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Lord Dixon-Smith: The noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, deserves the sympathy of this Chamber for the risk that he runs of the collapse of his voice. If I were to comment I believe that perhaps, for the sake of his voice, he could be a little less generous with his eloquence because his speech did range somewhat widely from the amendment that he was moving. That said, I sincerely hope that his voice will hold on for the rest of the day because I always enjoy listening to him even if I find myself disagreeing with so much of what he said.
I have a little difficulty with the arguments that the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, was introducing. Of course, he is right to be concerned about the level of under-achievement in schools, but that is something which, regrettably, has persisted for a very long time. Indeed, it was always there. I went to a moderately good public school and there was under-achievement even there. The fact of the matter is that if one looks at the other side of the spectrum--which I believe is the way that one should put it--and at university entrants, one finds that the percentage has risen from 8 per cent. in about 1980 to 30 per cent. today. That suggests that the schools are doing a remarkably successful job on behalf of a very large number of students. So there is another side to that particular picture.
I had a little difficulty with the argument that the noble Lord produced over the Book of Common Prayer because the original which we all grew up with was a very familiar and well-loved document and had been around for some centuries. To compare comprehensive education with that is being a little "radical" with the facts. I did not really like the process of gradualism from that being compared to this. In any event, even if we are now indulging in a process of gradualism back to something which existed for a long time before--it can be said that we are--that process is as nothing compared with the very blunt instrument that was used in two circulars from the Labour Government; namely, Circulars Nos. 1065 and 1066. They actually introduced the comprehensive system virtually at a stroke when in fact there was not a demand for it.
I come back to the amendments. The one thing that the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, left out of his proposition was consideration of the wishes and needs of parents. Not only are we talking about empowering schools as to how they should administer and organise their affairs, we are also talking about empowering parents so that they can make valid choices about the schools which their children attend. I remind the Committee that selection is not simply a matter of the 11-plus or bust. I come from a town with three very good schools and a sixth-form college. The rational way of organisation in that town would be for the three schools each to specialise in particular groups of subjects. It would make for much better use of resources. Such a system would imply a very heavy degree of selection by parents and the schools for it to work and the necessity to pick people with an affinity for the subject groupings on which the schools concentrated. I reject the remarks made in moving this amendment and I hope that the Committee will support the amendments proposed by the Government.
The Lord Bishop of Ripon: Perhaps I may add my voice in expressing sympathy to the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, for the affliction which has overcome him. It may have affected the mellifluence of his voice, but it has not affected the eloquence of his speech. I listened with great interest to his opening remarks. I am delighted that, in addition to his
knowledge of the Bible, of the 1662 book and of clerical humour, to which I referred at Second Reading, he has added a knowledge of liturgical development.He may be interested in a story which relates to the moment when the Queen was present at the General Synod of the Church of England and was to be presented with a copy of the alternative service book to which the noble Lord has referred. In presenting the book the Archbishop said that he had considered the possibility of making the point that the alternative service book stood alongside the 1662 book by presenting the Queen with a copy of each of them but, he said, "Your Majesty, we did think you might already possess a copy of one of them". I am quite sure that the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, possesses a copy of the 1662 book. I am delighted to think that he uses it so frequently.
I had some difficulty--as did the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith--over the application of that particular parallel because it seems to me, as has just been said, that the parallel was incorrectly drawn. Had we been considering the introduction of a new book, his analogy might have been right; but in going back to selection, we are surely doing something that might be paralleled by a return to the Book of Common Prayer--a restoration. Therefore, I found some difficulty with the notion that moving towards selection is paralleled by moving towards liturgical development. In fact, it seemed to me that the parallel was reversed.
I accept what the noble Lord said about the need for broad-based skills in education. When I listen to industrialists and a variety of other people talking about the educational needs of this country, again and again they paint the picture of an educational system which at the top produces marvellous scholars who are very well equipped, which produces a broad middle range of people with good skills, but which totally fails to produce the broad pyramid for the whole of our national workforce which is what we need. In other words, at the bottom end, the skills narrow down again. What we most need is an educational system which enables all those who pass through it to gain broad-based skills. Therefore, I accept the broad thrust of the noble Lord's remarks.
However, perhaps the noble Lord can explain my difficulty over the relevance of this amendment which, as I understand it, would mean that a school (either a county school or, under Amendment No. 4, a voluntary school) could not make two sets of changes within the four-year period. In other words, if a school has enlarged its capacity, it cannot then take the road towards selection within the same four-year period. I can understand the argument against selection, but I cannot at the moment quite grasp why a school which has enlarged its capacity should somehow be prevented from going down the road of selection. Perhaps the noble Lord can assist me with that. However, it may well be that as we move on in the debate, I shall find myself more in agreement with him.
3.30 p.m.
Lord Tope: I hesitate to follow the ecclesiastical arguments that have so far characterised this debate.
Indeed, I do not intend to do so. I rise to support this amendment, which stands also in my name and in that of the noble Earl, Lord Baldwin of Bewdley, to whom I spoke on the telephone this morning. Unfortunately, the noble Earl has been taken ill and is confined to his bed. He asked me to explain that and to give his apologies to the Committee for his unavoidable absence today and to say--I think I quote him accurately--that he supports anything that can be done to protect the role of LEAs.
Lord Henley: I can assure the noble Lord that the noble Earl, Lord Baldwin, communicated with me by fax to pass on exactly the same message.
Lord Tope: I am grateful to the Minister.
As I have said, I do not want to follow the ecclesiastical debate, but I should like to comment on one point made by the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, about the large growth in the number of university entrants. That has been a welcome change over the past 20 to 30 years and I should have thought that it makes the need for selection even less than might have been the case all those years ago. I believe it undermines any argument that there might be in favour of selection.
The noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, described the principal problems, as he saw them, of our education system as illiteracy and poor numeracy. He touched very gently and delicately--as I know that he must--on the other principal problem, the crumbling buildings and lack of equipment--basically, the under-funding of our education system. As we have said previously, the Bill does nothing to address that. Today, we are largely debating matters which, frankly, are irrelevant to the real needs of our education service. Nevertheless, we must now try to see how we can make a bad Bill better.
As I said on Second Reading, the only way to make this part of the Bill better is to remove Part I altogether. I urged the Minister to do that, but I did so more in hope than in expectation and I need to repeat it: the only satisfactory thing to do is to withdraw Part I from the Bill. We cannot do that, however, so we are seeking to make something bad a little less bad. That is the purpose of our amendments.
The noble Lord, Lord Morris, referred to serial change. It reminded me of a card that I used to have on my office wall which said, "Constant change is here to stay". That is the case with the education system. There have been Education Bills every year that this Government have been in office. Although most people agree that the one thing that our schools really need now is a period of calm and recuperation, here we are changing things and churning it all up again--and for no very good reason.
The amendments seek to restrict that degree of change. We propose either that there should be significant growth or that there should be a selective intake, but not both at the same time. The upheaval and the disturbance to a school at such a time would be
considerable. Perhaps even more so--here I come to the query raised by the right reverend Prelate--in that the effect of allowing growth and a selective intake, particularly in grant-maintained schools, would ensure that the rate of change and the rate of selection in such schools would be significantly greater. Over time--probably over not all that much time--the proportion of selective places would rise above even the percentages suggested in the Bill, although many of us agree that they are far too high.
The purpose of the amendment is to give schools and admission authorities a choice: either to expand the numbers or to increase the proportion of selective places. The amendments seek to prevent the drift towards selection being combined with the wholesale expansion of the grant-maintained sector, without the approval of the parents, the Secretary of State or anyone else.
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