1 Preface
1. On 28 June 2007 the Department for Education and
Skills was divided into the Department for Children, Schools and
Families (DCSF) and the Department for Innovation, Universities
and Skills. According to the DCSF itself, the focus of the new
Department is to secure "integrated children's services and
educational excellence".[1]
On the day on which the new Department was created, the Prime
Minister issued a Written Ministerial Statement, in which he said
that the aim of these Machinery of Government changes was to "sharpen
the focus of central Government on the new and very different
challenges that Britain will face in the years ahead".[2]
He added that "In particular the changes seek to strengthen
the Government's support for children, young people and families
through these challenges, and to ensure that Britain is equipped
to seize the new opportunities of the global economy."[3]
2. In December 2007, the Secretary of State for Children,
Schools and Families, Rt Hon Ed Balls MP, published a Children's
Plan,[4] setting out the
Government's ambitions "for improving children and young
people's lives over the next decade and how we intend to achieve
them."[5] The Plan
puts forward proposals on a large number of diverse issues, ranging
from improved health provisions and play facilities to reducing
child poverty, as well as aims for improving levels of educational
attainment.
3. The establishment of the new Department has led
in turn to the formation of a new Committee to enable the House
of Commons to scrutinise its work. We have already begun work
on a number of inquiries across the range of the Department's
remit, but, given that this is a new department which from the
outset has laid out its overall aims for the coming years, we
considered it important to look at some of the general issues
raised by the creation of the Department and the way in which
it is setting about its work. Our predecessors on the Education
and Skills Committee took evidence each year from the Secretary
of State and the Permanent Secretary, primarily on expenditure
matters, but also taking the opportunity to discuss issues relating
to the work of the Department more widely. It seemed sensible
for us to continue that practice, and we therefore took evidence
from the Secretary of State on the reasoning behind the new Department
and the contents of the Children's Plan. We shall continue this
wider scrutiny of the work of the Department in evidence on the
2008 departmental annual report in the summer.
1 http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/aboutus/ Back
2
HC Deb, 28 June 2007, cols 36-37WS Back
3
ibid Back
4
DCSF, The Children's Plan: Building brighter futures, Cm7280,
11 December 2007. Back
5
ibid, p.15. Back
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