Sitting of 24 January 2005

Preamble
The House met at half-past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Manchester.

Schools: Modern Languages
Baroness Howe of Idlicote Baroness Howe of Idlicote asked Her Majesty's Government:
What action they will take to reverse the decline in the number of secondary school pupils studying a foreign language.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, by the end of the decade we are committed to offering all children aged seven to 11 the opportunity to study a language. Our investment in the primary workforce and school resources will make this a reality. The key stage 3 national strategy modern foreign languages programme will build on primary learning. These measures, along with the availability of alternative qualifications and vocational options, supported by guidance from schools, will encourage more pupils to make positive choices to study languages at 14.
Baroness Howe of Idlicote: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply. Is he aware that, even in the few months since learning a foreign language ceased to be obligatory for 14 year-olds, there has been a sharp decline in take-up, with two-thirds of state schools now offering it only as a voluntary subject and three-fifths of children having opted out? Does the Minister agree with the finding of the National Centre for Languages that it is schools with the poorest exam results or those in deprived areas which are most likely to follow this trend? Is not the whole effect becoming increasingly elitist and wholly out of line with the previous Secretary of State's ambition for the UK to provide a global education system, preparing children for life in a global economy?
Lord Triesman: My Lords, I am aware, of course, of the National Centre for Languages' research report in 2004. I think it presents a slightly more mixed picture, with great respect, than the one described by the noble Baroness. For example, recent research shows that 44 per cent of primary schools are now offering some form of language learning, 35 per cent of which are doing so in mainstream class time, compared with 20 per cent of schools offering some language learning in 2001. Although it would be too elaborate a reply to give from the Dispatch Box, I can assure the noble Baroness that the intake at the other end into higher education is showing real stability.
Baroness Walmsley: My Lords, according to the most recently available figures, 380 secondary teachers of modern foreign languages recruited to the service in
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1997 had left the service by 2003. What are the Government doing to retain these teachers? Can the Minister tell the House precisely what is being done in the primary sector, because there certainly does not seem to have been a shift to teaching modern foreign languages in primary schools? Where it is done, it is often done as an after-school activity.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, perhaps I may take the questions in the opposite order and start with primary and go through to secondary. Since launching the languages strategy in 2002, 1,200 new primary language teachers have been trained and £10 million in addition has been committed to supporting the early language learning initiatives. There is, it has to be acknowledged, still a problem with capacity. We shall not make the breakthrough, of course, until the capacity is all there and operative. As to secondary education, the fundamental question lies in encouraging 14 year-olds to take a real interest and to wish to learn languages. A huge amount of the work going in is to try to make the subject more exciting, more relevant and, where possible, more vocationally based.
Lord Harrison: My Lords, does my noble friend acknowledge that the admirable ambition of the Government to help children to learn languages at a young age is somewhat compromised by the fact that only 3 per cent of primary schools at the moment offer a weekly foreign language lesson of greater than 20 minutes' duration?
Lord Triesman: My Lords, the point I made about the building of capacity is fundamental. A number of research reports have indicated that the earlier you can teach children a language, the more likely they are to pick it up and follow it through. But, of course, that does not mean anything unless you have a fundamental change at that level. I have been referring to what can best be described as an incremental change. I make no greater claim for it than that it is changing incrementally, but for the better.
Lord Quirk: My Lords, our state secondary schools include more than 200 which are busily specialising in foreign languages. Do not the Government think that it would be a good idea to issue a strategy paper which indicated their own aspirations with respect to particular languages, given that Mandarin is the most populous language in the world, German the most populous language in the EU and that we also have needs in niche areas such as the Middle and Near East?
Lord Triesman: My Lords, let me express the real sense of pleasure that the Government take in the specialist language schools and in the fact that senior pupils in those schools often go as ambassadors to other local schools to encourage young people in those schools to take up serious study of languages. Looking at the admissions to higher education institutions, it is interesting to note that in a number of areas about which your Lordships' House has been particularly

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concerned in the recent past—certainly including Chinese and Japanese studies and other Asian languages—we are making small but net gains in admissions in all of them. We are just about holding our own in the mainstream European languages after a period of decline. Obviously we need to do better in those.
Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve: My Lords—
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: My Lords—
Noble Lords: Oh!
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: My Lords, I apologise if I have done the wrong thing. Does the Minister agree that in persuading secondary school pupils that languages matter, as he said is very important, teachers must help them to understand that to understand your own country properly you need to understand another country very well, which you cannot do without knowing its language? That is a very important point to make to pupils.
The other point is—
Noble Lords: Question!
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: My Lords, does the Minister agree that the belief that English is a perfectly good language throughout Europe, and that everyone will be able to speak it, is simply not the case? If you go to eastern Europe, the main second languages are French or German, not English. People need to understand that, to travel, they need to be able to speak another language.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, I have no disagreement with either of the points the noble Baroness makes.
Lord Dykes: My Lords, will the noble Lord say something about the teaching of Spanish, which is all too low in British schools?
Lord Triesman: My Lords, I am happy to tell the noble Lord that one of the subjects in which there is a real and visible increase in uptake, at all levels of examination in schools and in universities, is Spanish.
Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve: My Lords—
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: My Lords, can the noble Lord assure me, as somebody who is actively engaged in encouraging students at school to study foreign languages, that the Government are doing their utmost to inform young people of the career-enhancing opportunities afforded them if they learn another language, be they doctors, nurses, teachers or engineers? Everybody is looking for people who can speak a second language.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, I entirely agree. The Careers Service plainly has an important responsibility. The 2004 report of the National Centre for Languages, which I mentioned earlier, deals with this vital and associated matter. It makes the point that there is a perception that languages are not a vocational subject. As a consequence, they are often timetabled against the very subjects with which they should be combined in order to encourage and enthuse people, such as tourism, business studies and leisure industry studies. A good deal of change is needed at school and elsewhere to make sure that the vocational value of languages is fully grasped and that we make the best use of the talents that we have.

Water Purification Units
2.45 p.m.
Lord Roberts of Llandudno Lord Roberts of Llandudno asked Her Majesty's Government:
How many water purification units held either by water companies in the United Kingdom or by the Ministry of Defence have been sent to the areas devastated by the recent tsunami.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Bach): My Lords, we are unaware of any MoD-owned water purification units being asked for or provided to the countries affected by the recent tsunami. However, Royal Navy engineers assisted with the repair and refurbishment of desalination plant in the Maldives. We are aware that water companies have independently supplied 56 water purification units to Sri Lanka to date.
Lord Roberts of Llandudno: My Lords, while I am grateful for the Minister's Answer, it is also disappointing. Is he aware of, and happy with, the contribution of the United Kingdom? I was informed in a Written Answer in November that the MoD held 187 water purification units and that the water authorities held 170, yet only 56 have been sent. Is the Minister content that we have done all we can to meet water needs in this area of tremendous catastrophe?
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am afraid I cannot agree with what the noble Lord is suggesting. The response from the UK has been absolutely superb at all levels. Indeed, I think the noble Lord should bear in mind that what matters is what is asked for by the agencies which have a lead in the area, whether they be the World Health Organisation, UNICEF or the individual governments concerned. No request has been made to DfID, as the lead department, for water purification units. If there had been, and DfID had asked the Ministry of Defence to supply some of its own units, then that is what we would have done.
Lord Naseby: My Lords, is the Minister aware that I returned from Sri Lanka and the Maldives yesterday? I should like to place on record the thanks from the President of Sri Lanka and the President of the Maldives for the response of Her Majesty's Government and, in particular, for the work that the Royal Navy did at Batticaloa in Sri Lanka and for restoring the generators in the Maldives. That said, our country does not have a formal aid programme to the Maldives. Is the Minister prepared to review the situation so that there is a formal aid programme? If he were to ask for information on Vilufishi and Muli, I suspect that the noble Lord would discover that both those islands still need water purification.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord for passing on the thanks of those to whom he has spoken. On his second point, I understand that DfID is making assessments for the long term, and no doubt the matter that he raises will be assessed as well.
Lord Lea of Crondall: My Lords, I join in congratulating the Government on the speed of their response. Impressed as we all are by the enormous public response, is my noble friend aware that some companies in the industry are saying that there is a case for DfID carrying out urgent evaluation of new technical solutions now on the market and capable of mass production which are medically much more reliable than the traditional water purification technologies? That is particularly important in parts of Indonesia where sewage systems, having collapsed, are contaminating fresh water supplies.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend. I was not aware of the cases that he mentioned. I know that DfID is assessing what we can do in the long term and any suggestions for improvements in those items will also be considered.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, in the light of the tragic case of the dalits—the so-called low-caste Indians denied food and water and shelter in camps for tsunami survivors—will the Minister confirm that efforts will be made to ensure that aid is given regardless of race, class or political affiliation?
Lord Bach: Yes, my Lords; of course I can give that assurance to the House. It is an important assurance and we stand by it.
Lord Brougham and Vaux: My Lords, perhaps the Minister can help me and many other people. When aid is gathered together either here or overseas, who co-ordinates to which country it should go and, when it gets there, who makes sure that it gets to the right people and does not fall into the wrong hands?
Lord Bach: My Lords, as far as concerns the tsunami, the United Nations has the lead responsibility to co-ordinate the aid and make sure that it gets into the right hands.

Political Parties: Funding
2.50 p.m.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. In doing so, I declare my obvious interest as the sole representative of the Green Party at Westminster.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will implement the recommendation of the Electoral Commission in its report on the funding of political parties that there should be "a modest expansion of the policy development grant scheme" to political parties with representation in the European and Scottish Parliaments and the Welsh and Northern Ireland Assemblies.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Constitutional Affairs (Baroness Ashton of Upholland): My Lords, the Government have recently received the Electoral Commission's report on the funding of political parties and are carefully considering its recommendations. We are not yet in a position to make any firm decision on particular recommendations.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, although I thank the Minister for that not very informative answer, am I right in thinking that the Government are in favour in principle of representation in the legislature of significant bodies of opinion? Does she agree that the Green Party, of which I have the pleasure of being a member, which under fairer methods of election than exist for Westminster has serious representation in the European Parliament and the Greater London Assembly and a block of eight members in the Scottish Parliament, deserves better in the United Kingdom Parliament than one elderly self-appointed Peer? If so, will the Government please do something about it very soon?
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, the noble Lord is too self-deprecating. He does an eminent job in representing the Green Party at Westminster. I hear what he says and recognise the implication. If we wish to have a thriving and vibrant democracy we need carefully to consider ensuring that we have the right kind of policy development for our political parties. On that basis, as I have already indicated, the Government are considering very carefully the recommendations put forward.
Lord Elis-Thomas: My Lords, I also declare an obvious interest as Presiding Officer for the National Assembly for Wales where, by our standing orders and by the Government of Wales Act 1998, members of subject committees are charged with a policy development role. Although we may expend, as we do, some of our limited budget from the Assembly Parliamentary Service to support them, that is no real alternative to policy development within parties. If and when the great work of my noble friend

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Lord Richard is implemented there will be even more policy development in the National Assembly for Wales that will need support.
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I am not entirely sure what question the noble Lord was asking me, but I might interpret the noble Lord's remarks to answer that this Government are of course committed to policy development. Indeed, in 2002 we introduced the policy development grant as a result of indications that political parties spent money on their campaigning and perhaps were not able to spend as much on the kind of development of policy that is important if one is going to the electorate.
Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, while the Government are pondering this issue, will they also make it plain that they do not support the wholesale introduction of state funding for all political parties?
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, as the noble Lord knows well, there are clear issues to be discussed in relation to state funding. He knows very well the Government's position on that. When looking at democracy, it is important to ensure that political parties have support—hence the policy development grants, which have been largely and broadly welcomed. It is also important to look at the opportunities for people to indicate their support for political parties by being able to make donations, and to ensure that public money is used wisely and well.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords—
Lord Rennard: My Lords—
Noble Lords: This side!
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords—
Lord Rennard: My Lords—
The Lord President of the Council (Baroness Amos): My Lords, there is enough time to hear from the Liberal Democrat Benches and from the independent Member behind me.
Lord Rennard: My Lords, I suspect that many of us have an interest in this issue; I certainly do. Does the Minister agree in principle that the relatively modest amounts paid to political parties through state funding in this scheme—which is currently accepted by the Labour Party, Conservative Party, the nationalist parties and the Liberal Democrat Party—is a better way of financing aspects of our democracy than for some political parties to be heavily dependent on a few big donations from a few very rich millionaires? Such donations may sometimes be seen to influence public policy or appointments or indeed, occasionally, government transactions.
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, in a sense, the noble Lord indicates the point I made earlier that one is trying to seek balance in the way political parties are funded. The Government's position is clear. We introduced a policy development grant to support the development of policy by major political parties for very good reasons. There is a much broader debate, which is not for now, about state funding.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, since I am not a member of a political party, I will not declare an interest. Bearing in mind that we are told that people have lost interest in political parties and do not trust all of them, should people who stand for Parliament as individuals and independents also be included—after all, our system is still based on electing people and not parties? Is there not a case, on the grounds of equity, for seeing that taxpayers' money is also available to individuals to develop their policies to put before the electorate?
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, the noble Lord takes a novel approach to the issue of state funding—for individuals to develop policies. I am not entirely certain that I agree with his analysis; nor do I agree with his statement that people have lost interest. If the noble Lord reads the Electoral Commission's report, he will see that it mentions that we have a vibrant democracy, which we shall see if and when we have a general election.
Lord Glentoran: My Lords, does the Minister agree that the Northern Ireland political parties are a special interest group? They are exempt from most of the rules and regulations that apply to political parties in the rest of the United Kingdom. I believe that state funding for them—I in no way disagree with my noble friend Lord Strathclyde on the overall situation— could go a long way to helping the situation, which the Lord President understands very well.
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I am not entirely sure that I understand the noble Lord's question, for which I apologise. I will write to the noble Lord to indicate our view with greater clarity.
Lord Goodhart: My Lords, although I support the view of the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, will the Government also give serious consideration to some of the other suggestions in the Electoral Commission's report, in particular the proposal to lower the cap on national expenditure in general elections and give tax relief to small donations to political parties?
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, as I indicated, the Government will indeed be considering the report carefully. It is important to note that the commission is not proposing any radical new systems and was at pains to point that out. Of course, as the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, said, there are a number of different ideas within the report, which we shall of course consider with great care.
Lord Tebbit: My Lords, will the Minister do something to help my noble friend Lord Glentoran?

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The point of his question was that the Northern Irish parties are allowed to fundraise overseas, which is not allowed for any of the parties on the mainland. That really ought to stop. Indeed, neither is it appropriate for Sinn Fein to organise bank robberies to finance itself.
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I am not sure that I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for the clarification. However, I accept that these are complicated issues and, as the noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, knows, we are consulting.
Lord McNally: My Lords, does the Minister agree with the maxim of the former organiser of the Labour Party, Dame Sarah Barker, that:
The triumph of ideals must be organised"?
There is a strong case for helping political parties to organise and recruit as well as develop policy. We should have no more hypocrisy from the Conservative, Labour or Liberal Democrat Parties because we have all been taking state funding for years.
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I do not believe that any noble Lords in their contributions were suggesting any form of hypocrisy. There is an important issue to be debated, relating to balance and the relationship between state funding, public money and the role of political parties, which I described in my reply to the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde. I am sure that we will discuss that issue further, both in your Lordships' House and in another place.

Angela Cannings
3 p.m.
Lord Lamont of Lerwickasked Her Majesty's Government:
Why they have decided not to pay compensation to Angela Cannings following the quashing of her conviction for the murder of two of her children.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Scotland of Asthal): My Lords, Mrs Angela Cannings did not meet the criteria set out within the provisions of Section 133 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 for a statutory payment of compensation; nor did she meet the criteria for an ex gratia payment of compensation under the terms of the then Home Secretary's Statement to the House of Commons on 29 November 1985 (Official Report, cols. 691–2).
Lord Lamont of Lerwick: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply. Does she agree that it would be nonsense to argue, as it has been hinted in certain newspapers that the Home Office has argued, that an independent expert witness does not come within the ambit of a public body when it is the Crown Prosecution Service that decides whether to prosecute and decides the selection of an expert witness?
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Does the Minister agree that the situation is obviously wrong, given the fact that the Home Office has given tens of thousands of pounds to a fraudster who fell over in a prison shower? We are talking about a woman who has been wrongly accused of smothering her two children, waited two years to go on trial, spent 18 months in prison, lost her house and nearly lost her other child to the social services. Then her conviction was quashed on the grounds that the evidence of the expert witness chosen by the Crown Prosecution Service was flawed, and the Attorney-General had to investigate nearly 300 cases based on the evidence of the same expert witness. If ever there was a case that deserved compensation, surely it is this.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I should say straightaway that there is very obvious sympathy for Mrs Cannings' position. But the noble Lord will know, and remember well, from the days when—albeit a while ago now—he was in government, that these are very difficult decisions to make. It is for those reasons that we have the statutory scheme and the ex gratia scheme, which was alluded to and set out in 1985 by the then Home Secretary's Statement. We have applied those rules, and the noble Lord will know that although the circumstances may affect the quantum, they do not affect whether a person falls within that exceptional category. There are often very difficult decisions to be made, and this was clearly one of them.

Business
Lord Grocott: My Lords, with permission, a Statement will be repeated later today. It will come at some convenient time around 6.45 p.m., will be entitled "Homes for All: Five-year Plan", and will be repeated by my noble friend Lord Rooker.

Education Bill [H.L.]
3.3 p.m.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Skills (Lord Filkin): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now again resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now again resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Filkin.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES in the Chair.]
Clause 91 [Duty to provide information]:
[Amendment No. 139H not moved.]
Clause 91 agreed to.
Clause 92 [Power of maintained schools to provide training for the school workforce]:
[Amendment No. 139J not moved.]
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 139K:
Page 50, line 15, leave out "maintained" and insert "relevant"
The noble Baroness said: The intention of the amendment is to probe the provision of initial staff training and professional development in academies. It seeks to test the Government's intentions regarding the role of academies and city technology colleges as training providers. Maintained schools may well be best placed to provide training for the school workforce. In fact, there was a piece in last week's Times Educational Supplemen which reported that Eton was sending teachers to be trained in state schools. That was a matter of some surprise to some people.
Given that the Bill limits the definition of "relevant" to Clause 112 only, I am aware that the amendment may be technically flawed. However, we are using it as an opportunity to debate the matter, because we feel that it is important and merits further clarification and debate. If such an amendment were adopted, albeit in a redrafted form, we would be concerned to ensure that academies and city technology colleges could provide courses only if they were subject to the same quality assurance procedures as independent schools.
The TTA currently has a statutory function to accredit and fund providers of initial teacher training to those who can demonstrate that they will satisfy the criteria laid down by the Secretary of State. It is assumed that that will still be the case—but will that include academies as well?
In addition, city academies are eligible for employment-based routes into teaching. Will they continue to be eligible as providers of those routes? Quite correctly, independent schools are not eligible for salary or training grants, but are still able to apply for the employment-based routes. The cost of the qualified teacher's status assessment is normally covered by the teacher training agency. So will the academies benefit from public funds as training providers also?
Currently, if an integrated early-years centre includes a maintained nursery school, a nursery-qualified teacher can complete the induction period in that school. If an early-years centre does not include a nursery school, it cannot offer that induction period. Will the Minister clarify the position of children's centres in that respect?
Having said all that, I make it clear that the amendment is a probing one. Will the Minister clarify the situation in the respects that I have highlighted? I beg to move.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: I shall speak to Amendments Nos. 139L and 139M. I apologise for not being here to move Amendment No. 139J; I was taken aback by the speed with which the fourth Starred Question was dealt with.
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Amendments Nos. 139L and 139M would allow a teacher or other member of the support staff to receive courses in education as part of his or her training provision. That is a sensible and welcome measure; however, we believe that it may be necessary to test the semantics used in the clause.
As it stands, a teacher or a member of the support staff can be provided with a course in training by his relevant school. We feel that that implies that the training will be limited in its nature and possibly restricted to one area of the individual's daily work— for example, sending the school secretary on an IT-based course to improve skills in administration and administering the school's database. However, we are keen to test what the clause actually means by that wording.
Our amendment would incorporate the idea that a course in higher or, indeed, any nature of education could be included as part of the training. Therefore, with our amendment, it would be perfectly possible for classroom assistants to receive class-based tuition, and possibly even courses towards achieving a certificate in education, rather than merely gaining on-the-job training for one particular aspect of their present job. Our amendments would expand the definition and meaning of training provision to incorporate a far wider understanding and interpretation of the word.
I have some other questions for the Minister. How many individuals does she believe will receive some form of training under this clause each year? How will the training differ between teachers and non-teachers? Is it her understanding that the cost of such training will be met out of existing school budgets, or will schools receive additional funding to cover this welcome part of the Bill?
Baroness Andrews: I am grateful to the noble Baronesses for explaining the purpose of their amendments. It is very difficult to disagree with the intention behind any of the amendments. Although we have not discussed Amendment No. 139J, we would want to insist that any decision on training is taken by the full senior management team and that the head teacher and governors are at one on the need for training and the importance of its quality. I just wanted to put that on the record.
Amendment No. 139K would change Clause 92 to confer power to provide workforce training not on maintained schools but instead on relevant schools. The noble Baroness specifically asked whether that would cover academies. Clause 97(1) defines a maintained school as,
"a community, foundation or voluntary school … a community or foundation special school, or … a maintained nursery school".
The amendment would widen that definition to give a power to provide training to independent schools. However, as academies are indeed independent schools, the power would be unnecessary.
The clause applies only to maintained schools because they are the only ones that need power in law to provide training. I remind the Committee that

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whereas Section 12 of the 1994 Act applies only to maintained schools, that fact has not prevented independent schools participating in TDA-funded activities and in employment-based training programmes. The Government would certainly expect academies to continue to do that, and indeed we want it to continue. The wording of Clause 92 in no way prevents that being achieved.
As for whether academies can offer employment-based training, I assure the noble Baroness that they can. She asked some slightly technical questions that are not covered in my brief. I should prefer to write to her so that we can ensure that the answers are correct.
There was a question about "education" and "training". As I understand it, the one subsumes the other. Technically and historically, there has always been a distinction in vocational emphasis between education and training. However, the two terms are interchangeable. The noble Baroness asked many other rather technical questions on the nature of what can be offered, how many people will receive teacher training, under what conditions and according to what definitions, and how the training will differ. I would prefer to write to her on those points also, if I may.
With those assurances, and with further and better information forthcoming, I hope that the noble Baronesses will not press their amendments.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: I thank the Minister and look forward to receiving her letter. I thank her also for making reference to Amendment No. 139J. After all, it is the head who will have daily contact with the staff, and one may well ask how such a scheme could operate without the head's input. I am pleased with the Minister's answer. Training to improve and open new possibilities is important for all staff and for schools to grow their own talent.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for her reply and look forward to hearing from her on the issue of children's centres and whether they will be able to provide training to the nursery-qualified teacher and whether the academies will benefit from public funds for training. I notice that she referred to academies as independent schools even though they are built with 92 per cent government money. The Minister knows that I have concerns about that. However, I look forward to her letter and beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 139L and 139M not moved.]
3.15 p.m.
Baroness Morris of Bolton Baroness Morris of Bolton moved Amendment No. 139N:
Page 50, line 19, leave out from "providers" to end of line 21.
The noble Baroness said: Clause 92 would allow the governing bodies of maintained schools to provide training for members of the school workforce in addition to the power that they already have to provide training for teachers, and schools will be
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allowed to provide such training either on their own or in partnership with other schools or training providers.
Amendment No. 139N is designed to probe how the measure would actually work in practice. We would be particularly grateful for any explanation that could be provided on how such schools would come to work together and work in partnership with others and other training providers. Paragraph (c) would allow governing bodies of maintained schools to create a new body to provide courses for training for teachers and/or other members of the school workforce. With the Committee's permission, I should like to ask a number of questions on this specific aspect of the clause.
How would such a body operate in practice? How many schools could apply to join such a body, and how? What powers and responsibility would it possess? How would it commission and pay for such training provision? Would it be free to put out tenders on a commercial basis? How would membership of the body be constituted and who would decide that? Would it, for example, include the headmaster of the relevant school? Would it be legally responsible for the quality of training? Would it be personally liable were something to go wrong? What expenses would there be, and what would be the likely cost of setting up and running such bodies on an annual basis? How would the body ensure that the quality of training was to a suitable standard and met the requirements of a particular school that may well differ from another school within the same grouping?
I have asked a number of fairly technical questions. However, I have tried to highlight just some of our unanswered queries on the clause. I beg to move.
Baroness Andrews: As the noble Baroness said, Amendment No. 139N would delete the latter part of paragraph (c) of subsection (1), which is in the same form as an exiting provision of the 1994 Act. I remind the noble Baroness that that was Conservative policy at the time. However, we are content that it should go forward.
As the Committee will be aware, schools currently may work in association with each other in a variety of formal and less formal ways for the purposes of providing teacher training. This part of Clause 92 gives them the ability to do that by forming a body with its own legal personality. For the sake of convenience, I shall refer to that body as a company. We are, however, hardly talking about ICI. These are terribly small and specific organisations designed for a specific purpose.
The main reason why schools and others might wish to act in this way might include, for example, the ability to handle grants from the TTA in situations where a consortium or company is a better arrangement, especially when none of them wants to act as the banker for the others. The effect of the amendment would be to prevent that happening. This is, however, a probing amendment and I am happy to try to answer the noble Baroness's questions.

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As I said, the provision was created in 1994 to allow companies to be formed by schools working together for teacher training. We propose to extend that to training for the wider school workforce. I think that the noble Baroness's first question was how many schools are involved. I do not have the answer, but we suspect that very few schools are involved. The power is nevertheless important as that flexibility and the make-up of a consortium that provides school-centred initial teacher training is one of its great advantages. It is very useful for schools to retain that flexibility according to what the training providers involved decide is the most convenient arrangement for their specific circumstances.
Perhaps I may work through the questions that have been asked. I shall cite for illustrative purposes the example of a school-centred initial teacher-training consortium. When we discussed Clause 72 last Tuesday, noble Lords highlighted, among other things, how important it is that schools should be closely involved in the training of the school workforce. Indeed, as it has evolved, the school-centred approach is halfway between a conventional PGCE course—where training is based partly in higher education and partly in the classroom—and an employment-based training course, where trainees are employed as teachers in schools. There are currently about 60 SCITTs—if I may use the term—in operation although they cater for only about 10 per cent of trainees. School-centred trainees are legally students rather than teachers but spend a large majority of their training gaining practical experience in schools.
School-centred training usually involves a number of schools forming a consortium with a higher education institution to offer a predominantly classroom-based form of training. It is a recent development and was introduced to counter the belief that our teacher training may have been too academically based at one point and that there needed to be more classroom-centred training. It has been very useful. Unfortunately, the Bishops' Benches are empty, but I know that they would agree that it has been very useful in denominational schools as well. The TTA encourages SCITT provision by providing start-up grants of about £15,000. That is considered to be an adequate contribution towards costs. Once a SCITT is established, it is funded through grants like any other training provider.
The key fact to remember is that in most respects a SCITT constituted as a company with separate legal status would operate in exactly the same way as one constituted as a partnership. It would be bound by the terms and conditions attached under Clause 76 to grants received from the TDA and would have the same responsibilities in respect of the content and quality of the training it provided. That is extremely important. Quality of provision and the presence of robust quality assurance procedures are two of the main factors that the TTA considers before awarding grants, and which it takes into account in deciding whether to continue funding. The noble Baroness also asked whether a company of this sort would be liable
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if a person's training went wrong. Yes, it would. However, the same sort of contractual obligations and liabilities would link any sort of trainee and training provider.
The noble Baroness asked about the number of partners. There is no minimum or maximum number of partners for a SCITT, but capacity to do the job and critical mass involved in making a success of it are factors that would be taken into account by the TDA in deciding whether to award grants. Most SCITTs involve groups of schools in the same area and between which there are already good contacts. As with any other company, a SCITT provider formed as a company would conduct its business in accordance with its articles and memorandum of association. In terms of its practical dealings with the outside world, the way in which it conducts its business would, however, probably differ very little from that of one formed as a partnership. In both cases there would clearly be matters such as its initial establishment that required the consent of the governing bodies of the schools concerned.
Finally, the noble Baroness asked whether a consortium formed as a company could contract out provision. That would depend on the terms of its constitution as with any other type of training provider. I expect that many probably could although I find it hard to imagine circumstances in which a consortium whose sole purpose was to provide training would want to do that.
I believe that I have addressed most of the specific questions of which the noble Baroness was courteous enough to give us advance warning. However, I shall read her comments carefully and if I have not addressed all the questions that she asked, I shall write to her to fill in any gaps.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: I thank the Minister for her detailed reply and look forward to receiving further information if she considers that her response contains gaps. It is a probing amendment. We welcome partnership, flexibility and the practical experience gained through school-centred training. The measure builds on previous good Conservative legislation. However, it never does anyone any harm to go back, have another look and ask a few questions. I thank the noble Baroness for her reply. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 92 agreed to.
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 140:
After Clause 92, insert the following new clause—
"OFFENCE FOR AN UNQUALIFIED PERSON TO ACT AS A TEACHER

(1) The Education Act 2002 (c. 32) is amended as follows.

(2) After section 135 insert—

"135A OFFENCES

(1) Any person who contravenes the provisions of regulations made under sections 132–135 by carrying out work specified under such regulations or by serving as a head teacher in contravention

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of regulations made under section 135 shall be guilty of an offence and liable on conviction on indictment to imprisonment for not more than two years or to a fine or to both.

(2) Any unqualified person who wilfully pretends to be, or takes or uses any name, title, addition or description implying that he is, qualified or recognised by law as qualified as a teacher shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding the fourth level on the standard scale.""

