HC Deb 30 March 1993 vol 222 cc146-8
10. Mr. Pawsey

To ask the Secretary of State for Education what estimate he has made of the number of children who will be in grant-maintained schools by the end of the current year.

Mr. Patten

Current estimates suggest that more than 625,000 children will be educated in self-governing grant-maintained schools by 1 January 1994.

Mr. Pawsey

I thank my right hon. Friend for that extremely helpful reply. Does he agree that that figure of 625,000 children underlines, as nothing else could, just how successful these schools are and how popular they are with the parents who vote them into existence? Will my right hon. Friend join me in condemning Labour Members who wish to abolish these schools, which provide parents with additional choice?

Mr. Patten

Already by this afternoon, about 15 per cent. of all our secondary schools have voted to go grant maintained. That number will increase rapidly. Indeed, the number of grant-maintained schools will increase so rapidly that, despite the pledges of Labour Front-Bench Members, by the time of the general election in 1996 or 1997 the movement to grant-maintained schools will be absolutely irreversible.

Mrs. Anne Campbell

Will the Secretary of State join my in congratulating the parents and governors of Hinchingbrooke school in Huntingdon, which is in the Prime Minister's constituency, on having recently voted by an overwhelming majority to stay with the local education authority?

Mr. Patten

Each school must make up its own mind whether it wishes to be self governing or a local education authority controlled school. Month after month, year after year, every time that schools hold a ballot, eight out of 10 resoundingly vote yes.

Mrs. Angela Knight

Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating the teachers, parents and many hundreds of pupils in Friesland school, the first school in my constituency to go grant maintained and whose proposals he has just approved? Does he agree that the widely publicised inspectors' report on grant-maintained schools shows not only that they work well but that self government is the best future for every school in the country?

Mr. Patten

I have two things to say to my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Mrs. Knight). First, I congratulate the school very warmly indeed, in particular because I know what the electors in that school had to go through, in terms of the vicious campaigning against the school becoming grant maintained. Secondly, the inspectors' report, published at 2.30 this afternoon, points clearly to the overwhelming advantages of self-governing, grant-maintained status.

Mr. Steinberg

Does the Secretary of State agree that he and his colleagues told us when grant-maintained status was introduced that it would allow schools to escape from bad local education authorities? Can he tell us how many grant-maintained schools there are in Tory authorities and how many there are in Labour authorities?

Mr. Patten

There have been ballots in nine out of 10 local education authorities. Very soon, there will have been ballots in every education authority.

Sir Anthony Grant

On the question of Hinchingbrooke school, in the Prime Minister's constituency, is my right hon. Friend aware that the headmaster, as is typical of a Liberal Democrat activist, has chopped and changed his views so much that it is hardly any wonder that the parents are totally bemused?

Mr. Patten

I did not know that there were many Liberal Democrat activists left in Cambridgeshire. I have nothing to say on any individual ballot, other than that it reflects the individual wishes of the parents who have taken part in that ballot. I believe that it is critical, however, that parents have in front of them a clear set of information about the pros and cons of becoming grant maintained. It is equally important that no local education authority or local education officer is involved in campaigning with misinformation in this way.