Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Monday 18th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hayes]

The Connexions service was roundly criticised for doing none of that. Connexions, over which the last Government presided, failed according to Ofsted, the Skills Commission inquiry into information, the Panel on Fair Access to the Professions, and the Edge survey. We will do better, because we understand that good-quality advice and guidance help people to change their lives by changing their life chances. Of course this is a challenge; it is a catharsis leading from failure to success.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

Given the number of young people who are still not in education, employment or training, does the Minister agree that it is vital for young people to be made aware, throughout the education process, of the apprenticeships and the vocational and other opportunities that are available to them?

[Mr Hayes]

As I have said in the House before, for too long we convinced ourselves that the only means of gaining prowess came through academic accomplishment. Like William Morris and John Ruskin, I believe that technical tastes and talents deserve their place in the sun, and the careers service will highlight that so that people with such aspirations can achieve their full potential.

Free School Meals (Colleges)

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Wednesday 13th June 2012 Westminster Hall

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your stewardship, Mr Davies, and I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett) for the opportunity to take part in this important debate. As he rightly notes, it seeks to end an anomaly that penalises some of the most disadvantaged teenagers in our education system, including those in my constituency of Gosport who are committed to furthering their education and their opportunities in life at our great local sixth-form colleges.

St Vincent college provides a diverse education for more than 1,000 16 to 18-year-olds. It has been recognised by Ofsted as the heart of the local community, and it continues to offer a range of practical and innovative courses—such as last year’s successful marine skills course—that seek to attract those not in education, employment or training. As hon. Members may be aware, it also produced this year’s BBC “Apprentice” winner, Ricky Martin—of which it is very proud.

Despite the importance of this local college, however, its students are being served a raw deal because as a number of colleagues have pointed out, they are denied the privilege afforded to their counterparts in school sixth forms throughout the area—the simple right to a free lunch for pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds.

I believe that state of affairs persists as an anomaly and not as a deliberate policy. It makes no sense for new academies, university technical colleges and free schools to offer free lunches while pupils at sixth-form colleges are excluded, and such an anomaly needs to be addressed. As the principal of one of my local colleges highlighted, the lack of a good, nutritious lunch can harm concentration, undermine achievement and deter participation among the most disadvantaged students.

The anomaly also flies in the face of the Government’s wider record on education, which reflects the Department for Education’s absolute commitment to improving school provision, widening access, and prolonging participation in education and training. That record speaks for itself, with colleges that have been freed from bureaucracy, more than 1,776 academies open across England, and a 63% increase in apprenticeships in just one year.

I acknowledge the argument put forward by Ministers that sixth-form colleges often operate a more flexible timetable than comparable institutions, yet often that is precisely the reason why they need more support. The Association of Colleges estimates that three times as many students at college would qualify for a free lunch as in a school sixth form. Through their flexibility and diversity of subject provision, sixth-form colleges are clearly succeeding in attracting those from more disadvantaged backgrounds, and it is ludicrous that they are denied the resources to support those students.

Ultimately, it is not necessary to prove that offering free school meals to the most disadvantaged students is fair and right; that has already been established. There is no need to argue about whether a good, nutritious meal helps students in their studies because we already know that is the case. We need only to resolve why those fair and reasonable conclusions are applied to academies, free schools and school sixth forms, but not to colleges. The Government have made a firm commitment to improving educational opportunities for all young people. Addressing the anomaly of free school meals would be a small but crucial step towards delivering that commitment.

Apprenticeships

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Monday 19th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to this incredibly important debate. I have learned an enormous amount from just sitting and listening to the contributions. It is a huge tribute to the Government’s commitment to apprenticeships that in just 12 months we have witnessed an incredible increase of more than 50% in the number of apprenticeships across the country. As the Minister said, however, it is not just about the increase in numbers but about the quality and standard of apprenticeships. The greatest growth has been achieved in level 3 apprenticeships, which means that more young people than ever are gaining the equivalent of A-levels in their chosen field. That is very important in my constituency, which has a proud maritime and naval heritage and a great tradition of engineering skills.

It is always heartbreaking to see young people who, when the academic door is closed on them at quite an early age, are uninspired by the work choices available to them. At best they have unskilled work, and at worst a life not in education, employment or training. I would like to think that the apprenticeships that are on offer could raise their aspirations.

Such apprenticeships are right on our doorstep, because key employers such as EDF and Network Rail are helping to reinvigorate the national skills base through a major apprenticeship training centre run by Babcock at HMS Sultan in my constituency. At any one time, up to 400 young adults are carrying out apprenticeships there for vital engineering and technology jobs. The dedication and passion of the apprentices are immense, as they know that they are gaining high-level skills for significant and tangible job opportunities. Such apprenticeship programmes open up opportunities for all.

Remarkably, last year women made up the majority of apprenticeship starters for the first time. The story of one female apprentice, Alannah at HMS Sultan, is one example that illustrates what has happened. After just a few months at the centre she was described as an exceptional apprentice with a highly promising career ahead of her. With her apprenticeship at Southern Water offering experience in a broad range of engineering roles, it is clear why she finds her training so rewarding.

