Education Bill

John Bercow Excerpts

Tuesday 8th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)]

This has been an excellent debate, with speeches delivered with passion and expertise on a subject that could not be more important. In the words of the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey), who made a principled speech in support of the Bill, the debate is about the education of the next generation and a Bill that will determine the kind of society we have in 20 or 30 years’ time.

Between April 2009 and March 2010, 20,094 children rang ChildLine because they were being bullied at school. The median age of the children concerned was between 10 and 14, and 342 of those children were so traumatised that they were considering suicide. It is unacceptable that a child’s education and childhood should be blighted by such stress. The coalition Government are committed to tackling all forms of bullying in our schools, including homophobic bullying, and the Bill makes a start by tackling the root cause of bullying—poor behaviour in our schools.

Last year, 2,890 pupils were expelled from school for violent or abusive behaviour, and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Reading East (Mr Wilson) pointed out, 1,000 pupils were suspended every day for such behaviour. The Bill ensures that when such a pupil is expelled, the appeals panel will be unable to require a school to take them back against its wishes.

We want to tackle violent behaviour, but we also want to tackle the widespread and corrosive, low-level disruption that challenges teachers throughout the day, which serves to deter people from entering the profession and pushes many to leave it. According to the National Foundation for Educational Research, two thirds of teachers say that negative behaviour is driving teachers out of the profession. Dealing with that is about even more than tackling low level disruption. In some schools, children refuse to do their homework and teachers know that their pupils will not do their French vocabulary or read the next chapter of the set novel. Tackling that culture of low expectation and the school ethos by which it is not cool to study and work hard is central to our educational reforms, because that culture is at its strongest in the weakest schools in the most disadvantaged areas.

The attainment gap between those from wealthy and poor backgrounds is unacceptably wide. Fifty-nine per cent. of non-free school meal pupils last year achieved five or more good GCSEs, compared with 31% of pupils who qualify for free school meals. That 28-point gap has remained stubbornly constant over the years. Our objective is to shift the balance of authority in schools away from the pupil and towards the teachers and heads—away from the child to the adult.

My hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) is right that we need to tackle the I-know-my-rights attitude of the disruptive child and enforce the rights of the overwhelming majority of children in schools, who just want to get on and learn in a safe, happy and stress-free environment. Pupils in schools make it clear that they know when they are being let down by poor behaviour, an inadequate curriculum or poor teaching. Addressing those issues is at the core of the Bill.

That is also why we have launched a major review of the national curriculum—we want to ensure that our schools are teaching at least the core knowledge of the main academic disciplines—and why we have introduced the English baccalaureate to include GCSEs in English, maths, science, history or geography and a language. My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol North West (Charlotte Leslie) was right to argue in a powerful speech that this is not an elitist education. It is elitist to say that children from poorer backgrounds are not entitled to a broad academic education. That is elitist and backward looking. It is that attitude that has led to this country having wider equality gaps than most other countries in the OECD.

My hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart) asked whether the duties in the Bill on school provision of independent careers advice will apply to new academies. They will do so through their funding agreements. He also asked how we can prevent competition from damaging co-operation between schools. Our whole approach is to encourage the best professionals and schools to support the improvement of other schools. That is why outstanding and good schools converting to academies are required to support weaker schools, and why we are increasing the number of national and local education leaders. The hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), the former Chairman of the then Select Committee on Children, Schools and Families, is right to say that we need to take the party battles out of the education debate, and to look at the evidence—an approach that he always took when I served under his excellent chairmanship of the Select Committee. I welcome his comments about the Bill.

I felt that the shadow Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), overstated his case, perhaps for internal Labour party reasons and the need to be seen to oppose. However, he was also wrong on a number of issues. Local authorities will continue to be responsible for co-ordinating admissions, parents will continue to be able to complain to the school governing body and then to the Secretary of State, and, on exclusions, parents will have the right to appeal to an independent review panel. My hon. Friends the Members for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson) and for Bedford (Richard Fuller) will be pleased to learn that we are considering the expertise on the panel, including that on special educational needs. The adjudicator will continue to investigate complaints, and we are extending his role to academies, which I hope will reassure my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke). The shadow Secretary of State was also wrong about apprenticeships. Under the Bill, every 16 to 18-year-old who secures an apprenticeship place will have their training funded. Next year’s budget will be more than £1.4 billion, funding more than 350,000 apprenticeships.

The key objectives of the Bill are to raise standards of behaviour in our schools, to return authority to teachers and head teachers, and to send a message to schools that this is a Government who will support teachers. If teachers tell us that we are not doing enough on discipline, we will do more: clarifying and strengthening the rights of teachers, anonymity when facing damaging false accusations and abolishing the statutory requirement for 24 hours’ written notice of detentions. We are sweeping away swathes of bureaucratic burdens from the desks and staff rooms of the teaching profession in order to send the message that we trust teachers as professionals. We are abolishing five quangos while strengthening accountability and increasing choice for parents. The White Paper, “The Importance of Teaching”, set out a programme of reform designed to close the attainment gap between those from the poorest and wealthiest backgrounds, and to reverse this country’s decline in international performance tables so that all who are educated in our state schools have the opportunity to compete with the school leavers and graduates of countries with the best performing education systems.

We want an education system in which left-leaning journalists no longer feel they have no choice but to send their children to the independent sector. We want an education system where high performing schools such as Durand primary school, Mossbourne academy in Hackney and Twyford Church of England school are no longer regarded as extraordinary. This is a Government serious about education reform. The White Paper sets out our path, and this Education Bill marks a further stride towards delivering high-quality education for all. I commend the Bill to the House.

Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

The House proceeded to a Division.

[Mr Speaker]

I ask the Serjeant at Arms to investigate the delay in the No Lobby.