§ 5.28 a.m.
§ Mr. Norman Miscampbell (Blackpool, North)There are two good reasons why I am pleased to see the Minister of State in her place. First, I know that she is here at some inconvenience, and secondly, because the matter we are about to discuss is important to young families.
The problem we are looking at has been with all Governments for 25 years, perhaps longer, and certainly since Section 8 of Lord Butler's Act of 1944 was 1428 passed promising the introduction of nursery schools. There have been since a series of circulars, reports, debates, and the Plowden Report. We have come to the position where all Governments have found grave difficulties in the way of providing nursery school education.
Just 24 years ago, when the then L.C.C. considered the 1944 Act it thought that if it provided for about half of those children aged between three and five who possibly could go to nursery schools it would satisfy the local demand. One has only to contrast that with what we have achieved over the years to see how great our failure has been. In maintained schools alone in 1964 there were only 110,000 places for children from a possible total of just over 2 million.
One realises the depth of the problem when one considers the demand and what the opportunities for children of that age can be. I did not really understand it until I set about having a family of my own, perhaps a little later in life than some have done. I was faced with the prospect of a three-year-old running about the house and, as the family grew larger, other two- and three-year-olds running about the home. I freely acknowledge that in that context of this country's families I do it from a background of privilege, with large rooms and gardens. The children have room to play and give expression to all the youthful exuberances which must prove so troublesome in the small flat or the under-privileged home. Yet our society continues to build town flats, because it must in order to provide its people with homes. Children must live in those flats, some of which are 10, 15 and even, in London, 20 storeys high. Some have very good facilities, but the problems for a mother bringing up her children in those conditions are great.
There are problems of the only child, inadequate homes and bad housing which are exactly those that can be helped by the child being taken to a nursery school and given an early opportunity in life. The nursery school can also help the mother who must go out to work and needs somewhere for her child to go, and the mother who simply wants to work and who can thus contribute to the country's welfare. The Government said last week that day nurseries would be provided for mothers 1429 who work. But, laudable though that may be, it has nothing to do with providing nursery education, which is what we are considering.
For the mother who wants to go out to work because she can help the country, nursery school education helps itself, as it were, because if an authority can show that by taking in the children of school teachers it can get more mothers to return to work it is allowed to help open up further nursery schools. If that is so for mothers who teach, why should not it be so for mothers who could practise medicine, or nurse, and for so many others who can help and whose help is needed?
I give the Government credit for caring about the under-privileged. At least they protest that they do, which moves many hon. Members on all sides of the House, and this I would have thought was one of the ways in which they would have said priority must be given. Who has the opportunity of going to one of these schools? We are faced with a society of high flats, a society where the television is becoming all too prevalent for the younger child, where grim basements are familiar features of children's lives and a society where tired mothers try to cope with small families.
We are also faced with an affluent society which is becoming a bookless society. A number of children can be taken from this environment and introduced to all the methods of stimulation, education and play which can do so much to build a firm foundation for children: water to play with, climbing frames on which to work out their inhibitions; books which they have probably never seen or been introduced to at home—and not just in the poor home, but the affluent home as well—pets whom they are shown how to love and care for; and dressing up clothes.
They are made alive and receptive to the world in a way which is not possible at home, even with the most helpful parent. If they get the privilege to start at that age, it builds into children a foundation on which all the rest of their educational life can be built.
We provide at present over 100,000 places, and London is slightly better in its provision than the rest of the country. The most recent figures I could get make 1430 it look as it places are available for 5 per cent. of children all over the country and for 7 per cent. in London. But if one takes Westminster, the No. 2 area of London, one maintained nursery school is provided by the G.L.C. for Westminster, St. Marylebone, Paddington and half of Hampstead.
When one sees how little is being done, one realises how much there is to do. This is one area of education where inevitably the State does much better than the private educational authority or school. With few exceptions, the State nursery school, with appropriate facilities, highly qualified teachers and all the advantages of money behind it, provides a better school than the smaller play group, the child minder, the factory creche or private nursery schools which are growing up.
There are exceptions, but on the whole the State does a good job which compares most favourably with that done by the private sector which is growing rapidly. We have legislation controlling those looking after children, but that is perhaps more a matter for the Ministry of Health than for the Home Office.
The demand is there. Those parents who can afford it are purchasing the privilege for their children. There is not much doubt, when one reads in the Sunday Press, as I did with some astonishment last weekend, that we now have our first take-over bid for a nursery school in the south of London, that there is pressure of demand for this sort of education.
Why is it so important? The period between the ages of three and five is the most important in a child's life. Almost all the studies here and in America show this to be true. If a child is given a real start at this time, its educational progress throughout the rest of its life is noticeably better than that of the child who starts later and comes from a more difficult background. This fact is borne out by every study and by everyone who has looked at the matter. It is fundametal, because if the proper basis is not built upon, what is the use of changing the school-leaving age, of changing opportunities at the top?