We must not pretend that the Government have achieved all they can for potential apprentices, including female apprentices. Alannah admits that she still experiences some prejudice in the male-dominated world of engineering, and more vitally recalls that she received no support or advice whatever at school about pursuing that route. The reality that her case illustrates is that many schools are simply not doing enough to promote apprenticeships. We must ensure that they are recognised and endorsed as a viable and exciting opportunity for young people. What better way of doing that than to get young apprentices into schools to talk about their experiences? Alannah says that she has been going to speak to kids in schools, and I ask the Minister whether more apprentices could be encouraged into schools. They are the best advert for what they are achieving.

The training offered at HMS Sultan totally belies the traditional and limited image that many young people and their teachers have of apprenticeships. Contrary to what Opposition Members have said today, apprentices there serve between 12 and 24 months of their three years’ training on site at HMS Collingwood, where they gain skills, tangible job opportunities and the joy of living away from home without the burden of university debts.

To build further on the successes of the past year, we must ensure that our schools and young people do not hold the damaging misconception that apprenticeships are second best. The breadth and diversity of the opportunities at HMS Sultan could put some university courses to shame, with the apprentices taking on fully functioning professional roles early on in their training.

There is also evidence throughout my constituency of how apprenticeships can build the resources of a community. At the new maritime skills centre, there are plans for an extensive apprenticeship programme, with talks currently ongoing with a company about the provision of apprentices for offshore wind farms. The potential for the students to gain high-level employment, and for employers to guarantee that their workers have the skills that they need, is immense. That is a real boost to the local economy.

Last year, Gosport saw more than 1,600 people start apprenticeships. I sincerely hope that that figure will grow and grow in the coming months and years, to the benefit of students, employers and the community. I also hope to encounter more girls like Alannah who are doing science, technology, engineering and maths-based apprenticeships throughout my constituency and getting the most from their fantastic opportunities.

Girls (Educational Development)

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Tuesday 29th November 2011 Westminster Hall

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

Thank you, Mrs Main, for allowing me to take part in this incredibly valuable debate.

I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey) for the huge contribution she has made to tackling the lack of confidence among girls by securing this debate and by working over many years to bring this issue to the public consciousness. It must have taken some confidence to stand up today and speak about this issue, because confidence among young women seems for some to be a marginal issue that is worthy of comment but always plays second fiddle to the goals of academic success, sporting achievement and extra-curricular excellence in schools. I believe, however, that the most important thing we can take from today’s debate is the understanding that confidence is absolutely pivotal to a girl’s success. That confidence and self-belief, which eludes so many girls in our schools, is the foundation of their achievement throughout life.

At senior levels across the sectors women remain a rare breed. FTSE 100 boards are plagued by a chronic under-representation of women, and only one of the 12 Supreme Court judges is female. However, the commendable aim of getting more women on the boards of top companies or to the heights of the professions is entirely alien to many girls in my constituency. The worlds of business, law or science are a million miles away from where some of the young women in Gosport believe they can take their lives, because of their persistent lack of confidence and aspiration. One teacher told me quite bluntly that many girls will get pregnant because they see having a baby as the one thing they are capable of achieving. As a primary school teacher, she sees first hand that from a tragically young age girls allow themselves to be shouted down by boys in class, as they mimic the lack of confidence, attainment and ambition they see in their own mothers and other female role models.

As children grow, so does the gender gap. National statistics show that girls are more than capable of outperforming boys throughout school. I could mention as anecdotal evidence the fact that, on the school run on Monday morning, my nine-year-old son bemoaned the fact that the two most brilliant children in his class were both girls and asked at what age girls stop being better than boys at everything. Despite the statistics, however, many girls are falling behind in the most deprived areas of Gosport. A teacher told me about one girl whose ability in maths far outstretched what she was actually achieving. At a certain point the girl started to believe that doing well in maths or in science was in some way not cool or attractive.

My hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West mentioned a survey by Girlguiding UK, which found that being a hairdresser or beautician is the top career goal for many secondary school girls. Although, God knows, I appreciate the work of beauticians and hairdressers as much as the next woman, more work is needed to ensure that careers advice and work experience opportunities highlight the hugely diverse avenues that are open to women.

[Jessica Lee (Erewash) (Con)]

I apologise for not being here earlier for the debate; I was detained in the main Chamber. Does my hon. Friend agree that we have an opportunity to advance the possibility of careers in science and engineering, and to show how attractive they can be for girls and how much opportunity there is?

[Caroline Dinenage]

That is absolutely correct. Raising aspiration for girls is about not only showing them opportunities but convincing them that those opportunities are within their reach. More than half the girls questioned eschewed science and engineering, because they believed that careers in them would be too difficult. From a very early age, our schools must convince girls of the simple truth that they are capable of achieving a great deal. One pioneering primary school in my constituency has launched a children’s university, which runs every Friday. The children’s university empowers kids as young as five to chose their own courses in subjects as diverse as microbiology, woodwork and Spanish. For a girl who has never seen a woman in her family go to university, or indeed even hold down a job, the impact is immense. The role that our schools play—through careers advice, the introduction of positive role models or innovative projects such as the children’s university—is central to raising the confidence and aspiration of girls.

