aylesbury)
(Con) †
McDonnell,
Dr. Alasdair (Belfast, South)
(SDLP) †
Öpik,
Lembit (Montgomeryshire)
(LD) †
Osborne,
Sandra (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock)
(Lab) †
Robertson,
Mr. Laurence (Tewkesbury)
(Con) †
Southworth,
Helen (Warrington, South)
(Lab) †
Todd,
Mr. Mark (South Derbyshire)
(Lab) †
Waltho,
Lynda (Stourbridge)
(Lab) †
Whitehead,
Dr. Alan (Southampton, Test)
(Lab) †
Wilson,
Sammy (East Antrim) (DUP) Mr.
Glenn McKee, Committee
Clerk † attended the
Committee The following also
attended, pursuant to Standing Order No.
118(2): Durkan,
Mark (Foyle)
(SDLP) Hoey,
Kate (Vauxhall)
(Lab) McCrea,
Dr. William (South Antrim)
(DUP) McGrady,
Mr. Eddie (South Down)
(SDLP) Paisley,
Rev. Ian (North Antrim)
(DUP) Robinson,
Mrs. Iris (Strangford)
(DUP) Robinson,
Mr. Peter (Belfast, East)
(DUP) Simpson,
David (Upper Bann) (DUP) Fourth
Standing Committee on Delegated
LegislationWednesday
28 June
2006[Miss
Anne Begg in the
Chair]Draft Education (Northern Ireland)Order 20062.30
pm
The
Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. David
Hanson): I beg to
move, That the
Committee has considered the draft Education (Northern Ireland) Order
2006. A
draft of the order was laid before the House on 12
June. I begin, Miss
Begg, by apologising for the absence of the Under-Secretary of State
for Northern Ireland, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Garston
(Maria Eagle), who has responsibility for education in Northern Ireland
while the devolved Administration is not sitting. She would usually
take this order through the Committee, but she is unfortunately
indisposed through ill health this week. As luck would have it, I was
available and I shall take the order through the Committee on behalf of
the Government. I look forward to a constructive and interesting debate
with my right hon. and hon. Friends and Opposition Members.
I welcome to the Committee my
right hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Jane Kennedy)
who held my post in a previous existence. According to my briefing
notes, which I have spent the last couple of hours reading, she had
some influence over the policy during her ministerial career.
Two key factors shape the
reforms before the Committee: the interests of children and young
people in Northern Ireland, and the interests of the Northern Ireland
economy. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Garston and my right
hon. Friend the Secretary of State have taken great care and concern to
ensure that the order meets the needs of both young people and the
economy. In short, we must create a system that enables all our young
people—and I do mean all of them, not just a minority—to
achieve their potential and to ensure that we have a system of
education in Northern Ireland that ensures that we have the skills to
meet the needs of the economy in the future, not in the past.
We live in
changing times. You will be aware, Miss Begg, that China,
India, the far east and eastern Europe are now Northern
Ireland’s major competitors and will become even more so in the
future. The Northern Ireland economy is competing not just with Dublin
and Liverpool but with skills and talents throughout the global
economy. We need to ensure that the children and young people of
Northern Ireland have the necessary skills for the future.
The order is part of a much
larger package of education measures that the Government have designed
to help to meet the needs of the 21st century.
We are radically streamlining the administrative structure of the
service to reduce bureaucracy and enable more money to be put into the
classrooms. We are increasing investment in Northern Ireland’s
education at unprecedented levels today by spending this year more than
£130 million to increase the massive £1.66 billion spent
on Northern Ireland’s education in the next financial year.
Indeed, for the first time we are allocating additional resources
direct to schools to enable them to decide their priorities. In addition, we have launched
the extended schools programme to give wrap-around education throughout
the school day, from before school begins and after it ends. The first
specialist schools will be in operation from September this year to
develop key curricular activities and to widen
choice. Lady
Hermon (North Down) (UUP): It is delightful to see you in
the Chair, Miss
Begg. The Minister
mentioned costs. Will he kindly tell the Committee, for the benefit of
every hon. Member, including those of his party, the overall cost of
the new arrangements we are
discussing?
Mr.
Hanson: I will return to that matter later in my speech. I
want to talk about the proposal before us. However, I can tell the hon.
Lady that whatever the cost of the changes we are making, the Labour
Government’s investment in education in Northern Ireland is
dramatically increasing. The order continues the process of reform by
putting in place a legislative framework to allow changes to be made to
improve the system in Northern Ireland for children and young
people. It is my view
and that of my hon. Friend and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of
State that the existing system of post-primary education is failing the
pupils and students of Northern Ireland, and its economy. As my hon.
Friends will recognise from their constituencies, for many that failure
begins at the age of 11. The Northern Ireland education system itself
now identifies children at that age as failures, which results in many
young people not achieving their full potential. Many, particularly
those from disadvantaged backgrounds—especially, if I may say
so, from Protestant disadvantaged backgrounds—are not achieving
their full potential.
