UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 353-vi

HOUSE OF COMMONS

MINUTES OF EVIDENCE

TAKEN BEFORE THE

CHILDREN, SCHOOLS AND FAMILIES COMMITTEE

 

SCHOOL ACCOUNTABILITY

Wednesday 8 July 2009

MR. VERNON COAKER and JON COLES

 

Evidence heard in Public

Questions 385 - 489

 

USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT

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Oral Evidence

Taken before the Children, Schools and Families Committee

on Wednesday 8 July 2009

Members present:

Mr. Barry Sheerman (Chairman)

Annette Brooke

Mr. David Chaytor

Fiona Mactaggart

Mr. Andy Slaughter

Helen Southworth

Mr. Graham Stuart

Mr. Edward Timpson

Derek Twigg

 

Examination of Witnesses

Witnesses: Mr. Vernon Coaker, Minister of State for Schools and Learners, DCSF, and Jon Coles, Director General, Schools Directorate, DCSF, gave evidence.

 

 

Q385 Chairman: I welcome the Minister, Vernon Coaker, and Jon Coles. You know that this is the final session on our school accountability inquiry. We will be meeting the Secretary of State about the White Paper at a later date, so let us not stray off into the wider fields of the White Paper but keep our eye on the ball of accountability as far as we can. Minister, I understand that you want to make a very brief statement about a different item before we get going on the accountability session.

Mr. Coaker: Chairman, that is very helpful. Thank you for very much for allowing me to say something very briefly before we get into accountability, which is obviously extremely important. May I say again that we welcome the inquiry and we look forward to the recommendations that you come forward with?

Externally marked tests also play an important role in our accountability system. The expert group on assessment reported that external validation of pupils' performance is vital and that national curriculum tests remain the best way of providing objective information on the performance of each pupil and each school. Last year's failures were unacceptable, and I am pleased to be able to tell the Committee that 99.9% of test results were made available to schools yesterday, as planned. Following this year's successful process, QCA will seek to award a single year contract for test delivery in 2010, which is similar in shape to this year's. We will look to put in place a longer contract from 2011 onwards, which will take more fully into account the recommendations of the expert group. I can confirm that tests will take place as planned in the week commencing 10 May 2010. Having taken account of the QCA's and Ofqual's advice, we will seek to implement the expert group's recommendation on moving the test to mid-June in 2011.

Finally, I am aware that following my colleagues' appearance before the Committee on 20 May, when the 2008 national curriculum test problems were discussed, you, Chairman, and Mr. Stuart both wrote to the Secretary of State asking for sight of documents relating to our handling of the process last year. A response to each of you is being sent today, which explains that we have decided to publish a wider package of documents relating to the Sutherland inquiry, and those documents will be available on the Department's website later today. May I thank you again, Chairman, for the opportunity to make those few brief remarks?

 

Q386 Chairman: Minister, you are very welcome. Do you want to say anything in terms of accountability?

Mr. Coaker: Not really, Chairman. Let's just get straight into it. Accountability is obviously very important and I am sure that the Committee have a number of questions to ask.

 

Q387 Chairman: Right. Let's get started. Jon, it is very nice to see you here. I think that it is the first time since you have been in your new role, isn't it?

Jon Coles: No-we were here not so very long ago.

Mr. Coaker: We were both here about three weeks ago, Chairman. Did we make that big an impact?

Chairman: I am afraid that the thought of starting an 80-mile walk tomorrow is preying on my mind.

Fiona Mactaggart: Have you asked him for sponsorship yet?

 

Q388 Chairman: I have already asked him-I am still waiting.

Let's start with what is really at the heart of all this. A very short time ago, hardly anyone had heard of school report cards; they have suddenly become, not only a great fashion, but also at the heart of the White Paper and are going to, from what I've read, transform the notion of accountability of schools and the education system. Where does all this come from? Is it all just that someone went to New York and was impressed by the school report card in one city in one country? This Committee has been to look at school report cards in New York and we thought that they were very interesting, but is this all based just on the New York experience?

Mr. Coaker: Obviously, we know that the Committee went to New York, and we have looked at what New York has done with respect to report cards and at other examples. I think that you have to put this in a broader context. People wanted to look at something like report cards because they were concerned that what we needed to do was capture everything that a school did. It is not just about academic results. Let me stress this because otherwise you are getting into a bit of a sterile debate: everyone agrees that standards of attainment are crucial in a school and that exam results, SATs results and academic attainment are absolutely fundamental, and we can never take our eye off the importance of that.

Alongside that, as you, the Committee and others know, people will say that schools are about much more than that-they are about the development of a child as an individual, how they progress and what the school does in terms of a whole range of other things. The drive was to say, "Is there a way in which we can keep a relentless pressure on standards in schools?" But it was also to try to capture something else about the ethos of a school-what a school is actually about. I think that the report card gives that opportunity. It also tries to give the opportunity to ask whether it is possible to actually measure and judge-in a broader sense-what progress a school is making in those other areas as well?

 

Q389 Chairman: But there is no doubt that a reading of the White Paper, and of any of the material that has come out on this, would suggest that this is going to profoundly change the relationship of accountability for all the players-local authorities, Ofsted and the school improvement partners. It is very much going to change the whole landscape, isn't it? It's a very fundamental change.

Mr. Coaker: It is a huge change, Chairman. It is a radical, reforming change. When people read it and look at it, they will say that this is a real attempt and a real desire on the part of the Government to capture that broader picture of what a school is about, and to actually say that we are going to look not only at exam standards, but at the well-being of pupils in the school, the perceptions of parents and pupils and the narrowing of the gap in pupil performance. Of course, that will then not only alter how we hold schools accountable, but also the way local authorities and the school improvement partners work with schools. It will change all of those sorts of relationships.

As I say, when people read what it is that we are trying to do, they will see that it is a move away from just saying that we should have one indicator which we concentrate on, as important as that is, because it does not always reflect everything else that goes on in a school and does not always reflect the fantastic progress that some schools make in difficult circumstances. What it will also do, Chairman, is to allow us to see where schools seem to be doing well, but actually could do better if they were pushed. I think that sort of contextualisation, that sort of approach, gives us a much more mature way of looking at what schools are actually doing.

 

Q390 Chairman: Are you really attempting to take people's mind off the other stuff? Is it really throwing dust in the public's eyes?

Mr. Coaker: No. Not at all.

 

Q391 Chairman: Is it a gimmick? You hear people say, "Oh, look at that school report thing, the Ofsted report. They don't look at the SIPs information, they don't look at the-

Mr. Coaker: Not at all, Chairman, because alongside-

 

Q392 Chairman: It's the only really striking thing in the White Paper. It has everything including the kitchen sink, but this is the thing that people have talked about most.

Mr. Coaker: It is the thing that has captured people's imagination and quite rightly, because it is, as I say, a reforming document. It is not a gimmick. It is not about throwing dust in people's eyes, but about trying to respond to many of the things that people have said. Of course standards are important, but why not try and capture some of the other things that a school is about as well? Why not try and inform parents about that? Why not try and inform the community about that and hold the school to account for what it does on a whole range of other areas as well as its academic attainment?

 

Q393 Chairman: What would happen in your constituency and mine, Minister, if a modest school was plodding around "satisfactory"-I take it there will be an A, B, C, D or E, or whatever in terms of their school report card-and on these new criteria that school got a C or a D? What happens to the parents' perception of sending their children to that school?

Mr. Coaker: Parents will make an overall judgment, as they do now, about schools. They will look at the report card, because the score has not just come about because of the academic results; it has come about because of a whole range of different things. But, of course, alongside that you will look to see what the reasons are for that-whether the school is improving, what is going on in the school. Of course, it will be a challenge for others-the local authority, the school improvement partner and so on-to actually work with the school to try and build on that. But it is that bigger picture that people will look for.

You and I know that some schools, on the face of it, just on raw exam scores, do not appear to be doing particularly well, and yet people still want their children to go there, because they have taken a whole range of things into account. What people want to know from a school is that a school is doing the best for each of the individual children in that school and that each of them can achieve the best that they possibly can.