Finally, we must accept that promoting confidence in young women requires a holistic approach. Other Members have said that eating disorders, mental health issues and self-harming all greatly undermine what girls can, and believe they can, achieve. We need to encourage more joined-up thinking between schools, training providers, and other youth and health services, rather than just seeing academic failings in isolation. Nurturing confidence in young women will ultimately rest on seeing the whole person; it will involve seeing the lack of ambition they experience at home, the insecurities that are re-confirmed by their peers and the emotional challenges that young girls will always endure. Only then can we ensure that young women will reach the great heights that we know they are capable of in their chosen career.

Adoption

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Wednesday 9th November 2011 Westminster Hall

[David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak. I will be brief, because I know that right hon. and hon. Members want to contribute to this debate.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee) on securing this debate on an issue that is very important to a lot of people out there among the general public who are interested in becoming prospective parents. They are interested in this debate, because the hon. Lady has expressed a lot of the frustration that many of them feel when they have to go through the process of adoption.

In the research papers that we received before this debate, one figure given to us was that last year, only 60 out of 3,600 children under the age of one who are in care were adopted, and in addition the average time that the process of adoption took was two and a half years. We all know that when a child reaches the age of four, the possibility of their being adopted is very slim indeed. They may go into foster care, but it is certainly very difficult for them to be adopted.

The research papers state that one in four adopted children were forced to wait more than a year before they moved in with their new parents. I have to say that my experience as someone who has adopted—I will go into that experience more in a moment—is in relation to the prospective parents: those couples who believe that they can offer a good home to children and who have tried for many years to have a family in a natural process but have never been able to do so. They are frustrated with the legislation on adoption. We have heard about the form-filling. In the words of people who have come to me, they are frustrated with “the intrusiveness” of having to sit down with social workers. The hon. Lady mentioned the good work of social services, and I accept that point, as being a social worker is a very difficult job. However, for older prospective parents aged between 30 and 35, having to sit down and talk to a young social worker who has very little experience of life and rearing a family—their experience all comes from a textbook—and tell them why they cannot have a family is very difficult. The prospective parents have to tell the social worker all their personal details and the process is very frustrating from their point of view.

There is a balance to be struck in all of this. I understand—and I am sure that all right hon. and hon. Members realise this—that some of the things that have happened to children over the years, and even in recent months, for example, baby P, children being starved to death and all those sorts of things, are horrific. In my opinion, anyone who does that sort of thing to a child is not fit to live in society.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman has raised the issues that people who want to adopt, or even foster, children are faced with. There is a myth that if someone is a smoker, or unmarried or even overweight, they will not be considered a suitable adoptive parent. Of course, many parents throughout the country face all those issues and it does not make them any better or any worse parents. We must also address the issue that people are expected to be paragons of virtue in everything that they do before they are regarded as perfect adoptive parents.

[David Simpson]

I agree wholeheartedly with the hon. Lady. Certainly, if being overweight had been an issue, I would not have fitted the bill. Later on this afternoon, my hon. Friend the Member for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell) will introduce a Westminster Hall debate on the Government policy on obesity, and he has dared me to attend. [Laughter.] I will go to it.

The hon. Member for Gosport (Caroline Dinenage) is right. No one is perfect and it is very hard to get a role model of a parent. We all have frustrations. Even if people have children through the natural process, they experience frustrations because they do not know how those children are going to turn out, which is difficult. The hon. Member for Devizes (Claire Perry) raised the issue of the age of prospective parents and I think that she said she is 47. May I say that she looks very well for 47? If I was a social worker, I would take her for 27, but we will not go down that road.

Returning to the serious point, it is nonsense for social services to restrict the number of prospective parents just because someone is over 40, or 45. That is absolutely scandalous. One of the prospective parents who had come to see me and who had been told that they could not adopt, was told that one reason was they were over 45, so when the child reached their teenage years the prospective father could not play football with them. That is absolute nonsense—the whole thing is crazy.

We must try to get a balance in all of this. In Northern Ireland 25 years ago, what my wife and I did was very new. We went to an agency, we went through missionaries, and we adopted our first child from India. That was 25 years ago this December. I think that we were the second set of parents in Northern Ireland to adopt a child from a foreign country. The reason was simple; it was because the waiting list to adopt a child in Northern Ireland was horrendous. It was unbelievable. We felt that we could give a child a home, and as we could not have that child from the British system, we were forced to go down another avenue.

We did that 25 years ago. We have had no problems whatsoever from a cultural or ethnic viewpoint, and we have experienced no racism in any way. My daughter is now 25 and she runs her own business. Then we adopted twins from Paraguay. At that time, the dictator in Paraguay made it very clear that he would prefer it if children died on the streets of Paraguay than be adopted by a western society. He did not have his way and we adopted the twins. Someone asked us after we did that if we were trying to start our own United Nations, but we decided to stop at just the three children because we knew that the United Nations was nothing to be proud of. We did not go down that road.

