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Baroness Morris of Bolton: The Minister said that the logical conclusion of my remarks was that we would have a draconian state. Not at all. We would not go down the route of compulsion. It is only because the Government are seeking to compel 17 and 18 year-olds that we will have a massive bureaucracy to track people and find out whether the data are correct and then a massive appeals process if they are not.
Lord Adonis: The massive bureaucracy that the noble Baroness refers to is in place already. We already have Connexions databases.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: Yes, but there will have to be checks that it is absolutely correct. The Minister accepted that the system is not perfect, but it will have to be perfect if the end result is that a young person will be criminalised by being fined and, if they do not pay, they will ultimately go before the Youth Justice Board.
Lord Adonis: I think we are going round in circles. I said that of course every effort must be made in the future, as it must be made now, to ensure that the data are accurate. However, if any action were to be taken on the basis of inaccurate information, there would be the opportunity to contest it.
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Baroness Sharp of Guildford moved Amendment No. 68:
(1) The governing body of an institution within the further education sector shall, in discharging their functions relating to the conduct of the further education institution, promote the well-being of children at the further education institution.
(2) In this section “well being of children” means their well-being so far as relating to the matters mentioned in section 10(2) of the Children Act 2004 (c. 31).
The noble Baroness said: This amendment, tabled in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Walmsley, would place a duty on further education providers to promote the well-being of children to ensure that the further education sector becomes a named partner in the Every Child Matters programme. In 2007, when a similar amendment was debated during the passage of the Further Education and Training Bill, noble Lords debated the ways in which the expectations laid on further education establishments were changing, with a new influx of students as young as 14 and with as many as 120,000 14 to 16 year-olds attending FE colleges regularly. Part 1 of this Bill will increase that intake even more, with a projected additional 28,000 16 year-olds remaining in the education system. It is likely that this group will include some of the most vulnerable and marginalised young people, who, for a number of reasons, may find it difficult to follow an unbroken pattern of study or to begin work-based training. These can include homeless young people,
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The five outcomes for children that lie at the heart of the Every Child Matters agenda are underpinned by Section 10 of the Children Act 2004, which defines the statutory partnership, the children’s trust, that is responsible for the planning, commissioning and delivery of children’s services. The outcomes are: to be healthy, to stay safe, to enjoy and achieve, to make a positive contribution and to achieve economic well-being. The guidance issued under Section 10 of the 2004 Act makes it clear that “other bodies” can include schools and further education colleges. The children’s trust guidance states that local authorities are expected to engage with education providers with a particular aim to address the economic well-being outcome. Supplementary guidance, currently out for consultation, emphasises the need for the children’s trust to increase its efforts to involve schools, implying that progress in this area has been sluggish. If progress in engaging schools fully in the Every Child Matters developments has been slow, it is likely that the engagement of the further education sector, with which at present local authorities have no statutory relationship, will be even worse.
During the debate on the Further Education and Training Bill, the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, referred to four ways in which the FE sector currently promotes the well-being of young learners, and I should like to address some of their shortcomings. First, Section 175 of the Education Act 2002 places a duty on the governing body of a further education establishment to safeguard and promote the welfare of children receiving education and training at a further education institution. This duty is focused on protecting children from harm, not on the more holistic concept of promoting and improving a young person’s well-being.
Secondly, the noble Lord mentioned pastoral support in FE colleges, which has three main components: undoing barriers to learning, boosting learning and achievement, and motivating learners to broaden their aspirations. Some FE colleges provide good, dedicated pastoral care support, and here I declare an interest as being on the Corporation of Guildford College, where I believe such support is provided. But this good practice is not consistent across the sector. Although pilots of different models of pastoral support were announced by the Government two years ago, many colleges have still not settled down to a consistent pattern of good practice in this regard. Placing the FE provider under a duty to improve the well-being of children and to bring them into the shared outcomes framework will mean that the provision of pastoral support becomes more consistent across the sector and will lead to improvements in practice. It could also lead to the development of well-being indicators for the sector similar to those being developed for schools, which would contribute to the development of consistent standards in the personal support services available to 14 to 19 year-olds.
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Thirdly, the Minister mentioned that the old local learning and skills councils are included under Section 10 of the 2004 Act covering the duty to co-operate. Although the councils were named as partners in Section 10, their contribution to improving the well-being of children and young people was as a commissioner of post-16 services, and that now applies to the regional councils. This does not satisfy the need for individual institutions, including further education colleges, to make their own contribution to the well-being of young people.
