SCHOOL UNIFORMS (Hansard, 14 October 1975)

§ Mrs. Colquhoun

Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

In raising the question of school uniforms, my intention, I must say at once, is not to be against the wearing of school uniform. This is not an anti-school uniform debate. It is my intention in this date to seek a declaration of intent from the Minister about the attitude of the Labour Government, and to discover whether a Labour Government, through the Department, will be brave enough to issue a circular to local education authorities which will once and for all clear up the vexed question whether children in Britain in 1975 ought to be prevented by head teachers and a court interpretation—Spiers v. Warrington Corporation 1954—which by now ought to have been challenged by some brave parent, from receiving State education unless the child dresses according to the requirements of a particular school. 1324 I suppose that this debate can be said to be fundamentally to do with dignity—the dignity of parents and the dignity of children—and that it is perhaps in part due to the rigidity of a downright minority—and I stress that it is a minority—of educationists who value the wearing of a school uniform above that of a child and the right of a child to receive a free State education.

I shall resist going into the particular case in Northampton. It was not in my constituency, although the head teacher saw fit to attack me personally, but it was to do with the school uniform situation. It resulted in seven boys initially being precluded from education and in two boys being banned from attending school. When the boys returned to school, after the parents had received a grant from the education authority, they were faced with the hideous adult situation of Press cuttings in the case being pinned on the school notice board.

I cannot tell the House how distasteful I find this action by an educationist. It was very anti-children. There is nothing in the Education Acts or regulations under them that says that school uniform is compulsory. Statute law touches on school uniforms—or "distinctive clothing" as the officials like to call it—only where provision is made for local authorities to subsidise school uniform in hardship cases.

The Education Act 1944 provides local education authorities with the power to give assistance by means of scholarships, but otherwise regulation is to be made by the Secretary of State under Section 81 empowering local education authorities, for the purpose of enabling pupils to take advantage without hardship to themselves or their parents of any educational facilities available to them—

(a) to defray such expenses of children attending county schools, voluntary schools or special schools, as may be necessary to enable them to take part in any school activities:"

1325 Local authorities also have the power to provide ordinary clothes for pupils who would otherwise be unable to take full advantage of the educational opportunities open to them. That power is contained in Section 5 of the Education (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1948 and the provision of clothing regulations made under them. Those powers are used to provide boots, shoes and sports clothes and so on, but not to make grants towards school uniform purchase.

Interestingly, in the figures available in Statistics of Education 1973, Volume 5, we see that £955,000 was spent in 1973 on the provision of clothing and footwear in primary schools, £1,198,000 in secondary schools and £244,000 in special education schools. I wonder whether my hon. Friend will say what would be the Government's attitude if the education cuts were to mean that no clothing grants were available? Would head teachers then be able to preclude children from their education as was done recently in Northampton?

There is no doubt in my mind that the enforcement of uniform rests on an extraordinary mixture of social pressure and blackmail. In the State system it has no legal basis. If a parent, when a child goes to a secondary school, signs a form promising to observe the rules of the school, which implicity or explicitly includes the wearing of a uniform, that is not a legally binding commitment by the parent. In Spiers v. Warrington Corporation, in which the court went against the parents, the ruling confirmed that a head teacher can, under the specific heading of "discipline", object to the wearing of trousers by a girl, and successfully ensured that the child was unable to attend school for that reason.

In drawing the attention of the House to this matter I think it is time that these curious situations were ended once and for all. They could be ended by a circular from the Department. Regrettably the attitude of the Department over the past couple of decades has always been that the Minister declines to intervene. Why not intervene? Why not take a firm decision? Why not give a lead if we are the country's legislators?

We have the situation that a head teacher can penalise a child and her or 1326 his parents for possibly capricious and certainly subjective reasons, and at the same time put the parents in danger of committing an offence which they never had any intention of committing. I refer, of course, to absenteeism from school. There is barely a country in the whole of Western Europe whose system of public law would tolerate such an unequal relationship between parent and teacher and the ludicrously vague view of the discretion of public employees—which, after all, is what head teachers are—and on which the matter rests.