The noble Baroness said: The purpose of this amendment is to ensure that it is against the law for a person to masquerade as a qualified teacher. The amendment seeks to provide teachers with the equivalent legal protection to their status already afforded to solicitors and other professionals. For example, noble Lords may know that it is illegal for an unqualified person to pose as a lawyer under the Solicitors Act 1974.
More importantly, the amendment will help ensure that no one will be able fraudulently to work in the name of a teacher already on the General Teaching Council register. It would also in effect ensure that any teacher who had been removed from the register for any reason could not work as a teacher under an assumed name.
Members of the Committee may not think that there is a problem in relation to this. We are more often told about fraudulent doctors than teachers. There must be something rather glamorous about the medical profession that attracts unqualified people to masquerade in a white coat with a stethoscope around their neck. Doctors have their patients' lives in their hands. Teachers also have children's lives in their hands. It is very important that only people who have achieved the appropriate standard of understanding of child psychology and development, their subject matter, how to protect children and the health and safety of those children and so on, can teach.
There have been various cases of "fake" teachers in the United States. In 2002, three teachers in Oregon had their credentials revoked after claiming to hold degrees from a now defunct diploma mill in Louisiana. In 2003 in the state of Georgia, an audit was carried out of its 130,000 teachers and 11 were found to have received salary increases based on so-called "degrees" from Saint Regis University, a diploma mill in Liberia, Africa. It is understood that Alan Merrick, the registrar of the General Teaching Council, would also be in favour of the provision that we are proposing today, which has come to us from the NUT. I would be most interested to hear whether there are any good reasons why, for the sake of the children, teachers should not be protected in the same way as other professionals. I beg to move.
Baroness Andrews: The noble Baroness's amendment would do two things. Although she focused on the second part, I shall also address the first part as it raises some interesting issues. The first part of the noble Baroness's amendment seeks to introduce new criminal offences punishable by fines or imprisonment, or both, for people who breach the limitations set under the Education Act 2002 on the types of work in schools that may be carried out by different types of staff. The second part—to which the
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noble Baroness particularly addressed her remarks— would extend to those claiming falsely to hold qualified teacher status criminal sanctions mirroring those which already apply to persons pretending to be qualified doctors or solicitors.
Let me begin by addressing the first part of the amendment. We are pleased that the evidence which we have shows that the school workforce reforms are timely and welcome. As the noble Baroness will know, one of the things that we wanted to address on the basis of research evidence and what teachers were telling us was excessive workload. We believe that the future lies in the development of a more varied and specialised school team. Within that team, teachers will remain a distinctive group with a unique and protected role as the people responsible for steering the education that children receive. However, they will have access to support in the classroom and outside from a variety of other specialists, including trained and certificated higher level teaching assistants. That will help to reduce teachers' workload and help them to focus their own work.
None of this means that we will let just anyone walk into a classroom and teach children. Regulations made in England and Wales under Sections 133 and 134 of the Education Act 2002 guarantee that certain types of work shall be the preserve of teachers who have QTS and who hold full registration with the General Teaching Councils for England or for Wales, together with some other specified types of teachers. These include overseas trained teachers and so on. Other types of staff, such as teaching assistants, may carry out these specified tasks only if they are acting under the direction and supervision of a qualified or nominated teacher in accordance with arrangements made by the head teacher of the school in question. We believe that we have guarantees and boundaries which ensure that those provisions can be enforced.
Section 496 of the Education Act 1996 provides that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State can direct LEAs and school governing bodies about the exercise of their powers if she is satisfied that they have acted, or are proposing to act, unreasonably. That might include knowingly employing or deploying someone to perform tasks in contravention of regulations. Alternatively, it would be open to a parent or teacher to seek judicial review of the lawfulness of the employment or deployment of someone in contravention of the regulations. A head teacher would also be open to disciplinary action if they failed to put proper arrangements in place for carrying out specified work, and that is also covered by the school teachers' pay and conditions document.
3.30 p.m.
We have a robust series of safeguards that address the question of the distribution of work in the classroom. We would certainly not want to invoke the criminal law in those situations, which is what that part of the amendment would do.
On the second part of the amendment, we are not in favour of criminalising situations such as this. We have robust provision in place. The second part of the

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amendment addresses a different matter; people who obtain employment as qualified teachers by deception. Teaching is unlike other professions, such as law and medicine—this is certainly not pejorative—where many practitioners are self-employed. Teachers cannot just set themselves up as such. They must apply for a post, which means having references taken up and checked. The General Teaching Council for England must be approached to verify that the teacher in question is qualified, holds full registration, has not been barred from teaching by the Secretary of State and is not on List 99. A teacher's employment is also subject to clearance from the Criminal Records Bureau. If someone managed to evade all those safeguards and obtained a post for financial gain by masquerading as a qualified teacher, they could potentially face up to five years' imprisonment under the Theft Act. That combination of safeguards is a better way to regulate the profession.
The noble Baroness addressed the question of fake degrees and diploma mills, which should be controllable in the first instance by the General Teaching Council for England and the equivalent body in Wales, which act as gatekeepers for the award of qualified teacher status. Registration is mandatory for all qualified teachers carrying out specified work in schools. I hope that the scrupulous application of those requirements would mean that we will not see this in the future. On those grounds, I hope that the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Walmsley: Will the Minister clarify something for me? Am I right to understand that she is rejecting the first part of my amendment so that the Government can continue to allow people to teach subjects for which they are not qualified?
Baroness Andrews: Absolutely not. I am saying that as we have worked through the provisions for workforce reform, putting the higher teaching assistants in place, and so on, that has been accompanied by sets of regulations. I am sure that the noble Baroness will remember the debate that we had in 2002 on those regulations, which make it clear what tasks are permissible for people supporting teachers in the classroom. If, for any reason, mistakes are made and people are deployed in an inappropriate manner, a whole range of things can be done that do not involve criminalising the teacher or person involved.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for that qualification. Certainly, on the second part of my amendment, I am aware of the robust system that is in place to ensure that unqualified people do not masquerade as teachers. It was helpful to have that on the record. I hope that other teachers, certainly the head teacher, would notice if someone who was unqualified was in charge of children. I thank the Minister for her reply, and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clauses 93 to 95 agreed to.
Schedule 14 [Amendments relating to the training of the school workforce]:
[Amendment No. 140A not moved.]
Schedule 14 agreed to.
Clause 96 agreed to.
Schedule 15 agreed to.
Clause 97 agreed to.
On Question, Whether Clause 98 shall stand part of the Bill?
Lord Hanningfield: Clause 98 introduces a sizable and significant change to the mechanism for the funding of schools in England. The background to this provision is the schools funding crisis of two years ago. Due to the mismanagement in Whitehall of the changes to the then formula, we were left with the undignified sight of schools without budgets and even teachers and support staff being laid off. This eventually led to the then Secretary of State apologising for the fiasco. I do not intend to go over old ground, but I stress once more, as I did at Second Reading, that we simply cannot afford a repeat of those circumstances as we embark once again on changes to the funding system.
Yet, we are here today to give the green light to those proposals with scant knowledge of their details or of how they will operate in practice. Much of the provisions in the Bill will be implemented at a later date through regulations and guidance issued by the Secretary of State. That, for any major legislation, is a constant concern. However, for something that will have a direct impact on the country's education system, it is even more of a worry.
I thank the Minister for sending me his department's policy paper in advance. However, I am afraid that the information in that document was restricted in the extent of detail provided. I cannot help but think that we are putting the cart before the horse with this section of the legislation, which is highly complex, and experts in the field are still grappling with its implications. It is being published at a time when a number of consultations, which have potential impact in areas covered by the Bill and for local government, are ongoing and have not yet reached conclusions. Ofsted currently has a consultation in train on the framework for inspection of schools, and is leading a 10-inspectorate-wide consultation on the framework for inspection of children's services, encompassing joint area reviews and annual performance targets. These are all results of the recent Children Act. Meanwhile, the Audit Commission is consulting on how a comprehensive performance assessment, which includes education, will work from 2005 for all local authorities. We now learn that consultation on this section of the Bill will not be launched until some time next month. Is the Minister satisfied that this part of the Bill has been handled in the best possible way?

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In relation to the proposed funding changes, the House of Commons Education Select Committee report makes the point:
"For a Department that believes in evidence-based policy the DfES has remarkably little evidence to support the changes it is making".
Equally, given the complexity of this section, and the Government's stated aim that they wish all legislation to receive parliamentary scrutiny, it is disappointing that this Bill was not debated in Parliament before being introduced. It is therefore imperative that it receives proper parliamentary scrutiny and is not rushed through the process here.
That said, the main issues that cause concern are, first, three-year budgets for schools; I know that there is a lot of support for this, and it is probably the best way to give schools some security in the financial provision that they are going to make, but I will go on to talk about the problems associated with it. Secondly, there will be a new ring-fenced specific government grant for the schools budget; obviously there is a move away from funding based on the financial year. Thirdly, new powers will be given to the schools forums.
I have a number of specific questions to ask the Minister on the first of these areas, the three-year funding. How will the level of three-year budgets for individual schools be determined, when the main driver for funding purposes is pupil numbers? What forecasting methodology is proposed? At what level will the new ring-fenced grant be set—current spending or schools' FSS? What impact will that have, if any, on the level of funding available for other local authority services? Can the Government give a firm assurance that no authority would lose grant due to spending differences with schools' FSS, with possible knock-on effects on other services or the authority's council tax?
The formula for the new dedicated schools grant is likely to start from the schools' formula spending share—that is, the FSS. That will be constrained by both a floor and a ceiling for increases to take account of the fact that some authorities are spending over and some spending under the schools' FSS and the fact that distribution still does not reflect the 2003–04 formula changes. My own authority—Essex—of which I am leader, still benefits considerably from the floor and ceiling in the mechanism, and we have not fully lost the grant that we shall eventually lose.
Can the Minister also comment on the impact that the measure will have on the flexibility of local authorities to move money between central services and social services and schools and shape services locally? Can he also confirm that schools' funding will no longer be paid for partly by the council tax, and will he comment on where the additional resources channelled through council tax into schools on an annual basis will now come from? I believe that, in the past year alone, the figure was in the region of £331 million. Will a school's funding and expenditure remain part of the local authority accounts?
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There are important transitional issues owing to the fact that authorities do not spend at their schools' FSS levels. That is likely to be dealt with in the ODPM's floor and ceiling mechanism, which I have just mentioned, to limit grant changes to authorities. I should be grateful if the Minister could give us any further information that he may have on this subject.
At what date in the year will budget shares be issued to schools? August could be problematic if budget shares are for the year commencing 1 September. Given the proposed new powers for the schools forum, is there any intention to extend these powers in future years to the potential detriment of the ability of local authorities to influence allocation methodologies related to school funding?
How will overspending and underspending of the new ring-fenced grant in budgets be retained centrally to manage LEA activities—for example, in relation to special schools? Under the proposed new arrangements, what are the funding implications for schools in deficit? Many schools are in deficit and at present the Government provide a special fund to help them in the early years with a change of grant. Those schools are benefiting from the fund this year and they will benefit from it for another year.
I also want to ask the Minister whether he believes that ring-fencing makes the links between other services for children and schools more difficult. The Children Act 2004, which we all support, places local government as the accountable body for children's services in their locality. But does the Minister agree that the proposed changes in the funding system reduce further the ability of local councils to influence schools and promote their wider role in the children's agenda—for example, becoming extended schools— with the possibility of other children's services, such as social workers and health visitors being located on school sites? Personally, I believe that that is the future of school sites and that they will be developed to benefit the community. But part of the school site will be used with a budget which runs from April to April and the other part will come under a budget running from September to September.
Do the Government envisage that the budget shares for schools will in future be calculated on similar lines to those used by the Learning and Skills Council to fund sixth forms? Frankly, the need to convert academic year funding into financial year funding causes confusion and uncertainty at the individual school level.
Will the statutory S52 budget and outturn statements for schools move to a different accounting period, thereby requiring local education authorities effectively to close their school accounts twice each year? Again, as local authority leader, I am aware of that situation with regard to presenting our annual accounts to the auditors. There are also divergent systems for England and Wales. Perhaps the Minister will comment on whether he sees any particular problems in that respect.
Finally, we are concerned that paragraph 6 of Schedule 16 makes amendments to Section 47 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 along the

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same broad lines as those contained in paragraph 4. These will give the Secretary of State powers to issue regulations which could have a broad-ranging effect. As it stands, Section 47 allows the Secretary of State to make regulations on school budget matters, such as timing, factors and criteria, which should be taken into account. It is contended that these arrangements would give the Secretary of State power to issue regulations specifying limits on particular classes of expenditure without seeking the consent of Parliament. Perhaps the Minister can comment on why this clause is required and in what circumstances it could be used.
In conclusion, Members of the Committee will see that, although we very much support the three-year principle, we have a number of grave concerns not only about the Government's proposals under this clause but about the way in which they have gone about introducing them. Therefore, I look to the Minister today to provide the reassurances that we seek.
3.45 p.m.
Lord Smith of Leigh: I rise to speak to the amendments standing in my name in this group. Before doing so, I declare my interest as leader of a local authority and as being married to someone who has been a teacher for many years.
I apologise to Members of the Committee for not being present at the Second Reading. My excuse is that, under the provisions of the 2002 Act, we had to produce the schools budget by 31 December. I had arranged a meeting on 13 December thinking that the Second Reading would be on the 20th, but the date of the Second Reading was changed and I was unable to be present.
However, I read the debate with interest and found that there was little mention of Schedule 16 or, indeed, of Clause 98. As the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, implied, those parts of the Bill move a great deal of responsibility away from local authorities. At present, through local authorities some £24 billion is spent on schools. These provisions would bring about a huge change and they deserve some consideration by this House. Therefore, the purpose of my amendments is simply to retain the status quo.
I shall try to argue in three general areas: first, I shall refer to the strategic role of local authorities; secondly, I shall talk about raising school standards; and, thirdly, I shall echo some of the practical issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, although I shall try not to repeat too much of what he said.
During the Second Reading debate, my noble friend made great play of the strategic role that local authorities should play in education, and I agree with him. I do not see a contradiction between a strategic role and a funding role. Indeed, in my experience, if you want to have a strategic role, having a little money to play with usually allows greater influence. That is certainly the way in which I tried to proceed in health matters in my own authority because we got greatest reward from the areas where we had funding influence.
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I can see no requirement in the Bill to make schools participate either in the general children's agenda or in the wider strategic agenda for local authorities. I think that that is a great omission and perhaps I may give an example to illustrate it. If, as the Government wish, a local authority wanted to pursue a public health agenda, raising fitness levels, and it wanted to get schools to co-operate in raising standards of fitness among their pupils and also perhaps in making their facilities available for the wider community, that participation would depend on the views of individual head teachers and governors. I do not think that that is a really strategic way to manage affairs.
I think that everyone in your Lordships' House agrees with the aim of the Bill—to ensure that we raise school standards. Certainly there is evidence that that has happened. Schools have done a great job with the support of government and, if I may say so, with the support of local authorities as well. But there now seems to be an indication that we have reached a plateau: we have raised standards to a certain point but the rate of increase has stopped. That is because we no longer need to pay so much attention to what is going on in schools—it is what is going on outside schools that is important. Again, perhaps I may use two illustrations to show the importance of providing a broader education and the importance of those social issues.
My own authority operates an outdoor pursuit centre in the Lake District. It gives children the opportunity to visit the Lake District which, despite its proximity, many of them would never do of their own volition. It gives those urban children a chance to see a different lifestyle and it gives them practical experience of subjects such as geography. It also helps them to develop social skills among themselves. As it is down to all schools to participate, rather than it being a local authority activity, we believe that under the new funding arrangements, the future of such activities is certainly under a big question mark.
I am concerned that the social side of education is not taken into account. Perhaps I can use an illustration that may be extreme, but it is real. To understand the way in which drugs affect communities, my authority carried out a study of a small housing area. The most shocking case that we came across was of a single mother—a chaotic drug-user—who was injecting drugs. The only person she could trust to inject her with drugs was her 14 year-old son. That young man did not have a perfect attendance at school, not that one would expect him to, and when he attended his mind was probably not always on the subject being taught.
If we are trying to achieve change for such individuals, we cannot leave the matter to schools. Schools will have to work with wider social partners. The recently published statistics, the tables set out by authority and by school, show very convincingly that social factors affect performance. I believe that the Bill is moving in the wrong direction.
On practical matters, I shall try not to repeat what the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, said, although I agree with him. Potentially, there is a £400 million

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problem for the Government: the £300 million odd that the noble Lord mentioned of overspending and the £100 million of underspending that takes place at the moment. Where will that money come from? Can we be assured that it will not come from raising the council tax or, as in my authority, continuing to subsidise schools through the council tax? What about the requirement on schools to operate the principle of best value? There has been great progress in achieving efficiency in local authorities, but where is that requirement on schools?
In conclusion, I shall repeat the questions raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield. What has changed to require this? Why is it different in England and Wales? Perhaps I may quote from the then Minister of State for School Standards,
"In introducing this consolidated power"—
he was talking about the 2002 Act—
"to provide Financial assistance there is no intention of moving away from the current situation where the great bulk of support for schools and LEAs—the £22 billion to which he referred—is directed through the local government finance system. That arrangement will remain in place".—[Official Report, Commons Standing Committee G, 18/12/01; cols. 199–201.]
It has not remained in place for very long. I believe that local authorities, unlike some advisers to government, are part of the solution for education and not part of the problem. The Government should act only where they have evidence that local authorities are not performing properly and should not break up strong, important relationships between local authorities and schools.
Baroness David: I want to speak in support of my noble friend Lord Smith of Leigh. First, I congratulate the Government on the excellent way in which funding has increased over the past seven years—over 30 per cent in real terms. I am confident that the money is worth investing for our future in that it will provide better education for children.
The increase has been managed by local government and almost without question local government has delivered the additional resources to schools. As I understand it, Amendment No. 141C, moved by my noble friend, would remove the Secretary of State's power to direct finance into schools and enable the money to continue to be routed through the local government finance settlement. I think it was in the late 1950s that the former Ministry of Education stopped funding local authority education services directly and the vote was transferred to local government. The reason, I recall, was that that would give more responsibility to the local authorities which would be able to decide better between the competing demands for local funding than central government could. It would promote joint working and the integration of services.
The Bill appears to unravel nearly 50 years of practice in this area which is a trifle ironic given that in the previous Session of Parliament we passed a Children Act which has, as one of its objectives, support for joint working between education and other local services, as the noble Lord, Lord
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Hanningfield, said. I understand that one of the Bill's proposals is to provide a three-year budget for schools. Perhaps the Minister could say in his summing up why that could not have been achieved by guaranteeing a three-year budget to local government.
I am sure that the Minister has read the recent report of the House of Commons Education and Skills Select Committee on Public Expenditure on Education and Skills (First Report of Session 2004–05, HC 168). For example, the report concludes in paragraph 25:
"The DfES reacted to perceptions of crisis rather than an actual widespread funding crisis, and in the solution that it has provided it has changed the nature of the funding allocation, the role of LEAs in education at the local level, and the role of the DfES".
In paragraph 34 it states:
"There is no proper evidential basis for saying that change is merited, and no way of being confident that the changed system will adequately address any problems that exist".
That is worrying. The expert Commons committee believes that DfES has brought forward this provision in the Bill, not because of actual problems, but because of perceptions and there is no evidence that the solution which the Bill is proposing will work anyhow.
The committee went on to record, in paragraph 30, that the change will lead to,
"the loss of LEAs' ability to make any executive decisions about schools' funding in their areas"
I am concerned about the effect of withdrawing upwards of £20 billion from local government finance and the effect on other local government services. Although the money will be channelled through local authorities, there must be a massive upheaval as local authorities will no longer be able to take an overview of the funding of all local services. What are the implications for other local government services such as transport, housing, planning, social services for the elderly and children?
I hope that the Minister will be able to give answers. I am a great local government sympathiser. Having served in local government in the 1960s and 1970s, I know how good and how helpful local authorities can be. I very much hope that the Minister will have some good answers to those points.
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: I regret that my friend the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Portsmouth cannot be in his place today. In his absence I would like to add a Church of England perspective to the matter before us in relation to Clause 98. As the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, has noted, it is complex, but nevertheless, it goes a long way towards addressing a major problem that we in the Church of England know schools face on budgeting.
The Church of England manages over 4,600 maintained schools in England. Its national and diocesan officers are constantly aware of the difficulties presented to schools by the year-on-year unpredictability of both capital and revenue budget allocations. Much positive work is currently being undertaken between the Church of England Board of Education staff, other voluntary-aided school

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providers and the department's officials on revised and simplified capital procedures. We are grateful for those conversations.
However, they need to be matched by the provision for three-year indicative revenue budgets which this Bill seeks to put in place. Such a provision is very important to all our schools. It will provide a financial framework within which strategic planning may take place, leading to improvements in both behaviour and achievement for pupils, and creating a more stable environment for school staff.
As has already been indicated in the debate, some schools are facing falling rolls because of a declining local child population. Where housing increases are planned, the number of children of school age thereby generated is much less predictable than was the case only a few years ago. Furthermore, many new behavioural and educational strategies are being promoted in schools as they continue to improve. In all these cases, the consequent planning at the individual school level will be materially enhanced by the provision of sensible budget predictions. Individual schools need the maximum knowledge about and control of their budgets to provide cost-effective, efficient and effective learning.
4 p.m.
Baroness Walmsley: We on these Benches, too, have major concerns about Clause 98 and Schedule 16 in so far as they take away the power of the local authority to do its best for its local schools. We see it as part of the incremental removal of power from local authorities and the further centralisation of power over education in the guise of giving schools more power to spend their own money.
However, there are things in these arrangements of which we approve—the school-year budgeting, the three-year budget and the year-on-year guaranteed increment for pupils. So I do not propose to oppose Clause 99 I just want to record our major concerns about the gradual withdrawal of power from local authorities.
Lord Dearing: In my local church on Sunday the first reading was from Proverbs, which extolled the virtue of wisdom. One of the wisdoms in this House is not to speak on a subject you know little about in the presence of those who are highly expert. I have listened with great respect and some awe to the speeches that have been made.
Reference has been made to the concerns of local authorities. I, too, have seen and thought about the representations by the LGA. Reference has not been made to the representations that I, at least, have received, from the Secondary Heads Association and the NAHT in support of this clause. Its deep concern has been about instability, uncertainty and confusion. It refers to it—I do not know whether it is true—as the annual dispute on who is to blame for the budget situation. Its representatives have written and spoken to me about its support for this greater certainty.
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As a former school governor, I like the idea of relating the provision to the school year, and—if it can work—a three-year indicative budget, as the right reverend Prelate said, with arrangements for flexing it in changing circumstances. That is difficult, but the principle is very good.
The ring-fencing is difficult. I very much understand the position of the primary and secondary heads. They want to know where they stand. But I should be concerned if there were not some room for manoeuvre. I can see the nexus between—indeed, in this Bill—the welfare side and the educational side coming together. If this clause stands part, could there be some provision for the Secretary of State to consider an appeal from the LEA that in its particular circumstances there were grounds for shifting some money, in the interests of the pupils in its schools, from such a movement? This is all very complex and needs time for thought. I hope that we shall not be driven to a vote this afternoon.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: Like my noble friend Lord Smith, I am interested in the impact that the changes in this Bill will have on the role of local education authorities, although I do not think that I have reached such a pessimistic conclusion as he has. It must be right in the current context of public services to want to give individual schools as much authority as possible. A three-year funding mechanism surely goes hand in hand with giving them more executive responsibility. So I very much support the thrust of this clause and hope that the Committee will also.
My own background, as noble Lords will know, is in the health service. We have seen a similar move in the past few years to try to give people running frontline services as much responsibility and control over their own destiny as possible. That must make sense. It is very important for parents, when they are concerned about a particular school, to be able to meet the people who are responsible for that performance and look them in the face. All too often in the past it has been easy for governors to put the blame on to someone else—either the Government or the LEA—and of course the resources made available by the Government are a very important component.
However, when one wants to point the finger of responsibility at people for the performance of a particular school, it is much better and more straightforward if one can point to the governing body and hold it responsible because it has now been given the tools, the ammunition and the resources responsibly to discharge its job. So I very much welcome the introduction of three-year budgets. It will give much greater flexibility to governing bodies and enable them to plan for the future. I accept that the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, is right in terms of in-year flexibility because of changes in school circumstance. I am sure that my noble friend will be able to respond on that point. In giving people the opportunity to make changes and develop policies, this must be the right direction in which to go.

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Like my noble friend Lord Smith I come from local government and saw the LEA in Birmingham, under the inspired leadership of Tim Brighouse, a few years ago totally turn around the ethos, quality and product of the schools. I do not think that it had much to do with money. There is no doubt that in the past few years we have seen a generous injection of funds into Birmingham's school systems, for which I am very grateful. But essentially the reason we have seen such an improvement in the quality and morale of people in our education system in Birmingham is because of leadership. We had a chief education officer who was an inspired leader. It did not depend on the LEA having micro-management control over the budgets of individual schools, it depended on leadership.
I do not think that moving to a three-year funding mechanism for schools, or the ring-fenced approach that is being taken, should necessarily impact on the leadership that the local education authority will still be able to give. Of course it will depend on whether the LEA is up to the task. I see no objection in moving to a situation where the LEA has to earn leadership and influence rather than simply accepting that it has that job, whether or not it does a good job.
I listened with great interest to the reference of my noble friend Lord Smith to outdoor pursuit centres. I certainly understand the point he makes. Outdoor pursuit centres are very valuable. In my own city of Birmingham we have something called the Young People's Parliament, which is funded by the LEA and encourages young people to become interested in politics and to have a say in the affairs of their city. I cannot guarantee it, but I imagine that it is centrally funded from the education budget. Like my noble friend, I would not want to see such initiatives being undone because money was being allocated straight to individual schools.
However, I should have thought it very likely that our schools, in wishing to contribute to outdoor pursuit centres, would wish also to contribute to the Young People's Parliament. It is not as though they are going to take leave of their common sense and suddenly decide to close the door and take no part in some of the inter-school activity which is so valuable. In any case, surely if schools took such a blinkered approach, that would be just the kind of issue that Ofsted would pick up in its inspection process.
My noble friend talked about health. I am well aware of the close working relationship between his local authority and the health service in his patch. In the health service we have the example of strategic health authorities which have a very strong leadership role, but no money because almost all the money is allocated to primary care trusts which do the bulk of the commissioning. That is another example of how you can have strong leadership of a public service but do not need to control a huge budget to discharge that leadership.
Overall, if the answer is yes to the question of whether it is right that we give more authority to individual schools—that, by giving them three-year budgets, we assist them in taking much greater
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ownership of what they do—we ought to support these measures. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, will withdraw his opposition to Clause 98 standing part of the Bill.
Lord Ouseley: I support the noble Lords, Lord Hanningfield and Lord Smith, in raising real concerns about Clause 98. There is no doubt that everyone would welcome support for greater autonomy for schools, assured budgets and more money. What is of concern is understanding what benefits the clause proposes for the quality of education. There is no justification for the proposal and, at this stage, no evidence of educational benefits. That view is supported by the House of Commons Education Select Committee. I am most concerned about the lack of public consultation and the lateness with which the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, has been given information about how the proposal will be implemented. I am concerned about the scant information that is available and the lack not only of public consultation but of consultation with local authorities about how their role is to be changed.
This proposal has been made before the publication of the detailed consultation documents, which continues to undermine the role of local government. The noble Lord, Lord Smith, rightly pointed out the wider role and responsibilities of local authorities for children. We should be concerned not just for the production of examination factories in schools but with the wider issues affecting vulnerable communities and the needs of children. After all, the Children Act 2004 places local government as the accountable body for all children's services.
I am most concerned about the role of local authorities in applying flexibility to move resources between central services, social services and schools to facilitate its responsibilities to meet the individual needs of all young people. We need to be reassured about many of the questions posed by the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield. It is important that we get assurances that no local authority will lose grant due to spending differences with schools formula spending shares, so as to avoid possible knock-on effects on other services or, indeed, the council tax.
I conclude by saying that the effect of transferring schools funding from SSS to a dedicated schools grant would be the removal of the link between local council tax payers and schools. It would make difficult the role of councils in seeking to justify spending over and above schools grant, as they would have no influence over how schools served the community. I therefore support the opposition to Clause 98 standing part, pending further discussion about how such a proposal could be implemented.
The Earl of Listowel: I shall speak briefly. The Minister knows my sympathy for what the Government are striving to do here but, listening to the debate, I also had some sympathy with what the noble Lord, Lord Smith of Leigh, said.
The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, drew attention to the parallel with the changes in the National Health Service. He will be aware of the concerns of specialised

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health service providers, which were brought home to me when I visited a small project for young abusers in north London during the passage of the Sexual Offences Bill. The manager running the project said that she had difficulty getting funding from a primary care trust for that service, which was provided for a very few children with very difficult, specialist needs. So there is a danger that such specialist services, such as the parliament and Outward Bound, might be missed by schools focused on their more narrow immediate concerns.
I rise simply to draw the parallel and to ask the Minister to tell us in his response that the Government are aware of those concerns and that they will from the very beginning seek to ensure that those small services, which we are concerned may be missed out on due to the change, will be carefully considered in future planning and not lose out because of the changes.
4.15 p.m.
Lord Filkin: Clause 98 introduces Schedule 16, which puts in place powers that will enable the Secretary of State to require local authorities to determine school budgets up to three years in advance. It deals with the provision of ring-fenced grant to local authorities for the purposes of funding their schools, and it repeals for England the existing reserve power to set an authority's minimum schools budget where the budget proposed is inadequate. All those powers are permissive, and we will consult fully before putting in place regulations under any of them. A consultation document on three-year academic year budgets in England will be published shortly.
As several speakers said, there was general warm support for the key measure on three-year budgets at Second Reading, and I was pleased to note the support in principle from both the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, and the Liberal Democrat Benches. I should have been shocked, although not for the first time, if I had not had the support of the Conservative Benches given that their education policy document states:
"We will remove the LEA role in funding and managing schools".
I will say no more on that.
I also appreciated the support in principle of the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, subject to one or two rather significant challenges. The House, with one or two exceptions, is supportive of the measure because there are many people out there who have been telling us for a long time—as the right reverend Prelate put it explicitly, people at the coalface in real life—that they want this to happen. We have listened to that.
In a sense, that is nothing new. I am amazed by those who say that the proposal is a shock and a horror and ask how on earth the Government can suddenly have done that, because it has been the clear thrust of government policy in this respect for many years. What is passporting about but central government saying to LEAs that the amount of additional money that central government put into the system to increase
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school budgets should get to schools? The rows about passporting have been about exactly that. This is an utterly logical consequential move in that process. There is nothing fundamentally different; it has been government policy for many years, for good reason.
Many Members of the Committee who have been in government will know partly why. One difficulty with local government funding is that if you persuade your colleagues in government to increase money for X function and then find that the money is spent on Y function, that makes life rather difficult. I will say no more.
However, that is not the reason for three-year budgets. The reason for three-year budgets is that they help schools enormously. Under the current system, they cannot be sure what will be their financial position next year. Understandably, schools make cautious assumptions. For example, they do not employ an additional teacher if they cannot be confident of having that person's salary, for good reasons. The consequence of that is that schools build up surpluses against a rainy day that may never come about, because they cannot be sure that it will not, instead of spending their budgets to the fullest possible extent on the benefit of their pupils.
Our proposals will allow schools to plan confidently over a longer timescale, to use their budgets fully and to afford that extra teacher, which will benefit children in our schools. So this is no technocratic or theoretical set of proposals; it is made for the practical reason that schools want certainty to be able to commit and use their resources. Without knowing what will be their future position, they will not behave so, for obvious reasons. This radical change will apply to all aspects of school funding. It will include grants from DfES and the LSC and devolved formula capital allocations, as well as their core budgets from the LEA. So schools will have a meaningful picture of the overall resources available to them when they plan their provision. That will have a positive impact on pupils.
It will also benefit staff. It has been pointed out to me that every year in some schools there will be some staff who are worried sick about whether their contract will be renewed after the end of the year. Until the school knows its budget, such staff will not know whether they have a job. That should not be a central driver of policy, but it is bound to affect the motivation of such employees, who need to know whether they are likely to be employed. This provision will help them to do so.
For the reasons that I have given, three-year budgets have been very widely welcomed. David Hart, General Secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, has said that
"guaranteed three year funding is precisely what heads need if they are going to deliver higher standards".
I wish to outline how the budgets will work in practice. The policy statement that I have placed in the Library of the House gives an overview of how we see the new arrangements working. There is a lot of underlying technical detail. My officials have been working closely with officials in the LGA and our

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national partners, representing local authorities and schools, since the summer on detailed proposals. There is an encouraging degree of consensus on those proposals.
On the flexibility of the budgets, we have no intention of requiring local authorities to set budgets utterly in stone. They must be responsive to appropriate changes in pupil numbers. A school that gains pupils will need more money and one that loses them will need less over time, although that transition must be managed carefully. There may also be other changes in schools' circumstances that should be taken into account in redetermining budgets from year to year. Those are the issues on which it is important that we continue the good discussions that are going on: for example, changes in the number of pupils with free school meals or the size of the school's premises. We plan to consult on whether that is the right way forward.
The initial discussions with our national partners suggest that, schools want to have confidence about the unit of resource from year to year, and under what circumstances that unit of resource will flex, rather than simply a cash sum. If they know the unit of resource and how the system will change, they can make their own calculations and assessment of how they will be affected.
However, we want to go further still. We agree that, alongside giving schools improved information about their budgets over a three-year period, we will also need to give them, where possible, information about cost pressures. The major cost pressure is teachers' pay. We have already taken a major step with the advent of multi-year pay proposals from the School Teachers' Review Body. In 2005 we expect to remit the body to consider a further two-year award, to have effect from September 2006. The benefit is clear: if teachers' pay settlements, as well as the school's budget and revenue position, were clear, the school would be better able to forecast resources and costs and therefore to make judgments about what to do.
We do not believe that the system will create additional burdens for schools, nor do we think that it will cause significant turbulence or a repetition of some of the earlier difficulties. There is no reason why the introduction of three-year budgets should do that. It is not about changing the distribution of funds to schools, which will remain largely the same; it is about giving them more information to enable them to plan ahead with certainty.
The noble Lord, Lord Smith, spoke to Amendment No. 143A. Passporting will be unnecessary under the new arrangements, since the size of the schools budget will be determined by central government, subject to any resources added locally, which will be entirely within each authority's discretion.
To sum up on three-year budgets, Amendments Nos. 143A and 143 would delete the provisions that facilitate three-year budgets. Amendment No. 143B would delete paragraph (5) of Schedule 16, which repeals the existing power of the Secretary of State or the National Assembly for Wales to set a minimum
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budget. The National Assembly for Wales intends to continue with the existing system of funding schools through the general local government grant system, but the Bill will give it the power to move to the system that we are introducing for England, if it wishes to.
The Bill offers a guarantee that the increases that we announce in a spending review will get through to schools. It is understandable that, without that guarantee, local authorities would be reluctant to offer their schools much information on three-year budgets. Only if we introduce a ring-fenced grant will local authorities and their schools be able to plan more firmly and take into account funding increases.
My noble friend Lady David asked whether giving three-year budgets to local authorities, as we hope to, would do the trick. Although that would help local authorities, there is no guarantee that an authority would pass on the funding to schools. Unless you close that gap, you have not done what this House has a clear wish to do: to enable schools to know what their income will be three years in advance. So it would not do the job.
Local authorities will continue in their existing role of distributing the funding granted to them from central government for the schools in their area. They will also be able to provide their schools with resources over and above the dedicated schools grant in response to what they judge as local priorities. They will therefore continue to play a critical strategic and quality-assurance role in education. I shall not repeat what I said at Second Reading.
This Government have been clear about the priority that they attach to education. Between 1997–98 and 2005–06, recurrent funding for schools in England has increased by an average of over £1,000 per pupil. It is important that that funding gets to schools and pupils. Our proposals make it clear beyond doubt that they will so benefit.
Ring-fencing does not mean that we are introducing a national funding formula, or that local authorities will no longer have a central role. I hope that I made that very clear at Second Reading. Local authorities' day-to-day relationship with schools will not be affected. The only thing that local authorities will not be able to do is to spend funding that central government provides for school education on non-educational provision. That is the nub of the issue; it is at the heart of three-year budgeting.
It has been argued a good deal in this debate that the provisions will mean almost the end of local government, although it was hardly mentioned at Second Reading. One of the practical reasons why that is not true is that most local authorities already behave as the provisions propose. The clear thrust of central government policy through passporting is that they should pass the funding on to schools, and so they do. The measure will cut out the process of tergiversation and argumentation to make it clear and transparent.
It has been argued that the new ring-fenced grant will make it more difficult to achieve joined-up services. I do not think that that is true. We are introducing a 7.6 per cent increase in general funding

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of children's social services for 2005–06. Although it will never be seen as enough, because that is how life is, it is nevertheless a substantial increase.
Local authorities will not be able to take funding intended for schools and use it for other purposes. However, they will be able to use their considerable discretion to fund other services that they think need more expenditure. So they should, and long may they do so.
The noble Lord, Lord Smith, talked about a £400 million shortfall. The argument that we usually hear is that there will be a £200 million shortfall. It has been suggested that, when the DSG is introduced, it may not take account of the fact that many authorities already spend above the schools formula spending share (SFSS). I can assure the Committee that there will be no shortfall. Our calculations for the new DSG will start from the total of what local authorities are actually spending on schools at present; that is the usual basis for making changes to local government finance arrangements. So it will not be necessary for local authorities to add to the DSG in order to continue spending what they have spent in the past, although they will be able to do so if they wish.
I have spoken about distribution already. In allocating the DSG we do not envisage any significant change to the existing SFSS formula, which was based on a major consultation exercise and introduced only two years ago. Nor will there be micromanagement of schools. We directly rejected that view, which is why we saw it as central to the proposals that the local authority should continue its role of distributing the grant.
On school forums, there is no question of any powers being taken away from local authorities. The powers in the Bill, which we will come to later, are about giving local authorities and school forums more power, at the expense of the Secretary of State, rather than the reverse. We have no intention in this Bill of taking that further to the detriment of local government.
I have spoken briefly about Wales. At this stage, Wales wishes to stay where it is.
I think that I have spoken to my noble friend Lady David. I have heard the comment that there is no evidence that change would be beneficial. I was surprised to hear the noble Lord, Lord Ouseley, also say that. I will put the question back to him. He said that there would be no benefits from moving to a three-year budget. Can he look me in the eye and say honestly that if, when he was chief executive of Lambeth council, he had known his revenue platform for the next three years for the borough, he would not have felt that that was massively beneficial, giving certainty to the local authority about its job? It would have removed a massive amount of officer and member turbulence about their position each year. I believe that he would have snatched at that with both hands, as I would have done when I was a local authority chief executive. One could then have got on with the job, rather than suffering the constant agony
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of wondering, "Where will we be?" and the short-termism that comes about as a consequence of that sort of financial environment. One should never provoke noble Lords; they always want to respond.
4.30 p.m.
Lord Ouseley: I thank the Minister for the opportunity to clarify. I was saying that I could not see the evidence of educational benefit from the proposal in Clause 98. It is important that we consider that at this stage. That matter has not been clarified, and I am still not convinced. I readily accept the proposition that the Minister put to me, but that is not what I was saying. I was talking about the educational benefits.
I do not think that ring-fencing, which is helpful in the context in which it is proposed, will provide educational benefits. We know about the way in which greater autonomy has helped certain schools to perform well, and we have seen the benefits for some children. Equally, however, we have seen how other children, particularly those from vulnerable communities, have not done so well. It is therefore important that we understand the discretion that is available with the autonomy to ensure that local authorities, which have responsibility for meeting the needs of children across the range of services for which they are responsible, can be effective and will not be hindered by the proposal.
Lord Filkin: I thank the noble Lord, Lord Ouseley, for his helpful interjection. Perhaps we should not protract that debate at this point.
I sought to give three specific reasons why there would be direct benefits for children in schools. One is that more teachers would be employed, rather than the money being kept in budgets. Secondly, the management of the school would have much greater clarity about its resources into the future and would spend less effort second-guessing what those resources might be. Thirdly, the staff would have less anxiety about whether they were going to be sacked as a consequence. I must move on.
I was asked some difficult questions by the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield. I shall try to answer most of those, at least to partial satisfaction. The noble Lord asked about the Select Committee on Education and Skills and about whether there was evidence for the changes. My noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, in part, made the argument about that. We believe, as, I think, do many others, that organisations in the public or private sector are more likely to deliver good results if they know what their resources are, if they have control over their inputs, if they are not burdened by excessive bureaucracy and regulation, and if they are judged by the outcomes that they produce, than if they are second-guessed through input controls. That is the central performance analysis that sits under the new relationship with schools and under what we are doing with three-year budgets.
Lord Hanningfield: I hope that the Minister will go on to answer more of the questions that I posed. He mentioned the security of budgets several times.

