Oral Answers to Questions
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)
I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Dr Hudson) will join me in thanking all staff in further and higher education for their work in responding to this unprecedented challenge—they have done a fantastic job. In further education we have introduced flexibilities and encouraged online teaching so that learners can complete their courses as planned. Colleges are open and we want to get all learners back into college as soon as possible.
Gillian Keegan
Of course, international students are a key concern for the sector at the moment and, as my hon. Friend the Minister of State for Universities outlined before, work is going on in this area and there is a two-tier system. The Department for International Trade is also working with the Department for Education to encourage students, particularly those in Europe, to come over and continue their international student placements.
Gavin Newlands [V]
I am sure the whole House will want to join me in paying tribute to Fiona, Alexander and Philip, the three young children who died in a tragic house fire in my constituency on Friday. Our thoughts and prayers are with their family and friends.
Many students who normally work over the summer will now, through no fault of their own, be pushed into poverty. The Scottish Government have brought forward earlier access to £11 million to support students, but given the unique circumstances, does the Minister agree that flexibility in universal credit over the summer would help many young people who will otherwise be in an impossible position?
Gillian Keegan
May I associate myself with the hon. Gentleman’s comments about the tragedy in his constituency?
Of course, this is a very difficult time. There is massive uncertainty in many of our sectors, and lots of those would have potentially provided short-term work opportunities to students. Obviously, the most important thing we need to do now is reopen our economy, get our economy working and provide those opportunities for young people. In the meantime, there are a number of supports and discretionary grants that are available through the FE sector or the HE sector to support students during this difficult time.
Oral Answers to Questions
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Nadhim Zahawi
This Government are spending £6 billion on childcare. It is not just about bricks and mortar. There are 2,300 children’s centres and they are very much part of the overall picture, but we will do what works. We have committed £8.5 million for councils to peer review each other, to see what is actually working. I hope that, like the Government, the hon. Gentleman is interested in outcomes rather than just bricks and mortar.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
The Secretary of State for Education (Damian Hinds)
In the past month, we have announced £730 million of capital funding to create new school places. That will bring to 1 million the additional school places to be created over the decade, making it the biggest for investment in school capacity for at least two generations. Friday was Thank a Teacher Day, and we have more of them to thank than ever before, as well as more to thank them for.
Gavin Newlands
This year’s Times Higher Education rankings show UK universities falling down the league tables. Does the Secretary of State agree that that makes it even more vital that the UK relaxes any restrictions on EU academic and research staff post Brexit, to ensure that our universities do not become isolated and cut off from development?
Damian Hinds
Our higher education sector performs extremely well in the international comparisons. It is a popular destination for international students, including EU students, and, indeed, it remains a popular destination for EU academics.
Statutory PHSE Education
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(6 years, 2 months ago)
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Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship once again, Mr Robertson. I congratulate the hon. Member for Erith and Thamesmead (Teresa Pearce) on securing this debate and setting it out in the manner in which she did.
It would be remiss of me not to mention that this is obviously an England-only debate, with education being devolved to the Scottish Parliament, so it might seem somewhat strange—despite the fact the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) has contributed—to see a Scottish MP engaging in today’s debate beyond our third party responsibilities. However, this is an issue that I feel strongly about and there are undoubtedly things we can learn from each other about the content and delivery of our curriculums.
PSHE not only helps children and young adults live healthier physical lives, but it also promotes better mental health. In addition to helping youngsters gain valuable transferable skills to help prepare them for life and work, PSHE also provides pupils with the relevant skills and knowledge to ensure they are safe online. That is an extremely important skill, given how accessible the internet and social media are to the current generation of young people, as I am finding out with my 11 and seven-year-old daughters.
It is also vital to note that relationship and sex education is a fundamental component of PSHE, and one that I am particularly passionate about. If it is implemented effectively and across the board, I firmly believe that we can help create positive and respectful relationships between boys and girls, which will help to tackle and eliminate sexist attitudes before they turn more violent later.
I received a report last week from the National Education Union and UK Feminista, which conveys the extent of the problem of sexism in our classrooms. The report highlighted that sexual harassment is prevalent in schools, with over a third of female students being subjected to some form of sexual harassment. Sexist language is too often dismissed as banter, with two-thirds of female students and teachers experiencing or witnessing it on a weekly basis. Less than a quarter of our female students think that their school takes sexism seriously. Those stats present a worrying picture of what life is like for too many female students.
Education is meant to be a place where our children learn, socialise and find their way in the world. Our education system should not be a place where sexist attitudes and behaviours, often fomented at home, are born and/or reinforced. One respondent to that report spoke about the sexual harassment she is experiencing:
“Some of the boys make comments on a lot of the girls in our years bodies and the girls just have to ignore it because no one thinks it’s a big deal. The boys also slap the girls butts and touch their breasts without any consent.”
It is shameful that we have allowed that sort of behaviour to go largely unchallenged in many of our schools. If we fail to educate in order to tackle and prevent sexism in classrooms, as sure as night follows day, we risk these behaviours manifesting later in life.
The Scottish Government’s “Equally Safe” strategy to prevent and eradicate violence against women and girls addresses the need to eliminate the systematic and deep-rooted inequality that women and girls face in their daily lives. The report completed by the National Education Union and UK Feminista shows that many of these deep-rooted behaviours are established very early at school. Sexism in schools is endemic, but not inevitable. The UK Government and others have to make PSHE a statutory part of the curriculum to ensure that every student receives education about the importance of positive, healthy and equal relationships. We need to get serious about adopting a zero-tolerance approach to sexual harassment.
