Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers
60-63)
RT HON
ED BALLS
MP AND RT
HON JIM
KNIGHT MP
4 FEBRUARY 2009
Q60 Chairman: A very senior member
of the Institute of Education described the current education
policy in respect of schools as a franchise system—franchised
directly out of the Department and directly to schools, largely
bypassing local authorities.
Ed Balls: I think that that is
a little out of date, to be honest.
Chairman: It was published in November.
Ed Balls: Heads and governing
bodies—increasingly in collaboration—are responsible
for their schools. In the case of the National Challenge, we have
challenged every local authority to show us what they are doing
to turn round leadership and standards.
Chairman: You mentioned that 90% of funding
goes straight to schools.
Ed Balls: The 2006 Act substantially
increased the responsibility of local authorities for commissioning
and for school improvements. In the past 18 months, we have been
saying that we will deliver the 2006 Act in practice by requiring
local authorities to use those powers to drive school improvement.
It does not require them necessarily to have the budget of the
school, but if the school is failing to deliver, the local authorities
have the powers. One question that I have been asking repeatedly
in the past year is why they do not use those powers when there
are schools that persistently underperform.
Chairman: I am going to get shot by my
colleagues if I pursue this, but I am of the generation who remember
All the President's Men, and I remember the line, "Follow
the money."
Q61 Mr Slaughter: London has a
particular problem with small local authorities and big colleges.
Can you give an assurance that students will still be able to
go to the college of their choice and be funded? Can you also
give an assurance that children who get into their 19th year will
also continue to be funded? That does happen if they are on the
second year of a course or are pursuing a Level 1, 2 or 3 course.
Jim Knight: We have encouraged
the local authorities to go into regional groupings, and they
decided who they wanted to get together with. London has come
together as a single sub-regional group, precisely to address
the issues that you mentioned, such as the issue around the large
colleges in the London area and being able to have sensible commissioning
arrangements for them. People travel across borough boundaries
all the time. The arrangements for those who continue beyond their
19th birthday are set out in the ASCL Bill, which we are introducing
today and publishing tomorrow. The guarantees around Level 2 and
Level 3 funding will, by and large, deal with that issue.
Chairman: We are nearly out of time.
Q62 Fiona Mactaggart: I have two
questions. I am sad that we are looking at child poverty in the
last three minutes of this session. I shall put my questions to
both of you, so perhaps your two answers to two different things
can be merged together. First, the paper put out earlier this
week about ending child poverty does not mention the target to
reduce the number of children in poverty by half by 2010-11. I
assume that is because you do not expect us to hit it. When do
we expect to hit that target? Secondly, you were very supportive
when we had what I thought was a very positive session speaking
to you and colleagues across Departments about child poverty.
Could we do something similar for the New Opportunities White
Paper, which includes responsibilities of different Departments
that have not been interrogated in that way? Would you help us
in being able to do that as a Committee, please?
Ed Balls: It is for the House
to decide how to conduct its inquiries and to allocate responsibilities,
rather than for Ministers. If this Committee were to have a hearing
on the New Opportunities White Paper, I would be delighted to
come. I am very happy to encourage other colleagues to attend
as well. The issue will arise as to whether you will be looking
at the nought to 19 part of social mobility or across the piece;
but, whatever, there is a substantial contribution—from
the activities of John Denham's responsibilities, as well as of
the Cabinet Office Minister Liam Byrne and others—to life
chances for nought to 19-year-olds. If you could imperialistically
expand your reach across the piece, that would be great.
Chairman: Our family responsibility goes
to 90.
Ed Balls: In that case, this is
absolutely the right Committee to do this inquiry, and I look
forward to giving evidence alongside what will be a range of colleagues.
On the former point, the critical decisions on where we will be
in 2010 have already been made or will be made in the coming weeks
and months. The decisions made in last year's Budget—the
allocation of more than £1 billion—will very importantly
affect child poverty this year. What happens to child poverty
up to 2010 will be very importantly determined by what happens
to incomes and employment in the coming 12 months, plus decisions
made in the Budget. The child poverty consultation is separately
and explicitly about 2020. It was never intended to be about 2010,
because the consultation is about what kind of Bill we should
introduce in this Session to become law during this year and then
to start affecting decisions and monitoring over the next decade.
So the Bill will establish 2020 targets on the percentage of children
in relatively low income families—combining low income and
material deprivation—and the percentage of children in persistent
poverty. We will consult on how to frame those objectives in primary
and secondary legislation correctly and on the monitoring. We
are now starting the consultation that will lead to the legislation
and then to the law. By the time that we have the law in place,
all the decisions, pretty much, will have been made for 2010.
So, the right focus for 2010 is not this document and legislation;
it is actions now. We are committed to meeting our 2010 and 2020
objectives, and I hope that there will be cross-party support
for the details of the Bill.
Chairman: Fiona.
Fiona Mactaggart: I said that I would
ask both questions at once.
Chairman: Okay, you have done that. One
very last thing is that we have had a letter from Ofsted that
puts a rather different light on the original figures on child
deaths that the Chief Inspector of Schools gave to the Committee.
Graham, I will give you one quick question on that.
Q63 Mr Stuart: I spoke to the
Secretary of State about this last night. Can we finally settle
the number of children who die as a result of abuse? Ofsted gave
evidence to the Committee and sent a letter to the ADCS in December.
Can we come up with a set of figures on such an important matter
that Ofsted, the Government and everyone else can agree on?
Ed Balls: There is always a difference
between being clear and being misleading, and between being comprehensible
and being incomprehensible, and our challenge is to be clear and
comprehensible. Perhaps the right thing, having read the letter
to the ADCS, would be for me to write to the Chair to set out
exactly what the position is.[4]
Just for the record now, the figures are all entirely reconcilable.
The letter from Ofsted is very helpful. As I explained in the
House before Christmas and again last night, while Ofsted quotes
282 child deaths notified in the 17-month period from 1 April
to 31 August, 210 were deaths in which abuse or neglect was suspected
to be a factor and the other 72 were cases in which abuse was
not suspected. That would come down to four deaths a year. The
question being asked is how do you reconcile 210 cases with the
140 serious case reviews and therefore the two deaths a week figure
that we quote. The answer is that the figure of 210 is based on
a 17-month period, rather than an annual figure, and our data
are based on serious case reviews that are identified. When Ofsted's
data are broken down, we find that, over the 16-month period where
an SCR has been commissioned, the figure is 125, which is entirely
consistent with departmental expectations. The difference is that
there were a number of cases where it had not been decided at
that time—or, in 44 cases, it was subsequently decided—that
there should not be a serious case review, because it was not,
in fact, a case where abuse or neglect would require such a review.
That is how the figures reconcile. They are all fully reconcilable,
and the big difference, as I have said many times, is that the
Ofsted figures—and the 280 figure—include deaths in
house fires, deaths by suicide and deaths by substance misuse,
where we would not say that abuse or neglect was a direct contributor
to the death of the child. I will set out to you clearly how we
reconcile those numbers, which I think will show that, while there
are differences between the figure that Ofsted used and the ones
that we use as standard, they are fully explained and there is
no intention to mislead anybody.
Chairman: This has been a long session
and a good session. Thank you, Secretary of State and Minister.
As I said before, it is the Department's range that takes up the
time.
4 See Ev 21. Back
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