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Oral Answers to Questions
(13 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)
1. What representations he has received on broadcasting rules on political impartiality in television news.
The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)
Absolutely none.
Paul Farrelly
I thank the Secretary of State for that precise and illuminating reply. He will know that the British public value the political neutrality of TV news in this country, so will he confirm that the Government have no plans to change the rules governing political impartiality on TV news, and that they will expect broadcasters on digital terrestrial television to conform to those rules in the future?
Mr Hunt
I can confirm that we have no plans to change the impartiality rules, but we will take no lessons on impartiality from the Opposition. There are two people responsible for impartiality in British broadcasting: the head of Ofcom and the head of the BBC Trust. One is a former Labour councillor and the other is a former Labour special adviser.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)
Does the Secretary of State agree that the BBC also needs to remain neutral on international politics, and that, if it is to be believed about its position on Israel, it needs to publish as a matter of urgency the internal report that it commissioned on its apparent anti-Israel bias?
Mr Hunt
I thank my hon. Friend for his question, and he is absolutely right that impartiality needs to apply across the board. I am well aware of his concerns about the issues surrounding the publication of the independent report into the BBC’s coverage of Israel, and I am very happy to raise those issues with the BBC Trust if he would like to supply me with any new information that he has about them.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
I agree entirely with the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Paul Farrelly), but there is another matter on which news broadcasts are not neutral: they have a degree of imbalance on matters relating to the European Union. Will the Secretary of State seek to ensure that in future broadcasters reflect the nation’s view on Europe, not their view?
Mr Hunt
I very much welcome the hon. Gentleman’s question. The BBC Trust recognised in a report that it published, entitled “From Seesaw to Wagon Wheel: Safeguarding Impartiality in the 21st Century”, that the BBC was behind public opinion on issues such as Europe and immigration, and the BBC recognises that it must ensure that that does not happen again. However, as Culture Secretary I have to be very careful not to direct the BBC in any way editorially, because in a free country that is a beacon for democracy it is very important that the national broadcaster be independent of the Government. However, that is not to say that the hon. Gentleman’s point should not be addressed in the appropriate way.
Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
2. What steps his Department plans to take to increase the level of participation in sport.
Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
3. What steps he plans to take to increase levels of participation of young people in sport.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Hugh Robertson)
Since taking office two months ago, the new coalition Government have already taken three steps that will increase participation by young people in sport. The first step is to increase sport’s share of national lottery funding to 20%, which was envisaged when the lottery was set up; the second is that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has announced plans for a new Olympic-style school sport competition; and the third is that we have asked sport’s national governing bodies to increase to 30% the amount of money that they commit to grass-roots sport from their broadcasting deals.
Simon Hughes
I thank my hon. Friend the Minister for a positive answer. The borough of Lambeth and my local borough have an excellent sports action zone, promoting sport at all ages. Will the Minister take further steps both in the short term to ensure that, now the school holidays have started throughout the UK, all ages are encouraged to get used to doing some sport, and in the medium term to ensure that we train and recruit many more sports coaches throughout the UK?
Hugh Robertson
I can absolutely give the hon. Gentleman that assurance. A key part of the new whole-sport programme, which the previous Government introduced, was to ensure precisely that sports’ governing bodies devoted a far greater proportion of their funding to grass roots; that the funding was targeted at precisely the sort of voluntary schemes that he mentions; and that a crucial part of that was funding for extra coaches, who will be vital to drive any form of participation that we get off the back of the 2012 games.
Toby Perkins
I am glad to hear that the Minister has some ideas on increasing youth participation in sport, but, as someone who has coached young people in rugby for the past five-and-a-half years and as a parent of a sports-mad child, I have to say that the idea that over the past 10 years there has not been any encouragement for competitive sports always seems quite ridiculous. Does he agree that the tabloid myth that there is no support for competitive sports is an insult not just to the previous Government, but to all those PE teachers who give up so much of their time and to all those people who voluntarily coach young people in sport?
Hugh Robertson
It would be fair to start by thanking the hon. Gentleman for his contribution to grass-roots sport over many years as a rugby coach in his own area.
The question of competitive sport is a difficult one, and it is clearly something that, as a new Government, we put at the heart of our sports policy. [Interruption.] If the hon. Gentleman looks at the figures for competitive sport in schools, he will see that it is an area that needs attention and that everybody would agree we need to work on. We have highlighted that and put in place a plan to address it.
Iain Stewart (Milton Keynes South) (Con)
Last Friday, I had a meeting with people at the National Badminton Centre, which has its headquarters in my constituency in Milton Keynes. They have ambitious plans to extend participation in the sport, but a problem they often encounter is that sports halls built for sports use are increasingly rented out for non-sports uses. Will the Minister look into that as a matter of urgency?
Hugh Robertson
I thank my hon. Friend for that question. In fact, the people there said the same thing to me when I went to visit about a year ago. When I looked into this, I found that the problem is that a village hall can be used for a variety of uses, so to try to screen it out for badminton means no dog show, no village fete, and none of the other things that take place in village halls. This is about the sensible division of time in the way that village halls are used. I can only promise my hon. Friend that I will look into it.
Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)
Over the past 13 years of a Labour Government, £5 billion was spent on sport, and that increased investment increased participation. After 10 weeks of this new Government, we have already seen the Building Schools for the Future programme cut, with 11% of that money due to be spent on new sports facilities; we have seen free swimming cut; and we are now seeing that they are prepared to drop the target of 2 million people participating in sport, which was one of the Olympic legacies. What discussions did the Minister have with the Department for Education before the decision was taken on Building Schools for the Future, and what is he going to do about the sports facilities that need to be improved and would have been improved under that scheme?
Hugh Robertson
There are two obvious things to say in answer to that question. First, we are dealing with an economic inheritance that we did not create but that was left to us by the Government of whom the hon. Gentleman was a member. Secondly, the Secretary of State has a regular series of meetings with his counterpart in the Department for Education at which these matters are discussed. We have already increased the share of lottery funding to 20%, and that is a huge improvement. Under the hon. Gentleman’s stewardship, the amount of money that sport governing bodies were committed to giving to the grass roots in their broadcasting deals was 5%; in three or four months’ time, when our changes have gone through, it will be 30%—a huge increase.
Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab)
4. What recent discussions he has had with the BBC on the level of the television licence fee.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
6. If he will bring forward proposals to reduce the television licence fee by 25% over the next four years.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
8. What his plans are for the future level of the television licence fee; and if he will make a statement.
The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)
We have had absolutely no discussions with the BBC about the level of the licence fee under the next settlement.
Graham Jones
The Secretary of State has said that a huge number of things need to change at the BBC. Will he tell the House what he means by that and provide a list of the changes that he thinks are in order?
Mr Hunt
I have been very clear that in its use of licence fee payers’ money, the BBC needs to be on the same planet as everyone else. We are tackling a huge deficit as a result of the economic legacy left by the last Government. As we are having to be careful about every penny of taxpayers’ money we spend, so the BBC must be careful with every penny of licence fee payers’ money that it spends.
Mr Hunt
My hon. Friend will know that we are committed to a strong BBC that focuses on producing great TV and high-quality news. He is absolutely right. There has been a trickle of stories about BBC pay and expenses, particularly BBC management pay; lots of people at the BBC do not have high salaries. The BBC must look at what happened to Parliament when we lost the trust of the public because we did not handle our own expenses correctly, and it must be careful not to make the same mistakes.
Kevin Brennan
Licence fee payers will have found last night’s broadcast of “Sherlock”, produced by BBC Wales and written by the excellent Steven Moffat, first class and great value for money. Earlier, the Secretary of State took pains to name the chairman of the BBC Trust and his former political affiliations, along with the chairman of Ofcom. By doing that, was he trying to call into question their impartiality in the work that they do, and if not, why did he bother to say it?
Mr Hunt
I, too, watched “Sherlock” last night and thought that Martin Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch did a brilliant job. It was a very good example of the BBC at its best, investing in new programming.
I am not in any way calling into question the impartiality of the two gentlemen I mentioned earlier, but the Opposition should not preach lessons on impartiality when they were so careful to put people of their own political affiliation in charge of so many Government quangos.
Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD)
Does the Secretary of State understand the concern of many of my constituents and others across the country following the report in The Daily Telegraph of his comments on the BBC? They feel that its high-quality programming is something to be supported and celebrated, not least the excellent independent news coverage that is free of the influence of commerce, or indeed Rupert Murdoch.
Mr Hunt
I agree with the hon. Lady about the importance of the BBC spending money on high-quality programming. That is what the coalition Government believe is one of the primary roles of the BBC. I also agree with her that one thing that has made British broadcasting some of the highest-quality broadcasting in the world is that we have a mix of funding streams, including the licence fee, advertising-funded programming and subscription-funded programming. That is why we are happy with that structure and intend to continue with it.
Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)
In the context of reducing the licence fee, what consideration has the Secretary of State given to encouraging the BBC to sell off some of its assets, possibly including Radio 1 and some of its other services?
Mr Hunt
We have no plans to ask the BBC to sell off Radio 1. There may be possibilities in the case of some of the BBC’s commercial assets, such as BBC Worldwide, and we await any proposals that the BBC may have. However, we are committed to a publicly funded, publicly owned national broadcaster as a benchmark of quality in the broadcasting system. We believe we are one of the few countries in the world to have competition at the quality end of the broadcasting market as well as the popular end, and we want that to continue.
Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)
Policy on broadband is a joint responsibility of the Secretary of State’s Department and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and he has indicated that he will dip into the licence fee to support the roll-out of high-speed broadband. Can he confirm that any new funding from that source will not be available until 2013 at the earliest, which is three years late, when Labour’s phone levy would have been generating £150 million a year in three months’ time, not in three years? Given his aim to reduce the licence fee, can he give any assurance that that level of funding will be available even three years late, and given the complete absence of significant new funding for high-speed broadband, is he embarrassed that his pre-election promises on high-speed broadband have so quickly turned to dust?
Mr Hunt
Let me confirm a few things that the right hon. Gentleman ought to be aware of, given that he was a Minister responsible for the matter. The first is that the money that his Government had allocated to ensure that everyone in this country could access broadband at a minimum speed of 2 megabits per second was less than half the total cost of doing that. That was why, when we examined the situation, we decided that we would honour the pledge but would not be able to do so by 2012 and extended it to 2015. As in so many areas, his Government simply did not leave enough money in the pot.
Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)
5. What recent representations he has received on sections 9 to 18 of the Digital Economy Act 2010.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey)
Ministers and officials have had recent meetings with copyright owners, consumer organisations and internet service providers, at which the matter has been raised.
Dr Huppert
Is the Minister aware of the deep concerns held about those sections of the Act among internet service providers such as BT and TalkTalk, among members of the public such as those who went to the Open Rights Group conference on Saturday, and among creative content providers? Given that the Act was rushed through in the dying days of the last Government, will he ensure that there is proper scrutiny of not just the details but the principle of those sections, which many of us oppose?
Mr Vaizey
I am aware of the concerns that the hon. Gentleman mentions. It is important to emphasise that the technical measures in those sections would not come in until at least 2012, and that this House and the other place will have a chance to debate the matter in full under the super-affirmative procedure.
Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)
What representations has the Minister had directly from those who actually work in the creative industries—the 1.8 million people who depend on the sector for their jobs and the 250,000 whose jobs are at risk from illegal downloading? What does he have to say to them?
Mr Tom Watson (West Bromwich East) (Lab)
7. What representations he has received on the appropriateness of regulation of media ownership.
The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)
I have had no representations from anyone on cross-media ownership.
Mr Watson
If News Corp is successful in buying the remaining 61% shares of BSkyB, the control that it exercises over UK mass media will be greater than that of any individual in any other advanced industrial country, including Berlusconi’s Italy. The law in the US and Australia would prohibit such a takeover. Is the Secretary of State concerned about the lack of plurality of ownership in the UK media? What is the estimated tax loss if the merger takes place?
Mr Hunt
I cannot tell the hon. Gentleman what the estimated tax loss will be—I do not know whether there will be a tax loss. There are big tax gains from having a plurality of players in the British media market. The particular decision that he mentioned is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, who is responsible for determining whether to invoke the public interest clause about the merger. He will make a decision in due course.
Mr John Whittingdale (Maldon) (Con)
Does the Secretary of State agree that the relatively low price for which Richard Desmond has acquired Channel Five is a further indication of the continuing difficulties affecting all traditional television companies, and that it also shows that successful companies are likely to have to operate across several different media in future? Given that, does he have any plans to look again at the current rules that govern cross-media ownership and cross-promotion?
Mr Hunt
I thank my hon. Friend for a thoughtful question, as ever, on the topic. He is absolutely right that media companies of the future will have to operate on different platforms. That is why one of my first decisions was to accept a recommendation by Ofcom to remove the regulations on cross-media ownership locally to allow local media operators to develop new business models that let them take product from newspapers to radio to TV to iPods to iPads and so on.
We do not currently have any plans to relax the rules on cross-promotion. Indeed, the regulations on taste, decency and political impartiality on Five remain extremely tight, but we are aware of the need to lighten regulations in general because, if we are to have a competitive broadcasting sector, we must have one in which independent players can also make a profit.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The Secretary of State knows that Richard Desmond and Rupert Murdoch have huge pornography empires. Does he share my concern that children have increasing access to pornography on television? What can he do about it? It is a curse, and I hope that he shares my desire to do something about it.
Mr Hunt
The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. Our real concern on this side of the House is about the sexualisation of young people in particular; we take a liberal view of adults’ ability to make decisions about what they see on television. I do not want to pretend that there is an easy answer, because traditional linear viewing, which allowed the watershed, made it possible to be much more definite about what would be seen by children and what would be seen by adults. To answer the hon. Gentleman’s question directly, we have no plans to relax any of the taste and decency regulations for terrestrial broadcasts.
David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)
9. What progress has been made on implementation of the proposals set out in the coalition agreement to give the National Audit Office full access to the BBC’s accounts.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey)
I had a brief meeting with the chair of the BBC Trust last month. My officials are now working with the BBC Trust to ensure that the commitment is achieved by November 2011, as announced in the Department’s structural reform plan, in a way that preserves the BBC’s editorial independence.
David Mowat
The move by part of the BBC from London to Salford has been good value for the licence payer, good for the north-west and will be good for the BBC. Does the Under-Secretary agree that it would be useful for the National Audit Office to consider moving further functions of the BBC from inside the M25 to the north-west, particularly Salford?
Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
Is there any real justification for not opening up the BBC accounts to the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee, especially given that one of the Secretary of State’s reasons for cutting the licence fee was deficit reduction? I am not sure whether the BBC accounts would rack up against the public finances in quite that way.
Mr Vaizey
Forgive me, Mr Speaker, but I am not quite sure what point the hon. Gentleman is making. It is a coalition Government commitment that the National Audit Office should have full access to the BBC’s accounts by November 2011 in order to ensure value for money and public accountability.
Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)
10. What plans he has for the future of Creative Partnerships.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey)
Creative Partnerships is funded by Arts Council England and as such, decisions on its future are a matter between that and Creativity, Culture and Education.
Fiona Mactaggart
The Minister does not sound as enthusiastic as the teachers and head teachers in my constituency are about this wonderful programme. Can he do more to publicise the achievements of Creative Partnerships? The case report that his Department semi-released a week ago without any real promotion concluded not only that Creative Partnerships improves learning and achievement, but that through research, it improves the capacity of creativity to do more to help children to learn.
Mr Vaizey
As the hon. Lady may know, I am a passionate supporter of both music and cultural education in the round. We could do more to make such programmes more coherent, so that they work in a more joined-up fashion, but as I said, the future of Creative Partnerships and how it works is very much a matter between it and Arts Council England.
Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that because Arts Council England set up a separate body to deliver that programme—Creative Partnerships—and even if much of the work on the ground and delivery is excellent, we need to be careful how many tiers of management are involved? Creative partnerships are possible through local authorities and some excellent private sector organisations that do a lot of work with the community, such as the Creative Foundation in my constituency.
Mr Vaizey
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his well-made point. As I said, I feel very strongly that we need to bring some coherence to the sector. Many very good initiatives are happening on the ground, and it is important that we join them up as much as possible to make them as effective as possible.
Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)
Successive Labour Culture Secretaries achieved settlements in every comprehensive spending review from 1997 onwards that were significantly better than the Whitehall average, arguing successfully that culture has a special role in our national life; that for every £1 we invest, we get £2 back; and that spending in any case is tiny—less than the annual underspend in the NHS. Are the Minister and his colleague the Secretary of State even bothering to make those arguments with the Treasury? What has happened to the Liberal Democrats manifesto pledge to protect spending on arts and culture? Is that just another example of the Lib Dems having no influence whatever on the Government?
Mr Vaizey
We work very closely with our Liberal Democrat colleagues. As the shadow Secretary of State is aware, the economic state that the previous Government left us in has left us with some very tough decisions to make. I can assure him that the Secretary of State and I, and all colleagues in the Department, are making effective arguments. Since the right hon. Gentleman makes his point so effectively, could he now give a guarantee that the Opposition—
Mr Speaker
Order. The Minister’s answer is always of interest to hear, but it is not for him to be posing questions to the shadow Secretary of State.
Mr Bradshaw
I note that there is not even a Lib Dem Front-Bench spokesman in the Chamber at the moment, although I am partially reassured by what the Minister has to say, because of course his Government have been described by senior Conservatives as the “Brokeback Mountain” coalition. That happens to be one of my favourite films, but as I am sure he is aware, it does not end well. One of the cowboys is killed in a homophobic attack by backwoodsmen, and the other lives out a sad, lonely life on a trailer park. Which is which in this coalition?
Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)
11. Whether he plans to bring forward proposals to exempt from the provisions of the Licensing Act 2003 live performances at small venues; and if he will make a statement.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (John Penrose)
I am delighted to reassure my hon. Friend that the Government are committed to the principle of trying to reduce the burden of red tape on live music performances. We are currently evaluating a series of options, and hope to bring forward whichever of them comes out best in the business case.
Chris Heaton-Harris
I wish to press my hon. Friend because I would like a date or time scale for the removal of these measures, which were introduced in the Licensing Act 2003 and which have been so detrimental to live music.
John Penrose
I am afraid that I cannot give my hon. Friend a precise date, if only because the devil is in the detail. I can only assure him that we are working through these measures as quickly as possible. A number of stakeholders—as the jargon has it—have to be consulted, and today I had meetings with people from the Local Government Association and Local Government Regulation in order to ensure that all the relevant people have been consulted. We will do it as fast as we can.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
12. What factors he took into account in reviewing English Heritage’s decision to list Coventry market.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (John Penrose)
In deciding to retain Coventry market on the statutory list, I took into account the architectural and historical interest of the building, as set out in the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990.
Mr Cunningham
I am surprised by the Minister’s answer, because if architectural design were taken into consideration that building would not pass muster. Is he aware that that scheme means that hundreds of millions of pounds of modernisation money now cannot be spent in Coventry city centre? Will he meet a delegation to consider this further?
John Penrose
I sympathise with the hon. Gentleman, who took the trouble to write to me in advance laying out some of his concerns. My problem is that economic considerations are not part of the factors that I am allowed to consider under the 1990 Act. I can reassure him that the fact that the building is listed as grade II does not mean that it cannot be touched. In fact, there are many examples every year of listed buildings at grade II that are altered, and in some cases pulled down, for economic reasons, depending on the decision of the local planning authority.
Stephen Gilbert (St Austell and Newquay) (LD)
14. What steps he is taking to increase provision of superfast broadband in Cornwall.
The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)
Unlike the previous Government, this Government are committed to the roll-out of superfast broadband in rural areas as well as in cities, and not just at speeds as slow as 2 megabits, but at very fast speeds. Cornwall will be an important part of that process.
Stephen Gilbert
I welcome the Government’s commitment to roll out superfast broadband across the UK, but can the Secretary of State give me an assurance that we will not have a digital divide between roll-out in urban areas and roll-out in rural areas such as Cornwall?
Mr Hunt
We will do everything we can to avoid that digital divide. The importance of superfast broadband is not just economic; it is social. The reason for that is that every year 7 million jobs are advertised on line, and 90% require internet skills. So for remote, rural and deprived areas it is incredibly important that they are part of the revolution. That is why we are committed to tackling rural broadband provision at the same time as broadband provision in our cities.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
15. What recent discussions he has had on the legacy for the north-west of the London 2012 Olympics.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Hugh Robertson)
I have regular discussions on maximising the legacy benefits of the games for the UK as a whole. The north-west stands to gain from a wide range of opportunities created by the games through businesses winning games-related work, increased tourism and cultural events. For example G R Formby Heavy Transport Ltd, a firm in my hon. Friend’s constituency has won work in the Olympic Deliver Authority supply chain.
Mark Menzies
I am sure that the people of Fylde will be pleased by my hon. Friend’s answer. What measures is he taking to ensure that schools and youth groups in the north-west have affordable access to the games in London?
Hugh Robertson
The first and obvious point is that 1,263 schools and colleges in the north-west are already registered for the London 2012 education programme. That is a process that will continue. It is part of highlighting the two years to go celebrations tomorrow and it is a process that we will continue as we move closer to the games.
Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) (Con)
16. If he will have discussions with industry representatives on promoting the use of superfast broadband on the Isle of Wight.
The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)
The Isle of Wight does not have good or consistent broadband coverage and this Government are determined to sort it out.
Mr Hunt
My hon. Friend is right to talk about the importance of superfast broadband and not just low-speed broadband for somewhere such as the Isle of Wight. We have said that we are committed to having the fastest superfast broadband network in Europe by the end of this Parliament, and we are doing everything possible both to stimulate private sector investment in our broadband network and to have a coherent strategy for dealing with rural and remote areas such as the Isle of Wight. We are happy to work closely with him to ensure that the Isle of Wight is part of that success story.
Ian Murray (Edinburgh South) (Lab)
17. What recent discussions he has had with the BBC on the level of the television licence fee.
The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)
I do apologise, Mr Speaker.
I have had no discussions with the BBC about the level of the licence fee.
Ian Murray
The Secretary of State will be aware that there is an ongoing programme of savings totalling £1.9 billion in the current licence fee period. What impact will that have on the Government’s decision with regard to the level of the licence fee?
Mr Hunt
I am delighted that the BBC has started to talk about making savings, but it needs to go further. The BBC needs to understand that the world in which licence fee payers are living is one of severe and constrained finances. Licence fee payers would like that to be reflected in the BBC’s approach to matters such as executive pay and remuneration, executive pensions, and a whole range of other areas. We want a strong BBC, but a strong BBC is one that is in touch with the feelings and the mood of the people who pay for it, and they are the licence fee payers.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.
The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)
I shall make a brief statement, if I may, to start proceedings. First, because of my Department’s responsibility to take its share of reducing the deficit inherited from the previous Government, we have announced today plans to rationalise or merge a number of arm’s length bodies for which we are responsible. As part of that, we have said that we are considering the abolition of the UK Film Council and the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council. That does not reflect our commitment to the Government’s or the lottery’s investing in UK film, or Government support for the sectors represented by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council. However, in the constrained circumstances in which we find ourselves, we want to ensure that every penny is used on front-line services, not on back-office and bureaucracy.
With permission, Mr Speaker, I also want to mention that tomorrow marks the date from which there will be exactly two years till the 2012 London Olympics opening ceremony. I am happy to report to the House that the construction of the project is on track, and I believe that it will also be delivered within budget. It is because I want to maintain the cross-party support for that important project that I can today announce that there will be Liberal Democrat and Labour representation on the Olympic board, and the Labour representative will be the right hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Tessa Jowell).
Mr Speaker
Order. Doubtless the Secretary of State was seeking to be helpful to the House, but in the light of the impromptu statement that he has just made, I will probably allow modest injury time.
Bob Blackman
We are all looking forward to the 2012 Olympics. However, this is a very difficult time for football fans—after the World cup and before the season starts—so what lobbying has the Secretary of State been doing and what action has he been taking to bring the World cup back to England?
Mr Hunt
I thank my hon. Friend for his excellent question. I have met five members of the FIFA executive committee to tell them personally that England is the best possible place to host the World cup in 2018. More than 1 million people watch or play football every week in this country, and we have the best football infrastructure in the world. There is no doubt at all that we would deliver the best World cup possible in 2018, so I thank my hon. Friend for his support.
Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)
T3. Will the Government’s Shott inquiry consider the media pressures in north Wales and, in particular, the failure of the BBC to provide any local radio in Wales or support the developing media network within the country?
Mr Hunt
The Shott inquiry will certainly be looking at that, but it will also look at the chronic failures in local media throughout the country. The situation is tough for local newspapers and local radio stations and, unlike many countries, we have virtually no local TV in this country. For rural areas such as north Wales, we believe that local media have an important role to play. That is why, unlike the previous Government, we are doing something about the problem.
Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)
T2. Will my right hon. Friend join me in praising Brentford football club community sports trust for its work in the community, involving more than 27 sports and 30,000 children, and explain what plans he has for developing the big society model to create more opportunities for sport for young people across the country?
Mr Hunt
I am very happy to praise the work of that organisation, which I visited with my hon. Friend before the election. I can personally attest to what a brilliant job it is doing. I think that it involves more than 50,000 young people every year across four London boroughs, and it has a brilliant role to play. I hope that restoring the lottery to its original four pillars as one of my first acts as Secretary of State will make more funds available for such projects and for their important work.
Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)
T4. Guisborough and Skinningrove in my constituency suffer from bad TV reception, and certain channels are unobtainable. Both areas are served by relay transmitters rather than masts. Will the Minister confirm the date for digital switchover in both communities, and provide details of the funding of the switchover? Will he also give me a guarantee that the residents of those areas will be able to receive all Freeview channels once the process is complete?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey)
By the time digital switchover ends in 2012, everyone in the country should be able to receive at least 15 Freeview channels, but I would be happy to meet the hon. Gentleman to discuss any particular problems in his constituency.
Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)
T5. Last week, Dr David Harrop, a dentist from Grassington in the heart of the Yorkshire dales, wrote to me to say that he felt completely left behind by all the advances in the internet. Does the Secretary of State agree that connecting rural communities with high-speed broadband is vital for setting up businesses and for work? Will he meet me and my North Yorkshire colleagues to work out how North Yorkshire can be at the forefront of his superfast broadband revolution?
Mr Hunt
I am happy to meet my hon. Friend and his colleagues from Yorkshire; I have already met colleagues from Norfolk. I agree that superfast broadband can create jobs in fields that we cannot possibly predict, including home education and telemedicine, and we are anxious that those benefits should be shared throughout the country.
Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)
T6. The Government’s change of policy on regional development agencies required Yorkshire Forward to cancel an investment of £5 million in the refurbishment of the National Railway museum’s great hall and one of £1 million towards the restoration of York minster’s great east window. If the Government do not want Yorkshire Forward to invest in heritage, will the Secretary of State or the Minister responsible for culture come to York over the summer to discuss other ways of supporting those important institutions, and to meet people from other important heritage organisations in the city?
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
T7. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has already mentioned the fact that the Olympics will be launched two years tomorrow. I am sure that he also enjoyed the various events that were held recently in constituencies across the country, including Xtremefest and the disability showcase in Ipswich. One concern that has been passed to me by many of the volunteers who help with sport across the country is that they are put off by the excessive health and safety regulations and the increasing requirements for insurance. Will he assure me that he will have words with his colleagues in the Cabinet about how we are preventing people from doing the right thing?
Mr Hunt
My hon. Friend makes an important point. I have already had a meeting with Lord Young to discuss how we can look at the burden of health and safety regulation on volunteering in general. A particular concern is the rule that requires two people to take children to sporting activities in minibuses. We are worried that that is putting off schools taking people to sports events in other places. My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and we are looking at that matter carefully.
Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab)
I am sure that the Front-Bench team will agree that it is important to increase participation in sport at school, and that playing fields have an important role in that. During the review of capital expenditure on education, was the Secretary of State consulted on the proposal to review the regulations relating to school playing fields? If he was consulted, what did he say? If he was not consulted, why not?
Mr Hunt
We are working closely with the Department for Education on a number of projects to do with school sport. In particular, we want to ensure that proper protections are in place for school playing fields. That was a failing of the previous Conservative Government and of the previous Labour Government, and we want to put it right.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
T8. May I praise my right hon. Friend for helping to expose some of the excessively large pay packages at the BBC, and ask him when something is actually going to be done about this matter?
Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)
Given the Minister’s unilateral decision to close the UK Film Council, will he outline what discussions he had with the council and its members and when those discussions took place? Will he also outline what direct support and ambition the Government have for film making in the United Kingdom?
Mr Speaker
I think that that was a triple question, but I know that the Secretary of State is dextrous enough to provide a single reply.
Mr Hunt
We have not announced a decision, but we have said that we are considering such action because we want to hear everyone’s views. The UK Film Council spends £3 million per annum on administration. We want to ask whether that money could be better used to support film makers.
Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)
When is the Shott review likely to report back on the creation and viability of local television?
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
1. What representations the House of Commons Commission has received from new hon. Members on Parliamentary Information and Communications Technology’s policy that ICT equipment is allocated only to the permanent office of an hon. Member.
Duncan Hames
It is a very serious matter when Members of the House are denied the tools to provide an efficient and effective service to their constituents, at home in their constituencies. Will the hon. Gentleman please consider removing that obstacle to Members, recognising that those such as me who did not rush into taking out office leases saved the taxpayer money and should be entitled to the IT provision available to other Members?
Sir Stuart Bell
I sympathise with the hon. Gentleman. If there are special circumstances in any case PICT will be prepared to consider an alternative approach. Under its current approach, each and every Member ought to have a permanent office, either in Westminster or their constituency, before they order equipment. That ensures that the equipment ordered is suitable for the space being occupied, and it avoids the need to relocate often heavy equipment and to set it up twice.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
2. What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the early-day motions procedure.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Office of the Leader of the House of Commons (Mr David Heath)
The procedure for early-day motions is a matter for the House. Despite their variable quality, the opportunity provided by EDMs to raise any issue in the House is valued by many hon. Members. I understand that the House authorities are considering measures to reduce the associated costs.
Mark Menzies
I thank the Minister for his response. I and many colleagues are increasingly concerned that the EDM procedure is being abused by outside interests and lobbyists, at considerable cost to the taxpayer and to Members’ time. What steps is he taking to ensure that that does not continue?
Mr Heath
I know that a number of hon. Members share the hon. Gentleman’s view. Ironically, perhaps, the concerns about early-day motions are expressed in early-day motion 432, which sets out a similar view to his. The problem is that many of our constituents are led to believe by campaigning organisations that EDMs have an efficacy well beyond what we in the House know to be the case. The matter will have to be considered by the House authorities and Committees, but he makes an important point.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Early-day motions are an important way for the House, and particularly Back Benchers, to show interest, concern and dedication to a particular cause. I urge the hon. Gentleman not to make it more difficult for Members to sign early-day motions—I know that there are difficulties deciding which to sign and which not to sign—but to make it easier. Currently, we can table a question online, but we cannot add our name to an early-day motion online. Surely that facility could be introduced.
Mr Heath
In the past financial year, a total of 2,531 EDMs were tabled, with 120,158 names added. Clearly, the obstacles are not insuperable, but the hon. Gentleman raises an important point, which he has raised with me previously and which I have taken up with the House authorities. I hope that we will soon make progress on the matter.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Had it not been for the availability of the EDM procedure, I would not have been able quickly to gather 249 signatures for an EDM that helped in considerable part to change the law so that the mad decision of three judges that our home addresses should be revealed to anyone who asked for them could be stultified and reversed. May I suggest gently to my hon. Friends and other hon. Members that if they are so shy about saying no when asked to sign an EDM, they have the option of simply informing the Table Office that they do not sign any EDMs, and informing their constituents of the same? Those of us who want to make use of the procedure can then continue to do so.
Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)
3. If he will take steps to ensure that no major Government policy announcements are made when the House is not sitting.
The Leader of the House of Commons (Sir George Young)
The Government make major policy announcements to the House in the first instance when it is sitting. However, the demands of modern government make it impossible to avoid making any announcements at all when the House is not sitting.
Rachel Reeves
The Minister for Housing, the right hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Grant Shapps), made substantial policy announcements on Friday that could just as easily have been made on Thursday or today. What assurances can the Leader of the House give us that until Parliament returns in September there will be no announcements that can wait, especially given that it is returning early in September? The House needs to be able to scrutinise legislation properly.
Sir George Young
It is precisely because the Government want to keep the House informed that there are 32 written ministerial statements on the Order Paper today. We have brought forward announcements that might otherwise have been made in August in order to keep the House fully in the picture. I am not aware that any substantial policy announcements are to be made during August.
Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend look favourably on a request that when consultation is announced over the summer—as it is in one of today’s written ministerial statements—a certain amount of injury time will be allowed to enable those of us who wish to take soundings from our constituents to do so adequately, and subsequently to respond?
Sir George Young
I think I am right in saying that the Government have set out guidelines in best practice to assist the consultation process, and I hope that the process to which my hon. Friend refers observes those guidelines, and that she will have an opportunity to consult her constituents in good time before it ends.
Ms Rosie Winterton (Doncaster Central) (Lab)
Will the Leader of the House ensure that when the Government have made up their mind about their policy on rape anonymity, it will be communicated when the House is sitting, especially given that there is another leak in today’s papers suggesting that the Government have reversed their stated position?
Sir George Young
The right hon. Lady knows that no legislation on rape anonymity is planned for the current Session, but of course the Government will make their views on the issue known at the right time. Before she waxes too indignant, let me remind her that the then Prime Minister announced at last year’s party conference—when the House was not sitting—substantial changes of policy on a national care service and a referendum on the alternative vote.
Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) (Con)
4. If the House of Commons Commission will bring forward proposals to reduce parliamentary recording unit charges for small independent broadcasters.
Sir Stuart Bell (Middlesbrough)
We have already taken action. In anticipating new licensing arrangements due to come into effect in August 2011, we have decided to stop charging copyright licence fees to broadcasters for the material that we hold.
Sir Stuart Bell
I am aware that the hon. Gentleman has had discussions with the parliamentary recording unit. He has been very diligent, and I congratulate him on that. As he knows, the principles and level of charges were originally set out in 1993 by what was then the Select Committee on Broadcasting and have thereafter been reviewed at official level. The technical duplication charges, to which the hon. Gentleman did not refer but which I know he understands, will be reviewed during the business planning for the new broadcasting arrangements that will be introduced in August 2011.
Diana R. Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
5. What steps he plans to take to provide for pre-legislative scrutiny of proposed Government legislation.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Office of the Leader of the House of Commons (Mr David Heath)
The Government will continue to publish Bills in draft for pre-legislative scrutiny as opportunities arise. We have already announced that three Bills—on parliamentary privilege, House of Lords reform and defamation—will be published in draft.
Diana R. Johnson
During last Thursday’s business questions, the Leader of the House told me that pre-legislative scrutiny was “not possible” for all constitutional Bills in the first term of a Parliament. Has the hon. Gentleman had an opportunity to read the words of Professor Robert Blackburn, Professor Robert Hazell and Peter Riddell, who say that there is no justification for rushing through without pre-legislative scrutiny the Fixed-term Parliaments Bill when we return in September, other than the political expediency of the two coalition partners?
Mr Heath
Well, that is their opinion. It is perfectly clear that it is not possible for Bills to be produced in time to allow full pre-legislative scrutiny in the first 10 weeks of a new Government when those Bills are to be debated in the very near future; I would have thought that that was obvious to any Member of this House. We are clearly committed to using pre-legislative scrutiny whenever possible, but I repeat that it is clear that, with a new Government and a new House of Commons, there will be new Bills that cannot go through that procedure.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)
The Deputy Leader of the House will be aware that in the previous Parliament many Bills were almost totally rewritten during their passage through the House. In due course, after the Government have had time to write their Bills, will the Deputy Leader of the House be able to say that pre-legislative scrutiny will be the norm, and not the exception, for a Bill in this Parliament?
Mr Heath
The hon. Gentleman makes the important point that what is most important is that Bills are written correctly and are made right first time, rather than having them rewritten, as was so often the case under the previous Administration. [Interruption.] We hear protestations from Opposition Members, but may I remind them that in the 2009-10 Session only five Bills were submitted for pre-legislative scrutiny and in the 2008-09 Session there were only four, whereas we have already announced three.
Mr Graham Allen (Nottingham North) (Lab)
The Deputy Leader of the House referred to someone’s opinion about pre-legislative scrutiny. What does he think of the opinion that all Bills should be given 12 weeks of pre-legislative scrutiny? That was the opinion of his right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, writing to the Liaison Committee last week. Is it not a travesty of the processes of this House that my Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform has only been able to squeeze in a maximum of three sessions to look at two very important Bills? Will the Deputy Leader of the House not cite past precedent, but try to set future precedent to do this job properly?
Mr Heath
I hope that the hon. Gentleman’s Committee will do an excellent job in looking at those Bills as they are taken forward. The critical period is between Second Reading and Committee, when Members consider amendments that they may wish to table. I hope that his Committee will take full advantage of that period by having as many sittings as he requires in order to do that work.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
6. How much it costs to print early-day motions in 2009-10.
Sir Stuart Bell (Middlesbrough)
The cost of publishing early-day motions, including printing, staff time and technical support, was approximately £1 million in the financial year 2009-10. Printing alone accounts for some £776,000.
Mr Hollobone
Taxpayers will be shocked by the figures that the hon. Gentleman has just read out to the House. Should this not offer scope for huge cost savings and, hopefully, be another nail in the coffin of the wretched EDM system?
Sir Stuart Bell
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his remarks, and he will be happy to know that from the start of this parliamentary Session older EDMs have not been reprinted weekly, saving 2.5 million sheets of paper and up to £300,000 in printing costs per year.
Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)
I confess that I have been here for only 18 years but I have not yet seen an EDM debated. Would it not be a good idea for us to pick four or five EDMs for debate in the course of a year and therefore, through the Backbench Business Committee or the Leader of the House, vent those issues and make the system better value for money?
Sir Stuart Bell
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, but I cannot add to the points made by the Deputy Leader of the House and the hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis). As my right hon. Friend will no doubt know, this is a matter for the Procedure Committee or the Backbench Business Committee.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
Would it not be a good way to save money to publish EDMs just on the internet and not print them on the Order Paper?
Sir Stuart Bell
That is an interesting point. In 2007 the Procedure Committee said there should be no electronic tabling of EDMs without stronger authentication than that in place for questions.
Sir Stuart Bell
My hon. Friend asks why. The Procedure Committee said there should not be such electronic tabling unless
“significantly stronger authentication than is currently required for parliamentary questions can be guaranteed”.
The Procedure Committee went on to say that it cannot therefore
“recommend the introduction of e-tabling for EDMs.”
I am happy to answer the hon. Gentleman’s question, and my hon. Friend’s question from a sedentary position.
Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)
7. Whether the House of Commons Commission plans to seek the views of hon. Members on ways of reducing the running costs of the House.
Sir Stuart Bell
The Commission will seek the view of Members in the normal way through the Finance and Services Committee and the Administration Committee. I am pleased to see on today’s Order Paper the submission of names to the will of the House for both those Committees. The Commission will also welcome the submission of views from individual Members, which should be sent to the secretary of the Commission.
Hugh Bayley
I understand the need for the House to cut its costs, but I am worried about the size of the cut in respect of Select Committee travel, because it will undermine the ability of Parliament to scrutinise the Government. Will the Commission seek savings in other areas which do not have a direct impact on how Parliament does its job? For example, at a time of widespread public concern about public sector bonuses, will the Commission examine what impact the bonus scheme for senior staff of this House has had on their output and productivity?
Sir Stuart Bell
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his question. On the cuts in the Select Committee budgets, I am afraid that we are not able in this House to distinguish between one set of expenditure and another. The cuts announced recently are for this year only and are in response to the general financial stringency being applied to the public sector in the current year. Following scrutiny by the Finance and Services Committee last December, the Commission agreed to a reduction of 9% over three years and will consider the position for future years in the autumn. My hon. Friend’s point about bonuses will be included in that review.
Taxibus Services (Plymouth)
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
The petition is against the withdrawal of the taxibus services in Plymouth from Glenholt down through to the city.
The petition states:
The Petition of residents of the Plymouth, Moor View constituency and others,
Declares that the petitioners are unhappy with the decision to withdraw the taxibus service that serves the residents in the north of Plymouth; notes that residents in St Budeaux and Weston Mill use this bus to access their GP surgery, dentist, shops and other community facilities; and further declares that the withdrawal of this service will cause major inconvenience to residents.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to encourage local authorities to support local taxibus services to avoid these vital public transport services being removed.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P000847]
Free Swimming (Wakefield)
Mary Creagh (Wakefield) (Lab)
I rise to present a petition on free swimming.
The petition states:
The Petition of Mrs Priscilla Whisker and residents of Wakefield constituency, and others,
Declares that HM Government’s decision to cut the previous Labour government's free swimming scheme from 1 August 2010 will make it more difficult for under 16 and over 60 year olds to access swimming facilities in Wakefield; further declares that the scheme was part of the 2012 Olympics legacy to get more people involved in healthy activities; further declares that there are high levels of child obesity in Wakefield; and further declares that the cuts will disproportionately affect the health of poor people in Wakefield.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges HM Government to recognise the value of encouraging young people to take regular exercise and to learn to swim; to recognise the important health benefits of swimming to children and people over 60; to reconsider the cuts to the Swim 4 Free local authority grant support; and to reinstate the Swim 4 Free grant support to local authorities from 1 August 2010.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P000848]
1GOAL For All Campaign
Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab)
I rise to present a petition on the 1GOAL For All campaign.
The petition states:
The Petition of staff and students at Halton Lodge School and their friends, relatives and others in their community,
Declares that the petitioners support the 1GOAL For All Campaign to use the power of football to contribute to securing universal primary education by 2015 (Millennium Development Goal 2); notes the progress that has already been made towards this goal, with 40 million more children in school since the Millennium; further declares that the petitioners are appalled that 72 million children across the world are still denied the opportunity of schooling; further notes that sport can be used to champion education, which gives people the tools to help themselves out of poverty…The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons agrees to any motion expressing support for the 1GOAL Campaign and urges the Leader of the House and the Backbench Business Committee to consider scheduling a debate on progress towards achieving Millennium Development Goal 2 (Universal Primary Education).
There are 452 petitioners.
Following is the full text of the petition:
[The Petition of staff and students at Halton Lodge School and their friends, relatives and others in their community,
Declares that the petitioners support the 1GOAL For All Campaign to use the power of football to contribute to securing universal primary education by 2015 (Millennium Development Goal 2); notes the progress that has already been made towards this goal, with 40 million more children in school since the Millennium; further declares that the petitioners are appalled that 72 million children across the world are still denied the opportunity of schooling; further notes that sport can be used to champion education, which gives people the tools to help themselves out of poverty; and further declares that Halton Lodge School has used the opportunity afforded by World Cup 2010 to engage with the international campaign founded and chaired by Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan, by watching and reading 1GOAL material, by producing artwork to raise the profile of the Campaign, by holding a 1GOAL school assembly and by opening the school for parents to watch the first game (France v South Africa) of the World Cup 2010 recently held in South Africa, an event which has raised the hopes and aspirations of millions of young people across Africa.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons agrees to any motion expressing support for the 1GOAL Campaign and urges the Leader of the House and the Backbench Business Committee to consider scheduling a debate on progress towards achieving Millennium Development Goal 2 (Universal Primary Education).
And the Petitioners remain, etc.]
[P000849]
Wind Farm (Puriton, Somerset)
Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger (Bridgwater and West Somerset) (Con)
The petition states:
The Petition of the residents of Woolavington and others,
Declares that they are concerned about plans by EDF Energy Renewables to develop a new wind farm at Withy Farm near Puriton; about the implications for local residents of noise from the turbines; the intrusive nature of the wind turbines and any possible additional power lines associated with them on the unique landscape of the Somerset Levels; and the potential damage to wildlife and their habitats.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to take all possible steps to take the impact on local communities and the landscape fully into account when considering plans submitted for the siting of wind farms and the provision of energy generation through renewable sources.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P000850]
Blandford Community Hospital (Dorset)
Mr Robert Walter (North Dorset) (Con)
I present a petition in the name of the Blandford community hospital in Dorset.
The petition states:
The Petition of Mrs Jacqueline Stayt and Mrs Josephine Seath, residents of the North Dorset community and others,
Declares that they are concerned about the future of Portman Ward at Blandford Community Hospital, Dorset.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Secretary of State for Health to encourage NHS Dorset to consider seriously the impact on the local community of proposed cuts to services at Blandford Hospital, in particular the proposed closure of Portman Ward, and to ensure that decisions affecting the hospital's future reflect the concerns and needs of patients, staff and the community at large.
And your Petitioners remain, as in duty bound, will ever pray.
[P000851]
Ian Tomlinson
(13 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
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Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Attorney-General if he will make a statement on the decision not to prosecute any police officer in connection with the assault and subsequent death of Ian Tomlinson?
The Attorney-General (Mr Dominic Grieve)
I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I wholly understand the reaction of the public and of this House to the news that the Director of Public Prosecutions considers that he cannot bring a criminal prosecution following the Independent Police Complaints Commission’s investigation into the death of Mr Ian Tomlinson in April 2009. No one who has seen the pictures of his treatment that day could fail to be disturbed by them. The facts were rightly and thoroughly investigated by the IPCC. In recognition of the strong public interest in understanding how that decision had been reached, last Thursday the Director of Public Prosecutions, who has responsibility, independently of Government, for the decision, made a detailed and lengthy statement explaining it. The statement is available on the Crown Prosecution Service website, and I have also asked for copies of it to be placed in the Library.
Once the IPCC has concluded its report, an inquest will follow into the death of Mr Tomlinson under the direction of Her Majesty’s coroner. The Metropolitan police will also consider whether disciplinary or any other action should be brought. It has to be remembered that the detailed statement made by the DPP did not purport to set out any defence that the suspected police officer would have advanced had the case come before a criminal court; it only centred on the evidential issues faced in any prosecution.
From the outset, the CPS and the IPCC approached this case on the basis that there may be evidence to justify a charge for manslaughter. Expert evidence was obtained with a view to establishing the cause of death. After the original pathologist, who was appointed by Her Majesty’s coroner, provided a second statement about his findings, the factual basis on which the other experts had given their opinions about the cause of death was seriously undermined. The CPS concluded that there was no realistic prospect of conviction for manslaughter.
It is not appropriate practice in possible homicide cases to bring a charge for a lesser offence such as common assault while there remains a prospect of a prosecution for manslaughter. But once it was clear that a charge for manslaughter was not going to be possible, the CPS turned to consider whether proceedings could be brought for assault occasioning actual bodily harm. In law, a charge of assault occasioning actual bodily harm can be brought in respect of quite minor injuries. However, to bring a measure of consistency to charging decisions in assault cases the CPS applies charging standards. In the case of the G20 demonstration, for example, after a police officer struck a woman twice with his baton causing a similar level of injury, the CPS brought a prosecution for common assault applying exactly the same guidance. That officer was of course recently acquitted by the courts.
I understand the dismay of the House at the outcome of this case, which is that a prosecution will not be brought for any offence. That outcome was reached after an independent investigation of the facts by the IPCC and independent and thorough consideration by a senior and experienced Crown Prosecution Service prosecutor, with the added benefit of advice from independent leading counsel under the oversight and with the approval of the Director of Public Prosecutions. I have seen nothing to make me doubt the seriousness and propriety of the decision-making process in this case.
Emily Thornberry
Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman believe that if a member of the public had launched an unprovoked attack on a police officer that was immediately followed by the officer’s death, and if that incident was on film, a pathologist of highly dubious professionalism would have been appointed to investigate and that that pathologist would have been allowed to throw away samples that could have proved the link between the assault and the death? Does he also agree that it would be highly unlikely, even if one were to leave aside the evidence in connection to the manslaughter, that there would be no action on the assault?
We have all seen the film. The man was clearly assaulted. We have also, have we not, read Nat Cary’s evidence in which he says that there is an area of bruising consistent with being hit with a baton? As Nat Cary says, if that is not ABH, what is? How can the CPS have taken 15 months to come to no conclusion? It is not going to take any action. I suggest that that would not have happened if the tables had been turned and this shows that there is no equality before the law. If the right hon. and learned Gentleman agrees, what is he going to do about it?
The Attorney-General
I should say at the outset that I think that the first part of the hon. Lady’s question is based on a slightly false premise. The appointment of a pathologist is a matter for the coroner, not for the CPS. The first pathologist appointed in this case was appointed by the coroner—he has the power to do that. The hon. Lady will be aware from what was said by the DPP and from what I said a moment ago that much flows from that appointment. It is clear that a report was produced that provided an indication to lead to further reports that looked as though it might lead to showing a causal connection between the assault and the death but that subsequently a further factual statement from the pathologist first appointed by the coroner entirely undermined the basis on which any further expert view could be taken of the case by other pathologists. That is at the root of the problem.
As for the hon. Lady’s suggestion that in some way this case would have been treated differently had it involved the death of a police officer, I have no reason to think that that is the case. It is right to say that when the matter was first drawn to the attention of Her Majesty’s coroner, it might not have been apparent at that stage—because the video evidence had not become available—that this was not a sudden death on the fringe of the G20 demonstration rather than something that was intimately linked to it, as became clear when the video evidence became available.
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)
I should like to thank the Attorney-General for the elaboration that he has given. It seems to me that the decision not to prosecute appears to rest on the divergence of medical opinion between the three pathologists who have conducted post-mortems, creating evidential problems for the DPP when considering the likelihood of proving a causal link between the push and the blow that, as we have all seen, were struck at Mr Tomlinson and his subsequent death. However, is it not the case that the decision of medical authorities to charge Dr Patel, the first pathologist, with 26 counts of misconduct is materially important?
The public will find it difficult to understand how the opinion of a doctor facing 26 charges of misconduct before the General Medical Council can in effect muddy the evidential waters in this very serious case to such an extent that a prosecution cannot proceed in a case where the public interest is not served, as I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman would probably agree, by such a decision.
Prosecuting authorities, of course, are rightly independent, but what powers of supervision does the Attorney-General have over their decisions? In view of the GMC’s charges against Dr Patel, has the Attorney-General asked the DPP to review his decision about whether to bring charges, given that the other two pathologists—Dr Cary and Dr Shorrock—agree that Mr Tomlinson’s death was a result of internal bleeding from blunt force trauma to the abdomen? If not, will he now do so?
I am sure that the Attorney-General agrees—and would say again—how important it is that justice is seen to be done, freely and fairly, with all being equal before the law. The unfortunate circumstances of this case do not appear to show that at present.
The Attorney-General
As for the hon. Lady’s last comment, I entirely endorse what she says. On her earlier comments, I am not in a position to make a judgment on the misconduct allegations that may pertain to the pathologist, Dr Patel, which I understand arise out of other matters. Neither am I in a position to comment on questions of expertise. As I tried to make clear a moment ago, this is about an issue of fact. Dr Patel carried out the first post-mortem examination, which included certain conclusions about blood in the abdominal cavity. Subsequently, he factually retracted those statements, or altered them markedly, putting a completely different complexion on what conclusions could be drawn from the evidence and whether, in particular, any connection could be made between the blow that one can see being struck on the video, the fall that followed and the actual cause of death. I understand that that lies at the root of the Crown Prosecution Service’s difficulties in this case.
The hon. Lady also asked about my powers of supervision and superintendence. I have those—they are my ability to ask questions. As she might appreciate, I have certainly had an opportunity to do that, but this is not my decision and I have not been in a position to review the evidence. As I said earlier, I have no reason to think, from anything I have heard, that this matter was not most conscientiously and fully inquired into with a clear desire to see justice being done. The decision is potentially open to being reviewed by means of judicial review—that could happen if someone wished it to take place—but I want to make it clear that on the basis of what I have been told and what I have discussed, but not on a review of the evidence, it seems to me that the CPS has acted with complete propriety in this matter and in trying to take it forward.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Does my right hon. and learned Friend accept that the CPS might have acted with complete propriety but that its actions have nothing to do with the delivery of justice in this case? Does he understand that to allow the findings of a pathologist who has previously found a victim of the Camden ripper in 2002 to have died of natural causes resulting from heart disease to trump the considered verdicts of two other pathologists is far from satisfactory? Is he more understanding than I am of the fact that the Director of Public Prosecutions can take the view that the findings amount to an irreconcilable disagreement between experts rather than between two experts and one incompetent who ought to be disregarded?
The Attorney-General
I fully understand my hon. Friend’s concerns, but at the risk of repeating myself, I must restate the key point. This is not just a disagreement between experts: it is about a key matter of fact that had to be established at the outset, which has been left completely unclear. On the basis of the facts as now stated, it does not lend support to there being a causal connection between the blow and the death. That might be a profoundly unsatisfactory state of affairs, but I simply say that the CPS has to go with the material that is available to it, and it cannot manufacture it or wish that something different had happened from what actually happened. From that point of view and bearing in mind my responsibility in this matter, in seeking to answer the House’s questions properly, I repeat that the CPS seems, from what I have been told, to have acted with complete propriety in investigating this matter.
Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)
The Attorney-General might recall that at the instigation of the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) the Select Committee on Home Affairs held an inquiry into the G20 riots and made passing comment on the case of Ian Tomlinson. Two recommendations were put forward, one of which concerned the use of untrained officers. The other involved the Committee’s concern about the prospect that communication between the police and the public at that time, and the tactics that were used, might undermine public confidence and trust in the police. Have those two recommendations been addressed? If not, will the Attorney-General write to me and let me know what progress has been made?
The Attorney-General
I think the right hon. Gentleman will understand that those questions fall slightly outside the remit of my area of responsibility. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is sitting on my left, however, and I am sure that is a reflection of the seriousness with which she takes the entirety of the matters that the right hon. Gentleman has just expounded. I hope very much, therefore, that my right hon. Friend will be in a position to answer the question that he raised.
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
It is important not to prejudice any further action, but does the Attorney-General agree that to avoid the impression of a cover-up it is also important that the CPS considers all the evidence that will be presented at the inquest and whether it warrants taking action against the officer then?
The Attorney-General
The hon. Gentleman makes a perfectly good point. As I indicated, the matter is not at an end. There will be an inquest and there is the IPCC report to the Home Secretary. If it were, indeed, the case that further evidence emerged, I have not the slightest doubt that the CPS would wish to consider it.
Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)
The issues causing my constituents concern are, first, the seeming failure of the Metropolitan police ever to learn from their past mistakes and, secondly, that the CPS seems to have endowed the medical evidence with undue weight and ignored the other manifest evidence that was in the public domain. If there is to be an inquest, will the family of Mr Tomlinson be afforded any kind of financial support by the Government, given the swingeing cuts that have been introduced to the legal financial service?
The Attorney-General
On that latter and final point, I have to tell the hon. Lady that it is a matter for my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Justice. As she is aware, provision is available to help families in certain inquests and that matter would have to be considered. It would also have to be considered by the Legal Services Commission to which application would be made.
May I return to this point: I do not think it is a question of the application of undue weight on anything? The responsibility of the CPS is to apply the code and test of Crown prosecutors as to whether there is a basis on which a prosecution can be brought. In a case of prosecution for manslaughter, that is not possible for the reasons I have already given the House and the hon. Lady. In a case of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, if the CPS were to depart from its own standards and guidelines, which have, I think, been in existence for some 15 years—I seem to recollect they were introduced following some criticisms that there were excessive variations in when assault occasioning actual bodily harm was charged or not—that decision could be open to criticism and challenge.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)
Is it not time that coroners were issued with new guidance that they should not appoint pathologists when there is a direct and/or present relationship with the police force they are investigating?
The Attorney-General
My hon. Friend raises an interesting question. Normally, as I understand it, that is a matter for the discretion of the coroner. It may be that one of the matters arising from this case that needs to be considered is how pathologists are appointed by coroners in all cases.
Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)
Does the Attorney-General agree that a key element in upholding the rule of law is people’s confidence in the rule of law? Does he also agree that a number of issues associated with this case have tended to undermine that confidence both for the tragic Tomlinson family and for the community as a whole? The question of the pathologist’s competence has been touched on, but there is also the chequered history of the policeman involved—at one point, he was actually discharged from the Metropolitan Police Service. There is also the question of the length of time it took the CPS to finish the inquiry, which has meant that no prosecution of any kind may be brought. Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman agree that all of us in the House who are committed to upholding the rule of law have reason to be concerned about what has happened in this case?
The Attorney-General
I certainly endorse the hon. Lady’s final comment. Yes, and I hope I made it clear that there is something profoundly unsatisfactory about a conflict of evidence arising on facts and matters of this kind. Some matters the hon. Lady raises are not within my province, but there may well be some lessons to be learned, and as I indicated previously, this matter is at least not yet completely at an end. That having been said, prosecutors have to see that the law is observed, but they have to act within the law and on the evidence. They are constrained by that; indeed, that is one of their responsibilities and duties. The fact that the evidence ends up unsatisfactory and that the matter cannot therefore be taken any further does not mean that they have not done their job properly.
Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)
Does the Attorney-General accept that, whatever may be the normal practice, there was nothing to prevent the CPS from bringing a simple assault charge while other matters continued to be investigated? Does he also recognise that the urgency of creating a system of genuinely independent medical examiners, as recommended after the Shipman case and by the Justice Committee, is confirmed by aspects of this case?
The Attorney-General
The right hon. Gentleman raises the question of whether an assault charge could have been brought while the investigation continued. I say simply that it could have been. The difficulty that might have arisen is that if that assault charge had been taken to conclusion through the courts during the period of the investigation and subsequently the material on which a manslaughter charge could have been based became apparent, it might then have been impossible to proceed with the manslaughter charge. I do not think that that matter can simply be overlooked.
I did not fully respond to the point put by the hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) about the timing. I simply say this: there was an IPCC inquiry first of all, which took some months. By the time the Crown Prosecution Service got the material in this case, time had already gone on a fair bit. In those circumstances, I do not take the view from what I have seen that the CPS was in any way dilatory in trying to bring this matter to a conclusion.
Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)
Does the Attorney-General understand that a lot of people view his remarks today and his response to my hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) with utter consternation? As my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) pointed out, this is a question of justice and of seeing justice to be done. If we are to have any confidence in the judicial system and in the ability of the Government or the CPS to mount a prosecution, something must happen in this case where a wholly innocent man was killed in broad daylight on the streets of London and no action appears to be imminent on this matter.
The Attorney-General
As I said, anyone who saw the video of what happened must be seized with very serious concern about the matter. That is a view that I entirely endorse. Therefore, for the same reason, I am extremely unhappy, as I am sure everyone in the House is, that we should be in the position that we are in today with such a complete lack of clarity in the matter. There may well be lessons to be learned overall, but I came to the House to answer for the CPS, which had to take the material available to it and act on it. As I said before, I do not believe there is anything in what I have seen of how the CPS has conducted itself in this matter to make me think that it was not seeking throughout to try to ensure that justice was done in this case. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will be able to accept that.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that the liberty of every citizen in this country relies on the separation of powers, that members of the public should not be tried by television and the media and that the CPS has looked at this properly and reached a proper decision?
The Attorney-General
My hon. Friend does make an important point—in this country, we have the presumption of innocence and it is also right that we only prosecute where the code test is passed and there is a credible basis on which a prosecution can be brought. Those are onerous burdens for the CPS, which it has to discharge impartially, free of political control and fearlessly. I have not the slightest doubt that in this matter that is what it has sought to do. The fact that the outcome is unsatisfactory—from the House’s viewpoint and that of many, particularly, I might add, the family of the deceased, for whom everyone in the House must have the greatest sympathy—does not, in fact, undermine the validity of what the CPS was trying to do.
Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab)
Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman accept that, on the CPS’s lack of proceeding against the officer, one aspect that causes concern is his alleged chequered history? According to press reports, he left the Met under a cloud, was re-employed as a clerk, successfully applied to Surrey constabulary for a position and then transferred back to the Met. Can the right hon. and learned Gentleman advise us, to his knowledge, whether that aspect of Metropolitan Police Authority recruitment policy is being examined as part of the process in respect of the prosecution, and whether, if there is a lesson for the Home Office on inter-constabulary transfers, that matter will be brought to the attention of the House?
The Attorney-General
The Home Secretary is sitting on my left, and she has had the opportunity of hearing the hon. Gentleman. As he will appreciate, the points that he makes are again outside the remit of myself as a Law Officer and, indeed, of the Crown Prosecution Service, but I fully accept that they are perfectly pertinent.
Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)
Would my right hon. and learned Friend be able to assist in this way: cases involving causation are always difficult, but did the Crown Prosecution Service consider two other charges available to it, neither of which would have been time-barred, namely affray and misfeasance in public office?
The Attorney-General
So far as affray is concerned, I am not aware of whether it was considered, and it does not immediately spring to mind as appropriately reflecting what happened in the case. So far as misconduct in public office is concerned, the matter can be looked at, but the test for misconduct in public office is quite clear: it should not be used as a substitute to get around a substantive offence being brought. For those reasons, the CPS took the view that misconduct in public office was not an appropriate charge to bring, and in that it is certainly backed by all precedent.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
Is it true that the coroner, Professor Paul Matthews, refused to allow two IPCC investigators to attend the first post-mortem and failed to advise Mr Tomlinson’s family about their rights in relation to the second post-mortem? If so, how can any of us have any confidence in his ability to conduct an inquest that will have such a crucial bearing on any future decision by the CPS?
The Attorney-General
As to the latter point about the family, I am not in a position to comment. As to the first, on whether the coroner insisted that a post- mortem go ahead with Dr Patel only, I think that I am in a position to confirm that that is what he did.
Policing in the 21st Century
(13 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mrs Theresa May)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement about a consultation paper that I am publishing today. Entitled “Policing in the 21st Century: Reconnecting police and the people”, it sets out the most radical reforms to policing in at least 50 years.
For this Government, police reform is a priority, not just because we inherited the worst public finances of any major economy, but because for too long the police have become disconnected from the communities that they serve, been bogged down by bureaucracy and answered to distant politicians instead of to the people. Crime remains too high, too many families and communities suffer from antisocial behaviour and barely half the public are confident that important local issues are dealt with. Meanwhile, the challenges that we face have changed. Terrorism, the growth in serious and organised crime and cybercrime all require new approaches that cross not just police force boundaries, but international borders.
First, we will transfer power back to the people. We will introduce directly elected police and crime commissioners by 2012. The commissioners will set the police budget, determine police force priorities and have the power to hire and, where necessary, fire their chief constable. To help the public hold their local police to account, we will publish local crime data and mandate local beat meetings so that people can challenge the performance of their neighbourhood policing teams.
Secondly, we will return professional responsibility to police officers. Front-line staff will no longer be form writers; they will be crime fighters, freed from bureaucracy and central guidance and trusted to get on with their jobs. We have scrapped the policing pledge. We have got rid of the confidence target. We will restore police discretion over charging decisions for particular offences. We will limit the reporting requirements for “stop and search” and we will scrap the “stop” form in its entirety.
Thirdly, we will shift the focus of Government. As the Home Affairs Committee noted during the previous Parliament, the previous Government tried to micro-manage local policing but failed to support forces effectively on national issues, so we will build on the work of the Serious Organised Crime Agency to create a more powerful national crime agency, which will tackle organised crime and protect our borders. We will phase out the National Policing Improvement Agency and scrap Labour’s plans for a statutory police senior appointments panel. We will discuss with the Association of Chief Police Officers the way forward in its role as a professional leadership body.
Fourthly, we will make the police more efficient at force, regional and national levels so that front-line local policing can be sustained. To this end, we are already consulting separately on police procurement regulations to get better value for taxpayers’ money.
Fifthly, we will unleash the power of community pride and civic responsibility, so that people can come together to cut crime. We will therefore look for a cost-effective way to establish 101 as a single police non-emergency number so that it is easier to report crime and antisocial behaviour. We will also do more to encourage active citizens to become special constables, community crime fighters and members of neighbourhood watch groups.
There is nothing inevitable about crime. That is why we are determined to press ahead with these reforms, which demonstrate our determination to undo the damage of the Labour years, put the people back in charge, and rid our communities of crime, antisocial behaviour and disorder. I commend the statement to the House.
Alan Johnson (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)
The statement should be entitled, “Policing in the 21st Century: How to make the job harder”. As usual, the Home Secretary trots out her infantile drivel about the last Labour Government, probably written by some pimply nerd foisted on her office by No. 10.
The Home Secretary said that she aims to undo the damage of the Labour years. That damage was recorded in the Home Office’s statistics on 15 July. Here it is: overall crime is down by 50%, violent crime is down by 50%, property crime is down by 55%, the murder rate is at its lowest level since at any time over the past 20 years, and the chance of being a victim of crime is at its lowest level since records began in 1981—21.5%, down from its peak of 40% under the Conservatives. That is the damage that she is seeking to undo—the kind of damage that any Government would be proud of.
The Home Secretary is about to have her budget cut by at least 25%.
Alan Johnson
Thanks to us, the hon. Lady says from a sedentary position. I remind her that we were making the police a priority and guaranteeing the funding for record numbers of police officers.
Last week’s report by Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and the Audit Commission made it plain that any cuts above 12% were bound adversely to affect front-line policing. Soon we will learn how the Government plan to restrict the use of the DNA database and CCTV, and thus make it harder for the police to catch criminals. Today we have the final part of the triple whammy—structural upheaval through the imposition of elected commissioners and the abolition of the Serious Organised Crime Agency. Perhaps the Home Secretary can tell me which chief constables, which police authority chairs or even which local authority leaders support the replacement of police authorities by a single elected commissioner. Sir Simon Milton, when he was the Conservative head of the Local Government Association, said that:
“there are already people elected at local level to represent the community and be advocates over a range of services—they’re called councillors”.
Is not the Home Secretary setting up, in Sir Simon Milton’s words,
“a parallel and potentially conflicting system with a competing mandate”?
Sir Hugh Orde has said:
“Every professional bone in my body tells me”
that having elected commissioners
“is a bad idea that could drive a coach and horses through the current model of accountability and add nothing but confusion.”
The Conservative chair of the Association of Police Authorities has said that the idea appears to be driven by dogma, and Richard Kemp, the leader of the Liberal Democrat group on the Local Government Association, has said that the vast majority of the 3,700 Lib Dem councillors—a figure soon to be drastically reduced at the next election—oppose an elected commissioner. Does the Home Secretary not think that the narrower the remit of the position, the weaker the case for having the occupier of that position decided by ballot?
How will the Home Secretary safeguard the operational independence of the chief constable? As the APA has pointed out, police authorities have done a great deal over the past few years to ensure that the public understand their role and that police authority members are properly equipped and trained to operate effectively. There is a clear argument for enhancing and increasing the role and responsibility of local government, so that local councillors have a clear mandate for holding the police to account. That is the route that we should be taking, rather than this unnecessary, unwanted and expensive diversion. Can the Home Secretary tell me whether the LGA is right when it states that the elected commissioners will cost £50 million? What is her estimate?
The coalition agreement talked about refocusing the Serious Organised Crime Agency, not eliminating it. That organisation was formed only four years ago, and the structural upheaval then took years to settle down.
