Education Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Grand Committee

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

My view is that independent schools are independent, and I would not look to the taxpayer to pick up the tab. That is my reaction off the top of my head. It is probably the answer that the noble Baroness hoped for, even if I have disappointed my noble friend Lord Lexden. Some noble Lords will know that I am a great supporter of the independent sector, but the word “independent” is important in that regard.

I thank the noble Earl for giving us the chance to have this debate and ask him to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Lucas]

My Lords, I am very encouraged by what my noble friend said in response to the amendments. Perhaps I may pick him up on a couple of points. He said some good things about the integration of the independent and state school sectors. Will he confirm that there is no longer any consideration of the idea of excluding teachers in independent schools from the main state teachers’ pension fund, which would make migration between the two sectors extremely difficult?

Secondly, there has been a history of initiatives, of which teaching schools is the latest, intended to develop and spread good practice. In my view such initiatives have always foundered on the lack of information flow between good schools and schools that need good advice. I will not detain the Committee with ideas on how that might be improved, but when the Minister is no longer under so much pressure, perhaps I might try to persuade him that the Government have a role in helping to set up structures to enable information to flow better than it does.

[Lord Elton]

My Lords, before my noble friend responds to that—

--- Later in debate ---

I read the Bill to mean that academies are excluded, although in a letter the noble Lord states that Clause 8, “Functions of the Secretary of State in relation to teachers”, and Clause 9 on induction periods for teachers continue to apply to academies. But I would not read that from the legislation as set out here. I know that I am raising a bigger issue about what in the Bill relates to academies and what does not. Perhaps the Minister can clarify whether academies are covered by this when he responds.

[Lord Lucas]

My Lords, I support my noble friend’s first amendment. Making sure that British education around the world is of high quality does Britain a great deal of good one way or another. There are many countries where our education system comes under far less criticism than it does here and where our qualifications are very highly regarded. All the work that we put in here to make sure that they are even better is important. Now that the system of inspection here, with which we are happy, reaches out to some of those schools, we should acknowledge that by extending to those schools the abilities in terms of raising young teachers that we would accord to them if they were in the UK. They are schools following the British system, using British qualifications and mostly British teachers. I see no reason why we should cut them out of that.

I disagree with my noble friend on his second amendment from two points of view. First, if only 15 or 16 people are failing, why are there so few? What kind of rigorous examination has so few people failing? It really cannot be a mark of quality that so few people fail their induction year. I cannot believe that, as set up now, the processes that allow someone to begin an induction year are so perfect that only that small proportion should fail.

Secondly, I want to argue against the premise that people who fail should not be allowed to retry. I know one of those 15 people and I have had a long conversation with him as to why he failed. In my view, the basic reason is that he wanted to make maths fun and would not put up with the Gradgrind methods that he was told to use. It was silly of him to argue. He should have just knuckled down and gone through it for a year. Then he would have been free to teach and to explore his own way. But he did not because he is a headstrong young man and full of what strikes me to be very good ideas as to how to enliven a subject that I have always enjoyed but many people have not. Where such people have come up against what in my mind is the wrong verdict or have tackled things in the wrong way, they should be given another chance. I look at this in both ways: a lot more people should be failing and they should be given a second chance.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

I thank my noble friend Lord Lexden for giving us this opportunity to talk about induction, which is an important part of ensuring we have good teachers in our schools. Induction is like a probationary period. It provides a statutory national framework for supporting new teachers to make the transition from initial teacher training to their career in teaching. It ensures that NQTs receive support, training and development. At the end of this time, new teachers have to pass an assessment and can then become full members of the teaching profession. Before I come on to the amendments in detail, let me set out briefly some of what the Government are doing to get excellent teachers into the profession, because induction is at the end of the process and needs to be viewed in that context.

Our initial teacher training strategy, which we recently launched, includes the following measures: we will attract the best graduates by offering one-off training bursaries of up to £20,000; we will double the size of Teach First, a scheme that has been highly successful in attracting graduates from some of our best universities into teaching; we will raise the bar for entry to teaching by funding training only for those with at least a second class degree, and by introducing literacy and numeracy entry tests; we will focus teacher training better on the skills that teachers need most, including managing behaviour and teaching early reading, items which we have already touched on in this Committee; and, we will give more schools a strong role in the recruitment and training of the trainees that they will go on to employ.

Alongside these reforms, we have been reviewing teacher standards, including those that trainee teachers must meet. We expect shortly to produce new, clear standards that raise the bar for newly qualified teachers who enter induction, so the Government are doing much—

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, the schools will need to be judged outstanding by Ofsted, so there will be levels of academic attainment within that. However, we are in no way underrating the value of schools such as the one to which the noble Earl has referred. They may well be able, say, to work in partnership with a school that was rated outstanding, bringing the special skills they have developed in those very challenging schools to bear on the induction period.