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Everyone would like to know what they are going to get for three years; that is fine. However, all budgets are based on pupil numbers. The Minister referred several times to the security of staff. With numbers changing, if we are not going to take money away from schools that lose pupils and give it to schools that gain pupils, we are going to have to pump in extra money. They will not be three-year budgets, because numbers will be changing all the time.
In my authority, for example, we go by the numbers in January. We prepare the budgets, but the schools get them on the basis of the number enrolled in September, which could be different from the suggested number in January. They get their full top-up money in September, on actual numbers, but numbers in some schools change dramatically. If numbers in some schools are falling dramatically, we will have to find extra money for the pupils who are now in the other schools, unless we reduce the money that the schools with falling numbers get. If we do not do that, more money will have to be pumped into the system every year. Also, there will be no security for staff in a school with a falling roll. I do not understand.
The Minister referred to security for staff several times. I do not know how we will get that security in schools with falling rolls. I cannot understand the Minister's point on that issue.
Lord Filkin: There is no such thing as a job for life, in the public or private sector, as we all know now. However, a school that is in the situation that the noble Lord described, with the head and the governors conceding that their rolls are falling, will have a reasonably good feel for likely future losses. It will make high and low assumptions.
With the direct school funding process, schools will know the revenue consequences and will be able to judge whether it is prudent to retain staff or take on more. That is different from the current situation, in which they have two variables to deal with. They know neither what will drive the funding nor what will happen to their volume of pupils.
Lord Smith of Leigh: School numbers can change dramatically in a short time. Often, if a school is losing pupils and parents suspect that the school may be closed, they will often vote early with their feet to get their children into a different school. A school that starts in September with a particular number of pupils may end the year with a substantially smaller number. Whatever system we have, we cannot legislate for that uncertainty.
Lord Filkin: It is a fact that, in this House, we cannot make the world stand still. However, through these measures, we can substantially reduce the uncertainty.
With regard to the forecasting methodology, we are carrying out a study of the methods used by LEAs to forecast pupil numbers. The early results from that work suggest that there is unlikely to be one method that fits all schools. We will make the results of that work available to all authorities to inform their work on forecasting pupil numbers at school level.
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I was asked about the level at which the new ring-fenced grant would be set—current spending or school FSS. The underlying formula will be the existing SFSS, subject to any minor change. However, the allocation of DSG will be based initially on actual spend by LEAs, to ensure that there is not a sudden redistribution.
Will the Government give full assurances to local government that no authority will lose grant due to spending differences? We will ensure that there are no adverse effects for the rest of local government and that transitional protection is put in place to ensure that no authority sees an unacceptable change in the central government resources available for non-school services.
Will school funding expenditure remain part of local authorities' accounts? Yes, it will. At what date will budget shares be issued to schools? We intend that they will be issued at much the same time as now— February or March, not August—following the local government settlement in November.
Lord Peston: I interrupt my noble friend for a word of clarification, following on from what the noble Lord, Lord Ouseley, said.
I support my noble friend in everything that he has said, except for one matter that looks a bit obscure. It seems to me that schools will want certainty—that is right—and I am certain that what is allocated to education should go to education. However, if, in a local authority area, one school needs more money for special reasons—perhaps it has a more difficult group of pupils—where is the decision taken, so that the school that needs more funding gets that funding? It is not clear. Are we to believe that it is a central government decision, or will the local authority at least be able to say, "We will certainly allocate all the education money to education, but our judgment is that we take the decision that this school should get it rather than that one"? That is the bit that I got lost on. I am sure that there is a good answer, but I would like to know what it is.
Lord Filkin: My noble friend is right to ask that question, as I skated over it in my response. There will be no change from the current situation, in which local authorities distribute the funding to schools according to a formula that they determine in a manner consistent with central government guidance. It is essentially a continuation of a local authority decision on how to distribute; that is, the "principles" that should drive the distribution—not whether the local authority likes school A or school B. That is consistent with government guidance and will continue unchanged.
As regards the question about LEA powers, there is no intention to remove LEA powers and give them to schools forums, a point that I have already covered. On under-spending or overspending the new ring fence grant in terms of budgets retained centrally to manage LEA activity, our proposals will not affect the position in relation to central spending by LEAs.

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In 2004–05, we introduced a limit on the annual increase in authorities' central spending that is not delegated to individual schools, such as PRUs and some SEN expenditure, to ensure that funding increases reach schools. We envisage that that will continue under the new system. Where an LEA can make an exceptional case for exceeding the limit— which is germane to the question asked by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel—it can currently apply to the Secretary of State for approval for a dispensation. In future, we propose that such proposals can be agreed locally with the school forums. If there is no agreement, as now, they can be referred to the Secretary of State. So there is the potential for flexibility.
I was also asked about the funding implications for schools in deficit. At present, schools are able to carry forward unspent balances. If they overspend, they can also carry forward a deficit. The introduction of DSG will not change that situation. I was asked whether this would limit extended schools development. That is a good question because I think that throughout the House we support that. The answer is, "No, it will not", in terms of the specifics for support for implementation. If memory serves me right, central government funded £50 million to the early pathfinders on extended schools development. Again, from recollection, we will be putting more than £100 million in the next phase to support the early development of that process. Schools, as the noble Lord knows, are strong supporters of extended school in general because they see the benefit. The noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, spoke strongly and clearly about what a good thing it is. We agree with him on that.
On the statutory S52 budget and outturn statements, the official closure of accounts will remain at 31 March. So there will be no change in that respect. As regards different systems in England Wales, yes, there will be different systems. That is a consequence of devolution, which we believe in, as the House well knows. On the question that paragraph 6 of Schedule 16 makes amendments to Section 47, I do not have an answer, so I shall have to write to the noble Lord.
In conclusion, I think that we have covered most of the issues. If it is not to full satisfaction, I have no doubt that we will come back to them later. In the House and in wider society, at heart there is a strong consensus for this measure, which is the logical consequence of the way in which policy has been moving for years. But it retains the important role of local authorities, which are massively important in terms of educational leadership in their communities, as my noble friend Lord Hunt so powerfully put across.
The Secondary Heads Association and the National Association of Head Teachers have said:
"Why our two associations support the introduction of dedicated school budgets for the LEA and three-year budgets for the school is because it will bring clarity and predictability".
They are absolutely clear.
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"It will remove also the major areas of uncertainty in the funding fog as to who is to hold account the basic level of their funding".
We have not spoken about that accountability, but it also is good in terms of democratic health. People will know the amount of money that has gone into schools and the responsibility for that. So both SHA and NAHT feel that all the provisions in the Bill work together to provide schools with a more coherent and stable funding system. They state:
"The changes are not a radical step forward, but the sensible, rational, next steps needed to develop greater equity, clarity and predictability in the system".
I am glad that largely the House supports them in that view.
I hope that my responses to the probing amendments put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, have been helpful and that I have persuaded my noble friend Lord Smith not to press his amendments.
Lord Smith of Leigh: Before my noble friend sits down, I would like to probe him on a couple more points. He talks about the logic of the Government's position as an extension of policy. Yet why in 2001 did the then Minister for schools standards state exactly the opposite?
There is a clear distinction of principle here. The Government are saying that any additional money for schools from the government should go to schools. From the total budgets that are being spent on education, a substantial part does not come from the Government but from local authorities or council tax payers. That is the distinction between the positions.
My noble friend made much about the position of certainty. We had a small debate on student numbers. I am pleased that he thinks that he can get an agreement on the long-term issue of teachers' pay. I hope that he is right. He is not right yet. I am sure that all parts of the public sector would welcome three-year budgets. I am sure that children's social services will also look for certainty for three years so that they can plan. We would all like that, but we can never be certain.
4.45 p.m.
Let us remind ourselves that the Government are taking responsibility for 25,000 schools up and down England, which is a huge responsibility. In terms of accountability, if a school comes to me and says that it does not have enough money, I will tell it who to go to and it will not be the local education authority.
We have also conducted this debate with the background of the current Government. I welcome the additional funding that has gone into education in the past few years, but I can remember when schools were losing money. Head teachers welcomed the fact that local authorities were able to put additional money into schools to make sure that they could survive. So perhaps—
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: I am grateful to my noble friend for giving way. But is that not the point? In

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those situations, it was not clear which public authority should take responsibility for the problems that schools had then. Now, in terms of how well the money is spent, responsibility is clearly with the governing body. With three-year flexibility, they have been given more opportunity to ensure they use that discretion wisely. When it comes to the overall funding level, the responsibility is clearly with central government.
Is it not better to be straight, rather than to have the traditional approach where so many bodies are involved? It is very difficult for the punter to know to whom they should go.
Lord Smith of Leigh: As complex as education funding is, I am sure that it is not quite as complicated as health funding. My point is that when schools have lost money because of decisions from central government, they have looked to local authorities for additional support. In the new arrangements that will not happen. We should be clear about that.
I would welcome clear responsibility. Responsibility is not quite clear because when the money gets to the schools, who takes direct accountability? At the moment, it is difficult enough to get sufficient people of quality to fill governing bodies. Most authorities in my area have a number of vacancies, which we do our best to encourage people to fill. If more responsibility is being given to school governors and heads, we must ensure that they can exercise it.
I will not bore Members of the Committee, but for as many rogue local authorities, I can quote many rogue head teachers—one of whom decided that the best way to solve the home-to-school transport situation was to use school funding to put a deposit on a new car for himself.
My noble friend should remember that, like financial investments, this should come with a health warning that spending on education can go down as well as up. We are assuming that it will always go up, which cannot be the case.
Perhaps I may just press my noble friend to reflect on these two points, which he did not really cover. First, how can we be certain that we can continue to get management efficiency in the money going to schools? Secondly, would he be supportive of trying to make sure that schools are involved in the wider agenda beyond the school gate, so that some kind of responsibility for schools is in the Bill?
Lord Filkin: I shall be brief. My noble friend Lord Hunt's interjection about it being better to be straight got to the nub of it. This has clarity and a certain intellectual honesty as a consequence. I take the noble Lord's point about governance. It is important that governance can cope with those issues, to which I am sure we will return in the future.
On three-year budgets for local government, I agree with him. My right honourable friend the Deputy Prime Minister has as one of his objectives the
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introduction of three-year budgets for local government because it would be good for local authorities as well. However, I should not refer to "three-year budgets" because those will be set by local government; rather, I refer to greater certainty about the forward grant from central government.
On management efficiency, my noble friend Lord Smith was not able to be with us when we considered other parts of the Bill and therefore missed our many happy hours spent looking at the very strong relationship between the new Ofsted inspection system and the performance of the school. We are confident that the new system will continue to drive greater efficiency forward.
I turn to my noble friend's comment that local government will stop putting any money into schools, that it will never do so again. I do not know how he can say that. I cannot speak for 150 local authorities or predict the future, and I do not know who can. We will see what happens. I expect that local authorities will think that they do want to do things with their schools because their children are being educated in them. They will want to put forward initiatives that they believe should be supported. However, we shall let that pass.
I hope that my noble friend will withdraw his amendment.
Lord Lucas: Perhaps I may ask a couple of brief questions about the reply given by the Minister. Am I right in understanding that the ring-fencing will apply to the entire school budget; that is, the money given to schools and the funds spent centrally by the LEA, and that the starting point will be what is in the budget at the moment? An LEA which has been contributing an extra £10 million a year to its schools is effectively now stuck with that commitment because it will become part of the central ring-fencing. They will lose any ability to cut back on the commitment if children's services need it.
Let us take two local authorities with budgets of around £200 million. One has been spending £100 million on schools while the other has been spending £110 million. It is at that point where the ring-fencing will be set. In effect, therefore, in two all but identical local authorities, one will have a budget for £100 million for non-school services while the other will have a budget of £90 million. That is the position in which they will find themselves stuck. In other words, past generosity will come back to hit them in the face, which will give them a jolly good reason not to do it again. Am I right in my understanding of how things will work?
Lord Filkin: Perhaps I may put it like this: up to a point, Lord Copper—and I mean no disrespect. In the situation described by the noble Lord, if for the sake of argument a local authority has been putting money into schools over and above the schools formula spending share, the SFSS—let us say £10 million, a rather large amount—while in the medium term the

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level of central government grant will be set at the level of the SFSS, in the short term—to avoid exactly the problem envisaged by my noble friend Lord Smith; that of a school finding that its grant is suddenly reduced—central government will protect the school from that by providing funding at the level that the school had been receiving in total prior to the changes. That will not mean that the local authority itself will be putting its hand in its pocket to sustain that school's budget, a point of concern for the noble Lord, Lord Lucas; it will be provided as part of the damping arrangements for the totality of the changes.
Lord Lucas: Perhaps I may press the Minister a little further. If an LEA has been spending an extra £10 million, those schools will do relatively badly because that extra £10 million will be absorbed over time. The government grant will start at £10 million higher and that particular authority will get the money. However, will it receive the extra funding in each budget?
I want to find out how this will work. Will additional government grant be provided to local authorities to cover their extra funding or will the ring-fencing be set high so that local authorities will find that some of their own money is ring-fenced, as it were? Will the ring-fencing then squeeze school funding? Moreover, if a local authority does put additional money in, am I right in interpreting paragraph 3(7) as providing that the Government will have control over how the money is spent or will the local authority be entirely free in how it spends the additional sums? In other words, will local authorities be constrained by considerations such as how much of the budget should go to schools or how allocations should be made between schools? Are these decisions to be left entirely to local authorities? Will they be able to distribute these funds as they wish?
Lord Filkin: On the noble Lord's last point, that is exactly so. The additional moneys that local authorities choose to put into schools in their area will be completely within their discretion.
On the situation described by the noble Lord in terms of the transition from one system to another, local authorities will not be required to continue to put funding into schools. They will not lose funds from the rest of their grant to fund the transitional damping process because central government themselves will provide it in order to avoid exactly the problems about which my noble friend Lord Smith was concerned. He asked whether there would be a hard landing and a sudden shift.
The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, is also right in that over a period of time, school funding will move towards accordance with the general formula for distribution as indicated by the dedicated schools grant and as vitiated through the distribution decisions made by local authorities themselves as part of their distribution responsibilities.
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That is so complicated that it may be better if I put the detail into a full note to the noble Lord and copy it to other Members of the Committee.
Lord Hanningfield: I do not want to start another detailed discussion, but it is worth pursuing this a little further. What is likely to happen to local authorities? They will not put money into schools actually to fund basic five-to-16-years education, rather they will fund the extended school way. In partnership with schools, they will support extended schooling, family development, social services and children's issues on each school campus. I sought to make that point when I introduced this debate.
Local authorities are to leave it to central government to fund the basic education budget, which is to be dealt with on the other financial year basis—from April to April with no three-year guarantee on funding. I know how that will operate in my own local authority. A lot of money will be injected into schools for supporting families and children outside the education system. We will find that school campuses will be supported in different ways. Part of the money will come from central government through the new system being introduced and part from local authorities, which will fund other things happening on the school campus. I am sure, as the years go by, that that is how this system will operate.
We are now in a major transition in the way that schools operate. Given that, it would have been more appropriate if this legislation had been introduced three years ago rather than now, given the way schools are to develop over the coming few years. Perhaps the Minister will clarify that that is what will happen. Money is to go into schools from different sources.
Lord Filkin: I should not venture to display my forecasting skills on decisions over which I have absolutely no control whatever. The noble Lord may well be right, in which case what he says will give some comfort to the noble Lord, Lord Dearing. In truth, I do not think that any of us really knows. It may be that it will be exactly as the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, has set out: LEAs which still have a passion for raising the educational and other attainments of their children will choose to behave in the way he has described, or it may be a more mixed picture. I think that I would put my money on it being a more mixed one, given the diversity of local government and the range of local politics. However, I could be wrong and I have no knowledge either way.
Lord Lucas: Before the moment passes, I rise only to accept the offer of a note from the noble Lord.
Lord Hanningfield: We have had a very extensive debate on an extremely complicated issue. Like myself, the noble Lord, Lord Smith, is the leader of a local authority and therefore becomes involved in these things in considerable detail. Wearing my other hat as the leader of a local authority and not speaking as a Member of this House, at the moment even a small school usually knows where to go. I am often

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approached, even though we have over 600 schools in the county of Essex. It is a pity that we shall lose some of those links.
Some schools have only two or three teachers, while other schools operate on budgets in excess of £10 million. There is a tremendous diversity in school provision. I would not want to be the Government Minister who has to introduce this for our 25,000 schools because there are going to be a lot of problems.
Lord Filkin: I am genuinely sorry for interrupting the noble Lord. We do not want to alter in any way the relationship between schools and the noble Lord when he is wearing his hat as the leader of a local authority. Schools should continue to go to their local authorities, which will have the roles of leadership and support for raising the educational attainment of the children in their area. I expect that schools will continue to turn to their local authority leaders.
Lord Hanningileld: The Committee will probably have had enough of this debate today. We shall analyse everything that has been said. I hope that the Minister will write to me and others, as he has promised. With that, I shall not pursue my opposition to the clause standing part of the Bill today.
Clause 98 agreed to.
5 p.m.
Lord Lucas Lord Lucas moved Amendment No. 141:
After Clause 98, insert the following new clause—
"Local education authorities as champions of the child and the family
The Secretary of State shall take such measures as he considers necessary to promote and provide for the role of local education authorities as champions of the child and the family, and in particular shall issue a consultation document on the central funding of statemented pupils and of pupils whose education is being provided in pupil referral units."
The noble Lord said: At Second Reading the Minister said that he was intent on moving local education authorities away from the historic position of being the controllers and distributors of money at their own discretion towards being champions of the child and family. I find that ambition wonderful and I very much hope that the Government will make it happen.
However, the obstacle in the way of that, with which I am familiar, is the conflict between the fact that the local authority may wish to be the champion of the child but, on many occasions, being the champion of the child can put it under impossible financial strain.
Special educational needs are a case in point. If local authorities became the champions of the child and the family and were out there trying to discover which children have special educational needs and providing properly for them, in ensuring that that happened, their SEN budgets would run beyond their extremely limited ability to deal with them under the current financial systems.
As a result, many local authorities have become the enemy of the child and the family by imposing extreme delays and denying that special educational needs
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exist. This makes the whole process very difficult. It is the articulate and the persistent who get what they want, and ordinary citizens—particularly their children—have an extremely miserable time. A two-year delay in dealing with children with severe dyslexia, dyspraxia or other behavioural special educational needs can cause long-term damage and make them very difficult to deal with.
A parallel problem occurs in pupil referral units. which are expensive. Very often the best thing for such children—and very often the best thing for their classmates—is to give them a breather; to give them a chance to get straight, to re-motivate them and to get them going again in an environment which is designed for them rather than for other children. Where these units work well, I have been impressed by what they achieve. But they are expensive and local education authorities, if they are keen on providing such facilities, often seem to be held back by the fact that the funding has to come out of a very limited budget.
Both of these matters conspire against local authorities becoming the kind of creature that the Minister said he would like them to become. I should like to know what he proposes to do about it. I beg to move.
Lord Filkin: If the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, will bear with me, I shall speak without my notes. This is an issue on which I have a policy responsibility as well as the pleasure of taking the Bill through. It is the kind of issue that would genuinely benefit from the opportunity for a fuller debate than that offered even by the Committee stage or Second Reading.
I strongly agree with much of what the noble Lord said. When we are dealing with special educational needs—whether at the softer end of a mild slowness in learning, for whatever reason, or at the very severe end of low incidence, high cost need—it is critical that there is early identification and early intervention. All the evidence shows that if you can identify with the parents that there is a problem and work with them on what might be an appropriate set of interventions very early on, you achieve two things: you reduce the risk that the child's education will suffer through the alienation that can follow on from that; and you reduce the risk that the parents will feel forced into an adversarial relationship with the local authority because they are worried about their child and it does not appear to them as if the system is responding adequately.
I am simplifying matters greatly, as the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, knows, but why I understand and support what he is trying to do in principle but do not support it in practice is because, essentially, he is pushing it all into a central pot and using—although he did not say this exactly—a statement-type process to get provision made and then to get the intervention. While undoubtedly a statement is necessary for some children with particularly complex needs—because that is the only way in which you can bring to bear the expertise, diagnosis and the funding package to intervene—in very many cases you do not need a statement.

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The best local authorities have demonstrated in practice that they can reduce the need for statements by getting better at much earlier intervention and identification. That is why we have been really pleased by the evidence of the early support programme which tries to bring intervention in the first less than three years of the child's experience and into early primary school settings. So you identify that there is a problem and you bring in the package of support.
That works by increasing, rather than reducing, the amount of budget that the school itself has to deal with SEN issues so that it does not need to go elsewhere to get either the cash resources or, for example, to get an educational psychologist to come into the school and to work with it on identifying the needs of the child. We have now seen enough of this to know that it is not theory; that, where it is working, it is good practice. Without threatening the noble Lord with two letters, I should be pleased to set out this argumentation in more detail.
This is the thrust of our policy. It does not mean that there is no role for the centre—there is a massive role for the centre—but it does not mean that the answer is to push all of the resource into the centre either. The more that the school or pre-school setting can identify the problem and have the skill, the resource and the access to specialists to intervene early, the better the service to both the child and the parent.
I hope that has been helpful. I am happy to write to the noble Lord in more detail if he would like me to do so.
Lord Dearing: The Minister has threatened another letter; may I have a copy? The noble Lord is right to say that there is an issue of resource and, as the Minister said, to get that resource early to the child will make a fantastic difference. However, it is my experience that there is not enough resource around to meet the needs of these children.
Lord Lucas: I am grateful for the noble Lord's reply. Yes, I would love to spend another few hours reading his letters.
One of the reasons I do not share the pessimism shown by the noble Lord, Lord Smith of Leigh, in the previous debate is that I can see that the Government are doing on school funding as a whole what I would like to see them doing—or suggest that they might do—on SEN funding. They have taken responsibility now for the level of funding that schools will receive. So the local authorities, instead of becoming the devils who will not give the extra 1 per cent, become the angels who might give it without in any way having to change their spots.
The Government have taken the responsibility for setting the level; the LEAs' money is entirely extra— the schools do not have a right to it—and is therefore positive. By setting the level centrally, by having central control and central determination of what should be done—which may well be, say, that much more should be distributed to schools—the LEA no
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longer has to fight that corner and has instead total freedom to line up alongside the parents and fight their corner.
I can see that the Minister and I want to end up in the same place. I shall be fascinated to read what the noble Lord has to say about the progress he is making towards it—not least because an awful lot of these kids are ending up in prison education, which is another area of his responsibilities. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 141 A:
After Clause 98, insert the following new clause—
"ACADEMIES: ADMISSIONS
After section 89 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 (c. 31) insert—
"89A An Academy shall be treated for the purposes of section 89 as a maintained school in the area of the local education authority in which the Academy is situated save that the governing body of the Academy shall be in all cases the admission authority for the Academy.""
The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 141 A, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 141B, which is grouped with it.
The amendments seek to address the issue of academy admissions policies. The first amendment seeks to ensure a level playing field in the way in which academies compete with other schools within the same pupil admission system. The second amendment seeks to probe the more particular concern about the impact of academies on neighbouring schools and to help ensure that they do not poach pupils.
Academies may be appropriate in certain areas but they must sit comfortably within the LEA's local plan. That is why it is quite inappropriate for the Government to have a target of 200 academies, or any other number come to that. The number of different admission authorities and the variety of admission arrangements add significantly to the level of complexity present in the school admissions system. While attempts to co-ordinate admissions arrangements may simplify the process to some extent for parents, it will not address variation in admissions policies. As the Select Committee on Education and Skills concluded last July, in the report of its inquiry into school admissions:
"The School Admissions Code of Practice is an advisory rather than a regulatory instrument and has proved insufficient for the task of ensuring widespread good practice in school admissions. Inconsistency in the definition and application of over-subscription criteria has been raised repeatedly during the course of our inquiry, as the cause of much confusion and complaint. This is a failure not of the Code itself but of the legislative framework in which it sits. Our recommendations call for a shift towards greater regulation of school admissions in the interests of fairness, consistency and clarity".
Local democratic accountability will inevitably be undermined by a large number of academies being set up, operating as independent schools, outside the aegis and control of the local authority. The impact of a substantial number of academies on school admissions

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arrangements could be quite dramatic. They are likely to undermine the LEAs' ability to plan coherent education provision.
Academies have the potential to disrupt fair and efficient admissions arrangements within authorities and in neighbouring authorities. Their establishment gives parents the perception that the academy is the best secondary school in the area, irrespective of the quality of other schools. Their designation as academies and the extra resources given to them could act as a magnet for parents who could be attracted by the sales pitch of such a designation, irrespective of the good Ofsted reports obtained by other secondary schools in the area.
Concerns have also been raised about academies targeting future pupils. In Bristol, for example, where the St George Community College is due to reopen as an academy, glossy leaflets have been distributed only in the more affluent areas. The Greig City Academy in Haringey experienced difficulties in recruiting pupils and targeted only the leafy suburbs rather than the neighbourhood area of Tottenham.
We very much approve of the idea that extra resources should be deployed in very deprived areas. There is considerable evidence, for example in the HEFCE report published last Thursday, that children in deprived areas need additional resources and help. However, we believe that that should be planned for by an accountable LEA which will take account of the wider impact and the interests of all the children in the area.
We object to the fact that academies' admissions policies are outside democratic accountability. Therefore, their overall impact cannot be planned for. We are concerned not just about the children who are receiving extra resources—which, I accept, they very often need—but all the children in an area. I beg to move.
Lord Filkin: As the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, indicated, the intention behind the first amendment is to ensure that local schools and academies work together to achieve co-ordinated admission arrangements which are straightforward, transparent and fair for local children and parents. We agree. That is precisely why we already require academies, as part of their funding agreement which they have to sign with the Secretary of State, to have admission arrangements which are consistent with the school admissions code of practice and with admissions law more widely. The words "consistent with" are, in fact, more powerful than those which apply to maintained schools.
Academies are also required, by the Education Act 2002, to have regard to advice from the local admissions forum. For all practical purposes, this puts them in the same position as a maintained school. They are also required by their funding agreement to consult locally on their admission arrangements each year. Representations about admission arrangements can be made to the Secretary of State and changes to admission arrangements have to be agreed with the
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Secretary of State. There is therefore no need for the noble Baroness's amendment; existing mechanisms and the existing policy seek to do exactly what she proposes. That aim is already met by existing requirements that we have placed on academies.
On Amendment No. 141B, academies have been established to tackle the problem of poor schools which have failed local children over many years. To make a real difference to those children's life chances, a radically different approach is needed. Academies are replacing schools which have been failing for too long, whatever the reason.
Academies are dealing with long-term failure through innovative new approaches, and they need to be able to retain the freedoms to innovate. They are set up with the support of funding from private sponsors, but more important than their money is the vision and sense of ethos that they bring to the academy. Sponsors often have exciting and innovative ideas, which help raise the expectations and ambitions of their pupils.
Academies are revenue-funded at comparable rates to all maintained schools in their locality. Capital investment is available to all maintained schools from other school programme initiatives. Academies mainly replace schools which have received very little investment in the past. We are targeting resources at the most needy schools, pupils and communities.
It is right that academies should be funded at a level comparable with LEA schools in the same area. Part of the rationale behind the academies programme is to transfer good practice and lessons learnt on transforming poor schools to the maintained sector. It is important that those lessons learnt cannot be distorted or ignored because of arguments about differing funding levels.
The noble Baroness said on Second Reading that in setting up academies, the Government have given away 17 valuable sites. It is true that academies are usually established on sites transferred from the previous owner, usually the local authority, to the Academy Trust. But the Academy Trust is typically a charitable company, responsible for the building and running of the academy. If the academy were to close, provisions in the academy's funding agreement and in the Education Act require that ownership of the land and the buildings or the proceeds of any sale must revert to the previous owner.
Similarly, academies' building plans are based on the same cost benchmarks as all other schools whose buildings are approved by the DfES. While they receive an initial substantial capital investment, they are simply sharing in our ambitious capital plans to replace or modernise every secondary school in the next 15 years.
Being independent and state maintained gives academies the freedom to innovate in the governance, staffing, curriculum and organisation of the school, and to explore new ways of organising the school day and term length. We have spoken previously about some of these issues.