Alan Johnson
It was our structural upheaval, I agree completely, but that is what occurs with any reorganisation. To put people through another structural upheaval four years later is simply madness.
In 2006, SOCA was wrongly described as replicating the FBI, and reports over the weekend gave the same description. Does the Home Secretary think it is accurate? She will be aware of Sir Paul Stephenson’s John Harris memorial lecture recently, which rejected the FBI option. Sir Paul set out a model built upon SOCA, not upon replacing it, and his national federated model has much to commend it. Why is the Home Secretary not pursuing that alternative?
The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre does fantastic work. To build upon that work, we were moving it away from SOCA to be a non-departmental public body. Will the Home Secretary continue that process, and if not, why not?
Will the dedicated border force replace the UK Border Agency, and how many jobs will be lost as a result of these initiatives in SOCA, the UKBA, the National Policing Improvement Agency and elsewhere?
We have yet to hear a word from this Government about how they plan to cut crime. All we have heard is how they will cut officer numbers, prison places and police powers. Today, the Home Secretary has managed to reannounce at least three decisions that we had already taken in government. She says that she will mandate beat meetings to challenge the performance of neighbourhood policing teams, having scrapped the policing pledge drawn up by chief constables themselves to provide exactly that mandate.
The Home Secretary inherited the Department when crime had fallen substantially, public confidence in the police had never been higher and public concern about antisocial behaviour had never been lower. She says she is pursuing bold policies; in fact she is pursuing bad policies. I was pleased to see the Government’s U-turn on anonymity for rape defendants; elected commissioners need to go the same way.
Mrs May
I have to say to the shadow Home Secretary that I find his complacent attitude in relation to what has happened over recent years rather surprising. As far we are concerned, we do need to fight and cut crime, but our streets can never be too safe and we will not be complacent about the antisocial behaviour and crime that still blight the lives of too many people in this country.
The right hon. Gentleman talks about the damage that is being done, but I will tell him when damage is done to policing in this country. It is when, as Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary reported last week, at any one point an average of only 11% of police officers are out on our streets. It is when the average police constable is spending only 14% of their time on the streets and 22% in filling forms. The Labour Government did that damage over 13 years.
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the DNA database. It is extraordinary that he is still willing to defend a Government who wanted to put innocent people’s DNA on the database, but were not willing to ensure that they had the DNA of all the people in prison on that database.
The right hon. Gentleman asks who supports the decision to have directly elected commissioners and elected representatives of the people. He will find some support from the following quote:
“we will legislate to strengthen the democratic link with the public by introducing local, directly elected crime and policing representatives.”—[Official Report, 17 July 2008; Vol. 479, c.435.]
Those are not my words, but those of the right hon. Gentleman’s predecessor as Home Secretary, the right honourable Jacqui Smith.
The right hon. Gentleman talks about the need to publish figures. Of course, we will in due course publish figures in relation to the police commissioners as well as the business case for the national crime agency. He mentioned its role and the need for it. Only two weeks ago in the Police Foundation lecture, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson, raised the need for us to strengthen the tasking and co-ordination of response to serious organised crime. That is what the national crime agency will do. It will also deliver our commitment for a border police force and strengthen our ability to protect our borders.
On the shadow Home Secretary’s comments about cuts in budgets, I simply refer him to two things. First, he seems to have forgotten that, in the words of the former Labour Chief Secretary to the Treasury, “There is no money left.” Secondly, it would be helpful for the House to know that yesterday, on Sky News, the shadow Home Secretary confirmed that, in a Labour Government, he would have cut police budgets.
Mr Speaker
Order. A great many hon. Members wish to take part, but there is important business to follow and there are real pressures on time. Single, short supplementary questions and brief replies are therefore required.
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
Does the Home Secretary agree that the checks and balances that apply to elected police commissioners must be strong enough to stop populist politicians turning policing into their personal fiefdoms?
Mrs May
I think that everybody in politics aims to represent the people and their views. The point of directly elected commissioners is to replace bureaucratic accountability with democratic accountability. However, the hon. Gentleman is right that checks and balances need to be in place. That is why we will introduce the police and crime panels, drawn from local authority representatives and independent members, with powers to look at the commissioner of police’s plans in their area and to raise public concerns if they wish to do that.
Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)
I will leave aside the fact that the Government came to power promising to stop constant reorganisations but have done nothing but reorganise. Will the Home Secretary confirm that SOCA in its current guise is being abolished and that the intelligence function, which is crucial to dealing with, for example, the cybercrime and e-crime that she mentioned, will go with it? Does she therefore propose to enhance the role of the excellent police e-crime unit in the Met, or to transfer the powers to that amorphous body, the NCA?
Mrs May
The right hon. Gentleman’s assumption that SOCA’s intelligence-gathering capability will be abolished is completely wrong. We intend to build on and harness the intelligence-gathering expertise that has been built up in SOCA in the past few years as part of the serious organised crime command in the national crime agency.
Given that, in November 2003, the right hon. Gentleman’s proposals included changing police authorities so that they would be wholly or partially directly elected rather than appointed, I am sorry that he has not supported our proposal for directly elected commissioners.
Nicola Blackwood (Oxford West and Abingdon) (Con)
Given that the Home Affairs Committee found that SOCA managed to seize only £1 from organised crime gangs for every £15 of its budget, will the Home Secretary reassure us that her proposals for the national crime agency will be more effective in cutting not only crime, but waste?
Mrs May
I am happy to give that assurance to my hon. Friend. SOCA has built up expertise in intelligence gathering, but we need to do more. We need to put more focus in this country on fighting serious organised crime, which is what the command within the NCA will be able to do.
Hazel Blears (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)
The Home Secretary will know that effective policing in this country is absolutely dependent on good intelligence at every level. How will she ensure that the relationships between local authorities and the police, which are essential not only for neighbourhood policing, but for that golden thread of intelligence that goes all the way through to tackling terrorism, are maintained under her proposals?
Mrs May
I thank the right hon. Lady for her question and for raising the point about the golden thread that runs through policing. It is absolutely essential that we retain that golden thread from local neighbourhood policing all the way through to the work done at national level to fight serious organised crime, terrorism and so on. However, one of the points of introducing directly elected police and crime commissioners is to ensure that someone in each force has a direct responsibility to the people, which will ensure that they represent the needs of the people in local policing.
Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)
The Home Secretary has done what the Opposition failed to do—she has stood up to the vested interests and put the police under democratic control. Since she does not envisage allowing directly elected individuals to direct particular investigations, will she assure the House that she will not sign up to a European investigation order that would allow political appointees in other member states to do precisely that?
Caroline Flint (Don Valley) (Lab)
I thank the right hon. Lady for clarifying that the Government intend not to abolish SOCA, but rather to build on it. How will she ensure that efforts are made locally and regionally, whether by elected commissioners or chief constables, to focus on serious organised crime, so that the national agency can perform appropriately and for the benefit of the whole country?
Mrs May
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for raising that important point. Of course, individual police forces will still have a responsibility to deal with serious organised crime, but we need to strengthen that national co-ordination and tasking in relation to such crime, which is why we are bringing the serious organised crime command into the national crime agency. However, we are also looking at imposing strong duties of collaboration among police forces to ensure that, when collaboration across force boundaries is necessary to deal with issues such as serious organised crime, that does indeed take place.
Mr Mike Hancock (Portsmouth South) (LD)
Will the Home Secretary give an assurance to the House and police forces in England and Wales that they need not fear that they will be forced into amalgamations because of the changes, and that we are not going to resurrect the Labour party’s proposals from its last term in power?
Mrs May
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that point and for enabling me to put absolutely clearly on the record that this Government will not try to impose mergers on police forces. If police forces voluntarily wish to merge and come forward not only with a strong business case, but with clear indications that such a merger is supported by the local communities, we will of course look at that, but we will not, unlike the previous Government, try to impose mergers on forces.
Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)
May I welcome a number of the Home Secretary’s proposals today that are in keeping with recommendations made by the Select Committee on Home Affairs last year? I was going to say that she nicked the name of our last report for her White Paper, but I will be generous and say that she borrowed it. She is right about SOCA, and clearly, £79 million on National Policing Improvement Agency consultants is far too much, but will she give the House an assurance that, whatever the reorganisation entails, front-line policing will not be affected; that the number of officers on the front line will remain the same; that our fight against terrorism will be as strong as it has been over the past few years; and that we will not give in to the serious organised crime gangs?
Mrs May
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his questions, for the work that the Home Affairs Committee has done under his chairmanship and for the issues that it has identified, to which I referred in my statement. I can confirm to him—and it is clear in the document—that our work on counter-terrorism is a good example of forces coming together and working together, and we have no plans to change the arrangements that are in place. In relation to front-line policing, this Government want to strengthen it. We want to slash the bureaucracy and get the police where they should be—out on the streets.
Mr Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)
In setting up the new national crime agency, will my right hon. Friend ensure that it does not make the same mistakes as its predecessor bodies in setting artificial targets for the confiscation of the proceeds of crime, which have often led to inappropriate and wasteful proceedings?
Mr George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)
Can the Home Secretary tell the House whether she has had any independent assessment made of the likely impact of these proposals on crime rates?
Nadhim Zahawi (Stratford-on-Avon) (Con)
Can my right hon. Friend confirm that for elected commissioners to work in the court of public opinion they will have to have real teeth? I am pleased to hear that they will have the powers to hire and fire. Will she confirm that those powers will not be watered down in the legislation?
Sir Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)
Is the Home Secretary aware that while concern about the impact of crime will always be great among our constituents, in my constituency the police—led by Inspector Damian O’Reilly and his colleagues—have great achievements in reducing crime levels and improving detection rates in several categories? Does she accept that, if those achievements—achieved with the support of the Labour Government and Manchester Labour council—deteriorate in any way, it will be her cuts and her reorganisation that will be held responsible?
Mrs May
I of course commend the work that is being done on the ground by individual police officers, such as those whom the right hon. Gentleman mentioned. This Government want to strengthen the fight against crime. He returns—as did the shadow Home Secretary—to the issue of cuts. Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary reported last week that it thinks that it will be possible to find 12% budget cuts in the police force without affecting front-line policing. The reason that we are having to look at the sort of spending cuts across Government that we are—[Interruption.] Labour Front Benchers may groan, but they know that it is their fault: it is the legacy of the last Labour Government.
Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)
Does the Home Secretary agree that having directly elected police commissioners will help to improve the public’s trust and confidence in our police force by ensuring that the police listen to local people?
Mrs May
My hon. Friend makes an important and valid point. We need to restore that confidence and the link between the police and the public—the link that has sadly been damaged over the years by the increased bureaucracy and imposition from the centre under the last Labour Government. He is right that our proposals will increase the public’s confidence.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
There will be concerns about the possible disruption of activities against organised crime as a result of the changeover from SOCA to the national crime agency. What contact has the Home Secretary had with regional assemblies across the UK and can she give an assurance that the formation of the new agency will not mean a downgrading of the fight against crime in regions such as Northern Ireland?
Mrs May
We certainly wish to ensure that the fight against crime is in no way downgraded; indeed, the whole purpose of our proposals is to help to strengthen the fight against crime across the UK, as I have said in answer to a number of questions. The directly elected police commissioners will relate to England and Wales, and both the Minister for Police and I have had discussions with the Welsh Assembly.
Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)
In welcoming my right hon. Friend’s excellent statement, may I urge her to consider extending control to the Crown Prosecution Service? We saw in the earlier statement the difficulties that we have with the uniquely British system of having a prosecution organisation that is wholly independent of accountability.
Mrs May
I thank my hon. Friend for raising an important point. As their name suggests, the police and crime commissioners will have a responsibility that goes wider than simply the police force. We are looking at how they can work with, for example, community safety partnerships in local areas. However, we also envisage looking at the possibility of extending the remit of police and crime commissioners further in the criminal justice system. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Minister for Police is looking at that with both the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice.
Paul Goggins (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
May I press the Home Secretary for an answer on the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, which has established itself as a world leader in protecting children and finding perpetrators? All the evidence points to the need for an independent organisation focused on child protection. Why does she want to shoehorn CEOP into the national crime agency?
Mrs May
There is no suggestion of shoehorning anything. The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that CEOP has built up a significant reputation through the important work that it has done. I pay tribute to CEOP and Jim Gamble for everything that they have done in that area. However, we are not talking about shoehorning it into anything. What we are talking about is greater co-ordination across a range of activities under the national crime agency, and CEOP will be part of that.
Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)
May I congratulate the Home Secretary on her commitment to looking for a cost-effective way of re-establishing the single non-emergency number, 101? May I also urge her to undertake to build on the pilots already established in Hampshire and elsewhere, and roll out the number nationwide as quickly as possible, so that the general public can have a quick and easy way to report crime and antisocial behaviour, and an alternative to the overloaded 999 number?
Mrs May
I thank my hon. Friend for making an important point. Let me take this opportunity to put on record my thanks to him for the work that he did at an early stage of the introduction of the 101 number pilots. The 101 number is an important development, and we will do all that we can to ensure that we introduce it cost-effectively.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
Can the Home Secretary explain how having elected police commissioners will genuinely be a step forward for democracy when it is likely to lead to senior police officers being chosen not for their ability to do the job, but because of their party allegiance?
Mrs May
As the hon. Lady will know, the question of party allegiance does not arise in relation to chief constables, because members of the police force are not able to be members of political parties. We are absolutely clear that chief constables will retain their operational independence. It is important that they and the police in this country are able to operate without fear or favour, and we will maintain that. However, according to a Cabinet Office survey conducted under the last Labour Government, at the moment, only 7% of people in this country know that if they have a problem with the police, they can go to their police authority. We will clearly be ensuring democratic accountability for the police at local level through the introduction of police commissioners, although I am sorry that the hon. Lady has such a jaundiced view of the views of the British people.
Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)
As a special constable who served in the Cheshire constabulary, I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement about increasing the number of special constables. Does she agree that these unpaid volunteers are an excellent and cost-effective way to fight crime?
Mrs May
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising the issue of special constables. I thank him for what he did as a special constable and place on record the thanks of the whole House for the work that all special constables do in helping the fight against crime. They play an important role, and we intend to encourage more people to take it on.
Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)
Many of the improvements that the Home Secretary has talked about are already happening on the ground in Stoke-on-Trent, thanks to people such as Inspector Sharrard-Williams. Recently, however, the House might have seen a man who runs the British National party claiming that he has 1 million followers—that is, 1 million people voting BNP—in the UK. What happens when the BNP stands for one of these commissioner posts, as will happen, and gets it?
Mrs May
This is something that the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues have raised on a number of occasions, and I will give him two answers. If he looks at the voting record so far, he will see that the British National party has never managed to get more than 15% of the vote in an election. But let us set that to one side; I actually believe in trusting the people of this country.
Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)
I welcome the Home Secretary’s statement as a way of empowering communities and making our streets safe. With regard to unnecessary bureaucracy, what steps are being taken to review the work of the NPIA, which costs millions and achieves nothing, according to some senior police officers?
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
Neither the Home Secretary nor I would want to comment on ongoing investigations, but I hope she will agree that the Northumbria police force recently faced a huge and complex challenge and that it responded to it admirably, with the support of police forces across the north. Will she explain to me and my constituents how this top-down reorganisation, combined with cuts in central and local funding, will enable the Northumbria police force to rise to such challenges in the future?
Mrs May
The hon. Lady is absolutely right to say that I would not want to comment on the ongoing investigations into the recent work of Northumbria police in relation to Raoul Moat. I would say, however, that that was a good example of how a police force can bring in resources from elsewhere. It brought in resources from across the country, including from the Police Service of Northern Ireland, the Met and other local forces, in response to a very difficult situation involving a callous murderer, Raoul Moat. I would say to the hon. Lady that we are not imposing a top-down reorganisation; we are talking about restoring democratic accountability, which will enable the link between the police and the public to be restored.
Amber Rudd (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
What effect does my right hon. Friend expect the national crime agency’s border police force to have on the number of illegal immigrants, which the previous Government estimated to be around 700,000?
Mrs May
I thank my hon. Friend for her question. It has been a long-standing concern of ours that we need to strengthen our border protection through the introduction of a border police force. We will do that within the national crime agency, which will enable the work of border police force, bringing together the work of the UK Border Agency, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs and other agencies, to link in with the work of the serious organised crime command. That will not only strengthen our ability to protect our borders in the way that she suggests, but will enable us to protect this country against serious organised crime.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
What is the point of the Home Secretary giving a paean to police community support officers when she is overseeing a programme of cuts that has resulted in Durham constabulary announcing last week that it would have to remove 200 such officers?
Mrs May
I believe neighbourhood policing to be an important part of our police landscape. The work that can be done at local level by warranted officers and PCSOs forms an important part of the golden thread that runs from neighbourhood policing through to national issues. The hon. Lady mentioned cuts in police budgets. The in-year cut in police budgets this year is less than 1.5% across the country, and we all know why. This will probably be a cause for groans from Labour Members because they know what the answer is: those budgets have been made necessary by the legacy of economic mismanagement by the previous Labour Government.
Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con)
Last week, Staffordshire police authority announced the appointment of its first full-time chief executive, with a salary of £85,000. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the people of Staffordshire would rather have more influence over policing priorities than see the appointment of another unelected, unaccountable and expensive bureaucrat?
Mrs May
The whole point of the structure that we are proposing is that, after May 2012, there will be directly elected police and crime commissioners who will set the budget and the strategic plan for the police, and ensure that the decisions being taken are in line with the interests of the people and with fighting crime.
Yvonne Fovargue (Makerfield) (Lab)
Given the amount of sensitive information to which the elected commissioners will have access, will they undergo security clearance before standing for election? What would happen after the election if they were elected without the appropriate level of clearance?
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
Is the Home Secretary aware that the chief constable of Essex has said in a written statement that the opportunities presented by elected police commissioners include the potential for less cost, less bureaucracy and greater public clarity? Will she agree to meet the chief constable with me, and to support local people who believe in local democracy for local policing?
Mrs May
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for reporting to the House the comments of the chief constable of Essex, whom I would be delighted to meet. We have been meeting chief constables across England and Wales to discuss the proposals, but I would be happy to hear what he has been able to do to fight crime and reduce bureaucracy in Essex.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
The Home Secretary has not addressed the effect of police budget cuts on her ideas. Does she not agree that elected commissioners are already doomed to fail, as thousands of neighbourhood police and thousands more police community support officers, for instance in the Cleveland police force, are removed from the communities they have served so well?
Mrs May
No, I do not agree that that is the implication of what we are doing. I suggest that the hon. Gentleman speaks to the shadow Home Secretary, who, when challenged during the general election campaign to guarantee that there would be no cuts to the number of police officers under a Labour Government, simply said that he could not make such a guarantee.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
I thank the Home Secretary for making the statement now, because in past years such announcements were made during the recess when the House could not question a Minister. The UK Human Trafficking Centre in Sheffield is closed and has been incorporated into SOCA, which is now being closed and will become the NCA. Are the Government still committed to combating human trafficking?
Mrs May
Yes, we are indeed still committed to combating human trafficking. Setting up the national crime agency, with not only the serious organised crime command but the border police force and increasing broader protection, will, I believe, enable our fight against trafficking to be even stronger.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
Will the Home Secretary tell us how much directly elected police commissioners will cost?
Mrs May
I have already referred to that question, which was raised by the shadow Home Secretary. We will in due course publish figures about the cost of directly elected commissioners. As I have said elsewhere, the introduction of directly elected commissioners is not an attempt to make savings; it is a long-standing commitment, which we believe is necessary to reconnect policing and the public.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that these commissioners will not have a new paid bureaucracy created around them? Instead, might they be assisted by an unpaid advisory board?
Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)
Did the Tory party not claim to be the party of law and order in the past? Is the Home Secretary not embarrassed to be the first Tory Home Secretary to set out to undermine the police with the proposed cuts? Does she agree that gimmicks are no substitute for substance?
Mrs May
The police have been undermined by the way in which Whitehall has set them targets, and by having to look constantly to Whitehall in relation to what they do. Instead, they should respond to the needs of people in their local area. We are strengthening the ability of police to fight crime, slashing bureaucracy and enabling police officers to get out on to the streets, where the public want to see them.
Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)
Does the Home Secretary agree that the 101 phone number is an important tool in understanding real levels of crime, and that it is also effective in helping police officers to know where to tackle the problem areas in the community?
Mrs May
My hon. Friend makes an extremely valid point. The 101 phone number is important, and that is why we are considering introducing it nationally. The information that we will make available about crime at street level will also be important in helping people to tackle crime locally.
Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
Does the Home Secretary accept that there will have to be a reduction in the number of front-line police officers as a result of the additional cost of directly electing police commissioners?
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
I declare my interest as a special constable serving the British Transport police.
Given that half of all crime is committed by 10% of criminals, may I urge my right hon. Friend to consider that one of the best ways of promoting policing in the 21st century would be to ensure that persistent and prolific offenders served their full time in jail?
Mrs May
I commend my hon. Friend for his work as a special constable with the British Transport police. The work that they do is often forgotten, but it is an important part of the fight against crime and the job of keeping people safe.
I think that what we need to do to protect people from crime is ensure that when offenders have served their time, we can reduce the likelihood of their reoffending.
Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
Is the Home Secretary embarrassed about the fact that she has not even had time to figure out the cost of the separate police commissioner apparatus? What on earth has she got against good old-fashioned democratic local government as the best way of holding the police to account?
Mrs May
I have absolutely no embarrassment in coming to the House and making it clear that what we will do is restore democratic accountability to the police through the direct election of commissioners. The hon. Gentleman speaks of local government. As a former councillor, I believe that local government is an important part of the strength of government in this country, but I also believe that most people do not know what their police authority is, or that they can consult it with a problem relating to their policing. Now they will have an opportunity to vote directly for the individual who will be their police commissioner.
David Tredinnick (Bosworth) (Con)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on going for it and introducing directly elected commissioners. They have been very successful in other parts of the world, particularly the United States. However, has she thought about the situation that might arise if a directly elected commissioner had one policy and she had another, based on the national interest? How would that situation be resolved?
Mrs May
I thank my hon. Friend for raising that prospect. One of the purposes of directly elected commissioners is to be responsive to local needs. Of course it will be necessary to ensure that the collaboration between police forces that I referred to earlier can be undertaken when necessary, and that will also involve ensuring that national policing issues are addressed properly. However, it is not the Home Secretary who should determine what happens in regard to local policing—which is what happened under the Labour Government—but the directly elected commissioners.
Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab)
The cost of elections in Lancashire is expected to be at least £1 million. Given that the Home Secretary has just said that there is no money, can she tell us whether they will be paid for by the Treasury or by Lancashire taxpayers?
Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)
Now that her right hon. Friend the Justice Secretary has explained that crime fell under Labour because of a rise in living standards, by what measure does the Home Secretary estimate that crime will rise as a result of cuts in public services, the rise in VAT and rising unemployment? Will the direct election of commissioners mean higher living standards for anyone other than the commissioners themselves?
Mrs May
That was a slightly convoluted question, if I may say so. I believe that directly elected commissioners will ensure that the police forces in their areas are responsive to local needs rather than being responsive simply to the bureaucratic imposition from Whitehall, as they were under the Labour Government.
Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)
Notwithstanding the Home Secretary’s response to her hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (David Tredinnick), who gave the example of directly elected commissioners in the United States, is it not the case that, far from crime falling there, the United States has vastly larger crime totals than we do and vastly overcrowded prisons? Is it not also the case that once elected, the directly elected police commissioner tends to spend the next three years campaigning for re-election rather than tackling crime? Is that really the model that the Home Secretary wishes to introduce to this country?
Mrs May
I neither accept nor recognise the picture the hon. Lady paints of what happens with directly elected commissioners in other parts of the world. Labour Members who are so against directly elected commissioners should ask themselves two questions. First, why then do they support the arrangements we have in London, where the Mayor is directly accountable? Secondly, why was it, therefore, that in 2008 the then Labour Home Secretary brought forward proposals for directly elected police representatives?
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
If the Home Secretary will not tell us how much this is going to cost or where the money is coming from, will she at least tell my constituents in Selly Oak that she is not planning to pinch it from their hard-pressed police budgets?
Mrs May
I have answered the question about—[Interruption.] No, I have made it clear that we will publish figures in due course. As the hon. Gentleman will know, all Departments are going through the spending review at the moment and the budgets and other figures will be revealed later this year.
Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)
Given that 80% of the Northern Ireland public are aware of their police authority and Policing Board, has the Home Secretary any plans to replicate the mechanisms adopted in respect of the Policing Board for holding a chief police officer to account, namely having elected, as well as appointed, officials on the board who have regular monthly public meetings holding the chief of police to account? Is that not a better way forward than directly electing commissioners?
Mrs May
We did, of course, look at the arrangements in Northern Ireland, but what we propose to introduce in England and Wales will include a directly elected commissioner and a police and crime panel, which will be drawn from local authority representatives and independent people who will be able to ask the commissioner of police to appear before them and explain what has been happening in their area.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
The inevitable logic of what the Home Secretary has said this afternoon is that we should be electing not only police commissioners but the local chief prosecuting officer. Indeed, it seemed from what she was saying earlier that she was moving in that direction. Surely the last thing people want in any of our constituencies is more party political interference in the policing of this country.
Mrs May
We are not talking about party political interference in policing. The picture the hon. Gentleman has painted does not accurately portray what I was saying earlier about directly elected commissioners. The directly elected commissioners will be called police and crime commissioners and they will have a wider role than simply looking at what is happening in relation to their police force; they will be looking at crime more generally and working with community safety partners. We are, however, absolutely clear that the operational independence of the police will remain.
Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)
As I am the final questioner, may I take the opportunity to ask two central questions? First, how much will these initiatives cost and, secondly, by how much will they cut crime?
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to all hon. and right hon. Members, including the Home Secretary whose pithiness enabled more than 40 colleagues to ask questions on the statement; that was very welcome.
Points of Order
Kris Hopkins (Keighley) (Con)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. You will be aware of the recent Westminster Hall debate in which we were reminded that one party with representatives elected to this House still refuses to take up its seats yet claims its allowances and expenses. May I ask you to make a ruling as to how we can bring this shameful activity to an end? Do you not agree that it is an affront to Members who believe that it is a privilege to serve and debate in this House, and that it is not, as some others believe, possible to be an associated Member of the Houses of Parliament?
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his point of order, and I respect the fact that there is concern about this issue in some sections of the House. First, I am of course aware that there has recently been a Westminster Hall debate on the subject—on 30 June if memory serves me correctly. Secondly, this is a matter for the House. The hon. Gentleman might be aware—and other Members will certainly be conscious of this—that a resolution of the House regarding the use of facilities and the ability to claim expenses that touched on precisely the matter that is of concern to him was passed on 18 December 2001. If the House wishes at any stage to consider this matter again and to debate and vote upon a resolution, it will, of course, be entirely open to the House to do so. This is, therefore, a matter not for the Speaker but for the House. I hope that is helpful.
Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. I welcome what you have just said, which clarifies matters. It might be worth my pointing out that there are Members on both sides of the House who share this concern and would like to see this measure come back to the House, as those of us who voted against it last time might find ourselves in the majority this time.
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that. As she is well aware, she has helpfully underlined and reinforced the point that the hon. Member for Keighley (Kris Hopkins) has just made. It is always a pleasure to be in agreement with the hon. Lady.
Caroline Flint (Don Valley) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. On 8 July, I received a written answer from the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt), assuring me that this week a report would be published on research and statistics
“relating both to false allegations of rape and to other relevant issues.”—[Official Report, 8 July 2010; Vol. 513, c. 428W.]
I have two unanswered written questions, in which I was pursuing whether or not the Government would be making legislative proposals. However, I read in The Sunday Telegraph that an
“MoJ source said: ‘We will certainly not be legislating’”
on this issue, and that the Government do not plan to publish the evidence, about which they certainly responded in their answer of 8 July to my question. Although I welcome a U-turn by the Government on this issue, is it in order that they have failed to come to the House to tell us comprehensively what they intend to do on this proposal and how they intend to move forward and let Members on both sides of the House receive information at first hand, rather than through the press?
Mr Speaker
What I would say in response to the right hon. Lady is that the timing of Government statements to the House is a matter specifically for the Government. I hope that I have understood the right hon. Lady correctly with reference to the questions that she has tabled, and what I would say is that if she has not received answers—or, at any rate, substantive answers—to questions, I would very much hope that substantive answers will be forthcoming before the House rises for the summer recess. I very much hope that Ministers from the Ministry of Justice have heard—if they have not heard, I hope that they will hear shortly—precisely what I have just said. That approach seems to me to be conducive to the good conduct of business of the House.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. During questions the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport made reference, in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Paul Farrelly), to the political affiliations of the chairman of the BBC Trust and the chairman of Ofcom. Subsequently, in answer to a supplementary question from me asking whether or not he was calling into question their impartiality, he went on to claim that a number of appointments to non-departmental public bodies under the previous Administration had been made in a politically biased way, despite the fact that proper procedures had been put in place for public appointments during the previous Parliament. Given your ruling that when Ministers speak from the Dispatch Box they are speaking on behalf of the Government, can we have a statement from the Government on whether or not they believe that public appointments made under the previous Administration were made for political reasons and were not made through the proper public appointments procedures, which were set up and in place, and on whether they have confidence in those public appointments?
Mr Speaker
It is always a pleasure to hear points of order from the hon. Gentleman. Something tells me that at least in part of his point of order—I will be generous and say “in part”—he was seeking to continue an earlier argument. That in itself would not constitute a point of order and might almost risk becoming disorderly. What I would say, which may be of interest to him and to others in the House, is that when reference is made to individuals outside this place, such reference should be made with care, restraint and circumspection. I hope that that is helpful to the hon. Gentleman.
Bills presented
Local Referendums Bill
Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No. 57)
Zac Goldsmith presented a Bill to make provision about binding local referendums; and for connected purposes.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 3 December, and to be printed (Bill 66).
Recall of Elected Representatives
Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No. 57)
Zac Goldsmith presented a Bill to permit voters to recall their elected representatives in specified circumstances; and for connected purposes.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 3 December, and to be printed (Bill 67).
Academies Bill [Lords]
(13 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
19:25 - The Committee divided: - Ayes: 229 / Noes: 303 - Question accordingly negatived.
19:39 - The Committee divided: - Ayes: 227 / Noes: 310 - Question accordingly negatived.
21:00 - The Committee divided: - Ayes: 319 / Noes: 222 - Question accordingly agreed to.
21:13 - The Committee divided: - Ayes: 223 / Noes: 315 - Question accordingly negatived.
21:59 - The House divided: - Ayes: 0 / Noes: 0 - Question accordingly agreed to.
Dr John Pugh (Southport) (LD)
I beg to move amendment 8, page 3, line 11, at end insert—
‘(1A) In the case of a member or members of a governing body objecting to an application under subsection (1), there shall be a ballot of the parents of children enrolled at the school, subject to regulations laid down by the Secretary of State.’.
The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans)
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Amendment 78, page 3, line 11, at end insert—
‘(1A) Before making an application for an Academy order, the governing body shall consult relevant parties on whether to make such an application.
(1B) The Secretary of State shall issue guidance as to how governing bodies should conduct such a consultation with parents, pupils, teaching and non-teaching staff and their representatives, neighbouring schools and the local authority and such other parties as he may think appropriate and such guidance must also specify the information to be made available to consultees in relation to the proposed arrangements for Academy status.’.
Amendment 4, in clause 5, page 4, line 11, leave out ‘such’ and insert—
(a) the local education authority,
(b) the teachers at the school,
(c) the pupils,
(d) the pupils’ parents,
(e) such persons as in their opinion represent the wider community, and
(f) such other’.
Amendment 18, page 4, line 11, at end insert ‘including the local authority for that area.’.
Amendment 77, page 4, line 14, leave out ‘may take place before or after an Academy order, or’ and insert ‘must take place before’.
Amendment 9, page 4, line 14, leave out ‘an Academy order, or’.
Amendment 86, page 4, line 14, leave out subsection (3).
Amendment 10, page 4, line 15, at end add—
‘(4) Consultation on Academy status should not be led by any member of a governing body who may benefit financially as a result of conversion to Academy status or whose salary, terms or conditions may be affected by such conversion.’.
New clause 1—Reversion of Academies to maintained status—
(1) This section applies to any former maintained school which has been converted into an Academy under section 4.
(2) The governing body must make arrangements for the holding of a ballot of parents under this section if at least 10 per cent of the parents of pupils at the Academy request it to do so.
(3) The purpose of a ballot under this section is to determine whether the parents of pupils at the Academy want the Academy to be converted into a maintained school.
(4) If the result of the ballot is in favour of conversion, the Secretary of State must—
(a) revoke the Academy order, and
(b) take such other steps as he considers necessary to convert the Academy into a maintained school.’.
Dr Pugh
When were elected this May—God, it seems years ago—we all knew that there was some prospect that politics in this place might never be quite the same again. Many of us, frankly, welcomed that. The huge and welcome influx of new Members gave us all hope that things could possibly be different. That, along with the odd arithmetic of this place and the challenging nature of the country’s problems, seemed to dictate that the way ahead would be through rational consensus and for a while—all too short a while—it appeared that tribalism and command-and-control politics were dead; the Chamber and Committees would be important and policy would have to be evidence-led, much to the disappointment of the media, whose preference is always for a good scrap.
