GRAMMAR SCHOOL PLACES, SURREY (Hansard, 19 March 1964)

§ Mr. Clifford Kenyon (Chorley)

Had some courtesy been shown to a constituent of mine by the Surrey Education Authority it would not have been necessary for me to have raised this subject this morning. The case arose when the family in question moved from Leyland, in Lancashire, to Surrey. There were two children, both of school age. The girl had been attending the Leyland Grammar School for three years and she was accepted into the Surrey Grammar School without question. The boy had been selected for attendance at grammar school in Lancashire but, when he came to Surrey, he was not accepted as a suitable pupil to attend the grammar school there.

I might explain that there is a difference in the method of selection in the two counties. In Lancashire a child is selected for attendance at grammar 1839 school by a panel of teachers who examine the results of the child's work over four years. In Surrey a child is examined for grammar school in a two-day examination, the children with the highest marks being selected for attendance at grammar school.

My constituent was selected for grammar school in Lancashire. There is an agreement between all education authorities that they will take into their schools children from other areas, and this agreement covers an interchange of places. It was fully expected that the boy about whom I am speaking, having been accepted by Lancashire after careful examination by a selection panel there, would have been accepted in Surrey.

When the boy came to Surrey, however, the authorities here looked at his last year's results only. It so happened that during that year he was ill for a considerable time, and the teacher who had taught him, with other scholars, during the four years, suddenly became ill and died. The upshot was that the boy's results in that last year were not as good as they ought to have been—we admit that—but, taken over the four years, they were quite good. When one compares the marks obtained by this boy with those obtained by his sister—the sister who has been accepted in the grammar school—one finds them to be almost identical. The boy is refused admittance to a grammar school in Surrey but his sister is taken into a grammar school, although the marks of the two children are almost the same.

We would have had no grumble about the position if the father of these two children could have talked the matter over with the education officers for Surrey; could have discussed the position with them, and heard their reasons for refusing to have the boy. But he has never been able to see these people face to face and discuss the position with them. They just refused the boy, and declined to have anything whatsoever to do with the parents. Nor would there have been any complaint if the boy had been examined in Surrey, but he has never been examined—he has never been seen, but he is demoted.

If this boy had remained in Lancashire, had entered into a grammar 1840 school for which he was selected, had remained there until Christmas of this year, and the family had then come to Surrey, he would have been taken into the grammar school in Surrey without difficulty. But when the father pointed that out to the people he saw, they said, "Yes, but if you had to do it now we would not accept him. We would not accept him if he was in the grammar school for two or three years now." Yet if he had gone into the grammar school in Lancashire before coming here, he would have gone in along with his sister.

If the family now move out of Surrey to another county this boy will be classed as a scholar in a bilateral school, not a grammar school. He cannot move out of Surrey into a grammar school, although he could have moved out of the school in Lancashire into a grammar school in another area.

This is demoting the boy for the whole of his school career and I do not think that anyone should have the power to do that. This is the greatest abuse of power. Moreover, the agreement which exists between education authorities throughout the country was agreed in part in order to prevent this sort of situation arising. It was also agreed so that the position of any child should be sustained in any part of the country at the level which he held in this home county. I say quite frankly that in this case Surrey is not keeping this agreement.

Let me call attention to the view which one of the assistants whom the father saw in Surrey put to him. He used, in these or very similar words, the argument that the standard of intelligence of Surrey children, the standard of entry into Surrey grammar schools, and the standards of tuition in those grammar schools were higher than those in any other county. While other counties were prepared to accept interchange of grammar school places, Surrey found it necessary to discriminate against the lower standards elsewhere.

I say that this is utter nonsense and absolute rubbish. Anyone who knows the education system of the country and knows of Surrey children moving out of Surrey to other areas knows that their scholastic ability is the average of children in the other areas. It is not better and it is no worse. To say that the intelligence of Surrey children is 1841 higher than that of children in other counties is an absolute insult to children in other counties. The statement ought never to have been made by a responsible person. No one could make a statement like that unless he had experience in every other county.

It would be invidious for me to quote instances of Surrey children who have moved to other areas, which I could do from my own experience. I could have understood the attitude of the Surrey people if they had given the boy an examination, but they took one year out of context and down-graded him on that year, when the Lancashire selection panel took four years.

When I took the matter up with the Minister in October, he went into the question fairly fully and sent me a letter on 17th October, of which the Parliamentary Secretary will have a copy. Throughout the whole of the letter the Minister writes on the assumption that the education given in any school in Surrey designated as a grammar school education is similar to and of equal standard to that given in a grammar school. He points out that difficulties are bound to arise between counties if one discusses this position only in terms of grammar schools and not of academic courses, because all local authorities do not provide their academic courses in schools which are called grammar schools.

If we were to have the assurance from the Parliamentary Secretary this morning that this boy is receiving in the bilateral school to which he has been sent an education which is equal to that given in a grammar school these parents would be satisfied. I take it from the Minister's letter that that is the case. I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to confirm it. The letter says: Children who fail to secure a place in the school of their parents' choice are offered places in other schools offering education of grammar standard". Will the Parliamentary Secretary confirm tonight that the education which this boy is receiving in a bilateral school is of grammar school standard? The clear inference from the whole of that letter is that the boy is receiving grammar school education. The inference is that Surrey has not the number of grammar schools necessary to meet the number of children who can qualify for 1842 a grammar education, and they overflow into the bilateral schools, receiving there an equal standard of grammar education. The only difference is in the type of school, not in the standard of education given.

