HC Deb 15 March 2000 vol 346 cc299-306 3.30 pm
Mrs. Theresa May (Maidenhead)

(by private notice): To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment to clarify the Government's position on selection in education following their defeat in the House of Lords yesterday on amendment No. 138A to the Learning and Skills Bill.

The Secretary of State for Education and Employment (Mr. David Blunkett)

I am happy to repeat the Government's position on grammar schools. We have said on a number of occasions that we have no intention of changing the status of grammar schools unless parents wish it. I am happy to repeat that commitment today.

The policy that we set out in 1995 and in our manifesto in 1997 indicated that we would leave the decision on grammar schools to parents and that they would continue with the 11-plus only if parents wished it. Our position remains the same today. In that agreed policy statement, we were clear that we were not in favour of the 11-plus; nor were we in favour of tackling grammar schools without parents being involved. That was agreed by both Houses of Parliament and was affirmed in the School Standards and Framework Act 1998.

Last night, my noble Friend the Minister for Education and Employment confirmed that position and indicated that the House of Commons would seek to reverse the Lords amendment. I repeat that commitment today—we shall seek to overturn that amendment when the Learning and Skills Bill comes before the Commons.

We fully respect the vote of parents in Ripon, but we find it extraordinary that from one ballot in one grammar school, one should argue that all other ballots should be overturned and the rights of parents denied. If that were the case, a by-election would determine the results of the following general election. Had that been the case, the Conservative party would have lasted less than two years in government after 1979.

While the Opposition continue to run the debate of a bygone era, we are determined to focus our policies on the needs of all children in 24,000 schools and 4,000 secondary schools, on lifting standards and achievements for all. The Government have already significantly extended the diversity and the excellence of the education available to pupils throughout the country. There are now nearly 500 specialist schools and there will be 250 beacon schools by the end of this year. We have brought into the new voluntary-aided sector independent schools, Jewish, Muslim and Sikh schools. The excellence in cities programme, which affects London and five other major areas, has been spreading excellence for all children in all major urban centres. We have been ready to tackle failure wherever it exists. As a party, we are opposed to simply sitting on our hands, as the Opposition did when in government, rather than taking decisive action against failure.

The result of the failure is that children are denied a decent education in whichever school. That is why, through our actions, we have been able to reduce the time that it takes to turn around schools subject to special measures from 25 to 17 months during our time in office.

We can learn from the past and from existing policy, including the fresh start measures that have been taken over the past 18 months. Today, I can tell the House that we are inviting promoters from the voluntary, religious and business sectors to make proposals to take over weak or failing schools or to replace them with city academies where existing measures to overcome failure have been unsuccessful.

The promoters of academies will have to have plans for improving the education of all the pupils attending the school or schools. We will use existing legislative powers to establish the academies. They will be built and managed by partnerships involving the Government and the voluntary, Church or business sectors. Over the next year, we intend to launch at least one new academy and we will pilot others over the next few years.

We will look for imaginative proposals and new potential for such schools. The aim will always be to improve pupil performance by breaking the cycle of disadvantage and low expectation. Promoters will use different approaches. They will have to fit in with the framework of our admissions code, but they will be able to make imaginative proposals for the schools' management, governance, teaching and curriculum. We will expect at least one specialist focus and, as with other specialist schools, we will expect that focus to be shared with the wider community of schools in the area.

Yes, we will leave the decision on grammar schools to parents, but no, we will not leave failure where it exists in our communities. Unlike the Conservatives, we will take decisive action to change standards, not structures.

The confusion of Conservative Members is illustrated by the statements of their spokesperson in the Lords last night, who tabled an amendment, which did not succeed, to expand grammar schools. The hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May), in the Times Educational Supplement on 1 October 1999, said: I don't get the impression that in areas where there are no grammar schools, there is a great groundswell of opinion in favour of introducing them. There is not a groundswell in favour of further selection. There is a groundswell in favour of raising standards for all children, whichever school they go to. When they had the chance to prove what they could do with our education system, the Conservatives failed.

Our task is to ensure that we have equality of opportunity and fulfil the potential of all individual children and schools, not with rigid uniformity but with diversity designed to bring excellence. That is why I am willing to leave the decision on existing grammar schools to parents and why I am ensuring that all our attention and our policies and focus are on raising standards for all our children.

Mrs. May

At the weekend, the Secretary of State said that arguments about selection are a past agenda and that he was not "hunting grammar schools". Does he accept that those words will ring hollow with teachers and parents of children in grammar schools when they hear his intention to put their schools under threat once again?