What do we have with amendments to the Bill, however? We have the spectacle of Ministers who have already told us that they will accept no amendment, period, and the sight of Whips new and old cracking their knuckles off-stage and perfecting basilisk-like stares in the mirror, persuading people not to vote for amendments such as amendment 8 and others that, it could be argued, align with the spirit and improve the detail of the Bill. Paradoxically, they are doing that because they assume that is how coalition politics work. I say paradoxically, because the amendment-denying Ministers in front of us, whose agents the Whips are, seem to be the most mature, civilised and benign advocates of the new politics. I personally cannot associate myself with the recent comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron); nor can I afford to drink in the Boot and Flogger. I am simply moving an amendment with which the Committee should be comfortable and, frankly, which any Member of any party can and should be free to support.
In the event of a governing body being divided, amendment 8 obliges a school to hold a ballot if a governor or a minority of governors object to an application for academy status. It therefore provides a restraint on a motivated group of governors misrepresenting or riding roughshod over parents’ wishes.
Mr Evans, you might recall that under Mrs Thatcher, in the Education Reform Act 1988, a parental ballot was an essential precondition of the change to grant-maintained status in any school. There were votes across the country on those matters. Sadly, subsequent Governments seem to have lost interest in the views of parents and, in my view, have disempowered parents, with one exception. Tony Blair insisted that the change from grammar school status required a parental ballot and that condition survives and is effectively incorporated in this Bill.
Can anyone in this Chamber give me an argument for why grammar school parents should be balloted before the status of their school changes and parents of children at other schools should not? I am at a loss to find such an argument. Why should grammar school parents have a right that primary school parents, comprehensive school parents and special school parents do not have? Will anyone agree with the former and present me with a good argument for voting against the latter?
Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)
Presumably, the reason is that a change from grammar school to non-grammar school involves a change in admission arrangements for the cohort coming in the new year. With an academy, the admissions code remains the same and all that effectively happens is that the school organisation changes.
Mr Mike Hancock (Portsmouth South) (LD)
Does my hon. Friend accept the suggestion that there are to be no ballots because most of them might be lost if parents knew all the facts? That situation is being avoided simply by not making provision for a ballot in the first place.
Dr Pugh
My hon. Friend suggests a cynical intention on the part of Ministers and I hesitate to endorse that. People must reach their own conclusions as to whether such an intention is present.
Is anyone going to give hon. Members a good reason to vote against my amendment, which would not even give parents the same rights as the parents of children at grammar schools but would be conditional on a governor objecting to proposals? I cannot for the life of me see why anyone would vote against it, but I suspect that nearly 300 will.
Let me be clear that I have no prejudice against grammar schools. I went to three of them—expelled from none, I hasten to add—and I taught happily at an ex-direct grant, independent school for 15 years. I am agnostic about educational structure and this is just a matter of logical consistency. In our debates on this issue, the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing) has called on the Opposition to
“acknowledge that parents should be the people who have the greatest say in their children's education”.—[Official Report, 19 July 2010; Vol. 514, c. 43.]
The hon. Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson) has accused Labour of not trusting people
“with the education of their own children.”—[Official Report, 19 July 2010; Vol. 514, c. 118.]
And the Minister has claimed that he wants to ensure that parents are “happy with the quality” of educational provision. The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Mr Brady) has assured us that
“the Conservative Front-Bench team takes the view that parents should have more choice”.—[Official Report, 21 July 2010; Vol. 514, c. 444.]
They are all wise and experienced politicians who must know, as we all do, that governing bodies can sometimes splinter, be out of touch or be monopolised or taken over by cliques, particularly given the current chronic shortage of governors nationally; it is quite difficult to get people to become governors. Governing bodies also can and might misread parental opinion.
There is a general concern, which I share, about people who are temporarily and contingently nominated as the governors of a state school being entitled unilaterally to change the status of an asset that is paid for and financed by the whole community without the consent of that community or its elected representatives. Setting that concern aside, however, changing the status of a school without allowing the parents of children at the school a decisive voice is extraordinarily hard to justify, especially given the discretionary and entirely unspecific nature of the consultation arrangements in the Bill. The only motive that I can see for opposing my amendment, other than the dishonourable motive that my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock) has suggested, is a relative indifference to parental wishes.
Mr Hancock
Does my hon. Friend agree that if the possibility of a ballot taking place arose, it should not be just the parents of children at the existing school who were allowed to vote? It would have to be wider than that and take in the parents of children in feeder schools, as they would be the major beneficiaries, and if not them, the wider community as a whole. As we have argued time and again in our debates on this issue, secondary schools are a focal point in many communities and offer more than the teaching of children.
Dr Pugh
I am arguing simply that we should be at least as permissive as Baroness Thatcher was in 1988. My hon. Friend argues that we should be more permissive, but the Government are arguing, and anyone who votes against my amendment will clearly be convinced by that argument, that we should be less permissive.
Amendment 9 would delete the words “an Academy order, or”, the effect of which would be to ensure that consultation on academy status would have to occur prior to the order being made. It is good common sense and, in essence, it is supported by the Chair of the Education Committee. As he said on Second Reading:
“The Government’s concession in clause 5 at least makes governing bodies consult those whom they deem appropriate, but it is blunted by the fact that they do not have to do so prior to applying to the Secretary of State and because they can do so even after they have been issued with an academy order. Those consulted in such circumstances would have good grounds for feeling that they were participating in a charade.”—[Official Report, 19 July 2010; Vol. 514, c. 49.]
I do not think that it is our business in this place to encourage charades.
I am aware that, from time to time, it suits Members to parody, simplify and stereotype their opponents. The last Government are characteristically portrayed by the current Government as an unmitigated disaster and, in return, Labour Members portray the Government as an unmitigated evil. If people want to live in a world of hyperbole, that is fine—if a little wearisome—but let us conduct a simple thought experiment. Let us imagine a Government—any Government—different from ours, who propose to allow a public institution to change its character. They agree that the institution must consult people about the change, but they allow consultation only after the irreversible change has happened. Would Members back such a Government? Would they applaud them? What would be the point of consultation? What would that process do for public cynicism about public service consultation—already significantly eroded by the pseudo and sham consultations organised by the previous Government? But on the coalition side of the Chamber, how many quotes—showing our previous attacks, time and again, on sham consultation—do we want dragged up and used against us? At least those consultations did not take place after the event. Why do we want to invite comparison with the twisted politics of a communist plebiscite?
Is the only reason why we support the provision that the Government are proposing it? I notice that no one has said that post-hoc consultation is a cracking idea. It cannot be a case of “my Government right or wrong”. That is not a good basis for a working democracy. It will not help the Government if we vote for indefensible nonsense. It will not help the Government if we vote, but compromise our beliefs in the process. Inconsistency and duff arguments will not help the coalition in the long or short term.
Amendment 10 is genuinely probing. It makes the obvious and, for me, slightly unkind point that the last time schools were given greater financial freedoms under local financial management, which I have always supported, nearly every governing body was presented with a paper from the headmaster showing that his salary should go up because the headmaster down the road would be getting a significant increase. We saw salary inflation across the headmaster class, so headmasters may have something to look forward to from new academy status. Of course, they may not think in those terms, and I am sure that the majority do not, but the point is pretty obvious to all of us—imagine asking MPs to consult on a change that might possibly result in improved salaries. The concept of declaration of interest has some relevance in these provisions, so it is important that consultation is led by those who have none.
I acknowledge that I have not shown a lot of enthusiasm for the Bill, but despite that and despite my doubts as to its cost and effects, I am not seeking to derail it. I do not wish to cause trouble. Free schools and academies are in the coalition agreement. All I hope I have done is to make a case for good sense, which I think most people are up for, the primacy of the Commons Chamber, which I think most of us support, and the right of parents to be taken seriously. I hope rational beings on both sides of the Committee will see their way to supporting the amendment.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
I want to speak to new clause 1, on the reversion of academies to maintained status, and amendment 4, on consultation on conversion to an academy. I shall concentrate the majority of my remarks on new clause 1, and will speak only briefly to amendment 4, as consultation has been pretty much covered in our previous debates.
I tabled new clause 1 because there is no provision in the Bill for academies to revert to maintained status. That means that all the potential problems that the Bill would permit—such as restrictive curriculum, discriminatory admissions and employment policies—would be made permanent at the point of conversion. The Government admit that problems are likely. I have cited this before, but it bears repeating that the Minister responding for the Government in a debate in the other place stated:
“I fully accept that if you trust people things do go wrong, but that is the direction that we want to try to go in.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 7 July 2010; Vol. 720, c. 299.]
It beggars belief that the Government would not want to guard against certain things going wrong, so is it really necessary to give schools complete freedom over admissions, curriculum and employment just to show that the dedicated people running our schools are trusted? I would argue not. The public are funding these schools, so on their behalf we must ensure that children are protected from indoctrination, that they are taught key subjects and that their staff are fairly treated. But given the Bill’s failure to make proper consultation mandatory when schools convert to academy status, it is crucial to have a mechanism for parents to say that they want their schools to revert to maintained status if, as an academy, things do go wrong.
The Government want academies to be like private schools funded by the state, yet if things go wrong at a private school, parents have more recourse than parents of children at an academy as envisaged in the Bill. For example, if a private school behaves in a way that a parent does not like, the parent can stop paying the fees, withdraw their child or pay for their child to go somewhere else. There is no comparable control in the Bill for parents of children in academies. For example, it may well not be practical or possible for there to be the surplus capacity necessary for children to be pulled out of one academy and be sent to the next state-funded school of choice.
If parents see things going wrong in schools and believe that the Government’s complete trust has been misplaced, surely they should be able to do something about it. The amendment is designed to provide a remedy to parents as a group—if, for example, an academy failed to teach key subjects or sought to impose religious beliefs on pupils. The amendment means that where 10% of the parents of pupils at an academy request it, the governing body must make arrangements for the holding of a ballot of parents to determine whether they want the academy to be converted back into a maintained school. If the Government are in favour of decentralising, as they constantly say they are with their big society rhetoric, why do they not want to let parents have the power to act if they decide that an academy is not better and if they want the school to go back to being a maintained school?
Mr Edward Timpson (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)
On the practical aspects of the amendment, as opposed to the principle that the hon. Lady has already articulated, will she explain why she arrived at the 10% figure as a threshold before a ballot is triggered? As to the ballot itself, once the mechanism is in place, what majority would apply to the ballot—50% or more—before academy status could be withdrawn?
Caroline Lucas
I am grateful that the hon. Gentleman takes the amendment sufficiently seriously to want to know such a level of detail, which is very encouraging. It seemed to me that 10% was a reasonable threshold, but I would be delighted to discuss the issue in more detail with other Members who might want a slightly higher threshold—I would not have thought we would want to make it lower— and I am equally open to suggestions as to the necessary majority. Perhaps a simple majority would not be enough and a two thirds majority might be better. At the moment, however, I am using the amendment to set out a basic principle.
Vernon Coaker (Gedling) (Lab)
I think that the hon. Lady’s amendment puts forward a good point. However, does not the intervention from the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mr Timpson) highlight the problem with the process that we have to go through in that the hon. Lady could have the most brilliant idea ever and be like Cicero in presenting it, but it would make no difference at all because there is no Report stage for the Government to consider her point and table appropriate amendments?
Caroline Lucas
I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for coming to the rescue. That was an exceedingly good point, which completely reinforces the fact that we are being forced to rush the Bill through at breakneck speed for no better reason than, presumably, the Secretary of State wanting to put a notch up and say that he has managed to achieve something before September. That is not a good way to make decisions. We should be going through the Bill line by line, making proposals and hearing the Government’s response so that we are able to create the best possible legislation. We are being railroaded into a charade that is not designed to get the best piece of legislation on to the statute book, and that is what we should be getting.
Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
It was a pleasure to hear the hon. Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) looking back with such fond nostalgia to those democratic, halcyon days of the Baroness Thatcher of Kesteven. I did not know that he cared quite as much, but it was a wonderful trip down memory lane. I have a lot of sympathy with the hon. Gentleman in usually favouring democratic solutions and thinking that consultation is good and voting better, but sometimes the best can be the enemy of the good. What we have from Ministers is the opportunity for schools that so wish to obtain greater freedom to serve their pupils, parents and the wider community by having more to spend of the money that is properly theirs in the educational budget, and greater freedom to decide who they employ and how, and what they do in the classroom.
The Bill does not, as the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) suggests, set up some kind of complete freedom, whereby iconoclasts can seize control of a school and ignore all kinds of standards and requirements; those schools will still be within the state sector, monitored and regulated, and they will still need to achieve standards. There will be a great deal of interest from the local community, but there will still be the national regulatory scheme, too, so the hon. Lady was just trying to shock the Committee and is not living in the real world.
Caroline Lucas
Is it not the case that, if one gives academies the right to choose their own curriculum and opt out in so many respects from the local authority, one is giving them exactly those freedoms? I do not think that anything that I have said is designed to shock; my remarks exactly reflect the Bill. It will give academies incredible freedoms that other schools do not enjoy, and it will have huge ramifications for the rest of the local authority, as academies drain resources from it and from other schools. That is why consultation is so important.
Mr Redwood
That is a completely different argument from the one that the hon. Lady made in her speech, in which she said that these schools would be free of all checks, balances, regulation, inspection and control, and that they would go wrong. She seemed to be implying that we were giving schools the freedom to do badly. That is a particularly fatuous argument, because parents have considerable influence through governors and through their own voice, and they would take a great deal of interest. The number of pupils applying to go to the school would drop off very rapidly if the kind of disaster that she envisaged in her remarks came true, so I do not see that happening. I think that a combination of national regulation, the framework of law and local pressure would, on the whole, be benign.
Now the hon. Lady is arguing a rather different case—that these academies are going to be so successful, because they have all these excellent freedoms, that they will attract more and more people from the local community at the expense of the other schools in the area. I wish it were so. I do not think they will be that successful and take all the pupils from the local area, but if they are very good, I welcome the fact that more people will want to send their children there. That is a benign pressure to place on the other schools in the local area. It may be, however, that some of the more traditionally maintained schools act as the beacon that she would like to see.
Caroline Lucas
To clarify my point, I am talking about the fact that these schools will drain resources away from other schools. That is already happening in my constituency with the existing academies established under the previous Government, and it will happen even more under the new Government’s proposals. I am talking about resources coming out of other schools because academies will essentially outsource things such as special educational needs provision and other co-ordinating methods that were usually undertaken by the local authority. That means that the local authority will have less money to perform those same roles.
Mr Redwood
The main mechanism by which academies could take more of the money would be by their being extremely popular and attracting more pupils, because most of the money follows the pupils. That is a thoroughly benign pressure. If these academies are going to take off and develop extremely good standards and reputations, they will attract more pupils and get more money, which they will need because they are teaching more pupils, and the other schools will need to pull their socks up. If the outcome is not as successful as that, the hon. Lady’s worries should fall away. Surely she must accept, however, that we need some challenge and improvement in the system, and that there is nothing wrong with choice.
Why is it that someone like the hon. Lady does not trust anybody other than the state and is never prepared to give anybody any freedom to initiate, innovate, change and improve? Cannot she see that we desperately need to raise school standards, and that we need to do something to try to make that happen? Her system was tried for 13 years, and it did not work.
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)
The right hon. Gentleman’s point about trust is unfortunate, to say the least. Governing bodies do not always get these things right, and that is why some kind of mechanism needs to be in place. The amendments are trying to achieve that and to remedy some of the problems caused by our not having enough time to do the job properly in Committee.
Mr Redwood
I have said that I love democracy, and it is often a good idea to give more people more votes. However, let me deal directly with the issue. Parents are not without powers or influence in this situation; if they were, I would immediately sign up to the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Southport. I suspect, however, that Ministers will argue, like me, that it would be a nice addition but is unnecessary because there are other checks and balances in the system.
Let us consider those elements. First, there is an elected local authority that will have a lot of influence and control over these schools. Its voice will be heard because it has considerable influence over the appointments of the very people who will be making this proposal or decision for each school. The local authority often has members on the governing body, and the governing body has parent representatives. If the parents became alarmed by the way in which the head teacher and the senior governors were moving, they would presumably make their voice heard through the parent governors or use their ability to change those governors to make the point.
Pat Glass (North West Durham) (Lab)
The evidence suggests that it takes seven years for a school to gain or lose a reputation, so it is not correct to say that the parents have this power to change things immediately. That is not going to happen—it will take a long time, and in the meantime children will lose out.
Mr Redwood
That may well be the case generally, but not in this situation. Changing to an academy is a one-off event of some significance in a school’s life, so parents would be well aware of it and the school would communicate with them. If the parents were alarmed, I am sure they would make their views known. I know that parents of children in my local area are well attuned to what is happening in their local school, and if they are alarmed by something that is going on, they soon raise it. They can do so directly with their councillors, with their MP or with the school’s governors.
Mr Mike Hancock
I understand and accept entirely the right hon. Gentleman’s point about the checks and balances being in place once a school is created, but the amendment is about whether people should have a choice about such a school being set up. Is he saying that the parents of potential pupils at such a school should not have a say in whether it should change its status? He is perfectly right about what happens after the event, but this is about what happens before the change.
Mr Redwood
If an entirely new school is being set up, it is up to the people putting forward that proposition to make their own decisions and canvass the marketplace to see whether people are likely to go to it. If there is a proposal to change a school’s status, parental opinion is very important, but I suggest that under the system set out in the Bill, which develops the current system, there will be plenty of opportunity for parents to make their views known. They can do that directly by talking or writing to the head teacher or governors, or they can get different people on to the governing body if they are really worried.
My experience is that people care desperately about the education of their children, and if they thought that the head teacher and the small group in the governing body who were trying to steer a change through were getting it wrong, they would make their views known very strongly. I suspect that the head and the governing body would moderate their stance or back off if they felt they had lost the confidence of their pupils and parents.
Dr Pugh
The right hon. Gentleman is sketching out various alternatives to a more democratic arrangement. I understand his argument, but is he not also making an overwhelming argument not to proceed in September? All the things that he asks parents to do cannot be done, because the parents are on holiday and the school is shut.
Mr Redwood
It cannot be done on that short a time scale—these things will take a bit of time to go through. As soon as schools want to make a proposal, they will have to put in an application, and of course they will notify parents at that time. It is quite possible for them to do so by e-mail or post in the school holidays, and the schools will be back in September, when there will be opportunities for the dialogue to continue.
Mr Iain Wright (Hartlepool) (Lab)
The right hon. Gentleman is being most generous in giving way. May I point him to paragraph 7 of the explanatory notes accompanying the Bill? It states:
“The Secretary of State expects that a significant number of Academies will open in September 2010 and for the number to continue to grow each year.”
As the hon. Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) says, there is simply not the time to consult in the way that the right hon. Gentleman suggests.
Mr Redwood
I think hon. Members are making obstacles where none need occur. Changes will go speedily only if the local community is happy. As soon as it gets out that a school is considering academy status, the local community will be engaged. There are local newspapers, local websites and all sorts of ways to do so, and the usual school grapevines will be in operation.
Opposition Members protest far too much—we all know they hate freedom, and they do not believe that free people can mobilise themselves in a good cause. I can assure them that people can do so very quickly if need arises. They should not be so afraid of the idea that their local schools might want a bit more freedom and a bit more of their own money to spend. It is dreadful that they believe that all their local schools need so much control from the centre that they want ever more regulation and control from Whitehall of the kind that Labour Governments meted out, and continued or increased control from local education authorities in the hope that one day there will be more Labour authorities to exercise it.
Surely it is high time that we set free the schools that wish to be set free. I can assure the Committee that should groups of parents not wish a change to academy status to happen, they will mobilise quickly and democracy will work. It is still alive and kicking.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
I, too, would like to consider the serious lack of consultation required before establishing an academy, as outlined in clauses 3 and 5. I share the concern of not only other hon. Members, but teachers, parents and other stakeholders, who fear that they could be excluded from the whole process at the whim of just over half a governing body—that could be five, six, seven or eight people—intent on establishing an academy.
Mr Redwood
Why does the hon. Gentleman think that there will be so many schools with governing bodies and head teachers that are completely out of touch with their local parents and want to ride roughshod over them?
Alex Cunningham
That is straightforward. Parents have always made good decisions when electing parent governors, but they have to be able to make bigger decisions, and I believe that they should be consulted.
The Government have chosen to ignore genuine concerns about the Bill. That is not new politics, but old politics of the worst type. Rushed legislation makes bad law. In the words of the National Association of Head Teachers, legislate in haste, repent at leisure. I therefore hope that the amendments that would compel governing bodies to consult parents, among others, will be supported.
Dan Rogerson (North Cornwall) (LD)
I welcome you back to the Chair on the third day of our Committee proceedings, Ms Primarolo.
My hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) presented a strong argument, which the Minister clearly needs to answer, on whether the Bill currently goes far enough in giving those who care about the future of their school the opportunity to be involved in determining it. My hon. Friend set out the case for a ballot and looked back to the previous Conservative Government’s decisions about grant-maintained status, which he looked to as a model. Like other hon. Members, he acknowledged that our noble Friends in another place debated consultation at length, hence the provision, which should have been included from the outset, for consultation. The hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) mentioned it, and it has improved the Bill a great deal.
My hon. Friend referred to the parents of children who currently attend the school as the electorate in such a ballot. As my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock) pointed out, many other interested parties may wish to be part of it. I therefore think that amendment 8 is a very useful tool for prompting a discussion on who should be consulted and how.
We are considering a series of amendments, which examine consultation and votes in detail. The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) tabled a new clause, which would allow for a reversion to maintained status if there were a trigger. She set out a 10% threshold on that. We could make some sort of hybrid amendment that sets out a 10% threshold of parents to trigger the kind of ballot that my hon. Friend the Member for Southport mentioned, or adopt a model based on the amendments tabled by the Opposition, which are more specific on who should be consulted and how that should happen. The debate is therefore important.
Vernon Coaker
The hon. Gentleman makes a perfectly reasonable point, but the problem is that we cannot amend the Bill unless we win a vote. That is the problem with this process. Frankly, we all feel immense frustration. His point is exactly right, but we cannot amend the Bill.
Dan Rogerson
The hon. Gentleman has made that point on a number of occasions—this afternoon and previously—but the fact remains that it is a question not just of whether we amend the Bill, but how we do so. That is what we are debating. When the Minister responds, he might say what the guidelines are for consultation on aspects of the Bill following debates in another place.
Amendment 8, which was moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Southport, is quite specific about one group of people who will be affected and who may take an interest.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
I take the point that the hon. Gentleman and others have made on the importance of consulting parents, but surely the Bill already ensures that they will be consulted. Clause 5 is clear that people “must” be consulted. It is also clear that people refers to “such persons as” the governors “think appropriate”. Surely to goodness no one would suggest that parents do not fall under the phrase,
“persons as they think appropriate”.
Dan Rogerson
The hon. Gentleman made that point in an earlier debate on another group of amendments. He is absolutely right that the Bill, as amended—amendments that were pressed for by my noble Friends in another place—would highlight parents as an obvious, key group for consultation. The question asked in amendment 8 by my hon. Friend the Member for Southport is whether there should be a ballot.
Who should trigger such a ballot? There may be some sympathy for the proposal of the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion for a reversal ballot—she suggests that 10% of parents could trigger such a ballot, but my hon. Friend said that an approval ballot should be triggered by one governor. However, one would have thought that even if a governing body, who might have signed up to academy status after a discussion lasting for a considerable period, decides to go for academy status, people outside that group may want a ballot. There are therefore problems with his proposal.
Sammy Wilson
Whether the threshold of one governor or 10% of parents is used to trigger a ballot, does the hon. Gentleman see the danger of a type of guerrilla warfare against a school? Ten per cent. of parents or one governor are very low thresholds. They could keep the debate going on for ever, which only introduces uncertainty on the school’s status.
Dan Rogerson
As a seasoned political campaigner, the hon. Gentleman is well aware of the possibilities that are open to anyone at that point.
Dr Pugh
I do not want to accuse the hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) of complete nonsense, but the gist of amendment 8 is a procedure for dealing with an objection. If a governor disagrees, there would be a ballot. The ballot would decide on that objection, and that would be the end of the matter. The hon. Gentleman said that a governor could keep the debate going for ever, but they cannot do so. That is not what the amendment proposes.
Dan Rogerson
My hon. Friend is right that amendment 8 sets out such a procedure, but the question is whether we should adopt it and whether it will allow everybody who might want a ballot to trigger one.
Dan Rogerson
I should like to make a little progress, after which I will happily give way to the hon. Gentleman, who I hope will contribute to the debate on this group of amendments.
The key question is this: do we feel that there is enough consultation provision in the Bill? There is also an issue of timing, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Southport and others referred when speaking to amendment 9. Is it possible to have meaningful consultation after an application has been made to the Secretary of State? In the debate in the other place this issue was addressed, and, as I recall, it is the signing of the funding agreement that makes things final. Therefore, should consultation reveal that everyone in the wider community is horrified by the idea of the school becoming an academy, there would be the option not to proceed. In other words, before the final funding agreement is signed, the application could be withdrawn and the process stopped at that point. There is a misunderstanding about when the point of no return is reached. It is not when the application is approved, but when the funding agreement is signed.
Mr Mike Hancock
I hope that my hon. Friend does not find my intervention unhelpful, although he might—[Laughter.] Does he agree that the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) go to the heart of the old Liberal adage about giving people a choice and a chance to have their say? Anything short of support for that would fly in the face of many of the things that we have stood for over the years.
Dan Rogerson
Against my hon. Friend’s possible intention, that was a helpful intervention as it gives me the opportunity to repeat the point that the amendment is about one particular group of people who would be involved in the vote, not others who would also be affected—a point that he made in an intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Southport. It is therefore important that the consultation should be as wide-ranging as possible, but it should take place before the final funding agreement has been signed. It is in that period that a meaningful consultation can take place because there is something to consult on.
Mr Redwood
If there were a good head teacher in a good school who recommended a transition to academy status, a ballot called with a 40% turn-out and 21% of the parents said no to academy status and 19% said yes, would the head master have to resign? Could the head teacher be lost because his proposal had been rejected?
Dan Rogerson
We are moving into uncharted territory with the suggestion of motions of no confidence in head teachers and legislating on that point. It is an interesting point.
I hope that the Minister can tell us how the consultation process will be supported and how it can move forward. I hope that he can reassure the Committee—as those in the other place were reassured—that consultation will be meaningful and allow everyone to have their say. Hon. Members have already raised concerns about the time scale over the summer for those who wish to take early advantage of these measures, and there are schools which do want to take this route. I would be interested if the Minister could say how we can ensure that that consultation is meaningful in those instances.
Amendment 9 is an important one in the context of consultation. It is possible to have that consultation after the application has been made. Amendment 9 would require the consultation to take place between the application and approval by the Secretary of State. It is fair to say that there may have been some discussions already between the Secretary of State and the Department and the schools that started this process before the Bill was introduced. It is possible theoretically therefore that approval could be given quickly. The amendment would narrow the window for consultation between the application being made and being granted by the Secretary of State. If that happened in a short space of time, there would be no time for consultation. We need the consultation to be able to proceed until the signing of the final agreement, which is the agreement that creates the academy and concludes the process.
Dr Pugh
Does it not follow that trying to get academy status by September must be nonsense? Can my hon. Friend sketch out an indicative timetable that includes application, the funding agreement—which is irreversible—and, somewhere in the middle, consultation, bearing in mind that it is only six weeks until September?
Dan Rogerson
I suspect that my hon. Friend has posed a problem not for me, but for the Minister to answer when he replies to this debate. He is right: as I have already said, the Committee will need some reassurance that those consultations can take place over the summer for schools that wish to proceed quickly.
For the reasons that I have outlined, this is an important debate for the Committee to have. My hon. Friend is to be commended on moving the amendment in his customarily considered way. For that reason, it should be treated as a probing amendment by the Minister, rather than one on which the Committee should be divided, because it would not actually achieve the aspirations that many hon. Members have outlined, and which others will perhaps outline later in this debate.
Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)
I would like to speak to amendment 4, and to support amendment 78, on the process of consultation, and amendment 77, on the timing.
I have grave concerns about the Bill. I cannot understand why the provisions are being rushed through for no identifiable reason other than political expediency. The Bill seems to seek completely to undermine the role of local authorities. It seems to be unaware of—indeed, antagonistic towards—the crucial role that those authorities play in planning for special educational needs, equalities, fair admissions, and so on. From my 25 years of being a governor, I know the importance of the local education authority in supporting schools, so it should be quite clear that I am not happy with the Bill. However, it is simply disgraceful to try to force through a re-designation of maintained schools to academies, bringing about a change in governance, curricula and admissions, and a possible loss of amenity to a local community, albeit without any meaningful consultation with them.
Amendment 4 seeks to outline a range of people and groups who should be consulted. They include—obviously—teachers, parents, other local authorities, pupils, potential partners to academies, and the wider community.
Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)
Proposed clause 5(1)(c) in amendment 4 lists the pupils. Would the hon. Lady not agree that consulting with pupils aged 11—or, if we give academy status to primary schools, five or six—might be a little stretching for them at that point in their educational cycle?
Roberta Blackman-Woods
The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point. I have some experience of consulting on an academy—albeit not the sort of the academy proposed by the Bill—and I can assure him that pupils find it very easy to grasp what the change of their school to academy status would mean. However, his point is valid in that there must be a given length of time for a consultation to take place, so that the arguments for and against an academy in an area can be properly explained to everyone concerned. However, the Bill completely overrides any meaningful consultation process.
Bill Esterson
There are many professionals with good experience of how to consult effectively with children. Exactly the same point that the hon. Member for Skipton and Ripon (Julian Smith) has just raised—the point about why children should not be consulted—was raised with me when I was dealing with the establishment of academies in Medway a couple of years ago. However, it is a completely spurious point, as I think my hon. Friend would agree, because even much younger children have good insights. The question is how we go about consulting them, not whether we should consult them.
Roberta Blackman-Woods
My hon. Friend makes a valid point, which demonstrates the lack of seriousness among the Government parties about consulting those in the community. They simply have not thought through how to consult particular groups.
Mr Timpson
When talking about consultation in the education of children, does the hon. Lady recall that the previous Government introduced provisions in the Children, Schools and Families Act 2010—which went through Parliament in the previous Session—relating to the education of home-educated children. Those provisions imposed far more draconian checks and balances on how parents who educated their children at home were to do so. However, there was no consultation by the previous Government when they introduced those provisions, so there has been no consistency from her party on the issue.
Roberta Blackman-Woods
I am quite sure that the previous Government were setting precise and specific standards for home education, because it is really important to ensure that children’s education is protected when they are being educated at home.
I shall return to amendment 4. It is important that time should be given to consulting all the relevant groups in an area that will be affected by a new academy. I find the Liberal Democrats’ position on this issue rather confusing. The academy that we were hoping to establish in my constituency has been stopped by the Government. It was supported by the local authority, in partnership, and backed by the university of Durham. It had huge support in the local community. It took some time to work through with the local community what the arrangements would mean, but once that had been adequately explained and they had asked their questions of the relevant partners and got the answers, everyone was clear about the way ahead. The parents and teachers were also very clear that they wanted an ongoing relationship with the local authority. If the Bill goes through unamended, as seems likely given the parliamentary process that is being adopted, it will be impossible for parents to have their points heard or to maintain their desired relationship with the local authority. I therefore urge hon. Members to support amendment 4 and amendment 78, so that proper consultation arrangements can be put in place.
I also want to speak to amendment 77, which relates to the timing of the consultation. When I first read clause 5, I thought that there must be something missing. Surely no one could be suggesting that it is appropriate to consult after an academy order has been made. That is clearly ludicrous. When I discussed this with people in my constituency at the weekend, they suggested that we should perhaps applaud the Government for being up front and honest about the fact that they were not going to hold consultations or pay any attention to any consultations that were held. Obviously, if a consultation takes place after an order has been made, they are not going to pay any attention to it. So perhaps the Government are just being honest in clause 5, and saying that, as they are not going to pay any attention to any consultation, it does not matter whether it takes place before or after an academy order is made.
The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)
Did the hon. Lady not hear the answer given my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), which is that the academy order is not the final moment in the conversion process? The final moment involves the funding agreement, which takes place after the academy order is made, so there will be plenty of time for the consultation to take place.
Roberta Blackman-Woods
I did hear that answer, but many of us fear that, at that point, the process will already have gone too far in a particular direction for it to be stopped. In any case, the Government should adopt best practice, but it is not best practice to carry out a consultation when all but the very last stages of a decision process have already been completed. It would be more honest of the Government to admit that this clause had been inserted in the other place, that they did not want it in the Bill in the first place, and that there is no intention whatever to consult outside the governing bodies. Significantly, they should also admit that no attention will be paid to the outcome of any consultation exercise. This is not what the Government should be doing; it is not good practice.
Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)
I should like to speak to amendments 8 and 9 and new clause 1. I shall possibly touch on amendment 4 as well. Over the past few weeks, it has been interesting for me, as a new Member, to listen to Labour Members telling us that a figure of 51% is the correct one in any decision. Today, however, I think it was the hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) who told us that using a figure of 51% was an unacceptable way of coming to a decision. I am interested that their consistency on one argument does not necessarily carry over into another.
There are some sensible reasons behind amendment 9, in that one would probably want a consultation to have begun—and possibly even finished—before making an academy order. I suspect that as schools move along this route, that will indeed be the case. Today, however, I have been struck by the lack of confidence in our governing bodies and our head teachers. It has been staggering to listen to that. I sit as a school governor and I was until recently a school teacher. Perhaps I am judging hon. Members unfairly, but they seem to be giving the impression that governing bodies are educational asset strippers who want to move forward as quickly as possible without any consultation with parents. As a governor and someone who has worked as a teacher, I do not recognise that portrayal of governors as some kind of strange being.
Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)
I take the hon. Gentleman’s point about Members not taking governors’ commitment seriously. I want to reassure him that that is certainly not the argument that many of us are putting forward. The point about governors, of which I am one, is that they have a strong duty to take into consideration the impact of changes on the children in their school. They attach the utmost importance to that duty. We are also asking them to take into account the impact of the proposed changes on the wider community, but they will be able to do that only if they consult the wider community. Many of us are concerned that that will not happen unless such a requirement is incorporated in the Bill.
Andrew Percy
I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. Amendment 8 does not mention the wider community; it simply mentions parents. We also now have community governors to represent the interests of the wider community. So it is untrue—sorry, it is incorrect to suggest that governors do not take into account the role of their school in the community. In fact, over the past few years, one of the great moves forward for most schools is that they now recognise their position at the centre of the local community, and no longer see their responsibility ending at the school gate or the perimeter fence. Most schools now work incredibly hard to build links with their communities.
Lisa Nandy
I accept that most schools see their role as being at the heart of their community, and I am grateful for that. The problem arises when a school does not see that as its role, and that is what many of these amendments are seeking to address.
Andrew Percy
I suspect that the hon. Lady and I will have to agree to differ on this point, otherwise we will end up bouncing backwards and forwards. Head teachers, teachers, governors and those who have attended a governors’ training course are generally well aware of their responsibilities beyond the boundary fence of their school.
Sammy Wilson
Does the hon. Gentleman not agree that any school that wants a long-term future and wants to attract the necessary intake of pupils to maintain its position will have to take cognisance of what is going on in the community, because without community support it will not get a supply of pupils?
Andrew Percy
My hon. Friend makes that point better than I could. That is precisely why I am making the point today that governing bodies are not full of educational asset strippers. They consist of people who care deeply about their schools and communities and who will not change the governance arrangements of their school without proper consultation with parents, pupils and the wider community. We should pay respect to the people who serve as governors. They are dedicated individuals who understand their responsibilities full well, and they will not proceed without proper consultation.
Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)
There seems to be a view that a particular school serves a community, but in many areas the reality is that it serves different communities. A catchment area will include a range of different communities, not all of which might be represented on the governing body.
Andrew Percy
The hon. Gentleman makes the point that I was going to make about amendment 8, which limits consultation on the ballot to the parents at the school at the time, taking no account of the wider community or communities. One of the biggest problems that I have with the suggestion of a ballot for parents is this: given that orders can take up to a year to go through, who do we ballot? Do we ballot year 11 parents? Do we ballot year 6 parents from feeder schools? Do we ballot people who might be thinking of having a child at some point? The impossibility of drawing a correct boundary around those to be balloted is the weakness of the ballot process.
Having served as a local councillor who has been through the Building Schools for the Future process, I would like to ask Labour Members who propose ballots this question: where were our ballots on the proposal to merge schools? Where were our ballots on the proposal to close schools? Where were our ballots on the proposal to move ahead with academies, put forward by the previous Government? Such ballots did not exist, and the Government were right not to call for them. Proper consultation with the governing bodies, involving consultation with parents and schools, was the best course of action.
The same applies to health services. In my area, a number of health services have been lost. Trusts have become foundation trusts, and their governance arrangements have changed, but we had no ballots on those proposals either.
Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)
The hon. Gentleman makes a cogent argument for the retention and strengthening of the strategic role of the local authority in education provision, which seems to run against the logic of establishing academies across the piece.
Andrew Percy
The hon. Gentleman will probably be disappointed, as I was about to move on to that point. Labour Members have said a great deal about the role of the local authority, and of parents in relation to it, in control of schools. In the area I represented as a councillor, when parents were up in arms about proposals to close our primary schools, the local education authority was in no position to fight such proposals or to act as a guardian for our local schools, because there is no genuine control by the local authority over education. The surplus places legislation and the Ofsted framework come down from central Government. It is a fallacy that parents are continuously engaged with their LEA about the structure of education in their area. The theory might look and sound good, but the reality is different.
The Bill gives parents a choice—I limit my comments here to maintained schools that become academy schools—to vote with their feet. The hon. Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) wants parents to vote in some form, and I suggest that providing a range of different education facilities in an area enables parents to decide not with a tick in a box but with their feet.
My concerns about new clause 1 echo many of those put forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mr Timpson). We might end up with the strange situation in which 10% of parents are continually unhappy with the governance arrangements and go back for a second, third or fourth bite at the cherry. That is the problem with a 10% threshold, or a 30%, 40% or 49.9% threshold—
Andrew Percy
I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman has come round to the idea of having a 55% rule in certain circumstances.
With the ballots proposal, the risk is that we end up with vexatious and frivolous requests for ballots.
Caroline Lucas
The hon. Gentleman’s points underline the fact that we do not have time to discuss the amendments properly. He focuses not on the principle of providing some way for academies to revert to maintained status, but on whether the threshold should be 10% and whether there will be vexatious uses. It is not beyond the wit of mankind to devise ways of further amending the proposal to ensure that it is not put to vexatious use. Will he focus on the principle of the amendment, and say whether he agrees with it?
Andrew Percy
As someone who has been a teacher, I hope that governing bodies will have a way not only to move in one direction but, potentially, to move back.
Dan Rogerson
I agree with the hon. Gentleman that such mechanisms are important, but would he be satisfied with the current provision that at the end of seven years, if the agreement is not renewed, the school would revert to maintained status?
Andrew Percy
My hon. Friend has, I hope, allayed some of the fears of the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas). Should the measures not succeed, or should the school not be happy with the position, the Bill would provide a route back.
We should trust governing bodies and governors to do their job. They are dedicated people, education professionals, well-intentioned parents, and well-intentioned people from local communities. They will not steamroller ahead against the wishes of parents and the wider community. They will take on board seriously the views and aspirations of local people. The weakness of not having a range of education provision is that we deny parents and pupils a choice over the curriculum that they want to follow. We end up with parents choosing between school A and school B, which are identical. There is nothing wrong with some competition, with giving parents the choice and with allowing them to vote with their feet. I urge the Committee to vote against the amendments.
Lisa Nandy
I want to speak particularly to my amendment 86, which is a probing amendment designed to understand the Government’s reasons for not including in the Bill consultation with key groups, including the wider community, prior to a school seeking academy status.
Previously, when maintained schools converted to academies, the local authority was obliged to consult widely. Although there was no legal requirement for public consultation where a new academy was to be established, the local authority at least had to be consulted. I am worried that that is not being replicated in the Bill. Despite some progress, the current wording on consultation is inadequate, requiring consultation only with
“such persons as they think appropriate”.
It is of the utmost importance that parents, pupils, staff and the local authority are consulted.
We have already talked a little about the importance of consulting children. I want also to draw attention to the United Nations convention on the rights of the child, which successive Governments have supported, and which sets the standard by which we expect children to be treated in this country. Part of that is about talking to children and listening to their views on matters that affect them. Few matters could affect children more than that currently under consideration by the Committee.
The changes will impact on all the groups to which I have referred, including the wider community, children who are not currently at school, children who are going on to school, and children who are at other schools. I will not rehearse the arguments that were advanced on Second Reading, but it is important to consider those in the context of the amendments.
The Government have said that they are committed to giving parents a greater voice. The National Governors Association has said that, in that case, it would like to see consultation with parents as part of that principle. I reiterate the point I made earlier that governors have a strong duty to put the children in their school first. I would like a provision for prior consultation with the wider community to be included in the Bill. That would mean that, before taking the decision to seek academy status, the governors were in command of the full facts. That cannot be controversial, and I cannot understand why the provision is not in the Bill.
Several groups have raised the concern with me that the wording of the Bill is so broad as to leave governing bodies open to legal action should they not carry out consultation with groups in a way that is considered proper. Will the Minister consider that in his response, as I would hate to see that happening to governing bodies? As a school governor, I would find it extremely worrying to find my school in that position.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Does it not strike my hon. Friend as odd that, while the Government are proposing to allow local communities to engage in consultation and to vote on planning permission for residential developments, they are proposing no such consultation when it comes to the impact on the future of a school and the implications of that for the whole community?
Lisa Nandy
That brings me to a point that was raised with me by the TUC. The Government’s concept of the big society appears to feature the involvement of more and more people in the services that they own as members of the community, but this proposal, like some of the other measures that have been pushed through, seems to be directly at odds with that principle.
Andrew Percy
Would the hon. Lady care to comment on the previous Government’s conversion of schools to academies, and their school closures? Does she believe that there was proper consultation with parents and pupils then, and does she feel that there should have been ballots?
Lisa Nandy
I believe that we can always do better when it comes to consultation, but I also believe that the standard being set in the Committee today marks an extraordinarily low point in the history of consultation. I think that we should move on from what was done by the previous Government, and ensure that there is more consultation, not less.
Let me emphasise to the Minister that schools are at the heart of their local communities. If there is no consultation with the people who will be affected by the Bill, schools will drive a wedge between themselves and their communities, and I believe that we have an obligation to prevent that from happening. My amendment seeks to establish why the Government do not wish to ensure that the views of the community inform the decisions of schools. I should be grateful if the Minister could answer that question.
Mr Mike Hancock
You will be pleased to know, Ms Primarolo, that I spent most of the weekend trying to pronounce your name without embarrassing myself or you. That is as near to pronouncing it correctly as I can get. I apologise for my rudeness to you last week when I could not pronounce it.
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy). Is it Wigan? It was on the annunciator screen, but I missed it. It moved so quickly. You know how unaccustomed this place is to things moving quickly, Ms Primarolo, except on the annunciator screen. Anyway, it is a pleasure to follow the hon. Lady, and I had more than a degree of sympathy for what she had to say.
I hope that Members will give serious consideration to some of the issues raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) and others, including the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas). She made a very good point. The only point on which I disagreed with her was the percentage business: I did not think that that was helpful to the debate.
I am disappointed that the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) has left the Chamber. He seemed to be digging himself gradually into a deeper and deeper hole, and taking interventions to save himself from burying himself. He appeared to be saying that everyone else could be right, but parents would have to be wrong. Parents could not be trusted to make a decision as important as this, because they might simply get it wrong. Well, who is to say that anyone else is going to get it right?
I should be interested to know what is wrong with giving people an opportunity to discuss and to make a decision. I shall explain shortly why I think that is important, but let me deal first with the notion that the amendment, or something like it, cannot be accepted because there is not enough time. Nothing in the rules of the House suggests that the business cannot be changed. If the Government were minded to accept the amendment, a Report stage could, if necessary, be arranged for tomorrow afternoon. Nothing in the rules states that the summer Adjournment debates must take place at a particular time on the last day before the recess, as long as they do take place. The business could be changed so that both Report and Third Reading could take place tomorrow. There would be nothing to prevent that, if good will existed in relation to bringing parents into the debate about academy status.
Mr Hancock
I see that the hon. Gentleman is itching to intervene. At our age, I think I should allow him to do so, so that he need not struggle to rise too often.
Mr Sheerman
The hon. Gentleman is more deeply rooted in his community and his constituency than almost anyone I know, but I hope he will not mind my saying that he is slightly missing one point. Under the last Government, Building Schools for the Future and academies were not just about improving schools, but about transforming the communities in which they sat. That was at the heart of what the last Government were doing, and that is what the present Government seem to be missing. Transforming the community is what a great school does.
Mr Hancock
I agree. As I said in my intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Southport, it is not just about the parents of children attending a school; it is about the wider community having a say. Academies were supposed to be at the very heart of the community, and they were supposed to be seven-days-a-week establishments offering a range of activities that the whole community could embrace. If that is what we will have, we should share it with the population and encourage them to become involved; but to suggest that we can create academies from scratch by September is pushing against a door that has already been slammed in our faces. It might be possible in the case of schools that have partly completed the process, but I think it highly unlikely that any academy created from scratch could succeed. I do not even know whether the governors would meet between the passing of the Bill and the time at which it would be possible to begin the process of setting up an academy.
How quickly will the Government be able to agree on the financial basis? What will happen to the role of local authorities that have already budgeted for the coming year? What will happen to the existing budgets in schools? That brings me to a point at which I have to declare an interest yet again, Ms Primarolo—Primarolo—[Laughter.] It is difficult for a person who has had a speech impediment for 60 years and then mastered it when someone comes along with a name that contains a P and an R too close together, with an O at the end. I am trying to fight this as best I can. I hope you will bear with me, Ms Primarolo. Are you looking for inspiration from above?
I was thinking about a problem that local authorities face. I must declare an interest at this point: I am a member of a local authority that is a local education authority. This morning we were discussing what to do now. We already have one academy and, as I have said, it is a pleasure to see the transformation that is taking place particularly in the parents, who were heavily consulted, and the pupils. Everyone is optimistic and looking for an improvement in the school’s academic record in one year. So even though I am against this measure, I have seen how it can start such a process.
As I said, this morning we on the Portsmouth executive were discussing what to do now in respect of the legislation before us. How will we deal with the other schools? Will we try to talk to them about having a federation? Should we think about helping one school? We have a very good single-sex girls’ school but it is sometimes difficult to see where its future will lie. I would very much like for it be maintained, but we also have a single-sex boys’ school that is not in such a good state of health, and the question therefore arises of how we work with them. I do not want local authorities to be left with a rump of schools that are difficult to manage.
We asked other questions, too. How do we cope with staff? How do we cope with low achievement in schools? How do we maintain parents’ confidence that their children will get an equal share of the resources? The Government did not address that problem during our discussions last week but it is fundamental, because if parents are not going to be involved in the creation of an academy they really ought to be told what the effects will be on those children who will not be fortunate enough to get into an academy.
I ask the Minister to talk about the confidence that the Government have to be able to give to parents in order to be sure that all of them believe their children will get equal opportunities at school. Under the Bill in its current form, there is a degree of unfairness that could easily and very quickly be exposed in cities such as mine—densely populated urban areas with schools very close together where it is difficult to regulate catchment areas fairly and properly because people live so close by. Where schools are located is also an issue in this respect. Some of them came into existence as secondary schools somewhat late in the day. We had to build two new secondary schools in our city in the last 10 years to cope with the rising numbers of children, and we had to build them where we could, rather than in the right place, so to speak. We had to build them on the available sites which were not necessarily in the right areas. That also makes the catchment areas issue very difficult.
Parents therefore rightly have a number of fears, and teachers certainly do too. The amendments before us are about making sure that parents have the opportunity to know both a lot more than is currently available about what an academy can achieve and the downsides of academies. The Minister would be foolish in the extreme if he were to suggest that some parents would not want the downsides of an academy to be explained. That is particularly the case in respect of parents of children who are not fortunate enough to get into them. What will happen to the rest of the children?
I hope the Minister will also respond to the points raised by the hon. Member for Wigan and my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson). My hon. Friend asked two or three questions that are worthy of a specific on-the-record comment from the Minister, because this Committee needs and demands that. We cannot allow legislation to be passed so quickly without proper scrutiny and with questions left unanswered. The Government cannot have it both ways. If they are not prepared to give us the time to scrutinise the Bill properly, they should be able to put a sustainable and maintainable position on the record by saying, “This is the way it’s going to be.” Anything short of that should be seen by this House and the country as totally unacceptable.
The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Dawn Primarolo)
I call Vernon Coaker.
Vernon Coaker
Thank you for calling me to speak, Ms Primarolo. It has been an interesting debate so far and, clearly, more Members wish to contribute to it.
The Government are in a mess on consultation. There are all sorts of worries and concerns on both sides of the Committee about consultation and what it actually means in practice for both local communities and individual schools across the country. This is a live issue for the Government, because we are supposed to be in an era of new politics, which is about localism—involving, talking to and empowering local people and communities—yet the Government are unclear about what that means in respect of schools.
Under the Bill in its current form, a governing body and head teacher can, effectively, apply to become an academy and be fast-tracked through that process if they are outstanding, and it is the Secretary of State who makes the final decision. This is therefore a hugely centralising measure that completely bypasses the local community, the local authority and anyone of influence in a local area. The Government can state clearly in the Bill that that is not their intention and they do not wish that to happen.
I take on board the point that there are many good governing bodies and that we should not impinge on individual governors and head teachers who work extremely hard, but they operate on the basis of what they consider to be best for their individual school whereas it is incumbent upon us here to pass laws that not only look towards the interests of individual schools but address such issues within the context of the education system as a whole. The Government’s intention is that thousands of schools will become academies and hundreds will be fast-tracked through the process but, as I said last week, I think we will simply be taking a leap in the dark, with no real idea where this will end up.
The Minister must tell us how many schools have applied to become academies and how many he anticipates will be academies in September 2010. The press release that the Department for Education sent out at the beginning of this process on 2 June told us 1,000 schools had applied for academy freedoms, but that is not what it meant to say. It meant that 1,000 schools had expressed an interest in that, but where are we now in this regard? Where have those schools got to in respect of consultation? Who will they be talking to in August? Which governors are consulting which local authorities? Which governors are talking to which parents? Which governing bodies are talking to which communities? What consultation is going on, given that the Secretary of State has expressly told this House that he wants as many outstanding schools as possible to be fast-tracked to academy status in September? “Not a clue,” is the answer from the Government. Any reasonable and rational person would say it is difficult to have such consultations when schools are on holiday. I accept that—we all accept that—but in that case the Government should not set out as one of the Bill’s policy objectives that large numbers of schools will become academies.
The Government have not stated what consultation they expect the schools that are being fast-tracked to academy status to be involved in. They have not set before the Committee what the process will be by which they as a Government monitor that, other than to say that there is a point of contact at the Department for Education. What on earth does that mean—a phone call, perhaps, or the odd letter, or a couple of e-mail exchanges? What evidence will be collected to ensure that the measures in the Bill—even the measure on this limited consultation—are followed? The issue of legal challenge was rightly raised. There will be a legal challenge if the Department cannot give adequate explanations—other than what it has given so far, which is extremely woolly—in respect of even the limited consultative process in the Bill, with the pre-commencement later on in it. If it cannot do that, there is a real problem.
Pat Glass
I wonder whether my hon. Friend agrees with me about what is happening in a school that is outside but close to my constituency, which may affect children in my constituency. The head teacher and a small number of governors have made an application for academy status and it is being fast-tracked, but the head teacher is retiring on 31 August. Does my hon. Friend agree that this is contemptuous, not only to children and to parents and to the local community, but to the new head teacher who is due to take over a school which is going to change in character and is not going to be the school to which he applied? That is what is happening as a result of this Bill being rushed through this House.
Vernon Coaker
I agree with that. The point that we have made on numerous occasions is that even if the Government think that this is a good Bill—they clearly do—and are determined to push forward with it, the rush to put the legislation in place will have unintended consequences of exactly the sort that my hon. Friend describes. I am not trying to be smart when I predict that individual Members from across the House will have individual schools coming to them about problems with this process and the adverse consequences that it is having for their area, and that will be as a result of having rushed this legislation through.
Mr Gibb
May I help the hon. Gentleman by saying that schools that do wish to convert this September must have submitted their applications by 30 June, so there will be time before the beginning of the schools’ summer recess for consultation to take place? In addition, the consultation is not required to terminate by September; it can go on through the autumn until the funding agreement is signed. So there is plenty of time, both before the summer and after it, for this important consultation to take place.
Vernon Coaker
I am afraid that the Minister is just asserting things; there is no fact in what he just said. How many schools are going through this process? What are they actually doing to consult? Are they sending a letter to every parent? Are they holding parents’ meetings? Are they going out into the community? Are leaflets being sent round? Are other schools involved in this? Are other governing bodies involved? Is the local authority involved? What does what the Minister has just said mean? The reality is that none of us knows.
Mr Mike Hancock
In view of what the Minister has just said, is the hon. Gentleman not slightly mystified, as I am, why the Government cannot tell us the number of schools that have indicated since 30 June that they want to start this process? Surely the Department ought to be able to make that information available to the Committee.
Vernon Coaker
Absolutely. The point that the Minister missed was that the Secretary of State has made great play of the fact that some schools will become academies not by Christmas or through the autumn, when the consultation is going to be by, but by September 2010; the whole reason we are rushing this Bill through is that the Secretary of State was telling us that all these schools were queuing up to become academies by September 2010. The Minister may have been saying in his intervention that a lot of schools signed up by 30 June, because the process takes three months, and they have therefore started the consultation. We do not know what that involves, but it carries on in August and can go on “through the autumn”—those were the Minister’s own words. So why are we rushing this legislation if the consultation can go on for longer? We could have slowed down a bit and improved the Bill, accepting some amendments that hon. Members have proposed. The Government would have thus achieved their objective with a much-improved Bill that would have allayed some of the concerns that have been raised, notwithstanding the fact that Labour Members would have opposed it in any case.
I hope that the Minister will tell us the exact number of schools that have applied, not the number that have expressed an interest—I hope he will give the exact number for primary schools and secondary schools. I know that this is not going to happen in special schools until 2011 and I cannot remember whether that is also the case for primary schools, but it certainly will happen in secondary schools. How many schools are actually applying? How many of that number does the Minister expect to open in September 2010? I hope he will outline for us exactly what consultation process those schools will be expected to have gone through and that he will explain to the Committee how the Department is ensuring that that has taken place, so that when the Secretary of State decides whether to give an academy order he can say, “These are the criteria I used.” The Committee deserves to know that, but we have so far been given no answer..
Mr Redwood
Can the shadow Minister explain why he thinks so many head teachers and governing bodies might want to drive something like this through against the wishes of the local community and parents or without bothering to find out what their views were? I would have thought that the first thing any head teacher would do when considering this would have been to ensure that they had support.
Vernon Coaker
What we are saying is that we are legislating for a process and we expect it to set out exactly what should happen. It is for the Government to determine what that process is. At the moment, they have no real idea about it. I also say to the right hon. Gentleman that what we are also trying to do—this is the point made by the hon. Member for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock)—is find out how many of the 1,000 schools that the press release says have applied will become academies in September. The Minister has failed last week and this to give a categorical answer to the question of how many academies the Department expects to open in September. I, too, will be interested to hear that answer.
Mr Redwood
I am sure that we will all be interested in that answer. However, the shadow Minister has given me no answer on the point that I asked. He is not saying that he knows of lots of head teachers and governing bodies foolish enough to try to drive this through against local opinion. Can he not understand that the whole idea of localism is that we need to trust these people more and give them more scope to act? They will decide how to consult and how widely they need to consult depending on the mood.
Vernon Coaker
But who will decide? It will be the head teacher and the governing body of the school. The right hon. Gentleman tells us not to worry because some consultation will take place, and he asks what head teacher would drive this through against local opposition. I just say to him that if parents—if all of them—are so important, why does the word “parents” not appear in the Bill? I ask him that to test him, because none of us can find a reference to them and I find that astonishing. He asks what head teacher would possibly go against the wishes of parents and against the wishes of anybody, but why is the word “parents”, which the right hon. Gentleman has just prayed in aid when he said that the Government were all for localism and for people empowering the local neighbourhood, not contained in this Bill? There may be one or two such references but I cannot find them.
Mr Redwood
Sometimes things are so obvious that when one trusts people they will do the obvious thing. Of course these people will want to carry the local parents with them because otherwise they will lose their school.
Vernon Coaker
I make a prediction to the right hon. Gentleman and to some of the hon. Members on the Government Benches who are saying “Hear, hear”. I predict that the Government will produce amendments in the Bill that they are introducing in the autumn to clarify the situation and that hon. Members will, at some point, be writing to the Minister asking whether he could intervene in respect of particular schools in their community where it looks as though the consultation has not taken place and other schools start complaining about the schools that have been fast-tracked to academy status. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, because he has been here longer than I have, when we legislate in this House, we do so in a way that lays out the process that we expect to be followed in order for a process to happen. The process in this Bill is confused, and people do not know what it is supposed to be. He knows as well as I do that confused legislation provides the opportunity for judicial review. All I am saying is that the fact that this reference is not in the Bill is astonishing.
Mr Ward
I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman is as concerned as I am about the proposals on consulting parents. Unless we receive some advice to the contrary, it appears that under clause 1(6)(d) up to 49% of the pupils in a new school do not have to be
“drawn from the area in which the school is situated.”
Vernon Coaker
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right about that. Of course what Lord Hill said in another place was that if we were to consider the grammar schools that become academies, we might find that that area is significantly broader. What that “area” meant was very difficult to define.
My hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), the former Chair of the Select Committee, drew attention to the fact that the Government are not averse to ballots because they have introduced them for local planning decisions. Of course, the Minister will know, as we heard in the statement that took place before our discussions in Committee started today, the Government are introducing ballots for locally elected police commissioners. The principle of ballots, such as that proposed by the hon. Member for Southport (Dr Pugh), is something to which the Government are not opposed.
We think that we should lay out the details that are set out in amendment 78 rather simply leaving it to people to do what is appropriate. Parents should be consulted and, as many people have said, it is essential that the pupil voice should be heard. In answer to an earlier question from a Member on the Government Benches, of course that would be done in a way that is appropriate. The amendment refers to guidance that should be given to schools on how they should consult pupils.
What are the teachers and non-teaching staff going to come back to in September? The Minister needs to answer the question about what is happening with the TUPE negotiations about the transfer of teaching and non-teaching staff for those schools that want to become academies.
Sammy Wilson
The shadow Minister is making a point about the form of the consultation. In fact, if he examines the remarks he is making now he will see just how difficult it will be to be prescriptive about the form of consultation, even though that is what he seems to be seeking. One would consult pupils in a different way to teachers, and parents in a different way to teachers, too. It might not be possible to get them all under one roof. Is he seeking a prescriptive method of consultation or is the fact that the Bill makes it clear there should be consultation on a question mentioned in the Bill and that it must take place with the appropriate people not sufficient detail for him?
Vernon Coaker
I do not think that it is sufficient. The hon. Gentleman is right: of course one would consult teachers, non-teaching staff and pupils differently. That is why our amendment states:
“The Secretary of State shall issue guidance as to how”
that is done. Of course the consultation will be carried out in different ways, and that is why we have included the word “guidance”.
On the need for consultation with neighbouring schools, the Bill does not require good and outstanding schools that become academies to partner schools that are in difficulty or need support. I know that in the other place it was believed—many of my hon. Friends believe it too—that such a provision should be on the face of the Bill. Merely stating that they should engage in such consultation is not sufficient. Many of us have made the point time and again that the complete elimination of local authorities from this situation is not acceptable at all.
Let me talk about amendment 77. The Chair of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart), was quoted by the hon. Member for Southport. If hon. Members think that I am making too much of the idea that a consultation should take place before, not after, the giving of an academy order, they should listen to what the Chair of the Select Committee said during one of the debates last week—it bears repeating. On the subject of consultations that took place after an academy order was made, and not before, he said:
“Those consulted in such circumstances would have good grounds for feeling that they were participating in a charade. I ask those on the Government Front Bench to consider that.”—[Official Report, 19 July 2010; Vol. 514, c. 49.]
In his reply, the Minister needs to explain why it is not a charade and why the Chair of the Select Committee is wrong or misguided in making that comment. Is he wrong? Has he got it wrong? Does he not understand the process? Of course he understands that the making of an academy order comes before an academy agreement is signed—everybody understands that, and we have all read the Bill. We are saying that the discussion of, and consultation on, an academy order—by the way, I can find no example of what an academy order would actually be—should take place before it is made and not afterwards. Perhaps the Minister—in answer to the Chair of the Select Committee, if not to me—can tell us what an academy order will contain. What will it look like? What will be in it? Will we have the opportunity for some sort of consultation on what an academy order should be?
Andrew Percy
I agree with the shadow Minister that there should always be a way back, but I fail to understand the following fact. When his party were in government, there were plenty of forced mergers and forced school closures through the transforming our primary schools programme and the surplus places legislation. There were thousands of names on petitions against irreversible school closures. Where were the democracy and localism in those decisions?
Vernon Coaker
There are two points. I shall come back to the local point in the moment, but all the way through these discussions—the hon. Gentleman, to his credit, has been in the Chamber for many hours of the debate on the Bill—I have pointed out significant and substantial differences between the academies programme pursued under the last Government and the academies programme and model proposed by the Bill. Our model concentrated on areas of educational underperformance and social disadvantage. That was the key driver for the use of the academy model. The Bill turns that on its head and says we will allow schools that are doing well under the current system to become academies, with all the worries and concerns that have arisen.
I know that the hon. Gentleman has been involved in this area and has worked hard in his constituency on the issue of school reorganisation. However, in virtually every circumstance in which academies have been agreed—that includes the 200 that were agreed and the number that were to go forward in September with secondary school reorganisation attached to educational transformation—the local authorities were key partners in those decisions. Some of those decisions were difficult. We have not tabled the amendments to say that any of this is easy, that there is a panacea or that someone can wave a magic wand to bring about school reorganisation in way that is never controversial or painful. We are saying that under our model, local authorities and local partners were specifically included. There were still difficulties, and sometimes tough decisions had to be made, but local authorities and local decision makers were involved. The way that the Bill is drafted specifically excludes those people from being involved other than in the way that a wish list of good practice would say that they should be involved.
Ian Mearns
Does my hon. Friend accept that under the previous Government’s academy proposals, the local consultation that took place was subject to an adjudicator’s ruling in the last instance if that was necessary?
Vernon Coaker
I was going to make that point: schools adjudicators have been involved almost as a final route of appeal. I know from my experience as a Minister—if the hon. Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) becomes a Minister he will find this out—that even when one thinks a decision is right, it can be completely thrown out of the window because the schools adjudicator prevents something from going ahead. That happened to me a couple of times in relation to the closure of a school.
Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)
Does the Minister accept that there have been examples of Labour-held local authorities being given the opportunity to set up academies but rejecting it without consulting parents at all? I refer specifically to the offer by Goldman Sachs several years ago to set up an academy in Tower Hamlets. The local authority there gave parents not a jot of consultation.
Vernon Coaker
Some local authorities have been a problem, but not just Labour authorities—Conservative local authorities have also stood in the way of academy development. One pays a price for local democracy and involving local authorities: sometimes it means that people pursue educational options in their area that one does not agree with. That is the point I was making when I asked the Minister whether localism is fine only as long as it goes along with the Government’s policy objectives.
There are all sorts of unanswered questions about consultation, many of which the hon. Member for Portsmouth South has laid out. What happens to local authorities? What happens to the money? What happens regarding special needs? Who is vetting the consultation that takes place? Who knows what is going on? How will the school funding proposals that have been published today affect what is going on? There are all sorts of issues to be discussed.
Bill Esterson
May I take my hon. Friend back to the primary capital programme and the democracy in that process, which the hon. Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) asked about? In the Tory-run authority in which I was the opposition spokesman on children’s services, there was a lot of opposition to some proposals and only a thorough consultation process brought up that opposition and showed the flaws in the plan. The council rejected them and the adjudicator, whose role my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) has mentioned, had to get involved. The checks and balances were in place in that process as they were in the School Standards and Framework Act 1998.
Vernon Coaker
My hon. Friend makes a self-evident and good point, and identifies some of the problems regarding the difference between what happened before and what will happen under the Bill’s measures. There are a huge number of questions that the Minister needs to answer.
On consultation, it would help if the Government and the Minister answered named day written questions, including a large number that are specifically relevant to this whole process and our discussions on consultation. I have 11 named-day questions for last Monday that have not yet been answered by the Department. Not all of them are relevant to this debate—[Interruption.] The Front Benchers are now debating who is responsible; I am afraid that it involves both Conservative and Liberal Democrat Ministers. Some of those questions are specific to today’s debate on consultation, so for the Department to talk about consultation, procedure and correct processes when I still have not received the answers to questions for which the named day was last Monday—[Interruption.] The Minister says that I have had a holding response: on Monday 19 July, for 11 of my questions, I received the reply, “I will reply as soon as possible,” from him and his colleagues. I do not know whether anyone else has experienced this problem, but given that the measures are being pushed through Parliament at significant speed, all hon. Members need the answers to their named day questions so that information that might inform our discussions is available.
With that, I shall simply say that we will support amendment 8 if the hon. Member for Southport pushes it to a vote, and I give notice that we would like to put amendment 78 to a vote.
Bill Esterson
I want to talk about consultation in relation to my experience as an opposition spokesman for children’s services, particularly in relation to pre and post-decision consultation and three academies that the council pushed through. The Tory-run council in Medway decided not to consult until decisions had been taken, which caused consternation and all sorts of problems with the wider community, not just parents. I think that was a precursor to what is happening with this legislation. It was only the involvement of the then Ministers with responsibility for schools standards, including my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker), that enabled us to have proper consultation before decisions were finally taken and to ensure that the assurances that the local community sought were addressed. My concern is that the proposed measures will cause what happened in Medway to be repeated across the country.
Dan Rogerson
Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that the situation he describes happened under legislation that was pushed through by a Labour Government and that the Bill does say—thanks to amendments that were passed in another place—that consultation must take place?
Bill Esterson
I confirm that it happened under the legislation—that was why the checks and balances were eventually put in place. The point I was making is that the Tory-run council in Medway tried to push things through using the same procedure that will be introduced by the Bill. The hon. Gentleman mentions the amendments that were made in the other place, but, like many hon. Members, I have grave concerns that leaving it to the governing body to decide not just who to consult but whether to consult is a fundamental problem that will not be overcome by any checks and balances further down the line.
My experience and that of many people in Medway shows that allowing consultation at any time up to the signing of an academy agreement will not work and will make the process completely inadequate. That is why the amendments are so important. If they are not accepted, not only Members, but schools, children, staff and parents across the country will regret the lack of a requirement for the sort of proper consultation that is detailed in many of the amendments and that was in the 1998 Act. That guidance on how to consult different groups is extremely thorough and works extremely well when it is followed.
Andrew Percy
I am failing to get my head round the arguments of Opposition Members. There was plenty of consultation—admittedly under the previous Government—on Building Schools for the Future and on transforming our primary school agenda, and it threw up thousands of names on petitions from parents who did not want their schools closed, yet their schools were still closed. Where was the consultation? The failings the hon. Gentleman is outlining are exactly those that took place under the last Government.
