Schools White Paper
Debate between Lucy Powell and Geoffrey Robinson(8 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Geoffrey Robinson (Coventry North West) (Lab)
Is my hon. Friend aware that we have an absurd situation in Coventry North West? The Secretary of State refused to meet me about this, but she is aware of it. After having been encouraged to become an academy, Woodlands underwent forced academisation a couple of years ago. Woodlands Academy is not doing well, but instead of putting in an intervention team, as the Prime Minister indicated at Question Time, the academy is being closed and another one is being started a mile up the road. What a waste of resources.
Lucy Powell
My hon. Friend makes a very good point.
Only today, Ofsted has reported that the performance of secondary schools in Reading is “not strong”. Eight out 10 secondary schools in Reading are already academies and are directly accountable to the Secretary of State. Why has she failed to improve those academies, and what is the Government’s school improvement strategy for that and other areas?
Further Education
Debate between Lucy Powell and Geoffrey Robinson(8 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lucy Powell
I entirely agree with that very well-made point. Not just FE colleges but sixth-form colleges—some excellent institutions in this country—would say the same.
Mr Geoffrey Robinson (Coventry North West) (Lab)
The scale of these cuts is huge. Two FE colleges in Coventry have written to me in the wake of the letter to the Secretary of State from, I think, 147 colleges. They speak of cuts of up to 40% in their budgets, 1,000 redundancies, and the elimination of whole courses—important courses for apprentices and courses in English for non-English-speaking students, which we desperately need. It is the scale of the cuts that is unprecedented and unmanageable.