HC Deb 07 December 1976 vol 922 cc223-4
19. Mr. Spearing

asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what factors she takes into account in deciding closure of teachers' training establishments.

Mr. Oakes

My right hon. Friend's proposals for the future reorganisation including closures, will be designed to create a minimum size of system capable of expansion, so structured and located as to best serve the needs of the schools in relation to both in-service and initial training. They will also take into account possible alternative uses for surplus premises.

I will send my hon. Friend a copy of a paper on this subject, which my Department will shortly be circulating to ACSTT.

Mr. Spearing

I thank my hon. Friend for that reply. Is he aware that the reports that have been published in the Press on the criteria for closure do not include the practical quality of some of the courses that are being conducted? Is he aware that a major need of schools is well-founded and practical courses of teacher training, which were all too few in the mid-sixties and are not found in all colleges? Will he assure the House that the quality of the course provided, especially in inner-urban areas, to which the Secretary of State has recently referred, will be borne very much in mind?

Mr. Oakes

The criteria have not yet been decided. This is still a matter of consultation between the bodies concerned. As for the lists of colleges that were published recently in a newspaper that I have been brought up to respect, I was disgusted by the irresponsibility of that newspaper, in that the lists that it published bore no relation to what is being discussed in the Department. I refer, of course, to The Guardian. I shall take my hon. Friend's last point into account.

Mr. Hal Miller

What consideration will be given to institutions such as the North Worcestershire colleges where colleges of education have been combined with colleges of further education? What is to happen to further education in areas where colleges of education apparently are marked for closure?

Mr. Oakes

As the whole question is now being considered, I should prefer not to discuss in the House any individual college.