Finally, let me turn to the issue of induction at British schools overseas, which was my noble friend’s other amendment. The British education sector overseas is growing rapidly. It appeals both to English-speaking expatriates and to local parents in many parts of the world, who want their children to have an education instilling British values and ethos. For those reasons, I agree with the noble Lord that British schools abroad should be able to offer induction.

In response to the question from the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland of Houndwood, there will be no impact at all on current arrangements between England and Wales and between England and Scotland—those will not change.

The good news is that primary legislation does in fact already allow this. These schools are legally independent schools, and independent schools are able to offer induction to their NQTs if they choose to do so, providing the teacher has QTS and the school can provide a suitable post. However, there is currently a legal barrier to this happening, in secondary legislation. Following our review of induction arrangements, I have therefore asked officials to ensure that proposed amendments to the induction regulations will include changes that allow certain British schools abroad—those that have been inspected under the British schools overseas arrangements and accredited by COBIS or other reputable British schools overseas organisations—to offer statutory induction to their NQTs.

I hope that my remarks have provided some reassurance to my noble friend Lord Lexden, and that he will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Lucas]

My Lords, since the noble Baroness is in writing mood, will she enlarge slightly on the questions that I asked in regard to the second amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Lexden? If we are focusing hard on trying to get high-quality teachers, we need to be careful to ensure that we have not built into the system disincentives to getting rid of teachers who are not up to the grade. It was always the problem with hanging someone for stealing a sheep that juries would never convict. It seems to me that we have a similar situation here, as the penalty for failing an induction year is so harsh—the person may never teach in a maintained school again. Most people strain to get these individuals through their induction year and to pass them just because the penalty is so harsh rather than because they have done well enough to be passed into the teaching profession with all flags flying. Therefore, I would like to understand the logic behind the Government’s decision to keep it as “once only” rather than allowing a second chance.

[Lord Elton]

Another class of people who deserve a second chance is those who fall over their shoelaces in the first term and lose the respect of children. They are never going to get that back in that school and will never get a fair trial. They need to go to another school and start again, where you may get a very good teacher out of the experience.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

My Lords, before the Minister sits down, would he accept that there is a difference between a system in which, by and large, those who make the assessment—that is, the referees—are either coaches or mentors or colleagues and a system in which the independent referee is not also a coach? The difficulty in that relationship is, I think, the point of the amendment.

[Lord Lucas]

Yes, it would be rather like driving tests being administered by the driving instructor.

[The Earl of Listowel]

Can I trouble the Minister just a little further? I was grateful for his response about ensuring that there is a high-quality mentor for trainees. If he had a little bit of time to drop me a note on how the mentors will be selected—both for the teachers in initial teacher training and for those in the qualified teacher year—I would be grateful to him for that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Howe of Idlicote]

My Lords, the more I listen, the more I am sad that we did not have the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, because that would have put things into a much clearer perspective. I have the gravest doubt the more I listen, frankly, and I agree more and more with my noble friend Lady Howarth.

[Lord Lucas]

I always find it very hard to agree with the Telegraph, so I have been having a terribly tough time over the last 15 minutes or so. Although I would say to the Telegraph and others, as they said of us, that they have brought it on themselves and that I have every sympathy for wanting to look after teachers, we have to produce legislation that is practical and that works. I cannot see how what we have in front of us works with Twitter, Facebook and the inevitable communication that there will be between parents and, particularly, pupils. You really cannot have a teacher hoicked out of school with these sort of allegations and not have it flying around on the net. The wording in front of us seems to seek to tackle this by criminalising the children and the parents who will be doing this. That is most unwise. The damage really only occurs when some newspaper picks up a story and eviscerates a teacher to entertain its readers. That is the evil; I do not believe that we should be trying to curb more than that.

--- Later in debate ---

You may ask what mad teacher is going to put into the public domain an allegation against himself. It will not happen often, but it could happen. I am going back to my own experience. The teacher concerned was an extremely competent, aggressive, up-front person, and you will get the odd, strange person who will think that attack is the best means of defence and will get his or her blow in first, so to speak. Unless we have this amendment, it allows such a person to have their cake and eat it and to take advantage of publicity that is not allowed to anyone else. It is for those reasons that I commend the amendments in this group to the Committee.

