HL Deb 21 March 1979 vol 399 cc1148-51

2.57 p.m.

Viscount MASSEREENE and FERRARD

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.

The Question was as follows:

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are concerned at the victimisation in State schools of children because of the way in which they speak.

Baroness DAVID

My Lords, Her Majesty's Government arc concerned about reports of any form of victimisation in schools, but my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Education and Science has no evidence to suggest that there is a widespread problem in this respect.

Viscount MASSEREENE and FERRARD

My Lords, while I thank the noble Baroness for that Answer, is she aware that I have experience of two cases? One was of a girl who had to be taken away from her school because of this victimisation. Would the noble Baroness not agree, bearing in mind the hope that in the future there will be little need for the racial discrimination Act, that it is essential that any intolerance at school as regards accent, race or religion should be curbed? Further, may I ask the noble Baroness whether—as I understand that we spend upwards of .8,000 million a year on free education— she agrees that it would be wise to concentrate on the correct tuition of English?

Baroness DAVID

My Lords, I am aware of at least one case where a child has been taken away from school and has now been sent to an independent school. In that particular case the local education authority is thinking of taking action, and the headmaster of the school in question has already instigated proceedings, so I think it would not be fitting to discuss the case. I should like to say to the noble Viscount that I think children are picked on for this or that reason in any school; they may be fat, they may be thin, their voices may be this way or that. I think children can be very cruel; bullying is something which, as I am sure many noble Lords will know, has gone on in schools of all sorts and kinds. So far as the teaching of English is concerned, if the noble Viscount had been at our debate last week—and I believe he was not—he would have learned that there has been a very marked improvement in the teaching of English, as shown in the results from tests which have been going on.

Lord BELSTEAD

My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that we accept that responsibility for this must of course lie at the local level, and that we also accept the noble Baroness's point that children must be left, as it were, to look after themselves? But may I ask the noble Baroness this: since there has been a Government report on the teaching and use of English within the last two years, is my noble friend's Question not of direct concern to the Government? The Government have now set up an inquiry into mathematics. Would the noble Baroness be replying that it was not really the concern of the Government if a pupil were treated badly because of performance I in mathematics?

Baroness DAVID

My Lords, 1 am sure we should regret that, but I do not think what happens in mathematics is really connected with this Question. It is the teaching of English and the speaking of English and the use of the English tongue which seems to me to be what we are talking about.

Lord KILBRACKEN

My Lords, is there not as much or more victimisation among children in public schools as there is in State schools?

Baroness DAVID

My Lords, from what my friends who have been to public schools have told me, it is certainly sometimes quite horrifying. I do not have any absolutely up to date experience, but certainly in the past I think that that would have been so.

Viscount MASSEREENE and FERRARD

My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that in my experience I never came across any incidents of victimisation or bullying at my public school?

Baroness DAVID

My Lords, all that I can say to the noble Viscount is that he was probably extremely lucky.

Lord ANNAN

My Lords, will the noble Baroness accept that it is, I believe, a fact that the victimisation by children of other children for speaking in an accent and in a manner which is not acceptable to the upper classes began around the 1680s and has been going on in our schools ever since? Would she not also agree that this is likely to occur not merely in State schools but in schools which are not in the maintained area, and that it is just conceivable that we may, at some time in the lifetime of some of the younger Members of your Lordships' House, achieve a state where a regional accent is as acceptable in this country as it is and always has been in Germany?

Baroness DAVID

My Lords, I do not have the historical knowledge to answer the first part of the noble Lord's question. However, I rather hope that regional accents will at any rate come back because I think that that would be a good thing. If I may give a personal anecdote, I have a grand-daughter who lives in Cumbria and who goes to a State school. She speaks with a Cumbrian accent when she is at school and when she comes to stay with me she will not speak in that accent at all. She can switch from one to the other. I think that we may be in for some interesting—I do not know about experiments, but at any rate developments.

Viscount MASSEREENE and FERRARD

My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that I am certainly not criticising?