Education and Adoption Bill (Sixth sitting)

Debate between Steve McCabe and John Pugh

Tuesday 7th July 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Steve McCabe]

I will be very brief. It seems to me that one of the central parts of the argument about this clause is whether the Minister has succeeded in persuading the Committee that he really has evidence to justify the powers that he seeks to take. Let me preface my remarks by pointing out that I like the Minister. He and I came into the House at the same time. In fact, I can remember tipping him in a poll of new Tories to be watched. Let me be clear on what I meant by that—new Tories who might succeed in climbing up the ministerial ladder, not slippery characters we needed to keep an eye on.

I should take advantage of this opportunity to clarify something raised earlier. I asked the Minister if he could cite some examples of local authorities being obstructive and say why he needed new powers. The Minister cited the example of local authorities seeking judicial review and went on to comment specifically on Coventry City Council and Henley Green primary school. I am sure the Minister did not want to mislead the Committee on this matter, but it is worth pointing out that at that time, Henley Green primary school was not in special measures. It was not a failing school. In fact, it was a school that had just received a “satisfactory” Ofsted report and some excellent comments in particular categories. What had happened was that its SATs results were way below the Government minimum. As a consequence, the Government decided that it should be part of a forced academisation programme. Before that, there had been no examples of the Government forcing a school to become an academy unless it was in special measures or had failed Ofsted before.

Coventry council objected because it said that the Secretary of State did not have the power in law to force academisation in these circumstances. It pointed out that it had already met voluntarily with the head of the school and had agreed an action programme in which Frederick Bird school would buddy the school to improve the situation. It was extremely successful. Within a few months, the SATs results had moved beyond the minimum standards, and in English and Maths had risen by more than 20%. So successful was the programme that the Government decided not to challenge Coventry’s decision, acknowledged that they were wrong and backed down. So it would not be right for the Minister to pray in aid this example of a council being obstructive to defend his position. This was an example of a council taking a very sensible course of action that led to the right outcome. It was a council quite legitimately seeking to test whether the Secretary of State was exceeding his lawful duties. I do not think it was the Minister’s intention to mislead us, but as this is such a central part of the argument about this clause, it is only fair that the Committee should have a much fuller picture.

[John Pugh (Southport) (LD)]

I was going to say that it is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Alan, but we were both on the Crossrail Bill and I have to say that it was not a pleasure all the time.

I have something to add about the appeal mechanism. Although I think that amendment 19 is a little too heavy-handed to address the issue, I want to appeal to all Members to consider carefully the concept of appeal. With regard to governing bodies, in certain cases an appeal for them would be worthless because they can be part of the problem. I am sure that members of the Committee can think of poor governing bodies in their own areas that have very little to say in defence of poor results and performance. However, there is another side of the story and I would like to give an example from my neck of the woods.

I have in my constituency a single-form-entry primary school that fell below the standard for entirely comprehensible reasons. There were quite a lot of staff changes, which make a big difference in a single-form primary school, and the school also had intake changes produced by an increase in migrant workers. The governing body rapidly found itself trapped in a room with somebody who described themselves as a broker on behalf of the Government and said that the school must join an academy chain as soon as possible—with which, incidentally, the broker had some connection. I never knew there were such people called brokers, but there are indeed; I am simply recording what they do. I have heard many descriptions of what then went on. There was an extraordinarily abrasive and unpleasant conversation, in which the broker said that either the school must join the academy chain, or the head and the governing body—the full set—would be replaced.