There is undoubtedly more that we in Scotland can do in this area, but I am proud of some of the progress that has been made by the Scottish Government and others. Through the curriculum for excellence, personal and social education is a subject that covers aspects of planning for choices and changes, substance misuse, relationships, sexual health and parenthood. Following a report completed by the Scottish Parliament’s Education and Skills Committee, the Scottish Government have outlined their intention to complete a review of PSHE. I hope that the Scottish Government are ambitious in this review, meet the calls made by young people during the consultation and use the review to lead the work into creating an inclusive school environment founded on the values of respect, inclusivity and equality.
The case for PSHE is undisputed. The evidence has been provided on the benefits that PSHE has in promoting healthy living, economic wellbeing and solidifying positive relationships. The statutory status for PSHE is supported by 85% of business leaders, 88% of teachers, 92% of parents, 92% of pupils, the Children’s Commissioner for England—I could go on and on, as the list is extensive. The current system is helping to foster behaviours that can grow more violent later in life. This debate is about introducing PSHE into all classrooms. It is about equipping our students with the skills, attributes and knowledge to prepare them for later in life. However, this debate has also been about the importance of sustaining a positive relationship between boys and girls, helping to eliminate sexist attitudes from our schools and preventing these behaviours from growing more violent.
Sadly, on average two women are killed by a partner or ex-partner each week. The attitudes that lead to this murderous behaviour must be addressed. We cannot leave it to an incremental shift in societal attitudes over generations to resolve this issue. We must address this head-on through a gender-based violence prevention education framework. Statutory PSHE is the ideal vehicle for this and I urge the Minister to get on and implement it.
Mr Laurence Robertson (in the Chair)
I am looking to call the Front-Bench speakers at 10.30 am, so that leaves about five minutes each for the two remaining speakers.
Anti-bullying Week
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(6 years, 5 months ago)
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Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered Anti-bullying Week.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Ms Buck. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this important debate. Although parliamentary business meant that this debate could not take place last week, during Anti-bullying Week itself, I am delighted that this debate is now able to take place and that Parliament is debating Anti-bullying Week for the first time—I hope it will not be the last.
Anti-bullying Week is an annual event which aims to raise awareness of the bullying that far too many young people experience, and discuss ways in which schools and others can help end bullying. The Anti-Bullying Alliance defines bullying as,
“the repetitive, intentional hurting of one person or group by another person or group, where the relationship involves an imbalance of power. It can happen face to face or online.”
In Scotland, the main Scottish Government-funded anti-bullying charity respectme widens that definition to include bullying behaviour. It says:
“Bullying is both behaviour and impact; what someone does and the impact it has on the other person’s capacity to feel in control of themselves. We call this their sense of ‘agency’. Bullying takes place in the context of relationships. It is behaviour that can make people feel hurt, threatened, frightened and left out and it can happen face to face and online.”
In my experience that is an important point. There will be thousands of young people at the receiving end of this kind of behaviour, but who do not realise they are being bullied. I know this through personal experience. I do not want to overstate the bullying. I was not bullied violently, bar perhaps one time in primary school. I was not called a specific derogatory name in front of the whole school persistently, but I was constantly belittled by two or three individuals. Young people react differently to abuse of whatever level. My reaction, as a fairly socially-awkward 14-year-old, lacking in self-confidence, was to retreat into myself and essentially give up on school.
Over the first three years or so in high school I had largely 1’s—A’s, as it would be down here—across the board on report cards and was a pupil of high promise, but that changed almost overnight. I am sure that the raging hormonal imbalances of my teenage years, in conjunction with the bullying, had a big effect as well. I went from loving school, soaking up the information and learning all that I could, to avoiding school, but not in the traditional sense of “dogging it,” as we say in Scotland—that has nothing to do with car parks, I hasten to add. [Laughter.] We have to make light of it. I would kid on that I was going out to school and then hide under the bed until my mum left for work, and I would bin any letters about attendance. I still had to go to school more often than not, but my heart and mind simply were not in it any more. I ended up leaving school with some at best half-decent standard grades— the equivalent of GCSEs—and two average Highers. Consequently university was not a route open to me.
It is not hard to see why an individual being bullied will have a higher absence rate than children who do not experience bullying. Research from the National Centre for Social Research confirms that over 15,000 children aged between 11 and 15 are absent from school at any one time due to bullying. Children are not only absent from school, but are struggling to reintegrate once they have returned to the classroom. People who have been bullied tend to have less education and fewer qualifications by the age of 50 than those who were never bullied. That requires us to adopt policies that not only stamp out the bullying behaviour, but help the child who was bullied to integrate back into school once the bullying has ended. Our actions to end bullying do not stop when the behaviour has ended. We have a responsibility to children beyond that.
This period in high school had the most profound effect on my self-confidence for my life since then. It has impacted on almost every life choice I have made since. A longitudinal study into bullying by the Institute of Education at University College London backs that up, and found that the victims of childhood bullying had higher rates of depression and psychological distress at ages 23 and 50 than those who were never bullied. Those who were bullied frequently while they were growing up had higher risks of anxiety and were more likely to have thought about suicide by the age of 45 than those who were never bullied. The effects of childhood bullying on adults’ mental health remained even after taking into consideration related factors such as family, social class, parenting and behavioural problems.
A lot of people who bully do so in the name of “banter,” possibly not fully realising the hurt and pain that their behaviour is causing. I would strongly encourage any young person who suspects that they may be being bullied or carrying out this behaviour: speak to one of your classmates or one of your teachers.