 

Q394 Chairman: Jon, Ministers come and go with some regularity. You have been around for quite a long time. When was the eureka moment when someone in the Department suddenly said, "Eureka! It's school report cards." When was it?

Jon Coles: I am not sure I can answer that.

 

Q395 Chairman: That is very worrying. You do not remember the first time someone said, "Why don't we look at these school report cards?"

Jon Coles: I am not sure I can remember the first time it was discussed. It has been discussed in the Department for some months. We have certainly been discussing it for over a year in the Department.

 

Q396 Chairman: Was it after someone's trip to America?

Jon Coles: No, it was before anybody went to America that we started talking about it. We are looking at practice all around the place and it is something that has been done not just in New York but in other countries, and in other parts of North America as well. It is true that there are some schools-you referred to this quite rightly-that would be challenged by report cards in a much sharper way than they have ever been challenged before, because there are schools where attainment might look satisfactory but actually people's progress is not all that it should be, and not as sharply challenged in the system as it should be. That is a really important thing for parents.

 

Q397 Chairman: But you are known as the man with the iron fist in the Department. I can remember people saying, "It's that Jon Coles. He believes in evidence-based policy. You won't get anything past him unless it's evidence-based." Come on, Jon. Is this based on evidence?

Jon Coles: I think there is a good evidence base for it.

 

Q398 Chairman: What evidence?

Jon Coles: We do have international evidence about the effectiveness of this.

 

Q399 Chairman: No, we don't have evidence. We have been to New York. There is no evidence. They are all arguing about it. Someone told us that you need a PhD to understand some of the school report cards in New York.

Jon Coles: Accountability systems are always controversial but that does not mean that there is not evidence.

 

Q400 Chairman: You are moving away from the evidence. Where is the evidence?

Jon Coles: I think there is very good evidence in New York that it has challenged performance at the bottom end very effectively, and shifted performance at the bottom end in New York. It has been done in all sorts of other places-in Alberta as well-on quite a different model. It is much less controversial in some of those other places than it is in New York. In New York, where it is a pretty new idea, it is still controversial, although there is good reason to believe that it has had a good effect in tackling performance at the bottom end.

 

Q401 Chairman: You wrote the White Paper, didn't you?

Jon Coles: Not physically, personally.

 

Q402 Chairman: No? You claimed to have written a previous White Paper-it is in your CV. You're not claiming this one? It says in your CV that you wrote the 2002 White Paper.

Jon Coles: That is a factually accurate statement, yes.

 

Q403 Chairman: But you did not write this one?

Jon Coles: I wrote some bits of it, but I didn't mainly write it, no.

 

Q404 Chairman: You didn't write the famous one on diversity and choice?

Jon Coles: I didn't write that one.

Chairman: Thank you for those opening remarks.

 

Q405 Fiona Mactaggart: When faced with a lot of research and evidence-OECD and so on-about different accountability systems, why did the Government pick one that was highly centralised in determining what it included, but looked at through schools?

Jon Coles: I am not sure that this is a more centralised system than the one we had before. In fact, it provides information to parents on the basis of nationally validated evidence about performance, so it is possible in this country-in a way that it isn't in many other countries-to compare the performance of schools in similar circumstances on the basis of common data and evidence. The OECD says its studies show that the single biggest driver of school performance is school-based accountability, on the basis of individually taken school-based assessments that are externally set and marked. That is the biggest driver of performance, and the reporting of that is an important factor. In other words, if you want to improve your system, testing people on a universal basis through external tests and marking, and reporting the results of that, is a key driver of performance in the system.

If you look at the issues that there are with our existing system of testing, you would say, first, that it focuses on a small range of measures and, secondly, that they are mostly threshold indicators, which therefore apply to particular groups of students far more strongly than to other groups. If you were to develop that system further, you would want to get a set of measures that captures, first, the progress of every single child and holds schools to account for that and, secondly, the breadth of things that schools are expected to do in the system, and not just attainment-although that should be centrally important-but the wider range of things that schools do as well. That is what the report card is attempting to do-to capture very much more sharply and precisely the progress of every child so that for those who have achieved poorly, for example at primary school, secondary schools are still held to account strongly for their progress, and more strongly than is the case at the moment. For those with particular abilities who have achieved highly, schools should be held to account for their progress, performance and success as well-not just that they should get grade C, but that they should go on and get As and A*s. That's what the report card is intending to do.

Chairman: That was a long answer, Jon.

Jon Coles: Sorry.

 

Q406 Fiona Mactaggart: But if we look at the education system as a whole, what is the biggest problem? Shockingly and depressingly, it is the problem that I made my maiden speech about and which the chief inspector has criticised us for: the appalling number of children still leaving primary school not reading successfully. My view is that every child has a human right to read, and we do not have-and you are not proposing-an accountability mechanism that focuses on the whole system and enabling each child to read effectively. Indeed, with the abandonment of the national strategy, it could be argued that it might be losing part of that.

Mr. Coaker: We are not taking our focus off numeracy and literacy in primary schools because, as Fiona was saying-is that okay in this Committee?

Chairman: Yes.

Mr. Coaker: Fiona was saying that the importance of numeracy and literacy was absolutely fundamental. As you know, I have said that we will be ending the contract with respect to national strategies in 2011, but that does not mean that we will take the focus off. We are saying that we will now look to schools individually to develop the work that they do on that, although we expect the literacy and numeracy hours and work in the schools to continue. But the money around that will be devolved to them.

Our view is that we have made some progress but, as you say, we now need to try to accelerate that and to build on what we see as the success of the national strategies with respect of numeracy and literacy in the way that it has gone up, and push further to try and tackle that 20% to 25% at the end who are still leaving primary school without the expected level. That was why the booster classes and the extension of the peer one-to-one into year 7 in secondary school were also included in the White Paper to try to build on and tackle that as well.

Jon Coles: Can I just add to that very quickly? If you look at the developments in this White Paper, I think they have the opposite effect to the one you're suggesting. I think that they sharpen the focus on English and maths. In accepting the expert group report conclusion that we should have externally marked and set tests in only English and maths, we are sharpening the focus on those subjects. They remain absolutely essential to the report card measures.

The fact that in the White Paper we say that every child who is behind expectations in either English or maths in Key Stage 2-at any stage-will get one-to-one support within the next few years to catch up in those two subjects is the biggest sharpening of focus on getting people up to national expectations in reading, writing and mathematics that we have had since the introduction of the literacy and numeracy strategies. It is a big attempt to focus attention more sharply on particularly those children who are not meeting national expectations.

 

Q407 Fiona Mactaggart: Just finally, one of the points that I made about the centrally determined accountability mechanism is that if you speak to parents, they want schools to be a place where their children learn and succeed. They want powerfully for them to come out able to read and participate in society. They also want their children to be happy. I worry about whether we have a clear enough focus on what parents and children want out of schools in this mechanism. Have we listened to them, or have we just decided that we know best?

Mr. Coaker: I think that that is exactly the reason for the report card. I think that the parents in your constituency and others will be pleased with the way in which the report card is actually trying to capture some of the points you make about people being happy and safe. Sometimes the problem is that you are then accused of being soft on standards and not caring about them.

 

Q408 Fiona Mactaggart: Standards are appalling when children are miserable.

Mr. Coaker: Absolutely. When young people feel happy, safe, secure and valued for who they are, achievement usually goes up as well. You will have seen the different categories laid out in the report card, including pupil well-being. Parents ask me, "Is my child going to be bullied at the school? Is my child going to be safe there? Is my child going to be looked after and cared for, and what is the pastoral system like?" They ask those questions as well as looking at the academic achievement and how well the school is doing with regard to reading and writing. The only point I am making is to ensure that, in a sense, we are not accused of taking our eye off the ball with regard to standards. Standards of literacy and numeracy, as you have said, Fiona, are absolutely fundamental, but there are other things that go alongside that and will, quite rightly, contribute to the achievement of a school if put right. The report card seeks to allow parents to be able to see whether a school is good in those respects as well as the others.