Bill Esterson
Consultation is not a referendum; it will not necessarily produce the answer that the majority are pushing for, but there is a fundamental difference between holding a consultation and not holding one at all. The problem with the Bill is that unless the governing body agrees, there will be no consultation at all.
Andrew Percy
I think I heard the hon. Gentleman correctly and that he was saying that the Opposition are arguing that they want consultation simply so that they can say they have had it, but they are not all that bothered about the outcome.
Bill Esterson
The hon. Gentleman is trying to put words into the mouths of many Members. I think he is talking a load of nonsense on that point, but it was a nice try.
One of my concerns about leaving it to governing bodies to decide about consultation is that they, understandably, feel that it is their duty to support head teachers. Sometimes, however, the head teacher gets their own way through strength of personality and the governing body may not apply the degree of scrutiny and challenge that it should, although I am not saying that is always true because many governing bodies work extremely well in genuine partnership with their head teacher. The reason I support the amendments proposed by the hon. Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) is that the situation I described, together with the potential for financial benefit for head teachers, could create the possibility for conflict of financial interest, which would be wholly undesirable. There is concern about the potential for financial gain for head teachers and the lack of scrutiny in some governing bodies, although by no means all—I stress that point. It is important that we get the legislation right at this point, before things go wrong, rather than rushing it through with the danger that such problems might arise.
The hon. Member for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock) and the former Chair of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), made important points about schools being a key part of their community. Although governing bodies are representative of certain parts of the community, they do not represent the wider community, which is why the provisions of the School Standards and Framework Act are a good guide. The fundamental problem with the Bill is that if consultation is not held until after the initial decision, it will be apparent to the local community that there has been a fait accompli. The danger is that once the train has left the station, it will be very difficult to put the brakes on.
Mr Gibb
This group of amendments deals with consultation. We have always made it clear that we expect schools to consult on their proposals for conversion to academy status, which is why we were happy to amend the Bill in the other place to put that provision on the face of the legislation. As Lord Adonis said, during the passage of the Bill in the other place,
“it is very unlikely that an academy proposal will be a success if it does not have a very wide measure of support from the parental body, the staff body and the wider community.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 21 June 2010; Vol. 719, c. 1230.]
As a result of persuasive arguments put in the other place, principally by Liberal Democrat peers, the Government tabled the amendment that led to clauses 5 and 10. I pay particular tribute to Baroness Walmsley for her determination to put consultation on the face of the Bill.
Amendment 8 would require that if any member of a school’s governing body objects to the school’s application for academy status, the parents of children at the school must be balloted. The purpose of the Bill is to allow schools that wish to do so to apply for academy status. The Bill is permissive rather than coercive. The arrangements for governing body decisions are set out in the School Governance (Procedures) (England) Regulations 2003, which state that every question to be decided at a governing body meeting must be determined by a majority of votes of those governors present and voting, and no decision can be taken without due discussion. Furthermore, at least a third of the membership of the governing bodies of all maintained schools is made up of parents. That means that the views of parents will clearly be considered during the governing body’s discussions. In addition, clause 5 requires a school’s governing body to consult on its proposals to convert to an academy. In practice, we believe that means that parents will be consulted and will have the chance to make representations about the proposals.
Dan Rogerson
The Minister is setting out his vision for the Bill and talking about the role of governing bodies. We did not have the opportunity to reach that clause last week because time defeated us. Is he able to confirm whether he has looked at the issue of how many parent governors there should be on future academy governing bodies?
Mr Gibb
I am happy to do so. We shall be coming to the relevant clause later in the debate, but I have been persuaded by my hon. Friend’s arguments, and as a result of his representations, and those of other people, we intend to amend the model funding agreement to raise the number of parents on governing bodies from one to a minimum of two.
Requiring a ballot of all parents of pupils at the school would unduly politicise the process.
Vernon Coaker
I welcome the concession the Minister just made. The Committee has run very well without being churlish about such things, and there are many other aspects we agree with, but that is an important step forward.
Caroline Lucas
At the risk of being churlish, why is the democracy such an issue? The point was made that if you were to—[Hon. Members: “He”]—if he were to have a proper election, it would—I am sorry. A moment ago, the Minister said that if you were to increase the governors—
Mr Gibb
I think I have taken the hon. Lady’s point. Requiring a ballot of all parents of pupils at the school would unduly politicise the process and would enable those who are ideologically opposed to academies—I do not accuse the hon. Lady of that—to use the process either to agitate against the proposals or to try to delay the implementation of the decision. That would place unnecessary burdens on the governing body of the school.
Amendment 10 relates to the financial interest of governors. I reassure the Committee that there are restrictions on people taking part in the proceedings of governing bodies of maintained schools. They are clearly set out in the well-known School Governance (Procedures) (England) Regulations 2003, which provide that where there is a conflict between the interests of any governor, associate member or head teacher and the interests of the governing body that person must disclose the interest, withdraw from the meeting and not vote. If one of those individuals has a financial interest in any matter, he or she must disclose it, withdraw from the meeting and not vote. If there is any dispute as to whether a person must withdraw, the other governors must decide on the matter.
There are important safeguards that apply both before and after conversion to academy status. They mean that there is no need for an amendment specifically to disallow a governor from leading the consultation, as under existing law governors cannot participate in decision making on issues that concern their remuneration or benefit. That is a fundamental principle of charity law, and all academies are charities. I can also confirm that the model articles of association ensure that no governor can make any financial gain in his or her role as a governor.
Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)
Will the Minister clarify that, by and large, these proceedings and procedures have worked very well and have presented very little difficulty in this regard?
Mr Gibb
Yes, my hon. Friend makes a very good point. The type of people who become school governors are motivated by one issue only—the school of which they are governors; they want to raise standards and are concerned about that school.
Several amendments—including amendments 78, 77, 9 and 86—would require the governing body of a maintained school to consult on their proposals to become an academy before applying for an academy order. Clause 5 requires, as I have said, that the governing body of the school
“must consult such persons as they think appropriate”
on the proposed conversion. The consultation may take place before or after an application for an academy order has been made in respect of the school or after an academy order has been granted. This will allow each school to determine when it has sufficient information on which to consult and at what point during the application process it wishes to do so. Schools are, after all, in the best position to determine when and how consultation should best take place, and they may not want to approach parents or others until they have firm proposals.
The only requirement is that the consultation must be held before the funding agreement is signed, since at that point the school will be legally committed to the conversion process. Academy orders, though a step along the way, are not irreversible and we therefore believe that there is still value in a school consulting after an order has been made. At that point, the school is in no sense bound to convert, so it is not the case that any consultation of parents or others would either be not meaningful or too late, as the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) suggested it would be in last week’s debate.
Mr Gibb
Of course, and it is up to the school to decide. I was going to come on to the guidance later. It is published on the departmental website and it sets out precisely what guidance the governing bodies should adhere to. It states:
“It will be for the Governing Body of the school to determine who should be consulted, although schools should consider involving local bodies or groups who have strong links with the school.”
It sets out various elements such as: information on the school’s website, a letter to all parents explaining the proposal, a meeting for parents, a newsletter for parents and asking for views from parents to be sent in writing to the school.
Ian Mearns
My hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) pursued this issue earlier, when he spoke about the ability of schools in the list to go ahead and become academies in September. If the Bill is passed—we assume it will be, given the parliamentary numbers—orders will be made and consultation will have to take place before the funding agreement is in force. If schools are to become academies in September—assuming this idea has not been completely abandoned—it means that the consultation will happen all through August. Is my understanding correct?
Mr Gibb
It is possible for an academy order to be issued in September, while the details of the funding agreement are still being negotiated. These things are very complicated, and it might take several weeks after the academy order is issued before the funding agreement is signed, so the consultation process can continue after the academy order has been issued.
Mr Iain Wright
We really need clarity on this very important point. As I mentioned earlier, paragraph 7 of the explanatory notes states:
“The Secretary of State expects that a significant number of Academies will open in September 2010”.
Is the Minister now suggesting that academies will open without a funding agreement being in place?
Mr Gibb
The school can continue with an academy order made. That is the point. The academy order can be made in September, but the funding agreement might take several additional weeks afterwards—[Interruption.] No, the school will be open; children will be able to attend a school and an academy order will have been made.
Sammy Wilson
I thank the Minister for giving way and for his further clarification of the purpose and usefulness of consultation after the order has been made, but does he not accept that once an order has been made, many of those who might have had an interest in the consultation might well deem that there has been a done deal so that the consultation is meaningless? I say that despite the Minister’s assurances today, because the flag locally will be whether or not an order has been made to declare a school an academy.
Mr Gibb
I am grateful for that intervention, as it enables me to repeat that the deal is not done until the funding agreement is signed. That has always been the case: it was the case under the previous Administration and it is the case today. It is the funding agreement that is key.
Let me turn my attention to amendments 78, 4 and 18, which seek to prescribe with whom the school must consult. The Government believe that the individuals who lead schools—the governors and the head—are best placed to make decisions about their schools. They are the ones who know the local area, the local circumstances of the school and how it relates to other schools in the area. We do not intend to be prescriptive over whom schools should consult, as schools will have different views and the level of information they want or can make available at the time of consultation will depend on the point at which they do it. If they consult at the very beginning of the process, they may consult only on the principle of conversion itself. If they consult at a much later stage, they may want to consult on a wide range of additional matters—the curriculum, governance arrangements or a specialism for the academy, for example—on which they may by then have firmer views.
We trust the school to determine how to consult and whom to consult, and we do not intend to provide an inflexible checklist, which would not, in itself, ensure that consultation were any more meaningful. This includes consultation with the local authority, as amendment 18 would require. We do not intend to give local authorities a role that could, in some areas of the country, undermine the Government’s policy—as we know, this has been the case in the past. We do not want to provide local authorities with an opportunity to delay or frustrate applications via the consultation process. The Department’s website, as I mentioned earlier, includes guidance on good consultation practice.
New clause 1, tabled by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas), would allow schools that have become academies to return to maintained status if 10% of the parents of the pupils at the academy vote in favour of it. Of course, the academies programme is about freedoms and lack of prescription, so an academy could choose, if it wished, to run itself like a maintained school. The academy could willingly act in such a way that for all intents and purposes, it would be a maintained school, operating with all the restrictions and requirements that apply to them—including the academy buying back services from the local authority and choosing not to use its curriculum or staffing freedoms. Therefore there would be no need for it to change its status for it to be run in a way that is equivalent to a maintained school.
We expect all schools that apply to become an academy to be fully committed to the academies programme. Before becoming an academy, the governing body of the predecessor school will have taken account, as I have said on numerous occasions, of the views of the parents and pupils at the academy.
Let me deal briefly with some of the comments made during the debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) raised the issue of the new politics, which he said that he, like me, supports. I believe that the coalition involves discussion, concessions and change, which we have seen during the passage of the Bill. The coalition is delivering the kind of politics demanded by the public. Today, the coalition has delivered its promise to introduce a pupil premium. The Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Brent Central (Sarah Teather) has today tabled a written ministerial statement announcing a consultation process on the implementation of the pupil premium.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) took us back to the halcyon days of Lady Thatcher, which I know he likes to do from time to time, as do we all. My right hon. Friend is absolutely right that we need to trust teachers and head teachers and that we need to give parents a genuine choice that will serve as a powerful force to raise standards.
My hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson) is right to point out that it is the funding agreement that is the key and the binding moment in the conversion process towards academy status. Schools wishing to convert in September had to apply by 30 June and we expect that those schools most keen to convert in September will already have embarked on consultation. That is what the Department has advised. There is nothing to stop such enthusiastic governing bodies from continuing to consult through July and the summer holidays, and it is inconceivable that they will have kept such matters from parents, when parents are represented to the tune of one third of governors on such bodies.
My hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) is absolutely right that the governors of a school, particularly the parent governors, take their responsibilities very seriously. They care deeply about the school and would not take forward the process of acquiring academy status without taking into account the views of the community, whether or not a particular part of the community were represented on the governing body.
The hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) made the important point that schools are at the heart of the local community, and we agree that they should be, which is why the funding agreement specifically states that academies should be at the heart of the community and share facilities with it. She also raised the issue of the risk to governing bodies of a legal challenge, but clause 5(1) requires them to consult those people whom they think appropriate, and to a large extent, therefore, it is up to the body to decide whom it should consult. Provided that its decision is reasonable, it is unlikely to face a legal challenge.
The hon. Member for Gedling asked for the number of schools that have applied. Those that want to convert in September must have applied to do so by 30 June, but that does not mean that others will not also have applied by that date, and we do not believe that all those that have applied will necessarily be in a position to convert by September. We want to ensure that the process is right, and we will not allow conversions until all issues have been resolved.
The hon. Gentleman also asked where we are with the TUPE negotiations. Employers of staff at schools seeking to convert will be at different stages, depending on when they intend to convert, but TUPE requires the consultation on the transfer of employment to be sufficient, and it will apply outside the Bill in any event. Any proposed September convertors will have been advised to begin a TUPE consultation some time ago, at the outset of their consideration of the application.
Finally, the hon. Gentleman asked about the details of the academy order. It will state that a named school will convert to an academy on such date as is specified in the funding agreement. It is a very short document, and with those few remarks I urge hon. Members and my hon. Friends, when asked, to withdraw their amendments.
Dr Pugh
I shall say a few words before putting amendment 8 to the vote. Ministers have been fairly quiet throughout the large part of this debate, and I cannot be alone in sensing a certain embarrassment about some aspects of this legislation and the manner in which it has been pressed.
My hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Mr. Hancock) said to me during my earlier contribution that the real reason for weak consultation and no balloting is that it is all about making the establishment of academies easier, and at the time I said that that was uncharitable. Having listened to the counter-arguments, however, I am not sure that he was not after all right and me a little naive.
The ministerial argument against ballots was that they would politicise, but one does not need to be very bright to realise that that is a general argument against any ballot, any time, any place. The right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood) suggested that we would know the parental view from informal soundings, and to some extent that is correct, but he was unable to explain how that could happen before September, when schools are closed for the holiday. Indeed, if that is such a good, sure-fire method, why do we persist with ballots before changing a grammar school’s status? People were completely unable to answer that, or why primary, secondary and special schools should not have the same privileged legal position.
No one answered the comments from the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr. Stuart), the Chair of the Education Committee, even though they were repeated. I shall repeat them again: he described the consultation arrangements as appearing like a charade. I recall working for a boss who used to listen to his heads of department, gather them all around, very carefully solicit their views and conclude by saying, “I hear what you say.” After that, he would do precisely what he wanted to do in the first place.
The hon. Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) suggested that parents will be able to vote not necessarily by ballot but with their feet. I describe that as the Burmese school of democracy: “If you don’t like it, you can get out and go somewhere else.” He was quite right that governors generally and usually have a good awareness of and good contact with parents, and that they are likely to know quite a lot about how they might feel and react, but the clear point is that that is not invariably the case. Were it invariably the case, every grant-maintained ballot would have been won, but many were lost. Indeed, the hon. Member for Sefton Central (Bill Esterson) and I come from an area where all the grant-maintained ballots were lost.
If Members wish to disempower parents, if people in this Chamber genuinely believe in post hoc consultation, and if they object to rational amendment in the Commons, they should vote against my amendment. I can do nothing about that, but if they think differently I should like them to agree to amendment 8.
Question put, That the amendment be made.
Vernon Coaker
I beg to move amendment 82, page 3, line 11, at end insert—
‘(1A) An application under subsection (1) shall be in such form and shall contain such particulars as may be prescribed in regulations.’.
The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means
With this we may take the following: amendment 81, in clause 4, page 3, line 34, at end insert—
‘(3A) The Secretary of State shall publish criteria which he will apply in deciding whether to make Academy orders, which shall be in such form and shall contain such particulars as may be prescribed in regulations.’.
Amendment 83, in clause 4, page 4, line 3, leave out subsection (6).
Vernon Coaker
I will be interested to hear why the Minister thinks that the amendments are unacceptable. Before that, it is important to say that, in the previous debate, there was a massive change in Government hope and expectation for their flagship academies policy. They have retreated from claiming that hundreds of new academies will open in September to saying that hundreds or a large number of academy orders will be agreed. The Secretary of State did not outline that as part of a flagship Government policy, which was for significant numbers of new academies to open. The policy is chaos, confusion and a complete shambles. Hon. Members of all parties will find it unbelievable that we now have a Government commitment to a significant number of academy orders, with consultation to follow. Significant progress has therefore been made as we have exposed the flaws in many aspects of the Bill. However, a Minister coming to the Dispatch Box and admitting that the Government’s aims and objectives will not be realised is astonishing.
I do not want to take up too much of the Committee’s time on the amendments. I should simply be grateful if the Minister explained why he thinks that they are unacceptable.
Mr Gibb
The amendments would collectively have the effect of increasing the burden of regulation associated with the academy conversion process. They propose several sets of regulations as well as a requirement that academy orders be made by statutory instrument. Hon. Members will recognise that that would take the Government’s policy in the opposite direction from our proposals. We want to deregulate when regulatory burdens are not only stifling innovation, but costing time and therefore money to achieve compliance. We want to give schools freedoms to allow them to focus on raising standards. Adding bureaucracy to the process is the last thing that we want.
Amendments 81 and 82 would introduce regulations that prescribed the contents of applications for academy orders and the criteria that the Secretary of State applied when deciding whether to make them. We do not believe that it is appropriate to regulate the contents of applications for academy orders. The Department already provides clear guidance on its website about the conversion process and the various steps that a school needs to take. The website also includes an application pro forma, which covers all the necessary information to enable a decision to be made. The Government have made it clear that they will apply a rigorous fit and proper person test in approving any sponsors of an academy.
The Secretary of State will consider applications from schools that wish to become academies and, in each case, confirm whether he is content for the conversion proposal to proceed to the next stage. If he is, he will make an academy order. In doing that he will, of course, take account of the relevant information before him, but he expects to approve most applications from outstanding schools. Those schools will make up the first wave, and we will publish the criteria for other applicants—the next wave—on the Department’s website.
Before issuing an academy order, the Secretary of State will undertake checks to ensure that the school is in a position to become an academy. That is important because academies operate with greater autonomy than other schools and need to be in a secure position to do so. We will check whether there has been any significant change since the school’s last outstanding Ofsted rating.
Mr Mike Hancock
Does my hon. Friend anticipate the criteria being changed from those that are currently applied to the raft of academies that is going through the process and the academies that he expects to go through shortly? Will the basic criteria be changed for future academies? He suggested that they would be published, but how different will they be?
Mr Gibb
The criteria will be different because the fast-tracking is confined to schools that are graded outstanding. When they have gone through the process, we will relax the criteria to enable other schools to do so. My hon. Friend will recall that the Secretary of State sent letters to all schools in the country. The criteria that I just mentioned apply to fast-tracking. There will be different criteria for the process once the first wave has gone through.
Issues that the Secretary of State will check include whether the school has a substantial budget deficit, whether there are PFI arrangements relating to the school and whether the school is already part of reorganisation proposals. Depending on the outcome of discussions, that may have a bearing on whether and when the Secretary of State can approve an outstanding school’s progression to the next stage. When an academy order is made, the Secretary of State must give a copy to the governing body, the head teacher and the local authority. If the application is rejected, the Secretary of State is required to inform the governing body, the head teacher and the local authority of his decision and the reason for it. It will therefore be transparent and clear why and when a school will be permitted to convert and when it will not.
However, the first stage of the process—the academy order stage—is just that: it permits a school to convert, but does not require it to do so. We need to be clear that, for many proposals, the greater detail and the final stage of the process will come later, when the Secretary of State decides whether to enter into a funding agreement with a proposed academy. It is only on signing the funding agreement that the conversion becomes legally binding. We therefore believe that prescription of the form and content of academy orders in secondary legislation is unnecessary and too bureaucratic.
An academy order is the means whereby a school’s conversion into an academy is enabled. The intention behind amendment 83 is that an academy order be made by statutory instrument, which would have to be laid before Parliament. Academy orders are intended to be the legal means whereby an individual school converts to academy status. They will contain key pieces of information that are pertinent to the conversion, but are highly specific to the circumstances of each school. It would not be a good use of Parliament’s time to require each order for each and every school to be tabled. The use of the negative resolution procedure would also be highly disruptive to any school, since the period of 40 days during which the order could be prayed against in this House or the other place would leave the school with no certainty about whether the conversion could go ahead.
In any event, the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) will be interested to know that the Lords Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee issued a report on the Bill, dated 17 June. I am sure that he knows it well, given that he has been so assiduous in scrutinising the Bill and all the accompanying documents. As he predicted, it states about the provision:
“this seems to us to be reasonable. Each order affects only one school and there is provision for those affected to be provided with copies. We agree… that these Orders are not really legislative in character and we see no reason why Parliament would want to have any control over them.”
For those reasons, I urge the hon. Gentleman to withdraw the amendment.
Vernon Coaker
It is a very good job that the Minister has persuaded me that statutory instruments of any sort—negative or affirmative—are unnecessary, otherwise he would not be able to announce academy orders in September. I intend to ask leave to withdraw the amendment, but I return to a point I made earlier. I provoked the Minister at the beginning of this debate, but in both this debate and the debate on the previous group of amendments, I note that he has not put any figure at all on the number of schools that he expects to become academies. That now seems to have gone down to almost nought, because the aspiration now is to introduce large numbers of academy orders.
Jon Trickett (Hemsworth) (Lab)
I beg to move amendment 54, in page 3, line 34, at end insert—
‘(3A) An Academy order must include provisions which make available for community use some or all of the school’s facilities.
(3B) Such provisions shall not be fewer and on less advantageous terms than those which have been available prior to the application being made for an Academy order.
(3C) Such provisions may be made by means of a contract or contracts with a local authority or other non-profit making or commercial body.
(3D) “Local authority” in this section means a county, district, unitary or parish council.’.
I welcome you to the Chair, Mr Hoyle. I think that this is the first time I have served under your distinguished chairpersonship, to use a gender-neutral phrase. Notwithstanding the fact that you and I come from different sides of the Pennines, I am sure that you will exercise justice and mercy if I happen to cross the line from time to time—if that is possible between people from different sides of the Pennines.
Amendment 54 is a probing amendment, and a similar proposal was discussed, albeit briefly, in the House of Lords, where the Minister prompted more questions than he gave answers. I shall be brief because I know that we have other important matters to debate tonight.
We now know that the Government have effectively given the Secretary of State the power to change the status of schools by order—by fiat or administrative measures—notwithstanding the fact that we seek some form of accountability to local communities, which the Government have denied. Members of the House will know that I was against academies and that I voted against them when they were introduced by my own party. However, at least the previous Government had the merit of saying that schools should be accountable and responsible to local communities, and that their facilities should be as widely accessible as possible.
The concept of the extended school—a school that reaches out into the community, and a community that reaches into the school—was very much at the heart of Labour’s schools provisions. It occurred to me that I should like to know what will happen to schools’ assets that are associated with that community provision. The idea of the extended school is that the school is a facility for the whole community. After all, in the African phrase, it takes a whole village to educate a child—sometimes it takes a child to educate the village, too—so the interaction between the community and the school is important, and lies at the heart of modern educational thinking.
I am pleased that over the years of the Labour Government, many schools in my area developed a series of community activities, and I shall highlight two—I am sure that every hon. Member could talk about what happens in schools in their areas in the same way. At Minsthorpe community college, a gym provided by the Labour Government, the Labour council and the college is open to everybody. A brand new sports hall that was built at the cost of millions of pounds in 2009 is also open to the community at subsidised cost. The college might become part of the Olympic preparations, because it is an Olympic-recognised site, which is a very proud achievement for our whole community. The school also has AstroTurf, which is used by local football clubs, a training and conference centre, beauty training, adult education, and crèche facilities on site and in the local village of Upton. The youngest pupil at the college is three months old, and the oldest is 80 years old. That is the school’s range of provision.
Hemsworth arts and community college has also had millions of pounds spent on it, and it opens every single day in one form or another. Cherry Tree House, a multi-agency drop-in centre, is available to the whole community, the police, the health service and others, and an on-site sports centre is open all year. There is an Ofsted-registered day-care nursery, an adult education learning programme, and a programme of arts that works with all kinds of community groups, which use creative skills that were unimaginable even a few years ago in Hemsworth. There are outreach programmes with local Churches, the skills centre and so on and so forth. That is a description of two schools, but I am sure that every school in every community provides similar facilities.
By tabling amendment 54, I am asking the Government: what do they intend to happen to all that community outreach? I propose that there should effectively be two further aspects to the Bill. First, there should be no less provision to the community than there is on the day of transfer, and secondly, those provisions should be available on at least the same advantageous terms as they are now, meaning that there should be no increase in price or decrease in accessibility. It is a simple proposal.
Tens of thousands of people use community schools in my constituency and throughout the country. The question is: what will happen to those community facilities? After all, they were provided not by the school, but by the whole community, through council tax and central taxation. The Bill ought to make it clear that that community provision should continue—that should be the underlying philosophy of the nature of the relationship between educational institutions and the people who live in a community—and that the pricing should not change.
Paragraph 33(e) of the Government’s proposed model funding agreement allows the academy to
“charge persons who are not registered pupils at the Academy for education provided or for facilities used by them at the Academy”.
I guess that the Minister will say that that is simply a measure to give academies a legal power to charge. However, there are fears, including in the schools that I mentioned and among the people who use them, whom I represent, that fees will increase rapidly, and that the community will be seen as a cash cow. Like many other right hon. and hon. Members, I represent many deprived communities. They, too, are seriously worried about the intentions of some academies.
I mentioned that a similar proposal was debated in the Lords. Lord Wallace of Saltaire, speaking for the Government, said:
“We therefore entirely agree with my noble friend”—
who moved the amendment—
“that it is important for a school to be at the heart of its community and that it should, as far as possible, encourage the community to make use of school facilities in the evenings and at weekends. The place to impose obligations on an academy is through the academy arrangements—either the funding agreement or the terms and conditions of grant. We therefore resist the imposition of this in the Bill but entirely sympathise with the intentions of the amendment.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 28 June 2010; Vol. 719, c. 1620.]
I guess that the Minister will say the same thing.
There are two ways to deal with this community access issue. One would be for the thousands and thousands of academies—if that is how many are eventually created—to each have their own funding agreement, which would have to be policed separately. If constituents come to my surgery and say that the fees that they used to pay to do French or learn IT, or to use the sports or beauty facilities, have suddenly tripled or quadrupled, where will I turn if the amendment is not accepted? I will have to turn to the Minister and his civil servants, who will have to look at the funding agreement and make a separate enforcement order. This is not releasing schools from red tape, as was suggested a few moments ago by the Minister. It is nationalising the education system and the schools because, instead of schools being accountable to the local authority, or regulated under an amendment of the type that I propose, the Minister will have to take separate enforcement orders for every academy. How can that be the case for a Government who claim to believe in freeing up institutions and the education system?
If the Government are determined to go ahead with the system proposed in the Bill and if they agree with the philosophy that schools should be part of their communities, it would be simpler, more direct and cheaper to put something in the Bill so that each principal and governing body of an academy will understand from the beginning that they have taken over community facilities that the council helped to build, that they have inherited pricing structures, and that they have to honour them. The amendment is not an earth-shattering one, but I want to test the Government’s commitment to their expressed desire to release people rather than bind them up in red tape. The Minister’s answer in the other place opened up a Pandora’s box of national control over an education system that we have always been proud of it being administered locally. The Bill is a reversal of that trend.
Mr Mike Hancock
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hoyle. This is the first time that I have had the honour of speaking when you are in the Chair.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett) because he makes a very important point. We have had a helpful debate on all the issues over the three or four days of consideration of the Bill, and it has been remarkable how much common ground has been found, even by those who are diametrically opposed to the idea of academies. Several of us have seen the merits of some of the issues, and the debate as a whole has been fair and frank. I suspect that the Minister has also found some of the comments helpful in framing the final form of the legislation and the detail that is provided to future academies.
I support the amendment, because the effect of a large secondary school on the social fabric of a community—with possibly an increased role in the future—is important for social cohesion. I had hoped that we would consider new clause 2, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), because that talks specifically about the importance of social cohesion. If that obligation were in the Bill, there would be no going back on the school’s commitment to the community. I have been a governor of schools where the local authority put in money for community facilities—such as a nursery—and bit by bit those services, which were additional to the school, disappeared, because of the weight of numbers. First, we lost the community room, and then the nursery. Those community facilities are not paid for by the education budget, but by the general rate fund—and in large council estates by the housing revenue account—but the pressure of numbers at the school means that they are lost to the community.
The Minister of State, Department for Education (Sarah Teather)
He was talking to his wife.
Mr Hancock
Yes, I was a bit thrown by that. I do not know if there was a domestic going on—
The Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Hoyle)
Order. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman could stick to the amendment.
Mr Hancock
The amendment is very important because it places pressure on the Minister to spell out exactly what he believes social cohesion should mean, how schools can be best used and whether any concession will be made by the Government in this area. I hope that there is, and I expect that the hon. Member for Hemsworth feels the same.
If academies come into being, the chances of local authorities—which may have “bought into” new schools in the past—to buy facilities in schools will be remote and will not happen very often. It will be important for academies to start to sell themselves to the wider communities, saying what is on offer and inviting people to use it. We do not want to start with the idea that the use of facilities will be restricted. I would hope that Ministers will give us a concession tonight that would lead people to believe that schools will have a newly awakened sense of their responsibility to make a greater effort to bring the community in.
Dan Rogerson
I apologise to you, Mr Hoyle, and to the Committee for not being here for the start of the debate on this group of amendments. I was startled by the efficiency and economy with which the Committee dealt with the previous one.
I welcome the fact that the hon. Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett) has raised this issue. It is right that people should look to their local schools for more than the education of young people—or even the education of people throughout their lives. In constituencies such as mine, the rural primary schools are at the heart of the small villages and offer much in terms of facilities and a focal point for much of what happens in the community. In the towns and bigger urban areas, secondary schools offer a similar facility, as my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock) said. I completely understand the concerns that the hon. Member for Hemsworth has raised, on behalf of his constituents and people across the country watching this debate, about facilities that they are accustomed to having access to, for a whole range of purposes, perhaps being affected.
I do not have an academy in my constituency, so I bow to the experience of hon. Members who do as to how academies can continue to be at the heart of their communities. However, I would hope that we could have a response from the Minister to the issues raised by the hon. Member for Hemsworth, to reassure people that there will be something in the funding agreement—as we have heard, Government spokespeople in the other place suggested that that would be the way forward—if not in the Bill itself, to ensure that there is a duty on those schools to continue to engage with their local communities.
We have provision in the Bill not just for the transition of existing maintained schools into academies, but for new schools. We have already had a debate about whether some capital resource might be available to help those schools get under way. I hope that that could be kept to a minimum and that where people come forward wishing to provide those services, they would bring with them the determination to provide such facilities themselves. However, if there is a drawdown of money from the state system, as it were, the relevant duties and responsibilities must lie with those people, because they will be wanting to make a contribution to the education of young people in their communities, and I would hope that they should also be at the heart of those communities.
Amendment 54 seeks to place that commitment in the Bill, particularly with regard to facilities. I hesitate to get into a debate on the new clause standing in my name, which my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South mentioned—we may reach it this evening; I am not sure—but there are related issues, which I hope you will permit me to mention, Mr Hoyle, that go wider than just the facilities. My hon. Friend referred to social and community cohesion, on which I hope the Minister will have had a chance to reflect.
With regard to the use of the facilities that the hon. Member for Hemsworth has set out in his amendment, there is a concern that if schools that are considering going down that route are to be held in law to be responsible for providing them following a change, they might seek to reduce such facilities or run them down. I hope that they would not, because all schools, whether they are undergoing the process or not, will want to be at the heart of their communities. However, behind the amendment is a concern that a school might wish to restrict access a little. My concern is that accepting the amendment as drafted, with all the caveats that the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) will no doubt raise on Report—perhaps I can cut in now, before we get there—will mean that schools would be encouraged to run down the community activities that they offer, because they would want to keep to a minimum what they would have to do afterwards. The amendment might therefore have the opposite effect.
Also, the courts would presumably then become the final arbiter of whether a school was keeping its swimming pool open—if it had a swimming pool—for the same number of hours as it had been a little while ago. We could have schools repeatedly going back to court. I know that that is not the intention of the hon. Member for Hemsworth. I am merely saying that his amendment is a chance to probe the Minister’s intentions and insist that, wherever possible, we should have as much in the guidelines or the funding agreement, which is probably the way to do things, to reassure people that schools will continue to be at the heart of their communities, no matter how they receive their state funding—whether through a maintained set-up or the newer, academies option.
I hope that the Minister will indicate his support for that, but also place on record the fact that it will apply to any new academies, as well as to those formed by existing schools transferring across.
Mr Iain Wright
May I begin by saying what a pleasure it is to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hoyle?
I will be brief, because my hon. Friend the Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett) and the hon. Members for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock) and for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson) have said all that needs to be said about amendment 54. I welcome the amendment, which was tabled by my hon. Friend. He has rightly expressed the concern about the risk that community facilities—provision that could and should be used by partnering schools or the wider community—could be stopped as a result of an academy order. All three hon. Members who have spoken in this debate have said how important such facilities are to social cohesion.
A further point is that in times when public finances are tight, the potential saving from having extended schools with those provisions is immense. There could be savings to the NHS, from having that social network in place, to the Home Office and police budgets, from early intervention, or to the social care budget. Those savings could be huge, and they all stem from the idea of an extended school that opens out into the community, providing an open and collaborative range of offers. However, there is nothing in the Bill that might safeguard that. I am concerned about that, which is why I welcome the amendment. I know that it is a probing amendment, as my hon. Friend said. However, I hope that the Minister can reassure the Committee that what is in the Bill will safeguard what is available for the community, because the whole of society can benefit as a result.