Fourthly, the Minister believed that the common inspection framework would do the job. I accept that Ofsted’s thematic report on further education indicates that many colleges are rated good or even very good at providing this kind of support. However, the same report notes concerns about the new challenges facing staff in further education colleges, in particular in relation to the 14 to 16 year-old age group with whom, through the diploma programme, they will now have increasing contact. When a duty to participate comes into force, the number of disaffected 16 and 17 year-olds will add to the difficulties that the college may face, bringing further challenges to the sector. Applying the well-being duty to FE providers should lead to improvements in the training available to staff working with young people and an increased expectation that further education providers will be made aware of and tap into the additional support services available in the community. That is particularly so given that, as we all know, the functions of learning and skills councils are to be transferred to local authorities. In that case, FE colleges will be answerable to local authorities for the 16 to 19 year-old cohort of students in their care. It would seem appropriate that they should have the same obligations as schools in this respect.
The amendment is supported by the National Children’s Bureau and the Equality and Human Rights Commission because they, like noble Lords on these Benches, believe that it is desirable and necessary to ensure that young people in further education are treated in exactly the same way as those in schools, and schools already have that duty. It will, in the end, contribute to their success in learning, since we all know that a young person whose needs are not being met will not learn as well as someone who is well supported. I beg to move.
Baroness Verma: This proposed new clause by the Liberal Democrats sets out a general duty for governing bodies in the FE sector to promote the well-being of students under 18. As the Government plan for a rise in the number of 18 year-olds attending further education colleges, it is appropriate to make clear now that their well-being is of great importance. The aim of the Bill is to improve the prospects of young people, so it is sensible that everyone involved in making that happen should promote their welfare.
Baroness Howe of Idlicote: I also support this proposed new clause. It makes sense to require the governing body of an institution to be made fully aware of the extra duties as a result of the compulsion on young people under the age of 18 to be in continuing education. Of course, one hopes that most students will go into such colleges with a degree of motivation, but not all
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I hope very much that the Minister will see the point of this new clause. If he regards it as unnecessary, I hope that he can reassure us that all the points made have been fully taken into account.
Lord Adonis: The noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, is right that, in respect of the duties on governing bodies of FE colleges in England and Wales, Section 175 of the Education Act 2002 is limited to ensuring that they exercise their functions with a view to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of their younger students. However, the section needs to be seen in the context of other provisions, policies and developments which adequately ensure that colleges support and promote the well-being of young people. The Further Education and Training Act 2007 provides that, in England, FE institutions must have regard to guidance from the Secretary of State on consulting employers, learners and potential learners, and this guidance will be published in the summer. Ofsted is reviewing the common inspection framework for colleges and intends to ensure that all the Every Child Matters outcomes will be fundamental to its inspection approach. Inspections of some English colleges have highlighted issues around the capacity of some staff to deal with disaffected young people, and these are being addressed through teacher training and the continuous professional development standards introduced in 2007. The Children’s Workforce Development Council will also be reporting in September on its evaluation of integrated working arrangements, and we will consider that report carefully in developing any further support for colleges.
We have also been considering how the existing duty to co-operate under Section 10 of the Children Act 2004, which provides the underpinning framework for children’s trusts, should be applied to FE colleges under the new arrangements. Today my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families has written to local authorities to say:
“We are sending out to all local authorities proposals to extend the duty to co-operate with children’s trusts to FE colleges and the providers of publicly funded 16-19 provision, with future academies brought within the scope through their funding agreements”.
This will be a further step in the direction that the noble Baroness is urging us to take.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I am grateful to the Minister for his response. Clearly, as the guidance is still being consulted on and has not yet been published, it is impossible for us to know what it contains. It is the same with the new common inspection framework that Ofsted is publishing. I am pleased to hear that both sets of guidance and comments will take account of this issue and that the CWDC will be looking at the working arrangements in relation to it. It is good to hear that the Children Act will extend to further education colleges the duty to co-operate with children’s trusts. All these things will help.
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Nevertheless, an anomaly creeps in here. There is a duty on all schools to promote well-being, and Section 175 of the Education Act 2002 refers to promoting the welfare of children receiving training in the educational institution. “Well-being” is defined clearly, in a holistic sense, within the Children Act, but this is not so of “welfare” in the Education Act 2002. The anomaly is that, unlike FE colleges, all schools and other educational institutions have such an obligation.
I shall read carefully what the Minister said. We shall ponder this matter and may well bring it back on Report. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 13 [Notification of non-compliance with duty imposed by section 2]:
Baroness Sharp of Guildford moved Amendment No. 70:
“( ) an independent education institution entered in the register of independent education institutions maintained by the Chief Inspector under section 80;”The noble Baroness said: Amendment No. 70 relates to Clause 13, which puts a duty on education institutions to inform the authorities if a person under the age of 18 stops attending; in other words, if they fail in the duty to participate. However, for some reason, the list of education institutions in the clause does not include independent schools. The purpose of the amendment is to probe why the Government have left them out of the duty.
