§ Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Heppell.]
1.33 am§ Bob Spink (Castle Point)As we have been here since yesterday afternoon, my hon. Friends the Members for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) and for Southend, West (Mr. Amess) took me to the Tea Room and bought me a mug of tea and a rock cake. I now know why they are called rock cakes, but I will try to struggle on.
I hope that we can have a positive exchange, welcoming the education successes and addressing the issues, both large and small, in my constituency. Schoolchildren and staff alike will go off for the holidays tired and happy, but also a little anxious about the results that will come out in August. They deserve a wonderful break, because they work so hard, and they deserve the excellent results that will be returned in Castle Point, where the story of education is a tale of excellence. Governors, staff, pupils and parents in Castle Point can all be rightly proud of their great achievements, and I thank them on behalf of the whole community that I represent. The results in August will show another superb year, building on previous extraordinary years of achievement. I should like to add my thanks to the lollipop ladies and gentlemen who come out in all weathers to keep our children safe. They deserve our respect and our gratitude no less than all the other members of the school staff.
I thank the Government for increasing education funding—so far as it has gone. The Secretary of State for Education and Skills told me that
we are already in the middle of the most sustained increase in funding we have ever had, and our new plans represent another significant step forward.I accept her sincerity, and I do not seek to make political points, but the funds do not seem to be getting through to the schools in Castle Point, and I shall adduce evidence to that effect as the debate progresses. That lack of funds is exacerbating a serious staffing problem—if not a crisis—in those schools, which is also affecting several schools across Essex.On funding, all Essex secondary schools are suffering in the 2002–03 financial year. In cash terms, the standard spending assessment increase is 6.7 per cent. After taking account of pupil number increases, the cash increase for Essex secondary schools is 4.3 per cent., but the actual increase in the cost of staffing Essex schools is considerably more, requiring a cash increase of approximately 9.5 per cent. As a result of interplay between the Learning and Skills Council and the local education authority, all schools for 11 to 16-year-olds, and many for 11 to 18-year-olds, have received cash increases of between 2.9 per cent. and 3.5 per cent. only. All but a minority of Essex secondary schools have a revenue budget shortfall for 2002–03 of between 3 per cent. and 5 per cent.
Many schools will be forced to divert spending from standards fund targeted allowances in order to produce a balanced budget. For other schools, it will not be possible to produce a balanced budget for this financial year. I am grateful to the Association of Secondary Heads in Essex for that information, and particularly to Ted Rowley, 822 an Essex head teacher. The association is not a Conservative source; it is a highly independent and extremely reliable source of information.
Does the Minister agree with the idea of schools running a deficit budget, and if not, should they sack teachers instead? I shall be interested to hear his reply. I hope that he does not try to blame Essex county council for the shortfall. It was given a very limited amount of cash this year, and it has to spend an enormous amount to maintain social care of the most vulnerable people in our society. That is why it was unable to meet all schools' needs.
If that were not enough, the Government now seek to change the funding rules for next year in such a way as to remove even more cash from schools in Essex and in Castle Point. In essence, the Government propose to redistribute money from shire counties in the south of England to deprived areas in metropolitan cities in the north, and to the inner London boroughs. As the front-page headline of the 9 July edition of The Times says, "Labour will tax Tory voters to fund heartlands". As Lord Hanningfield, the leader of Essex county council, says, the Government's proposals
are crude and unjust. They are based on assumptions about South East being exclusively well off, when in reality we have areas of real deprivation.The various Government options for change next year in education funding show a possible loss of £46.5 million in option EDU4. That is the result of a combination of the change in the education formula, plus a loss in the area cost adjustment. Teachers, parents and governors in Castle Point view the recent promise of £50,000 direct cash for schools in the context of losses of £100,000 to £250,000 for their schools. Put simply, the public, especially governors of schools, have lost trust in this Government.It is increasingly difficult to recruit and retain teachers in Essex, without that further burden from the Government. The proposed changes in the education formula and area cost adjustment would damage Essex and Castle Point schools enormously. I hope that the Minister will say how much more the Government will give to Castle Point schools. Does he think that Castle Point school heads and governors have been incompetent in recent years, or does he think that Castle Point has a real problem?