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On the suggestion that there is a target of 200, that is not a quota, it is just a statement of what we believe to be the likely numbers and the conditions that can enable an academy to be set up. I hope that that is helpful.
We do not believe that academies will disrupt local admission arrangements for the reasons I have indicated. The requirement to be consistent with the code of practice goes further than the requirement on maintained schools merely to have regard to the code. So there is a stronger lock on academies in that respect for good reasons.
I hope that my explanation is helpful and that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, is not minded to press her amendment.
5.15 p.m.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for his reassurances in this respect. However, it strikes me that the control over the admissions policy relies to a very great extent on the funding agreement and the funding contract with the academy. What sanctions are there if the academy should move away from that in a few years' time? For example, what sanctions does the department intend should be placed on the schools in Bristol and Haringey that I gave as examples? It is quite clear that they have targeted students from particular areas where academic attainment is likely to be higher than in the poorer parts of the catchment area.
Lord Filkin: I will chance my arm and no doubt correct what I say in a letter. Essentially, I would not have expected that the literalism of a sanction was enormously necessary. To put it another way, we have a body set up under statute as a charitable body, which is utterly reliant on central government for its funding. It cannot survive without that. If, as part of its foundation agreement with that totally dominant funding body—the central state—it has a set of clear agreements that it has to behave in a certain way, it is my experience of public or charitable bodies that it will not lightly ignore those issues.
I suspect that there is a more specific answer which, I guess, is that withdrawal of funding is one possible sanction. No doubt there are others, and I shall give the noble Baroness chapter and verse on that.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for that. I am interested to know whether the department will be asking any questions of the schools in Bristol and Haringey—the examples that I have given. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 141B not moved.]
Schedule 16 [Funding of maintained schools]:
[Amendment No. 141C not moved.]
Lord Livsey of Talgarth Lord Livsey of Talgarth moved Amendment No. 142:
Page 134, line 23, leave out "or the Secretary of State"
The noble Lord said: Amendments Nos. 142, 143 and 144 address the whole question of the Secretary of State in relation to local authorities and in particular to schools forums. In moving this amendment, I am asking a simple question. Does a local authority which has failed to obtain authority from its schools forum then have a second bite at the cherry by seeking authorisation from the Secretary of State? We see no justification at all for that. This is a simple set of amendments that deal with that problem, which we feel is inappropriate.
The intention of Amendment No. 144A, which is in the same group, is to probe the extended powers of schools forums. The Bill allows for an increased role for schools forums which will be given decision-making powers in addition to their current advisory role. We want to focus on this and see the extent of it. During the passage of the Education Bill 2002, there was much debate about the role of schools forums. The main concern was that the Bill would allow schools forums to determine whether some school support service budgets should be delegated to schools. In effect, that would give the forums de facto employer capacity over employees in those services without any of the accountabilities to which LEAs are subject.
At the time, Opposition Peers won a vote by 161 to 130 in favour of removing the provision for the establishment of schools forums. The then Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Ashton, came back with a helpful amendment which led to the current position whereby schools forums can now perform only an advisory role and cannot take any binding decisions on LEA's central retention of funds. This Education Bill, under Schedule 16, will give limited decision-making powers to schools forums. The purpose of this amendment is simply to probe exactly what those powers are.
The DfES memorandum to the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee refers to regulations under Paragraph 3(7) and Paragraph 6(3)(d). Paragraph 6(3)(d) provides that regulations may set out the circumstances in which a schools forum or the Secretary of State may authorise changes to the operation of an LEA's school funding formula to take account of local circumstances. Paragraph 109 of the memorandum states:
"It is appropriate that the detail of,
the circumstances in which this should occur,
"should be set out in regulations together with other detailed … provision relating to school funding".
By tabling this amendment, we are seeking some of that detail. Will the Minister oblige us by giving us some of that detail?
The other issue of concern in 2002 was whether schools forums were suitably representative. Many governors remained concerned about the low level of governor representation on some LEA schools forums falling well short of the proportionality originally envisaged as well as the need for training and good

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practice guidance. I understand that similar concerns are shared by the Audit Commission. Indeed, similar concerns were raised at a schools forums conference organised in conjunction with ConfED, NASG, NGC, NAHT, SHA and the LGA on 22 October in London. One delegate from Buckinghamshire reported:
"What struck me was that different Schools Forum were constituted in very different ways. In some there were virtually no governors, or no Teachers Panel representatives, in others, the Portfolio Member was the Chairman".
He continued:
"Despite the fact that Buckinghamshire's forum was slow to be properly constituted and formed, I was quite pleased that we had a balance of Headteacher and Governor representatives, that officers were in attendance but not members of the Forum, and that our Portfolio Member was an interested observer, welcomed at our meetings to contribute—but not a member of the Forum and certainly not the Chairman!"
There is little to require schools forums to consult and obtain views from those that they purport to represent. The next sentence is important. School governors, who are volunteers and already give heavily of their spare time to their schools, are unlikely in many cases to seek or play an additional role in schools forums. Head teachers in one particular sector, whether primary or secondary, may come to dominate their proceedings by virtue of the demographics or inequity of representation. What impact are such situations likely to have on the operation of the extended powers of schools forums? I beg to move.
Baroness Andrews: I am grateful to the noble Lord for giving me the opportunity to explain, as he has invited me to do, some of the implications of the powers that we seek and the impact that his own amendments will have on the proposals. I will start by saying, because this is the way that he started, that this is in no way a second bite of the cherry that was snatched away from us in the 2002 Bill. The decision-making powers that we are proposing to give the schools forums are very different from the powers that were proposed in that Bill. This is important to the noble Lords on the Liberal Benches—in this Bill we are proposing to take away powers that are currently held by the Secretary of State and not elected members. There is no intention to transfer powers from elected members. I will explain that in some detail.
However, I will first turn to Amendment 144A, which would remove the ability of the schools forums to acquire powers which we want to provide them with in order to replace central and local control. As I said, we have no intention of taking powers away from the LEAs. The powers would allow the schools forum to agree to certain types of proposals which themselves come directly from LEAs. These are proposals that would hitherto have had to come from the Secretary of State for approval. We aim to make what is a cumbersome process easier to operate but also allow local decisions to be taken locally.
Amendments 142, 143 and 144 would remove the powers of the Secretary of State to agree to variations in the budget and school funding regulations. I stress that these are existing and important powers. If they were removed, we would either have to devolve
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existing powers to schools forums or reduce the flexibility of LEAs to adapt regulations to reflect local circumstances. I am sure that neither of those things would meet the approval of the noble Lord.
To backtrack a little, I know that noble Lords on the Liberal Benches were sceptical about the schools forums and I trust that they are open minded enough to recognise that they are growing in capacity and confidence. I will return to the issue of representation later. Certainly, the conferences to which the noble Lord referred have shown that there is a great deal of exchange of best practice and information and there is a general sense that they are coming to terms with and doing the job that they were intended to do.
We propose to extend the powers of the schools forums in only two limited areas and to strengthen local accountability in so doing. The powers will apply to two sets of regulations, the first of which govern the composition of the LEA, schools and individual budgets and the second of which governs the determination of the individual schools' budget shares.
Under existing legislation, the Secretary of State and the National Assembly in Wales must make amending regulations to vary the operation of the budget regulations for an individual LEA. However, Section 47(2)(g) of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 already allows the Secretary of State and the Assembly to vary the operation of the school funding regulations without the need to lay amending regulations. It is true that those powers have been used sparingly in recent years; however, in the current financial year they have been used to a greater extent and in two key situations, which I shall outline.
5.30 p.m.
Our intention is to streamline the process further so that schools forums can agree to these types of proposals from LEAs, without the need to trek over to the Secretary of State for approval. There are only two types of proposal to which we intend that forums will be able to agree. The first is applications for an extension to the limits placed in regulations on central spending by LEAs—that is, for example, funds spent directly on provisions for SEN or PRUs, rather than delegated to schools. We know that the limit on central items of expenditure in an LEA is necessary to ensure that expenditure does not rise from year to year at a faster rate than do individual school delegated budgets.
That limit was introduced in England in response to the fact that in 2003–04 there were significant increases in LEA central spending at the expense of individual school budgets. We propose to continue to have such limits under the new funding arrangements, as we feel that it is right that schools themselves should receive their fair share of increases in the schools budget. We have debated that, too, at some length this afternoon. But there will sometimes be exceptional circumstances which mean that the limit set for an individual LEA should be higher than the one prescribed in regulations—for example, as a result of the reorganisation of LEA-funded SEN provision.

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Currently, applications for a higher limit have to come to the Secretary of State, who, if she agrees, then has to make amending regulations. To date, the great majority of cash applications from LEAs have been supported by the schools forums. We have no evidence that these are areas in which the schools forums and LEAs disagree and fall out. We think that in future— reflecting that fact not least—those should be matters for LEAs and their schools forums to resolve on their own.
The second instance involves variations in the detailed application of the minimum funding guarantee for individual schools, to avoid anomalous budget outcomes. For example, that would apply when, because of the change in circumstances of a school, such as the addition of a special needs facility, which would obviously have a major impact on the budget, making a like-for-like comparison of the school's budget share to calculate its guarantee is not possible. In that case, the new funding for the facility is excluded from the guarantee calculation and then added back to the school's budget share. This ensures that the school gets the full benefit of the guaranteed per pupil increase and the new funding for the facility. Again, we believe that LEAs should be free to make such decisions in future without reference to the Secretary of State, so long as the schools forum agrees. Again, those are areas in which one would expect full resolution between the schools forums and the LEA.
Two benefits come from pursuing this approach. First, it is right for decisions to be made at local level— we all agree about that—by the people who are best placed to judge the impact, and schools forums are well placed. Secondly, by allowing schools forums to agree to these kinds of local variations in national arrangements, we are reducing burdens on LEAs, reducing bureaucracy and reducing time.
To reiterate, it is not the case that we are seeking to introduce powers that we did not succeed in introducing in 2002. There is no power in the Bill to transfer powers which currently sit with elected members in local authorities to schools forums. These are very limited powers, and can be exercised only when an LEA itself puts a proposal to the forum. Schools forums will not be able to initiate the exercise of this power on behalf of the schools forum, and limitations will be placed on what they can agree to, which will mean that we have consistency across all LEAs. We believe, quite sincerely, that that enhances the democratic process.
I turn, very briefly, to Amendments Nos. 142, 143 and 144, which would remove the powers of the Secretary of State to agree to variations. Again, all our evidence is that in the vast majority of cases, a consensus is reached by the LEAs and schools forums about these issues, and there has been and will be no need to intervene. There may be occasional cases in which agreement cannot be reached, but in those cases we do not believe it would be right to give the schools forums a veto over the local authorities' proposals, which would be the effect of the amendment.
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There is another knock-on effect: as well as retaining the powers of the Secretary of State to make a decision in the event that agreement cannot be reached between an LEA and a schools forum, we also need to retain those powers to consider requests for a variation to the regulations which fall outside the scope of a schools forum's decision-making powers. In England, for example, that might be agreeing to an LEA delegating funding to schools through a method that is not currently approved in the regulations; or altering, in a more fundamental way than the forum can agree to, the workings of the guarantee to ensure that it reflects local circumstances. So there are difficulties with the amendments, both from the point of view that noble Lords are expressing and in principle.
I turn, finally, to what the noble Lord said about representation and the way in which the schools forums are working. We should congratulate schools forums on undertaking a new role during their operation, and on doing so successfully. Our evidence is that they are working well. The department is doing all that it can to enable sharing of good practice, to enable training and support and to be alert to the need to continue to do so. The membership is not only drawn from head teachers and governors but can include representatives of childcare partnerships, special needs organisations, dioceses and staff associations. Those people bring knowledge and expertise from different aspects, which is all extremely important when considering the issues that schools forums are there to address. They are evolutionary and we hope very much that people will continue to commit their time and energy to them to make them even more successful.
I hope that I have succeeded in giving the sort of detail that the noble Lord was seeking and that on that basis he feels able to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Livsey of Talgarth: I thank the Minister for that reply. A lot of ground has been covered, and there has been a very detailed response. I shall certainly wish to read Hansard and the detail that she has given us this afternoon to evaluate what she has said.
There is an issue about the second bite of the cherry, which we feel should not be given an opportunity. That relates to Amendment No. 144A, concerning the schools forums. We feel, particularly with regard to the Minister's later comments, that there seems to be no enormous confidence in the operation of the schools forums at present; they are finding their way. The Minister was, rightly, happy to relate details of good circumstances on schools forums, when there was a range of representation. However, the uncertainty with which the role of the forums is being addressed at the moment means that it needs to be defined rather more clearly.
With regard to best practice and representation, given the range that is desirable, which the Minister mentioned—indeed, she gave a very good example of the range of people that might be found on a schools forum—I do not quite see why it cannot be laid out in best practice, so that we know the type of people who ought to be on the forum. That would be desirable with

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regard to the whole issue of special needs. Obviously, we welcome what the Minister has said in that regard, and the provisions that are being made. That is a good example; but the voices of those concerned with special needs need to be found on the forum as well. I am sure that some authorities would need a little push in terms of guidance to ensure that we have a fair balance on the forum.
Having taken account of what the Minister has said, I shall study Hansard. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 143 to 143C not moved.]
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 143D:
Page 137, line 26, at end insert—
"( ) in sub-paragraph (b)(i) after "factors or criteria" insert ", including in particular factors and criteria relating to the ages, abilities, aptitudes and needs of pupils at each such school and the provision which may be made to meet such needs,"
The noble Baroness said: This amendment was devised to probe the issues concerning schools funding and in particular to propose a model of activity-led funding for both England and Wales. As we know, and as we heard at great length earlier today, the Bill allows for the Government's proposed changes to the way in which schools are funded to take place. Those include all the issues that we debated at great length earlier.
In its report on public expenditure published on 7 January 2005, the Education and Skills Committee said that the changes made by the DfES to the funding system had resulted in the loss of LEAs' ability to make any executive decisions about school funding and would inevitably lead to far greater involvement of the DfES in day-to-day management of the school funding system. The committee argued that the DfES did not understand the problem on which it based its decision to centralise funding. There was no proper evidential base for the view that change was needed and no confidence that the changed system would address any problems. You do not have to agree with every word of the Select Committee's report, but you do have to take note of that level of concern and the level of concern that has been expressed in Committee today.
Paragraph 27 of the Select Committee report states:
"The decision to change to three year budgets with ring-fenced grants and minimum funding guarantees was taken quite abruptly".
I think that there is far too much of that. There has so far been no consultation with local authorities, as mentioned earlier, on the way in which their role is to be changed. A consultation paper is promised very soon, but it will be some time after the Government are committed to this legislation. I think that that is putting the cart before the horse. We have far too much of that with this Government.
According to the LGA, most local authorities continue to pay more into funding their local schools than the amount given them by the Government. The most reassuring thing that I heard earlier from the
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noble Lord, Lord Filkin, is that the basis of the new direct schools grant will be the amount currently being spent, at least initially, including the extra money that is coming from the LEAs. I am a little concerned that that will gradually disappear over the years. At least initially, however, I was most reassured that that money will be there.
The NUT and the LGA have briefed us about their concerns that these proposals will significantly reduce local democratic control over school funding, and that has been reflected today by leaders of local authorities in the Committee. Under the proposals, funding will be determined not on an objective basis but on the basis of historic spending patterns, including the extra money that local authorities have until now been putting in. LEAs that have historically spent less than others would be under no pressure to increase spending.
It would be fairer for all schools and children to have an activity-led model of funding. That is the intention behind this amendment. This model determines the basic entitlement of schools to funding by identifying the cost factors involved in the delivery of the national curriculum. An activity-led approach seeks to identify the real costs faced by schools and represents a bottom-up approach to quantifying school funding. The current system, by contrast, is a top-down approach.
The use of pupil numbers as the central determinant for funding can cause problems for schools. Apart from problems related to cost pressures which may not be related to pupil numbers, there is the problem of falling rolls which has also been mentioned today. Between 2004 and 2012, full-time equivalent pupil numbers in England and Wales are expected to fall by half a million. This is a rare opportunity to keep the funding stable and to improve teachers' working conditions and the quality of education—but one which I am afraid is likely to be missed under a system where funding is based on pupil numbers alone. That is why my amendment proposes an activity-led model. I beg to move.
5.45 p.m.
Lord FilkinI agree with one of the objectives outlined by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley: the concern to ensure that the funding which a school receives should reflect the different cost basis that the school experiences, often driven by differences in the age, abilities, aptitude and needs of its pupils. However, we do not believe that this amendment is necessary. Let me try to explain why.
Section 47 of the School Standards and Framework Act makes provision for regulations that specify the factors or criteria to be used by an LEA in calculating the school's budget share. As we know from our previous discussion, the role of the LEA as the distribution decision-maker for the school grant continues. At present, Section 47 enables the Secretary of State or the National Assembly to put into those regulations permission, or a requirement, to use any reasonable factor or criteria. The regulation-making

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power is drawn widely. In our view, it is therefore not necessary to insert specific factors on to the face of the Act. The regulations are reviewed regularly after consultation with our school and local government partners to reflect current policy and the needs of the school. They already deal with most of the factors listed in the amendment.
In one technical respect the amendment is flawed. It seeks to widen the scope of the regulations to include the provision to be made to meet the needs of pupils, but these regulations are specifically about the calculation of schools' budget shares, as Section 47(1) makes clear. It would be contrary to that for the regulations to say anything about provision, for example, by specifying staff levels or class sizes. Decisions on the use of a school's budget share are a matter for the governing body, subject to the restriction that they must be used for the purposes of the school. We think that it is fundamental that the governing body and the head, working with it, should retain that discretion.
As the noble Baroness signalled, activity-led funding is what the NUT was after on this. I think that it has been after that for a number of years. The regulations do not refer specifically to activity-led funding. If they had, I am sure that the amendment would not have been moved. Activity-led funding is a model that uses an attempt at a detailed assessment of the cost of delivering education to pupils at particular key stages by reference to teacher time and other measurable input costs.
In fact, some authorities have used activity-led funding assessment to revise their funding formula— for example, to check whether their balance of funding between primary and secondary is correct. The age-weighted funding per pupil contained in most authorities' funding formulae is based on assumptions about the relative staffing costs. But as the noble Baroness indicated, those may have a historical basis that may have become distorted over time or not fully reflect the changes in schools.
So, activity-led models can be one of a number of useful tools to assess and challenge the validity of the formulae to allocate resources between schools. There is nothing in the Section 47 regulations to prevent an LEA going down this road, although in doing so it will have to have regard to overall affordability. On the other hand, we see no justification for seeking to impose this method of funding on schools. As I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, and others will agree, the attempt to find universal agreement on the distribution formula between local government or between schools is a bit of a will-o'-the-wisp. We have been debating SSA for many happy decades, but there is never a single right answer. So we think that, consistent with the framework of national guidance, local authorities should have the freedom to make their decision on these issues.
Local authorities should by all means use activity-led models as a mechanism if they think that it is useful as a way of checking the validity of some of the inbuilt assumptions in those distribution practices. However,
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I do not think that it is helpful for us as the centre or state, or for Parliament, to tell them that they have to use such a method. They should use the method that they think is most sensible, consistent with their statutory obligations. That is why we think that it is not necessary to go this far in this respect.
The noble Baroness made one or two comments about consultation and what the Government are seeking to do. As I think I said, we are not seeking to remove LEA influence over decision-making on school funding. In fact, the local authority is absolutely central. The new dedicated school grant will simply ensure that the increases in central government funding intended for the schools actually reaches them.
As has been signalled—I think the Prime Minister gave an indication in May 2004, and as I indicated earlier—this move is a clear and logical extension of the movement of government policy over time. As regards consultation on the detail, while we have not yet formally published a public consultation paper, but hope to do so shortly, there has been very detailed engagement with local government finance specialists and others in schools about these issues. They are very much involved with them.
There has also been considerable discussion with local government about the changes in role—I have been part of those discussions—that the Bill is making; in other words, affirming the enormous leadership role of local authorities over the totality of the children's agenda of which education is part. I believe that the noble Baroness was a little harsh on us in that respect. but be that as it may. Essentially, local authorities can use such methods if they want to, but it should not be for us to tell them that they must.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for his reassurances that my amendment is unnecessary. When my copy of Hansard arrives tomorrow I shall read what he said with great care to confirm that he is quite correct, although I am sure that he is. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 144 to 144A not moved.]
Schedule 16 agreed to.
Clause 99 [LEA targets: England]:
Lord Livsey of Talgarth Lord Livsey of Talgarth moved Amendment No. 144B:
Page 52, line 30. leave out "educational performance" and insert "educational opportunities to be made available to"
The noble Lord said: In moving Amendment No. 144B, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 144C and 144D. The emphasis here is to assert educational opportunities rather than to be bogged down with educational performance. Indeed, the amendment seeks to take out the provision to allow LEAs to impose targets on schools. Clause 99 re-enacts provisions in the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 for England because the Children Act has repealed this previous legislation.

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The Bill re-enacts the requirement for schools and local education authorities to set challenging annual targets for pupil performance and to submit those to the Secretary of State. The Explanatory Notes state in paragraph 189:
"This is a continuing power which is needed because the existing requirement contained in regulations relating to education development plans will cease to have effect when the repeals of sections 6 and 7 of SSFA 1998 effected by the Children Act 2004 come into force".
However, no pupil targets are set by LEAs in Wales, so why is this needed in England? As a Welsh Peer, I thoroughly approve of the situation in Wales in that regard. Target setting should be a collaborative exercise beginning with the pupil and his or her teacher. From individual pupil-teacher targets, those for teacher-head teacher, head teacher-governing body, governing body-LEA and LEA-government can then follow. Any target-setting exercise should be based on a mature understanding of current achievement and a realistic set of aspirations about what can be achieved in the future. With all their emphasis on personalised learning it is very disappointing that the Government have chosen to reintroduce the top down imposition of LEA level targets.
Amendments Nos. 144B, 144C and 144D will no doubt be criticised as completely unworkable—as, indeed, they would be. But that is exactly what very many head teachers feel about imposed targets. Real achievement by schools and local education authorities is obscured by pointless debates about whether arbitrary government or LEA targets have been achieved. Parents and teachers are better informed of pupils' strengths and weaknesses by teacher assessment. That assessment provides valuable information rather than a simple label that tells no one very much. I beg to move.
Lord Filkin: This is the first of a number of important groups of amendments about targets. Clause 99 maintains the current statutory accountability regime whereby the Secretary of State requires local education authorities, through regulations, to set annual targets for the educational performance of pupils for whom they are responsible and to notify those targets to her for England.
The requirement for LEAs to set targets for pupils' educational performance has provided a powerful stimulus for the improvements in educational standards at both primary and secondary level since 1997. We believe it is essential to include a power in this Bill for local education authorities to set and submit educational targets for the attainment and attendance of pupils in their area. These targets have helped us to deliver the impressive rise in standards that we have seen over the past seven years. Primary schools are now performing better than ever. We have halved the number of schools where fewer than 65 per cent of 11 year-olds achieve level 4 in English or maths and we have doubled the number of schools where more than 80 per cent of pupils achieve level 4.
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In addition, over half of all 14 year-olds are now achieving level 6 in maths—above the expected level for their age. London is now the fastest improving region in the country for GCSE results, and maintained schools in London are now performing for the first time above the average for all maintained schools. Such rapid improvement would not have been achieved without the challenge of specific and focused targets related to performance outcomes.
However, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, that targets should be a collaborative and bottom up process. I reassure him that what he asserts is not the case. The clause will not change the bottom up process for setting targets that we have now introduced for both schools and local education authorities for the good reasons that he set out. Schools will continue to set their targets first with local education authorities setting their targets after they have had proper debate with the schools in their area on whether they think the targets are sufficiently challenging and ambitious, and whether they are realistic. That is how the process should work. We will not go back to top down target setting, nor will we impose unrealistic or unachievable targets on local education authorities.
We recognise that for targets to have relevance and be a powerful tool for helping to drive school improvement, they must be owned by schools and local education authorities and they must be realistic as well as challenging. However, they must be capable of being challenged; that must be part of the process of setting targets. I hope the Committee understands what I mean by that. Local authorities and government must have the power to ask schools and local authorities respectively whether targets are sufficiently ambitious and clear and whether that is as far as they should be going in that respect; otherwise, there is the danger of complacency setting in within the system and, as a consequence, children will lose out if the relevant school or local authority does not do as much as it could do.
Targets have been a powerful tool for school improvement. Head teacher associations, schools, local government associations and chief education officers have all welcomed the changes we have made to the target setting arrangements over the past year. Therefore, I am delighted to give the reassurance that the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, sought in that respect.
The national targets are ambitious. We make no apology for maintaining our commitment to them. We will not give up on ambitions for children, but that has to be the product of debate between local authorities and their schools, and between central government and a limited number of local authorities where, at least on first look, it seems that there is a question about whether they are being ambitious enough. Our five-year strategy sets out our aims for primary and secondary education. We want the best in the basics of reading, writing and maths for every primary age child.
Amendments Nos. 144C, 144D and 144E would replace the requirement for LEAs to set targets for educational performance with the vaguer notion of

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opportunities. Of course, we all want children to enjoy a rich mix of opportunities throughout their education. Every Child Matters shows the Government's commitment. Schools should offer an enriched curriculum that stretches and engages the children and prepares them better for adult life. Services and learning should be designed around the needs of the individual child. However, we should not prescribe those opportunities through targets. That should in general be for the local education authority and schools to determine. Therefore, it is slightly surprising to see an amendment that would appear to want to prescribe how they do that—in other words, to specify inputs—rather than focus on the standards of education.
The children and young people's plan will be the strategic, overarching plan for all services for children and young people, which will address the local authorities' wider responsibilities, including how they would provide educational opportunities for all children and young people in their area.
As to why targets are set in England and not in Wales, I am afraid it is the standard answer, on which I would have expected support from the Liberal Democrat Benches. We believe in devolution, and that means that sometimes people will do things differently. I will say no more. I hope that has been helpful.
6 p.m.
Lord Livsey of Talgarth: I was particularly pleased to hear what the Minister said on devolution. It is interesting to observe that two different systems are operating and in the past 18 months the results in Wales have overtaken England. Perhaps this can be achieved in two different ways by two different recipes. We have a probing amendment here on which we want to test the Government. I acknowledge what the Minister said, with his examples on level 4 targets reaching 80 per cent of achievement, which is to be welcomed.
One of the main thrusts of Amendment No. 144B was to look particularly at educational opportunities in relation to the alternative of educational performance. Obviously, there is room for both in the education system. We are particularly concerned about the motivation of children and that they have interest in a variety of subjects, some of them outside the school curriculum, which would motivate them to perform rather better, whereas a prescribed educational performance method would switch off some children.
I am glad to hear the Minister say that it is not totally a top-down situation, and that the LEAs and schools will be involved in the target-setting procedure. We need to examine what the Minister has said, and evaluate it in relation to what I have just said. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 144C and 144D not moved.]
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 145:
Page 52, line 38, leave out paragraph (c).
The noble Baroness said: The whole concept of the Secretary of State setting annual targets is questionable in itself, but the provisions of Clause 99(2)(c) are particularly inappropriate. We now have a situation where the Government have agreed that schools will be responsible for setting their own targets at key stage 2, key stage 3, and at other key stages, and that neither the local authority nor the Secretary of State can impose targets on individual schools. The powers set out in Clause 99(2)(c) would enable the Secretary of State unilaterally to amend targets provided by LEAs or require modification in a manner that could bring unacceptable pressure on individual schools, because targets will be used by LEAs to provide an aggregate target for that authority, as just described by the Minister.
We have tabled this amendment because we feel that the imposition of the Secretary of State here is totally inappropriate. I beg to move.
Lord Hanningfield: In moving that Clause 99 does not stand part of the Bill, I will be adding to what the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, has just said. Clause 99 enables the Secretary of State to make regulations requiring local authorities to set annual targets in respect of schools. There are a number of pertinent questions as to why the Secretary of State should possess such powers and oppose such targets these days.
The recently changed regulations now require schools to set their own targets on improved pupil performance. Formerly, the LEA played an active "challenge" role in the school target-setting process, and LEAs strove to get schools to set targets that would aggregate up to the LEA target. The approach now is that the LEA would only challenge or intervene where the school has set targets outside the range suggested by its data. With this change of emphasis on the school setting its own targets and becoming far more of an independent entity in its own right, which we all support, why does the Minister believe that such targets are still relevant? I believe in devolution too, and I believe in devolution to local authorities and schools, so this is not the sort of thing in which the Secretary of State, in this day and age, should be involved.
LEA targets were set in a dialogue between LEAs and DfES senior officers. I have spoken to a number of senior LEA officials throughout the country, who have said that there has often been pressure from the DfES to inflate LEA targets. Therefore, in interpreting some of this, we might interpret that the Secretary of State might want to bring back LEA-wide targets: I would not approve of that. The setting of overstretched targets has led to such targets ceasing to be motivating for LEAs and schools. Therefore, I hope that the Minister can give assurances that these targets will be set on a realistic basis to reflect the circumstances of schools in a particular LEA. Can he also assure me that local education authorities will be consulted during the target-setting process? Working

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in partnership is a far more effective way of achieving things than having unrealistic edicts passed from the Secretary of State down, if the Secretary of State is going to continue to intervene.
With the development of alternative education schemes for 14 to 19 year-olds who are not benefiting from full-time schooling, there is a growing problem that these pupils' achievements are not captured in the data on GCSE/GNVQ. Schools may be providing appropriate schemes for 14 to 16 year-olds but not meeting targets for GCSE. What assurance can the Minister give that this growing trend will not unduly penalise and distort the results and targets that local authorities are expected to meet?
Lord Filkin: To start with, this is not a new power. This does not impose additional burdens either on local education authorities or schools. Clause 99 maintains the current statutory accountability regime, whereby the Secretary of State requires local education authorities, through regulations, to set annual targets for the educational performance of pupils for which they are responsible and to notify those targets to her. In that respect, I do not imagine that there is any debate between us that local authorities should be setting targets for the schools in their area, both in the specific and the aggregate. That is part of the "challenge" function, to be matched hopefully by the "support" function that the local authority will provide. Perhaps the debate is about the role of the Secretary of State rather than the role of the local authority.
The setting of ambitious national targets and the requirement in turn for local authorities and schools to set their own targets has provided a powerful stimulus for improvements in educational standards at both primary and secondary level since 1997. The existing power for local education authorities to set annual targets for the performance of pupils at key stages 2, 3 and 4; for school attendance; and for children leaving public care has been in place since 2000 through the education development plans. The requirement to produce and submit an education development plan has been repealed under Schedule 5, Part 1, to the Children Act 2004 as part of the streamlining of local authorities' planning arrangements. From 2006, there will be a single children and young people's plan, which will not have to be submitted for approval to the Secretary of State.
The Government believe that it is essential to include a power in this Bill so that local education authorities are required to set educational targets for the attainment and attendance of pupils in their area. As I have signalled, that is a fundamental part of the job of a local authority in giving leadership to its schools, both collectively and individually, to raise their ambition to get better results for their children. That is one of the critical and crucial roles of the local authority in adding value to the education system of its area over and above what individual schools do. We have talked about the contribution of school improvement partners as part of that. Therefore, we do not believe for a second that now is the time to
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sweep away the gains that a stronger system of accountability has delivered. Without being too bureaucratic about it, having accountability expressed in a way that one can measure—
Lord Hanningfield: But the targets may be as obvious as the fact that a school must have a playing field. That is the point that we are trying to make. Whether one is talking about targets or trying to improve performance, that is obvious everywhere in local authorities and, if that is the case, local people should be left to get on with it. The Secretary of State might as well prescribe that a school should have doors. It is accepted that targets are part of the system, but it is far better if they are set at a local level because people there know the circumstances and they know what they are trying to improve.
Lord Hunt of Chesterton: As I understand it, the provision is included in the Bill because, if local authorities are the only ones to set the targets, there will be very large discrepancies across the country. I was a governor of a secondary school in Cambridge and I noticed that, depending on where they came from, the people applying for jobs at the school had totally different concepts of what was required in terms of standards and so on. Unless I have misunderstood, that is partly what the Bill touches on. It seems to me to be a question of having the same standards across the country.
Lord Filkin: I always find two interruptions at once difficult to handle, particularly when they seem to be on different points. Be that as it may, I shall try to address both.
Essentially the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, was saying that this issue is so motherhood and apple pie that it is not necessary to have it and therefore we should not bother to include it in the Bill. If he is right in that argument—it is a bold argument—then there should be nothing burdensome about it.
But, of course, the clause goes further than that and that is what we should engage with. It also states that the Secretary of State is given the power to have a dialogue with local authorities about the targets that they have set. On the earlier group of amendments, on which we had a good debate, I signalled that we have moved away from a system whereby the Secretary of State sets targets, which are meant to cascade down in some way, to a system which is fundamentally much better. In the latter, the schools set the targets, the local authority is challenged to discuss them, the authority locks on to those targets and agrees to support them, and then the targets are set.
Therefore, this a question of whether we really believe that, in all circumstances, it is completely and utterly superfluous for the Secretary of State to have a debate with some—it is hoped, very few indeed—local authorities where, from the evidence, it appears to the Secretary of State that it is open to question that the local authority is setting an ambitious enough target for its area, its schools and itself. It is clear that we would be foolish to throw that away.