Chairman: Let us move on. Graham, you may ask questions on the school report card.

 

Q409 Mr. Stuart: Returning to the point John made about the right to one-to-one tuition set out in the White Paper, it reminds me of the golden days of the British car industry and of British Leyland and its commitment to quality control. There was a bigger number of people at the end of the line dealing with all the ones that were not constructed properly in the first place, which showed British Leyland's commitment to quality control. The Japanese did not do that. They decided to get it right the first time and have no one at the end of the line because no car got there without being right from the beginning, and anyone could press a button on the conveyor belt to stop the whole process and ensure that it was done right.

I find rather worrying the idea that you are not challenging, or doing enough to remove, inadequate teachers and are not focusing enough on getting great teachers in classrooms. When you get a great teacher in a classroom in the most deprived and challenging area, standards are transformed, and if you get someone who cannot do it, you do not. One-to-one tuition is yet another gimmick from a Government who have come up with millions in 12 years, and it does not reassure me that children in the worst affected areas will get the support they need.

Mr. Coaker: Nobody disagrees that it is necessary to get a continued emphasis on standards to try to improve everybody within the pre-school, infant and junior phases of primary education, as you rightly point out, Graham. However, if people do not succeed and fall behind, it is important to have a system that supports them to catch up. A number of studies have demonstrated that one-to-one tuition and support is a way of doing that. My experience of talking to teachers, parents and others is that it has actually been exceedingly well-received. Notwithstanding the point you made, which we obviously would all want, nobody would be in a position where they would need that. People have been very pleased by the fact that, when people fall behind, that additional help and support will be provided. Now it will be not only available in years 3 to 6, but extended into year 7.

 

Q410 Mr. Stuart: For the record, I personally do not find that convincing, but we will see. So, true school accountability measures that work will root out the poor and inadequate who are failing children-is that right?

Mr. Coaker: It will improve accountability, which improves practice and standards in schools overall and allows parents to see what is going on. Alongside that-as a part of it-improving what happens in schools is about improving the quality of leadership through the head teacher, which is absolutely fundamental, and also about improving the quality of the teaching that goes on. One of the other things in the document, as you will know, is the licence to teach, which is another way in which we will try to ensure that teachers keep their professional skills up to date. Alongside that will be continuous professional development. As we discussed before, we want to ensure that high-quality teaching is available to everyone in every class.

 

Q411 Mr. Stuart: Accountability should mean that we root out the inadequate, and that is not about box-ticking. There will be some great teachers who will be damned if they are going to go on a course, even though the head nags them, and they might fail to fill the box in. When the guys come along every five years for the licence renewal, the poor and mediocre teacher, who is pretty good and assiduous at sucking up to anyone at the right time, will get a tick in all the boxes. Will this system root out the poor and the inadequate, because we have a system in which poor and inadequate teachers are not removed from our classrooms? Until you do that you have not got an accountability system worth the name.

Mr. Coaker: I think that the reforms we have announced will help to ensure that we have high-quality teaching available in every class. Accountability is about that, but it is also about ensuring that all the other things take place and that parents are informed. Then they will bring that pressure to bear themselves on the school to ensure that the quality of education there is as it should be.

 

Q412 Mr. Stuart: So you are saying that parents will be in a position to trigger the removal of inadequate teachers?

Mr. Coaker: What I am saying is that parents will be able to hold a school to account. If people have the information about a school, they will make a judgment about that, and ultimately they will make a judgment about whether they want their son or daughter to go there.

Jon Coles: I think you are rightly saying that there is a big implementation issue about the licence to teach. If it is implemented in a way which says that people must go on a certain number of courses every year and fill in the forms and submit a portfolio, which is convincing on paper but says nothing about their teaching practice, it will not work. Therefore the job of implementation is to make sure that this is a real and effective way of making sure that those who are effective in the classroom, whose skills are up to date and who teach well every lesson, every day, are relicensed, and those who fall short of those professional standards are not relicensed. Obviously, making that system work effectively is the key to making it an effective reform, rather than one that is about box-ticking. We are very clear that the job is to make it about the quality of teaching practice and not about the number of courses that somebody has been on.

 

Q413 Mr. Stuart: We know how many teachers have been removed from teaching over the last number of years-practically none. Chris Woodhead famously came out with a figure of 15,000 inadequate teachers at one stage. Do you have any idea of what success would look like in terms of rooting out inadequate teachers?

Mr. Coaker: I do not have a figure that I can tell the Committee, but I accept the point that ensuring that we have good, high-quality teaching in every classroom is essential. I think that the licence to teach would help with respect to that.

 

Q414 Mr. Stuart: May I ask you quickly about the report card? However it is constructed, the evidence we heard from New York was that the pressure for change was immense. When Christine Gilbert came here she sounded rather distant from the report card work. The letter from the Secretary of State that I received recently emphasised how close the work is now. The prospectus from Ofsted is 55 pages, and most of it is pretty complex and talks about statistical means and various other things. Is it not true that the thing is going to be in a permanent state of flux as everyone challenges the results and says it does not fairly reflect their school?

Mr. Coaker: Let us be clear that that is the starting prospectus. We have a two-year pilot starting this September to take forward the whole proposal. The prospectus sets out some of the ways in which we think we can do it. That is now a matter for consultation, debate and testing in practice so that we can come forward in 2011 with a report card that exactly avoids the sorts of points that Graham quite rightly makes. We get something and there is a continuous state of flux, and that is why we have a two-year pilot.

 

Q415 Mr. Stuart: One last question. Is it your vision that there would be a total score? In New York you could get every school and find out which was top, which was 277th and which one on this year's marking was 586th. Is that how it will be with the report card here?

Mr. Coaker: The Secretary of State said when launching the White Paper that while we are going to consult further, he is now convinced that if parents, newspapers and websites are to make fair, clear and easy to understand comparisons between schools, our school report card will need to include a single overall grade. He said that while we need to consult further, it is his view, subject to that, that a single overall grade would be-

 

Q416 Mr. Stuart: I am clear about the grading, but will we be able to see the individual scoring? If all the schools are grade A, you will not be able to differentiate them.

Mr. Coaker: Do you mean the individual categories that make up the overall score?

Mr. Stuart: In order to come up with A-

Mr. Coaker: So that is if the pupil progress and pupil well-being people are saying what their scores are as well?

 

Q417 Mr. Stuart: The grand total. Literally, you would have the ultimate league table. You would be able to see the top school in the country possibly, and right down to the bottom. You could see every differentiation all the way down.

Mr. Coaker: I think our intention is to make as much information available as we can. Certainly, if you look at the information relating to pupil attainment, you will see that there is no difference in terms of the information we have made available. For example, people would still be able to compare, if they wanted to, examination results or SATs results. But the intention is to aggregate all those different categories to give an overall score.

 

Q418 Chairman: It is a fair point that Graham makes: the press will turn those into league tables in the same way that it has turned exam and test results into league tables.

Mr. Coaker: That may well be the case, and it will be up to people to do that or not. But it is important to say that the Government have responded to the exact point that Fiona has made, which I think many of us have heard from our constituents, about schools not just being about exam results. While people understand that exam results and standards are fundamental, they also want to know what a school does in relation to other things. That is what the report card will make available to them.

 

Q419 Mr. Chaytor: This is a serious point: isn't the key to the success of the report card that is replacing the performance tables the way the Government compile the information on the raw scores? At the moment, the information on the raw scores is there, and any newspaper can lift it and print it. Is it still going to be easily accessible, or is the information on raw scores simply going to be part of each school's report card?

Mr. Coaker: It will be part of the report card.

 

Q420 Mr. Chaytor: In which case, it is only the most assiduous newspapers, such as The Independent, that will take the trouble to go through the report cards of every school in the country to extract the data and put them in league table format.

Mr. Coaker: Yes, but what I am saying is that the information is still available.

 

Q421 Mr. Chaytor: But the Government are not going to make it easy.