Our twins are now 22, and again that adoption has worked well; there are absolutely no issues. However, the point that I am making is that because of the system we were forced to go in that direction. The system needs to be looked at. Two and a half years is much too long for any prospective parent to wait for a child. We need to deal with that, and we must address the ageism involved in beliefs about the age a prospective parent should be.

--- Later in debate ---

[Esther McVey]

I completely agree. There are benefits to society, but also huge benefits to the child who progresses into adulthood.

My constituents came to see me about the significant changes to adoption agencies under Labour’s 2010 equality laws, which state that the prohibition of discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation is a fundamental principle of human rights laws and that such discrimination can be permitted only in the most compelling circumstances. I completely agree. That is the law; that is the way forward. The consequence, however, has been the closing of Catholic adoption agencies across the country. We have a huge problem, because those adoption agencies were the best at finding parents for older children—the most difficult to place with adoptive parents—and were the most successful in ensuring that those children remained in families.

People said to me, “You put the Catholic Church in a situation in which Parliament’s laws conflicted with the Church laws,” which they considered a higher law. They said, “When does tolerance become intolerance? Why were we tolerant of other people but not of the Catholic Church? When did equality for the Catholic Church become inequality?” We have seen that inequality, as all of a sudden the help that the agencies provided stopped because they were no longer given funding. Agencies that can trace their origins back to orphanages set up in Leeds in 1863 ended up closing down. Of course, we have to live within the law—of course, we must have the correct outcome—but surely that does not mean that we cannot have choice in how adoption agencies go about their work and in how they meet the needs of parents who come to them.

I looked slightly closer at the falling numbers of children being adopted. At the moment, there are 177 adoption agencies, 150 in local authorities and 27 voluntary ones, but if we go back, there were 11 more—Catholic ones that closed. That was a 5.83% decrease in the total number of agencies, but a 30% drop in the number of voluntary ones. How do we replace those valuable agencies? How do we find a selection—a choice—for people wanting to come forward, and how do we find those people? Some people come forward via the Church. This is a fundamental need for them, and they feel they are helping the Church, local communities and children. We must look very carefully at how we reach out to people who want to adopt, but for the past couple of years feel that they have been overlooked. There must be equality for everyone, but we need choice, which will ultimately provide equality for everyone and for the children who so desperately need to be adopted.

[Caroline Dinenage]

I want to reinforce my hon. Friend’s point. In my constituency of Gosport and in the wider Hampshire area, only 35 children were adopted last year. The older children are, the harder they are to place, and looked-after children have half the success rate of other kids in English and maths. We therefore need to explore every possible avenue to enable older children to be adopted, and the Catholic agencies were very successful at placing them and other harder-to-help children.

[Esther McVey]

Absolutely. The key point is, “When does tolerance become intolerance?” The Catholics who came to see me thought that that had happened. They believed that providing choice could bring about equality, but that what we had stopped was choice.

My second point, which a constituent of mine, Paula Davies, raised with me, is about the lack of awareness in the education system. She had adopted a daughter, and thought that she had unique needs arising from the adoption, which had happened later in life. She was concerned that the schools did not seem to be fully aware of the requirements of children from such backgrounds. She did not want something specific for her child; she did not want anybody taking her aside or teaching her differently. She was not looking for something different or extreme. However, she told me that two county councils, Hertfordshire and Somerset, have documents for staff who work with looked-after or adopted children in schools, and she wondered why every county council could not have those documents to hand for teachers to read, so that they could be aware of such children’s unique sensitivities and awareness.

Children adopted later in life are particularly vulnerable to rejection. They might take being told off or made to sit over there in a slightly different way, having been rejected early or later in life. It would be a simple change. The documents already exist, so I am not asking for anything with a cost implication. We are asking that they be made available to other councils, and therefore to teachers across the country.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Monday 23rd May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Tim Loughton]

I echo my hon. Friend’s support for the fantastic dedication of prospective adopters and people who take on that great responsibility. I know of his great interest in this area. He is absolutely right. I do not want to see anything that stands in the way of people coming forward and offering themselves to give safe adoptive placements to vulnerable children. He has raised this issue with me before in an Adjournment debate. I give him an undertaking that we will see if there are any problems in this area that are undermining the system.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

10. What plans he has for the future of citizenship teaching in schools.

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)]

We are currently reviewing the national curriculum with a view to slimming it down and focusing it on the essential knowledge that all children should acquire. Beyond that, it should be for individual schools to design a curriculum that best meets the needs of their pupils. The review is considering which subjects, beyond English, maths, science and physical education, should be part of the national curriculum in future, and we will announce our proposals early next year.

[Caroline Dinenage]

Fareport Training Organisation in Gosport has been nominated as a community champion for its amazing work in using citizenship education to help to engage post-16 students who have been disengaged with the traditional school system. Given what these classes have taught these students about their role in society and the value of democracy, does the Minister think that they would have enormous value in delivering the big society?

[Mr Gibb]

My hon. Friend is right. Citizenship is an important subject, and schools have an important role to play in encouraging young people to become responsible citizens and active members of society. I welcome what she says about her school. The Government are fully committed to empowering young people to become active citizens. That is the intention behind the launch of the national citizenship service programme last year.