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It is true that, from recollection, in primary schools where this system of bottom-up targets has been in place for about a year the Secretary of State has had such a dialogue with only about 25 local authorities. With regard to the other 125, it has been possible to say, "We have confidence. We leave it to you and we won't have a dialogue".
For many decades, the House has seen the spread of local authority performance into every indicator that one chooses to identify between the good, the bad and the ugly, if I may put it so coarsely. There will always be some local authorities—I hope that there will be only one or two—where, due to a combination of factors, it appears that not enough is being done to accept responsibility under the Acts to raise children's educational attainment. Then, the role of the Secretary of State is not suddenly to set a target saying, "You must do it". It is exactly as the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, signalled—to hold a dialogue with the local authority in which the starting point is, "Can we talk to you about whether you are being ambitious enough, given, for example, the attainment of the children in your area in maths or English? Their attainment for their age looks poor in comparison with other local authorities". In such a situation, without any other stimulus, do we leave it completely to the local authority not to have a debate with the Secretary of State? I think that we would be mad to act in that way.
The trick, of course, as the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, said, is to ensure that this bottom-up process is in place and that an intervention by the Secretary of State is limited to where it appears that there is a case for a debate. It should be a debate between the LEA and the school about whether or not they have it right and, as a result, they should be able to move forward. That is essentially what this measure is about and it is included because we have a passion for raising the educational attainment of children in our society.
Fifteen or perhaps even eight years ago, people might have said that we can expect only so much from some children and that they cannot go further. Over the past seven or eight years, what schools, local authorities and the Government have done has been remarkable in breaking down some of the old assumptions about what is possible in the educational attainment of children—particularly those from poor backgrounds, who might traditionally have been written off in our society.
For that reason, while I hope that we do not need to use this power to a great extent, we would be irresponsible as a government if we did not retain the ability to have a debate with a local authority about whether it was being sufficiently ambitious for the children in its area. Therefore, I believe that it is morally, as well as politically, right for us to retain that power. But I assure Members of the Committee that it is right that local authorities should be realistic and that they should not overstretch schools. There is no point in setting heroic and stupid targets that do nothing but discredit, and the local authority must be actively respected as a consultee in the process. The
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same applies to looked-after children. I think I have said all that I should say at this stage and I hope that that has been helpful.
6.15 p.m.
Lord Hanningfield: From these Benches there is no denying that we believe in targets. We were the ones who first promoted them. But I believe it is time for the Secretary of State to abdicate any involvement in them. I am entering a complicated area, but most local authorities have what is called a public sector agreement. In Essex, it is worth around £25 million. It contains education targets, and every large local authority has education targets set by the Secretary of State. Not one local authority in the whole country, however excellent, will achieve them because the targets are set too high.
I repeat what I said earlier: these days, targets should very much be set by schools and by local education authorities. There are plenty of ways in which local authorities are challenged. At present, they are reviewed by Ofsted and, in future, there will be joint reviews in which they can be challenged. Schools have Ofsted inspections and local authorities have comprehensive performance assessments. That is where the targets should be challenged. Of course, there will be differences between the targets set in Cornwall and Durham or Essex and Lancashire because of the different nature of the schools. Therefore, there will be differences around the country.
I was disappointed to hear the Minister say that he wants the heavy hand of the Secretary of State still to be involved. We all accept that targets should be set, and there are now many more ways to ensure that that happens through all the other processes.
Baroness Walmsley: I was reassured to hear from the Minister that the intervention of the Secretary of State will be what I should perhaps describe as a last resort and that the process will be consultative. But, ultimately, the Bill gives the Secretary of State the power to impose changes on targets that have been agreed between the schools and the LEAs and aggregated together to achieve the LEAs' targets.
I think it is right that it is done in that way. The schools should agree targets which balance the challenging and the achievable. As the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, said, there is no point in having unachievable targets; that does not motivate anyone. But if the Government have confidence in the strength of the system in which schools set targets, they are agreed with the LEAs, they challenge the schools but they are achievable, then there really should be no need for the Secretary of State to intervene at all. It suggests that the Government think that the system may well fail.
I agree that there will be differences in different parts of the country. That is only right because the background of children in different parts of the country will be different. But I still believe that the intervention of the Secretary of State is

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inappropriate if the system described by the Minister is as robust as he says. Does the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, want to intervene?
Lord Dearing: I thank the noble Baroness. I am surprised that that doubt exists. This is the first time that I have risen to give unqualified support to the Government's position. I come from Hull and my title is Lord Dearing of Kingston-upon-Hull. I fear that in my city the aspirations of the local authority are not as high as they should be. For years we have plodded along at the bottom of the league table. It is fair in those circumstances for a Secretary of State to say, if it was justified and if he felt that the aspirations were not there, "Chums, we should aim to do better for the children of this city. Come on, let's discuss this". I hope that there would be agreement to aim for a higher figure.
Let me put that another way. As a nation we must lift our standards as a whole to allow all our children to earn a decent living. The challenge will be increasing and enormous. The Government can say that standards must be raised, but unless there is articulation of what government see as necessary aspirations and the work that the local authority puts into its schools, they will be paddling in the air with no water underneath. For the first time I find myself giving unqualified support to the Government's rationale, provided that a "bottom-up" process will be discussed between reasonable people. If the Government set an unreasonable target, the results will not happen. There must be reasoned thinking. I thank the noble Baroness for inviting me to comment.
Baroness Walmsley: I could see that the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, was itching to intervene. I would agree with him that if the LEAs only were setting the targets, it might be necessary for the Secretary of State to challenge them. But if those targets came from the schools and were aggregated into the local authority targets, it would become much less necessary, because every school that I know wants the best for its children. The teaching force, the assistants and all the non-teaching staff work towards that. We must trust the schools to be able to set challenging but achievable targets. If those elements were put together, the LEAs would provide the context. The Secretary of State should provide the context and the resources for schools to do that. The noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, wishes to challenge me, too.
Lord Sutherland of Houndwood: The noble Baroness is doubly kind to the Cross-Benchers. I must support the line offered by the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, in support of the Government, by sharing my experience of having to declare the first "failing school" in England. In that school there was, effectively, a collusion of ignorance and lack of aspiration between the local authority, the school and those who were responsible for the governance of the school. Such situations are, happily, not common, but in that case the difficulty was not simply in the school; it went right through the system. Other local authorities have been
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in difficulties since then, but that case seared my experience; we should be cautious before striking the provision from the Bill.
Baroness Walmsley: That is the most powerful argument that has been put against the amendment, and convinces me to withdraw it. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 145AA:
Page 53, line 2, at end insert—"
( ) provide for reviews, to be carried out at such intervals as may be prescribed, of the effectiveness and suitability of such targets in relation to the National Curriculum and other assessment arrangements for England made under Part 6 of the Education Act 2002 (c. 32)"
The noble Baroness said: The amendment seeks to probe the Government further on their position regarding testing and assessment in England—that is, to enable a review of the national curriculum and assessment system, similar to that which took place in Wales.
For many teachers, a number of government initiatives have had a positive effect on professional lives. In primary schools, standards in the core subjects have never been higher and examination results in secondary schools show that many young people are succeeding. The Government in England must properly acknowledge the major developments which have taken place in reforming assessment in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The review of assessment in Wales, conducted by Professor Richard Daugherty and his team, whereby SATs and targets are being removed, is a model from which the DfES should learn. An independent review of testing and assessment of children in England could be commissioned by the Government and I hope that they will consider that. Such a review should encourage and support assessment for learning and could examine the role of summative assessment.
There is strong evidence in secondary schools that teachers lack time for reflection and professional space for talking with and learning from colleagues. My experience in schools is many years old, but I remember that such was the case, even then. Many young people in years seven and eight believe that the curriculum does not encourage variety, enjoyment and engagement. We all accept that there is an intrinsic relationship between pupil behaviour and inappropriate curriculum.
The national curriculum and assessment system does not facilitate easily the preparation of pupils for adult life in a diverse society and in a global context. Nor does it encourage the meeting of specific needs, such as those of minority ethnic pupils and those from socially and economically deprived backgrounds. The curriculum must provide schools with the confidence to tackle discrimination, including racism, sexism and homophobic bullying.
The current structure of key stages 2 and 3 does not encourage curriculum continuity between primary and secondary schools—a matter of great concern to both

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primary and secondary school staff—nor is there a recognition in the two key stages of the different ways that primary and secondary schools are organised. In addition, the piecemeal reduction in the number of statutory subject orders for post-14s has not achieved the aim of all young people being offered a broad and balanced curriculum and of tackling effectively the vocational and occupational skills deficit. The plight of modern foreign languages, which was discussed at Question Time today, and technology for post-14s, is an example of the urgency with which the 14 to 19 curriculum has to be tackled.
All such problems indicate the need for a proper curriculum and assessment review, for which the amendment would provide. I beg to move.
Lord Filkin: Although my speaking notes might say "no", I am inclined to say "yes", but with qualifications. Perhaps I may explain that in more detail. In the two previous groups of amendments we debated our stance on targets. I shall not repeat that, given that we each know our positions, even if we cannot persuade each other.
There are 7 million adults in this country who do not have basic literacy and numeracy skills and that type of horrific figure drives us all to believe that we must do better in our system. We are also comforted by, but not complacent about, the fact that schools in the most deprived areas have seen the greatest improvement in performance in recent years.
The amendment seeks to require the Secretary of State to keep under regular review the targets related to national curriculum and other assessments. It is prompted by the decision of the Welsh Assembly to undertake such a review. We remain committed to our system of national testing and the independent Qualifications and Curriculum Authority maintains a comprehensive system to guarantee that the tests are of good quality and reliable. We are always ready to listen to constructive suggestions about the content of the tests.
The Welsh review is an interesting contribution to the debate on assessment. It centred on the educational needs of pupils in Wales, while ensuring that evidence from assessment is available to inform those who need to know about the learning of individuals and groups. At this point, we see no need to replicate that review in England. We will keep performance targets under review and the national targets are reviewed every two years as part of the Government's spending review.
Perhaps I may go a little further, because it is almost a truism of public policy that after a while the performance lift that is obtained from an innovation in terms of method can start to abate—in other words, over time, you obtain diminishing returns from some initiatives. Over and above that, government should constantly ask themselves, "Are there better means to achieve clear ends?".
Clearly, on much of the children's agenda we share a common goal with local government and with schools as regards our aims. Therefore, we have to
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continue to review—probably more than periodically—and that is fundamental thinking about whether a different system is likely to give us better lift. That is part of what good government means. I do not believe that we require statute to tell us to do that; we should be doing that anyway, as we must always seek a better outcome for what we put into the system.
I can assure the Committee that part of our responsibility is to reflect periodically on whether the curriculum formula and the performance formula systems are the best or whether there is a case for doing more. That is what we should do. Without agreeing that we should legislate for such a matter, I hope that reply is helpful.
6.30 p.m.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for that reply. He has stated that reviews may take place regularly anyway, but the link between the targets and rising standards is not reviewed. It is assumed that the rising standards are a result of the targets, as the Minister has said tonight. I do not think it is unreasonable to scrutinise that assumption very carefully. There may be other reasons. Wales, for example, has carried out a review. We have heard from my noble friend Lord Livsey of Talgarth that Wales is not doing better. Does the Minister want to reply?
Lord Filkin: As the noble Baroness knows, I am absolutely clear that the lift in educational attainment in England, which has been remarkable, has, in part, been the product of the challenge and ambition that targets set. It is a fact of life that if one does not have a target, one just administers; whereas a sensible target motivates one to think about what needs to be changed to improve. I am a passionate zealot for targets.
I am with the noble Baroness on what she was signalling; that—without being silly about it and having debating points—one should periodically reflect on root and branch systems. The Bill does exactly that. The new relationship with schools is about getting out from input controls and giving them the freedom of resources; the new inspection framework is about getting out of much of the detail and asking schools, local authorities and Ofsted to challenge whether they can raise attainment. They are explicit illustrations of a new model about how one improves performance and support people to do that. Therefore, as regards the future, we should consider matters broadly and have everything in scope. Without implying that we are about to throw away targets, which we are not, I am with the noble Baroness on that.
Baroness Walmsley: I have to agree with the noble Lord that targets can be very helpful. No one who has been to Weight Watchers would argue with that. However, the part that targets play, along with other factors, has to be considered. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 99 agreed to.
Clause 100 [Removal of requirements for governors'reports and parents' meetings]:
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 145AB:
Page 53, line 22, at end insert—
"( ) In section 22 of the Education Act 2002 (c. 32) after paragraph (b) insert—
"( ) take such measures as they consider appropriate to promote and encourage the membership of parents of registered pupils of school governing bodies""
The noble Baroness said: We come now to the part of the Bill which removes the requirement on schools to hold parents' meetings and for the governors to produce annual reports. It replaces the annual report with a school profile. Grouped with my amendment is the question whether Clauses 100 and 101 should stand part of the Bill. I support both of those propositions.
I believe that it is vital that parents should be involved as much as possible with schools and that, for many reasons, everything possible should be done to encourage parents to do that. We need the involvement of parents in their children's education; they need to understand the context in which that education is being delivered; they need to know something of their children's day-to-day experience; and they need to know about the curriculum so that they can help at home. We also need parents on governing bodies. If parents do not become interested in schools and do not have regular opportunities to visit schools, they will not be sufficiently interested to become governors.
If we remove the obligation to have an annual meeting, some schools will decide not to hold one and that will lead to problems with accountability of governors. Every corporate body, every charity has to have an annual meeting, providing financial information for the customers and shareholders of a company or donors to a charity. Schools use hundreds of thousands of pounds of public money and it is being suggested that they do not have to hold an annual meeting at which the governors can be held accountable for all that money. I believe that is very wrong.
Despite the fact that I would like to remove Clauses 100 and 101, I thought it would be helpful to table an amendment to ensure that schools have to take such measures as they consider appropriate to promote and to encourage the membership of parents of registered pupils on school governing bodies. As we heard earlier, many parent governors go on to schools forums where their input is needed.
There need to be better opportunities and strategies for the involvement of parents in schools. Some schools find it very hard to recruit sufficient governors of the right, age, gender and ethnic background to reflect the local community. The School Governance (Constitution) (England) Regulations 2003 require one-third of governing bodies to consist of parent governors by 31 August 2006. One of the most effective ways to tackle under-representation is to target parents. Greater parental involvement has all the benefits that I mentioned earlier, including family
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learning to support community cohesion. What sort of signal does it send out to parents if schools do not have an annual meeting?
There are approximately 350,000 school governor posts in England, which is about 1 percent of the adult population. I gather it is the largest volunteer force in the country. However, at any one time around 12 per cent of governor posts are vacant with some inner-city areas having higher vacancy rates. This is not the time to remove the obligation on a school to have parents in at least once a year.
One of the three roles of the governing body is accountability. One of the main stakeholder groups that it reports to is the parents and it could be argued that parents are the main stakeholder group. Certainly, by the enlargement of the parent group in the new regulations for 2003 on the constitution of governing bodies, the Government have implied that that is their view, but at the same time the accountability to parents is being considerably relaxed. There appears to be a lack of consistency.
There is an expectation that if governing bodies are no longer required to have annual parents' meetings, a very large percentage of governing bodies will not hold them this year, despite the fact that the Minister reminded us last week that this provision would not stop a school holding an annual meeting if it wanted. That would put more pressure on the annual report as the governors' main vehicle of accountability. However, the school profile proposal replaces the governors' annual report.
I have great problems with the proposals about the school profile. I do not believe it is anywhere near as good as the school annual report. It appears to be a box-ticking exercise and, according to the Bill, it is very prescribed by the Secretary of State.
I have received some briefing from the Special Educational Consortium expressing its grave concern about the replacement of annual reports with school profiles. It believes that information about the school's special educational needs policy, information about the school's arrangements for disabled pupils and information that I mentioned earlier about the finances for schools relating to the accountability of the governors is better given in an annual report.
On top of all that, I just cannot see how you can get a feeling for the ethos, the character, the very nature and the soul of the school, if you like, from a pro forma where you have to tick boxes. I do not see how it could work. Therefore, in the interests of being helpful, at least on Clause 100, we have tabled this amendment which we hope the Government might accept; although we are very firmly against Clauses 100 and 101, and I suspect that view will be echoed in various other parts of the Chamber. I beg to move.
Lord Hanningfield: I support everything the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, has said. In questioning whether Clause 100 stands part of the Bill, we wish to understand why the Government have decided to abolish both the annual parents' meeting and the governors' report. I wish to talk also to Amendment

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No. 145A. That is a simple and straightforward new clause that would give each headmaster the discretion to decide whether his or her school should have an annual parents' meeting. I shall talk a little more about that in a moment.
As the Bill currently stands, the obligation to hold such a meeting will be scrapped, as the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, said—I shall not repeat many of the arguments, I just want to stress them—as would be the requirement to produce an annual report to parents. Again that would apply only to England. We see that Wales is to continue with both the meeting and the report unless the Assembly decides otherwise.
Will the Minister explain the rationale behind such a step? In particular, what evidence is there that such meetings are not well attended or are not wanted, and, indeed, that the report is not widely read among parents of registered children?
We are not convinced that this is the best step forward, for many of the reasons given by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. Once again, in adopting such an approach as we did with the discussion on Ofsted in not involving governors and parents so much, we risk loosening and separating the bonds between parents and schools. In Committee, we have mentioned many times the important part that parents have to play in the life of a child's school. Such a step as this in the legislation merely erodes that involvement once again. Most parents find that having a parents' meeting is a useful and productive exercise, as it is possibly one of the few opportunities they have to find out what is going on in the school and how everything is progressing.
Although we might be told that schools could do this anyway, our new clause would mean that there would still be meetings, but that the heads would have discretion on whether to hold them. I hope that the Minister may support our amendment. He might say that that may happen anyway, but I should be interested to hear his views.
Lord Sutherland of Houndwood: I speak in support of these amendments for two reasons: first, the set of arguments already given in support of them; but, secondly—a point made earlier in debate from all sides of the Chamber—the Bill seems to be moving in the direction of downgrading the involvement of both parents and governors in how schools are run. There may well be practical problems about organising parents' meetings. I know of one head teacher who, to establish contact with parents, went out to hand the bills through doors and to post them through letterboxes; although she soon found that in certain parts of town you go with an escort before you do that. But that was the determination of the head teacher. I feel this Bill does not support that determination; we are moving away from it.
Had there been alternative proposals for the involvement of parents and governors in the running of schools that strengthened that involvement, perhaps these amendments would not be necessary. But, as the Bill stands, I think that they are.
6.45 p.m.
Lord Livsey of Talgarth: I wish also to support the amendment, in particular on the situation for Wales—and we have clarified the situation as far as concerns devolution. But we have some concerns. Clause 100 demands that the 2002 Act makes the requirement for a governors' report and an annual parents' meeting to apply only in Wales, with, as other noble Lords have said, the Assembly having an order-making power to remove these requirements in due course.
I have consulted a number of communities in Wales on this issue. I was a school governor for some time; I am not at the moment. These proposals are greeted with horror. People want to be involved in their communities. I do not know whether communities are much stronger in Wales, but certainly any prospect of removing the annual parents' meeting and not having a governors' report is treated as plainly unrealistic as far as concerns the cohesiveness of communities and their schools. So this is a matter of some considerable concern. I should have thought that many communities in England have a similar attitude.
Concurrently, I should like clarification in relation to Wales because it is part of the primary legislation. Does the provision in Clause 100(3)(b) mean that the Assembly could adopt the school profiles legislation as a consequence of removing these requirements at some possible date in the future? Given that the Government are rarely silent on anything, will their future position be to continue to urge schools to hold such events? Is there such a commitment or will they discourage them? Presumably saying nothing is certainly not an option in this particular instance.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: I hope my noble friend will be prepared to have a look at these amendments, although I am not sure that the amendments that we are debating are necessarily the right way forward. Earlier today we discussed the question of funding for schools and the desirability of giving schools three years' advance budgets as part of the process of giving more responsibility to individual school governing bodies.
My sense is that greater power and authority brings greater accountability. The accountability has to be not only to those who fund the schools—the taxpayers—but also to the parents and the children of individual schools. I think that there is a bit of a problem if parents lose the right to have at least an annual meeting with the governors of that school.
I well understand how we have reached this position. When we debated the question of funding, those of us in favour of the Government's proposals were very happy to quote from the Secondary Heads Association. There is no doubt that the secondary heads have had quite an influence on the drafting of the Bill, but on face-to-face meetings between heads and parents, it is not the Secondary Heads Association that I would turn to for advice. I fear that the Government have listened a little too closely to that august association in this area.

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I understand that in many schools these annual meetings are not well attended. That is probably a sign of health, It means that the parents are pretty satisfied with the way the school is being run and that they do not need to turn up to have a go at the governors. But, as noble Lords will know, my own experience is that it is the schools where things are not going well, where you have a weak governing body and a powerful though wrong-headed head teacher, where there can be real problems. I am not suggesting that the annual meeting of the governors with the parents will be a cure-all for solving those problems, but it is a way of at least allowing parents to put their concerns face to face to the governors.
My fear is that if we get rid of this mechanism, there does not seem to be any other way in which parents can require the governors to come and account for their stewardship. For that reason, I do not agree with the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield. He leaves discretion in the hands of the head teacher. The head teacher is the last person who should have discretion on whether to call a meeting of parents.
Perhaps my noble friend may be prepared to reconsider the matter. Would one way of dealing with the problem be for a certain percentage of parents at a school to sign a letter calling for a meeting between them and the governors? In other words, although I accept that, where parents are satisfied, the annual meeting becomes a ritual that no one is interested in attending, there are circumstances in which parents ought to be able to require the governors to account for their responsibilities—where there are real concerns about the running of the school. I do not have an easy answer to how that should be done, but I ask my noble friend to consider the matter and return to it on Report.
Baroness Howe of Idlicote: I know that we are coming to a close, so I shall be very brief, because we have already heard some extremely important points. I am strongly in favour of retaining meetings with parents and governors and of having a real input from parents to the school activities. I want to give two examples that have shown a way to involve parents much more in the future well-being of their children and other children.
The first is the Wales Pre-School Playgroups Association. I have endless examples of diffident young parents who started there who went on to be crucial in the education of their children and other pupils and become much more confident members of society. The other is the Government's own Sure Start programme. That has already shown us how it can bring out the qualities and potential of parents by getting them involved. We must build on that because, once parents have seen the inside of the school and feel that it is friendly towards them, they will be much more part of the scene.
I must disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, in his assumption that parents do not come because they are satisfied with the school. That is not always true. They could well, truly, not be being encouraged and not feel themselves part of the school. So I hope that
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we will get some reversion to the original pattern of a really high profile for parents for their meetings both with governors and in the school.
Lord Dearing: I intervene briefly to say that if the Government insist on Clauses 100 and 101, I urge that they accept Amendments Nos. 145AB, 145A—except that it should specify the governing body, rather than the headmaster—145B and 146, which I do not think has been mentioned, in which the governing body, in partnership with the headmaster should, in addition to what the Secretary of State may prescribe, decide the content of the school profile. I ask the Government to think about that.
Lord Taylor of Blackburn: As the chairman of the committee that introduced the Taylor report in the 1970s, which created school governing bodies, I have been reluctant to join in this debate until now. but to do away with an annual general meeting in the way that the Government propose is ridiculous. We need every support to encourage parents to serve on governing bodies. If you do not give them an opportunity to come to an annual meeting and to read an annual report, they will be less interested than ever. I plead with the Government after what has been said from all sides of the House this evening to take the proposal back and think again.
Lord Lucas: I very much agree with those Members of the Committee who want to do away with Clause 100. I mostly ally myself with the noble Lord, Lord Hunt: it is a matter of responsibility and a proper relationship between parents and governors in the school. People may not attend the meeting, but if they want it, it is there. There is a connection and a way to talk.
Indeed, I should like the Government to use Clause 101 to open that door rather wider. I have looked at the current draft of the school profile. It is a deficient document at present. It mentions the name of the chair of governors but gives no means of contacting her, other than through the school. If you have trouble with the headmaster, you want to know how to talk to the governors. It ought to list all the governors; it ought to give a way to contact them that does not come under the headmaster's beady eye.
It is crucial that governors are allowed to play their role in a school and are open and available to contact from parents. It is often extremely difficult for parents to do that, because the only way to find out the information is to disclose to the school the fact that they are talking to the governors. I find that thoroughly difficult and very much hope that, in its final version, this document will remedy that deficiency.
The school profile contains collections of data, such as how well the school's pupils achieved at 14, with a little bar graph, but no space for explanation. So there will be that little graph to show whether they have done well or badly compared to other schools or nationally, but no explanation, no words to provide understanding.

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Given all the criticism that has, quite reasonably, come from the Labour Benches over the years about the limitations of league tables, and how much more you need to say about a school to give a reasonable picture of it, it is very disappointing that, here, the Government are sticking to just the figures with no explanation. Well, there is a technical explanation of what they are but no explanation by the school of what lies behind them; nothing to say what subjects are being taught or what rationale lies behind that.
There are technical details, such as how we teach our pupils, which will not really be understood by most parents, but nothing that really speaks to parents directly about how pupils are faring in the school. There is nothing that could be said to be human about it. One of the great virtues of the annual report, when it is written well, is that it gives you a human picture of the school, a feeling of what it is like to be there. That has all been expunged from the school profile. There is nothing current about it. Yes, it will be updated every year, but it is a sort of mission statement tacked on to a few statistics. It is not a bad document in its way, but terribly limited.
It would be nice if there was a standard document— ticking the box at least makes sure that people fill in the various sections—but it should be much better thought out than it is and I want there to be a requirement that it should be on every local authority website. There should be a link to the school profile for every school that it looks after. That way, it will become possible for parents to use that document at a distance.
I also want to pick up on what the Special Educational Consortium has said about disability. There is a little box at the back that contains about five lines of standard wording and then says, effectively, if you want to know about our policy towards pupils with disability, e-mail the school. As the consortium says, that will not do. Parents feel that, by asking such questions, they are putting their child at a disadvantage or putting the school's back up by asking it to do something, becoming a tiresome supplicant of the school, rather than getting something to which they are entitled. That information ought to be readily available, not the subject of some special request of the school.
So, although I approve of Clause 101, it needs to be much better drafted.
7 p.m.
Baroness Andrews: I am very grateful to all Members of the Committee who have spoken in this important and passionate debate—I should expect no less. I shall try to keep my remarks short, because I know that the House is under pressure of other business, but I must take issue with some points. At the same time, I tell all Members of the Committee who have spoken that the Government are listening intently to what is said this evening. I hope that I can give some reassurances and a little extra explanation about why we have taken this route. I hope that it will make sense if I do so.
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I could not agree more with the noble Baroness when she said that it is vital for parents to be involved. The noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, asked me what explanation we can possibly offer for our decision in Clause 100 to get rid of the parents' meeting and substitute other forms of contact. It is precisely because we believe that there are more effective ways to do that and because so much has changed since school annual meetings were introduced in 1986.
To my noble friends, who I know feel passionately about this, I say that accountability is meaningful only if it is owned and supported by those who need to be held accountable and those who hold them accountable. We fear that the annual parents' meeting has not been effective in doing that job.
I shall now deal with some of the evidence and arguments, dealing separately with Wales. We have a great deal of experience to show that participation between parents and schools is not delivered sufficiently through an annual general meeting which involves a very random, and often very small, group of parents. I do not accept the argument that parents' meetings tend to happen only in schools that are doing well; there is fairly random distribution. A great deal depends on the leadership of the school and governors, and the effectiveness of parent teachers' organisations. It is very hard to generalise, so we should be very careful about that.
Most schools, and especially governing bodies, put huge effort into holding meetings and writing the governors' annual report, but our evidence suggests that few parents respond positively. These time-consuming and valuable activities require a lot of resources. The governors' annual report is designed to provide parents with information about the school's performance. Its content is heavily prescribed, detailed, lengthy and time-consuming. Removing the requirement to produce the annual report and introducing the school profile—about which I shall try to reassure the noble Lord, Lord Lucas—is at the heart of what we want to see in the new relationship with schools.
Schools and governing bodies have changed a great deal since 1986, when the annual parents' meeting was introduced by the then Conservative government. The same degree of parental representation did not exist in schools; parents certainly did not have the same rights to express preferences to schools; there were no regular Ofsted reports; no requirements on schools to have a complaints procedure; no home-school agreements; and no public achievement and attainment tables. Things have changed dramatically as regards the amount of information available and the accessibility of that information.
The 1999 Education Select Committee looked into the role of school governors. We pay a great deal of attention to the Select Committee; it is a wise and comprehensive body. Its report recommended the abolition of the parents' meeting, suggesting that governing bodies should find alternative ways—I shall come to Amendment No. 145AB on this point—of promoting good relationships with parents. Over the

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past 10 years many different ways of bringing parents into schools have been found. I have an inch-thick bundle of evidence about the different methods, such as out-of-school activities and various partnerships related to family learning, to which the noble Baroness pointed. We have moved on a great deal. I know from experience that such contacts generate the commitment that parents develop towards schools. Their commitment develops not from an annual meeting, which may last an hour and have no lasting impact, but from the regular, familiar contact between schools and parents daily. Of course we will want to encourage good practice. When I say that we are listening, we are listening particularly to those sorts of ideas about how best we do that.
When we talk about trust with parents, we send out a very powerful message. We believe in all seriousness that the annual parents' meeting is not sufficient, given the changes since 1986, given our other methods of contacting parents and the changes that we want to bring about in the school profile and the whole way in which schools communicate with parents. On Amendment No. 145A, I reiterate that there is nothing to stop schools holding an annual, six-monthly or three-monthly meeting with parents, if that is their commitment to parents. Many already go far beyond an annual meeting.
I have listened carefully to what my noble friend has said about governors. On the profile, we recognise that if you give schools increased freedoms, there are increased risks, and we must safeguard parents' rights to information. The best evidence of what we want to achieve through the profiles is the fact that they are being trialled. Last year we held a three-month national consultation on the profile. Of the respondents, 81 per cent of primary schools and 82 per cent of secondary schools welcomed the profile. Seventy five per cent of respondents thought that the profile should replace the governors' annual report.
The profile will not be a box-tick mechanism. Formulated information will be provided centrally because that will make it much easier for schools, which will not have to spend time putting together all the statistics. But there will be a narrative about the school, talking about its ethos, its expectations for its students and much more. All the key information will be engagingly written, short, accessible, readable and available in a range of languages. We are trialling the profile at 90 schools. That is why we think we will be on sure ground. However, we will continue to evaluate the proposal as it goes through; in fact, we are still waiting for feedback. We hope to introduce the school profile in the academic year 2005–06.
The noble Lord made a very important point about SEN and disability. He will know that it has always been a statutory requirement to include that in the governors' report. Now it will be in the school prospectus in the same form, under the same requirement. Nothing will be lost as regards the quantity or quality of information. I can enlarge on that when we debate the next set of amendments after the dinner break.
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Clause 100 retains the requirements for a governors' annual report and annual parents' meeting in relation to governing bodies in Wales, but it provides the National Assembly for Wales with the power to remove the requirements by order at a later date. Clause 101 does not apply to Wales. In Wales the situation is different—that is becoming a mantra. Already the governing bodies can produce a summary report that is significantly shorter, so the Welsh Assembly Government do not believe that school profiles are needed in Wales.
The Welsh Assembly Government consulted in early 2004 on proposals to reduce the need for governors to hold an annual meeting. Half of the respondents supported this proposal. The National Assembly for Wales proposes to make regulations under the Education Act 2002 giving provision for exemptions to the general requirement, but it wants to assess the impact of the proposal before it makes the next move. It can then determine whether to consult on proposals to abolish the requirement altogether. The situation in Wales is different but it is dynamic.
I have gone very quickly through the arguments in response to what Members of the Committee have said. I thank noble Lords for their remarks. We will continue to listen. We will have the opportunity to debate school profiles in more detail on the next set of amendments.
Lord Elton: The noble Baroness said a great deal about how governors will be able to communicate with parents but almost nothing about how parents will be able to communicate with governors. Do I understand from her reference that she is asking us to take comfort from the fact that parents can call a meeting if they are unhappy about what is going on? Does the noble Baroness really think that it is satisfactory to wait until there is a head of displeasure among parents sufficient to call such a meeting in place of one that takes place regularly?
Baroness Andrews: No, we would expect schools not to wait until such a point but to be on the alert for what parents felt and to ensure that their governors were involved. A great deal has been said in this short debate about governors. I reiterate that we are listening closely to what has been said.
Baroness Byford: Having listened very carefully to the debate, perhaps I may ask the noble Baroness a question before she responds. She says that the annual report is not sufficient or not working well. Is that really a good reason to throw it out? The noble Baroness said clearly that there were other ways of doing things, but surely it would be very sensible to maintain the provision in the Bill rather than get rid of it, until the new ways have established themselves. I should have thought that you could have the best of both worlds. I do not think that the noble Baroness

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quite responded to the reality. I should have thought that the Government would want to ensure that the annual reports and annual parents' meetings work in addition to the new ways that they seek of encouraging more participation between parents and schools.
Baroness Andrews: We are searching for new and better ways. The annual report, a very long document, has presented schools and parents with problems in the past. We do not want to throw it out without thinking very hard about what the school profile might achieve. However, as I said, we are listening hard. The Committee has made clear its views on the importance of parents in the school relationship and the importance of finding better ways of communicating with them. We are listening.
Lord Lucas: Throwing out something that is okay but could be better before we know what will be better is the wrong way to go about this. It is terribly important that we keep that line of accountability and, as my noble friend said, that we keep that accessibility for parents to the governors. There must be a way for parents, without having to appear pushy or tiresome, to talk to and deal with the governors. Once a year is little enough.
On my calculations, this House is in control of the matter. I think that the Bill will get caught up in the wash-up before the election, if it is when we expect it to be. We are therefore in a position to wipe this clause out without fear or favour. I hope that we will use the time to arrive at something better because the Government are being helpful. We need not live with the clause if we do not want to.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for going so quickly through so much information. I agreed with some of the things that she said but disagreed with others.
I agreed with the Minister that an annual parents' meeting was not enough. If the only way in which schools met the need was through an annual meeting, that would be very deficient. However, taking away the obligation to have the meeting does not mean that they do not have to go through all those effective ways of getting in contact with parents.
It has been said that not many people attend the meetings. Annual general meetings of companies and charities often do not attract many people, unless something contentious is being discussed. That does not mean that such meetings should not happen; they are an obligation, and they are a matter of accountability. The same thing should apply to schools that are using hundreds of thousands of pounds of public money.
I turn to the school profiles. The Minister said that information about disability policy, SEN policy, and so on could be put in the school prospectus. The prospectus does not go to every parent; they have to ask for it. The governors' annual report is the only document that is sent to all parents, without their having to ask for it. As, I think, the noble Lord, Lord
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Lucas, said, some parents might be reluctant to ask for the information about SEN policy or disability, for fear that their child might be victimised. That is surely an unfounded fear, but they may feel it. For that reason, it is important that every parent gets an annual report. It may be long and detailed, but, if it has a summary and a sensible contents page, it can still be a very useful document, even for a parent who does not have a lot of time to read every item in it.
The Minister said that the profiles were being trialled. Why put the cart before the horse and take away the obligation to produce an annual report, before we know that the profiles are better? We do not know that the profiles are better, and many noble Lords have expressed extreme reservations about them.
The Government would be wise to think carefully about the two clauses. I hope that the Ministers—the noble Lord and the noble Baroness—will listen to the concerns that have been expressed this evening. I do not intend to press the matters tonight, but we have a lot of support in the Committee and we may come back to this on Report. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 100 agreed to.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Lyell): Is the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, going to speak to Amendment No. 145A? It is part of the same group.
Lord Hanningfield: I am.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees: If the noble Lord wants to speak to the amendment, it might be convenient if we stopped now.
Lord Hanningfield: I wish to speak to Amendment No. 145A. Given the strength of feeling, I wish to test the opinion of the Committee.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees: We have not come to it yet.
Lord Hanningfield: I thought that the noble Lord was going to call it.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees: No.
Lord Filkin: This may be an appropriate time to move that the House do now resume for the Statement and the prayer. In moving the Motion, I suggest that the Committee stage of the Education Bill begin immediately following the conclusion of the prayer to annul the Fire and Rescue Services (National Framework) (England) Order 2004 but not before 8.15 p.m.
Moved accordingly and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.