Mr. Coaker: We are not deliberately trying to make it difficult either. We are trying to say that this is going to be a different way of looking at what a school is about. We are not about trying to hide information, or about pushing it away. I would rather say that the information people can use will still be made available.

 

Q422 Mr. Chaytor: But by and large, you would accept that most newspapers will print things that are easily available? They are less likely to construct league tables based on hard work.

Mr. Coaker: It depends. If people want that information, it will be available. As I have said, standards and examination and SATs results are important, but so are other things alongside them.

 

Q423 Mr. Chaytor: Can I ask about the relationship between the report card and the framework for excellence report card, which is also being piloted as of this September? It is conceivable that an individual school may get a very good school report card, but a very weak framework for excellence report card. Is the framework for excellence report card to be used to deal with the long-standing problem of inadequate small sixth forms?

Jon Coles: It is certainly true that an individual school with a sixth form might get strong performance for one of the indicators and be much less strong for the other. That is already the case with Ofsted reports, which can and do differentiate between the quality of a sixth form and the quality of the rest of the school. We are piloting those things together, and the framework for excellence has had a long period of piloting in FE-although it will only be piloted in schools from this September-but as part of the pilot we need to align those two things in a sensible way. But it is certainly true that the framework for excellence may very well identify, in an otherwise good school, a weak sixth form, and lead to action to deal with it if that is the case. Equally, of course, it could find quite the opposite and lead to a better focus of action on the 11 to 16 part of the school. That is absolutely possible.

 

Q424 Mr. Chaytor: The division at 16 is logical in one sense-I see the point of that. But isn't the reality that when the diploma system is fully in place, the real dividing point is 14? If the original diploma model means that students might have to take their diplomas partly at their own school, partly at a neighbouring school and partly at a local college-increasingly from the age of 14 students will be on an apprenticeship scheme that will take them to their local college as well-what are the practical problems of completing the school report card for students who may spend most of their week away from the school at which they are officially registered? How are those students' achievements reflected?

Jon Coles: The starting point for that is that the home institution-the institution with which the pupil is registered-is the one that is held to account for their performance. That is certainly the right model at the moment because you want the home institution to be taking responsibility for making sure that the individual pupil gets the quality of education that is their right. If they are putting on and arranging courses in other institutions for that student, they have a responsibility to make sure that they are not just washing their hands of that child, but that they are making sure that the child is getting a good quality experience. They are still the people who are responsible for making sure that that is the case. That is the right model.

On the whole, as things stand at the moment, models of diploma delivery are leading to people being out of their home institution for one or one and a half days a week. The overwhelming balance of time for almost all students in the country is still with the home institution. Obviously, it could be the case-we don't know this-that the model will evolve further to a point at which people are actually spending the bulk of their time outside their institution. At that point, we would need to think further about whether the accountability system needs to evolve to reflect that change in practice. At the moment, I think we're on the right case.

Mr. Coaker: I also think, David, that the alignment of the school report card, the framework for excellence, and the interrelationship to which you allude is something that we are going to have to look at very carefully during the pilot to see how you actually align them. Jon is right in saying that it is the home institution. But you can see it is a challenge. When we talked about initial teacher training last time I was at the Committee a couple of weeks ago, a similar issue arose about the movement of teaching and non-teaching staff between different institutions. The fluidity of the system will raise these sorts of challenge and we will simply have to look at how best to align those two systems in a way that is non-bureaucratic, fair to both institutions and fair to the individual.

Chairman: You can hardly say that without a smile.

Mr. Coaker: I am smiling, but you have to start with that aspiration.

 

Q425Mr. Chaytor: Pursuing the question of possible contradictions, the report card will also include the summary of the most recent Ofsted report. What happens if there is a sharp contrast between the assessment on the report card itself or the rating that goes into the report card, and the judgment of the most recent Ofsted report? Would it be more useful to have a summary of the past two or three Ofsted reports?

Mr. Coaker: The summary of the last Ofsted report is the right thing to do because you want the most recent information available to parents. As you know, some schools are changing quite dramatically. Going back a couple of Ofsteds ago may unfairly reflect on the school's improvement, which the most recent Ofsted report would show. Even though the most recent Ofsted report would show it, there will almost be an aspersion cast, because of where the school was a year or two ago. It is important that the latest Ofsted inspection is there-it is an important part of the report card and of the information that should be available to parents when they make their judgment.

Chairman: We are going to drill down on Ofsted.

Jon Coles: May I make one other comment on this, in passing, which is important? The fact that it is going to act as the risk assessment for Ofsted is really important in that context, because if you see a sharp decline in the report card, that would obviously be evidence for Ofsted to say, "We should go and have a look at what's going on in this school." Aligning it as part of that process is quite important.

 

Q426 Mr. Chaytor: Finally, on parental perceptions, how will the system guard against what might be described as the inevitability of schools with active and well-informed bodies of parents and with energetic head teachers mobilising parental perceptions through the report?

Mr. Coaker: That is a reasonable point to make but, frankly, it was made when Ofsted went out to get parental information to inform its inspections-people were saying that in some schools, you'll get the school mobilising parents. What happens is that one indication comes in, and you make that judgment against the whole range of other judgments about a school. Clearly, when it comes to parental perception, the way it is done and the way it is looked at is something that needs to be tested in the pilots to ensure that you don't get that skewing of opinion that you might have if it was done in the way that you suggest.

 

Q427 Chairman: Minister, before we move on, you have to admit that it is going to be a difficult job, once a child gets to 14, to track his or her well-being as he or she goes off to FE college or to diplomas on different sites. It is going to be much easier to do this in terms of a standard secondary and primary career, but it is more difficult when you get to 14 to 19, isn't it?

Mr. Coaker: To be fair, that probably is the case, but if something is difficult or challenging, or you wonder how it could be done, the fact is that if it is the right thing to do, you have to press ahead with it. I think it is the right thing to do. It is challenging, as you say; it is more challenging in those circumstances, but none the less, it is something that we should pursue.

 

Q428 Chairman: Does it seem that the softer end-parental and student satisfaction-becomes more difficult? Will it become more difficult, in terms of the softer data, when you're polling people about what they think of the experience? That will be much more difficult across a number of institutions.

Mr. Coaker: Yes, but not impossible, and not something that is not worth doing, notwithstanding the practical problem you raise.

 

Q429 Mr. Timpson: We have touched briefly on the role of Ofsted and where it fits into the chain of accountability, but the prospectus that we've seen appears on the face of it to be a joint publication. It has Ofsted written on it-indeed, even the report card example you have has Ofsted written on it-but it is meant to be an independent regulator. Isn't there a worry that if the Government are going to be deciding the aspects of performance that will be on the report cards and how they are measured, and if that will be informing Ofsted in deciding whether a school under the risk assessment, or its inspection, is underperforming and needs to be inspected, that is compromising the independence of Ofsted?

Mr. Coaker: Ofsted is independent-it is important that we put that on the record; and I am sure that Christine Gilbert will go on that independence, as she should. It is not a case of compromising independence but of trying to work together in order to improve accountability and improve the way that the system works. As I have said, in the production of the prospectus that we have before us, we have worked closely with Ofsted. The inspection regime will stand alongside it and will be a part of it, but will be separate from it.

 

Q430 Mr. Timpson: But it won't be separate, will it, if Ofsted is looking to the school report card to help inform it of its own decision on inspection? Surely, all Ofsted should be doing is relying on its own inspection regime and ignoring what the school report card says, because that is something that the Government have set as a measure of performance. That is something that Ofsted should not be involving itself with.

Mr. Coaker: It will be one of the ways in which a risk assessment or something indicates to Ofsted that there may be a problem. There will be other things that it uses, of course, and the inspection that then takes place and the way in which Ofsted operates in looking at a school and coming to a judgment about a school, looking into the processes that take place and the qualitative judgments that it makes, will be completely independent in coming to the conclusions it wants to make about that.

