Alun Cairns
Main Page: Alun Cairns (Conservative - Vale of Glamorgan)Department Debates - View all Alun Cairns's debates with the Department for Education
(9 years, 12 months ago)
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Michael Gove
I absolutely shall. The first thing to bear in mind is that, as the hon. Lady rightly points out, Darlington is an exceptionally high-performing local authority. One of the reasons for that is that many of its schools have converted to academy status with the support of the local authority, and Darlington shines out as an enlightened Labour local authority. I will share the exact figures with the hon. Lady, but I should stress that many of the independent schools that have changed to become free schools are now open to all and an excellent standard of education is available to children on a comprehensive basis. Many of those arguing for independent schools to become free schools are Labour MPs such as the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) and the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw), and I am delighted to have been able to work with two more Labour MPs supporting our free schools programme.
Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)
How many new places have been created by the free schools policy, and how does the demand compare with that for local authority schools?
Michael Gove
So far, some 83,000 places have been created, and as I pointed out earlier, these schools are overwhelmingly over-subscribed.