The courts could change that attitude. There could be another ruling, but are there enough parents to resist, by legal action, the arbitrary actions of a minority of teachers? I suspect that there are not. I suspect that, when one's own children are involved, the difficulties are too great to take that risk. Many of the parents who get into these difficulties, such as those involved in the Northampton case, are themselves in a deteriorating economic situation and are quite unable to spare the money not only for school uniform but to take such legal action as I have outlined. In this situation the worst hit are those who are least able to afford to fight that kind of injustice.

Perhaps the Minister will say whether she thinks it fair that these parents should have to go through the indignity of meanstesting to dress their child to attend school. Common sense should prevail and, as has been shown in various cases throughout the country, where educationists cannot show common sense, the Government should be able to take a definite decision. For far too long the Department has shied away from a difficult but important decision. It is important to parents, educationists, and certainly to the children.

More and more parents will be faced with difficulties over the cost of school uniforms, particularly in the light of the present economic situation. Is it too much to expect that the Labour Government will set right the situation once and for all, will refuse to shelter behind local autonomy, and be brave in the interests of parents' democratic right to dress a child as they wish and as they can afford, without having to resort to a means test via the local education authority? 1327 To return to the question of a head teacher's power to refuse a child admission to school on the grounds that he or she is not wearing a school uniform, it appears to be a generally-held view that a head teacher has every right to do this, provided that he or she is not acting unreasonably. But how much more unreasonable can one get than to tell a child, "Go home, you are not properly dressed", as did a head teacher recently in Northampton? We have a moral responsibility to end that kind of situation, and I hope that the Minister will agree.

Finally, I wish to draw my hon. Friend's attention to Regulation 7(1) of the Schools Regulations, 1959, SI No. 364, which provides that: A pupil shall not be refused admission to or be excluded from school on other than reasonable grounds. I submit that the fact that a parent does not wish to undergo a means test with the local education authority, or does not agree with school uniform, or wishes the freedom to dress a child according to his or her means is not unreasonable in a democratic and free nation. What is needed now is a show of strength from the Government to end the injustices which have existed over school uniforms for far too long.

§ The Under-Secretary of State for Education and Science (Miss Joan Lestor)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the sympathetic way in which she has presented a situation which I know has given her a great deal of concern in recent times. I shall try to deal with the several points she has raised, but not necessarily in the order in which she raised them.

The main point is that the question of school uniform has always aroused fierce argument in the country amongst educationists and within schools. On the one hand, it is claimed that it avoids invidious comparison, engenders a corporate feeling in a school, and helps individuals to achieve a sense of identity. On the other hand, there are those who maintain that uniform denotes elitism, unnecessary regimentation and is a suppression of the individual choice of the pupil and parent.

Whatever the view we may take of this, the decision, so far as the individual school is concerned at the moment, is 1328 one for the head teacher to take in the light of any guidance given by the school managers, governors or authority. The Government have no power to intervene in the matter unless it gives rise to some subsequent action—for example, the exclusion of a pupil from the school in circumstances which appear to be unreasonable.

I will comment shortly on the case in Northampton raised by my hon. Friend but there are other aspects to be taken into consideration particularly at the present time. At the moment, in the present economic circumstances, it may be particularly inappropriate for a head to insist rigidly on an elaborate uniform, obtainable, say, at one shop only and at a price disproportionately high for every parent to afford. We know that some schools need to take this into account.

We also see, on the other hand, a more liberal and flexible view of uniform being taken in many schools. Some do not require sixth formers to wear it. Some offer a choice. Some carefully select—for approval in collaboration with the parents' association, and sometimes with the children—clothing that is simple and durable and can be obtained from a variety of relatively cheap sources. But for people of low incomes, even a modestly priced uniform, at least so far as the initial outlay is concerned, can represent a serious financial burden. In these cases local education authorities have discretion to help.