One local special school will have a crisis in staff vacancies in December this year. Two secondary schools, one on the mainland and one on Canvey island will each lose 17 teachers in September. I recently received a letter from a Castle Point school dated 2 July. It reads:
Dear Bob, Thank you for coming into school last Friday and it was also good of you to come to the Summer Fayre on Saturday.I promised to write to you about the major issues facing our school. They are … staffing: we are having to appoint unqualified teachers because we cannot attract qualified staff … Housing is very expensive here … and a teacher's salary of £17,500 does not go far on rents or mortgage. In Basildon, staff receive a Fringe Allowance which is not available here … The budget reduction … combined with a reduction in pupil numbers, means that we are working to an impossibly tight budget … Ofsted will be inspecting our school shortly and it is impossible to meet all of their requirements given our budgetary constraints and the staffing crisis"—those are the two key issues. The letter finishes:
Perhaps you will be able to do something to help us.823 I will not identify the school, because it could be one of many in Castle Point or in Essex. I have written to the Secretary of State and to Councillor Iris Pummell, who has responsibility for the education portfolio in Essex, and I hope that we can obtain some positive help for that school and for others. It would be a travesty of justice if we allowed Ofsted to damage that school and to set back all the excellent work done in Castle Point and on Canvey island to improve the image and profile of education in the borough, and to improve public and parent confidence in, and engagement with, education. That would be neither just nor constructive. It would do irreparable damage to our efforts to build up the importance of education locally. It would send negative signals to teachers looking for jobs and set back our ability to recruit and retain even further. It would damage local education, the community and, of course, our children.I say to the Minister, "Let us work together now to solve this problem with that school and others." That would, first, cost less money than an adverse Ofsted report and, secondly, protect and enhance our educational achievements across the community. The teachers and public will not forgive the Government if they ignore those words and pleas and, through Ofsted, trash schools that have already suffered in terms of money and teacher vacancies through no fault of their own.
I thank the Government for some education blessings. The Deanes is an excellent specialist sports college. It has worked successfully with a large family of more than 40 schools in raising standards and developing opportunities in supporting gifted and talented performers, curriculum development, professional development, ICT development in physical education, dance and community sport. The Deanes, through its successful record, has received much interest from national governing bodies of sport with a view to their delivering their national strategy across Deanes and its family of schools. We welcome this partnership involvement.
The King John school has just been awarded specialist maths and computing college status, for which I am grateful to the Government. The school has a fantastic wide-ranging list of plans and will truly add to Great Britain plc. It achieved a 64 per cent. gold standard. That is five or more GCSEs at C grade or above in the past year. That is a remarkable achievement for a school with a very mixed intake.
Appleton school remains at the forefront of achievement as well. I hope that it will secure specialist college status in the near future.
The three Canvey secondary schools are currently bidding for joint or co-operative specialist status on a well-balanced portfolio of Castle View as science, Cornelius Vermuyden as arts—that is visual—and Firtherwick Park 11 to 18 school as maths and computing.
Canvey Island is a special and separate community. It is a close knit, supportive and friendly community with great skills and excellent head teachers across the board. I hope that the Minister will meet me to discuss how we can best promote the collaborative three-way bids. It is an excellent approach that has great merit, and success is much needed to help solve some of our local difficulties on Canvey Island, and locally in education.
824 We are making enormous steps forward in education on the island, and this progress must not be put at risk, especially not by Ofsted, which should be constructive. Helen Marsden, a Canvey teacher, said that
after just a term on Canvey Island I began to rediscover my commitment and enthusiasm … because teaching here is fun! … the staff here are experienced. dedicated, loyal professionals who have helped to instil an ethos of respect".If that does not bring teachers rushing to Canvey Island to teach in our schools, I do not know what will.Another local success is Glenwood school for children with complex learning difficulties. It achieved beacon status, and was the first Essex school to do so. The head, the staff and the parents are to be much congratulated on that. Essex is taking a collaborative approach with closer integration of the three agencies—education, health and social services—to help these children find the right way forward. I congratulate all those who are involved in that approach.
The Glenwood chairman of governors, Alan Bennett, and his governing body are to be much congratulated and thanked for the work that they do. We must never forget that our governing bodies are voluntary. They do what they do out of the goodness of their hearts because they passionately believe in their communities. Perhaps I should declare an interest, because Alan Bennett and his superb kids, Nickie and Jamie, who attend Glenwood school, often join me at Canvey Island football club to cheer on Britain's premier giant killers—Canvey Island, of course.