Mr Gibb
Amendment 54 seeks to ensure that each academy order contains provisions that make the school’s facilities available for community use once the school has converted to an academy. We agree on the importance of schools being at the heart of their communities. We would want to encourage the community use of school facilities. That is why the model funding agreement, which has been made available in the Libraries of both Houses and on the Department’s website, requires academies
“to be at the heart of their communities and to share their facilities with other schools and the wider community”.
That could include a wide range of initiatives—for example, making the school’s sports facilities available for local groups to use, offering adult education after hours, and engaging staff in outreach work across other local schools. It is clear from the provisions in academy arrangements that we are committed to academies being a central resource to their local communities. That is also borne out by our expectation that all outstanding schools commit in principle to working in partnership with a weaker school, as part of their applications to become academies.
However, it would not be appropriate for every academy order to make such provision. Academy orders are intended to be the documents that confirm a school’s conversion, and will contain key pieces of information pertinent to the conversion, depending on the circumstances of each school. We believe that the place to impose obligations on an academy is through the academy arrangements, in either the funding agreement or the terms and conditions of grant. That is consistent with the approach of the previous Government.
The hon. Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett) talked about the gym and the sports facilities in his local school, and asked whether it could be made a requirement that there should be no less provision to the community than existed at the date of the transfer. He wanted to put that in the Bill, which I have explained would be excessive. He also raised the issue of the fees charged for those sports facilities. Again, his fear is that an academy would raise those fees in order to raise further funds for the academy or the school. However, all the issues that he has raised are issues for the funding agreement. There is no reason why those facilities cannot continue. If the issue is shared facilities between the school and the local authority, these will be subject to discussion as part of the conversion process. On the wider issue of charging, charging that is allowed is limited, as he knows, and will be equivalent to the money that maintained schools are also entitled to raise for out-of-hours-type activities.
I suppose that the issue at the back of the hon. Gentleman’s mind is the concern that somehow academies will be less community-minded than the maintained schools that they replace—that somehow they will gouge out those facilities used by local residents or the out-of-hours evening classes that they attend. I see no evidence from the academies that I have visited around the country that that is their attitude. They are just as much a part of the community as the maintained schools that they are replacing.
The hon. Gentleman should be assured, certainly on the basis of the statements that I am now making to the Committee, that it is not the Government’s intention that academies should become islands unto themselves, charging the maximum that they can to raise funds for their facilities. They will continue to be part of the community, concerned about the community, and wanting to share their facilities with the community.
I want to turn now to the points raised tangentially by my hon. Friends the Members for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock) and for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson). They both raised the issue of community cohesion. It is our view that the funding agreement will already include that requirement, using the phrase that I have just read out about being at the heart of the community and sharing facilities with the community. I am also able to help my hon. Friends by adding to the funding agreement an explicit requirement that academies will be required to be at the heart of their communities, to promote community cohesion and to share their facilities with other schools and the wider community. I hope that, in the light of those few words and the arguments that I put forward earlier, the hon. Member for Hemsworth will withdraw his amendment, which he described as a probing amendment.
Jon Trickett
I am grateful to the Minister for the way in which he has presented his case to the Committee, and I do not wish to press the amendment to a vote. He has had the opportunity to put the Government’s views on record, and they will no doubt form part of any future debate when academies begin to operate. I predict, however, that the monitoring system he is introducing will be more expensive, more bureaucratic and more top-down than the present system of accountability of schools to their local communities through the local authorities, and that is deeply regrettable. With that, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Mr Iain Wright
I beg to move amendment 79, page 4, line 8, at end add—
‘(8) Before making an Academy order in respect of a maintained school under this section, the Secretary of State shall consult with—
(a) the local authority,
(b) any other local authority who would in his opinion be affected by the making of an Academy order,
(c) teachers and other staff at the school and their representatives,
(d) parents and pupils of the school and the other schools in the community, and
(e) such other persons as the Secretary of State considers appropriate.’.
The Chairman of Ways and Means
With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 7—Social cohesion—
(1) Before a school makes an application for an Academy order or an Academy arrangement with an additional school the relevant local authority must be asked to assess the impact of Academy status on—
(a) admissions in the local authority area where the school is situated;
(b) funding between all publicly funded schools in the local authority area where the school is situated; and
(c) social cohesion in the local authority area where the school is situated.
(2) The impact assessment in subsection (1) should be made with regard to any existing policies the local authority or local schools forum have in relation to (a), (b) and (c).
(3) Before making an Academy order or an Academy arrangement with an additional school the Secretary of State must have regard to the impact assessment in subsection (1) made by the local authority.’.
Mr Wright
With this amendment and new clause 7, we return to a subject that we have discussed time and again in this brief Committee stage. One of the most fundamental weaknesses of the entire Bill is its wholly inadequate provision for consultation. Clause 4 sets out the process for the Secretary of State to consider and approve an academy order. It also sets out the criteria by which an application may be considered. The two criteria are that the governing body has applied or that the school is eligible for intervention. This provides no role for the local community or for parents to ask for intervention, however. Time and again this afternoon, the point has been raised about the lack of consultation for local stakeholders, especially parents. We believe that local authorities, communities, teachers, trade unionists and, most importantly, parents should have a role in calling for intervention.
Inherent in the Bill is a massive risk of creating a two-tier system that will divide rather than unite communities, and that will set deprived communities against affluent neighbourhoods. As I said in Committee last week, the Bill could ensure that the most important relationship was between the individual school and the Secretary of State, rather than between the school and its local community.
We have just been discussing amendment 54. One of my concerns is that the Bill, as it stands, is a highly centralising piece of legislation whose focus is firmly on the school and the Secretary of State, rather than on the wider area. There is also a risk that the Secretary of State intends to use the freedoms that academies allow to give only successful, prosperous schools the flexibility and resources to thrive. Those freedoms could well be provided at the expense of the vast majority of schools, which could face cuts to support services and experience severe disruption. The fragmentation of our schools system would be a real step backwards for social progress and social cohesion.
Amendment 79 would ensure that, before making an academy order in respect of a maintained school, the Secretary of State would be obliged to consult the local authority, teachers and other staff at the school, parents and pupils of the school and the other schools in the community, and any other such persons who are considered appropriate. In addition, he would have to consult other local authorities that might be affected by an academy order. This is most common, although not exclusively so, in London, where pupils in a particular school may be drawn from a wide variety of local authorities. Demand for places at a school in a particular local authority, especially a popular school, can affect the demand, and hence the viability, of schools in other boroughs. Surely the Minister accepts that it is right for those affected local authorities to be consulted as well. Proposed new subsection 8(b) would ensure that any other local authority that might be affected by the making of an academy order was consulted. For those reasons, we believe that amendment 79 offers an important means of injecting more challenge, scrutiny and consultation into the proposed legislation.
We believe strongly that local authorities have a strong role to play in helping every child to succeed. They do not, and should not, run schools, but they can provide a strategic function, and commission provision across an area that is relevant, suitable and in keeping with the local authority’s vision for the shape of their economy. Local authorities can ensure that local services are of a high quality and meet the needs, ambitions and aspirations of children and young people. The actions or, at times, inactions of local authorities can also be held to account by local people in a truly democratic fashion, as a means of securing effective, efficient and fair local public services.
We on the Labour Benches and, I suspect, some on the Government Benches, believe that local authorities are best placed to facilitate partnerships across different schools and drive forward improvement and rising standards. I said “I suspect”, but it is fair to say that all Liberal Democrats subscribe to that view. I quote page 37 of their 2010 general election manifesto, which states:
“Local authorities will not run schools, but will have a central and strategic role, including responsibility for oversight of school performance and fair admissions. They will be expected to intervene where school leadership or performance is weak.”
We can all agree with that sentiment. I can more or less agree, too, with the next bullet point in their manifesto:
“We will ensure a level playing field for admissions and funding and replace Academies with our own model of ‘Sponsor-Managed Schools’. These schools will be commissioned by and accountable to local authorities and not Whitehall”.
That is an important commitment, on which every Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament was returned to the House. It is important that the Committee has the opportunity to vote on the matter, so that Liberal Democrat Members can support their manifesto commitments to a level playing field on admissions and funding and on social cohesion. On that basis, I give notice that I want to test the Committee’s opinion with regard to new clause 7.
Ian Swales (Redcar) (LD)
What did the hon. Gentleman think about the provisions under discussion when the Labour Government introduced academies? As far as I know, none of the provisions apply to the current academy system.
Mr Wright
I do not want to return to the Second Reading debate, but the purpose and definition of academies under the Bill differ fundamentally from those of the academies introduced by the Labour Government. We gave freedoms and flexibilities to poorly performing schools in deprived areas. The Bill is a completely different kettle of fish, and I think that the hon. Gentleman agrees with me.
Under new clause 7, before a school can make an application for an academy order—or arrangement with a free school—local authorities would be asked to assess the impact of such an order or arrangement on admissions, the funding between all state-funded schools and social cohesion in an area. As the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson) ably articulated, social cohesion with regard to education is vital. There is a huge risk inherent in the Bill that social cohesion will be threatened and compromised. The new clause addresses that.
Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)
The hon. Gentleman makes a strong case, referring to Liberal Democrat party policy. In new clause 7(1)(a), he refers to the admissions policy and the impact on admissions to schools. Were he successful in getting the new clause accepted, what would he envisage as the best solution in circumstances in which, inevitably, parents will be disgruntled that their child is unable to gain admission to a local school?
Mr Wright
In my constituency, parents want to get their children into certain popular schools. It is important that the local authority sets out a clear procedure by which admissions will be considered, that there is a good appeals process, and that the schools adjudicator is part of that process. It is important that local authorities are in the driving seat: not running schools, but with borough-wide thinking on admissions. The approach has worked well and can continue to do so.
Earlier today, my right hon. Friend the shadow Secretary of State for Education and the shadow Schools Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) wrote to every Liberal Democrat Member, expressing the wish that we work together to amend and improve the Bill by supporting new clause 7. If Liberal Democrat Members feel that they must support the Bill as a whole in keeping with the coalition agreement, I can understand and respect their position, but I hope that there can be cross-party support for new clause 7.
Dan Rogerson
How could I resist the opportunity to respond to the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr Wright), who has thrown his glove across the Floor of the House to land at my feet?
The hon. Gentleman is obviously pining for the day on which there is a Liberal Democrat majority Government—[Interruption.] I look forward to working with the hon. Gentleman. Given the way in which his party has conducted itself in opposition, he and his hon. Friends may well be working towards such an arrangement even now.
Let me say, in all seriousness, that the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to suggest that if the Liberal Democrats had been the majority party, we would have proceeded with the sponsor-managed schools option. However, we are not in that position. As the hon. Gentleman pointed out, we are in a coalition Government with a coalition agreement, and it is clear that some policies emanate from one partner in the coalition and some from the other. That is the way it works in coalition agreements all over the world, in countries where arrangements such as this are far more common than they have been in the United Kingdom, at least for several decades.
I do not think that academies are the answer. I did not think that they were the answer when the hon. Gentleman’s party was in charge of the policy, and I do not think that they will necessarily be the answer for all schools now. However, following the coalition agreement, the Bill contains a series of provisions enabling communities, where there is a will, to allow schools to adopt academy status. It remains to be seen how many will take up the option and what use they will make of it. Amendments were made in another place, notably with regard to the provision of additional schools—which I know concerned the hon. Gentleman in earlier debates—and assessments of the impact on the surrounding area.
Consultation is vital. We have already engaged in a full debate on that issue, and I shall not go over the ground again. I will say, however, that the hon. Gentleman spoke of commitments by a political party in a set of circumstances prior to a coalition agreement which has been published and is available for everyone to examine and discuss. Believe me, people in my constituency and others have been discussing it, and we have had many debates on it. That should not come as a surprise to the hon. Gentleman.
I had the honour of serving in the last Parliament, when the hon. Gentleman stood at the Government Dispatch Box ably standing up for—it must be said—the sometimes slightly dodgy policies that his party was producing. He must have seen us sitting on the Opposition Benches below the Gangway—where his hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) is sitting now—talking to some of his hon. Friends who were then sitting on this side of the Committee. They were sorely tempted to join us. Lord McAvoy, as he now is, would have been there, casting his eye over Labour Members and making sure that that did not happen.
It could be said that we are now in similar circumstances in terms of the way in which this place works, but it can only work, and a Government can only work, when there is an agreed programme. We have an agreed programme, and the Government are proceeding with it. However, I am pleased that the Minister was willing to listen—as was his noble Friend Lord Hill—to Members of our party and our side of the coalition, and to other noble Lords and hon. Members, and to make provision to allay some of the concerns that have been raised.
Vernon Coaker
Let me explain why we consider new clause 7 so important. Subsection (1)(c) refers to
“social cohesion in the local authority area where the school is situated.”
Under the Bill, as part of the funding agreement, if a pupil is excluded from an academy during the year, the academy will keep the funding as if the pupil had not been excluded, but the local authority—or someone else—will have to provide the funding for that excluded pupil somewhere else. It is because of such provisions in the Bill that some of us consider an impact assessment to be vital. Otherwise, when a pupil is excluded, the academy will keep the money and the pupil will become the responsibility of the local authority, which will have no funds with which to carry out that responsibility.
Dan Rogerson
I understand the hon. Gentleman’s point, and I am sure the Minister will want to respond to it in respect of how the funding agreement will work as the academies come into being. However, the hon. Gentleman said earlier that he thinks that academies are a good thing and that if Labour had continued in government, they would have increased in number. [Interruption.] Well, the issue of variance that has arisen between the Government’s proposal and that of the hon. Gentleman is how the academies come into being. Until now they have undoubtedly had an effect on their local area, but there is an issue of critical mass, as many Opposition Members have said: there must be a tipping point at which there is a sufficient number of academies to have a particular effect on the local authority. That would have happened under the hon. Gentleman’s vision for expanding the number of academies as well as under the Government’s, so that is a separate question; it is a question about how many academies we have and what effect they have collectively.
I was tempted to rise and respond to the question of whether the model under discussion is the same as that which the Liberal Democrats have advocated throughout history. It is not of course, but real progress has been made in that the Government have now introduced a Bill that includes a provision to allay a lot of the concerns that many of us have raised, but which also opens a way for communities that feel they want to go in this direction.
I am concerned that scare stories are being told that everybody will want to go for this in a big rush, but I do not think that will be the case. I think that many governing bodies, schools and groups will want to—[Interruption.] Well, the Secretary of State has talked about the huge amount of interest in this programme and I am sure that that is true, but I think that many people will want to see what happens and how things develop before deciding whether to take advantage of the provisions.
Andrew George
My hon. Friend has said that his concerns have been allayed. He will have heard my intervention on the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr Wright) in respect of the impact of these proposals on the admissions policies of each of the academies and what will happen when parents are unable to find a place in their local school which happens to be an academy—from whom they can seek redress in those circumstances if they have a justifiable reason to take the matter a stage further. I wonder how my hon. Friend might allay my concerns, given that his concerns in respect of the admissions policy have been allayed. This point is particularly important if we bear in mind the fact that the first academies are likely to be the outstanding schools—those that all pupils would wish to go to.
Dan Rogerson
My hon. Friend raises an important point. He has intervened on both the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr Wright) and me, and he will no doubt want to raise his question with the Minister when he responds—indeed, the Minister may well wish to do address it in any case. When talking about fears being allayed, the particular point I was addressing was to do with community cohesion, which is very important. It is about the way in which the existing maintained schools, the new academies that have transferred over and other new school provision that is offered will interact and relate to the surrounding community. There has been a bit of progress on that, which I welcome.
On the tempting invitation from the hon. Member for Hartlepool to support the Labour amendment, I must say that their conversion comes a little late on some of these issues. As my party colleagues, my hon. Friends the Members for St Ives (Andrew George) and for Redcar (Ian Swales), have already said in this brief debate, in respect of how the relationships emerge most of the provisions were in existence and operation under the previous academies programme. I do not think there is any huge difference therefore. The only difference is that this is someone else’s academy programme, not that of the hon. Gentleman.
Mr Gibb
Amendment 79 would require the Secretary of State to consult all those listed in the amendment before making an academy order in respect of a maintained school. As I have mentioned a number of times, clause 5 already requires the governing body of a maintained school wishing to convert to academy status to consult on its proposals. That provision was included in the Bill in response to concerns raised in the other place and in order to demonstrate the importance that this Government attach to consultation. I believe, therefore, that it is unnecessary and inappropriate, not to mention impractical, for the Secretary of State to consult on those same proposals. It should be the school’s decision to become an academy, except in those cases where the school is eligible for intervention. It is our aim to reduce any unnecessary bureaucracy surrounding the academy conversion process, and I believe that potentially duplicating consultation would fall into that category.
We have made it very clear that we believe that schools are in the best position to determine how best consultation should take place. That includes deciding who should be consulted, although some guidance is provided on the website as to who is consulted, and when and how that should be done. We do not intend to provide an inflexible checklist, such as that proposed in this amendment, which would not, in itself, ensure that consultation was any more meaningful.
New clause 7 would mean that before a school makes an application for an academy order or an academy arrangement with an additional school, a local authority must be asked to assess the impact of academy status on admissions, on funding between all publicly funded schools and on social cohesion in the local authority area where the school is situated. It would also mean that before making an academy order or an academy arrangement with an additional school, the Secretary of State would be required to have regard to the impact assessment.
Clause 9 requires the Secretary of State, when deciding whether to enter into academy arrangements with an additional school—an entirely new or “free” school—to take into account the impact of such a school on the existing schools and colleges in the area. We believe that requiring the local authority to consider the impact of an additional school as well is unnecessary and will simply result, again, in the duplication of work. The clause does not include provisions for the Secretary of State to assess the impact of schools that convert into academies. We are clear that schools should convert “as is”; in most cases, it will be the same head, the same staff, the same parents and the same children in the school, but with additional freedoms to innovate and raise standards. Furthermore, the requirement for converting schools to consult means that those other schools in the area may have the chance to make representations on the proposed conversion. Where schools convert “as is” we do not believe, therefore, that the nature of the change is such that there is any need for an impact assessment.
Andrew George
The Minister will have heard my two interventions about the availability of an appeals process where an admissions policy excludes potential pupils from a school before they have been able to gain admission to the school. Under the current arrangements, in most areas the parents can appeal to the local authority if they feel that the decision is unacceptable. What arrangements will apply where an academy has been set up?
Mr Gibb
My hon. Friend will know that the admissions code will apply just as much to academies as to maintained schools, that the admissions appeals code will also apply just as much to academies as to maintained schools and that the co-ordination arrangements will apply too. So the local authorities will hold the ring on admissions in the same way as they do at the moment.
Mr Iain Wright
I may be pre-empting what the Minister is going to say. He has been talking about existing maintained schools converting to an academy, using the phrase “as is” and he mentioned that schools would have the same head, the same estate and so on. New clause 7(1) states:
“Before a school makes an application for an Academy order or”—
this is the point on which I seek clarification—
“an Academy arrangement with an additional school”.
That refers to a free school. Will the existing arrangements still apply in respect of a free school too? Could the Minister provide clarity on that?
Mr Gibb
I shall seek to do that during the rest of my speech. If I do not get round to the hon. Gentleman’s point, I shall write to him.
We believe that the impact of an increase in academies and the freedoms they provide will lead to improvements in standards across the education sector as the best heads and the best schools drive improvements and expertise. The noble Lords were concerned about schools changing their age range and the Bill was amended to allay those concerns. Subsection (4) of clause 9 makes it clear than when a maintained school becomes an academy under the current school closure processes, further to the Education and Inspections Act 2006 and not further to an academy order, when the age range is not like-for-like, the school would be classed as an additional school, so the Secretary of State would be required to evaluate the impact. That would include, for example, an academy created as a result of the amalgamation of two or more schools or an 11-to-18 academy that replaced an 11-to-16 maintained school, if that involved a closure rather than a conversion. Any school wishing to add a sixth form would need to follow the relevant statutory provisions.
The answer to the question whether the admissions code and the appeals code will apply to free schools, too, is yes, it will. The problem with the Minister’s opening remarks—
Mr Gibb
Sorry, the shadow Minister. It is all very new.
The problem with the shadow Minister’s speech in moving the amendment was that it was written, I think, before he heard of the Government’s intention to put in the funding agreement an explicit requirement to promote community cohesion. On top of that, it already requires academies to be at the heart of the community. He cited the Liberal Democrat manifesto commitment that local authorities will not run schools. That is a view common throughout the coalition and we also agree that local authorities should be the champion of parents and pupils, championing school improvement and challenging rather than defending underperforming schools. In an old politics kind of way, he is trying to drive a wedge into fissures in the coalition where no fissures exist—and he is doing so unsuccessfully.
The point made by the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) about excluded pupils is wrong. He alleged that the funding for an excluded pupil stays with the academy. The funding follows the pupil when the pupil is excluded and that is a requirement in the academy agreement.
With those few words, I hope that I have persuaded Opposition Members and those elsewhere to withdraw their amendments.
Mr Iain Wright
I apologise to the Minister on the subject of the concession that he has made on social cohesion and community cohesion in the funding agreement. I had meant to mention that, but I was wrapped up in helping Liberal Democrats. I apologise; that is a welcome concession.
The hon. Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson) went so far in tempting me to think that he does not agree with academies, but then he pulled back considerably. He mentioned, rightly, that coalition—like all politics—is a question of compromise and negotiation, but I think that the Liberal Democrats are getting a bit of a raw deal in the coalition agreement when it comes to education policy. I will readily admit that today there has been the announcement on school funding and the pupil premium and I am pleased to see the Minister of State, the hon. Member for Brent Central (Sarah Teather), on the Treasury Bench. I pay tribute to her for pushing that forward.
In every other sense, the emphasis has been on Conservative party policy, with an emphasis on free markets. There has been a rush to the markets and a lack of consultation with and consideration for the wider community that is at odds with what the Liberal Democrats want. I shall still provide the hon. Member for North Cornwall and his hon. Friends, who seem readily poised to join us in the appropriate Lobby, with the opportunity to ensure that the commitments that were made in the Liberal Democrat manifesto in the general election, only a matter of weeks ago, can still be fulfilled.
I am not content with the Minister’s explanations in terms of new clause 7. I think it is very important and I will want to press that to a vote, but I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 4 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 5 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 16
Pre-commencement applications etc
Question put, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Mr Gibb
We have had an interesting week of debates on the Bill, and I thank all hon. Members who took part, particularly my hon. Friends the Members for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart) and for South Basildon and East Thurrock (Stephen Metcalfe), who made their maiden speeches during these debates. I should also like to thank the Minister of State, Department for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Brent Central (Sarah Teather), for her help, and the right hon. and hon. Members on the Opposition Front Bench for their careful and thorough scrutiny of the Bill.
I thank officials in the Department for the long hours that they have spent on the Bill during its passage through the other place and this House, and for their support of my right hon. and hon. Friends. We should also thank the Chairs of the Committee: Mr Evans, Mr Caton, you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and Ms Primarolo, whom my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock) lovingly referred to as “Miss P”. I am grateful to my noble Friend Lord Hill, who skilfully steered the Bill through the other place just days after being appointed a Minister, and to my hon. Friends and noble Friends who have improved the Bill and the model funding agreement in both the other place and this House.
Throughout the process we have been keen to listen to concerns, particularly, though not exclusively, those of our partners in the Liberal Democrat part of the coalition. Amendments in the other place have given children with special educational needs greater rights to admission to academies than existed in previous academies legislation, and new requirements for funding for low-incidence special needs have been added. New duties to consult have been included in clauses 5 and 10, and the Secretary of State will now be obliged by statute to take into account the impact on other schools of any new school established under the Bill. That is now in clause 9.
My noble Friends have added greater parliamentary accountability through an annual report to Parliament, which will also enable us to analyse issues of concern to my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), such as the viability of primary schools that opt for academy status. He made a compelling case for increasing the number of parent governors, so as I mentioned earlier, the model funding agreement will be changed to increase the number from one to two. Opposition Members have successfully ensured that the funding agreement includes a requirement for looked-after children to have a designated member of staff.
Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)
Will the two parent governors be elected by other parents or appointed?
Mr Gibb
My understanding is that they will be elected, but if I am proved wrong I will write to my hon. Friend.
After 22 hours in Committee and nine hours on Report in the other place between 7 June and 13 July, and after 19 and a half hours of Second Reading and Committee in this House, not including this afternoon and evening, we finally reach Third Reading of a Bill that, in the words of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State,
“grants greater autonomy to individual schools…gives more freedom to teachers and…injects a new level of dynamism into a programme that has been proven to raise standards for all children and for the disadvantaged most of all.”—[Official Report, 19 July 2010; Vol. 514, c. 24.]
I shall start by saying what the Bill is not about. It is not about a “full-scale assault” on comprehensive education—a ludicrous claim by the shadow Secretary of State in The Guardian on Saturday. We believe in comprehensive education and are committed to it, and the Bill will strengthen it. Nor is it about scrapping the admissions code, another spurious claim about the Government’s education policies by the shadow Secretary of State. We are committed to fair admissions through the code, and all academies will be bound by it through the model funding agreement.
Nor is this Bill about the creation of a two-tier education system. Two tiers are what we have today—the best performing state schools and the worst. The independent sector, which educates just 8% of children, is responsible for 44% of all A* grades in GCSE French. It educates just 10% of 16-18 year olds, but is responsible for 35% of all A grades in A-level physics.
The Bill offers all schools the opportunity to acquire the kind of professional freedoms that have proved so successful not only in the independent sector, but in the city technology colleges and in academies. After 20 years of independence, CTCs are among the most successful schools in the country. On average, in those schools, 82% achieve five or more GCSEs at grades A* to C, including English and maths. In those academies that have been open long enough to have had GCSE results in 2008 and 2009, a third have GCSE results that improved by 15 percentage points compared with their predecessor schools.
There have been 1,958 expressions of interest from schools in all parts of the country. Of those 1,071 are from schools graded outstanding by Ofsted. Many of the heads and governing bodies of those schools are hungry for the freedoms in the academies legislation that the previous Administration introduced. They are in a hurry to have them by September and, for those schools that are ready and able, so are we.
We are in a hurry because we do not think that it is right that 40% of 11-year-olds leave primary school still struggling with reading, writing and maths. It is not acceptable that nearly three quarters of pupils eligible for free school meals fail to get five or more GCSEs or equivalents at grades A* to C, including English and maths, or that 42% of those eligible for free school meals fail to achieve a single GCSE above grade D.
I know that there are some concerns among hon. Members of all parties about the future role of local authorities if all schools become academies. However, I should point out that there are 203 academies out of 3,300 secondary schools and some 17,000 primary schools. It will be many years, if at all, before all those schools acquire academy status. The Bill is permissive, not prescriptive or mandatory. We see a new and stronger role for local authorities emerging over the years as champions of parents and pupils, challenging rather than defending underperforming schools. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has established a ministerial advisory group to take that forward and written to all education authorities seeking views.
The Bill is the first step in the coalition’s ambitious plans to raise standards in all our schools. We want parents not to have to worry about the quality of education that their children will receive at their local school. We want behaviour in all schools to be as good as in the best. That is why we are clarifying and strengthening teachers’ powers and abolishing the statutory requirement for 24 hours’ notice for detentions. We want a teaching profession with renewed morale and confidence, no longer struggling under the yoke of monthly Government initiatives and ever-demanding bureaucratic requirements.
The Bill is about trusting the professionalism of teachers and head teachers. It is about innovation and excellence, about giving parents a genuine choice and children the opportunity for a better future. It is a short Bill, but its impact will be long lasting. I commend it to the House.
Ed Balls (Morley and Outwood) (Lab/Co-op)
It is customary to commence a Third Reading debate with congratulations to hon. Members of all parties on the excellence of their speeches; to departmental officials and external advisers on the cogency of their briefing, and to you, Mr Speaker and your Deputies on your conduct of the proceedings. Tonight must be no different. Therefore, on behalf of the shadow Education Ministers and all Labour Members, I commend all those who have taken part in the debates, with a special mention to my hon. Friends the Members for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) and for North West Durham (Pat Glass) for their contributions, as well as—the list is only partial, from the speeches that I have heard—the hon. Members for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy), for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart), for St Ives (Andrew George), for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), for Portsmouth South (Mr Hancock) and for Bradford East (Mr Ward).
However, normally those tributes are paid after weeks of post-Second Reading scrutiny—after many days of Committee deliberations and hours of scrutiny on Report. Those weeks of debate in Parliament are important because, although consensus may not be reached on every point, everyone can feel that they have raised issues, aired concerns and had their say. Not so with this Bill. In the opinion of my hon. Friends and I, and many outside experts, the flawed and rushed provisions in the Bill risk ripping apart the community-based comprehensive education system that we have built in this country over decades. We fear that the Bill will make things worse for our schools, our children’s futures and the cohesion of our communities, yet it has been railroaded through from Second Reading to Third Reading in just seven days, with just three days in Committee, and following unprecedentedly constricted debates in the other place.
There has been no time for proper debate or scrutiny, no Report, and no amendments have been allowed, and hon. Members on both sides of the House have had no opportunity to correct some of the Bill’s worst excesses. Three weeks ago, we had the unedifying sight of the Secretary of State having to apologise twice to the House because of his rushed and discourteous handling of his school buildings cancellation. It is a pity that he has not learned that rushing through unfair or ill-thought through policies does him no credit.
As I said on Second Reading just seven days ago, the Secretary of State was clearly fearful of what proper parliamentary scrutiny would throw up about the Bill. As the hon. Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) said earlier from the Government Benches, “We have the spectacle of Ministers who have already told us that they will accept no amendment, period, and the sight of Whips new and old cracking their knuckles off-stage and perfecting basilisk-like stares in the mirror.”[Hon. Members: “What?”] I have no clue what that means, but it sounds very bad to me. If the hon. Gentleman were in the Chamber, I would be happy for him to intervene to tell us. He is a Liberal Democrat, so clearly, among those on the Government Benches not only the Chair of the Select Committee on Education is deeply critical of the handling of the Bill.
The Opposition are very proud of the biggest school-building programme since the Victorian era, of the best generation of teachers we have ever had in our country, and of the hard work of children, parents and teachers. That has delivered the biggest increase in standards for many years. We have gone from fewer than half of schools not reaching the basic standard to just one in 12 over the past 10 years. It is our firm view that the Bill will create an unfair, two-tier education system, and gross unfairness in funding. Standards will not rise but fall, and fairness and social cohesion will be undermined.
Chris Skidmore (Kingswood) (Con)
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned that he is proud of bringing up a new generation of teachers. The Bill is principally about handing power back to teachers to set up good new schools. Why is he running scared of that?
Ed Balls
The most important issue is standards, not structures, and the Bill is all about structural change that cuts out consultation with teachers, governors, parents and communities, and that undermines the ability of people to ensure that their local area has a proper spread of schools. The fact is that the Bill is a complete free market free-for-all. That is why I am critical of it.
There have been some words of reassurance and promises of reviews to come, but none of any substance. The explanatory notes to the Bill state:
“The Secretary of State expects that a significant number of Academies will open in September 2010”,
but we now know—we heard it this afternoon—that such are the rushed provisions of the Bill and the lack of substance to those expressions of interest, no academies at all will open this September. We are rushing this through purely to have orders agreed by next September. This is just an attempt to bounce the coalition partners into agreeing before they wake up to exactly what is going on.
I shall explain that in more detail. What has become abundantly clear in the short time that we have had to debate this Bill is that, by dropping any pretence at consultation and clearing away the role of the local authority entirely, the Secretary of State has made it possible, through this legislation, to divert billions of pounds from existing school building, the Building Schools for the Future programme, into the creation of new, additional school places through the setting up of new, free market schools, even when there are already too many school places, creating a chaotic free market.
Chris Skidmore
The right hon. Gentleman is right that it is standards, not structures that are important, so I find it hard to believe his new obsession with the BSF programme, which he never had the money for in the first place. But he did not answer my first question: why is he running scared of allowing teachers to set up schools? Why is he running free—I mean scared—of giving teachers that freedom?
Ed Balls
I am not running free, or even scared. I support new schools where we need new schools, but I have been to the Brunel academy and seen the huge boost to the aspirations of the children in that part of Bristol from the first ever BSF programme. I also went to Knowsley last year and opened a new BSF school. I asked two year 9 pupils what they thought of the school. They said that they never thought that anybody would think that they were sufficiently important to have a school like that built for them. That boost to aspiration, hope and expectation has been taken away from 700 schools and from 700,000 children all around the country, and that is why I am critical of this Bill and that decision. This is paving legislation for the new free market schools.
I wish to remind the House of the amendments that have been rejected by the Government in the few hours that we have had to debate this Bill because of the no amendment rule—
Mr Mike Hancock
Like the shadow Education Secretary, I think that this Bill is a threat to comprehensive education. But I thought that his Government’s Bill on academies was also a threat to comprehensive education. What is the difference now?
Ed Balls
The only similarity between our policy on academies and the new policy on academies is that the Secretary of State has pinched the word “academy” and attached it to the new schools he wishes to establish. Our academies were set up in the most disadvantaged areas, not the most affluent areas. They were set up with the agreement of local authorities rather than to avoid any role for local authorities. They taught the core parts of the national curriculum, including sex and relationship education, rather than opting out entirely from the curriculum. They had an obligation not just on looked-after children, but to co-operate to stop competitive exclusions in an area, and that has been entirely removed by this Bill. There was a requirement for our academies to have a sponsor, and that has been removed. We had a requirement for proper consultation with the community, also removed. Our academies programme was about tackling disadvantage. The new policy is about encouraging elitism and enabling the affluent to do better. That is why it is so deeply unfair.