In preparation for today’s debate I have been sent numerous briefing papers by fantastic organisations, all doing inspirational work to combat bullying behaviour. There are too many to name, but I thank them all. I will try to cover as many points as I can in the time available. Reading through these papers is a stark reminder of the scale of the problem. The Scottish anti-bullying charity respectme states that 30% of schoolchildren have experienced some form of bullying during a recent academic term. Research conducted by the Anti-Bullying Alliance found that 40% of children in England would hide aspects of themselves for fear of being bullied. Engender, in a shocking 2015 report which I have quoted before in this place, found that 5,500 sexual offences were recorded in UK schools over a three-year period, including 600 rapes.
However, behind every statistic is a story of a young person who is living in fear due to the bullying behaviour of others, and behind every statistic is a story of a child who lives in fear of going through the school gates every morning or who is reluctant to go online due to the actions of others. Behind every statistic is a story of a young person being bullied due to others perceiving them as being “different.”
Children who have a disability are more likely to experience bullying than their peers, with Ditch the Label suggesting that 63% of disabled schoolchildren had experienced bullying, with 19% of these kids being bullied every single day.
An amazing organisation based in Renfrewshire are doing groundbreaking work to tackle the bullying that many disabled children face day-in, day-out. I Am Me Scotland work with pupils to design an innovative programme that raises awareness of bullying and help the young people to understand what they can do to help create a safe environment for their classmates. They work with Police Scotland and travel around Renfrewshire and across Scotland in their mobile cinema bus, delivering this innovative programme to local schoolchildren. To date, they have reached over 10,000 primary school children in Renfrewshire, creating a long-lasting change in our schools.
Over the summer, I Am Me Scotland launched their network of Keep Safe places across Scotland. Keep Safe places are premises across Scotland that provide a safe space for any disabled person who is being victimised while out and about. The scheme uses an app to let people know where their closest Keep Safe space is, and staff at the premises are fully trained to help that person, should they come into their premises looking for assistance. I cannot speak highly enough of I Am Me Scotland—I have met them two or three times now. They were awarded the title Scottish charity of the year just a few weeks ago. I would definitely encourage the Minister to meet the staff of I Am Me Scotland to learn more about their work. He would be amazed by their energy and drive, and it would give him the opportunity to spread their best practice around the UK.
Homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying is also widespread in UK schools. The School Report in 2017 found that 45% of lesbian, gay, bi and trans young people are bullied for being LGBT at school. LGBT+ students are hiding a central part of who they are, due to the fear of being bullied if their classmates found out about their sexual orientation. In research undertaken by LGBT Youth Scotland, less than half of the respondents said they would feel confident reporting homophobic, biphobic or transphobic bullying in schools, highlighting that pupils are not confident that teachers and schools will be able to deal with their bullying. LGBT Youth Scotland calls for a dedicated fund for initiatives to prevent and address homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying in schools, including training for teachers. It is a no-brainer—they are right. We need to offer more support to these young people, and we can take inspiration from the work of Diversity Role Models, LGBT Youth Scotland and others who are working in our schools to eliminate this form of bullying.
Diversity Role Models provides a range of storytelling workshops to help schools create an environment where everyone feels safe. It encourages schoolchildren to celebrate being different and is achieving fantastic results; 96% of young people who have attended one of the workshops say that they would treat an LGBT+ person with more respect in the future.
Young women are also far more likely to experience bullying, especially sexist bullying, than other students. Children in Scotland reports that sexualised bullying has been described as a regular occurrence in our schools. That complements a poll of 16 to 18-year-olds that found that 29% of girls experienced unwanted sexual touching at school, and that a further 71% said they had heard sexual name-calling towards girls at school on a daily basis. Sexual harassment in our schools undermines the dignity and safety of girls. It negatively impacts on how these young women perceive themselves and contributes to gender stereotyping, which will sadly follow them throughout their lives. Unfortunately, in Scotland schools are not required to collect data on sexist bullying, unlike with racist bullying. Engender in Scotland believes that that should be a priority to enable us to understand better the problem that too many young girls are experiencing.
We also have to take a whole-school approach that tackles the gender inequalities in schools. School policies, management processes and teacher training must all specifically address the problem of negative gender stereotypes and sexist bullying. Not only will that help us to address sexual harassment in schools, but it will be an effective preventive approach in helping to stop those stereotypes growing and leading to violence later in life.
The Race Relations Act 1976 states that schools and governing bodies have a duty to ensure that students do not face any form of racial discrimination, including attacks and harassment. However, despite the positive intentions behind that legislation, too many children are still being targeted because of the colour of their skin or their ethnicity. Last week, a poll by the Diana Award found that 61% of school staff had witnessed bullying that resulted from racism. That is a pretty shameful state of affairs in 2017 and it highlights how far we have to go to create an environment where racism does not exist in our schools.
I want to expand on the prevalence of bullying behaviour, as I believe that if we want to pursue effective preventive strategies in combatting bullying we must fully understand this behaviour, which is causing real harm to young people throughout the UK. A 2015 research report by the Department for Education highlights that one child in every classroom will be bullied every day, unable to escape the torment, and that children who say they are bullied every day are three times as likely to be excluded from school as children who are not being bullied. I hope that when he sums up, the Minister can address that point head-on. Why, all too often, are we still failing those who are being bullied? Why are we excluding those who are being bullied from our schools? What can be done to prepare our schools better to support those who are being bullied rather than excluding them?