I saw the Secretary of State for Education and Science looking rather sad and lugubrious about the Government cuts. He spoke of the hard and cruel decisions 1431 which had to be made and one realised that he was being forced to agree to postponement of the higher school leaving age. I felt like saying then that it was all very well to talk about this hard decision but that the Government were ignoring the much harder and important decision in that they were simply not providing a proper foundation in the early years which, if it were there, would mean that many children would stay on voluntarily at the end of their school life because they had been introduced early enough to the techniques of learning, the opportunity of meeting books and the stimulus of good teaching.
I believe that the two years between the ages of three and five almost certainly are more important than an opportunity to stay on for an extra year at the end of school life. If children do not get that help and stimulation early in life, they probably will find that they never have been stimulated and have never understood what is coming to them through their education and will voluntarily wish to leave earlier.
I appreciate that at this time one is asking for a great deal. Nursery school education is one of the most expensive items we have to face. I understand that it costs about £150 a place to provide maintained nursery schools. Nevertheless, I believe that the time has come when the Government should take a clear decision to change the position and do what was promised so many years ago, and what everyone who has looked at the problem since recognises as absolutely vital, and that is to extend the part-time school.
This is important. One can double up. This does not provide for the mother who simply wants to leave her child when she is at work, but it provides an excellent educational background. Some children can go in the morning and others in the afternoon. Nursery schools can be run in cheaper buildings than we have often thought of in the past. That is never a step I want to see in education, but if it helped to provide education I would agree to it.
We ought to take over from the Ministry of Health the inspection and control and the provision of teaching facilities in so many of the groups run by the Ministry of Health. I want more money from the 1432 Government. I recognise the difficulties in this at the moment, but the priorities should simply be changed within education so that more money in a given total is spent at the lower end rather than in an extension of the school-leaving age.
Lastly, although I do it with reluctance, if it would help to get greater facilities, I would not be opposed to allowing parents to pay a contribution towards the schools helped by the State. I do not view this with any great pleasure, but if it was money which would help then it is something we should face. I recognise that my plea tonight is one of a number that have been made by others. If we can move things only a small way it is better than not moving at all. We have to understand the problems here and realise how important it is to give to children a stimulus which will build a real foundation to their educational life. If we can do this then such a small contribution will not have been wasted.
§ 5.47 a.m.
§ The Minister of State, Department of Education and Science (Miss Alice Bacon)I would like to thank the hon. Member for the way in which he has put forward his plea and say that the extension of his remarks to the raising of the school leaving age was the only thing with which I did not agree. It is one thing to point out the need for something, as he has done, and another to find the necessary wherewithal and the teachers in order to put it into operation. He has completely ignored the desperate shortage of teachers in our primary schools.
My Department is responsible for nursery education. That is the education in our special nursery schools or classes of children between the ages of three and five. The day nurseries for children under the age of three and the whole of child-minding is the responsibility of my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health. I recognise that the hon. Gentleman's point is one of substantial importance, and I do not disagree with what he has said about the value of nursery education. He mentioned the only child. I am an only child and I took myself to school at the age of two. The school was on our doorstep and I went to school by walking into the nursery class in that school.
I must say that I am a little surprised at the plea being put forward from the 1433 benches opposite. The hon. Gentleman said that this problem had been with Governments for the last few years and no Government had felt able to make a very great expansion in nursery school education. The Plowden Report reminded us of the value of nursery school education and made proposals for a very large expansion of the service. Although much of what it provided in the way of evidence and thinking was new, the desirability of more nursery education has not been in question for many years. There is no evidence that the right hon. Gentlemen who held office when the party opposite was in power made any substantial development in this direction, but the hon. Gentleman will recognise that no Government can make rapid advances in this direction. I am not blaming anybody for this, because the reasons have been partly economic in terms of expenditure, but mainly—and I stress this because it was ignored by the hon. Gentleman—the need to conserve teachers for infant schools.
Circular 8/60 was issued in 1960 and started by saying:
There is no change in the circumstances which have made it impossible to undertake any expansion in the provision of nursery education.During the last 20 years there has been a very large growth in the number of pupils in primary and secondary schools—in fact, from 5 million to 7.3 million, or an increase of 46 per cent. During this period, the number of full-time teachers has grown from 186,700 to 297,000—an increase of 59 per cent—but, in spite of the fact that the output from the colleges of education is still growing and in spite of the very large expansion in the number of students, we have not yet got to the position where we can be satisfied that our primary schools are adequately staffed. There are still classes of over 40 pupils, and I for one would not quarrel with the Plowden Committee's conclusion that 40 is too big for a class in a primary school.Broadly speaking, therefore, it seems to me right and inevitable that the decisions on whether there should be any general expansion of nurseries have had to await a time when the increasing flow of teachers will begin to enable some to be freed without serious results to the primary schools and especially infant 1434 schools. I assure the hon. Gentleman, who talked about the children at one end and the children at the other end in our secondary schools, that this is not the case. If we did have any rapid expansion of nursery education it would be the children in our primary schools who would suffer from the fact that the teachers would go to the nursery schools from the primary schools.