Jon Coles: It is worth adding that Ofsted has produced its own revised version of its inspection process and framework. By doing that, it wanted to have a way of deciding which schools should be inspected on the five-year cycle and which should be inspected more frequently, and to have a way of judging the risks and deciding which of the schools are at risk of going downhill and which we therefore ought to go and have a look at quickly. What Ofsted has said is that assuming we get the design of the report card right, it will use that as the basis of its risk assessment, but that does not mean that it will constrain itself to looking only at the report card as evidence; it might chose to look at other things as well.

We have worked very closely with Ofsted, and I think that we have a much better product because we have worked with it and taken its educational advice. This is a joint consultation, which means that Ofsted is saying that it is serving its purposes as well as ours. Clearly, if at any point Christine decided that it was not serving Ofsted's purposes and would not work for it as the basis of its risk assessment, I am sure she would say that she would not use it as the basis of her risk assessment, because that would not be the right thing for her to do.

 

Q431 Mr. Timpson: Could I ask that you take away and consider the fact that some people will view Ofsted's involvement in the creation of this school report card-the ultimate contents of which have been decided by the Government-and Ofsted's reliance on that to inform it of its own independent inspection, as leaving both Ofsted and the Government open to the charge that Ofsted has been taken under the wing of the Government and is simply acting as their poodle in the way that people within Government would want it to?

Mr. Coaker: We certainly will take that away. The Committee will come forward with its report about accountability, and we will look very carefully at the recommendations that the Committee makes. Obviously, if that is something of concern, it is something that we need to consider as well, because we do not want to compromise the independence of Ofsted-that is not the intention. Our intention is to work with Ofsted to produce a better product.

 

Q432 Mr. Timpson: Just one final question, if I may. Jon, you touched on the new inspection framework that is rolling out in September 2009. One of the changes of emphasis within that is that schools that are already performing well have to be able to demonstrate ongoing improvement in order to maintain their inspection grade. That leaves open the scenario in which you have a high-performing school with a grade 1 that is going to have to try to show improvement, but cannot get any higher. How do you envisage their being able to show that they are significantly improving, to avoid their grade going lower?

Jon Coles: This is a moment when I might pray in aid myself the independence of Ofsted, because obviously it is its inspection framework, not ours. I think that what Ofsted is saying is that every school, no matter how good, ought to be improving and looking for continuous improvement. It is the sort of Japanese production-line model that, no matter how well you are doing, you ought to be looking to improve your processes and continuously improve. It is not saying, "You must be looking to improve your inspection grade", but that "You must look to be improving teaching practice and processes, and your processes of developing staff and monitoring the attainment and progress of children and young people. You must be looking to extend the areas in which you are excellent, and to identify the subject departments that are perhaps slightly weaker than others and look to improve those".

There is no doubt that what Ofsted is doing is again raising the bar on the expectation of what is needed in the system, but that push towards continuous improvement is a very positive thing. You are absolutely right that the way in which that is then judged by inspectors, sensitively and taking care to look at the context of the school and at what it is doing, is absolutely crucial in getting that right. What you do not want, of course, is a school that is the most outstanding school in the country but struggles, therefore, to demonstrate that it is improving, and is marked down for that. What you do want is that most outstanding school in the country to be looking always to be stretching and improving itself, to be identifying where it is weaker and to be improving in lots of areas. That is what it is trying to achieve.

Mr. Coaker: Briefly, the striving for continuous improvement, even when you are excellent, is what keeps you excellent. Jon was saying, Ofsted is independent in that sense, but I think that that is what they mean-the continuing drive to do even better, even when you are doing exceedingly well, is what keeps you there. You will know, Edward, from your own constituency, as I do, that some of the best schools, which are right at the top of their game, are still always looking to see what more they can do.

 

Q433 Chairman: We did see one of the top schools in New York, which could not get above a B in its school report card.

Mr. Coaker: That is because of the limiting judgment.

 

Q434 Helen Southworth: In terms of the opportunities that might be brought in by the school report cards and accountability to local people and pupils' parents, what are you expecting to be able to do in terms of indicating responses for children who find it difficult to achieve in school because of challenging circumstances? That could be because of long-term conditions, or it could be children who go missing or who have challenging family circumstances.

Mr. Coaker: One of the things that we are looking at is the whole issue of contextualisation, of trying to look at the context in which schools are prey to some of the more difficult and challenging circumstances that some schools have compared with others. What we are trying to do is to devise a system that allows that to happen in a way that does not reward poor performance or does not have people saying, "Well, what do you expect around here, we can't achieve anything?" There is avoiding that, but also allowing us to devise a system that shows where a school is making sufficient progress despite some of the issues that it has.

One of the things we shall do with pupil progress-not with pupil attainment; there will be no contextualisation for that-is that there will be this contextualisation in which we try to look at some of the indicators you have mentioned, some of the issues around poverty and ethnicity, and some of the other issues, to see what impact they have on a school and in what ways the school has made progress despite that. One of the ways that we are looking to do that is to give credits to a school-in terms of taking account of that, credits would add to a school's overall score. Clearly there is a lot of technical detail, which I would not pretend to be able to explain to the Committee. Certainly, the idea of trying to take into account some of those factors will be welcome to many schools that make fundamentally excellent progress in difficult circumstances, and that sometimes feel they are not adequately accepted or acknowledged.

 

Q435 Helen Southworth: In terms of the particular examples I gave-long-term conditions and children going missing-they can happen irrespective of the challenging circumstances. Will this be an opportunity for Ofsted to inspect the support that schools give for children with long-term conditions, for example?

Mr. Coaker: Certainly Ofsted would, or should, look at how a school tackles any of those issues, whether special needs or children with learning difficulties, or how they deal with children not at school-missing or not attending. All those things it would take into account in coming to an overall judgment about a particular school.

 

Q436 Chairman: You have certainly put an interesting gloss on this, both of you. Some people might say that Ofsted deeply resents this new intrusion on a job that it thought it was doing perfectly well. There is a minor voice coming out of Ofsted, which we picked up, that seems to be sulking a bit about this. This is Ofsted's job-accountability, inspection and telling parents. All these things that you want the school report card to do, Ofsted could say, quite justifiably, "We do that. This is a question mark over our existence. We are going to be peripheralised by this." That is true, isn't it?

Jon Coles: No, I don't think it is. Can I just say that we have produced this report card absolutely jointly with Ofsted?

 

Q437 Chairman: Well, perhaps you shouldn't have. I thought Ofsted was supposed to be independent. I thought Ofsted should have had the guts and the courage to say, "Look, we don't like this. We think we weren't consulted enough. Where's the evidence base for it?" Why is Ofsted in this cosy relationship? What is the point of having Ofsted? Why do we not get rid of Ofsted if it is so cosy with the Government and doing all these nice little joint policies?

Jon Coles: I think that Ofsted are completely free to say that they do not wish to use the report card in the way they have said they wish to. Where we have worked together with them is on the design of the report card, and their educational advisers are absolutely invaluable in doing this properly. I am sure that if they felt that they resented it and did not want to do it, that is what they would be saying, because they have the independence to say that.

Of course, it is absolutely vital in the system that we have an independent inspectorate which can comment independently on schools, on Government policy, and so on, and they do that absolutely freely.

 

Q438 Chairman: They don't, Jon-come on. Sitting where we sit, we do not see that. We see quite a comfortable relationship between Ofsted and the Department. I know it is not popular to talk about rocking the boat, but they do not want to rock the boat, do they? It is hardly Chris Woodhead in charge at the moment, is it?

Mr. Coaker: No, but it is somebody who works hard and does challenge us and will challenge us, no doubt, in the annual report.

 

Q439 Chairman: We have not seen any challenge with this. You have picked this up in a year. A year ago, no one had ever heard of it, then someone scratches his or her head in the Department and we have suddenly got this fashion. You have introduced it and I would imagine that many people in Ofsted were saying, "What on earth is this all about?"

Mr. Coaker: We think that the role that Ofsted plays in looking at the process that takes place in schools-observation and a lot of the qualitative work that they have done-is significantly different to a report card, which is outcome-based and data-based. The way that Ofsted drills down underneath that is of huge importance and significance.

 

Q440 Chairman: Minister, you can see the point that I am trying to make.