Some bullying behaviour is as old as formal education itself, but we need to be aware of the new opportunities to bully in today’s digital age. Cyber-bullying, usually through social media and messaging, means that bullying can now be extended beyond the school gates and into the safety of someone’s home. It is a relatively new phenomenon, but in practice it means bullying through the use of electronic means and includes the spreading of malicious rumours, sending hurtful texts, emails or post, sharing harmful pictures or video content, manipulation, bribery and impersonation. Bullying UK reports that the number of young people seeking assistance with regard to cyber-bullying is increasing all the time. More people are searching for that form of bullying on its website, with more than 2 million views in the last year alone.
Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat and others all have a responsibility to tackle cyber-bullying. Although Facebook in particular has taken welcome steps of late, most social media responses are implemented to respond to problems once they have occurred, when often the damage has already been done, and are therefore of limited effectiveness. We must therefore look beyond social media companies for solutions, and harness the latest technologies to combat cyber-bullying, such as the SafeToNet app and others like it. That acts like a moderator, although it is exponentially quicker than any human moderator. Nevertheless, I am keen to learn what discussions the Minister has had with the major social media providers about what they are doing to create a safer online space for all our young people.
As I touched on earlier, there is a direct link between being bullied and the quality mental health. A study into users of child and adolescent mental health services in London found that more than 61% of participants reported being bullied earlier in their lives. Being the victim of bullying also significantly increases the chances of an individual experiencing depression later in life by well over 50%. Respectme points out that the impact of bullying can last even when the behaviour has stopped. That is particularly true when we consider some of the health difficulties that young people face because of the horrible and stressful experiences that they have gone through.
Sadly, there is a clear link between bullied teenagers and suicide. Ditch the Label, an international charity, published research in 2014 showing that one in 10 teenagers bullied at school had attempted to commit suicide, with a further 30% committing self-harm. Furthermore, studies have found that half of the suicides among young people were related to bullying. Will the Minister commission research into the impact that bullying can have on mental health at various stages in people’s lives?
Unfortunately, certain schools are better at recognising bullying and implementing effective prevention strategies than others, and quite frankly that is not good enough. I know this from my own local area, where it seems to me that some schools do not have a good enough level of preventive services or support. Every child who is being bullied and who is at risk of self-harm should receive the same high level of care and attention regardless of what school they attend. In relation to that, research published during Anti-bullying Week found that 36% of children do not believe they learn enough about bullying and what to do if they experience bullying themselves. I believe that government—I include all devolved Governments in this, given the devolved nature of education—has a key role in addressing what amounts to this postcode lottery in the approach to bullying. The Government must ensure that all teachers and support staff in our schools have the appropriate training and skills to recognise incidences of self-harm and to help those students. That is the absolute minimum level of care that we should be willing to accept for our children.
I hope that following this debate we, and more importantly the Government, realise that we are not dealing with bullying as effectively as we should be. I hope the Government listen to the variety of organisations that I have referenced, and many that I have not been able to, and formulate a more effective approach to bullying that can help us to deal better with it and its consequences. That includes undertaking large-scale surveys into the mental health and wellbeing of school-age young people, including specific questions on bullying. When summing up, the Minister should commit to reversing the Government’s cuts—he will probably disagree —to mental health services in England. Recent reports suggest that mental health spending is being cut by £4.5 million in five English regions this year. Ending bullying has to be a priority for this Government and the Governments across these islands, and that includes prioritising mental health services.
As I said at the start, Anti-bullying Week was last week. This year its theme encouraged us all to celebrate being different. I have spoken about the fact that schoolchildren who are perceived as different are more likely to be bullied. That creates a situation where more than half of teenagers worry about being seen as different, with 40% of those young people hiding aspects of themselves for fear of being bullied. We all tell our kids to celebrate diversity and to take pride in being different, but the reality on the ground is that young people are scared of being seen as different for fear of being bullied. To promote last week’s campaign, young people were encouraged to wear odd socks on the day as a way of celebrating diversity in our classrooms and across society.
No one is born destined to be a bully. No one sets out in life to target diversity and to see what makes us all different as a weakness. We are in a privileged position that enables us to influence younger children’s behaviour, and we should use that position of power to celebrate what makes us all different. Providing children with an equal chance to flourish in life is at the heart of everything we do and should do. However, the system is failing too many children from all backgrounds. We are failing to offer protection to our children, and the consequences of that are long-standing and often lifelong. None of us wants to live in a society in which kids are frightened about entering the school gates in the morning or logging in online.
Creating a society in which bullying does not exist will not be easy—at the moment, it almost seems like an impossible goal—but we as lawmakers have a duty to aim for just that. We have a duty to listen to young people about their experience and to do what can be done to create a safe environment for all our children. We have a duty to support policies that prevent bullying from occurring in the first place. We are currently failing in that duty, but with commitment, passion and cross-party support, I believe that we can improve the experience of all our schoolchildren.
Gavin Newlands
I thank all the contributors to today’s debate. We have heard some extremely powerful testimony—none more so than from the hon. Member for Ogmore (Chris Elmore), who spoke of his harrowing experience. I think I speak for all of us when I say that he is a credit to himself for coming through that and reaching where he is today. The hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) spoke of the various definitions of bullying; I agree wholeheartedly that it is time to draft a legal definition. The hon. Member for East Lothian (Martin Whitfield) leant his experience to today’s proceedings, which was very welcome. He made an excellent point about the problem with labelling bullies, or indeed their victims. I certainly empathised with the hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Paul Masterton) when he spoke of his three-year-old’s skills on an iPad. I have two young daughters with similar skills.