Sure Start Children’s Centres

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Wednesday 27th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

I would like to correct the right hon. Gentleman on his facts, unfortunately. Hampshire county council has pledged to protect all front-line Sure Start services and only back-office costs will be cut.

[Andy Burnham]

Well, there was a plan to close 28 children’s centres. I was led to believe that the council was considering the plan and consulting on it. I do not know when it had a change of heart. Perhaps it was because of the force of the representations of the right hon. Member for Eastleigh. We will have to find out. I am tempted to ask the Liberal Democrats to relay back to their colleague that rather than sign the petition, it might have been better for him to speak up in Cabinet to oppose the Secretary of State for Education and his cuts to the early intervention grant. Would that not have been a quicker way of resolving the matter, whether or not the local authority has had a last-minute change of heart with the local elections looming?

I do not know what to make of the behaviour of the right hon. Member for Eastleigh. Am I alone in finding his behaviour increasingly strange and Cable-esque? For the past 11 months, he has sat with his Lib Dem colleagues in Cabinet as the Tories have put various questions before them. They were asked, “How about trebling tuition fees and creating a market in higher education?” They said, “Why of course, be our guest, go and do it.” The Secretary of State for Education asked, “How about scrapping EMA?” “Please do,” said the right hon. Member for Eastleigh, “and why not decimate the careers service while you’re at it?” They were asked, “Shall we cut Sure Start?” “Please do,” said the right hon. Member for Eastleigh, “it will give me a good campaign at local level. Please get on and do it.” However, when the Tories ask, “Won’t AV mean we spend a little more on counting machines and the cost of elections?” all of a sudden, there is talk of resignation, legal challenges and Lord knows what. I struggle to understand that response from the right hon. Member for Eastleigh.

Does that synthetic rage not expose once and for all the absolute moral bankruptcy of today’s Liberal Democrats? When the interests of millions of young people were at stake in Cabinet discussions, they sat on their hands, but when their self-interest is challenged because they might not win a vote on a change to the voting system, it is time to bring down the coalition. That tells people everything they need to know about the Liberal Democrats: their politics are flaky, unprincipled and cynical, and their disloyal Ministers are preparing for life beyond the coalition.

There have been increasingly desperate statements from the Deputy Prime Minister. What has he said about Sure Start? At the Lib Dem spring conference he said:

“I cannot tell you how proud I am that not a single Liberal Democrat-led council is closing a single Sure Start children’s centre.”

Liberal Democrat Members have gone quiet. Are any of them prepared to back up that statement today? Stand up now. Does anyone hold to that statement?

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

I start by addressing the sunny side that we have been aiming to get to today by talking about the benefits of Sure Start. It has been fantastic for many of my constituents. At the age of 17, one of my constituents found herself pregnant with twins as a single mum. She had to deal with the challenges of that without the help of a loving family around her, and the burden of those challenges led her to self-harming. I am pleased to be able to say that she is now the proud mum of healthy, happy five-year-old twins, and she maintains that that is all down to the help and support she received from Sure Start. It led her to gain the right medical help that she needed and to gain the parental skills necessary to cope with the challenge of twins—which, let us face it, we would all struggle with. Sure Start put her on the right track and taught her how to be a responsible parent, giving her the skills required to be self-sufficient—so much so that she now acts as a mentor to young mothers in my constituency. She is a bright, shining example of why Sure Start is a good thing. The fact that people who were previously on the edge of society can come back in that way shows the great value of Sure Start.

My husband is in the military, so I know at first hand the difficulties involved in trying to bring up a family effectively as a single mum while a partner is away on duty. Two weeks after the birth of my second child, my husband was deployed overseas. Fortunately, I had a strong and supportive family around me to help, but I know that others are not so lucky. On my visits to local Sure Start centres throughout my constituency, I have met many mums with partners in the military who are living in married quarters that are miles away from their home town and from the support network of family and friends that those with young children sometimes need. All of them have emphasised the importance to them of Sure Start. It provides support for mothers to come together and gain the help and advice they need, and it provides them with a welcome opportunity to talk to someone over the age of five.

Sure Start centres provide important services for children and families and they must not be undermined. A recent independent review found that 54% of current incidents of depression in women and 58% of female suicide attempts can be attributed to adverse childhood experiences. That hammers home the great importance of the early years of our childhood to our future prospects. Research has shown that a child’s development at 22 months is an accurate indicator of educational outcomes at 26 years of age, while boys deemed to be “at risk” at the age of three have almost three times more criminal convictions in adulthood than their peers. This is why we must support children from the very start.

It is important to remember that Sure Start was initially introduced to provide a haven of support and advice for our most vulnerable families in particular, yet Ofsted reports that, under the last Government, half of Sure Start children’s centres were not reaching out to the most vulnerable. Therefore, it is crucial that these resources are protected in order to help those who are most in need of help—from the children, whose health and well-being is improved, to the young parents, who are given the support and parenting skills that may have been lacking in their own lives. I know how much they gain from this lifeline.

Sure Start was one of the few positive legacies we inherited from the previous Labour Government, and it surprises me that it is the Labour-run councils up and down the country who are seeking to save money by closing these valuable centres almost as a first resort.