Mr. Coaker: Yes, I understand the point.

 

Q441 Chairman: Where is the grit in all this? Of all the accountabilities that we are going through, where is the bit of accountability that says, "We are separate from the Department; we'll say things that the Department really doesn't want to hear"? I do not see, in the accountability evidence that we have taken, that there is any real grit. It does seem to be very cosy, and if it is cosy it cannot be right, surely.

Mr. Coaker: No, it shouldn't be cosy, it isn't cosy and it won't be cosy. It is a partnership which has brought about this. Where we go to in the future will no doubt be a matter for discussion, but it is something that we have worked with Ofsted to develop. This is where we have got to at the present time. We think it is now something we need to go out and pilot, which we will do for two years, and, as I say, we will see how that works. But we believe it is a fundamental reform. As I say, we also respect the work that Ofsted has done and will do.

Chairman: Well, let us see if there is a cosy relationship with local authorities. Derek.

 

Q442 Derek Twigg: In terms of the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill, the Secretary of State is going to take powers to direct local authorities to use their statutory powers. There is also reference made in the White Paper. Do you have a hit list of local education authorities that you are going to do this to?

Mr. Coaker: No, we do not have a hit list, but you will have seen in the White Paper that we have taken action with four local authorities: the most serious action was taken with respect to Milton Keynes and the second most serious was obviously Leicester. So we do not have a hit list, but we have schools that we are concerned about, we have national challenge areas and we have a clear remit that says that if we think that, notwithstanding all the efforts that are being made, a local authority is not being as quick and as determined to tackle some of the underachievement in their area as it should be, we will not tolerate that and, if we have to take action, we will.

 

Q443 Derek Twigg: I think this is an issue with local authorities-the collaborative, sort of personal, informal working relationship, which clearly works well in a lot of authorities, because we have seen significant improvements. Is there a misunderstanding by Government of that approach, and is it really more of a stick rather than carrot approach that the Government prefer? Is there a misunderstanding of some gap between local authorities and Government about how this should be best approached?

Mr. Coaker: I think the important thing is to have it as a balance. I do not think you should start off with the desire to take over a local authority to intervene. I think you should start out with the desire to work with them and to collaborate to improve standards where they need to be improving. But if at the end of the day, clearly, progress is not being made or it is too slow or there is resistance to change because it is difficult, young people are left with substandard schools. What we are saying in the White Paper is that we are no longer prepared to tolerate that and that unless we get that progress and that collaborative approach, which is about bringing about the change that is necessary, we will intervene.

 

Q444 Derek Twigg: Do you think that we could give local education authorities more powers?

Mr. Coaker: I think they have got significant powers. I think part of the problem is that at the end of the day we need to ensure that they realise that if there is continuous failure, and continuous failure to address that failure, the Government will intervene, because we think it important to do so for the welfare and educational entitlement of those young people.

 

Q445 Derek Twigg: Whether we talk about report cards or the powers the local authority or Ministers might have, is not the single biggest issue, as always in schools, leadership? If the leadership is wrong or inadequate then the school is most likely to perform poorly. We can put all the structures we want in place and all the changes, but what we have not done is got to the bottom of the problem, which is to have a quick removal of head teachers where schools are failing and they cannot see any improvement. We need to develop a pool of very good potential head teachers, which can be put in place over the years, particularly where schools are poorly performing. That is what they do in the armed forces, for instance. They coach and groom potential leaders. Isn't that what we should be doing, rather than going through all these different systems?

Mr. Coaker: I think the leadership provided by the head teacher is fundamental. It is the right point to make. In the short period of time that I have been in post, inadequate leadership has been dealt with in a number of schools in a number of ways. Indeed, the White Paper looks at how we can have more federations of schools where excellent head teachers take on and work with schools that are failing. They can bring their leadership skills and develop leadership abilities in those schools. There is also the National College for School Leadership, which has-I cannot remember what they are called-

Jon Coles: National leaders in education.

Mr. Coaker: Yes. They go and share their experience and their ability. You are quite right to say that we cannot tolerate failure. Graham often makes the point about classroom teachers. We simply have to accept that if we have failing head teachers-it is a small number as the vast majority work very well-we should not be afraid of taking the action that is necessary. Increasingly that is being done.

 

Q446 Annette Brooke: My understanding is that the White Paper gives much more autonomy to schools to make decisions on CPD and school improvement. Is there a tension between your view that local authorities have to be more challenging, and giving these extra powers at school level?

Mr. Coaker: I do not think that it is a contradiction or something that should be seen as difficult. We are saying that schools should be the vehicle for school improvement and they need to work with local authorities to do that. Ultimately, schools challenge themselves and schools often individually will bring about that change, but sometimes they will need the support of others to do that and the local authority can help with that. You often need a local authority to help with the overall strategic planning for an area.

Annette Brooke: I wonder whether I could go straight into asking about school improvement partners-

 

Q447 Chairman: May I stop you just for a second before we finish? Could I keep you on local authorities for a moment and leadership? If part of the accountability is the local authority, surely you want strong leadership in the local authority, not just heads. Some of the evidence that this Committee has seen in Building Schools for the Future shows that the leadership is not there. We found instances under your new system of having a head of children's services where the head of social services is running children's services and does not understand schools. They may be very good at child protection and very good at that side of things, but they are really very poor at leadership on schools. We are detecting a real problem of leadership in terms of Building Schools for the Future and in terms of giving sufficient leadership and help to schools that are struggling.

Mr. Coaker: I think the leadership issue, whether it is in local authorities or in schools, as Derek has said, is fundamental. It is not just about leadership with respect to officers-directors of children's services-but sometimes about difficulties with political leadership in local authorities. One of my points about Derek's point is that what we are signalling in the White Paper with the four authorities that we have named is that where the Government need to step in, they will. But what we want to do first of all is encourage strong leadership at a local authority level. We do not want to say, as a first resort, that we are going to step in; we want to say, "Sort it out," but we will take action if necessary.

 

Q448 Chairman: In some places, it is a triumph of hope over experience, isn't it?

Mr. Coaker: I think hope should be time limited, if you understand the point that I am making. You cannot hope for change all of the time; you sometimes have to act.

 

Q449 Chairman: You haven't done anything dramatic recently, like taking over a local education authority or a children's services department, have you?

Mr. Coaker: We have intervened quite strongly in Milton Keynes. I'm not sure that "taking over" is the right phrase, but we have certainly intervened very strongly.

 

Q450 Chairman: David Blunkett used to do it, didn't he? He took over Leeds and Bradford, and put a new team in Hackney. Are you all becoming a bit too cosy with local authorities?

Mr. Coaker: No, certainly not. As I said to you, in the first instance we want to help and support local authorities, but we also signal in the White Paper that we are not frightened to intervene if necessary.

Chairman: We will go on to SIPs.

 

Q451 Annette Brooke: When we met some SIPs, I do not think that we really got to the bottom of their dual functions to be a critical friend and to be sufficiently challenging. Again, I see tensions between those different roles. How do you actually view the SIPs, and how can they be a really good friend and then tell tales to the local authority?

Mr. Coaker: There are always those sorts of tensions in professional relationships-it does not have to be with a SIP and a school. When I was a deputy head, one of the people that I had to discipline was a very good friend of mine. Those sorts of tensions always emerge, but you have to be professional about them. One of the things that we have done, and that you have seen, is say that to overcome some of the problems that may exist with cosiness, instead of five years with a SIP, it will be three years.

We are seeking to develop the professionalism, training and support that are given to SIPs. As you know, the National College for School Leadership is responsible for the accreditation, and we will work with it to see how we will develop the role of SIPs and improve their training and accreditation. We will also continue to look at giving SIPs a licence to practise. We will look at how to improve that, and we think that that will help significantly.

 

Q452 Annette Brooke: I had the impression from some of the SIPs that we were talking about that there was a lot of concentration on getting the data right. It sounded as if they were being taught how to tick the boxes, as I recall. I would like to ask Jon: what is the hard evidence that SIPs have brought about a real improvement? After all, you are rushing into expanding, so you must have some evidence.

