Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Monday 3rd September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Tim Loughton]

I pay tribute to the work that my hon. Friend has done on this important issue. She is absolutely right. I absolutely want the internet to be a safer place for our children, and I am open to any suggestions to bring that about. However, a joint effort is needed, which is why UKCCIS is a union of lots of different interested parties. But parents are absolutely at the heart of the issue: they need to know what to look out for in respect of their children’s internet access at home and to talk to their children to make sure that they are safe. We all have a role in this, and I praise the contribution that my hon. Friend is making.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

19. What measures he has put in place to prevent the sale of academy school sports playing fields.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

No disposal of publicly funded playing field land at an academy may take place without the Secretary of State’s consent. The Government will agree to the sale of playing fields only if the sports and curriculum needs of the academy and its neighbouring schools can continue to be met. Sale proceeds must be used to improve sports and education facilities.

[Chi Onwurah]

The Secretary of State made sure that academies were accountable only to himself and then decided that all state schools should become academies. But he gets his figures wrong on playing fields, overrules his own advisers, exempts academies from most of his own policies and, in any case, focuses all his time and his Department’s money on free schools. How can we have confidence in him on sport or anything else?

[Michael Gove]

I am proud of the success of academies and free schools, but they are not the only thing that the Government are doing; we are also making sure that we improve inspection, teacher recruitment, the curriculum and examinations. As for playing fields, we have ensured that the rules have changed so that they are better protected under this Government than they were under the last one.