In my view, the Northern
Ireland economy cannot compete with the growing pressure from China,
India, the far east and the emerging Asian economies generally if we
waste the talent and skills of so many people. I do not deal with this
issue daily, but I am acutely aware, having read the papers and heard
the views being put forward by Members, that great controversy
surrounds parts of this order. However, its provisions have been
subject to extensive and wide-ranging consultation and they
are—this may surprise my hon. Friends in particular—very
much home-grown in origin; they are not just the tools and brainchild
of direct rule
Ministers. Kate
Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab): If there was this wonderful
consultation, why, on the day the order was published, did 92 per cent.
of the population of Northern Ireland express absolute opposition to
part
of it? They may want to see changes to the 11-plus, but they are not
against academic selection in the context of Northern Ireland. Why will
my hon. Friend not admit that and say, “Nevertheless, we are
going to ram through the
order”?
Mr.
Hanson: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her
intervention. She gives me an opportunity to put on the record the fact
that, as the consultation and the various processes have shown, there
is widespread support among people and organisations in Northern
Ireland for this order. Let me share with her, Miss Begg, some of its
potential supporters. The majority of education and library boards, the
Council for Catholic Maintained Schools, the Northern Ireland Council
for the Curriculum Examinations and Assessment, the Northern Ireland
Council for Integrated Education, the Northern Ireland council for
Irish speaking schools, and the five main teaching unions all support
the changes proposed in the order.
I could go on
and as I am on my feet, I probably will. The Northern Ireland Catholic
bishops support these proposals. My hon. Friend the Member for Foyle
(Mark Durkan), the leader of the Social Democratic and Labour party,
and his party support them. Members representing Sinn Fein in this
House support them. Members of the Alliance party—the sister
party of the Liberal Democrats—support them. The Progressive
Unionist party supports them. The majority of voluntary and community
interests that have responded to the consultation support them. The
Irish Congress of Trade Unions supports them. The Northern Ireland
Human Rights Commission supports them. And just in case the
hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Lidington) wishes to make some points
later on, the CBI supports them. I simply say to my hon. Friend the
Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey) and others that a considerable body of
opinion—it is not unanimous or universal, I
accept—supports the proposals before the
Committee.
Sammy
Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP): Will the Minister outline the
percentage of teachers who oppose the proposals? In fact, 62 per cent.
of all teachers oppose them. In the biggest consultation exercise, 62
per cent. of the population opposed them. Despite the requirement that
this Government have laid down under the Belfast agreement, there is no
cross-community support for this very important legislation, so the
Government are in fact breaching the requirement that they demand of
other legislation under the Belfast
agreement.
Mr.
Hanson: As I have indicated, according to the Department
for Education—as I said earlier, the Under-Secretary of State
for Northern Ireland, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Garston,
is the Education Minister for Northern Ireland—the trade unions
and the teaching unions support the proposals. I have to take account
of that. The draft
order deals with a range of issues related to revision of the Northern
Ireland curriculum, the entitlement framework and applied and general
courses. There will be new arrangements for post-primary school
admissions. Given that this is one of the bones of contention, let me
take on the question of admissions and the related issues. The order
introduces
new admission arrangements for post-primary schools, and I know that if
my hon. Friend were here today she would put that on the record for the
Committee. Like her and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, I
am of the firm view that there is no room in the education system for
selection. I recognise that some members of the Committee and some
parts of Northern Ireland society disagree with that view, but I put it
on the record. The
impact of demography cannot be ignored. Pupil numbers are falling and
the Government have been aware for a long time of the widening range of
11-plus grades being accepted into many grammar schools in Northern
Ireland. Figures quoted in the Chamber this morning during Education
questions, which were published today by the Belfast Telegraph,
confirm the changing intake profile of grammar schools, with many
schools admitting C2 and D grades. They also show different intake
patterns in different areas, thereby illustrating the unfairness of the
current arrangements. The Belfast Telegraph also quotes my hon.
Friend—dare I call him that?—the Member for East Antrim
(Sammy Wilson) as
saying, “I
think the grammar schools lobby needs to sort this issue out if we want
to have a strong case for keeping academic selection.”
I recognise that there are
differing views in the Committee on these issues, but I simply put to
its members, for their vote in due course, that in my view, the
fundamental point at the heart of the debate is that children have an
infinite variety of skills and talents, and that it is simply wrong to
segregate them at age 11 into their future life patterns, based on
their achievements and attainments in a test at that age. As a result
of such an approach, the majority of pupils are regarded as failures at
11. Let me provide a
little local colour based on my own experience. I grew up on a council
estate near my constituency. I passed the grammar school examination
and out of 33 children in my class, I went to grammar school and the 32
others did not. I know what happened to those children: they did not
get the investment in their education that they demanded and needed,
and which their talents and skills deserved. I happened to do so. We
have to look at the needs of all children in society—not just
those who pass a test at the age of
11. Mr.
Jeffrey M. Donaldson (Lagan Valley) (DUP): If the
Minister’s assertion is that people from a working-class
background in Northern Ireland are substantially disadvantaged as a
result of our education system, can he explain why Queen’s
university, and the university of Ulster are in the top three
universities in the United Kingdom for admitting students from a
working-class
background?
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