§ 7. Mr. Hilary Benn (Leeds, Central)If he will make a statement on added-value measures of school performance. [143464]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment (Jacqui Smith)The Government are committed to supplementing the information already published in school performance tables with information about how far schools help their pupils to progress between the stages of their education. We intend to do this as soon as we have the necessary 1229 information about individual pupil performance and have tested successfully the processes involved. The first value-added measures, for secondary schools, should appear in the performance tables in 2002.
§ Mr. BennThe Government's commitment to publish these measures is greatly welcomed and eagerly anticipated by schools in my constituency serving the most disadvantaged areas because those schools believe passionately that they will provide a fair reflection of the progress they are making with pupils. Will my hon. Friend use every effort to ensure that, apart from the Department, those who publish performance information, including the newspapers, include the new value-added measures as soon as they are available?
§ Jacqui SmithMy hon. Friend has made an important point and I know that there will be many schools in my his constituency and more widely that are doing an excellent job in making a difference to children's lives. That is what the value-added information will enable us to measure. I regret that we have not been able to introduce value-added performance tables more quickly, but my hon. Friend probably needs to know, as does the House, that when we took office, no work had been done on developing the individual pupil information that is necessary to ensure that our value-added tables are based on individual pupil progress. We have undertaken to do that work and we will publish the information as soon as possible. I hope that the way in which the information is published, in newspapers and more widely, will help to recognise the difference that schools are making to our children's lives.