Contrary to those statements at the weekend, the Secretary of State has confirmed that he is against the 11-plus. Does he not accept that there are many activists campaigning against grammar schools who will see that as a sign, egging them on to continue their vendetta? What is his view on the use of any form of selection in education? Does he not accept that, by seeking to reverse the decision to abolish grammar school ballots, he is prolonging the uncertainty for the country's remaining grammar schools?

Does the Secretary of State realise that his decision will hit especially hard in areas where anti-grammar school campaigners have been active—such as in Barnet or at Latymer school in Enfield—where the grammar schools woke up this morning free from the threat of abolition but now face months of uncertainty until the Learning and Skills Bill has completed its passage through Parliament? If he is really interested in raising standards, why does not he remove the legislative death threat from the grammar schools and let them get on with the job of delivering excellence in education?

Will the Secretary of State confirm that the city academies that he announced to the press yesterday and has spoken of today will have freedom over their admissions policies and will be free to select by examination and/or interview? Will he also confirm that that would lead to further selection compared to the position in 1995? That was when he told the Labour party conference no selection by examination or interview under a Labour Government. At the weekend, the Secretary of State said that that statement was a joke. Does not he accept that it was not a joke then for parents, children or staff involved in grammar schools or for those who aspire to go to grammar schools, and it is not a joke today? Because the Secretary of State spins his message according to his audience, parents now know that they can have no faith in what he says. His claims at the weekend that he supported the grammar schools were simply another example of a Government who say one thing and do another.

Mr. Blunkett

I support excellence wherever it is. The idea that parents are a threat to grammar schools is an insult to parents who have the ballot. One cannot, as the hon. Lady and her colleagues did at the weekend, parade the glory of winning a ballot in Ripon, and then tell parents elsewhere that they should be denied the right to ballot. The hon. Lady cannot parade democracy when the result is in her favour and fear it when it is against her. Democracy involves winning and losing, and giving people the ability to make a choice is an essential part of democracy.

Had we taken action to remove the selective system in Ripon from the centre, there would have been an outcry demanding to know whether we had the legitimate right to second-guess the wish of parents. We did not do that; we gave parents the right to decide for themselves, as we will elsewhere.

Admissions policies will be within the code that we have laid down and on which the House voted. It is important that the action which is taken to improve and overcome failure deals with the children who are in that position. Anyone can improve a school if they reject all the pupils and then select them on an entirely different basis. That is why we have not engaged with the past agenda about structure or selection but concentrated all our efforts on raising standards.

For those whose memories stretch back as far as 1995—for journalists who have left school since then and for ageing, beloved politicians who have campaigned from that October day to this against what I said—of course "Watch my lips" was a parody. The difference is that after the level 2, level 3 and level 4 achievements in primary school, even an 11-year-old will know the difference between a parody and a joke about a speech. The parody was a parody of someone else's words, at which the conference laughed. The selection policy that was laid out in the manifesto and was contained in the document that was voted on that day was far from a joke, and that policy has been carried out faithfully for four and half years by me and my colleagues.

Mr. Gordon Marsden (Blackpool, South)

Does not my right hon. Friend think that there is something very sad about the Conservatives' obsession with the grammar school ballot issue when 95 per cent. of our children are not educated in that system? Does he accept that when I speak to teachers, parents and children in Blackpool, they are concerned about issues such as the raising of standards, the success of the literacy and numeracy hours, the family learning centres and all the other initiatives that the Government have introduced, not the paranoid obsessions of the Conservatives?

Mr. Blunkett

Yes, I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. As more children reach level 4 at the age of 11, the anachronism of selection will become apparent to everybody.

Mr. Phil Willis (Harrogate and Knaresborough)

Does the Secretary of State agree that this is a sad occasion? Even though we have had a social exclusion report, "Bridging the Gap", which said that 9 per cent. of our young people leave school with no qualifications, no hope and no future, we spend our time on an obsession with the 4.5 per cent. of our youngsters who are in grammar schools. That is the real disgrace of what is happening today. Does the Secretary of State agree that, between 1979 and 1997 under the previous Administration, there was a net loss of 96 grammar schools? In fact, roughly one grammar school out of every three or four disappeared, without arousing much protest from Conservative Members,

However, does not the right hon. Gentleman agree that there are serious flaws in the current ballot arrangements? For example, one in four of those eligible to vote in Ripon had put their children in private schools. The children in the grammar school were denied a vote. No full explanation was ever offered of what would happen when the grammar school was abolished, and the local education authority was not allowed to put in place the organisational structure needed to pick up the pieces if the grammar school had been abolished.