Does the Minister think that, because a young person’s parents are paying for him or her to attend a school after the age of 16, they will make sure that he attends? Not all young people from privileged backgrounds are well motivated. Indeed, not all the young people who attend independent schools could be described as privileged in the usual sense of the word, as some are there on scholarships. A particular issue arises in relation to independent special schools, whose pupils are most likely to be school shy.
If the school does not inform the authority—which, after all, has a duty in this matter—who is expected to do so? The authority cannot be expected to carry out its duty to support the young person if it does not know that there is a problem. Is it the duty of the parents? If so, what can you do about parents if they do not comply with that duty?
I wonder whether there is an issue in relation to data protection legislation. If so, surely that would affect employers as well. The Government have put a duty on employers to inform the authority if a young person on an apprenticeship or in work-based learning is absent. Presumably this duty lets them off the hook as regards data protection; therefore, why not give the same duty to independent schools? If there is a system designed to ensure that young people in the maintained sectors participate until they are 18, surely the equity principle means that those in the independent sector should be treated in the same way.
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If Amendment No. 70 were agreed to, independent institutions would also have to comply with the Clause 14 duty to provide information, including all the safeguards that we would like to see in relation to that issue. That is for a later debate. In the mean time, I beg to move.
Lord Adonis: This is a limited amendment, although the noble Baroness raised wider issues in respect of it. It specifically refers to independent schools, which it would add to the list of institutions in Clause 13 that are required to notify Connexions if a young person drops out of education or training.
One of the problems of being a Minister in these debates is that, when you are faced with about 20 questions to answer, if you are lucky you get through half of them, sometimes not even that many, and afterwards you remember the ones that you did not get to. The noble Lord, Lord Elton, asked me in the previous debate whether it is the case that there are requirements on Connexions—and, in future, on local authorities—to maintain the data on participation but no requirements to provide information. That is not the case; there will be substantial requirements to provide information, as indeed there are at the moment. The requirements to provide information are set out in Clause 14 and powers to provide information are set out in Clauses 15 and 16.
With regard to the remark of the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, that the existing database is intended only for NEETs, that is emphatically not the case; it covers all 13 to 19 year-olds. Only a very small percentage of young people are currently not captured—about 5 per cent, according to my information. That relates also to the point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Perry: it is not the case that at the moment there are vast numbers of young people in respect of whose participation Connexions does not have some data. The number about whom Connexions does not at present have data is very small. As I say, the information requirements are not new. They are set out elaborately in the Learning and Skills Act 2000, which brought Connexions into being.
Regarding the independent schools, which cater for about 7 per cent of the cohort and therefore are an important source of information on young people, we are looking at ways to encourage existing good practice on the ground. For example, in some areas Connexions has locally agreed protocols in place with independent schools and we are looking into whether they can be extended so that more information from independent schools is included in the database. However, we are not minded at present to extend statutory duties to independent schools, although we will keep that issue under review.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I thank the Minister for his reply. I am glad to hear that the Government are looking at ways of bringing independent schools in. As he says, 7 per cent of the age cohort is not an insubstantial proportion. If the aim is to provide a comprehensive database, it is the more necessary that all schools be brought into it. This was a minor, probing amendment, and I beg leave to withdraw it.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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[Amendment No. 71 had been retabled as Amendment No. 67A.]
Clause 14 [Educational institutions: duty to provide information]:
Baroness Morris of Bolton moved Amendment No. 72:
Clause 14, page 7, line 47, at beginning insert “Subject to the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998 (c. 29),”
The noble Baroness said: I shall speak to all the amendments in this group. We originally had these amendments in a number of different groups; that was how they were debated in another place, but it inevitably led to a duplication of arguments. I thought that it would assist the Committee if we debated these similar topics together. One of the problems of such a large grouping is the danger of not speaking to each specific amendment, but I have the utmost confidence in the Minister, who I know will still give me a thoroughly comprehensive answer even if I have not asked the question.
This group of amendments aims to inject some caution into the provisions on information sharing and provision in the Bill. We must be careful when it comes to handing information to the state. People ought to be consulted about which of their personal details will be passed on to agencies. They must be confident that the information is correct and is not going to be misused. The Government’s track record of losing disks, laptops and files, of leaving them on trains or of losing data in the post, is not the best—and the list seems to grow ever longer.
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