Housing: Five-Year Plan
7.15 p.m.
The Minister of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Lord Rooker): My Lords, with permission, I will repeat a Statement made earlier today in the other place by my right honourable friend the Deputy Prime Minister on the publication of the Sustainable Communities: Homes for All document. The Statement is as follows:
"As the House is aware, the Government have been drawing up a series of five-year plans as we continue to modernise our country. Today, I am presenting the Government's new five-year strategy, Sustainable Communities: Homes for All.
"We will provide more homes to buy or rent through responsible growth; continue to improve the social housing stock; promote greater home ownership; and give more people a share in their home. Homes for All offers choice, opportunity and fairness. It is a comprehensive strategy to deal with the housing challenges which we face in this country.
"For decades, Britain has faced major long-term problems in housing. We inherited a boom-and-bust economy, with 15 per cent interest rates and hundreds of thousands of people suffering the misery of negative equity; a £19 billion backlog of repairs to social housing; and a record number of rough sleepers and families in bed-and-breakfast accommodation. And, for decades, the number of households had increased, while the supply of new housing had fallen. This widened the wealth gap and priced millions of people out of home ownership.
"Successive governments had failed to deal with these long-term challenges. Our priorities in the first five years were to deliver economic stability; tackle the backlog in housing repairs; and remove the obstacles to increasing housing supply.
"I am proud of what we have achieved. There are more than a million fewer non-decent homes than in 1997. Rough sleeping is down by two thirds, and we have virtually ended the use of bed-and-breakfast hotels for homeless families with children. In the private rented sector, we have improved investment and quality and tackled the problem of bad landlords.
"Labour economic stability has replaced Tory boom and bust with low interest rates, low unemployment and low inflation. It was only by making progress on these issues that we have been able in our second term to take action to increase housing supply and give more people choice and opportunity in housing.
"The number of households has been increasing faster than growth in population, while the supply of new housing has been falling. The number of single-person households has more than doubled from over 3 million in 1971 to about 6.5 million today.
"Ten years ago, house prices were 3.5 times people's annual salary. Now, they are six times the annual salary. Sons and daughters cannot afford to
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live where they were brought up. Nurses and teachers cannot afford to buy homes near where they work. As house prices rise, more people are priced out of the market.
"This is not just a housing problem—it is a matter of fairness, opportunity and social justice. That is why I announced the £38 billion Sustainable Communities Plan to the House two years ago. That plan provided for 200,000 extra homes in London and the wider south-east, increasing the total to 1.1 million in the wider south-east by 2016.
"Kate Barker's review of housing supply supported that decision. It said that undersupply of housing was threatening economic stability and people's quality of life. The review also said that we needed a step change in housing supply, meaning an extra 70,000 to 120,000 new homes a year. The Barker review concluded that many people on moderate incomes in high-demand areas were unable to buy a home.
"The case for sustainable growth is clear and unambiguous. The Sustainable Communities Plan and this five-year strategy will achieve growth in a fair and responsible way.
"Responsible growth means concentrating more housing in our four growth areas in the wider south-east; modernising the planning system to make more land available for housing; encouraging environmentally sustainable homes; using brownfield land; and protecting the green belt.
"Responsible growth also means providing infrastructure because we are creating communities, not just housing estates. We are investing extra resources in schools and hospitals and over £3 billion of new transport investment in the growth areas.
"The growth areas—the Thames Gateway, Milton Keynes and the south Midlands, Ashford and the Stansted/Cambridge/London corridor—are about creating sustainable communities with more affordable housing. Today, I am announcing £40 million for sustainable communities in other areas to support extra housing growth and promote regeneration.
"Today, I am also announcing important changes to our planning policies. We are extending our stricter controls on density to cover more areas of high demand in the east of England and the south-west. Development on brownfield land has already been increased from 56 per cent in 1997 to 67 per cent in 2003. Today, we are further encouraging the use of brownfield land. Our new planning guidance will help local authorities release unwanted industrial land to be used for housing or other purposes. We are using less land to provide the homes that people need. We are already doing this in London and the south-east, where we are planning to provide for 1.1 million new homes on less land than the last government set aside for 900,000 homes in 1997.
"We have already added 19,000 hectares to the green belt, an area the size of Liverpool. Now I am proposing a new green belt direction which will further strengthen the protection of the green belt, so that local authorities will have to seek my endorsement for development. We also want more affordable homes in rural areas. For the first time, we will allow local authorities to ring-fence land so that it can be used for rural affordable housing to meet local needs.
"Today, I am also announcing a review of the way existing homeowners apply for planning permission for home improvements. The number of such applications has doubled in 10 years to over 300,000 and this has put additional strain on the planning system. I believe that we can reduce red tape and make the planning system more effective while still safeguarding the rights of neighbours and protecting the environment.
"In parts of the north and the Midlands long-term industrial decline and people's changing aspirations have led to low demand for housing: 850,000 properties are affected and it has devastated the value of people's homes and undermined communities. We are investing £1.2 billion on nine market renewal pathfinders to help lift housing markets in many of the worst-affected areas. That investment could also attract billions of pounds of private investment. Today, I am making £65 million available to new areas, such as the Tees valley, west Cumbria and west Yorkshire, to tackle their problems of low demand.
"This plan offers more fairness, opportunity and choice to our 4 million social housing tenants. We are providing more affordable homes, more decent homes, more choice over where they want to live, more help with jobs and housing and more opportunities for home ownership.
"Following the recent spending review, we will provide 75,000 new social rented homes over the next three years. By 2008, we will have doubled our annual investment in new affordable housing to £2 billion compared to 1997. This is in addition to the £18 billion that we will have invested in the improvement of our existing social homes since 1997 to correct the disinvestment of the previous administration. That will benefit over a million people, many with new kitchens, bathrooms and central heating. I realise that these are not new houses, but for the people that live in them they are new homes.
"We also aim to halve the numbers of households in temporary accommodation within five years. We are on track to meet our commitment to bring every social home up to a decent standard by 2010. We are making £500 million of new private finance initiative credits available to allow local authorities to work with housing associations and the private sector to build new affordable homes.
"We are offering social tenants more choice to rent or buy and we have already considerably improved tenant participation. We are offering them more information and more involvement in the decisions which affect their homes.
"Local authorities such as Newham and Sheffield have been running choice-based lettings schemes, which have been very popular with tenants. I now want to work with all local authorities to expand choice-based lettings so that we can create a national system by 2010. I want this system to include housing associations and private rented homes.
"It would give information not just about renting but also the cost of buying a share in a home, and it would give more people a chance of finding a decent home with employment.
"We are establishing a new scheme called "MoveUK", which will help tenants find a new job as well as a home. MoveUK will extend our existing location schemes to help tenants find a new home and a better quality of life in another area.
"We are offering social tenants more choice and more opportunity. Our plan means that local authorities will continue their excellent work delivering the decent homes programme, continue to invest in new social housing, offer more choice and manage housing better and use their land for low-cost homes. We also know that many social tenants want to own a share of their own home.
"Since 1970, home ownership has increased from 50 per cent to 70 per cent and it has continued to grow in every region. Average interest rates are half what they were under the previous government. Cheaper and more stable mortgages have enabled over 1 million more people to buy their home under this Government.
"But there are still many people who want the opportunity to own a home. By offering more people the chance to own or buy a share in their home, we will widen opportunity and narrow the wealth gap between those with housing assets and those without.
"The House will be aware that 80 per cent of social tenants already have the right to buy their home. The right to buy and the right to acquire will continue to be available. They have helped boost home ownership, but have meant the loss of 1.8 million homes from the public sector and have come at a cost of £40 billion in discounts.
"In 41 areas of housing crisis, I have capped the level of discount. But elsewhere the right to buy still gives a discount of up to £38,000 for each home and the right to acquire gives a discount of up to £16,000. On average it costs us £75,000 in grant to replace each home that is sold.
"I asked Baroness Dean to chair a task force which made recommendations about how to promote sustainable home ownership while protecting the social housing stock. I am grateful for the valuable work and useful recommendations.
"Today, our new five-year plan offers a comprehensive package of schemes to help social tenants and first-time buyers to become home-owners. We have two different approaches; namely, HomeBuy, which will offer up to 300,000 council and housing association tenants the opportunity to buy an equity share in their home at a discount; and the first-time-buyer initiative, which, together with our key worker and other low-cost home ownership programmes, will help 80,000 families into a home of their own by 2010.
"HomeBuy is significantly different for several reasons. It will protect the social housing stock because social landlords will have first refusal to buy the home back if the owner decides to move to the private sector. It will help more people—up to 300,000 tenants—and it will be more cost-effective. We will consult on a range of options for discounts up to the level of the right to acquire.
"Tenants will be able to buy as little as half of their home, increasing their share over time if they want to. This will particularly help tenants who are unable to afford the right to buy or who do not have the right to buy. And—unlike right to buy—it will treat local authorities and housing associations equally, allowing both to retain the full receipts from the sale of homes, therefore creating a level playing field.
"Today's housing plan will widen the opportunity to own or part own. In addition to our HomeBuy scheme, I am announcing a radical new first-time buyers initiative. Our key worker programme has already helped over 13,000 key workers, such as nurses and teachers, who have been previously priced out of the housing market.
"This new first-time buyers scheme will help even more key workers and people on low incomes who cannot afford to buy a home. When they are ready to move on, the social landlord will have first refusal to buy it back, so that the house can be offered to another first-time buyer.
"The scheme will use surplus public land for new homes. The first-time buyer will pay a price that reflects the cost of construction. The public sector landowner will keep a share that reflects the value of the land. In due course, the first-time buyer will be able to increase his share—up to full ownership if he wants it.
"To begin with, the first-time-buyer initiative will use land owned by the Government and their agencies. But I want to encourage other public and private sector landowners—in urban and rural areas—to use their land for new, affordable housing.
"We are encouraged by our talks with the Council of Mortgage Lenders about ways in which the private sector can support and extend the first-time-buyer initiative.
"Separating the cost of land and the cost of construction in the first-time buyer initiative will be a big help in driving down purchase prices for the home buyer, but we still need to reduce construction
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costs, which over recent years have gone up more than three times faster than retail price inflation, and certainly higher than those in Europe.
"I have said that I believe you can build a home for £60,000, and it is now clear that you can. So I am asking English Partnerships to hold a competition challenging contractors and house builders to produce a well designed, environmentally efficient home for £60,000 without sacrificing safety or quality. Next week, at the Sustainable Communities summit in Manchester, English Partnerships will exhibit a house that shows you can deliver high standards at low cost.
"This five-year plan is the next step in creating sustainable communities: mixed use and mixed tenures designed to the highest standards; using less land to build more homes; and helping thousands of key workers and first-time buyers to get a home of their own. It means more homes and more home ownership with extra help for first-time buyers. The five-year plan offers choice for all, fairness for all, opportunity for all, and homes for all in sustainable communities. I commend it to the House".
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
7.31 p.m.
Baroness Hanham: My Lords, first I thank the Minister for repeating this rather euphoric Statement made in the other place earlier this afternoon, and for sending me a copy in advance of the Deputy Prime Minister's comments.
I am afraid to say that I still think that today's Statement contains a series of previous announcements and some half-baked compromises that will do little to address the deep flaws and underlying problems that still afflict the country's housing market, many of which are the result of this Government's own policies. Given the time constraints and the length of the euphoric Statement, I intend not to comment on every element but to stick to one or two particular areas.
Despite what the Minister has said, under this Government homelessness has continued to increase. The number of individuals and families living in some form of temporary accommodation, whether within local authorities' own stock or not, is still far from being reduced. And, as the Minister has said, the chance of a young couple being able to afford their own home is a complete pipedream. Indeed, only on Saturday Halifax Estate Agents, the country's biggest estate agency, published information showing that first-time buyers on average salaries simply cannot afford to buy a home in 92 per cent of towns across the country. I see the Minister nodding in assent, and I think we must all agree with that finding.
But the position has not been helped by the Government. Over the course of time they have increased council tax by 70 per cent and imposed an additional increase of £1,200 in stamp duty for first-time owners. Along with the abolition of mortgage tax relief, these measures have combined to make home

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ownership a near impossibility for hundreds of thousands of people each year. No wonder the Prime Minister said earlier today:
"If you are a young couple struggling to make ends meet and get your feet on the housing ladder, it's very difficult".
Indeed it is, and it is also worth asking the Minister whether he is aware of the current slowdown in the housing market and what that brings with it; namely, the possibility of negative equity. If young people cannot get on to the housing ladder, those young people who bought flats and houses a little while ago will not be able to sell them because the value of their property is more than likely to be less than what they paid for it. Sadly, the proposals announced today will do nothing to change that situation.
The ability of housing association tenants to have a stake in their property, limiting the purchase to only 50 per cent of the value of their home, is another half-hearted policy. Indeed, so far as I can see, it is a rerun of equity sharing given that it has all the ingredients of that system, which has been around for as long as I can remember. As a policy, it has had varying degrees of attraction, although equity sharing as such has not always been a policy that has taken off well. Can the Minister confirm whether he believes that the new scheme falls within the terms of the right to buy? If it does not, is it equity sharing by any other name?
Does he not also agree that housing association tenants will not have the same right to buy as council tenants? Labour's proposals announced today for a "social home-buy" scheme will not allow people to buy their own home outright. Will housing association tenants still be told to whom they can and cannot sell their share of the property? The Statement indicates that they will have to offer first refusal to the local authority. Presumably the only reason a local authority will not buy back a property will be because it has no capital to do so. Can the Minister tell us where the capital is going to come from for such properties to be bought back?
Is it also the case that anyone who purchases such properties will have to ask permission to make any home improvements? If they do, this is simply not a question of home ownership. On reflection, therefore, this is a very half-cooked egg. Is there not also a danger that a market within a market will be created as the value of such units of accommodation will be artificially depressed, creating a cycle from which it will be difficult to escape? As a result of today's Statement, not one single housing association tenant will be able to own their current home.
The Conservative Party would help social housing tenants to purchase the homes of their choice, not only their present house, by extending the availability of transferable discounts and giving them a right to own. The new government will use the receipts from right-to-buy sales to fund these discounts. Transferable discounts will also free up existing social housing that can be let to those most in need. The proceeds of new right to buy will be available to be reinvested in new social housing.
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That is the line which should be adopted and, having announced it as we have, I daresay that the Government will scoop it up, just as they have so many other of the excellent Conservative policies that have been put forward recently. The Government have decided to absorb them into their own policy system. I offer this policy on the clear understanding that it will be one that the Minister will not want to adopt.
The other main plank of today's announcement is the provision of cheap houses for key workers that will lead to tens of thousands of starter homes on government-owned land for as little as £60,000. I should like, first, to ask the Minister where such land will be found. Secondly, even with the enormous help of English Partnerships, where do the Government believe that a house of any substance and style could be provided for £60,000, particularly in the south-east of England?
So far, the Government's sole answer to the housing crisis has been to concrete over more and more green fields in the vain hope that eventually supply will match demand and bring house prices down. We now learn that the Government wish to see a "step change"—meaning a big increase—in the total output of new homes, as recommended by Kate Barker in her review last year. But it is clear that we simply cannot build our way out of our housing problems. Big increases in the provision of market housing, even if they were ever achievable, would do nothing to reduce house prices and would be likely to cause serious environmental damage. The Minister will know also that there are still grave concerns about the new areas which have been put forward for development.
The Government have to become more ambitious about making better use of previously developed brownfield land. Is it correct that the Government's target of 60 per cent of all new homes to come from conversions or building on brownfield sites was reached within eight years and that since then the level has risen to only 66 per cent? There has been only a very small increase over the past few years.
I hope that the Minister will also comment on a question that I have put to him in the hope, ultimately, of receiving a written response. Is not much brownfield land likely to be classified as "landfill" under new European regulations? If that happens, the land will be deemed to be contaminated and will not be available or able to sustain housing. I am sure the Minister will have heard of the new directive. Perhaps he will comment on it orally today as well as sending me a written reply.
The Government are obviously still determined to steamroll ahead with their plans to impose massive housing targets on the countryside, despite the fact that there are considerable concerns about sustainability and the sustainable communities policy. Perhaps the Minister will comment on the reaction of local authorities in the areas that are likely to be affected as well as that of the local people.
It is clear that there have been some grave disagreements within the Government about policy issues and what the objectives should be. The Minister

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has announced several new tranches of money. Can he say whether they are indeed new tranches or whether they have been subsumed already into the Red Book calculations. That would of course include the £30 billion that has been put forward.
I should comment again on the Government's attitude towards right to buy because it is informative. When they were in opposition they refused to accept that right to buy was a policy of any value whatever. Indeed, they campaigned strongly against it. When they came into government, they marginally accepted that there might be a possibility that right to buy would work, but they were not very enthusiastic about it. They then capped the discounts so that it was impossible for people in higher cost areas to undertake right to buy. Perhaps the Minister will clarify exactly what is now the Government's view of right to buy and whether they will ensure that discounts are at a level that will enable people in reality to undertake right to buy.
Finally, the Minister alluded to changes in planning law for home improvements. We discussed this during the process of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Bill not so long ago. I recall coming to the conclusion that small improvements were nearly as likely to have a detrimental effect on neighbours as large ones. Can the Minister enlighten us on the proposed planning changes in order that we might consider them further?
All in all, this is a quite disappointing Statement. Nevertheless, I thank the Minister for bringing it to the House.
7.43 p.m.
Baroness Scott of Needham Market: My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement, with its bewildering level of statistics and initiatives. If there was any doubt as to the proximity of an election, it becomes less all the time.
The Government have been very up front about the fact that the number of households has been rising faster than the supply of new housing, but it is wrong to assume that simply building more houses will deal with the problem. It is not only a question of there being too few houses but that too many of them are in the wrong place, at the wrong price and in the wrong condition. This is because many years of poorly implemented and thought out regional strategies have resulted in the kind of imbalances that we currently see and the overheating of the economy in London and the south east.
Given that house prices have risen, as we have heard, from 3.5 per cent of an annual salary to six times that over the past 10 years, have the Government any evidence to suggest that building large numbers of houses in London and the south east will have any real effect in dampening down the cost—and certainly enough to create access for first-time buyers who are increasingly struggling to get into the housing market? This problem will get worse with an emerging generation of people trying to start off in the housing market with huge debts accumulated from university.
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Since the late 1950s, between 150,000 and 200,000 new houses have been built each year for sale. Last year, however, only 21,000 social housing units were built. That is against a backdrop of a loss of 1.7 million council houses which were sold and 100,000 housing association properties. It is the shortfall in this sector which requires urgent action, a fact which has been brought to the attention of the Government by the Rowntree Foundation and the CPRE among others. It is against that backdrop that the announcement today of 75,000 houses over the next three years does not represent enough of an increase to make a difference.
It is, however, a significant improvement on the proposals from the Conservative Benches, which would not only see the level of funding available for housing cut—as we saw in their spending proposals last week—but their policy of bringing in the unfettered right to buy for housing association tenants would deplete the stock of social housing down to almost zero.
The report makes much of the fact that something like 90 per cent of people say they would like to buy their own homes, but I caution the Government to be careful about how they interpret that figure. Many of those people are not necessarily expressing a wish or aspiration for the joys of home ownership; rather it is a reflection of the alternatives available to them. Social housing is very difficult to get into and the private sector is expensive, insecure and often affords very poor conditions.
The reason I say that is because moving from the current level of 70 per cent homeowners to, say, 90 per cent—if that is the figure at which the Government are looking—could only be achieved at a significant cost to the public purse through subsidies and discounts. That may or may not be right, but I would ask the Government at least to consider whether the cost of moving the level of home ownership up from 70 per cent would not be money better spent on providing rented accommodation in the social sector in the first place.
Unlike the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, we on these Benches welcome the fact that the Government have pulled back from bringing in the right to buy for housing association tenants. In fact, we have serious doubts about whether it would be legal to extend the right to buy to housing associations if they were to be forced by government. Given their charitable status and the role of private financial institutions in their funding, we are not convinced that it would be legal for a government to do that. There is also the question of undermining the confidence of private and charitable investors in housing associations if they believe that their assets are going to be sold on.
I note from the accompanying document which was published today that the Government's home buy proposals will allow housing associations voluntarily to agree to the right to buy. I want to put on record at this stage that we would like that choice to be real and truly voluntary. We shall be looking out for ways in which the Government might actually force the hands of housing associations in this.

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Can the Minister say a little more about the green belt direction and explain why the Government believe that the green belt is safer in Mr Prescott's hands than it is with local authorities?
I also note that there is a chapter in the document which refers to cutting red tape on renovations. It is a pity that the Government have not dealt with the real issue—that is, the cost of renovating and restoring old properties, of which there are many in parts of the country. At the moment, the 17.5 per cent VAT on renovating existing properties is a nonsense.
Finally, the report is very bullish on the question of infrastructure but my region, the east of England, has told the Government that it cannot sustain the levels of housing numbers required unless there is more investment in transport infrastructure. Perhaps the Government will concentrate on that.
7.49 p.m.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I shall do my best to answer the points raised. Those points that I cannot answer today I shall be happy to cover through correspondence.
I apologise for all the statistics and the rate at which I read the Statement. I was watching the clock and thought that it would take a long time if I used my normal drawl. I probably read it a little too quickly.
I agree with some of the points; others I take exception to. As shown by the recent figures to which the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, referred, homelessness has increased if one measures it by those living in temporary accommodation. However, in the past five quarters the numbers have gone down. What has not gone down is the number of people leaving temporary accommodation to secure settled tenancies. There is a block on the conveyor belt, which we need to address. That is why we are quite confident of making the commitment in the document to halve the numbers in temporary accommodation by 2010. We have already tackled the flow into homelessness through our other strategies, which I shall not detail here. For the past five quarters, the numbers going in have gone down, but people have got stuck in temporary accommodation.
Some of the noble Baroness's points are quite right. I cannot say anything about stamp duty; it is a matter for the Chancellor, and is not covered in today's document. I think that there was a general consensus about the abolition of mortgage tax relief which, as far as I understood, took place under the previous administration. I do not depart from that, because there was a general consensus, so it is not really relevant to raise it now.
There is no sign of the return of hundreds of thousands of people being trapped in negative equity. That is always a danger if the market fails, but there is no sign that this is happening.
Both noble Baronesses referred to housing association tenants. This is a voluntary scheme—it is not the right to buy. It will be for the housing
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associations to make the decision, charitable or not, if they are not already involved in the right to acquire. Most of the charitable ones are not, because the legislation did not pass this House in 1984 or 1985, I understand. These arrangements are not hard and fast; a consultation paper will be issued before Easter. We want to consult on the way in which the discounts are financed and recycled for the provision of social housing. We think that we can make this a genuinely voluntary scheme, which will be embraced by the housing association movement in providing social rented housing. Several good and positive comments have been made today.
I take very much what the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, said. There is a fantastic amount of ignorance and it spreads around Whitehall. There is some £24 billion of private sector investment in the housing association movement. Speaking off the cuff, giving knee-jerk reactions or considering policies that have not properly taken that into account could be highly damaging to private-sector investment in the housing association movement. Anyone who wanted to propose a policy of wholesale selling without taking account of that is on very dangerous ground when it comes to the financial markets and homes for our fellow citizens. We have taken that on board in respect of the way in which the policy has been enunciated, so we do not envisage any difficulties. If there is a good policy floating around, like other political parties, we will want to steal it. I do not say that with reference to any particular policy; all policies should be considered by mature adults in a democracy, and if they are good they should be adopted.
I realise that there is some difficulty in grasping the idea of building a new home for £60,000. When this was announced at the Labour Party conference by the Deputy Prime Minister, there were gasps. However, one can visit the Delivering Sustainable Communities Summit in Manchester next week—at a fee, but I understand that offers were made to Opposition parties for a discount—and see such a dwelling constructed inside the GMEX centre. A competition for house builders to do this will be announced. We want to drive down the costs of construction without jeopardising environmental standards, quality or safety. We are fairly confident that that can be done.
I realise that the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, was being tongue in cheek, but we are the first government ever to have a target for new homes to be built on brownfield sites—second-hand land. We do not want to waste land. We are an island nation, and it is in short supply.
When we came into power, the number of homes built on brownfield sites, including conversions, was 56 per cent. There was no previous government target for this. We set a target of 60 per cent. We reached that target seven or eight years ahead of time; it is now 67 per cent, and growing. We do not want to increase the target; we want to keep the pressure on. The noble Baroness said that we cannot build ourselves out of housing policies, which leads me to believe that there is not much support for the step change in production. We know that it will be more difficult to keep meeting

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that target with a step change in housing production. It makes no sense to start jacking up the target. We think that building 67 per cent—two thirds—of all new houses on second-hand land is good, and we also think that we can do better.
Secondly, in 1997, the density of building in England—these are all English figures—was 25 dwellings per hectare. In 2003, it was 33 dwellings per hectare. That is quite a substantial increase. It is sufficient for us to be able to claim that the extra 200,000 homes under the communities plan over those which were already planned in the wider south-east—930,000 were already planned to be built by 2016—can be built on less land than was planned for the original 930,000, and the saving of land would be the size of Oxford. So we can build 200,000 extra houses, save land the size of Oxford, and have 1.1 million houses by using more brownfield sites and higher densities.
We are increasing the geographical spread of the density directive which currently applies only to the south-east and to London. We are including the east of England region, the south-west and the county of Northampton, so that all parts of the four growth areas are included in the density directive.
The new money announced today—although there were not many actual figures—flows from the spending review announced by the Chancellor in the summer. The figures have not been used before, and there is a lot more to come. We are working on the spending plans for 2006–07 and 2007–08. Announcements will be made this year, flowing from the Chancellor's announcement at the spending review in July. There are literally hundreds of millions of pounds to be disbursed, whether the money goes on neighbourhood renewal, the growth areas or the Thames Gateway. That money has not yet been announced; we are still working on it. The figures announced today are part of that money, so it is the first time they have been announced.
We are committed to the right to buy. For reasons of historical accuracy, the Labour Party abandoned its opposition to the right to buy in 1985. The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, shakes her head, but I was the shadow Minister responsible and I proposed the document at the Labour Party conference in Bournemouth that year, which was approved. The fact that we went to the 1987 election and people still thought we were opposed was a complete and abject failure of communication by the Labour Party. Well, we have learnt our lesson since then. However, it is on record that our opposition was abandoned in 1985.
The householders development consent review is a hell of a mouthful. I could not find it in my notes because I looked under "planning reform". This will be a root-and-branch review of the regulations facing householders wanting to improve their homes. We will be looking for ways in which to streamline application processes and minimise bureaucracy while, of course, protecting neighbours' rights and the local environment. We will be examining the case for introducing new ideas such as involving neighbours at an earlier stage in the planning process so that we can resolve disagreements by mediation.
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The review expects to report in the second half of 2005, following which its proposals would then be subject to full consultation. Several items announced today require further processes, secondary legislation or proper consultation. It will not be done on the hoof—it is a five-year plan, after all. There is a degree of strategy involved rather that just tactics.
The green belt direction will enable the Secretary of State to review proposals for inappropriate development in the green belt. It is basically an additional protection. I reject the noble Baroness's cheap jibe. The Deputy Prime Minister has provided more than 19,000 extra hectares of green belt land. It is statutorily protected. Before anybody says it, I accept that a lot of it is in Northumberland, but that is not the issue. The issue is that it is statutory green belt. There are 12,000 more hectares in the pipeline currently coming through the local authority process, so there will be up to 31,000 more hectares of green belt protection in this country than there were when this Government came to power in 1997. By the way, before it is introduced, the direction will be subject to consultation so there will be plenty of opportunities for comment.
8 p.m.
One final point relates to moving forward on people's aspirations for home ownership to be greater than 70 per cent. We are not saying that we must get to 90 per cent. There may be an aspiration for that out there, but the noble Baroness is quite right. The issue must be carefully balanced. We are trying to balance it with a series of packages to improve social housing. It would not make sense simply to promote a large programme of social housing under the existing set of rules. With all the cost flaws we would still lose some stock with the crude application of the blunderbuss of right-to-buy. It does not make sense. We would lose housing stock for future generations. We are seeking to bring changes and possible nuances to the schemes that protect the stock for social renting or the stock for first-time buyers for future generations, so people can cascade out and staircase up—to use the jargon—into the private sector.
The Statement is wonderful and excellent in terms of housing policy and I can tell the House that there is a lot more to come next week, when the five-year plan partner document for the rest of the ODPM's activities will be published, as will about 13 daughter documents on local governance, the quality of life in communities and other initiatives. It will be a wonderful week for announcements from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister.
Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville: My Lords, the 15 minute Statement could have been significantly shorter if the selective party-political abuse had been omitted. However, in the spirit that the Deputy Prime Minister chose and on the 40th anniversary of the death of Winston Churchill, whose 1951 government built 300,000 houses a year, which far exceeds the target that the Government have loudly announced today, why is the proportion of "non-decent homes in

