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Baroness Blatch: I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Peston, was supporting the notion of having an all-embracing statement about special educational needs in the Bill.
Lord Peston: No, I was not. My whole point is that I am totally committed to special educational needs provision, but over the years I have found it rather
tedious that there are certain topics on which we are always asked to have special general statements. Special educational needs is one. Wales is another—it gets whole sections of Bills devoted to it. Occasionally, those who press for these things ought to accept the good faith of a number of us who are totally committed to doing the best things. I cannot say a word for the Government, because I have no responsibility for them, but I have—this is not my favourite word—faith that occasionally the good will out. We do not need a general statement on SEN or any of the other pressure group issues that dominate the House. That is my general position.9 p.m.
Baroness Blatch: I am sorry that the noble Lord feels that way. I refer to my disappointment when we discussed the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001 during its passage through this House. I believe that that applied to most of us who were involved in that discussion. I had been involved in the minutiae of the 1993 and 1996 Bills which contained large sections devoted to children with special educational needs. However, in 2001 we discovered that the situation was not working on the ground and that the quality of statements and their detail and content left a great deal to be desired. There were inadequacies as regards the rights of parents to have the appropriate provision made for their children and the quality of diagnosis of children with special educational needs. I refer to the increasing number of children with difficult to detect conditions such as autism and Asperger's syndrome. Many other conditions were not being detected at an early stage and young people were drifting through school and developing behavioural problems. Some were withdrawn from school. A number of problems exist in that area and we have not yet got the matter right.
It seems to me that one way of keeping this matter at the front of the agenda is, rather than table amendments on the subject as we progress through the Bill—as we are all trying to do at the moment—to make a statement that there is a group of children with special educational needs who must not be lost in the understandable wish to raise standards for all children. The phrase "all children" includes children with special educational needs. A neater and more profound way to deal with the matter is to have a portmanteau statement in the Bill. It is a long and disparate Bill with many different objectives such as setting up companies, forming federations and curricular changes. All we are saying is that there could be a statement at the beginning of the Bill to the effect that nothing in the Bill will have the effect of reducing or in any way marring the provision of education to meet the needs of children with special educational needs. I believe that that would be one way to cope with the matter rather than having this debate.
I know that the noble Lord, Lord Peston, cares as passionately about education as everyone else in the Chamber and has done so for many, many years, but I refer to what is almost a war of attrition with regard to everyone concerned with the delivery of services to
children with special educational needs. There is still more that can be done. It is a question of making sure that the Bill recognises that. There is not a mention of special needs in the Bill from beginning to end. It is our mission to do something about that before the Bill returns to another place.
Lord Davies of Oldham: I, for one, am enormously grateful that the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, moved the amendment as I was in danger of participating in the debate so late in the evening that the sobriquet "something of the night about him" was beginning to become appropriate. Therefore, I am rather glad of the opportunity to be on my feet at the extraordinarily early hour of 9 p.m.
I say to my noble friend Lord Peston that he may not be able to speak for the Government but he is quite capable of taking the Government's best lines and using them before we get the chance to deploy them ourselves. What he says is absolutely right; namely, we have great sympathy with the motivation behind the amendments we are discussing as they share our concern to ensure that the best possible provision is made for students with special educational needs.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, has just reminded us, we spent many arduous months and expended a considerable amount of intellectual energy in seeking to improve provision for special educational needs during the passage of the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001. Therefore, it is scarcely likely that the Government would bring forward a measure which in any way, shape or form threatened that broad objective of an inclusive agenda in which special educational needs must play the fullest possible part. On that basis I seek to reassure the Committee.
I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Peston for expressing more graphically and more accurately than I the fact that what we hope to achieve through federation—as I believe the right reverend Prelate indicated in his welcome of the concept—is a framework within which best practice can be deployed and developed. I make the obvious point that the inevitable pooling of resources which federation implies also indicates that such resources can potentially be operated more effectively within such a framework. There is certainly likely to be expertise in a group of schools coming together in a federation which can be made available to students across the federation. At the present time it is more difficult to release that expertise within the framework of each individual school.