To conclude, we all want the best for our children, and to ensure that they are all viewed equally and given an equal chance in life. On that basis, I urge the Minister to meet with anti-bullying organisations and to draft a new, properly-funded anti-bullying strategy to take the issue forward. I thank all Members, and you, Ms Buck. I certainly hope that this is not the last time that we debate Anti-bullying Week. I hope that this becomes an annual debate, to check our progress towards removing the scourge of bullying from our schools.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered Anti-bullying Week.
Fathers in the Family
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(7 years, 1 month ago)
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Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Neil Gray) on securing the debate. We have had a number of speakers, including the hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double), who invited us to imagine him as Prime Minister. I can only point out that the unexpected can often happen in politics. There is clearly an appetite to debate this issue, and perhaps we can revisit it in a longer format in future. It is also good to hear so many MPs from south of the border looking to copy Scottish Government initiatives—it is always a welcome thing to hear, as an SNP Member.
Thankfully, the days of dads being passive players in the raising of their children are increasingly rare. Nowadays most dads want to get involved in every part of their child’s life. The modern-day father comes in various forms, and today’s family unit thankfully no longer has to conform to the traditional parenting paradigm of the man being the traditional breadwinner and disciplinarian in the family. He can be single or married, an employed or stay-at-home dad, gay or straight, an adoptive parent or step-parent, and a more than capable caregiver to children facing physical or psychological challenges.
The purpose of the debate is not to downplay the critical role that mothers play in families, but simply to celebrate the father’s role, and to debate what can be done through Government and workplace policy to enhance that role. From my experience of helping to raise two beautiful daughters aged 10 and six—Eilidh is seven in two weeks and four days, as she is keen to remind us—I know that the modern-day father wants to be there for their child at every stage. We want to help feed the baby, change their nappies, read them their bedtime stories, drive them to after-school activities and actively discourage any interest from any potential suitor until at least their mid-20s. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] I feel your pain.
However, our society still makes it difficult for fathers to be actively involved in raising their children. Some 53% of millennial dads want to downshift into a less stressful job because they cannot balance the demands of work and family life. If I thought it was difficult to achieve a good work-life balance in my old job, it has pretty much gone out of the window with this one. However, after two years in this role, I know that I must try to do better in striking some sort of balance, for the sake of not just my children but my wife, who is a full-time student, a part-time worker and, for half of the week, has to juggle those roles with being a full-time parent with no assistance whatever from me.
Our economy also retains bias about the role of fathers in the family unit. According to University of Plymouth research, fathers face a “negative bias” from managers when seeking time off work to take care of their children. I know from speaking to other dads that workplaces tend to question their commitment to the job should they request a period of flexible working in order to look after their children. That complements University of Edinburgh research that showed that many dads would prefer to lie and say that they had a dentist appointment, rather than admit that they were leaving work to look after their children.
Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)
My hon. Friend is making a powerful point. Does he agree that the problem of fathers not seeking parental time off is more pronounced among young fathers at the outset of their careers? In fact, their being able to be more flexible on that would actually improve outcomes for children and families.
Gavin Newlands
I could not agree more with my hon. Friend; he makes a powerful point. I think we have all seen circumstances in which that is definitely the case.
Angela Crawley (Lanark and Hamilton East) (SNP)
Does my hon. Friend agree that all the evidence from the work of the Women and Equalities Committee—including the gender pay gap report, the pregnancy and maternity discrimination report and the current fathers and the workplace inquiry—outlines that there is an economic benefit to fathers playing an active role in their children’s lives?
Gavin Newlands
I could not agree more with my hon. Friend; if she had waited a few seconds I would have come on to that. Those factors help to create a situation in which men in the UK still spend only 24 minutes caring for their children for every hour that women do. Policies to create an economy that empowers and promotes the positive role of fathers in the family would help to achieve equality for women. In Sweden, it was found that for every additional month of leave dads took, mums’ career earnings increased by 6.7%.
However, despite some progress—such as the Scottish Government’s Year of the Dad initiative, which highlights the positives of active dads and which my hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and Shotts spoke of in detail earlier—there is still a lot of work to do in creating an economy that allows dads to achieve an appropriate work-life balance. Attitudes towards the role of the father have changed somewhat, and for the better, but our economy has not adapted to the changing role of the modern dad. I think we all want to see any dad be able to achieve an appropriate, family-friendly work-life balance. That would benefit not only families but our economy.
In closing, it would be remiss of me not to speak of families in which the parents’ relationship has not survived, and there is either no father figure, or one whose influence is via scheduled weekly access. Like an increasing number of children, I experienced growing up in a traditional family unit, but following my parents’ separation when I was around eight, I was brought up, in the main, by my mother through my formative years. Although we talked earlier about promoting parental equality and enhancing the role of fathers, we must ensure that those who bring up children on their own—be they male or female—are fully supported, and we must try to end the stigma that the Daily Mail and other such publications attach to such parents.
Let us be clear: in the vast majority of single-parent families, it is women who bring up the children. They are often vilified in said press, whereas a single father will often be depicted as brave and an all-around good egg. That inherent bias aids no one and must end now. The truth is that although we would all like to see relationships succeed and children growing up in stable and loving families, that has become more an exception than the rule. Equally, there can be no doubt that children brought up lovingly in single-parent families have a better environment in which to grow up than children whose parents constantly argue and are trying to stay together for the sake of the child. That rarely works.