[Andy Burnham]

Which ones?

[Caroline Dinenage]

I will go on to give a couple of examples.

Some of these councils are cutting valuable front-line services to save money, while protecting the pay packets of the council hierarchy. There are some bizarre—and, frankly, ridiculous—job titles, including a creative director at the county council of the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman), earning £120,000 a year. Labour-run Liverpool city council is closing four Sure Start centres, and its record is a prime example of the wasteful spending that has plagued the effectiveness of our front-line services as, meanwhile, it has an astonishing 23 employees earning over £100,000 a year. Its recently retired chief executive earned more than double what the Prime Minister earns.

Labour-run Manchester city council has put question marks over its Sure Start centres, as the right hon. Gentleman outlined, despite having paid 18 employees over £100,000 a year, having cash reserves of £95 million, as my hon. Friend the Member for High Peak (Andrew Bingham) pointed out, and having the highest levels of funding per head in the area. The recent efficiency measures will provide the councils that have been reckless in their spending with an opportunity to reform their strategies and, as a result, function in a more streamlined and effective manner.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Lady understand that councils whose areas suffer the greatest deprivation, and which are therefore mainly Labour-run, have faced disproportionately large cuts from the Tory Government, and does she accept that the biggest cuts are taking place because they have received less grant from the Government?

[Caroline Dinenage]

I cannot comment on the councils in the hon. Lady’s area. I can only speak about my own area, which has some of the highest levels of social deprivation in the south of England, and highlight the fact that our country would not be in this situation—spending 39 times the Sure Start budget on the deficit—if the previous Government had not left us in such a pickle.

[Andy Burnham]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Caroline Dinenage]

Much as I would love to give way to the shadow Secretary of State, he will have plenty of time to say what he wants when summing up.

Hampshire county council has been discussed a lot in the debate. There were plans to keep the number of individually managed centres at 81, but to reduce the number of management hubs to 53. There were never plans to reduce the number of centres. No Sure Start centres in Hampshire were ever planned to be cut; it was just the management of them that was considered. I can well understand why the Opposition struggle with the concept of reducing bureaucracy, management and red tape even though not doing so would be at the expense of front-line services.

Hampshire county council is making £6 million-worth of savings while protecting front-line services. It is even planning to increase the number of family support workers but outsourcing some of the IT and admin from the county council in Winchester and merging some of the management structures of the smaller centres that are closer together. No front-line Sure Start services will be cut, nor will any family support worker posts. From speaking to the mums who use the Sure Start centres, I know that the most important thing for them is that the service will continue in the same way. In fact, they have all identified that savings can be made, while front-line services can be protected. I have given them my absolute commitment that I will continue the dialogue with Hampshire county council to ensure that that is what happens to front-line services and that no mums or families suffer in any way. That is why I called on the Prime Minister in a recent Prime Minister’s Question Time to endorse proposals that protect front-line services, and that is why I criticised the mischief-making that has resulted in Sure Start being used as a political football. It is, was, and always will be, far too important for that.

Sure Start transforms lives in areas such as Gosport, and I have been inspired by the work of our local centres in dramatically improving the well-being, educational achievements and health of children.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

This debate, like others before it, has shown the strength of feeling in this House that the children of this country deserve the very best.

Let us be clear about why we are here today. The Government’s mandate was to protect and improve the Sure Start network; instead, they have done the opposite and put centres up and down the country at risk of cutback and closure. There is no way in which Ministers can hide behind the favourite line we hear of late that this is a coalition and manifestos do not count. It is not the case that the Tories wanted to abolish Sure Start and the Lib Dems heroically stood their ground with the Business Secretary wielding his secret weapon menacingly, because the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and every single Member sat opposite me today were elected on a promise to protect and build on the Sure Start centre network. The fact that they have done the opposite represents yet another broken promise to the British people.

I was always brought up to think that when someone breaks a promise, the least one can expect is an apology. This debate gave the Secretary of State a chance not only to apologise to the parents, carers and children who will suffer because of his broken promise but to make amends for it. Our motion gives Ministers an opportunity to say to all the parents who are fighting tooth and nail up and down the country to save their children’s centres, “We are sorry; we will keep our promise.” Ministers have said in this Chamber that there is enough money in the early intervention grant to maintain and improve Sure Start. In the comprehensive spending review, the Chancellor told us that there is £1.135 billion every year throughout this Parliament. If that were true, they would have no problem in voting for the motion, but they will not do so. The Minister will no doubt cite the localism agenda. Decisions should be taken locally, he will say—but these should be decisions about how to improve outcomes for children rather than where to cut inputs. In this case, localism is not about who makes the decisions but about who takes the blame.