[Lord Lucas]

My Lords, I can remember an occasion that illustrates my noble friend’s last amendment. Some boys went to a headmaster and asked if they could have a videotape to use for a project they were doing. He picked one off a shelf and gave it to them, and it was the evidence. People do put these things in the public domain by mistake. I particularly welcome my noble friend’s Amendment 73HJ. There has to be the right for pupils and parents directly affected by this to discuss things. It is the obvious way in which things will come forward. Anyway, it is going to happen. You cannot criminalise that sort of conversation within a school community about something that is happening within the school, so it has to be possible. It will be done on Twitter and on Facebook. These things will not spread. No teacher is Ryan Giggs. There is no national interest in the person’s name. They will remain in a little corner of the social media, of interest to pupils in the school and to the parents of the children, and that is where it will remain. No great harm will be done because, frankly, the school community knows already. I do not see any objection in the wider media carrying just a basic statement that so-and-so has been accused and has taken leave of absence from the school as a result. That is scarcely something that in that form is going to hit the national media, but it at least means that the basic facts that that has happened are, as they should be, a matter of public property.

Surely the evil we are trying to prevent is a newspaper aggressively trying to dig up information about a particular individual in order to make a story, which you might call a human interest story, for people who have never heard of this person and have no interest in him otherwise. It is just a composed story that might be about anybody, but it is immensely harmful to the teacher concerned. That is the sort of thing that we are trying to prevent. The fact that an allegation is made is there and is fact. It should surely not be hidden. We are not in super-injunction territory. I find my noble friend’s amendments very persuasive.

[Lord Black of Brentwood]

My Lords, I support the amendments tabled by my noble friend Lord Phillips and will speak also to Amendment 73M. Just for the sake of the record, I draw attention to the interests I declared earlier. I was very struck by what the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, said earlier. She said that this clause as currently drafted is unworkable and that unworkable legislation simply brings the law into disrepute. My noble friend has just said that we are not in super-injunction territory, but I fear that, because of the impact of digital media, which I shall talk about in a moment or two, we will be in super-injunction territory at a sort of local level that will cast this legislation into that disrepute.

If we are to have legislation, at least let it be workable. I believe that the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, try to do that by importing into new Sections 141F and 141G the concept of the public domain and the public interest. The exclusion of any mention of the public interest in Clause 13, as it stands, is quite remarkable. I cannot think of any other legislation dealing with incursions into the freedom of the press and freedom of expression which do not have a public interest defence. That must be put right.

In my view, these amendments are crucial because the real problem with this clause—the unworkability factor—is that it takes no account of how allegations are spread and the damage that they can do to schools and to innocent teachers in the absence of responsible press reporting. As I said at Second Reading, my concern is that this legislation will simply drive innuendo and rumour underground and new Section 141F(12) will encourage that. Its definition of “publication” is designed to catch the media, which is not at the root of any mischief here, by tying it to material addressed to the public at large. That is the wrong target. The Minister in another place, Nick Gibb, made it clear that this legislation is not intended to capture private conversations, which include e-mail exchanges, texts, Facebook postings, Twitter and all sorts of other mechanisms. That is precisely where allegations and innuendo, which it seems to me that the Government want to be at the root of this legislation, will build up, now that Clause 13 makes it impossible for them to be dealt with in a responsible way in the press, which is constrained by the laws of libel and contempt. In a short space of time, the weight of individual private exchanges may mean that in a small school everyone knows when a teacher has been accused of something, but only the local newspaper will be unable to report it.

--- Later in debate ---

Those are my responses. I understand half of the spirit in which my noble friend tabled his amendments; I know that he is about to introduce a clause stand part debate, which suggests that there is another half of the spirit in which the amendments were tabled. I am grateful to him and would be glad to explore these matters further with him. In the mean time, I ask him to withdraw the amendment.

[Lord Lucas]

My Lords, perhaps I may pick up on what my noble friend said about private conversations not being included. I entirely understand that, but I do not understand where the Government think the border is in modern social media between private and public. Does he agree that Twitter is at all times public but that Facebook is a pretty difficult area? Kids these days communicate over Facebook in the way that we use e-mail. Communication between children talking about a particular allegation and saying, “Has this happened to you?” or “Have you seen anything like that?” will take place in an environment that might be considered public even though the kids will see it in the same way that we see e-mail. Will the noble Lord say which bits of the social media are public and which are private for the purposes of the Bill?

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I will have a go, and if I need to follow up subsequently, I will. We have made it clear that an offence is committed not only when somebody publishes an article or broadcasts a programme in the traditional media, but when somebody posts an allegation on the internet, even anonymously. I recognise, as the noble Lord pointed out, some of the practical challenges posed by investigating the source of allegations on the internet, with which we are all familiar: but that is the intent. It will not affect private conversations, including via e-mail or text. However, where such communications constitute a publication—this is the definition in the clause, which I am sure we can have some fun with—by being addressed to the public at large, or to any section of the public, we propose that reporting restrictions will apply.