Mrs Anne Main (in the Chair)
Order. Can the hon. Gentleman be brief? I thought he said “in conclusion” quite a long time ago.
Gavin Newlands
I do not often say this—in fact, I may have never said it—but I would like to thank my own mother for doing a fantastic job in raising my sister and me following my parents’ separation. I would like to reiterate that there is no one perfect model for perfect parenting—
Mrs Anne Main (in the Chair)
Order. The hon. Gentleman is eating into other Members’ time. I have to call the Opposition spokesperson.
Oral Answers to Questions
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(7 years, 2 months ago)
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Joseph Johnson
The key thing is that, whether or not they are in those figures, there is no limit on the number of international students who can come here to study. The UK is the best place in the world to get a higher education, and we are delighted that, for the last six years, over 170,000 international students have come to study in the UK.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
Joseph Johnson
The UK is immensely successful at attracting international students. We are second in the world in terms of our market share, behind only the United States. We continue to extend a warm welcome, and we wish that more international students would come.
Oral Answers to Questions
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(7 years, 2 months ago)
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Justine Greening
The hon. Gentleman raises an important point, because we have a large number of faith-based schools. Indeed, the values that we want to give our young people as they come through the education system are not only British but often underpinned by faith values. Coming back to the point on the economy, PSHE can really help students develop their teamwork, communications skills and resilience—precisely the sorts of things that British business wants.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Welfare Delivery (Caroline Nokes)
The Government are committed to complying with our public sector equality duty, and we will take account of feedback from our public consultations. We will undertake an equality analysis as part of the detailed planning for service reconfiguration, which will include feedback from public consultations in those locations where this applies.
Gavin Newlands
Last week, the UK Government announced the closure of 15 jobcentre sites in Scotland, including the Lonend site in Paisley. This follows a proposal to close eight jobcentres in Glasgow, which was announced in December. Does the Minister agree that it is a dereliction of duty and an insult to those affected not to conduct an equality impact assessment in advance of these plans, given the hardship that they will cause to thousands of the most disadvantaged people?
Caroline Nokes
The views and opinions from the consultations we are carrying out with claimants who use the services across the country, not simply in Scotland, will be fed into our equality analysis.
Oral Answers to Questions
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(7 years, 4 months ago)
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The Minister for Vulnerable Children and Families (Edward Timpson)
Every child and young person should be able to enjoy good mental health and well-being. My hon. Friend is right to raise the serious concerns about self-harm. That is why we are working closely with the Department of Health to tackle it by funding guidance for schools on teaching about it, and information and training for professionals and parents through the MindEd web portal, as well as providing funding to the YoungMinds parents’ helpline and to the NSPCC’s invaluable Childline. However, we know that there is more to do.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
Joseph Johnson
The hon. Gentleman will have seen the amendment that the Government tabled to the Bill ensuring that there will be at least one member of the UKRI board with experience of the excellent research that goes on in at least one of our devolved Administrations.
International Men’s Day
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(7 years, 5 months ago)
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Paula Sherriff (Dewsbury) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the SNP spokeswoman in this important debate. I congratulate the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies), a fellow Yorkshire MP, on securing this debate in the main Chamber this year. As we have heard, International Men’s Day falls on 19 November, which is Saturday, and one of the themes this year is the high suicide rate among men. The Opposition welcome the opportunity to discuss seriously that issue and all other matters relating to the health and wellbeing of men and boys. We also recognise the opportunity that International Men’s Day presents to examine the societal pressures facing young men, particularly around body image and traditional ideas about masculinity, which can add a burden of expectation to young men and limit the psychological and physical horizons of both men and women.
I will first address the theme of International Men’s Day this year—namely, the high suicide rate among men—and then I will move on to address International Men’s Day in general. Simply put, the rate of suicide among men in this country is far too high. The rate of male suicide is more than three times the rate of female suicide. There are 16.8 male deaths per 100,000, compared with 5.2 female deaths per 100,000. Although it is true that suicide is the most common cause of death in men under the age of 45, the Office for National Statistics found that the highest rate of suicide actually occurs in men between the ages of 45 and 59, at 23.9 deaths per 100,000 according to 2014 figures. This is clearly a complex issue that can affect men of any age.
I am conscious that I may cover similar ground to last year’s debate in Westminster Hall, when male suicide was specified in the motion. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger) for her words as the then shadow Minister for mental health. In particular, she emphasised that “suicide is not inevitable.” By paying due attention to the societal and medical factors that can contribute to the increased risk of suicide and by ensuring that proper care is available when such factors arise, we can do much better. Unfortunately, we often fall short. Although we have made great inroads into understanding the various facets of the wider problem—the difficulties young men face with body image, the negative effects of unemployment on mental health, the greater propensity of men to abuse alcohol and drugs and the scale of the suicide epidemic in our prisons—we all too often fail to respond to such situations adequately in the areas of education, work and criminal justice.
Additionally, as my hon. Friend also mentioned in last year’s debate, we now understand that men tend to use more lethal methods in attempting suicide, so early and effective intervention in mental health is crucial. Sadly, the help that people need is often simply not there at the time they need it. My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner) recently spoke very movingly in the House about the tragedy of losing his nephew to suicide after being told that he would have to wait for up to six months to access a talking therapy. It is a pain recognised by all too many families across this country.