Glenwood school is not the only excellent special school in my constituency. Cedar Hall is equally excellent, under the superb headship of Chris Bent. I sometimes feel that our special school heads are some of the best heads in the country. There is a strong place for special schools. Too much inclusion would be much against the interests of the children. We need a balance. Children with global learning difficulties need their peer groups as much as other children.
I end this contribution where perhaps I should have started it: the nursery sector—the most important foundation stage, where we give children the joy of education, discovery, learning and the essential social skills and discipline to launch them successfully into their school careers. There are many excellent nurseries in Castle Point. I shall mention just one in each of the three main communities in my constituency: Pumpkins on Canvey Island, First Class in Benfleet, and Sandcastles in Hadleigh provide superb and caring environments for our young children and are a model to all nursery schools throughout Essex. There is but one cloud on the nursery school horizon: Ofsted.
Since Ofsted took over inspection from social services, things have started to go wrong. Ofsted must not seek to gold-plate regulations or apply them over-vigorously. That would be very counterproductive. Ofsted must try to work co-operatively and flexibly. In other words, it must be constructive and find solutions and stability. It must not create uncertainty or even bring about the abandonment of much-needed and excellent resources, especially when no alternative is available.
EDNA—the Essex Day Nurseries Association—has had cause for concern about Ofsted and has called a meeting to deal with the problem. For example, our most experienced and valuable nursery managers, who have 825 qualified pre-1989 and have been doing the job for decades and are currently training and testing new staff up to NNEB level 3 must not be made to retrain so long as they have updated themselves regularly on the various courses.
Ofsted inspectors must act fairly and not seek to entrap nurseries simply to justify their own position and work, as has happened. I could give the Minister specific details if he wished to question me on them. Ofsted needs to use common sense, sensitivity and courtesy in dealing with our nurseries. I hope that we have now put a shot across its bow and that we will not need to return to the issue. If that is not the case, watch this space!
§ The Minister for School Standards (Mr. David Miliband)My first duty is to congratulate the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) on securing this debate. In fact, I shall congratulate him on two other things: first, on persuading his two colleagues—the hon. Members for Southend, West (Mr. Amess) and for Rayleigh (Mr. Francois)—to remain with him at this late hour. If he speaks to me after the debate, I shall tell him which one was yawning during his peroration.
The second reason to congratulate the hon. Gentleman is that this is, in fact, his second speech tonight. I was recently a humble Back Bencher, so I know that it is an honour—it is humbling—to speak once a month. It is a rare privilege to speak twice a month, but to speak twice in one night suggests that one has a relationship with the Whips Office that would be a source of great suspicion among one's colleagues; but I congratulate him none the less.
I was very pleased to hear the hon. Gentleman congratulate the teachers and pupils in his constituency. It may be for the benefit of the House to know that key stage 2 results—in other words, those for 11-year-oldsin the hon. Gentleman's constituency last year were 75 per cent. in English, 71 per cent. in maths, 87 per cent. in science. There were rises across all those three categories, and those improvements in standards were reflected at the age of 14, at key stage 3.
The hon. Gentleman was gracious enough also to congratulate the Government on their £600 a year increase in funding for each pupil in Castle Point. I am very glad that he is as pleased as I am that that is going ahead. Funding in Essex has increased from about £470 million in 1998, to £630 million in 2002–03—an average increase of more than 5 per cent. a year. He will know that the standards fund has also increased from about £7 million in 1998–99, to £45 million in 2002–03. The school standards direct grant. which goes direct to head teachers, is now worth more than £7.5 million a year.
No doubt, the hon. Gentleman will be pleased that the recent spending review confirmed those record rises in investment. He congratulated the Government on how far we had gone. That sounded like a plea for even more spending, so I welcome him to the ranks of the rebels in the Conservative party. I trust that he will continue to advocate higher spending on education, despite the unwillingness of his party's Front Benchers to do the same.
The hon. Gentleman is legitimately concerned about funding being passed through to schools. He read out a letter dated 2 July; I, too, have it to hand, and I will not 826 mention the name of the school that wrote to him either. He left out from his reading point 3 of the letter, which set out a complaint about the passporting by Essex LEA of the funds given by the Government to schools. In 2002–03 Essex county council received an increase in its education standard spending assessment in excess of £37.5 million—a boost of about 6.35 per cent., which was above the national average of 5.7 per cent. Essex LEA chose not to reflect that increase in its education budget, and that failure to passport may have prompted some of the concerns that led Essex heads to write to me and to the hon. Gentleman.