Gavin Barwell (Croydon Central) (Con)
The right hon. Gentleman has just said that the academies that the previous Government set up were in disadvantaged areas. In the London borough of Croydon, he approved two academies in two of the most affluent wards in the borough.
Ed Balls
The fact is that our academies were disproportionately set up in disadvantaged communities. They disproportionately took in more children on free school meals than the catchment area required, and they achieved faster-rising results than the average. That was social justice in action; what we are seeing with this Bill is the opposite. The freedoms and the extra resources in the Bill are going to outstanding schools, not schools that need extra help. They are going to schools that have more children from more affluent areas, fewer children with free school meals, and fewer children with special needs and disabilities, even though they will get pro rata funding. That is not social justice being put into action; it is social injustice. That is why the Bill is deeply offensive to people on the Opposition Benches and, I think, probably to many on the Government Benches as well.
Ed Balls
If the hon. Gentleman looks at the facts over the past decade, he will see that of the 20 local authorities that had the biggest increase in results, half were in the poorest 10% of boroughs in the country, all of which were in London. The London Challenge programme and our academies focused on tackling disadvantage. Of course there is a long legacy of social division and inequality in our education system. We were addressing it; the Government are going to re-entrench it. That is the difference.
Let us look at the amendments that—[Interruption.] The Secretary of State, who chose not to participate in this Third Reading debate—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. Let me say that we have 15 minutes left to complete our consideration of Third Reading. We do not have enough time to go back to 1931 and Ramsay MacDonald.
Ed Balls
It would have been better if the Secretary of State had contributed to this debate, given that it was so truncated. The only thing that I will say, Mr Speaker, is that in 1931, Ramsay MacDonald cut public spending to try to get us out of a recession. That caused a depression, and I am afraid that he ended up going into a coalition with the Conservatives. In that debate the Liberal Democrats opposed the cuts that were being made; unfortunately, this time they are propping up the coalition. However, I did not raise the issue of Ramsay MacDonald, Mr Speaker, so I will move on.
Let me look at the amendments tabled that have been rejected. First—
Mr Speaker
Order. Let me gently say to the shadow Secretary of State—this is a point often not fully comprehended on either side of the House—that contributions to Third Reading debates have to be on the remaining content of the Bill, and must not focus on matters that have been excluded from it. But I know that the right hon. Gentleman will reorient his remarks readily.
Ed Balls
In that case, Mr Speaker, I will make no reference to the fact that a requirement that the admissions code should attach to such schools was excluded from the Bill, nor will I refer to the fact that parental consultation could have been strengthened, but that that was ignored.
Let me come to the substance of the Bill as we find it. The thing that worries me most is this—
The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)
That Unite backed Ed Miliband.
Ed Balls
The right hon. Gentleman makes his jokes, but as Secretary of State he is, in my view, presiding over the most profoundly unfair piece of social engineering in this generation, and in the end he will be ashamed of what he has done this evening and over these past few days. That is my strong view. The contemptuous way in which he has treated the House of Commons in recent weeks is a matter of great shame to him as well.
In any case, the Liberal Democrats appear to have completely forgotten their manifesto, which declared that
“we will ensure a level playing field for admissions and funding and replace Academies with our own model of ‘Sponsor-Managed Schools’. These schools will be commissioned by and accountable to local authorities and not Whitehall”.
However, the Bill entirely removes any role for local authorities. We are told now by the Schools Minister that there will be a new ministerial advisory group. However, the fact is that cutting out the role of the local authority will mean that there will be no check on the pressures for free market schools to lead us not just to massive unfairness, but to what we fear will be much greater social segregation in the coming weeks, months and years. I fear a new education social apartheid arising from this Bill.
I am very fearful, and that is why I say to Government Members that this Bill is the greatest threat to our state education system in 60 years. It is a Bill of great significance, but it has been rushed through in a way that is an abuse of Parliament. As I said a moment ago, I think that the Secretary of State should be ashamed of himself. This evening we challenge the coalition, Conservatives and Liberal Democrats alike, to put a halt to this deeply ideological, free market experiment before it is too late, and to vote against the Third Reading of the Bill.
Gavin Barwell
I spoke in the Second Reading debate and sat through most of the Committee stage because one of the main issues in my constituency is standards in schools, particularly secondary schools. The former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls), approved a number of academies in the London borough of Croydon, often in schools with a deprived pupil cohort that were in affluent areas. That catchment could change over time as the schools improve. He was right to do that, but the question that I want to ask Labour Members is why they want to limit to underperforming schools the improvements that the academy programme has delivered. Why should not good, satisfactory or outstanding schools also seek to improve? In my borough, one third of parents who choose to send their children to a state primary school do not go on to send them to a state secondary school in Croydon. They look to selective schools outside the borough and to schools in the independent sector. I would have thought that Opposition Members wanted improvements in schools right across the board in my borough, to give parents the confidence to send their children to local schools.
In Croydon, we had the Harris city technology college. It was one of the original CTCs, and it is now the Harris academy Crystal Palace. More than 500 parents wanted to send their children there this year—more than twice as many as to any other school in our borough. We also have schools such as the Coloma convent school, Archbishop Tenison’s high school and Wolsey infants school. These are outstanding schools that want to take up the opportunities that the Bill offers.
The shadow Secretary of State spoke of the importance of spreading opportunity in disadvantaged areas. Wolsey infants school is in the middle of the town of New Addington in my constituency—one of the most deprived parts of London. It is an outstanding school that is doing a fantastic job for pupils from a deprived background, and it wants to take on the additional freedoms that academy status will offer. Why do Opposition Members want to deny that school that opportunity?
Beyond those outstanding schools, we have Shirley high school and St Mary’s junior and high schools. They are good or satisfactory schools that have also expressed an interest in taking on the opportunities that academy status offers. Why should they be denied that opportunity? Why should it be reserved solely for a certain class of school?
We also have to accept that there are local authorities that are not as progressive as my own, and that do not take action to deal with underperforming schools. Indeed, the shadow Secretary of State took a great deal of action when he was Secretary of State to push councils into taking that kind of action. The Bill will give freedom to parents who have been told, year after year, that there is no place for their child in the schools that they want them to go to. It will give them the opportunity to find a place for their child in a satisfactory school. Local authorities should be doing that already, and those that are taking the right action and driving up standards have absolutely nothing to fear from this legislation, but it will give an option to parents who have not been given that opportunity, year after year.
I am conscious that other hon. Members want to speak in the debate, so I shall draw my remarks to a close. I welcome the debate that we had in Committee, and I paid tribute earlier to the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) for his contribution. I disagree with him about primary schools, and with his point about surplus places being a bar to academies being set up. He was right, however, to raise the issue of special educational needs. We have had a long and detailed debate, which has added something to the Bill. I shall be grateful to see the Bill pass into law because it will drive up opportunities for pupils right across my constituency.
Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)
I was interested to hear the contribution of the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Gavin Barwell). He spoke eloquently of the freedoms that will be presented to the schools in his constituency, but he markedly failed to give details of what those freedoms would be, as indeed has the Bill. One of the freedoms is said to relate to expansion. We all have schools in our constituencies that are oversubscribed. However, the capacity for expansion, which would enable parents in my constituency to send their children to schools with very high standards, was completely sabotaged by the Secretary of State cancelling the Building Schools for the Future programme, so capacity is still an issue.
I was interested to hear the Minister of State, Department for Education, the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb), making a direct comparison between comprehensive state education and the independent sector. I was having a conversation with a parent only this weekend, and she told me that, in the school that her children attend, there are only 18 children in every class. If the Government are so committed to raising standards in the state sector so that they meet and pass those of the independent sector, why are they not spending their time and energy putting the necessary funding into the state system so that those class sizes could become the norm rather than the exception?
The central issue is that the Bill has nothing to do with freedom for all our people; it has to do with exclusion, not inclusion. The failure to consult on these proposals across a wide range of people in the community will mean that more and more children, certainly in my constituency, will be excluded from the best that already exists. The best that already exists is from a system that was funded by my Government, and that acknowledged the need for wide consultation across the community, with services presented to all schools from a local authority, which is essential to those standards. The proposal of the Minister and the Government, however, will sabotage those standards. As I had occasion to say on Second Reading, and as I have continued to say, we will not only see standards go down in our state sector as result of the Bill, but we shall see centrally, and most reprehensibly, serious social division, of which he and every member of his collaborationist Government should be ashamed.
Dan Rogerson
I extend my thanks to all hon. Members who participated in the debate, to the Minister, who has done his best to listen and take on board the issues raised, and to the hon. Members for Hartlepool (Mr Wright) and for—famously—Gedling (Vernon Coaker), who have led ably for the Opposition.
I am delighted to say that the Bill is better than when it started out. Clearly, in another place it was altered to reflect some of the concerns generated there and outside. During the Committee stage in this place, we have heard, on the record, that there are no extra sources of funding for the academies above and beyond the money that will go to the local authority for them; that the role of the Young People’s Learning Agency with regard to monitoring will be clarified; and that there will be wide consultation, the intent of which will be explained, which is helpful. The Minister has also generously pointed out that the role of parent governors will be strengthened.
Bob Russell
Does my hon. Friend agree that it is disappointing that the Minister was not able to say whether parent governors would be elected or appointed? The other issue is that existing comprehensive schools can have as many as eight elected parent governors, whereas under the Bill the number is only two.
Dan Rogerson
My hon. Friend has made his point to the Minister and the House as is his wont.
The progress that occurred in the other place on the impact statement has been crucial. Tonight’s discussions about community cohesion have also been important. The hon. Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett), who is no longer in his place, made some useful points on that, and I was delighted to hear the Minister’s reassurance.
It is nice to see the shadow Secretary of State for Education in his place. He was not here for most of the debate—someone was, because they wrote his speech for him. As a comprehensive-educated boy, I can point out to him that a basilisk is a mythological reptile that can freeze someone with its breath or stare. That point aside, it is clear that he has not listened to the debates too closely. For some of us who do not have the widening of the number of academies at the top of our political agenda, the explanation of the Government’s thinking has reassured us about a Bill that, with some welcome safeguards, allows that in places that are keen for it to happen.
Andrew Percy
I was not planning to speak on Third Reading, but I want to respond to a couple of points made by the shadow Secretary of State, particularly relating to Labour Members’ concerns about special educational needs and inclusion. We should always use temperate language, and although debate on the Bill has been interesting and measured on both sides of the House, the extreme language used—we heard some recently from the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Glenda Jackson)—about social division, apartheid and exclusion has been incredibly unfortunate. As the Bill has progressed, we have received assurances from Ministers about the content of funding agreements with regard to social inclusion and SEN. It is incorrect to suggest that only Labour Members are interested in those issues. Many Members have raised concerns and received assurances from Ministers.
The Bill has been improved in another place, and welcome assurances have been received from Ministers. Ultimately, we should accept that parents will be given a choice, and it is for parents and governors to take the Bill forward and make what they can of it. The suggestion that schools will, in some way, do something bad for their community is a nonsense.
Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
The House divided: Ayes 317, Noes 225.
Business without Debate
Delegated Legislation
Administration
Environmental Audit
European Scrutiny
Committees
Mr Speaker
With the leave of the House, we will take motions 8 to 12 together.
Ordered,
Human Rights (Joint Committee)
That Dr Hywel Francis, Dr Julian Huppert, Mrs Eleanor Laing, Mr Dominic Raab, Mr Richard Shepherd and Mr Andy Slaughter be members of the Select Committee appointed to join with a Committee of the Lords as the Joint Committee on Human Rights.
Northern Ireland Affairs
That Mr Joe Benton, Oliver Colvile, Mr Stephen Hepburn, Lady Hermon, Ian Lavery, Naomi Long, Jack Lopresti, Dr Alasdair McDonnell, Ian Paisley, Stephen Pound, David Simpson, Mel Stride and Gavin Williamson be members of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee.
Procedure
That Mrs Jenny Chapman, Mr Roger Gale, Mr James Gray, Tom Greatrex, John Hemming, Mr David Nuttall, Andrew Percy, Bridget Phillipson, Jacob Rees-Mogg, Angela Smith, Sir Peter Soulsby and Mike Wood be members of the Procedure Committee.
Public Administration
That David Heyes and Jon Trickett be added to the Select Committee on Public Administration.
Regulatory Reform
That Heidi Alexander, Mr David Anderson, Andrew Bridgen, Jack Dromey, Lilian Greenwood, Ben Gummer, John Hemming, Gordon Henderson, Andrew Jones, Ian Lavery, Brandon Lewis, Andrew Percy, Mr Robert Syms and Valerie Vaz be members of the Regulatory Reform Committee.—(Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, on behalf of the Committee of Selection.)
Finance and Services
Standards and Privileges
Adjournment of the House (27 July)
Petitions
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
The petition is against the withdrawal of the taxibus services in Plymouth from Glenholt down through to the city.
The petition states:
The Petition of residents of the Plymouth, Moor View constituency and others,
Declares that the petitioners are unhappy with the decision to withdraw the taxibus service that serves the residents in the north of Plymouth; notes that residents in St Budeaux and Weston Mill use this bus to access their GP surgery, dentist, shops and other community facilities; and further declares that the withdrawal of this service will cause major inconvenience to residents.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to encourage local authorities to support local taxibus services to avoid these vital public transport services being removed.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P000847]
Mary Creagh (Wakefield) (Lab)
I rise to present a petition on free swimming.
The petition states:
The Petition of Mrs Priscilla Whisker and residents of Wakefield constituency, and others,
Declares that HM Government’s decision to cut the previous Labour government's free swimming scheme from 1 August 2010 will make it more difficult for under 16 and over 60 year olds to access swimming facilities in Wakefield; further declares that the scheme was part of the 2012 Olympics legacy to get more people involved in healthy activities; further declares that there are high levels of child obesity in Wakefield; and further declares that the cuts will disproportionately affect the health of poor people in Wakefield.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges HM Government to recognise the value of encouraging young people to take regular exercise and to learn to swim; to recognise the important health benefits of swimming to children and people over 60; to reconsider the cuts to the Swim 4 Free local authority grant support; and to reinstate the Swim 4 Free grant support to local authorities from 1 August 2010.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P000848]
Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab)
I rise to present a petition on the 1GOAL For All campaign.
The petition states:
The Petition of staff and students at Halton Lodge School and their friends, relatives and others in their community,
Declares that the petitioners support the 1GOAL For All Campaign to use the power of football to contribute to securing universal primary education by 2015 (Millennium Development Goal 2); notes the progress that has already been made towards this goal, with 40 million more children in school since the Millennium; further declares that the petitioners are appalled that 72 million children across the world are still denied the opportunity of schooling; further notes that sport can be used to champion education, which gives people the tools to help themselves out of poverty…The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons agrees to any motion expressing support for the 1GOAL Campaign and urges the Leader of the House and the Backbench Business Committee to consider scheduling a debate on progress towards achieving Millennium Development Goal 2 (Universal Primary Education).
There are 452 petitioners.
Following is the full text of the petition:
[The Petition of staff and students at Halton Lodge School and their friends, relatives and others in their community,
Declares that the petitioners support the 1GOAL For All Campaign to use the power of football to contribute to securing universal primary education by 2015 (Millennium Development Goal 2); notes the progress that has already been made towards this goal, with 40 million more children in school since the Millennium; further declares that the petitioners are appalled that 72 million children across the world are still denied the opportunity of schooling; further notes that sport can be used to champion education, which gives people the tools to help themselves out of poverty; and further declares that Halton Lodge School has used the opportunity afforded by World Cup 2010 to engage with the international campaign founded and chaired by Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan, by watching and reading 1GOAL material, by producing artwork to raise the profile of the Campaign, by holding a 1GOAL school assembly and by opening the school for parents to watch the first game (France v South Africa) of the World Cup 2010 recently held in South Africa, an event which has raised the hopes and aspirations of millions of young people across Africa.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons agrees to any motion expressing support for the 1GOAL Campaign and urges the Leader of the House and the Backbench Business Committee to consider scheduling a debate on progress towards achieving Millennium Development Goal 2 (Universal Primary Education).
And the Petitioners remain, etc.]
[P000849]
Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger (Bridgwater and West Somerset) (Con)
The petition states:
The Petition of the residents of Woolavington and others,
Declares that they are concerned about plans by EDF Energy Renewables to develop a new wind farm at Withy Farm near Puriton; about the implications for local residents of noise from the turbines; the intrusive nature of the wind turbines and any possible additional power lines associated with them on the unique landscape of the Somerset Levels; and the potential damage to wildlife and their habitats.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to take all possible steps to take the impact on local communities and the landscape fully into account when considering plans submitted for the siting of wind farms and the provision of energy generation through renewable sources.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P000850]
Mr Robert Walter (North Dorset) (Con)
I present a petition in the name of the Blandford community hospital in Dorset.
The petition states:
The Petition of Mrs Jacqueline Stayt and Mrs Josephine Seath, residents of the North Dorset community and others,
Declares that they are concerned about the future of Portman Ward at Blandford Community Hospital, Dorset.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Secretary of State for Health to encourage NHS Dorset to consider seriously the impact on the local community of proposed cuts to services at Blandford Hospital, in particular the proposed closure of Portman Ward, and to ensure that decisions affecting the hospital's future reflect the concerns and needs of patients, staff and the community at large.
And your Petitioners remain, as in duty bound, will ever pray.
[P000851]
Hospital Car Parking Charges (Hereford)
(13 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)
I am very grateful for the opportunity to bring before the House this important issue, which is of great local concern in Hereford, where a campaign led by Sarah Carr has resulted in a petition of more than 1,400 signatures against hospital car parking charges. It is important to emphasise that this issue is not about a “little local difficulty”. On the contrary, it shines a bright light on the huge cost and inflexibility of the private finance initiative and raises some profoundly important long-term public policy issues about the management and financing of the NHS. It is a case study of the foolishness and self-serving incompetence of the last Government.
These charges are expensive and unfair. They affect hospital patients and their families at a very vulnerable and difficult time in their lives. They particularly target frequent users, such as those visiting in-patients and those suffering from cancer, and they are socially regressive, falling relatively harder on the poor than the rich. Nationally, patients are estimated to pay more than £100 million a year in these charges.
But the problem of car parking charges does not end with Hereford hospital—quite the contrary. The trust would like nothing better than to reduce or scrap the charges for those affected, but it cannot because its hands are almost completely tied by the hospital’s PFI contract.
To see why, we need to step back a little. Hereford hospital was started in 1999 and was one of the earliest projects undertaken through the PFI. It was built, and is currently owned and managed under a 30-year contract, through Mercia Healthcare. Mercia is a special-purpose company that is 75%-owned by Semperian, a large PFI firm that is based in the City of London, and 25%-owned by the French industrial services giant, Sodexo. As well as being a shareholder, Sodexo acts as the contractor for car parking, among other things, which it in turn subcontracts out to CP Plus. Other non-clinical services are contracted out, including maintenance to WS Atkins.
The total cost of the project has been about £93 million. In return the hospital trust pays a unitary sum every year, currently about £15 million, which covers all costs—both capital and services. Governing all that is a huge legal contract that seeks to cover every eventuality that could arise between the two sides over its 30-year life. But there is little transparency in the contract as to how much different services cost or what margin is being charged on them. Instead, there is massive inflexibility.
This is how the contract works. A consultant who wants to put up a shelf in her office cannot do it herself or get the odd-job man in—after all, the trust does not own the hospital; instead, she has to use the in-house PFI contractor at unknown but doubtless significant expense. The contract allows up to 12 weeks for a quotation to be supplied and up to 12 more weeks for the work to be completed—six full months from when the original need arose. Even that is not necessarily the end of the matter. The contractor will also insist that some items be treated as capital items—as permanent additions to the infrastructure. and charged for in every subsequent year of the life of the contract.
A recent low point was reached with the installation of a new TV aerial in the consultants’ staff room at the hospital. A “changes” notice was raised and sent to the contractor, WS Atkins in that case. Twelve weeks later, it was costed at the princely sum of £819 plus VAT, or a grand total of £963—almost £1,000 for a TV aerial! That is the reality of public contracting in the UK today.
It is significant that later PFI contracts contained some financial safeguards for the NHS, which included automatic efficiency savings of 3% a year and the right for a hospital to put services out to public tender periodically. However, the Hereford contract contains neither of those safeguards; any efficiency savings go direct to the PFI consortium. Yet including savings of only 3% a year would reduce the cost of services by 60% in nominal terms over the life of the contract. That is a lot of lost medicines, lost hospital care and lost surgery.
The car park is managed not by Mercia or by its contractor, Sodexo, but by Sodexo’s subcontractor, CP Plus, in effect creating a treble mark-up on the deal. The hospital trust has little influence, knowledge of underlying costs or legal scope to negotiate changes to the contract. There are no automatic efficiency savings, and the contract cannot be re-tendered until 2029. The PFI consortium is thus sitting on a huge revenue stream, paid for by the taxpayer. My fear is that the contract is costing the taxpayer millions of pounds too much over its life.
Is it any surprise that the citizens of Herefordshire are paying so much for car parking, or that so little progress has been made to fix the problem, despite the trust’s best efforts? Is it any surprise that cost inflation in the NHS has been running at twice the national level?
Let us take stock. The issue of car parking charges is a matter of public concern. Every year, thousands of vulnerable people are affected by the charges in Herefordshire alone. We must have a solution.
It is well known that PFI contractors have done very well over the years from the huge wave of spending that has taken place in the NHS. I therefore ask Sodexo and Semperian to sit down again with the hospital trust, open up the books, sharpen their pencils, pass on some efficiencies and work with the trust to craft a new agreement. For myself, I shall not let the matter rest until they do.
However, the deeper issue, here as elsewhere, lies in the impact of the PFI itself. It is almost as though these contracts were deliberately designed to impede public transparency and public accountability. The point is not to blame those who originally negotiated the Hereford contract; they were rightly delighted that the new hospital was being built, in a county traditionally starved of public investment. It was one of the earliest deals of its kind, and as with any new market it took time to develop the knowledge and safeguards of the public interest that existed in later deals.
But if we look more broadly, we see some staggering ironies. The PFI was used to protect the last Government’s much-vaunted fiscal rules, only for the same rules to be spectacularly smashed anyway, as their spending boom gave us the longest and deepest recession on record. Secondly, the early PFI consortiums were actively encouraged by the Government to take on service provision so that their debt could be put off balance sheet. The result has arguably been to impose hundreds of millions of pounds of unnecessary costs on the NHS, while the Office for National Statistics has started to look at bringing the same debt on to the national balance sheet anyway. You could not make it up, Mr Speaker. Thirdly, the PFI has put car parking and other services beyond the scope of public accountability, while the structure of the contracts prevents hospital trusts from having the very information they need to renegotiate the contracts themselves.
This cautionary tale raises a vital wider question. At a time of fiscal crisis, should PFI projects be exempt from contributing to the public purse? I would argue that they should not be exempt. They should contribute to our national economic recovery like everybody else.
There are some £210 billion-worth of outstanding PFI capital assets in this country at the moment. A McKinsey study last year suggested that for the NHS alone, a reduction in interest charges of just two or three one hundredths of 1% could save £200 million. Anyone who thinks two or three hundredths of 1% is a lot should bear in mind that since July 2007, the base rate has fallen a full 5.25%.
“Are these not commercial contracts?”, it might be asked. Of course they are, and I am not for one moment suggesting that those contracts should be torn up. But the Government do not lack influence in this area. They have many points of contact with the different consortiums. For example, Semperian alone has stakes in 106 different PFI or public-private partnership projects, while Sodexo has stakes in 11 of them.
Moreover, many of the investors in these organisations are themselves public authorities. The largest investor in Semperian, with an equity stake of more than 25%, is Transport for London. It and other public bodies may themselves wish to support fairer treatment of PFI hospitals, rather than make huge sums at a time of national austerity.
Finally, some PFI providers are looking to expand abroad in search of future growth. They will not wish to be faced with criticism at home about the high cost of their services, while they seek new markets overseas. So I would call on the Government to use all these levers to encourage PFI providers to rebate some of their gains to the taxpayer. There is a direct precedent for this in the voluntary code that was introduced a few years to encourage PFI providers to share refinancing windfalls with the taxpayer.
I will close on a more positive note. The use of assets in many PFI hospitals remains far below international best practice. But over the longer term, there is clear scope to open up current deals, to relax some of the restrictions, to make better use of hospital assets and to remit more value to the public purse. The contractors will get what they are owed, but the taxpayer could benefit still more. That, I suggest, should be the thrust of Government policy in this area, and I greatly look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say on this issue. I would, of course, be happy to work with him to win a fairer deal for the taxpayers of Herefordshire and elsewhere if the need arises.
The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr Simon Burns)
I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman) on securing his first Adjournment debate—on the effect of NHS PFI costs on hospital car parking charges in Hereford.
Let me provide a little background on the trust before discussing my hon. Friend’s specific points about car parking. As he will know, Hereford Hospitals NHS Trust is the main provider of acute services across Herefordshire and for parts of Wales. The trust offers a wide range of services, including a dedicated cancer unit, which forms part of the three counties cancer network. I understand that funding has now been secured in partnership with Macmillan Cancer Support to develop a new cancer unit.
The most recent Care Quality Commission outpatient survey, released in April this year, showed that 19 out of 20 patients—95%—attending the Hereford hospital out-patient department rated the care they received as either “good”, “very good” or “excellent”. It also found that 89% of those asked stated that they were treated with dignity and respect at all times. This is very much to the hospital’s credit, and I pay tribute to the hard-working staff at Hereford hospital. It is through their dedication and expertise that my hon. Friend’s constituents benefit from such a high quality of care.
My hon. Friend has raised the important issue of parking costs at Hereford hospital. The quality of care inside the hospital is excellent. However, the service provided outside the hospital presents a real and pressing concern for patients, visitors and members of staff.
The Hereford county hospital development was, as my hon. Friend mentioned, part of the previous Government’s first wave of private finance initiatives. The County hospital PFI contract lasts for 30 years, from 2002 until 2032. In some respects, the Hereford contract differs from later PFIs, which utilised a standard form developed following the experience of earlier agreements.
In 2005, car parking charges for the period 2006-15 were agreed between the trust and Mercia Healthcare and incorporated in the main PFI contract through a legally binding variation, as my hon. Friend mentioned. Although Mercia owns the car parks, CP Plus operates them on a day-to-day basis via a subcontract with Sodexo, which runs all food and facilities management services on the site. I am told, unfortunately, that the cost to the trust of buying back the car parking element of the contract to 2032 has been calculated at some £7 million, a sum that my hon. Friend will agree is deemed prohibitive by the Hereford Hospitals NHS Trust.
The contract also switched car parking charges from pay and display to pay on exit. That change was introduced to discourage people using the hospital car park when shopping in Hereford city centre, cutting the number of spaces available for patients and visitors to the hospital. The hospital offers concessionary parking for different types of user. For example, a range of discounts is available to those who use the car park frequently, to the disabled and to a wide range of people on benefits or low incomes. In addition, when the length of stay exceeds certain local waiting targets, the cost of parking is reduced to the target wait. For example, if initial treatment is not given within four hours at accident and emergency, the cost of parking is reduced so that a patient pays only for four hours. Also, parents of children staying overnight in the hospital have their parking costs discounted to the two-hour rate of £3.
However, there is a real issue about people not knowing that those concessions exist. Although they are clearly displayed on the trust’s website, the internet, as my hon. Friend will probably appreciate, is not usually the first place to look for information when one drives into a car park. The clear and prominent display of the discounts and concessions available is a common complaint of patient groups throughout the country and one with which I have a considerable sympathy. I am told that the current car parking charges are in fact a little lower than those originally agreed with Mercia and reflect the trust board’s decision to subsidise the tariff by 50p an hour over the past two years. The annual cost of that subsidy is £88,502.
The strategic health authority has informed me that the trust board has taken a number of measures to ensure that car parking charges are reasonable. It has committed to reducing progressively the costs of on-site parking for patients and, eventually, to eliminating those costs all together. To pay for the reduction, charges for visitors and other users will be increased in line with the existing 10-year tariff plan. The trust is also investigating alternative transport initiatives to encourage staff and patients to use public transport.
The strategic health authority informs me that Hereford Hospitals NHS Trust is reviewing its car park policy. The aim is to develop proposals for charges and concessions for patients’ parking at the hospital, covering the hourly rates charged to patients and the availability of revenue to develop alternative arrangements. The review will also consider the range and appropriateness of current concessions. The trust hopes to complete its review of car parking charges by the end of this month, and the next increase to car parking charges, now due, is on hold pending the outcome of it. I also understand that the trust has already agreed a package of measures to improve car parking arrangements for patients receiving chemotherapy. These include the allocation of further free car parking spaces and better advertising of concessions.
Individual patients and advocate groups such as Macmillan Cancer Support and the Patients Association regularly raise the issue of car parking charges. Macmillan has highlighted how a lack of awareness among users and the poor promotion of concessions by some trusts lead to low take-up among long-term patients. We are giving those concerns serious thought. The Department of Health recently conducted a consultation on car parking charges, and I can assure my hon. Friend that we aim to publish a response to that consultation in September.
Unfortunately, though, whatever one’s views might be on the subject of NHS car parking charges, given the dire state of the public finances it is simply not possible to abolish them. Within a very difficult economic climate, this Government are committed to delivering health care outcomes that are among the best in the world. As part of this, power is being devolved to the front line like never before. As my hon. Friend will appreciate, when we came into government in May we inherited a deficit of £155 billion. Some tough decisions are having to be taken because my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer rightly makes it a priority to reduce the huge debt that we inherited, which is causing so many problems for our general economic well-being.
I am sure that my hon. Friend will appreciate that, as I said, it is simply not possible to abolish car parking fees at the moment, because the ethos of our policy towards better provision of health care, as outlined by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health in his White Paper last week, is that we believe that it is crucial to put patients at the forefront and the centre of health care. We must have bottom-up provision of health care that meets local needs to improve services and ensures the finest quality health care that the health service can provide in such a way that we do not have politicians and bureaucrats dictating a top-down approach.
Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that many of the problems that we face in Hereford and in many other towns across the country are down to poorly negotiated private finance initiatives agreed by the last Labour Government?
Mr Burns
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that cogent and powerful point. As we have all found out since we came into office, the economy was left in a dire state, and we are now having to pick up the pieces, as we did in 1979, to sort out the mess that the previous Government left us. That is the challenge that we are facing, and that is why we are having to take some tough decisions for the general better welfare of the economy as a whole and the people of this country, as tends to be traditional when we come to power after a Labour Government.
Where car parking charges make it difficult for staff to do their jobs properly, where they damage patients’ access to services, or where they prevent family and friends from visiting, hospital trusts have a responsibility to look again at their charges and policies. As my hon. Friend knows, a review is currently under way at Hereford hospital. I trust that he and all his constituents who are concerned about the level of car parking charges at the hospital are contributing to that review and ensuring that their views and concerns are known as regards the impact that those charges may be having on them. I also believe that it is crucial, not only in Hereford but throughout the country, that greater publicity and prominence be given to the fact that some people may qualify for a reduction in car parking charges due to their individual circumstances. That must be drawn to the attention of the client group that might benefit, because one suspects that too often, there is too little publicity and awareness of those discounts, which would provide genuine help to those who find car parking charges genuinely onerous to pay for.
James Wharton (Stockton South) (Con)
I should just like to have it recorded in Hansard as a point of important note that while we are talking about the people who are the most disadvantaged by the charges that are so often levied in hospital car parks, not a single Opposition Member is here to hear the debate. I hope my hon. Friend agrees that that is an important point that should be recorded and registered.
Mr Burns
I congratulate my hon. Friend, who has certainly succeeded in achieving what he intended. No doubt tomorrow, when Hansard is published, his cogent point will be marked. The only disappointment is that as there are no Opposition Members here, they will not be aware of his intervention, but I am sure he will use his skills to ensure that his point is given a wider audience.
Matthew Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con)
Before my hon. Friend concludes, will he address the point about renegotiating the PFI? Will he take up the offer of my hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman) and try to squeeze some more value out of the PFI, and to help? He has made an eloquent case about how tight the money is.
Mr Burns
I thank my hon. Friend for that extremely helpful intervention. I am grateful for his kind offer for me to try to intervene and use my good offices to facilitate a renegotiation. It is late at night, but I do not want to be churlish and I do not want to upset my hon. Friend. However, gone are the days when politicians and bureaucrats sitting in Whitehall interfere and micro-manage local health services. The Government’s vision, new policy and ethos is for a localised health service, responding to local needs, not hamstrung by interfering Ministers, including—I know that my hon. Friend will find that difficult to believe—me. I must therefore say that it is a local matter, which would have to be taken up and sorted out locally, though, from my extensive knowledge of the position, I would not, were I a betting man, put a considerable amount of money on the suggested course of action being adopted.
Having said that, during a review of car parking at the hospital, it is important that all those with an interest or a concern about the charges play a full part. Ultimately, as I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Matthew Hancock) will appreciate, it is for the NHS trust to manage its car parking to suit best the needs of its patients, the visitors and staff.
However, I hope that, given the campaign of my hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire and my hon. Friends in the surrounding constituencies, who have played their part not only in recent months but for a considerable time in representing their constituents and trying to get a good deal for them, they will continue to open dialogue with the local trust and do all they can to pursue the matter and ensure that they get a better and fairer deal, which is mutually satisfactory to the trust, the PFI and my hon. Friend’s constituents.
Question put and agreed to.