HC Deb 21 February 1995 vol 255 cc147-8
10. Mr. Corbett

To ask the Secretary of State for Education what progress has been made on the accessibility audit of primary and secondary schools.

Mr. Forth

Local education authorities and the Funding Agency for Schools are required to provide the Secretary of State in May this year with information about the accessibility of schools to pupils in wheelchairs. The Department issued guidance on that exercise on 6 January.

Mr. Corbett

I thank the Minister for that reply. What plans does he have to extend that audit to further and higher education? When all those audits are completed, and they confirm what we know already—that most primary schools, most secondary schools and most colleges of further and higher education are far from accessible to people with disabilities—will his Department make new and extra money available to increase that accessibility?

Mr. Forth

What we want to do first is to consider and assess the results of the first tranche of information, which will be important in setting the scene. I hope that we shall be able to build on that in terms of discovering where we most need to ensure better accessibility.

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman and the House accept that we cannot and do not necessarily want every school to have wheelchair access. It is a matter of establishing priorities. I believe that a satisfactory mechanism already exists in further and higher education to tackle the problem of access, but we shall constantly look to that sector to bring forward its further proposals. I hope, some time in the near future, to be able to announce a new project to improve accessibility in our schools. There is a lot going on in that area and the survey results will be the first step in a number of successive measures to he taken.

Mr. Congdon

Given that the Spastics Society produced a report showing that many schools could provide accessibility to people with disabilities relatively cheaply, does my hon. Friend agree that it is about time that local education authorities gave accessibility of schools the priority that it so richly deserves?

Mr. Forth

Yes, and the schools themselves must make accessibility a priority. Each school must now have a published policy on its treatment of special educational needs and that, together with the special needs code of practice, makes me believe that we should see a lol of progress in this area which, in the past, has been somewhat neglected by schools and authorities alike.