For the hon. Gentleman's benefit, I will give him a preview of the letter that will soon be winging its way to him in response to his letter to the Secretary of State. Among other things, it says:
The Secretary of State wrote to the leaders of all councils with education responsibilities in January urging them to make sure that all of the increased funding was actually spent on education. However, I am sure you are aware, we cannot compel them to do this. It is up to each local authority to decide how it allocates funding to the various services it provides, taking account of local circumstances. Once the Department became aware of Essex's intent, I"—that is, me—
wrote to the leader of the Council expressing my disappointment at their decision.The hon. Gentleman is concerned about proposals on reform of the funding system. The proposals that the Government have put on the table are about producing the best possible match between the distribution of funding and LEAs' relative needs and costs. The current consultation process aims to try to find a way forward that balances those two needs. He will know that the consultation runs until 30 September, and I hope that he and his colleagues will make representations to that review.
§ Mr. Mark Francois (Rayleigh)I thank the Minister for giving way, especially as I did not notify his office of my intention to intervene. I am grateful for his courtesy.
I have two brief points. First, the Minister will be aware of the great concern in Essex about the entire restructuring of SSAs. I am therefore glad to hear his comments, and we shall indeed all make representations.
Secondly, is it not a fact that Essex passes on a greater proportion of its funding to schools than any other shire LEA in the country—with the possible exception of Lincolnshire, according to last year's figures?
§ Mr. MilibandI chose my words reasonably carefully. I did not want to launch an all-out attack on local government when putting forward the proposals. I believe that it is true that Essex LEA's delegation is about 87.1 per cent., which is an honourable record; however, this year the increase in SSA given by the Government was not passported on, which is a source of some regret.
The hon. Member for Castle Point expressed concern about teacher recruitment. He will be as pleased as I am that the national vacancy rate has fallen from 1.4 per cent. in 2001 to 1.2 per cent. in 2002, which is the result in part of the 9,000-person increase in the teaching force achieved over the past year—the fastest rise in 20 years—and in part of the increase in teachers' pay. In addition to the overall pay increase, teachers and heads will be especially interested in the extra recruitment and retention initiatives that have been made available by the Government.
827 The hon. Gentleman's area, I know, falls outside the areas receiving London fringe allowances, and we recognise that that causes problems, but I hope that he will accept from me that we want to address such issues in the context of the local government funding review that we hope will come into play in the next financial year. He should know that there is a special recruitment and retention fund available for the recruitment of teachers, from which Essex received £2.1 million this year—the second-highest allocation of any LEA in the country. We are not complacent about the issue: we are working with the Teacher Training Agency and other relevant bodies to ensure that we make progress, not least on housing, which the hon. Gentleman mentioned.
The hon. Gentleman was good enough to pay tribute to the work of the specialist schools in his area. We know from Ofsted's evaluation that in four out of five schools, specialist designation has been a catalyst for innovation in the schooling system and has helped to sustain the momentum of improvement. The specialist school programme is about celebrating the different strengths of individual schools within a revitalised comprehensive system.
I heard the hon. Gentleman's remarks about the innovative proposals being developed locally for a new specialisation proposal involving several schools. I hope that he will understand when I say that, as the judge of 828 that competition, it would not be right if I were to meet him and individual heads. However, my Department makes itself and its officers available to discuss with schools proposals that they might make, as does the Technology Colleges Trust.
I shall certainly also pass to David Bell, Her Majesty's chief inspector of schools, the hon. Gentleman's concerns about early education and the Ofsted inspection regime. If he cares to write to me with the individual complaints, I shall certainly take them on, because we take them extremely seriously.
I conclude by once again congratulating the hon. Gentleman. Even at this late hour, he has held the attention of the House with his lucid exposition. I assure him that education is safe in the Government's hands. I look forward to continued support for the measures that we are taking both to invest in the educational system and to reform it in order to support high standards.
The independent inspectorate—Ofsted—reports that we have the best generation of teachers ever in this country. We certainly know from test and examination results that we have the highest scores ever. I believe that those are the result of hard-working teachers and hard-working pupils doing their best in the nation's schools. There are great things happening. I look forward to greater things, both in Castle Point and in the nation at large.
§ Question put and agreed to.
§ Adjourned accordingly at Two o'clock.