I understand and greatly respect the points that the noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, made. She indicated that we ought to be able to address the issue of special educational needs in a general portmanteau statement. However, the only thing I would say to her in this regard—mistress of detail that she is—is how difficult it is to produce such a framework without laying ourselves open to a whole range of potential difficulties, not least that of judicial review in respect of the operation of such a measure.
We said that we would consider this matter and we are doing so very seriously. The issue was raised earlier. However, it should be recognised that the matter is not straightforward. Given the representations that have been made by a whole range of people in this Chamber with tremendous expertise in special educational needs, it was not beyond our wit to anticipate that the issue would arise. We all regret the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Rix, cannot be present this evening. Given the representations that have been made, if we thought that we could meet the obvious challenge that would be made with regard to a general statement on special educational needs, I assure the Committee that we would probably have been able to produce such a statement.
As I say, we are considering the matter and our efforts may bear fruit. However, in the meantime, I reassure the Committee and the noble Lord, Lord Rix, in his absence that there is nothing within the framework of federation that jeopardises the concept of proper facilities, treatment and resources for special needs; far from it. Our whole intention is to ensure that those are enhanced.
I turn to Amendment No. 118 which is grouped with Amendment No. 115. We intend to regulate that it will be for the governing body of the federation to look at each school's special educational needs provision and decide whether developing a common policy would be both feasible and beneficial, or whether distinct SEN policy should be established for certain—or each and every—school within a federation. We envisage, for example, that federations involving special schools would wish to retain a distinct special educational needs policy for any special school.
However, it is worth noting that federation would provide an opportunity for special schools to share best practice in this area. That in turn could be used to enrich SEN policies and provision in other schools in the federation. It would also contribute to a wider strategy of sharing best practice.
I hope that, on the basis of those arguments, I have reassured the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp. We recognise the motivation that lies behind the amendment. I am grateful to her for the way in which she expressed her views. I hope that I reassure her that we regard federation as an enhancing development.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I thank the Minister for that reply. I am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Peston, feels that I am unduly gloomy on these issues. I began by trying to be positive about them all. I am particularly grateful to the Minister for his reassurance. It is important to stress the need to bring all schools in a federation up to the standard of best practice. As the noble Lord wishes, we should look positively on these issues. This is an opportunity to do so. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 116 not moved.]
Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 117:
- Page 15, line 18, at end insert—
The noble Baroness said: The amendment would ensure that any regulations make provision for securing the same balance of stakeholder representation for federated school governing bodies as that required for single school governing bodies—in other words, as would have been the case if the federated school were a single school. It would ensure that the governing body of the federation had the benefit of experienced representation from different types of school within the federation. I refer, for example, to a special school within a federation of mainstream schools or a nursery school within such a federation. There may be advantages in bringing a group of schools together to share expertise, resources and facilities. However, bringing schools under one governing body may be problematic.
Will the Minister clarify the role of the governing body when one school in a federation enters special measures? How will grouped governing bodies be fully accountable to the community and to each of the schools within the group that they serve, particularly if the group is large? There is a danger, for example, of a decrease in social representation on governing bodies because some governors might find it difficult to travel considerable distances to meetings. Would governing bodies be required to move their meetings around the schools in a group?
The workload for a grouped governing body is likely to increase with more than one school budget, school development plan, action plan and other school policies to be considered. In light of the increasing difficulty of getting school governors, could that make the problem even worse?
More research should be undertaken into, and more evidence gathered on, the benefits of grouping schools under a single governing body before any change takes place. Collaboration between schools is essential to the provision of first-class education. That is already happening all over the country anyway. There appears to be no obvious reason for the reintroduction of grouped governing bodies.
The amendment seeks further clarification. How will the Government ensure that all types of governors and schools are represented appropriately on a federated governing body when the schools within the group are of differing types? I beg to move.
"( ) Notwithstanding the provisions of subsection (6), regulations made under section 18(2) shall, in so far as they make provision for the composition of the governing body of a federation, provide that the number of persons in each category of which the governing body consists shall be the same in proportion to the total number of governors, or as near thereto as is reasonably practicable, as would be the case if the federated schools were together a single school."
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