Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Lord Field of Birkenhead and Kevin Brennan

3rd reading: House of Commons & Legislative Grand Committee: House of Commons & Programme motion No. 3: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Monday 28th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the new clause because it follows a private Member’s Bill that I introduced. Following Liverpool’s example, Wirral carried out automatic registration for free school dinners and the school premium, and that resulted in £750,000 more coming into the area to target those poorest families.

[Kevin Brennan]

My right hon. Friend is correct. I was about to say that I wanted to praise him and, again, my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West for their work on that matter. We hope that the Government will support this sensible new clause.

I turn to amendment 3—our final amendment, you will be glad to know, Madam Deputy Speaker, in the group. In the aftermath of the care.data scandal, it is vital that patients are able to have trust in the confidential nature of the health service and to feel confident in sharing sensitive information with health care professionals. Part 5 of the Bill—clause 29 in particular—appears to permit an unprecedented sharing of confidential information. We are extremely concerned that if the information-sharing powers cover information held by bodies providing healthcare services, patient confidentiality could be undermined.

Amendment 3 would ensure that identifiable information held by healthcare bodies in connection with their functions would be exempt from the information-sharing powers in clause 29, thereby upholding current protections for confidentiality. We believe that the Bill should be amended to ensure that patient confidentiality is protected by clarifying that the Bill does not give power to public authorities to disclose any identifiable healthcare information. That would bring clause 29 into line with clause 56, which addresses information sharing specifically for research purposes. That was amended by the Government in Committee to prevent any erosion of the status quo for sharing healthcare data for research purposes. We believe, as does the British Medical Association, that similar protections should be extended to cover part 5. I look forward to the Minister accepting that amendment, along with all the other measures in the group.

Education Bill

Debate between Lord Field of Birkenhead and Kevin Brennan

Wednesday 11th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan]

I am grateful to the Schools Minister for that answer, which is very helpful.

On amendments 34 and 35, I would be grateful if we could have an assurance that there is no risk that pupils will be referred unnecessarily under these provisions or that there will be a huge increase in the volume and therefore the cost of alternative provision. What safeguards are in place to ensure that pupils are not simply referred out of mainstream schools and into alternative provision because, for example, their academic performance is not up to scratch as regards hitting their English baccalaureate targets or because schools want a way of dealing with pupils with special educational needs? I would be grateful if the Minister could assure us that strict safeguards will be in place to ensure that the new alternative provision approach cannot be abused in such a way by any schools that are seeking to hit any particular targets on special educational needs and academic achievement. Who will pick up the bill in such cases? Will it be the referring school or the local authority?

Finally, the Minister mentioned the technical Government amendments, and I am grateful for his explanation of them.

[Mr Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

I rise to support new clause 19, which stands in my name. I can do so briefly and I am sure that colleagues will be grateful for that, but I must explain that the new clause comes not out of the ether of theory but out of practice. I will happily declare an interest, in case I have to, in that I chair one of the two new academy schools in Birkenhead. The governors have made no decisions on the new clause, if we were to be successful, or on some of the other options about which I shall speak. We are testing the ground to see the best forms of education we can offer some young people in Birkenhead. The new clause is very simple and states that as an academy we will be able to buy any places anywhere we want for our pupils, including in private schools, but that we should not be able to do so until pupils have spent three years with us—that is, until they are 14. The governors are seriously considering how we can start to reinforce once again the idea of life chances for our pupils by giving them a range of options that they might wish to choose at 14.

I know that this is the responsibility of the Minister's colleague in the Lords, but I am anxious that we should be successful in bidding for moneys from the new tranche of finance that the Chancellor announced in the Budget to establish what I might call a Baker academy. We would like some of our pupils to be able to consider that as one option. We have a first-class metropolitan college and we would like pupils to be able to choose—perhaps at 14—to transfer their talents and prosper even more in those circumstances. We will, of course, have some pupils of high academic attainment and it would be good to be able to fast-track them and their education in a local private school. This new clause is about giving not just our academy but academies in general that power.

I asked our brilliant experts in the Library whether the academies had such a power now and, more importantly, whether the law would prevent us from exercising it now. The answer was that, on the face of the record, we do not have that power now, but it is certainly cloudy whether any provision in statute would prevent us from using it. As the Bill moves to the other place, where we will try to move this clause in all seriousness, I am anxious that we should clarify the position beyond any doubt.

I do not know the views of Tory Back Benchers on such a new clause, but I imagine that the Liberal Democrats would insist that it should be part of the renegotiations of the coalition agreement, as it ticks every box in the Liberal vocabulary. If we felt that they were dragging their feet, in Birkenhead we would know who was stopping us increasing life chances for some of our poorest pupils. If the Liberals made this provision a key part of their renegotiations, they would get the credit.

The new clause moves the focus of the debate from buildings to pupils. I know we love the cant in this place and to pretend that we have moved in such a way, but everything we decide is really about buildings and institutions. The clause takes the debate beyond institutions and schools, and centres it on pupils. What can we buy that they most need at a certain point of time? I hasten to add—in case this disappoints any Tories—that this is not a subsidy to the private sector. We would buy provision at less cost than that spent in a state school on the very small group of pupils whom we might wish to give the opportunity of going to a local public school. If the Liberals opposed us, they would be saying that they were not in favour of our having this freedom and that we would have to spend the money in the state sector, even though that would mean spending more and not getting the sort of education that we want for the small minority of pupils who might benefit from such choice.