Jon Coles: First, I think that your analysis of the issue is basically right, which is to say that too often SIPs are very focused on the data. When they are in the schools, they spend a great deal of their time in the head teacher's office. They spend less time in the school understanding what is going on, reading the school, diagnosing the problems and prescribing what the solutions might be, and then coaching and supporting the leadership of the school to address the problems in the right way, and brokering in the right support to make that happen. That is the role that SIPs can most usefully play.

The evidence for saying that that is an effective role comes from the London Challenge and from the City Challenge, because that is the role that the London Challenge advisers, who have been working with the least effective or the lowest-performing schools in City Challenge areas, have been playing. For example, London has gone from being the region with the largest number of schools below the then floor target to the only region that, in 2006, achieved the floor target entirely within all its schools. I think we have evidence that that role is effective, and therefore, the White Paper says that that is the reform that we will make to the system to develop the role of the SIP, from being too focused too often on the data to being a broader role, which is about reading a school, challenging it and brokering in the right support to shift it. That is the evidence base for it.

Annette Brooke: I think I have some relief there that it might get beyond the data.

 

Q453 Chairman: Are you sure that it is not just to give jobs to all these people who do not have jobs, now that they are not doing National Strategies?

Mr. Coaker: No, absolutely not.

 

Q454 Chairman: No? But they're all out of work, aren't they?

Mr. Coaker: The contracts are until 2011, and then it may be that when schools get their devolved funding down, they may think that these people are very good, and that they should employ them-but that would be a matter for them.

 

Q455 Chairman: How much are you saving? Was it £100 million?

Jon Coles: The contracts are £100 million.

 

Q456 Annette Brooke: I see that you are going to increase the number of days of SIP support to 20. How does that sit with recruiting practising head teachers to do this? I think the Government initially saw them as rather important players.

Jon Coles: I want to emphasise that it is up to 20 days, and it will be differentiated according to the performance of the school. The National Challenge advisers, who are working with the lowest-performing schools, are effectively SIPs who are taking on this new role now in the system, and are doing 20 days. But we would expect the number of schools that are not in the lowest-performing category, where the SIP does 20 days, to be quite limited. So it will be differentiated, and the highest-performing schools will get less SIP time than the lowest-performing one. That was the first point.

The second point is that National Challenge advisers are doing this anyway. We do have a good proportion of head teachers doing that role for the National Challenge, either current head teachers or very recently retired heads. I absolutely agree that it remains important that we get a good proportion of heads or people with very recent headship experience doing the job. The experience of the National Challenge is that there is still a pool of people with that experience who will do it.

Chairman: Annette, I will call you again in a second. The Minister has got to go. Two quick questions for the Minister.

Mr. Coaker: I have a debate at 11 in Westminster Hall.

 

Q457 Mr. Chaytor: If every school is going to have a SIP, are you confident that the pool of potential SIPs is there, particularly given the new accreditation and training procedures?

Mr. Coaker: There are more people wanting to do it at the moment than there are places available. I think the issue then is quality and ensuring that we have the right people doing it. That is something that we are going to work closely on with the national college.

 

Q458 Mr. Chaytor: You still have fewer head teachers working as SIPs than originally envisaged?

Mr. Coaker: That is the case, but going back to Derek's point, I think good head teachers sharing their practice is something that we want to encourage, and we need to look at ways to increase that number.

 

Q459 Mr. Chaytor: It is the same question about governors. In the White Paper, there is great emphasis on recruiting more governors and providing better training for them, to deal with the problem that many schools are struggling to recruit governors. Surely, if the burden on governors through extra training and more responsibilities has increased, that is less likely to encourage people to want to take up the role.

Mr. Coaker: I accept the point to an extent, but I think it is also about ensuring that governors-this is obviously a matter for local recruitment, which is difficult-feel that they are valued, that it is worth while, and that they are making a very real contribution. I read what the National Governors Association said to the Committee Chairman about how governors sometimes feel as though they are tagged on as an afterthought. I think the role of governors is absolutely crucial in schools. Certainly, while I am in this post, I will seek to encourage them, speak about them and praise them, and in that sense, try to change the environment in which people decide whether or not to become a governor.

 

Q460 Mr. Chaytor: Do you think we need fewer but better people?

Mr. Coaker: I think that is difficult to say overall. I would hate the idea of professionalisation, although they need to be more professional, if you understand the point.

 

Q461 Chairman: I think there is a good balance here. Minister, does the Schools Commissioner have anything to do with accountability these days?

Mr. Coaker: Certainly, the Schools Commissioner works with us in tackling all of these issues.

 

Q462 Chairman: Who is the new Schools Commissioner?

Jon Coles: We will be advertising a director job in the directorate shortly.

 

Q463 Chairman: That is not the Schools Commissioner. The Schools Commissioner left months ago, and you haven't got one. Where is he? I know he went, but where's the new one? You're not going to have one, are you?

Jon Coles: We will make an appointment of a director in the directorate.

 

Q464 Chairman: That is not the same, Jon. These are weasel words. I have asked consistently what has happened to the role of Schools Commissioner. He is mentioned in primary legislation.

Jon Coles: No, he's not.

Chairman: Yes, he is.

Jon Coles: No.

 

Q465 Chairman: We will check you on that. Why have a Schools Commissioner up front, an important part of balancing the evidence given to this Committee? It was an important role and you buried it-or buried him.

Jon Coles: He has gone to do a really important job in the system.

 

Q466 Chairman: We know what has happened to him, but it is very unusual. You couldn't do that with the Chief Inspector, could you? Who else in the firmament of education is at risk and not to be replaced? There has been no explanation to this Committee. I have asked time and time again-what has happened to the Schools Commissioner?

Mr. Coaker: Would it be helpful, given that you have asked for an explanation and not had one, if I offered to go back to the Department and find out and write to you?

 

Q467 Chairman: But I have consistently asked. It is really frustrating that there is a mystery around this. It is like an Agatha Christie story. Who killed him in-

Mr. Coaker: If I put on the record that I will write to you on this point, and copy it to members of the Committee, and that I will ensure that that is done quickly and promptly, would that be helpful?

 

Q468 Chairman: Thank you. Will you check that that role is not mentioned at all in any legislation?

Mr. Coaker: I will check the factual point as well.

Chairman: Thank you. You can go now. John, you cannot go-we have two more questions for you because you do not have to run to a debate.

 

Q469 Annette Brooke: Coming back to the data evaluation, which I must admit I was really not impressed with at the time, to what extent are SIPs simply being trained to produce what Ofsted wants to see? Do we have a cosy relationship between Ofsted and SIPs?

Jon Coles: No, I don't think so. I think there is an issue with SIP training at the moment as it is too narrowly focused on data, but I do not think that that is connected to Ofsted and what Ofsted is looking for. We need-and the White Paper says this-to train SIPs much more broadly in school improvement and in reading schools and brokering the right support and so on, but I don't think that that is an Ofsted issue at all.

 

Q470 Annette Brooke: But presumably, the point of having the SIPs there is to improve the Ofsted grade.

Jon Coles: Yes. It is to improve the school. Absolutely. It provides challenge and support to the leadership of the school to improve it.

 

Q471 Annette Brooke: I think my concern is that it is game-playing to get a better grade. Perhaps the SIPs role will change something so that you get the highest overall grade on the report card. How are we seeing real changes in behaviour, and not just the data looking better? I am still not convinced.

Jon Coles: Obviously, this is a change that has not been implemented yet, so I cannot prove to you that it is going to be effective. The aim is straightforwardly that there is someone who really knows and understands the school well, knows what is going on, knows the ways in which the pupils are being well served or less well served, and is able to challenge and support the leadership of the school to serve the pupils better. That is the objective. I do not see that as a game-playing exercise at all; I see it as a well-grounded process of trying to improve things for the children and young people in the school. As I say, I cannot prove to you that the reforms are going to work as we have yet to implement them, but that is absolutely the objective of them.

 

Q472 Chairman: Jon, how long have SIPs been in place? How long have we had them?