It has been said that some parents are too proud to seek such help, and many of us know that this applies to many areas of help that is available. I think that this is misplaced pride, but we know that it exists. The facility is provided for a good purpose and parents in difficulties should avail themselves of it for the sake of their children. Most authorities are at pains to preserve confidentiality, and I think all of us would want to see that.

The matter of school uniform is one that can, as my hon. Friend has said, and must, as the law stands, be left at the discretion of authorities and schools. There is no one overall approach that would command universal acceptance. In the vast majority of cases any difficulty or hardship arising from school clothing 1329 rules is solved in a common sense manner, but I would hope that in present circumstances the need for economy and durability may be uppermost in the minds of heads and managers, and that the views of parents are taken into account locally where school clothing rules are being considered. I believe that these factors are self-evident and that they should not need to be spelled out.

My hon. Friend drew attention to a specific case in Northampton. I shall be writing to her when I have received further information from the authority in response to the points that have been raised. The decision in this case, that pupils should wear school uniform, appears to have been reached democratically, with the agreement of the parents' advisory committee, the governors, on which body the parents are also represented, and the staff.

The parents on whose behalf my hon. Friend has written were advised by the school in June that a clothing grant might be available, but for some reason the application to the authority was not received until the day before the autumn term started. The grant was paid within two days of the start of term, but meanwhile the children had appeared at school without uniform, and my hon. Friend related the remainder of the story. I shall be writing to her when I have received further information, but I understand that the children are now attending school in uniform, and I hope that their troubles are over. I regret any humiliation which they may have experienced as a result of the difficulties which they encountered about the uniform.

There is nothing in the Education Acts or School Regulations which deals specifically with what shall be or shall not be worn in schools. These are matters of organisation and discipline within a school and, as such, are in practice the responsibility of the head teacher in consultation with his managers or governors. The Secretary of State has no direct jurisdiction over school uniforms or how they are to be retailed to parents. It is up to parents themselves to take matters up with the school or local education authority if they are dissatisfied with the arrangements. 1330 My hon. Friend quoted the school regulation which has a bearing on this matter. It says: A pupil shall not be refused admission to or excluded from a school on other than reasonable grounds. If there were a case of an authority or school acting unreasonably in this context, a complaint could be lodged with the Secretary of State under Section 68 of the Education Act 1944. If my right hon. Friend were satisfied that the complaint was justified, he could then give such directions as appeared to him to be expedient. At the moment, that is how the law stands.

My hon. Friend also raised another very important matter when she referred to the Government's Circular 1/75 of 3rd September dealing with the extent of the standstill in some expenditure. As my hon. Friend knows, according to the circular, … the change to an overall standstill in expenditure in 1976–77 will call for a careful reappraisal of priorities and commitments There will be no scope for increased expenditure in real terms on the rest of the education service—including … maintenance allowances or other assistance to individual pupils". I underline the words "increased expenditure in real terms", because I think that they are sometimes misinterpreted. In reviewing their services in the light of rising costs—that is, not in "real" terms—authorities will have to consider priorities and may have to be selective in updating expenditure on the different elements of the education service.

Nevertheless, it is to be hoped that in any review of school clothing arrangements, authorities will bear in mind the position of poorer parents and ensure that grants towards the cost of distinctive clothing such as school uniforms are adequate, as Section 81 of the Education Act 1944 puts it, … for the purpose of enabling pupils to take advantage without hardship to themselves or their parents of any educational facilities available to them. It is quite clear from that that it is unfair and foolish for a uniform to be insisted upon if grants available to poorer parents to buy it are to be withdrawn. 1331 I hope that local education authorities will take note of this.

The question of whether uniform must be worn is a matter for the school. The level of school clothing grants is a matter for the local authority's discretion. Clearly, if poorer parents are not to be put in an impossible position, the requirements of the school must be tailored to the grant available. In the present economic circumstances, it is as much the responsibility of the school to have regard 1332 to the need for economy and durability in drawing up school clothing rules as it is for an authority to have regard to the needs of those less well off financially.

My hon. Friend raised one or two other matters. As I have said already, I shall be contacting her when I have had fuller information from the authority about the specific case to which she referred.