We have found that accident and emergency departments continue to face unprecedented pressures, and we hear that many are now also facing closure. That is felt very acutely in my constituency. A&E is often the place where people find themselves when seeking treatment for a mental health crisis. Waiting times in excess of four hours, longer journeys to the nearest A&E department and a reported lack of mental health nurses all serve to present further barriers to people finding the help they need during a mental health crisis, with sadly predictable consequences.
I welcome the excellent speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North East (Colleen Fletcher), who referred to the “It Takes Balls to Talk” initiative in Coventry. I was fortunate to visit it recently with the Health Committee to hear about some of the fantastic work it is doing. It is true that such factors affect anybody suffering from difficulties with mental health, but the fact that the suicide rate is so much higher among men makes it all the more pressing for men’s health that these issues are tackled—and tackled soon.
I now turn to the issue of International Men’s Day in general. Labour Members welcome the day as an opportunity to highlight and have a serious discussion about the issues facing the wellbeing of men and boys. There are many challenges, such as the continuing battle against health conditions, such as testicular and prostate cancer, where it is recognised that there remains a reticence among some men about visiting a doctor to catch problems early. It is very timely that we should hold this debate in November—or Movember. There are also challenges about the educational attainment of boys in schools and the lack of men teaching, particularly in primary schools, as well as about the recognition of domestic violence towards men, as several hon. Members have said.
We also want to highlight the societal pressures involving body image, gender roles, and sex and relationships. Labour is committed to compulsory, age-appropriate sex and relationships education to promote gender equality, mutual respect and healthy relationships from an early age. This is also about ensuring that young men and women are educated in an atmosphere of mutual respect that broadens their horizons and does not pigeonhole them from the start of life. Although this would be of benefit to both young men and women, it should be noted that such pigeonholing is one of the many gender disparities that still predominantly affect women.
The fact that there are currently more male MPs in the House in this Parliament than the number of female MPs who have ever been elected illustrates that there is still such a long way to go. With regard to respect and healthy relationships, the fact that an average of two women in this country are killed each week by a violent partner or former partner illustrates once again that there is still much further to go.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
Does the hon. Lady agree that we are doing men a disservice if we do not address our shortcomings during this debate, given that men still perpetrate about 80% of all domestic violence cases? As we approach the international day for the elimination of violence against women, will she join me in calling on all male MPs to take the White Ribbon pledge
“never to commit, condone, or remain silent about men’s violence against women in all its forms”?
Paula Sherriff
I am happy to join the hon. Gentleman in that pledge. The White Ribbon campaign does some absolutely wonderful work, including in many schools. I am proud to support that initiative.
The continued existence of the gender pay gap, which we recognised in this place only last week, stands as a shameful testament to the inequalities still faced by women, as does the horrendous abuse I received on Twitter and by email for even daring to mention it. The Library tells us that a gender pay gap exists across all sectors of full-time work, some 46 years after the Equal Pay Act 1970.
These are not just issues for women. Organisations such as the White Ribbon campaign and the United Nations HeForShe campaign have capably demonstrated how men not only can but often actively want to play their part in fighting for the safety and equality of women. Indeed, the founder of the latter, Elizabeth Nyamayaro, has said that the campaign started from the mistaken premise that men might not be interested in gender equality, only to later find that the question was merely one of extent. Those positive programmes demonstrate that feminism and equality are not matters of interest to women only.
Although I have congratulated the hon. Member for Shipley on securing the debate, I do not think it would be unreasonable to suggest that he has made something of a name for himself in vociferously standing against feminism. He has gained notoriety in that regard, including by speaking this summer at an event organised by the Justice for Men and Boys party, which garnered media attention. I find that regrettable, as that organisation is sadly—I shall put this charitably—on the less constructive side of the argument.
The most cursory look at that organisation’s website brings a whole new meaning to the word “patronising”. It celebrates articles such as “13 reasons women lie about being raped”, and currently harbours awards including “Lying Feminist of the Month”, “Whiny Feminist of the Month”, “Gormless Feminist of the Month” and “Toxic Feminist of the Month”. As several of my hon. Friends appear to have been added to those lists for simply standing at this Dispatch Box doing what I am doing today, I dare say that I may well be at risk of ending up on one of them myself. Suffice it to say that I am not afraid. The nature of the organisation’s discourse is little better than that of the Twitter trolls who constantly confront female Members just for daring to speak up. I find the hon. Gentleman’s association with that organisation most regrettable.
I mention that not to detract from the issues raised today, but to highlight the fact that this event does not exist in a vacuum. Thanks to such rhetoric, there is a charged and poisonous atmosphere surrounding these issues, and I fear that many people will see International Men’s Day not as standing alongside International Women’s Day but as standing in opposition to it. We must send a message from this House that that is a false dichotomy that creates division where none need exist.
Many hon. Members have said this before me, but it is important to emphasise that equality is not a zero-sum game. The rise of feminism does not mean that men have been in some way denigrated or disfranchised. I hope that we all recognise that work remains to be done for both men and women, but that an improvement in the lot of one does not inherently detract from the rights of the other. In short, we should have no truck with those who would use this event to further divide us. I cannot say it better than the International Men’s Day website itself, which lists as two of its objectives:
“To improve gender relations and promote gender equality… To create a safer, better world; where people can be safe and grow to reach their full potential.”
In those objectives, it has our full support.
School Penalty Fines and Authorised Absence
Gavin Newlands Excerpts(7 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Turner
No. Mr Platt used the term “good” to describe his child attending school all-year round except for a fortnight, which is not the same as one day a fortnight, and there was no evidence from any quarter to question that description.