Jon Coles: We started piloting them-I will have to confirm this-around 2004, I think.

 

Q473 Chairman: So we have had time to evaluate whether they add value?

Jon Coles: Yes, and there is a SIP evaluation available.

 

Q474 Chairman: Who did that?

Jon Coles: I don't know the answer to that off the top of my head, I'm afraid. It is publicly available, and I can certainly make sure that you get it.

 

Q475 Chairman: But the evaluation was that they do add value, and that is why you are really going into SIPs phase 2?

Jon Coles: There are a number of points of detail where the evaluation suggested that there was room for improvement, but overall, there was a sense that they had added value. We think that this set of reforms potentially makes their impact that much greater.

 

Q476 Chairman: There is a voice out there, Jon, that says, "For goodness' sake, why do we need a White Paper and more legislation? Why not let it all be?" Not all of the reforms you have introduced over the last 12 years have bedded down, and yet you are bringing on more. Do you sit in the Department in Sanctuary Buildings looking down at the school, the head, the teachers and the students just thinking up wheezes but not really thinking about what impact they will have on the people who have to put them into operation?

Jon Coles: Well, no, we do not. By going through the policy-making process, we are obviously trying to understand the real issues out there that affect children and young people and their educational success and the evidence about what might be effective in improving that and producing well-implemented policies that improve things for children and young people. That is obviously the objective of what we are doing. Some of what we are saying in the White Paper aims to reduce the pressure of centrally driven reform programmes, move to a system based more closely on the needs of individual schools and produce something that is actually more effective in improving things, partly because it is easier to implement for schools, more manageable for them and more focused on their precise needs. That is the objective.

 

Q477 Chairman: Jon, we said very similar things in our report on the national curriculum, but you gave us a really dusty old reply to that report because we said that the pendulum should swing back to give more power to schools and teachers. That is exactly what we said, but you came back with a very negative response. Why was that, because that does not seem to square with what you are saying this morning or what you said in the White Paper?

Jon Coles: Well, I know that you will be discussing that further shortly and am sorry that you thought our reply was dusty.

Chairman: Negative.

Jon Coles: It was not intended to be. Clearly, what we have done in the White Paper is try to design a system that is more effective in improving things, partly because it is more sensitive to school circumstances. If we are at one on that, so much the better.

 

Q478 Mr. Chaytor: The model report card that Ofsted has produced describes the school by age range, gender and type. The "Anytown" school in "General" borough council is described as a comprehensive. How many types of school will there be for that purpose?

Jon Coles: The report card will treat them all in exactly the same way.

 

Q479 Mr. Chaytor: So all schools will be described as comprehensives?

Jon Coles: No, they will all be accurately described as what they are.

 

Q480 Mr. Chaytor: How many types will the Department list?

Jon Coles: I suppose the main categories will be community school, foundation school, voluntary controlled school, voluntary aided school and academy.

 

Q481 Mr. Chaytor: But here it is defined by its admissions policy, rather than by its legal status.

Jon Coles: I am sorry, but I do not have the details because the Minister has taken the copy of the card I had in front on me, so I will check how that looks on the card. [Interruption.] Thank you for giving me your copy, Graham.

Chairman: What a gentleman.

Jon Coles: This is simply the data that would be produced in the tables as they are now, so it would be just as we now identify selective schools, comprehensive schools and other schools.

 

Q482 Mr. Chaytor: So it will be exactly as it is on the card?

Jon Coles: This is just the same as in the achievement and attainment tables.

 

Q483 Mr. Chaytor: So a school that selects 10 % by aptitude in languages, music or maths and science will still be described as comprehensive?

Jon Coles: As in the tables at the moment.

Chairman: You get the last question, Graham, for being such as sterling fellow and giving that information to Jon.

Mr. Stuart: Teacher's pet. I shall have to send a note of congratulations to the Chairman more often during meetings, because it is obviously a fruitful course to follow.

Jon Coles: I wonder if that would work for me.

 

Q484 Mr. Stuart: As too often with my questions, this will probably sound more like a statement than a question. Going back to the Chairman's remarks earlier, Ofsted is supposed to be an independent inspector, and the report card is, arguably, a useful tool for accountability-there is some evidence to suggest that-so why couldn't the Department just let it alone? Why couldn't the Department say, "Dear independent inspector, whom we will try not to meet too often because the very act of meeting you will affect you too much and stop your independence happening. Here's an idea. Have you thought of looking at it? Love, respectfully and from far away, the Department"? Instead, you are forcing its logo on here and on the draft document. It utterly looks as though you are trampling all over the central, core function of Ofsted. It says on page 5, "our intention is that the indicators that underpin the school report card will form the core of the process of risk assessment that Ofsted will use to select schools for inspection". Who wrote that?

Jon Coles: That is Ofsted. This is not us forcing Ofsted's logo on to the document; this is genuinely a joint document.

 

Q485 Mr. Stuart: But there is no choice, because you are trampling all over the area of its core competence. What if it did not get on board? When we had Christine Gilbert here, she sounded very distant from it, and I have got a letter back from the Secretary of State protesting again and again how closely we are now working with Ofsted; I thought, "I bet you are." It does not feel very independent.

Jon Coles: I think it is quite important for schools in the system-talking about the impact on schools-to see a single, unified accountability system and that, as far as possible, they are not subject to two totally different accountability processes. Therefore, in looking at how we will move on and get beyond our current achievements and attainment tables, and produce something that is a more effective way of holding people to account using all that data, there seemed, I think, to both us and Ofsted, a benefit in having that as an integrated system where this could work for Ofsted. If at any stage Ofsted takes the view that this report card will not work as the core of its risk assessment process, it will decide not to use it. That is the nature of its independence.

 

Q486Mr. Stuart: But the Government can trample on anyone's independence if they want to. The only way independence works is if Government resist and recognise the territory that they must not occupy. You have invaded that territory. You say that Ofsted can say, "We are not going to participate," but there you are with your report card which you are driving through-it will look foolish if it does not work with the card, so it has no choice. A body like Ofsted is not going to come here and shout from the rooftops that the Government's doing things to it-it never, ever does; it just suffers in silence while its independence is eroded. That is not because the people there are bad; it's because you are careless of their independence.

Jon Coles: I think we take great care of that independence and do, in the way that we work with Ofsted, seek to make sure always that we respect its independence. Actually, the chief inspector does have the option of saying in public that this is not the right thing to do, or that, although it might be fine for the Department to do it, Ofsted does not wish to take part in it. That is entirely within the gift of the chief inspector, and she does have that level of independence. In working together to design this, we have been seeking to make it the best quality product to hold schools to account in the best quality way.

 

Q487Mr. Stuart: Why couldn't Ofsted do it by itself? To go back to my original question-I am sorry I have taken so long-why couldn't you just have said, "Ofsted, it's for you to do, and we're staying out of it"? Couldn't Ofsted have done all this without having worked jointly and closely together to develop the school report, and so fulfil its role?

Jon Coles: The current position is, of course, that we produce the achievement and attainment tables. We do that because the data are our data, rather than Ofsted's. Those data are at the heart of the school report card, so if one party was to do it independently, it would probably have to be us, simply producing the school report card. It seemed to us, and it seemed to Ofsted as well, that there would be advantage in making this work for different purposes if possible. That is the basis on which we have done it. I completely recognise that it is absolutely vital that it doesn't look like we are compromising Ofsted's independence.

 

Q488 Chairman: Jon, if you were sitting doing a report card on the various quangos that exist around the education sector, where would you put, out of 10, the independence of Ofsted?

Jon Coles: Sorry?

Chairman: How independent is Ofsted?

Jon Coles: Completely independent-10 out of 10 independent.

 

Q489 Chairman: How independent was or is the QCA?

Jon Coles: Significantly less than that. Ofqual is being established to be as independent as Ofsted is, and the QCDA will be much more a delivery agency of Government. That is a distinction that has been very specifically made.

Chairman: Thank you for your attendance, Jon. You were all on your own at the end, but we have very much valued your attendance.