Is the Secretary of State prepared to do more than overturn the Lords amendment? Should not he give serious consideration to the question of ballots, and to the idea that LEAs should be responsible for all schools and admission arrangements in their areas?

Mr. Blunkett

I certainly agree with the hon. Gentleman's first point about the number of grammar schools for which selection was abolished by the previous Government. I have travelled the country over the past three years, but, as yet, have not come across any local campaign to bring back selection where it has been abolished.

I am not prepared to reopen consideration of the ballot question. When my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Kilfoyle) attended the preparatory schools conference just before the last general election, he committed the Labour party to including those of primary age who were in the private school sector. He did so because he thought it right that parents with children in any school that had a direct feed into an area's grammar schools should be part of the total picture. It would be wrong to consider reopening that debate now. Those who are engaged in seeking the petition for a ballot should be allowed to progress under the existing rules.

Mr. Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield)

May I urge my right hon. Friend to continue his pursuit of a vision of diversity and excellence? He should not be distracted by a petty squabble whipped up by Conservative Members about the 4.5 per cent. of the population who are obsessed with grammar schools. Nor should he be distracted by the hypocrisy of Conservative Members, given that the previous Conservative Government got rid of one grammar school in three.

Will my right hon. Friend look carefully at diversity in the new academies and specialist schools, and ensure that they reach out to other schools in their areas? The city technology colleges were set up by the previous Government, but they failed to share their excellence and their mission, just as they failed to spread good teaching throughout their communities.

I welcome my right hon. Friend's new initiatives. He must make sure that they enthuse the rest of the teaching community and benefit every child in every school.

Mr. Blunkett

I agree with my hon. Friend. The provisions covering specialist schools specifically require that a third of the additional resources are used in work with neighbouring schools and the wider community. The original 15 technology colleges have been warmly welcomed and have sought actively to collaborate with schools and the wider community in their areas.

Mr. David Curry (Skipton and Ripon)

If the Ripon parents had voted in favour of reorganisation, that decision would have been irrevocable, even though—because they were not consulted—they would not have known what form the reorganisation would have taken. However, the parents voted against reorganisation. Should not that decision also be irrevocable? Is it fair to schools that they should face another five years of uncertainty, and all the difficulties that that will cause for pupils, parents and teachers—and to the very head teachers whom the Secretary of State wants to fulfil a leadership role? Should not a decision reached by ballot decide a matter once and for all?

Mr. Blunkett

I take very seriously what the right hon. Gentleman says. There will be no threat to the school in the next five years. The outcome in Ripon was decisive, and people will take note of that. However, I would take his question more seriously if, under the balloting arrangements for grant-maintained schools, there had been any provision for the next generation of parents and children to have any say in the status of those schools. The Conservative party turned parent against parent, teacher against teacher and school against school, and the parents of the generation of children about to enter the school, or whose children had an expectation of going to the school, had no chance of a say in its status.

Mr. Llew Smith (Blaenau Gwent)

Does the Secretary of State accept that if all our children are to have the opportunity to develop all the skill, talent and creativity at their disposal, we need to abolish the 11-plus and grammar schools? Unless we have the courage to do that, our youngsters will still lose out, and many of them will be written off at the grand old age of 11.

Mr. Blunkett

There are parts of the country where the traditional 11-plus continues across the authority. That causes undoubted difficulties for secondary modern schools in achieving the kind of levels that they wish for their pupils. I commend them for the work that they are doing.

One thing was absolutely certain to us in October 1995. If we were elected, we would be diverted into spending all our time dealing with a very small number of schools in a very small number of areas, rather than dealing with standards and overcoming failure. That is why we took the decision to ensure that parents had the democratic right to decide and that Ministers did not spend all their time dealing with a handful of schools.

Mr. Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale, West)

First, I congratulate the Secretary of State on his city academies initiative. I hope that that will open the way to cities such as Manchester having a new tradition of grammar schools that will be open to all pupils, regardless of their parents' ability to pay.

Secondly, in relation to last night's amendment in the Lords, if the right hon. Gentleman insists on using the Government's Commons majority to override that decision, will he at least take another look at the ballot regulations? Will he remove the rigged ballot question that favours those who want to abolish the grammar schools, and ensure that the question refers instead to losing grammar schools? The Government should not use a rigged, fudged question to try to con parents so that they do not know what they are voting for.

