Lord Austin of Dudley
Main Page: Lord Austin of Dudley (Non-affiliated - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Austin of Dudley's debates with the Department for Education
(10 years ago)
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Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)
Parents in Dudley are spending this week in appeals once again because their children have been allocated places in schools they do not want to send them to. Why should pupils be denied places in popular and successful schools because those schools just do not have the space needed to accommodate them? Why will the Secretary of State not promote competition and expand the market by enabling well-run, oversubscribed, financially sound schools to borrow the resources needed to provide those extra facilities and be able to pay them back with the revenue the extra pupils would bring?
Michael Gove
The hon. Gentleman makes a very good point. I read with interest and appreciation the article he wrote in The Independent on Sunday outlining a similar case, and I have asked officials in the Department to see what we can do to give effect to his suggestion. If he would like to come to the Department and share his thinking with officials, I shall be delighted to see what we can do to take this forward.