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Wales" so much higher than in the rest of the UK, when it is now 145 years since the Conservative Party last won a general election in the Principality?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I cannot answer that question without notice. The Statement that I repeated today relates exclusively to England. I am an English Minister and although I speak for the Government in this place, I do not have the necessary information regarding Wales to answer the question. However, I will try to find the information and write to the noble Lord.
Lord Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay: My Lords, the Minister was talking about staircasing, but the problem for first-time home buyers is that they have been desperately trying to walk up an escalator that is going the wrong way, especially in relation to stamp duty. I know that the Minister said that that was a matter for the Chancellor and ultimately it is, in the same way as is value added tax on improvements. However, we cannot talk about housing and have a serious Statement mentioning first-time buyers without at least addressing the question of stamp duty.
Is the Minister aware that when the stamp duty threshold was raised to £60,000 in 1993, the average price paid by a first-time buyer was below that threshold in every single region of the United Kingdom apart from London, even in the south east? Is the Minister aware that today, in every single region, first-time home buyers have to pay well over the £60,000 and that the amount of money that has been taken from home buyers by stamp duty has gone up from just under £700 million when the Government came to power in 1997 to £3.8 billion last year? That money is being sucked out of the pockets of homebuyers. Will the Minister, from a housing perspective—he is always very robust at fighting for the interests of his department—tell us what the effect of that is and what representations he is making to his friend the Chancellor to ease this crippling burden on first-time buyers?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, the effect is to price first-time buyers on the margin out of buying. That is obvious: the figures that the noble Lord just gave speak for themselves. This matter is constantly discussed in the Government. We are aware of the difficulty. There has been a substantial increase in taxation—there is no question about that. The figures are all there. They are published by the Chancellor, so there is no secret, but the effect on the margin for first-time buyers is to price them out of buying when it is the last, final straw that stops the sale. The Government are discussing that issue because we are looking for all ways that we can. However, decisions on these matters are for the Chancellor.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the Minister's enthusiasm for the Statement was infectious and we all enjoyed it. However, could he help me with one problem that I find difficult to understand? He said that he wants a
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more houses on less land. Therefore, presumably, the congestion will be greater. He said that the houses will be of a better standard and neither safety nor any other standard will be compromised, yet the houses will cost less. These are all good objectives, but they militate against each other. How can we do all that and in the end the house costs less? I know that the Minister could say, "Do go up to Manchester next week without a discount", but perhaps he could explain it.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I will try to explain without the noble Earl having to venture to Manchester. There are enormous variations in the density—the number of dwellings per hectare around the country. There are award-winning schemes with densities of dwellings per hectare in the 80s and 90s where people queue up to buy and to rent to get into quality developments—both from environmental and other points of view in terms of design. High-density need not militate against good quality design in houses. The highest density housing area in the country is around Kensington and Chelsea, so that proves that high density does not militate against quality in a good environment.
There are some poor high density areas. Currently, housing in London is being built at 71 dwellings a hectare. It was 51 dwellings a hectare in 1997, so there has been an increase. In terms of cost, we have looked at various schemes. The scheme for the £60,000 dwelling will be special because the land value is removed from the calculation. In some areas—not all—the land values are astronomical and are a real barrier. That is why in the growth areas in the country in the south east we are looking for new techniques to capture some of the land value along with developers and landowners so that, over a 20-year period, everyone feels fairly treated.
It looks as though we are squaring the circle, as I said to the noble Lord, but with a combination of different ways of financing higher densities as a matter of policy, using CABE—the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment—to make sure that we get good quality dwellings from environmental, safety and other aspects, we are confident that we can build to reduce costs. That is the issue—construction costs in this country have been going way ahead of normal inflation, with no apparent reason for it.
Lord Marlesford: My Lords, the Minister's Statement was rather like one of my grandchildren's Christmas stockings, in that it appeared to lack a certain economic coherence, although the Minister himself moved towards economic coherence when he talked about not going to 90 percent of people in home ownership. It would have been nice if he had made the tribute that the big increase from 50 per cent to 70 per cent, which was thoroughly desirable, was very largely due to Conservative policies. I believe that he implied that.
I ask the Minister about two points. First, does he recognise that bricks and mortar are not always necessarily a sensible investment, especially for young people? Secondly, does he recognise that a dynamic

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economy requires a mobile society, which must mean that there must be a healthy supply of houses to rent at all levels, including affordable housing? There is a risk of undermining that important mobility, if the affordable housing is taken out of the rented sector and put into the ownership sector.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I can say at the outset that I do not seek to hide the fact that the increase in home ownership shot up under the "right to buy" policy, which was introduced by the government led by the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher. That was probably the greatest single act of redistribution of wealth in this country that occurred over decades. Like most good policies, it was invented in Birmingham, where it operated at various times during the 1960s. It took quite a while for my party to come to terms with that change—I accept that—but nevertheless we have embraced it and, like converts, we have the zeal to push it even further. That is why we are looking at new ways in which to let people share the aspirations of others.
I am not sure when bricks and mortar are not a good investment—perhaps when people pay over the odds, or buy houses without checking. We have had lots of debates on that issue in this House, with regard to the need for buyers to beware of what they are buying, so there have been warnings. However, on the noble Lord's substantive point about jobs and other matters, MoveUK will seek to enable people to move around the country, for jobs and housing in the rented sector, for local authorities' social housing, housing associations and the private rented sector. That will be a big move, we hope. It will be a web-based system and will be a big incentive for labour mobility.
The noble Lord is quite right that for such a system to work you must have, if not an over-supply, then a good supply of a mixture of dwellings available in which people want to live at prices that they can afford. That is the Holy Grail that both parties have been seeking. We live in a very uneven country with regard to housing—we all understand that—and we are seeking to even up some aspects of the situation.
Baroness Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde: My Lords, I welcome my noble friend's Statement, and I thank him for including in it a substantial number of the recommendations of the Home Ownership Task Force, which I chaired in 2003. That taskforce was made up of a wide range of people, including the users, funders and providers of social housing. The recommendations within the report are certainly very welcome, although it is a pity that they have to occur within a Statement. I hope that we can have a full debate on the issue. I am going to the sustainable communities conference in Manchester next week, although after the announcement of 13 daughter documents I am wondering whether I should not stay, because I might miss something.
The document is very wide-ranging. The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, referred, I thought very good-naturedly, to the Minister's "euphoric" presentation. Quite frankly, I do not believe that we should be difficult about that, as he is entitled to be a
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bit euphoric. The noble Baroness, Lady Scott, remarked that there was a bewildering range of figures. She was absolutely right; but she then went on to quote quite a number of figures herself, in her presentation, if I may say so with due kindness.
To sum up the document, it is full of energy, proposals and ideas, some of which are quite ingenious. We talk about home ownership as though you either own a home or you do not. In fact, many of the people with whom we spoke said that they would simply like to have a stake in their home, which may not mean owning it fully. This policy goes a long way towards recognising that.
I have one question with regard to rural communities, as there are areas whose homing needs are quite often forgotten in the pressure cooker of the south-east. The Minister suggested that there would be discussions with Defra and that the Government have doubled the investment in rural housing. In fact, they do not do themselves justice: they have more than doubled the investment in rural housing since they came to power. But is it intended that the social housing in the countryside, in the rural areas, is ring-fence protected for the people who need it? Otherwise, young people from families in rural areas simply have to leave their homes.
In conclusion, I look forward to a full-blown debate on this important issue.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, first, I pay tribute to my noble friend, as I did in the Statement, and to her leadership of the task force. The answer to her point on ring-fencing for rural communities is, "Yes". But what I mentioned in the Statement goes beyond that by giving local authorities more powers to ring-fence for local communities and to ensure that those houses are available for the next generation, which is crucial but has been the problem in the past. We lose those houses after the first or second sale. There are issues here on which consultation is necessary, but that is our intention.
I want to make it clear, before I get a real slap on the knuckles, that I was only joking when I said that there will be 13 daughter documents. There is a partner document on the five-year plan. I think that there are three daughter documents. I said 13, but that was just my little joke. The documents will be available in Manchester. As my honourable friend walks round the £60,000 house, she will be able to read those as well. I would welcome a debate in this House on any aspect of the plan at any suitable time.
8.15 p.m.
Baroness Byford: My Lords, I gave way to the noble Baroness, Lady Dean—it was right that she should have intervened as no one from their Benches had done so—but she slightly stole my thunder. I hope that the House will forgive me if I continue the discussion on the provision of affordable housing in rural areas.
I understand that the Statement only said:
"we will allow local authorities to ring-fence land so thai it can be used for rural affordable housing to meet local needs".

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Can the Minister tell us more about that?
I have two other points. First, however, I should like to raise an issue which is not a sideswipe but a real issue. Two of the issues that make it so difficult for first-time buyers are the rate of council tax, as I think we would all agree, and the rate of stamp duty. I hope that adding my voice to those of others who have spoken on that issue will give the Minister a little more weight when other discussions take place later.
I turn to my two questions. First, why have the Government chosen not to designate redundant farm buildings as brownfield sites? I know that that would make a lot of difference. It is a move for which my honourable friend John Hayes has been calling for for some time. As the Minister will know, I too regularly call for it in this House.
Secondly, why have the Government not included the use of cross-subsidy of options for a limited amount of open-market housing in order to try to get more such provision in villages? We are talking about rural villages which may require only three, four or five extra houses. Someone in our family has allowed some land to go for affordable housing and would be willing to do so again. For those who are willing to do that, it is frustrating that there is no agreement on permitting the building of a certain amount of non-affordable housing. I suspect that such agreement would help reduce land values, which, in some areas, are the major cost in building affordable housing. I wonder why the Government have not considered that at all. It seems rather a wasted opportunity. I should be very grateful if the Minister would comment.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, my comments on the first two parts of the noble Baroness's question, on council tax and stamp duty, are basically as before. However, I note that she has raised the issue and I am grateful that she has done so.
Two other documents beside the strategy have been published today, both of which are PPG3 documents, or planning policy guidance notes. As the noble Baroness said, the planning change will allow local authorities to allocate sites only for affordable housing in rural communities. However, those must be permanently dedicated to meeting the needs of local people in rural communities. The point is that there is that extra lock-in.
There does not seem to be any change on farm buildings. I know that the issue has been raised before. Business in the Community is working with landowners on a scheme. I went recently to the launch of a programme, at Eaton Hall, in Cheshire, where 200 landowners were assembled. The joys of releasing land for affordable housing, particularly in rural areas and the small settlements, and the fact that that would repay itself not only in sustainable communities but in
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jobs and services in those communities, was made clear to them. It was not just a question of housing. As no new policy was enunciated today on the release of land for non-affordable market housing, it was not covered in the Statement.
Lord Lucas: My Lords, I share my noble friend's disappointment in that. Our villages really do need help to develop into sustainable communities. That is not just affordable housing. We need to build new employment in villages and we need to build the houses for those who will have that employment. What I also felt was missing from the Statement was initiatives on moving economic activity north. This endless pressure to build houses in the south-east comes from the economic success we are having here. We need to continue to find ways of reviving economic activity in the north and doing what we can to push it up there. I have always liked the idea of moving the House of Commons to Stoke-on-Trent. I thought last week that would have the added advantage that we could move the world dance championship to Gerrards Cross and depress house prices there.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, as I said, we are an unbalanced country, housing, economically and population wise—everyone knows that. What we cannot do—you hear this on the radio and see it in the media—is order where people will live and work. That is not possible; we do not live in that kind of society.
We are operating on many fronts to rebuild the communities of the north. The north has beautiful countryside and better quality of life than is sometimes the case in the overcrowded south east, but the south east is the economic generator of the country. We do not want to do anything to upset that; that would be barmy. On the other hand, we have to face facts. The greatest pressure regarding housing in the wider south east of England comes from families who live there. That is where the pressure comes from. It does not come from incomers from other regions or from overseas.
As I say, the greatest pressure is exerted by families in the wider south east to prevent their sons and daughters being driven out of the areas where they were born and raised. We have a duty to meet that pressure while maintaining the environment and everything else; hence the policy of the four growth areas, which I listed. It is planned that half of all the growth will take place in those four growth areas so that we do not wreck our villages and countryside. That is what the sustainable communities plan is all about. People talk about numbers and concreting over the land. However, we have proved that growth can be achieved using less land. Growth will be managed in a targeted way so that it is not just spread all over the wider south east. That way it is easier to manage the creation and development of more sustainable communities.

Fire and Rescue Services (National Framework) (England) Order 2004
8.21 p.m.
Baroness Hanhamrose to move, That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty praying that the order, laid before the House on 14 December 2004, be annulled (S.I. 2004/3217).
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, the framework document for 2005–06 is similar to that for the previous year, but that does not mean that it does not raise significant questions, which I believe it is appropriate that the Minister should address. It is for this reason that I have prayed against the statutory instrument.
The first matter may not be one of complete surprise to the Minister as it relates to the continuation of the principle of regionalism within the organisation of the service. The electorate, as the Minister will recall, resoundingly rejected the possibility of having elected regional assemblies, where it was tested. My understanding is that the Government have to all intents and purposes come to the conclusion that regional assemblies are a dead duck. It is an important matter in terms of the fire and rescue service, since authorities have been led to believe that they had no choice but to set up regional management boards. Indeed, they were instructed to do so, well before the legislation was in place, with the threat of the Government using their statutory powers to impose such structures if they did not. Now the 2005–06 framework suggests that combining fire and rescue authorities might be achieved at a sub-regional level.
That immediately begs two questions. First, why are the Government continuing to demand a regional structure when the new wording would at least suggest that regional management boards are not now a requirement? Secondly, would it not be a sensible conclusion to reach that sub-regional structures could be constituted from local authority partnerships and/or clusters, and that regional management boards should be developed only on a voluntary basis? Will the Government be advising local authorities of this new position to enable them to revise the fire and rescue service management into smaller divisions, if they so wish?
There are two further matters that arise from the regional organisation, which appear later in the framework, which I can and will address now. The fire and rescue authorities are obliged, within this structure, to co-operate with other,
"emergency services, local authorities and front line responders at a local level".
What is the logic of expecting a local service to be organised regionally in order to work with,
"front line responders at a local level",
and with local authorities to which the service is already happily linked?
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The framework calls for greater co-operation with police and ambulance services, but these are local services, so what is the benefit of having regional management boards running this service which is, by definition, a local service?
Why are regional management boards being instructed to draw up human resources strategies, when this should be conducted at a local level? It is clear that there will be considerable displacement of staff from control rooms, but it is anticipated that they will be absorbed into, or have the situation managed by, local authorities. Why is a regional HR strategy required?
I will address the situation regarding the FiReControl project; that is, the regional control rooms. The 2004–05 framework said that a finance working group had been set up to make recommendations on funding issues associated with the project by September 2004. The Minister will know that it did not report until November, and then there were highly restricted details on finance. How will authorities be expected to respond to this report, and the outline business case, in the light of the sparsity of information, and in a significantly reduced time-scale?
It is apparent, at paragraph 2.14, that more information has been given to the chairmen of the regional management boards, and they have been consulted on the full outline business case. The fire and rescue authorities have been consulted on the outline business case but with some commercially sensitive information excluded. How are the full boards to make decisions on financial matters when the business case will not be published until mid-2005?
I have already put down some Questions on the Firelink project. As we know, the contract signing has been delayed. Will the Minister confirm that either in the absence of such a contract, or one being signed imminently, there will be no call on fire and rescue authorities to make any contributions in this financial year, since they would now be under very short notice for their financial planning? It would also be a good opportunity here to record the considerable concerns of local government about the speed and secretiveness of the Firelink project, particularly as local government are already committed to the responsibility for bringing the computer system in within the Government's time-scale, and, presumably at its negotiated costs.
There are still some big issues around with regard to the new fire and rescue service. I have at least raised some of them here, and I hope that the Minister will answer them tonight, or if unable to deal with them all, give a written reply.
Moved, That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty praying that the order, laid before the House on 14 December 2004, be annulled (S.I. 2004/3217).—(Baroness Hanham.)
Baroness Scott of Needham Market: My Lords, I feel rather at sea here, as I am surrounded by veterans of the 2004 Act. I am here as a newcomer, but I will do

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my best, and I will attempt to be brief, as I know that colleagues who are dealing with the Education Bill need to get on.
From these Benches we do not have the inherent problems with the regional agenda that the noble Baroness has, although our preference would be for voluntary arrangements to continue, as in many cases these are working extremely well. Where the best local option is the voluntary arrangement, we would like to see that continue. Each region has different geographical and social circumstances, so often collaboration on the exact nature of their co-operation is better left for them to decide rather than for central government to determine.
Would the noble Lord like to comment on the delays in publishing the guidelines? There have been some problems for local authorities as dates have passed without the guidance that they have been waiting for having materialised.
On the question of regional control rooms, there is concern among local authorities about the identification of callers. I know that that is particularly the case in large regions such as the south-west. People in Cornwall are very concerned that calls routed to Bristol will not be identified properly. I gather that, during the passage of the Act, a commitment was made to introduce IT systems which would identify the location of the callers. Can the Minister comment on progress on that? Given the track record of government IT programmes, I am sure he will understand why there are some concerns.
Finally, in the context of debates about reform of regulation generally, regulation of the fire authorities comes about partly through the Audit Commission and its comprehensive performance assessment but also, of course, through Her Majesty's Fire Service Inspectorate. I wonder whether the Government's review of regulation and inspection will include a rationalisation of those two roles or whether the Minister sees them as staying separate.
Lord Wedderburn of Charlton: My Lords, I am conscious of the hour and of the urgency of other business that this House has to consider. Therefore, I wish to speak very briefly in putting some rather important points to my noble friend on the Front Bench.
The noble Baroness will excuse me if I say that, so far, I think that the Minister just needs to enter a plea of "no case to answer" so far as concerns annulling this order. This is a very important order and I want to ask some questions about the booklet which lay behind it: The Fire and Rescue Service National Framework. I take it that the copy with which I have been provided is the same booklet referred to in the order.
I was unable to attend the House for much of the period in which one might have discussed this matter, but I think I am right in saying that there has been no debate specifically on that central document since its publication. The booklet—or, at least, my copy—
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came out at about the same time as, or just a day or so after, the Third Reading in this House of the big Fire and Rescue Services Bill in July.
That booklet insists that the new national framework must be brought in, and, indeed, in previous debates the case has been made that some such framework is needed. But it states that it must be brought in in partnership between the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister and the fire authorities. It states that they must work in "partnership where appropriate". I want to put to my noble friend one or two points of that kind. He may not wish to speak on them at length this evening but he may be able to deal with them in the future if it is not appropriate to do so now.
For example, there will be a new consultation in summer 2005–06. I want to ask what consultations there have been, and indeed will be, with all the stakeholders. The document refers a number of times to all the stakeholders involved in the new national framework. Therefore, I ask my noble friend whether, either today or on another suitable occasion, the Government will tell us what consultation has been, or will be, held with the trade unions representing the firefighters, who have the primary task of carrying out what will be an enormous extension of their functions under this booklet, the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 and, of course, the Civil Contingencies Act 2004, which is probably more important. The House will know that that Act covers an enormous area, far beyond problems of terrorism, to cover any threat of serious damage to any place or to human welfare, including illness, health, homelessness, disruption to supplies or communication or transport or disruption even of plant life in Britain. These provisions impose an enormous extension of firefighters' duties, as the booklet makes very clear. I am glad to refer to the much wider training that will be required of everyone in the fire and rescue services in this regard.
The workers involved are among the stakeholders in these important changes. The booklet admirably insists that we must have more women and more ethnic minority firefighters, but it says little about consultation with organisations which will represent the firefighters of tomorrow. It states categorically that the new regionalisation of fire control functions, for which a case has been made previously, will need "fewer staff. Indeed, that will be a delicate operation. Many think that it is surprising, in the light of the enormous extension of functions, that the service will be called upon to exercise such a reduction. Can my noble friend say anything about the expected size of the firefighting force under the document?
Firefighters do not largely figure in the booklet, except that their greatly increased duties of co-operation, as the noble Baroness rightly said, with all other emergency services, and the increased training to meet those duties, are fairly set out. But the booklet refers to "recent industrial action"—recent in 2004—where the Secretary of State will, under the new statutes, continue to have,
"the power to direct the use of fire and rescue facilities and assets",

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which will constitute,
"new and more effective arrangements",
in the face of such industrial action.
I do not wish, either here or on any future occasion, to reopen old wounds on this subject. But the Government's position in previous debates was that the Secretary of State's new statutory powers would not affect the law as it stood on rights of industrial action. That is not what the booklet says.
Consultation on that and all other matters that affect the workforce is important—for example, in respect of the new discipline code which must be introduced. While one must welcome the intention to introduce a new law based on ACAS principles, firefighters will lose a previous right of appeal to the Secretary of State on dismissal. Consultation on aspects of appeal against dismissal, as much as what the new booklet raises regarding the new pension scheme, must, surely, be a matter for extensive consultation, including with the organisations that represent those concerned.
There is much more to be said on this matter, especially regarding the regulatory impact assessment. I am sure my noble friend will agree that it is vital that these extensive and important changes should be the subject of consultation with the workforce, from fire officers to firefighters and their unions. That is critical. There is much concern on the matter, but it may be that my noble friend can allay such concerns. I hope that he may say something about, or refer on some future occasion to, consultation with the trade unions, either when he replies or, as time is limited today, to a source where we can find details of what has happened and what is planned in that regard.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I shall try to deal with some of the points briefly and I shall write to noble Lords about those matters I do not cover. I shall first address the points made by my noble friend Lord Wedderburn because they are the easiest to answer. My noble friend has the old document. The document that we are debating tonight for approval was published in December 2004 and relates to the 2005–06 framework. My noble friend was, I believe, referring to the 2004–05 framework.
The order lists the principle differences between the 2004–05 and the 2005–06 frameworks, which are minor. The changes have taken into account responses to the consultation. There was no justification for a regulatory impact assessment on the order, because none of the interests was affected—however, I shall check on those points.
A separate consultation on the pension scheme started on 13 October and finished last week on 14 January. I can assure my noble friend that these issues are receiving full consultation. There is ongoing work on the setting up of the new Joint Industrial Council, although that is not the subject of this document.
On the points raised by the noble Baroness, I thought we were revisiting the referendum, although the points were legitimate. The referendum was lost
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and that is water under the bridge. There is no prospect of elected regional assemblies, but that does not mean that there is no need to do things regionally.
On Firelink, which is the new radio system, the contract will be signed around May 2005. There will be competition to ensure a value-for-money outcome. There will be no costs to fire authorities in 2004–05 or in 2005–06. The capital costs are being met by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, so there is no additional cost to fire authorities. The Government are meeting the costs of operational continuity to ensure the existing systems work in the interim. On commercial competition, it is subject to the procurement rules for fair and open competition. It is not a secretive issue.
The noble Baroness asked why the regional management boards have been asked to draw up regional human resource strategies. The reason is that there are considerable efficiencies—we made that quite clear—to be gained by co-operation and working on human resource issues, including training, recruitment and equal opportunities. That is why we have asked authorities to draw up strategies so that they can jointly achieve those efficiencies.
I was also asked why a regional structure is still being demanded. The regional management boards are required to deal with the six issues identified in the White Paper. Those are the specialist services, resilience, human resources, training, procurement and the regional control centres. So the regional approach is about helping the service to work at the most appropriate level: at local level, at district level, at sub-regional level or at regional level.
The noble Baroness asked me how we can respond to the consultation document on fire control in a short space of time. The consultation document was issued late, but the full consultation period of 12 weeks was allowed, so we did not cut any corners and there was no reduction in the consultation period.
I was also asked about how the boards are able to make decisions when the full business case will not be published until mid-2005. The outline business case does not have final figures. The full business case will be published later this year, when we shall have full and final figures. All the authorities will be consulted on the final version and they can use that to set their budgets.
I regret to say that I do not have an answer on caller location, which is a fair point as it was mentioned in the debate, nor on the joint inspection process under the regulations. I shall seek further and better particulars on those points and I shall write to all noble Lords involved in the debate.
Baroness Hanham: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply. I appreciate and welcome the fact that he has offered to respond to all questions in writing—some of them were quite detailed. For today's purposes, I thank the House for the debate and I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Education Bill [H.L.]
8.44 p.m.
House again in Committee.
Lord Hanningfieldmoved Amendment No. 145A:
After Clause 100, insert the following new clause—
"ANNUAL PARENTS MEETING

(1) It shall be left to the discretion of the headmaster of each maintained school in England and Wales to decide whether or not to hold an annual parents' meeting.

(2) The headmaster shall decide on the nature, length and style of any meeting which is to be held."

The noble Lord said: We debated the whole issue just before we adjourned. I feel that I should test the feeling of the Committee on the amendment because of the strength of feeling on the whole issue.
Lord FilkinBefore the noble Lord sits down, perhaps I may make explicitly clear what my noble friend was signalling—I thought very clearly—before we adjourned for dinner. We have had a number of important debates about the role of parents generally in the Bill. We debated their role in inspection and in the governance and accountability of the school, as exhibited through annual reports and other mechanisms.
I am signalling to the Committee very clearly that these are absolutely critical issues. We think the role of parents is fundamental to raising school attainment. I am giving as clear signals as possible that we wish to give very serious reflection and consideration to the points that Members of the Committee have made. The Committee knows what that means; it means that we shall go away and reflect on these issues. It does not guarantee that we will completely transform the issue, but it does signal that we are very serious in reflecting on these issues to see whether we can address the concerns of the Committee.
Lord Hanningfield: I thank the Minister for that comment. He will have heard the strength of feeling from all sides of the Chamber about this issue earlier in the debate. I should still like to test the feeling of the Committee on this amendment, although obviously there could be further amendments later if this one is not successful.
8.46 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said amendment (No. 145A) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 30; Not-Contents, 70.

Division No. 1

CONTENTS

Alton of Liverpool, L.

Cope of Berkeley, L. [Teller]

Astor, V.

Cox, B.

Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, L.

Dundee, E.

Brougham and Vaux, L.

Ferrers, E.

Byford, B.

Fookes, B.

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Fowler, L.

Montrose, D.

Glenarthur, L.

Morris of Bolton, B.

Hanham, B.

Newton of Braintree, L.

Hanningfield, L.

Northesk, E.

Liverpool, E.

Powell of Bayswater, L.

Lyell, L.

Renton, L.

MacGregor of Pulham Market, L.

Saatchi, L.

Seccombe B. [Teller]

Skelmersdale, L.

Maginnis of Drumglass, L.

Stewartby, L.

Marlesford, L.

Willoughby de Broke, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Amos, B. (Lord President of the Council )

Hoyle, L.

Hughes of Woodside, L.

Andrews, B.

Hunt of Kings Heath, L.

Bach, L.

Jones, L.

Bassam of Brighton, L.

Jordan, L.

Berkeley, L.

Lea of Crondall, L.

Billingham, B.

Listowel, E.

Brennan, L.

Lofthouse of Pontefract, L.

Brooke of Alverthorpe, L.

Macdonald of Tradeston, L.

Campbell-Savours, L.

McIntosh of Hudnall, B.

Carter of Coles, L.

MacKenzie of Culkein, L.

Chandos, V.

McKenzie of Luton, L.

Clinton-Davis, L.

Massey of Darwen, B.

Davies of Coity, L.

Maxton, L.

Davies of Oldham, L.[Teller]

Morgan, L

Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde, B.

Pendry, L.

Dearing, L

Peston, L.

Dixon, L

Radice, L.

Elder, L

Randall of St. Budeaux, L.

Evans of Parkside, L

Rooker, L.

Evans of Temple Guiting, L.

Royall of Blaisdon, B.

Farrington of Ribbleton, B

Sawyer, L.

Faulkner of Worcester, L

Sewel, L.

Filkin, L.

Smith of Leigh, L

Gale, B.

Sutherland of Houndwood, L.

Gibson of Market Rasen, B.

Symons of Vernham Dean, B.

Giddens, L.

Taylor of Blackburn, L

Gordon of Strathblane, L

Triesman, L.

Griffiths of Burry Port, L.

Truscott, L

Grocott, L.[Teller]

Tunnicliffe, L.

Hattersley, L.

Turner of Camden, B.

Hogg of Cumbernauld, L.

Walpole, L.

Hollis of Heigham, B.

Warwick of Undercliffe, B.

Howe of Idlicote, B.

Wedderburn of Charlton, L.

Howells of St. Davids, B.

Woolmer of Leeds, L.

Young of Norwood Green, L.

Resolved in the negative, and amendment disagreed to accordingly.
8.56 p.m.
Clause 101 [School profiles]:
Baroness Morris of Boltonmoved Amendment No. 145B:
Page 53, line 29, at end insert "including the level of educational achievement and attainment achieved by the school and a summary of the school's most recent Ofsted report"
The noble Baroness said: Just when I thought I was getting the hang of all this, I realise that I do not understand it at all. These amendments are all about Clause 101, which we debated in the previous group of amendments. I shall not detain the Committee any longer, as we have already had a very thorough debate. I agree with everything that my noble friend Lord Lucas said. The Minister said that the profiles were being trialled. Perhaps I could assist the Government

1107
with that trial by sending them my questions. If the Minister would be kind enough to answer them, we would be most grateful. I beg to move.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Brougham and Vaux): Amendment No. 145D is grouped with this amendment. If it is agreed to, I cannot call Amendment No. 146.
Baroness Walmsley: I wish to speak briefly to Amendment No. 146, which is tabled in my name. The clause seems to prevent the governing body providing such information as it may wish as part of its school profile. As drafted, the clause gives the Secretary of State unlimited powers. I would like to add the phrase,
"or which the governing body may wish to provide",
in terms of additional information. It frees up the provision.
In addition, the NSPCC has asked me to ask the Government whether the Minister can give an assurance that they envisage the regulations providing for the inclusion of non-academic-related information in the school profiles; for example, the school's safeguarding and child protection arrangements, its contribution to improving well-being, co-operation with other agencies and development of extended services, where appropriate.
Baroness Andrews: I am very grateful to the noble Baroness for the suggestion. It is an extension of the trial. She will find that many of the questions that she asked in her many amendments on this matter will be answered in the affirmative, because we are making provision already. I shall certainly give her a fuller answer than I can provide today.
Amendment No. 146 would allow the governing bodies to add extra information. We intend to reduce prescription so that schools can reflect aspects other than the important information that they are required to give parents. We are reducing the statutory content, but parents must have a minimum amount of information: that is the role of the profile, and it is what parents want. When we trialled the profile with parents, they really liked it.
We also want schools to provide reliable information about pupil achievement and plans for the future—parents were also keen on that. Within that there will be narrative sections, written by the governing body, which can be tailored. So, for example, they can make a feature of the school's safeguarding arrangements or partnership arrangements. At the same time, we need a basic agreement with schools about what is in them. We must make sure that it is consistent and that schools can, as it were, relate to one another. They would certainly be free to put in a lot of things to show the school off.
9 p.m.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: I thank the Minister for that reply. If, under the clause, the Secretary of State is to be given absolute discretion about the contents of
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the profile, where is the deregulation, unless there are clear limits to that discretion? We have to trust the governing bodies to govern. The profile should go to parents. After all, if it does not go to them, what is the point of it? I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 145C to 146B not moved.]
Clause 101 agreed to.
Clause 102 [Provision and funding of higher education in maintained schools]:
Lord Sutherland of Houndwood Lord Sutherland of Houndwood moved Amendment No. 147:
Page 54, line 15, at end insert—
"( ) TheChief Inspector shall agree with the Chief Executive of the Quality Assurance Agency the pattern and form of inspection appropriate for such courses."
The noble Lord said: I say at the outset that I welcome the opportunity that this part of the Bill gives schools to extend their provision towards higher and further education. However, if the provision to be made is genuinely at the higher and possibly tertiary level, the patterns of inspection should be appropriate to that. Thus, I believe that there is a need to seek an agreement between HMCI and the Quality Assurance Agency, which is responsible for the quality assurance of education at tertiary level.
I am not asking for a separate inspection. That would be against the spirit of the Bill and would overburden schools with an additional inspection. However, there ought to be consultation and, ideally, agreement between the two bodies. I believe that the current incumbents are quite capable of reaching that agreement.
There would be two advantages. The first is that it would help the quality of the courses offered in this provision to be seen to be credibly at a higher and tertiary level. Secondly, it would help colleges in the higher and tertiary area to give due credit for such courses, where that was appropriate. Those would be the specific benefits of a clear inspection system involving the agreement of the QAA.
Initially, there will be limited take-up of the option. I would be interested to hear what the Minister has to say about that. Do the Government expect many schools to take it up? However, its perceived value will grow. Schools with ambition, of which there are an increasing number, will begin to seize the opportunity, especially, I expect, city academies, whose inspection is our business, but also some private schools that have a good record of following HMCI protocols in inspection. It would be an encouragement to them to ensure that the inspection of such courses, which may well flourish in private schools and city academies, is appropriate.
Lastly, the option to extend the range of school education into this area will be increasingly attractive, as university fees begin to bite. It could become a de facto extension of the number of places offering some form of tertiary education, albeit within the school sector.