Reinstating the ring fence is not a panacea, but it would bring back the stability and security that the Sure Start network needs. It would let managers and staff concentrate on how to deliver the improvements that we all want in children’s centres rather than forcing them to focus on financial fire-fighting year in, year out. Parents would have the sense of security, which they do not have at the moment, that their local centre would be there from the moment their child is born right up until they started school. We would have a sign that the Government are listening to all the advice that they have sought—not least from my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field), whose excellent speech we heard earlier, and my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen)—and that they are taking early education and early intervention seriously. It would also mean that we would not be left with situations such as those in Tory-controlled Hampshire, which is facing 35% budget cuts; Liberal Democrat-led Hull, with its smoke and mirrors and 50% cuts; and Tory-led Hammersmith and Fulham, which has a strange hub-and-spoke model where the spokes are buildings with a caretaker and a bottle of bleach. A building running on £25,000 a year or less is not a Sure Start children’s centre—it is just a building.

We are giving Ministers a chance to increase their popularity with parents—and not just the Toby Youngs of this world, either: parents such as those I met on mother’s day outside Downing street, who were handing in petitions from all over the country that, on that day alone, contained 52,000 signatures; parents such as the ones who came to the Sure Start seminar in Parliament, which was hosted by my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham); parents such as those I met recently with my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North (Chris Williamson), who are fighting Tory-controlled Derby city council over its plans to close or cut centres; and parents such as those I have met on doorsteps over the past few weeks in Sheffield, York, Peterborough, Gravesham, Newcastle and Sunderland in my own constituency. No matter where one goes, the view is the same: the Government are letting down families and attacking social mobility at every stage of a child’s life.

We have heard a lot today about Hampshire. The debate has done a real service in exposing the cynicism of some Conservative councils. We heard the surprise news that a last-minute extraordinary meeting was called in Hampshire yesterday, although a final decision is not due until 24 May. That is a blatantly cynical move to get through the local election period. The council is still cutting £6 million from the budget, which will cut right to the heart of the service. One of the petitions handed into Downing street on mother’s day was from Hampshire, and another petition signed by 22,000 parents was handed in on 18 April by 50 mums from Hampshire. That may well have led to yesterday’s U-turn. Twenty-eight centres were earmarked for closure or serious cuts, and there was a legal challenge to the rushed consultation.

[Caroline Dinenage]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Mrs Hodgson]

You have already spoken, thank you.

We announced the subject of this Opposition day debate last week, just before the bank holiday weekend. The fact that an extraordinary meeting was called over a bank holiday weekend and hastily arranged for the other side of the weekend is very telling. I am sure that the tens of thousands of parents in Hampshire who signed the two petitions were happy when they heard the news, as we were when we heard it today. However, the news is bitter-sweet. Although we are told that no centres will close, they face a 35% budget cut: going from £17 million to £11 million is a £6 million cut, which is huge. A £6 million cut is much more than just the streamlining of services, and parents know that. They use the services, and will notice if they are taken away or diminished. Indeed, on the Facebook page for the Hampshire children’s centres campaign, this is not seen as a U-turn or a great victory. The group is still campaigning, because it is deeply worried about the £6 million cut and the effect it will have on children’s centres. It says that the campaign goes on.

The Secretary of State loves playing to the gallery, so why will he not give the people what they want and say that he will consider bringing back the ring fence? After all, it would be a nice boost for all those Tory and Lib Dem candidates who are struggling on the doorstep. My right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead, who is one of the most knowledgeable people in this area, challenged the non-ring-fencing of this vital area of expenditure and said that the Government should change their attitude to non-ring-fencing. That is strong stuff from a highly respected expert in the area. I hope that the Government pay heed to that.

It is not as if the Secretary of State has not had practice at backing down. In fact, he is probably the most qualified person in the Cabinet when it comes to U-turns, and that Cabinet includes the Deputy Prime Minister. My right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh laid bare at the beginning of the debate the reasons the Secretary of State probably will not back down and support the motion. He repeated the claims of Ministers that Sure Start funding is protected and showed that that simply is not true. There is not enough money to maintain the current network of children’s centres if Ministers expect councils to deliver all the other important programmes that the grant pays for, such as short breaks for disabled children. How can there be enough, when there has been a real-terms cut of 22% in the pot?

If I am wrong, why are centres closing or effectively being mothballed, and why are services being cut? If I am wrong, why would Ministers have a problem with the motion? But I am not wrong: they are, just as they have been wrong on Bookstart, on EMA, on the English baccalaureate and on Building Schools for the Future. They are the most incompetent Department in a shambolic Government, and the worst thing is that children’s lives are at stake.

I know that some Government Members do see the value of Sure Start and recognise the importance of protecting it, and we have heard from some of them today. My plea to those Members is simple: support the motion and show their constituents that they understand the priorities and concerns of ordinary, hard-working families, even if their Front-Bench colleagues do not.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Thursday 17th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning (Mr John Hayes)]

Volunteering is an important way of giving people a taster, which can then lead to employment or to further learning. I agree that we need to do more work on the matter, and I am very happy to discuss it further. As a result of the hon. Lady’s question, I shall ask my officials to come back to me, and then I shall return to the issue, through her, and to the House.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

T8. What efforts is the Minister’s Department making to support and to promote the marine industry in the UK?

[Mr Prisk]

We are working hard to ensure that the sector, which is a £10 billion industry by sales, is able to grow. That is why I am co-chairing the Marine Industries Leadership Council, and we held a reception in Parliament for all Members to understand its impact. We have a number of important studies on exports and on trade, making sure that investment is forthcoming, and we are determined to ensure an effective partnership between industry and Government so that there is growth.