In many parts of the country local education authorities are still having great difficulty in finding room for the 5 year olds, and, while we have a great many rising 5 year olds—that is, those under 5 years of age—in many schools, there are other areas where it is impossible to take a child until the end of the term in which the child is 5.
The other important factor—I dislike saying this, but the hon. Gentleman did recognise it—which will certainly be crucial for the next year or two has been the question of cost. In an educational service, the cost of which is expanding as rapidly as ours is, there is no escaping the question of priorities and the need for considering at any given point of time which sector of the service is the one which should have first call on any extra resources which may prove to be available. It has, howover, been possible in the last few years to allow some nursery expansion without conflicting with the principle of conserving the supply of teachers.
Under an addendum issued in 1964, to the Circular which I have mentioned local education authorities were told that they could start new nursery classes where they could identify a number of qualified women teachers who, if they could send their children to the nursey, would be free to teach in a maintained school. This has meant more teachers for our primary schools in particular.
Following further consideration, a second addendum to this Circular was issued in December, 1965, which again encouraged a further controlled expansion of nursery facilities where this would increase the return to the education service of married women teachers or enable married woman graduates to be recruited as teachers who had not taught before. Under both these addenda it was thought that in general local authorities wanting to establish new nursery classes would 1435 have spare accommodation for the purpose, and they were allowed to use their minor works allocation for any necessary adaptations.
The results so far have been encouraging. By 1st January, 1967, fifty authorities had established a total of 93 new nursery classes, and during the following 12 months ending in January of this year the number of authorities had risen to at least 60 and the number of classes to 139. Returns are not yet complete. Where these classes are established for women teachers who are going back to schools the classes are filled by children of other parents in the area, so these classes are not exclusively for married women teachers. Quite a substantial number of children have benefited, with a net gain to the teaching force.
Naturally, I do not regard this as anything but an interim plan. I shall welcome the time when more nursery provision can be made, especially in what the Plowden Report called the "educational priority areas". But let me examine for a moment the Plowden proposals and particularly the cost. In general, the Plowden Committee recommended that nursery education should be made available mainly on a part-time basis to all children over the age of 3 whose parents wanted them to attend, and that a start should be made in the educational priority areas.
These proposals raised questions which are not themselves entirely uncontroversial with regard to part-time, and so on, but in terms of cost the total bill on the estimates prepared by the Council was very large. It was estimated that altogether the full-time equivalent of about 750,000 places would be needed overall, and that the capital cost would amount to about £158 million, of which £19 million would be in respect of the educational priority areas. It was also estimated that the annual running cost of the system, once established, excluding the cost of training, which would amount to about £9 million or more a year, would reach nearly £50 million.
As all hon. Members know, the Government concluded earlier this year that it was essential to take a number of decisions that they would rather not have taken, especially with regard to the post 1436 ponement of the raising of the school-leaving age. The hon. Member implied that he would rather has seen a postponement of the raising of the school-leaving age and more nursery education. I would remind him that it was his right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Handsworth (Sir E. Boyle), when Secretary of State for Education, who quite deliberately—and I agreed with him—took the decision that the important thing was to raise the school-leaving age. He placed that as a priority over the general expansion of nursery education.
We have had to announce the postponement of the raising of the school-leaving age to save over £70 million in the next two years in capital provision. It would be unthinkable to say that we could now take on a capital cost of £158 million plus a running cost of £50 million a year in the present economic circumstances. Therefore, I do not see how there can be any question of regarding the development of nursery education at this time as taking priority over everything else.
Nevertheless, let me end on a slightly more hopeful note. First of all, both the Government and the Opposition, in a debate which took place in this House just over a year ago on the Plowden Report, gave a warm welcome in principle to the recommendations which dealt with educational priority areas. This welcome has been followed up by the Government, and my right hon. Friend will next week be announcing a programme of £16 million worth of building projects for the educational priority areas. Those are the socially deprived urban areas. I think that the fact that this programme was retained in spite of the economic problems of the country shows the importance which the Government attach to giving such help as we can to this type of area, and I want to assure the House—and this is important—that when the time comes when resources can be made available for nursery expansion I feel sure that the right course will be, as Plowden suggested, that a start should be made in the educational priority areas, even though it would, perhaps, be only a modest one.
I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we are well aware of the need for nursery education. I regard it as desirable in 1437 itself, and not merely as a means whereby we can enable married women to go back to work. I agree that nursery education is very valuable indeed, but it would be foolish of me to suggest that in the present economic position, and with the present shortage of teachers in our primary schools, we could engage at the present time on this general expansion. But I do promise that as soon as ever we can see our way clear we shall make a start on nursery education in the educational priority areas.