In the discussion with the father, one of the assistant officers of the education department used as an argument for not putting the boy in a grammar school that the boy's standard of intelligence was such that he could not keep up with a Surrey grammar school education and Surrey was doing the boy a kindness in putting him into a lower grade school where the pace was not so hot. How does that statement tie in with the letter from the Minister which says that the boy is receiving a grammar school education?

This boy has been in the bilateral school for one term, and he has taken one term's examinations. What was the result? He is the second boy of the school and the top boy in his class. This proves quite conclusively either that the education which the boy is receiving in this school is not of grammar standard or that he is capable of taking a grammar school education and would qualify for it in any examination which Surrey could give him. Which is correct?

I feel that I must quote again from the statements made by the assistant in the education department. He said that they were able to assess absolutely and uniquely the standard of a child's intelligence from the fourth-year test, whether the child was aware that this was his only chance of entry into a grammar school or not. He said that the result of the test was always the same.

I contest statements of this kind made about a boy they had not seen, whom they had never tested, and whom they assessed on one year's working. I ask the Minister to give me three assurances. First, if it is possible for him tonight to say that he would reconsider this case and also ask the Surrey Education Authority to reconsider it carefully, sympathetically, and genuinely and, if possible—and I claim that it is possible—to give this boy the opportunity of moving out of the bilateral school at the end of the Easter term into 1843 the grammar school. Then the matter would be settled.

When I took up this matter in the first place, I got on to one of the officials of the Ministry of Education here and he informed me that one of the main reasons why the boy was not put into a grammar school was that there were no places; that 174 had applied to enter the grammar school nearest to the boy's home, and that only 94 could be taken. Surrey children were unable to enter this grammar school, and this boy could not be put in for that reason. Yet I have a letter here, written only last week, which states that the Surrey local education authority has always a reserve of empty places for transfers from other areas and I ask the Minister to see that one of those places is occupied by this boy.

Will the Minister say that this boy is now receiving grammar school standard education and that his exclusion from the grammar school will not affect him detrimentally if he moves from the area, and that, in view of the boy's demonstrated ability, the Surrey authority will put him into a grammar school where there are now empty places?

§ The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Education (Mr. Christopher Chataway)

The hon. Member has been able to raise the case of his constituent without mentioning his child's name, and I should like to say straight away that in many other cases we might follow his example. It seems an unhappy thing that the name of a child should be given publicity in circumstances which may be embarrassing or even harmful to that child.

The hon. Member has had a long correspondence with the Minister over this matter, and it has been explained, both to the parents and to the hon. Gentleman that local education authorities have a large measure of freedom in determining both the way in which their secondary organisation is arranged, and the means by which they carry out the selection procedures which are necessary. It has been explained that the Minister can intervene only where he is satisfied that the behaviour of a local education authority has been unreasonable.

1844 In this instance we certainly could not feel that the action of the Surrey County Council has been in any way unreasonable. I do not think that, in the few minutes at my disposal I can go into the means by which both Lanes and Surrey carry out their tests and make their selections for grammar schools. But perhaps I should say that, in Surrey, if a child has a mark in the Moray House test—which operates also in Lancs—of less than 345 he, in the normal course of events, goes to a secondary modern school.

The child with whom the hon. Member is concerned had in Lanes a mark of 340. This was sufficient in Lanes for him to be admitted to a grammar school but in Surrey, in the ordinary course of events, it would have resulted in his going to secondary modern school.

Both in Surrey and Lanes the placing of children at 11 is, I am glad to say, not done entirely on the basis of written tests. It is done also on the basis of the teachers' records and the child's achievements over a period. But Surrey has, in this instance, made to the hon. Member's constituent the offer of a grammar place and that brings me to his question of whether the education the child is receiving is a grammar education.

The answer to that is "Yes". My right hon. Friend has made it clear that Surrey organises its grammar provision both in grammar schools and in bilateral schools. I find it unfortunate that the hon. Member should have used the word "demote" on a number of occasions and that he should have suggested that a child who finds himself in a bilateral school is bound to have fewer opportunities than a child in a grammar school.

This I would contest. In many counties there is a move towards comprehensive education. If this child had moved to London, for instance, where again the number of places in the grammar schools is limited but where there are opportunities for pursuing advanced academic work in comprehensive schools, he would almost certainly have been placed in a comprehensive school.

In Surrey he is being placed in a bilateral school but is none the less 1845 receiving a grammar education and I believe that it is no service to the child or to the status of these schools to suggest that it is impossible to carry on serious academic work otherwise than in a grammar school.

The hon. Member asked, secondly, what would happen if the family were now to move from Surrey to another county. If they do, Surrey will forward to the new authority all the information which it received from Lancashire about the child's results in the Lancashire tests, together with any information which Surrey may have about his progress since. Whether he would then be moved into a grammar, a comprehensive or a bilateral school would depend upon the way in which education was organised in the county to which he went.

The point which I wish to make with all the emphasis I can is that what matters most is surely the education that 1846 a child receives. It matters far more than the label that happens to be placed upon the school where that education is given.

My right hon. Friend is satisfied that in this cafe Surrey has treated the parents—the hon. Member's constituents—fairly and has abided by the practice by which authorities accept each other's assessments of a child's suitability for a grammar education. Surrey has placed the child in a bilateral school, where he is receiving a grammar education, and I hope that he will, as a result, reach the high academic attainments that has present performance suggests is within his capability. This is not, however, an instance when my right hon. Friend could intervene on the ground that a local education authority had acted unreasonably.