Education Bill

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Tuesday 8th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

I support the words of the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), who made some excellent and even-handed points. No one will be surprised that I support the Bill, not least because it signals a shift of power away from bureaucrats and quangos and back towards those who run our schools.

For too long teachers and head teachers have been dictated to by Government and overloaded with complex bureaucracy and endless initiatives. How can it be that head teachers spend 15 hours a week on unnecessary paperwork—15 hours that do not raise a single teaching standard, improve a single result or support a single pupil?

I want to speak on one particular topic today—Ofsted. We must not undervalue Ofsted, for it does an important job in identifying the quality of schools and informing parents about the choices. However, we should be under no illusions that Ofsted is perfect. There are currently 27 separate headings under which schools are marked during inspections—27 headings, but, as one school told me, the inspectors did not speak to a single child during their visit.

Under the Bill, Ofsted inspections will focus on four key areas—the achievement of pupils, the quality of teaching, leadership and management, and the behaviour and safety of pupils at the school. In today’s society it is far too easy to judge a pupil by an exam result or a school by a rigid and complex Ofsted report. The results tell only a part, never the whole story.

Over the past few months, I have visited on average two schools a week. I have 39 schools in my constituency, so I still have a way to go. I am extremely fortunate that the diversity of my constituency gives me a good insight into the challenges that schools face. Not only do I have some schools in nice middle class areas, but I have others that are situated in areas with significant welfare dependency and high levels of multiple deprivation. In some of my schools well over half the children are on free school meals, more than 75% live with just one of their birth parents, and more than 10% are under child protection measures because of neglect or abuse.

Many children experience challenging home lives, sometimes with parents who have drug or alcohol problems or mental health issues. These kids, from an early age, have to get themselves up in the morning, feed themselves, dress themselves and get themselves to school, perhaps with a younger sibling, while their mum might still be in bed. For these children, school is their stability, their comfort zone, a safe haven where they know what to expect and what is expected of them, where they will be secure, nurtured, listened to and cared for, where their needs are put first.

The schools that take children from extremely vulnerable backgrounds often have to do much more than educate them. Often they have to heal them, deal with their issues and address their needs, and give them so much more than numeracy and literacy. Those that are doing this successfully are, to me, the very best schools and the very best teachers of all. The problem with the current system is that after this incredible level of achievement, they might still get only a satisfactory Ofsted report because they have not attained the same high level of results as schools in more affluent areas.

That must be incredibly demoralising for the amazing teachers and governors who pour so much of themselves into supporting the most vulnerable children. What incentive is there for more able teachers and heads to take jobs in the most challenging of schools, which should surely be the most rewarding of roles, when they know that all their effort could be seen as merely satisfactory?

Reforms to Ofsted inspections will help to prevent that. Of course grades and results are important, but there is hope that for the first time it will be more than the end result that is considered. It will be possible to achieve good Ofsted reports in certain circumstances by demonstrating the true progress that has been made, measuring achievement from where the school started, not just where it ends up. Ofsted must be more sophisticated in recognising the social justice agenda, not just performance levels.

In many schools, the move away from mainstream academic subjects such as modern languages could be laid partly at the door of Ofsted. The constant focus on performance levels and grades achieved, irrespective of the subject matter, means that curriculums have been altered to please Ofsted. In my constituency there are senior schools in which no one is studying a modern language, yet classes are crammed with pupils studying for a GCSE in dance. We will become a nation of people who can glide sure-footedly through the streets of the cities of the world, but unable to communicate with a soul who lives there.

The Bill removes the requirement for Ofsted to inspect every school, enabling more resources to be concentrated on the underperforming schools. This will lead to more targeted inspections, so schools in need of support will get the help that they require to progress and show that progress is being made. Above all, the Bill sends parents the message that allowing every child to flourish and be the very best that they can is at the heart of Government thinking. It sends heads the message that the Government prize educating more than ticking boxes and filling forms, and it sends teachers the message that the Government value teachers and understand that nothing is more important than attracting great people into teaching. That is why I will support the Bill.

Education Policy

Caroline Dinenage Excerpts

Monday 18th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful for the right hon. Gentleman’s constructive question. He is a distinguished member of the dwindling Blairite tendency on the Opposition Back Benches. He is fortunate in having in Knowsley one of the more imaginative and creative local authorities. That is why representatives from Knowsley are working with the Department for Education to ensure that we can target deprivation more effectively.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

One of the biggest complaints that I hear from local head teachers concerns the way in which they were micro-managed under the previous Government and told how to spend their money. Will my right hon. Friend please give us an assurance that head teachers will be free to spend the pupil premium money in the way that they see fit?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. We are working with head teachers to ensure that the unacceptable level of ring-fencing and bureaucracy that fettered their discretion under the previous Government is removed, so that the money—particularly the money that will be spent on the very poorest children—can be spent in line with their priorities and judgment. Of course schools will be accountable for how that money is spent, but greater freedom combined with sharper accountability seems to me to be the adult way to go.