Mr. Blunkett

That is a real insult to the parents in Ripon. They seemed well aware of what they were voting on. If the hon. Gentleman thinks that they were not, he is insulting their intelligence. He says that I rigged the ballot one way, while Lord Hattersley says that I rigged it the other way. Somewhere in between lies rational common sense and a reasonable way forward.

On the hon. Gentleman's first point, I very much welcome Manchester grammar school coming back into the public sector. My right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman), who represents the constituency that the school is in, has rightly pointed out that there are thousands of deprived youngsters around that school who would benefit greatly if its admissions policy enabled them to enter, rather than those living in Cheshire and beyond.

Dr. Phyllis Starkey (Milton Keynes, South-West)

I welcome my right hon. Friend's statement. I remind him that, before the election, the people of my constituency voted three times in local ballots, at the behest of Tory-controlled Buckinghamshire county council which was attempting to impose a grammar school on the people of Milton Keynes. That grammar school was rejected three times by the people of Milton Keynes, yet Buckinghamshire county council persisted, with the Conservative Government, in trying to force that school on a community that did not want it. It was this Government who finally went along with the wishes of the local people. Does not that demonstrate the Conservative party's lack of commitment when it comes to listening to parents, except when they say what it wishes them to say?

Since that grammar school proposal was finally killed, the quality of education in Milton Keynes overall has improved because teachers, the local council and the Government can concentrate on providing an excellent education for all children without the divisiveness that was forced on them by the Tory county council.

Mr. Blunkett

Yes, I agree. That shows the sheer, naked opportunism of the amendment last night in the other place and of the private notice question this afternoon.

Sir Teddy Taylor (Rochford and Southend, East)

Everyone seems to be criticising the Secretary of State. Is he aware that in Southend-on-Sea we have no fear of democracy. We have a unique system, with 25 per cent. of our children going to grammar schools and getting opportunities that they would not otherwise have? We have gained the clear impression that the right hon. Gentleman has become more understanding and positive about our situation. Bearing in mind the fact that our unique 25 per cent. system produces results for all children in all areas and provides opportunity, is he willing to come to Southend to visit one of the schools? May I assure him that he would get a great welcome?

Mr. Blunkett

How could anyone refuse such a warm embrace? Certainly not my right hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards, who was in Southend last week to celebrate the education action zone. We wish those in Southend well, as we wish the top 25 per cent. well throughout the country in comprehensive schools who get five or more A to C grades.

Mr. Ben Chapman (Wirral, South)

Is my right hon. Friend aware that for proof that the Government are about standards rather than structures, he need look no further than the grammar schools on the Wirral, which provide an excellent standard of education? Does he also understand that this is not a matter for exclusivity? Excellence can sit alongside excellence and does so in the Wirral in the form of, for example, Bebington and South Wirral high schools and Plessington Roman Catholic high school.

Mr. Blunkett

When my hon. Friend was elected, I was pleased to be in his constituency at Wirral grammar school for girls, particularly as it was when the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth), who was then an Education Minister, was trying to break in through the gate and was being ejected by the governors and staff. I repeat what I said then: we welcome excellence in those schools and their willingness to share what they are doing with the wider community.

Mr. Nick St. Aubyn (Guildford)

If the Secretary of State is serious about his project for city academies, will he accept my invitation to visit Guildford, where a private sector company founded by a city technology college is turning around a failing school, which our Conservative local education authority inherited from its Lib-Lab predecessor? Will he accept my regrets that it has taken him two years to understand what I have been telling him—that Conservative policies on failing and inner-city schools are the best for Guildford and for Britain?

Mr. Blunkett

I think that one has to have had different experiences to describe Guildford as the inner city, but nevertheless, as Kings Manor school progresses I will happily consider an invitation to visit it and find out what the staff, governors and non-teaching staff are doing. We are trying to tackle deep-rooted failure through diversity—it does not matter which authority, or its political complexion. However, when Surrey county council talks about failure, it must examine its own part in letting down schools such as Kings Manor. In that context, we will take action from the centre to ensure that no child is left in a failing school simply because the authority has failed to live up to expectations.

Charlotte Atkins (Staffordshire, Moorlands)

Does my right hon. Friend remember the Opposition pledge for a grammar school in every town? If that were to be the case, which of the two excellent comprehensive schools in Leek would they choose to be the secondary modern—Westwood high or Leek high?

Mr. Blunkett

I do not think that I had better second-guess that proposition. Fortunately, as I am in favour of supporting both those excellent comprehensive schools, I do not have to do so.