Isle of Wight Council wanted a different interpretation of the law and so it took Mr Platt’s case to the High Court. The High Court found that it was not acceptable for the authority
“to criminalise every unauthorised holiday by the simple device of alleging…that there has been no regular attendance in a period limited to the absence on holiday.”
The judgment said that regular attendance must be measured over a longer period of time, and Mr Platt’s daughter’s attendance record was satisfactory in that respect.
The High Court’s judgment did not find favour with either Isle of Wight Council or the Department for Education. The Department has now provided the council with funding and legal support to take the case to the Supreme Court. Mr Platt is being given no such help; he is fighting this battle using private resources and not public money. The state is throwing the book at him for daring to stand up to the authorities and being found right—not once, but twice. So this is a real David and Goliath situation.
I am a former teacher and both my parents were teachers, too, so I understand the importance and value of education. I have experienced at first hand the difficulties of teaching a class where not all the children are in the classroom full-time. However, I have also seen the immense value of family holidays, in educational and other terms.
I have listened to the Government’s argument about the relationship between attendance and attainment. It exists, but it is not a simple picture. As the latest research from the Department itself says:
“There are a range of pupil, school, parental and societal characteristics that are likely to affect attainment in varying degrees.”
It is the interplay of factors that cannot be judged in Whitehall. Schools can collaborate with parents to ensure that a child’s education will be enriched by a family holiday and of course the child can be set work to be completed while they are away.
However, if the headteacher cannot justify that the holiday is being taken in “exceptional circumstances”, then parents can be criminalised under legislation introduced by statutory instrument in 2013. For many years, parents have been legally responsible for their child’s regular attendance at school, and headteachers are accountable for the performance of their school and their pupils. So it should be headteachers, working with parents, who decide whether or not to allow a family holiday, or any other kind of absence, after taking into account all the individual circumstances.
Before being elected to this House, I ran the Grant Maintained Schools Foundation and I am proud that this Government have taken forward the principle that we worked so hard to promote—greater autonomy and decision making in schools. So I find it incomprehensible why, on this particular issue, the Government insist that they know better than headteachers what is best for individual children.
There is a misconception that prior to 2013 parents had a right to take their children out of school for up to 10 days for a holiday. That was never the case. Headteachers were able to agree to a child being absent on a family holiday in “special circumstances”. It has been said, including by my right hon. Friend the Minister for Schools himself during a debate last October, that the 2013 amendments “clarified” the situation, but I disagree. A change from “special circumstances” to “exceptional circumstances” is a material difference, and it has given rise to markedly different approaches from local education authorities.
We now have a postcode lottery that determines whether a parent is prosecuted. For example, I understand that in the west country Cornwall has issued four “school fines” in the last three years, but Devon, which is just next door, has issued 1,386 such fines in the last year alone. The variation is great even among just primary schools on my island. In one school, the parents of 176 pupils received fines over three years, while another school did not issue any fines at all. That cannot have been the Government’s intention—or, if it was, they are not explaining it well.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the rules that are applied in many local authorities at the moment discriminate against those who simply cannot afford a family holiday during the school holidays? Does he also agree that quality of life, particularly in childhood, is just as important as, and can enhance, the quality of education?
Mr Turner
I agree with both those points and I hope that I make them myself.
It has been said that before 2013 some headteachers felt pressurised into authorising family holidays. I have been a Member of this House for 15 years and I have never had a headteacher say that to me, but it does sound as though it happens occasionally. I believe, however, that the introduction of the holiday fines by statutory instrument in 2013 was like using a cannon to try to kill a fly. The fines are inappropriate and unworkable, and have widespread damaging consequences.
Marion Fellows
I definitely agree with the hon. Lady. I find it strange that in the system in England, which is so different from the one in Scotland, authority is devolved away from local authorities and down to schools.
It is important that we listen to the almost 200,000 people who signed the petition, because this is a real-life issue for them and their families. Of course educational attainment is important, and of course there are links to attendance—as a former lecturer in a further education college, I can vouch for that—but when headteachers authorise absences for good reasons and teachers know about those reasons, they can provide homework and catch-up sessions, so students can generally catch up. I very much take on board what the hon. Member for Isle of Wight said: a two-week absence should be seen as a 14-day absence across the whole school year. If a student is attending regularly, a one or two-week holiday might not make much different to their attainment.
It is not acceptable to criminalise parents for taking holidays. Parents know what is best for their children, and in that regard I suppose I should declare an interest having, a long while ago, taken my children out of school for a family holiday. I could not have gone away later because I was pregnant with my third child and wanted him to be born in Scotland, not in Scarborough, which was where we were headed.
It is absolutely essential that we, including the Minister, take on board the fact that there is a real difficulty across the UK, not just in England, as parents do their level best to provide for their children in what are, for many, cash-strapped times. We have heard examples of how much additional money is needed to go on holiday in term time. A spokesman for the National Parent Forum of Scotland has said:
“We all know how important family time is, particularly when money is short. But we’d encourage parents to avoid taking their children out of school during term time, as it does impact on their learning.
It would be helpful if holiday companies did not increase their prices so much during school holidays.”
Perhaps the Government should look at that issue.
Gavin Newlands
On that point, we heard earlier about the difference in the price of holidays in and out of term time—a 60% increase, I think. When my family looked at holidays this year we found that the exact same holiday, going from the same airport, with the same room, departing three and a half hours later, was £2,400 more expensive. The prices were £3,700 and £6,100. That is a 62% increase in the space of three hours, let alone three weeks or three months. My hon. Friend is absolutely correct in what she is saying about the holiday companies.