1109
Although it will not happen immediately or quickly, people will see it as an opportunity. Private schools, city academies and others will follow that route, hence the need now to make adequate provision for the proper type of inspection. I beg to move.
Lord Dearing: I added my name to the amendment. I warmly support the clause, but I think that it would be greatly improved by the amendment. The time being what it is, I shall say no more, unless provoked.
Baroness Andrews: I have tried hard not to provoke any noble Lords. I am grateful for the welcome—
Baroness Morris of Bolton: I apologise: I was not quick enough to my feet. In speaking to Clause 102 stand part, I shall speak also in support of Amendment No. 147, which is tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Dearing and Lord Sutherland. I wish to associate these Benches with everything that the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, said.
Shocking as it might seem, I find myself in one of those rare positions where I can support a government proposal—in this case, the concept of a school being able to offer its pupils courses in higher education. However, we have questioned that Clause 102 stand part of the Bill because there are a number of important questions that need to be answered.
This is a sensible step forward, which will allow head teachers the freedom to provide a greater variety of education in their schools that will act as a stepping stone from school to university. We are also pleased that such courses should not be offered if they would have a detrimental impact on the provision of other education offered in a school. Teachers are already under immense pressure simply coping with their existing duties. We would not want them swamped by additional responsibilities.
I would like briefly to outline our support for Amendment No. 147. As the Bill stands there exists no mechanism for either inspecting or assessing how effective such courses would be. I have seven practical questions. Going through them now would require a detailed analysis. If the Minister does not mind, I am happy to let her have the questions, to which she can reply in writing. I hope that she will be able to provide the assurances that we seek.
Baroness Andrews: The volume of correspondence that the noble Baroness and I will have in the next week will, I think, reach mega proportions. If she has detailed questions, we will be delighted to answer them.
Perhaps I may reiterate my thanks to the two noble Lords who have welcomed this clause. It is a very exciting development to offer courses at a level higher than A-level as an enrichment activity alongside the main course of study. That shows what we are beginning to achieve in terms of stretching not just the most able students, because these courses could come
1110
from different directions. The courses would meet the needs of individual students as well as raising their aspirations.
As regards take-up, at present there are a small number of innovative maintained schools working to stretch their most able students with vocational and professional qualifications and modules of Open University courses, which lend themselves very well. This clause would ensure that all schools which consider such high-level provision would be of benefit are able to develop similar enrichment programmes. It is hard to tell what the take-up will be. My feeling is that it presents a wonderful opportunity for many good schools. I hope that we will be surprised by the take-up.
However, this clause will not enable schools to offer full degrees or full first years of degrees. It will not and must not displace the statutory learning of 14 to 19 year-olds, but it will offer an opportunity to develop independent learning skills for those students going on to higher education, which will be very useful.
Amendment No. 147 focuses on quality assurance. I was glad to hear the noble Lord say that he did not think that an independent inspection was appropriate. We are clear that the Ofsted inspection framework will be quite adequate. Perhaps I may explain why. I would hazard that it is not in the Bill because it does not need to be in order to be included.
Under the current school framework and the proposed new inspection arrangements such provision can be assessed by Ofsted as part of its assessment of enrichment activities provided for pupils. That will be appropriate and consistent with the small proportion of students likely to be involved. Estyn in Wales can also assess such provision.
The QAA has a role as part of its broader responsibilities to ensure that higher education institutions have systems in place to assure quality and standards wherever it is delivered. Ofsted and Estyn will need to consult and agree with the QAA the most appropriate way of inspecting such provision.
Our view is that those arrangements are best left flexible, reflecting the varying nature and style of delivery of such provision locally in schools. Clearly, we are in a moving situation, which we will keep under review. We will work together to address any changes necessary to take account of future developments. That may not be quite the answer that the noble Lord wanted, but I hope he will be content to let us keep watching the situation for a while.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: Members on these Benches simply want to know how this will work, how it will be funded, and ensure that any final decision remains with heads and governing bodies.
Lord Sutherland of Houndwood: I thank the noble Baroness for her helpful reply, although there is still a question of quite how the QAA will be involved. I would hate a situation to develop where personalities made it difficult. At the moment that would not be the case, and the advantage of having something either

1111
written down or on the record is that personalities would have to overcome any such risks. However, I shall think about it. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 102 agreed to.
Clause 103 agreed to.
Schedule 17 [Foundation, voluntary and foundation special schools: disposal of land]:
Lord Filkin Lord Filkin moved Amendment No. 148:
Page 138, leave out lines 26 and 27 and insert—
"(2) In sub-paragraph (1)—

(a) at the beginning insert "Subject to sub-paragraph (1A),", and

(b) in paragraph (a), after "paragraph 5(4)(c)" insert "or 5(4B)(c)"."

The noble Lord said: In moving Amendment No. 148, I shall speak also to the other government amendments in the group. Schedule 17 is intended to ensure that publicly funded land no longer required for a foundation school remains available for alternative educational use. A governing body or foundation body wishing to dispose of land must seek the consent of the Secretary of State or the Assembly.
Schedule 17 closes the loophole that currently arises where land is transferred from the governing body of a foundation school to its trustees, who would not be caught by the prohibition on disposal. The subsequent amendments in the group are necessary to ensure that the legislation takes full account of all the circumstances in which trustees may acquire land for foundation schools. Our intention is to provide adequate protection for all former local authority land held by trustees. In order to do this, the legislation must set out clearly all the circumstances in which they might acquire the land.
As it stands, new paragraph 2A of Schedule 22 to the 1998 Act, which is inserted by Schedule 17, would not impose restrictions on the subsequent disposal of land by foundation school trustees who acquired it as a result of such a direction. The effect of Amendments Nos. 148 to 151 is to capture land transferred to trustees in the circumstances I have described within the definition of land which may not be disposed of without the consent of the Secretary of State or the Assembly.
The effect of Amendment No. 152 is different. It enables the Secretary of State or the Assembly to direct that where trustees hold land on trust for a foundation school which is discontinued, the same body of trustees may continue to hold the land for the purposes of a different school. This further amendment is intended to ensure that the legislation is comprehensive in its coverage so that all publicly funded foundation school land is subject to the same restrictions on disposal. I hope that the Committee will support the amendments. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Filkin Lord Filkin moved Amendments Nos. 149 and 150:
Page 139, line 7, after "enactment)" insert ", under paragraph 5(4B)(c) of this Schedule"
Page 139, line 14, at end insert "or of another foundation or foundation special school"
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Baroness Morris of Bolton Baroness Morris of Bolton moved Amendment No. 150ZA:
Page 139, line 25, at end insert—
"( ) The trustees of a foundation school or foundation special school shall not make any disposal where land is designated or used for recreational or sports use by pupils of that school or members of that local community unless alternative provision has been acquired."
The noble Baroness said: Amendment No. 150ZA would effectively forbid the trustees of a foundation school or foundation special school disposing of land used by either the pupils of the relevant school or members of the local community for recreational or sporting purposes unless alternative provision has been acquired.
Recreational space is a vital part of every community, especially the land offered by schools. But despite its importance, an average of one playing field every day comes under threat from building development. There is no statutory protection for our playing fields, so the country's irreplaceable recreational heritage and future sporting facilities are constantly at risk.
Statistics produced by the DfES for October 1998 to December 2002 show that the number of applications received for playing field disposals where the area is larger than a sports pitch was 168. Of those, 118 were approved, 19 were withdrawn and only two were rejected. The number of applications received for playing field disposals where the area is smaller than a sports pitch was 102, of which 84 were approved, 10 were withdrawn and four were rejected. Therefore the overall picture during the period was 202 approvals and only six rejections.
We are aware of the then Education Secretary's move, announced last summer, in strengthening guidance on school playing fields disposals that would require town halls which wanted to sell off fields having to show that they had no other means of raising the cash. They would also have to reinvest any proceeds from the sales in new outdoor facilities "wherever possible", such as floodlighting or new drainage systems for remaining sports pitches.
However, such guidance does not apply to foundation, voluntary or foundation special schools. This is a serious loophole that the amendment attempts both to highlight and close.
Furthermore, the Government's new position on protecting playing fields applies only to proposals which are for disposals of land capable of being used as a sports pitch of at least 1.2 hectares, or half an acre. The new requirements relating to the use of proceeds will not apply to disposals of smaller parcels of land. We believe the amendment is an important means of

1113
protecting such sporting and recreational facilities under the control of foundation schools. I beg to move.
9.15 p.m.
Baroness Walmsley: I associate these Benches with the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Bolton. We share her concerns. I shall not repeat the arguments that she has so ably laid before the Committee; I just wish to express our support.
Lord Filkin: The Government are committed to the protection of school playing fields. Since 1998 we have ensured that only school pitches that are surplus to the needs of local schools and their communities are sold and that all the money is ploughed back into improving sports or educational facilities.
Schedule 22 to the 1998 Act, which this schedule amends, provides protection for land held by the governing bodies or trustees of foundation, voluntary and foundation special schools, and by foundation bodies. We are extending the protection for former local authority land held by the trustees of foundation schools. Section 77 of the 1998 Act provides further protection for school playing fields in particular, including land owned by local authorities and governing bodies and foundation bodies. The legislation protects school playgrounds and recreation areas as well as whole sports fields.
Local authorities and schools wishing to dispose of playing fields must satisfy rigorous criteria before their applications can be approved. These are set out in the department's guidance, which makes clear that disposal of playing fields will be allowed only if the sports and curriculum needs of the school disposing of the land and neighbouring schools continue to be met. Community usage of the school playing fields is also a consideration in decisions.
With reference to the substance of the amendment, it is the Secretary of State's policy that any sale proceeds must be reinvested first in outdoor sports facilities where possible; or, if not, in indoor sport or education facilities. This means that where school playing fields are disposed of there is no diminution in the standard of recreational facilities available to schools and local communities.
The Secretary of State has established an independent school playing fields advisory panel to advise on the extent to which applications meet the criteria.
These measures demonstrate our commitment to protection. We have set out rigorous criteria which those wishing to dispose of land must satisfy. We have put in place an independent panel of experts and we insist that any proceeds must normally be ploughed back into alternative sports provision.
There might be circumstances where local authorities or schools wishing to dispose of playing fields can demonstrate that recreational provision in the area is already of a sufficiently high quality and that the proceeds of sale should be used to provide
1114
better education or community facilities. Where they do this, having met the criteria set out and having satisfied the Secretary of State and the independent panel, we believe that they should not be prevented from investing in such facilities. Hence I invite the noble Baroness to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: I thank the Minister for his detailed reply but, despite that answer, we feel that under the Government too many schools have lost too many playing fields and too many children have lost too vital a part of their education. This waste of resource and of children's talents and health must not be allowed to continue. For the moment I shall withdraw the amendment, but I am sure that we shall return to it at Report stage.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 150A:
Page 139, leave out lines 39 to 40 and insert—
"(ii) a direction that the proceeds from the sale of the whole or any part of the land should be used only for educational purposes"
The noble Baroness said: The education system in this country is not over-generously resourced and it is a pity that the value of any land that is not needed for one educational purpose should not be put to another educational purpose. In fact, the land itself could well be used for a different educational purpose if no longer needed for a school because of falling rolls.
Let me give two examples. The new children's centres will need a large amount of land and large buildings if all the different services are to be drawn together in one place. Schools are usually built in the centre of communities, which are exactly the sort of places where you would want to have children's centres.
Another example is further education colleges. An awful lot of them are in a terrible state. They need rebuilding; we need modern buildings for a modern further education system. Either the land itself or the proceeds from the sale of the land could very well be deployed in strengthening that part of our tertiary system.
I have tabled the amendment to probe the Government's feelings about these issues. The Government certainly have a lot of ideas about children's centres. Where will they get the premises? Where will they get the land? Where will they get the money? This is an opportunity to address those matters. I beg to move.
Lord Filkin: I broadly support the thrust of the noble Baroness's agenda. However, I will explain why I think that the amendment is not necessary and would perhaps frustrate what she seeks to achieve, although I recognise it is a probing amendment.
The purpose of the amendments that we are proposing to Schedule 22 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 is to ensure proper protection for local authority land transferred to the trustees of foundation schools. The amendments reinforce

1115
existing protection for such land so as to enable the Secretary of State to ensure that, in the event that it is no longer required for the purposes of the school which it was originally transferred to, any proceeds of sale may be retained for public benefit.
The Bill gives the Secretary of State the flexibility to determine to what use such proceeds of sale might be put. He might direct, for example, that they be paid to the local authority, retained by the school for other purposes, or made available to the governors or trustees of a different school.
The powers we are proposing for the Secretary of State in this sub-paragraph are identical to the Secretary of State's existing powers under Schedule 22(1)(3).
Where the trustees of a foundation school sought the Secretary of State's consent to dispose of land, they would submit details of the proposed disposal and how they intended to use any sale proceeds. The Secretary of State will consider each on its merits. It would first need to be considered by the independent School Playing Fields Advisory Panel, which would recommend to the Secretary of State whether consent should be given. When consenting to the disposal, the Secretary of State generally insists that any proceeds are used for capital purposes.
The amendment seeks to ensure that any proceeds of sale would be retained for educational purposes. I understand the objective, and while I do not object to the spirit of the amendment, I point out that the purposes of a school may extend beyond purely educational ones. The Government are committed to promoting and developing schools which provide a comprehensive range of services for pupils, their families and the wider community. These services might include childcare and health services, which go beyond what may be defined as "educational purposes" in statute.
I am delighted that schools and local authorities are embracing the extended schools agenda enthusiastically. Against that background, we would not want to prevent schools reinvesting the proceeds of sale from surplus land in other, non-educational activities benefiting pupils, their families and the wider community. But of course, they would have to meet the test on this amendment and the previous one.
I hope that that explanation is helpful, and that the noble Baroness feels comforted and not minded to press the amendment.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for his reply. Neither would I want to prevent schools using those resources for the sort of purposes that he outlined. Therefore, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Filkin Lord Filkin moved Amendments Nos. 151 and 152:
Page 140, leave out line 9 and insert—
"(2) In sub-paragraph (1)—

(a) at the beginning insert "Subject to sub-paragraph (2A).", and

1116

(b) in paragraph (a), after "enactment)" insert "under paragraph 5(4B)(c) of this Schedule"."

Page 140, line 25, at end insert—
"(aa) where the trustees have power to use the land for the purposes of another foundation or foundation special school or for the purposes of a voluntary school, direct the trustees to exercise that power in such manner as he may specify;"
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Schedule 17, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 104 [Supply of information: education maintenance allowances]:
[Amendments Nos. 152 A to 152C not moved.]
Baroness Morris of Bolton Baroness Morris of Bolton moved Amendment No. 152CA:
Page 55, line 24, leave out paragraph (d).
The noble Baroness said: I will be brief in moving this amendment because I fear that any answers could be quite technical. Although we are happy to support any measures designed to crack down on abuse and unnecessary loss of public funds, every care must be taken when dealing with such personal information that it does not pass into the wrong hands.
Therefore, with these amendments we are seeking an explanation of who will actually receive this personal information and, again, on what grounds. What safeguards will be in place?
The Government's record on administering large IT-based contracts is not good. Therefore, we need all the assurances that the Minister can give us today that this will not end up going the same way as, for example, the passports fiasco or the Criminal Record Bureau problems. I beg to move.
Baroness Andrews: This is one of a group of amendments on data sharing in relation to education maintenance allowances and free school meals. The previous group of amendments was withdrawn and I would have given the noble Baroness a long and detailed explanation of the exact process—about who receives this information and under what conditions.
I will address the amendments, but I will briefly say in relation to EMAs that the scheme is being administered by Capita at the moment. The information has to be provided by the young people themselves. It is basic information about household earnings and so forth. The school has very little to do with the process. It has to account for the registration of the young person. We need data-sharing provisions essentially to make sure that in the best, speediest and least bureaucratic way the information provided to make a claim for EMA can be verified by the Inland Revenue or benefits people. That is a very short outline about what is happening and I will write at length to the noble Baroness so that she understands the process involved. It is complex and technical.
The answer in relation to Amendments Nos. 152CA and 152CB is particularly technical. EMAs are administered under Section 14 of the Education Act 2002. As I said, the scheme is currently administered by Capita. However, Section 17 of the 2000 Act allows

1117
the Secretary of State to transfer his functions in future in relation to the administration of EMA to another body. We have chosen not to rely on the use of regulations in the first instance, which is why the provision is in the Bill, but we may use them in the future, so we must have the power to do that. When I write and explain the process, which I will do with pleasure, I will explain how this particular power will be used to secure proper future administration. What the noble Baroness said about the financial accountability, privacy and security of data is extremely important and we are alert to it.
Amendment No. 152CC, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, relates to the devolved administrations. Quite simply, we have a situation in which each of the devolved administrations operates a separate EMA allowance scheme. They are all members of a cross-departmental team that includes officials from the Treasury, the Inland Revenue and the Department for Work and Pensions. They have been discussing how best to share data in a secure and effective way. They have designed what they think is the best operational process which will cover the devolved administrations by having only one nation sending data and receiving it from the Inland Revenue. Having a lead nation to do that will provide the best and most effective operational process. At the moment, because England has the largest volume of cases, the administrators of EMA in England have agreed to take on the lead nation role. Welsh and Northern Irish administrators will pass information to English administrators to be sent on to the Inland Revenue, which will return the information to the devolved administrations.
Clearly, noble Lords will find it much more helpful if I write and explain in detail how that will happen and the safeguards that are around that in terms of managing a secure process that gets the EMA where it is needed as swiftly and safely as possible.
9.30 p.m.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: I thank the Minister for her reply, and I look forward to receiving her letter. People's private financial details have long been confidential, and any risk to that confidentiality must be taken very seriously. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 152CB and 152CC not moved.]
Clause 104 agreed to.
Clause 105 [Unauthorised disclosure of information received under section 104]:
[Amendment No. 152CD not moved.]
Clause 105 agreed to.
Clause 106 [Supply of information: free school lunches etc.]:
[Amendments Nos. 152D to 152GD not moved.]
Clause 106 agreed to.
Clauses 107 and 108 agreed to.
Clause 109 [Information about the school workforce: introductory]:
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 152H:
Page 58, line 34, leave out "section" and insert "sections (Targets for qualifying workers and qualifying trainees )"
The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 152H, I shall also speak to Amendment No. 152J, which is in my name. The amendments would ensure that the Government established a target annually for the total number of teachers and support staff who should be employed, and for the target to be costed in the annual local government finance settlement. Each school and pupil referral unit could be required to employ a minimum number of teachers, defined by maximum class and group size limits; appropriate distinctions between the work of teachers and support staff; a statutory curriculum framework, which requires a balanced and broadly based curriculum; and the personal and social needs of children and young people.
We have falling pupil rolls, and I have argued before that that should be seen as an opportunity and not a threat, as they represent an opportunity to reduce class sizes and expand the curriculum, establish productive links with parents in other schools, and many other opportunities. In recognising such opportunities, the Government could establish an annual target for the total number of teachers and support staff in employment, as well as what teachers are qualified to teach in, in relation to the need. We all know about subject shortages; this is an opportunity to define what is needed.
I know that the Government are at long last about to do the staff survey, so that before long we should know exactly where the shortages are and how many teachers are in place, against the actual need. So it should not be too difficult to do something like that. The latest publicly available figures show that at least half of all teachers in 2002 were aged 45 or over. Natural wastage is going to come into play before long—so there is a need for the Government to initiate a major and thorough investigation into the future supply of teachers for the next 10 to 15 years, or we might land up with nowhere near enough. I beg to move.
Lord Filkin: Only 45—I wish.
I struggle to understand what benefit would be obtained by what I believe is an NUT-inspired or promoted amendment. Let me explain why.
Clauses 109 and 110 lay the basis for a new, more comprehensive and less burdensome system for collecting data on the school workforce by replacing the stream of existing surveys with a single, streamlined data collection system. That will give us the most accurate picture ever of our school system and will be a powerful management and planning tool, both at national and local level.
The amendment proposed would not increase the transparency we are trying to achieve. Every year, if we take the amendment literally, the Secretary of State would be obliged to publish a figure for the total

1119
number of people who should be employed at, or otherwise working in, schools. That would include not only teachers and support staff, but school secretaries, dinner ladies, handymen and so forth.
The figure would not be a target because, even supposing that the Secretary of State could or wanted to get such a national figure, how would such a global figure be distributed between the local authorities and schools? Even if one divided it by 150 or 24,000, in some spurious way, what benefit would it be as a consequence? It would not have any benefit that we can see for schools and certainly not for children.
None of what I have said means that the Secretary of State does not have clear responsibilities under the 1994 Act to secure an adequate supply of trained teachers. I shall not weary the Committee with the story on that, but over the past few years that story has been remarkable, powerful and successful.
Clause 76(7) obliges the new Training and Development Agency to have regard when providing financial support for training to the Secretary of State's estimates of future demand not only for teachers but also for other members of the school workforce.
While the Secretary of State clearly has to review the total numbers and take cognisance of factors such as the ageing of various workforce populations and increasingly to be thoughtful about how the school workforce is shaping at both national level and local level, just as local authorities will as part of their children's plan, specifying national targets or local targets would no doubt consume an enormous amount of effort, time and argument, and what benefit would flow from it? While I do not wish to be dismissive of the amendment, we struggle to see that it would achieve anything that would be useful.
I am happy to engage further on the matter in case I have missed any of the noble Baroness's points. However, at this point, we can see little benefit in the amendment and ask whether she would consider withdrawing it.
Baroness Walmsley: I certainly would. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 109 agreed to.
[Amendment No. 152J not moved.]
Clause 110 [Supply of information about school workforce]:
On Question, Whether Clause 110 shall stand part of the Bill?
Lord Hanningfield: I shall briefly outline the points and would be grateful if we could be sent a written explanation from the Minister dealing with them. The Explanatory Notes tell us that Clause 110 will enable,
"regulations to require or authorise the proprietor of a school, a children's services authority … or any person prescribed in regulations to supply information … to the Secretary of State, the Assembly",
or to anyone else prescribed in regulations.
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We are rather concerned about who those people "prescribed in regulations" might be and how that information might be passed around. I have a much wider briefing note that I could read, but the simple point is that we need more information on how that information will be shared, how the Government will ensure that it does not go to the wrong people and on who are the prescribed people. I shall not speak further on this now, but I hope that the Minister will let us have more information on exactly how the provision will operate.
Lord Filkin: Perhaps I may ask the noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, whether he wanted me to dazzle him—or weary him—by reading out my speaking note or whether he would prefer that I correspond with him on these points in more detail.
Lord Hanningfield: The latter.
Lord Filkin: I shall be pleased to do so. Of course I shall copy it to the other Opposition Front Benchers and to all other participants in the debate.
Clause 110 agreed to.
Clause 111 [Power of governing body to make alternative provision for excluded pupils]:
[Amendments Nos. 152Kand 152L not moved.]
Clause 111 agreed to.
[Amendment No. 152LA not moved.]
Clause 112 agreed to.
Baroness Turner of Camden Baroness Turner of Camden moved Amendment No. 153:
After Clause 112, insert the following new clause—
"EXCLUSION OF CHILDREN: DUTIES IN RELATION TO PUPILS

(1) Section 52 of the Education Act 2002 (c. 32) is amended as follows.

(2) After subsection (5) there is inserted—

"(5A) It shall be the duty of all persons and bodies exercising functions under this section—

(a) to have regard to the welfare of the child that is proposed to be excluded, and

(b) to have regard in particular to the child's educational achievement.

(5B) Regulations shall make provision for compliance with the duty under subsection (5A) and in particular to ensure that pupils who are proposed to be excluded or have been excluded under the provisions of this section—

(a) have a proper opportunity to make representations in relation to their exclusion or proposed exclusion, and

(b) receive all information that might be relevant to such representations.""

The noble Baroness said: I declare my interest as a former trustee and council member of Save the Children. This amendment has been suggested to me by that charity. It is also supported by a number of other similar organisations.
The amendment is concerned with the important matter of the exclusion of children from school. In August 2004, Save the Children commissioned a research project specifically aimed at gathering

1121
information from children and young people on their experience of the exclusion process. The objectives were to determine what experiences children and young people have of the exclusion process; to elicit the extent to which children and young people are involved in the exclusion process and whether their involvement is systemic or sporadic and inconsistent; to assess whether children and young people are given the necessary information and support to facilitate their full involvement in the process; to determine whether there are any possible or lasting benefits to children and young people being involved in the process; and to assess whether there are any negative effects of not being involved.
Face-to-face individual interviews took place with a number of children and young people who had recently been excluded either permanently or on a fixed time-period exclusion. The amendment before the Committee today is the result of that research.
The findings indicated that the exclusion process is associated with considerable obfuscation, misunderstanding and frustration by many young people. Many who participated in the research appeared confused about what was involved in the exclusion process, the sequence of events and the specific purpose of any meetings held. They regarded themselves as having no influence or control over the exclusion process. It was something that happened around them and about them, but did not directly involve them other than incidentally. Not surprisingly, most of the respondents in the research had a predominantly negative view of the overall merits and value of the process. They often failed to differentiate between initial meetings to consider possible exclusion, disciplinary committee meetings and appeal meetings. Few seemed to be aware of, or understand, the appeal procedures linked to permanent exclusions.
The extent to which young people were involved in the process of their exclusion varied considerably across the research sample. At one end of the spectrum were respondents who often attended meetings and presented their view on what had happened; at the other end were respondents who never went to meetings to do with exclusion and therefore had never given their side of the story. Some respondents expressed anger and frustration at not having been asked to give their side of the story. They suffered a sense not only of disempowerment but also the feeling that justice had not been done because teachers were making exclusion decisions without knowing all the full facts of the case. In several cases it was thought that having the opportunity to speak could well have changed the exclusion decision.
Young people proposed a number of useful suggestions as to how the exclusion process might be improved: first, that discussions focus on what had happened during the specific incident concerned rather than on the young person's general character and behaviour; secondly, that all young people be treated equally; thirdly, that teachers spend more time gathering evidence from all those involved; fourthly, that a young person accused be given a chance to call
1122
witnesses of their choice to attend exclusion meetings; and, finally, that young people be allowed to hear the evidence against them before being given the opportunity to present their side of the case.
There is no doubt from the case studies cited in the research that young people excluded are concerned that their education will be disrupted, and this could well cause problems for them in later life. As one of them put it, "You go thick if you're off school too long". There seems to be an expectation that all parents and carers have the information and capacity to present the best interests of their child throughout the process. However, the research undertaken shows that that is not always the case. One young man explained that he had wanted to appeal against what he felt was an unfair exclusion but his mother felt that it would take too much time. He told researchers, "My mum didn't want me to have an appeal to go back as it would take too long. I wanted to go back, but my mum says it takes too long so leave it. I would have told them it wasn't me and that they should not have excluded me in the first place".
Current statutory guidance in England does not enforce statutory involvement of a child in the exclusion process. Not all schools make provision for children and young people to make representations at disciplinary meetings or appeal hearings. Furthermore, the current guidance does not cover the provision of relevant information to children and young people regarding their exclusion. As a result children are not always in a position to make representation at exclusion hearings, even if they are allowed to attend. Research has shown that children most likely to be excluded already suffer reduced life chances.
Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child states:
"States Parties shall assure, to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views, the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child".
Legislative change would ensure that the Government are meeting their obligations under Article 12 by establishing a legal standard that requires schools to listen to children and young people in matters of concern to them in the exclusions process. Fully involving children and young people in the process and supporting them to make representations would help to ensure that they take responsibility for their actions and do not become disengaged from education altogether.
Research has shown that many excluded young people appreciate the chance to be able to tell their side of the story and are only too well aware of the problems that they may face in later life if their education is disrupted by exclusion.
In Scotland and Wales, legislative changes have been introduced that give children the rights sought in this amendment. In order to ensure that all children have the right to access appropriate information and have their voices heard in the school exclusion process, it is crucial that statutory guidance be strengthened

1123
through legislative change. I hope that the Government will view this amendment favourably. I beg to move.
9.45 p.m.
Baroness Walmsley: I have added my name and that of my noble friend Lady Sharp of Guildford to this amendment, and I rise to support it. Being excluded from school can often be a cataclysmic and disastrous life-changing event for a child. It is unbelievable to me that it could happen to a child without him or her having the opportunity properly to express his or her side of the story and give his or her views.
We cannot rely on parents to be able to put the child's point of view. The parent often does not know the truth of the situation and certainly cannot express it in the way that the child can. It is unfortunate that sometimes in the regulations the parent can be a gatekeeper, because the regulations say that the child can give his or her opinion if the parent agrees—that really should go. The UN convention says that it is the child's views that we must hear. When we went through the Children Act 2004, the Government accepted that the child's wishes and feelings should be taken into account in certain parts of the Bill. In a situation as cataclysmic and as damaging to a child's future prospects as exclusion from school, it is absolutely essential. You only have to look at the number of young offenders who have been excluded from school to realise what a very important event exclusion is in the life of a child. It is essential that their voices be heard.
The Earl of Listowel: I strongly support this amendment, but with one qualification. On the point of the parents in this case, who are the gatekeepers, as the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, put it, I note that the Princess Royal Trust for Carers supports this amendment. One can well imagine the situation of a young carer with a parent with a mental disability, or with an alcohol or drug addiction, where family circumstances are such that parents in that case are not best placed to make that decision, or cannot helpfully do so, at least where there are difficulties involved in the family. Family circumstances are often closely connected with the child's behaviour in school.
In the research referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Turner of Camden, one boy, who I will call Stuart, a 16 year-old from Hull, was interviewed. He was permanently excluded from his school, and he subsequently went into care. At the time of the interview, he was doing fairly well in his new school, but no longer had any contact with his family. In his instance, it may have been that the parental relationship was not such that it would have been helpful to involve the mother or father in the decision about whether the boy could make an appeal.
I have spoken recently with a young woman who was an asylum seeker, who was fostered. Her foster mother had a nervous breakdown in the course of her care. This young woman, who was very resilient, is now starting at university, but in other circumstances
1124
that child might have begun to suffer at school, and it would be helpful for the school governors to know her background circumstances.
Another child who was in care in a children's home was telling me that she shared a bedroom with five other children. Again, in the exclusion process, the governors might well wish to know that that was happening in her case, in order to inform that process. It is vital that children have the experience of agency in their lives as far as possible in a proportionate way. The Government recognise that, and they are enshrining that in the Children Act as one of the five outcomes about contributing to society. They need to be involved in the decision-making processes which affect them.
If a child does not feel involved in those processes and if, in the past, he has had experience of the adult world not being sympathetic towards him and treating him badly, as many of these children have, there is a danger that in life he will go on to carry a grievance against the adult world and society. If one creates every opportunity for such children to express their point of view and if one bends over backwards to be fair towards them, there is at least a chance that that sense of grievance will be reduced and perhaps done away with altogether. So, for children who are leaving school, this could be a very educative experience in ensuring that their voice is heard. I hope that, in her response, the Minister can be sympathetic tow ards the amendment. I think that it fits quite well with government policy.
Baroness Howe of Idlicote: I support the amendment, which was moved so persuasively by the noble Baroness. It is crucial that, with all the legislation protecting their rights, children have the ability to exercise those rights. Spelling it out in this way within the education system, which is still not seen as part of the total well-being concept in the Children Act, will help very much.
As has already been said, one worrying aspect is the number of children whose parents may not be on their side—perhaps for understandable reasons. But there is a need for an independent person who can speak on their behalf when decisions such as this are taken. I have to say that, quite apart from the examples that we have heard from other noble Lords, a number of these children are in this situation because truancy has been allowed to develop over a long period. On occasion, no doubt the school is all too delighted not to have within its premises children who might be disruptive.
I think that the amendment would spell out the position beautifully and I hope very much that it will receive the consideration that it deserves.
The Earl of Listowel: I apologise but I did mention that there was one qualification to my support—that is, I have not heard from teachers or governors on this matter. I imagine that they will be mostly very supportive of the amendment because I think that

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most of them feel that, so far as possible, children should be involved in important decisions which affect their lives.
Baroness Andrews: As I hope noble Lords would expect, we are entirely sympathetic with the main thrust of the amendment. It is a very important matter. The noble Baroness moved the amendment most eloquently and brought some new and powerful research to our considerations.
By way of preface, everything that the noble Baroness said fits in with what we are trying to do in government—that is, we are trying to be much more responsive to the voice of the child, no matter in what context and no matter what is said and how it is heard. In 2002, we started with Listening to Learn —an action plan for involving children and young people. That was updated in July 2004. As the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, pointed out, the whole thrust of the Children Act, not least thanks to the contributions of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, was to amplify the voice and the role of the child in helping us to inform our policies in the interests of children. Therefore, we are very much moving towards that agenda. During debate on this Bill, for example, we have already discussed how pupils receive their own feedback as part of the inspection process. They will have their own letter describing what the inspector has found, tailored to their needs.
However, one point that we must bear in mind is the process of exclusion. It is a serious process which, as noble Lords have said, has a very serious impact on young people. We also have to ensure that the balance of interests is satisfied. The welfare of individual pupils is vital, and responsible bodies dealing with exclusions must also consider the welfare of others in the school community. So we are talking very much about getting the balance right. Placing a duty on responsible bodies to have regard only to the welfare and education of an individual child could result in decisions which may adversely affect their overall duty to be able to deliver the welfare and education of the wider school community. We had similar debates earlier in Committee and we should be aware of that matter in context.
Regarding excluded pupils missing out on education, since September 2002 all local authorities have made a commitment to provide full-time education for all permanently excluded pupils and the vast majority of authorities are doing this. We are working with those that are finding it more difficult.
Guidance is issued both in England and Wales, which goes to appeal panels and governing bodies. That certainly advises that if they wish to do so and the parent agrees, young people would be allowed to speak and to give their accounts of events at each stage of the exclusions process. Schools which are not doing that are not following the guidance. A message should be sent to those schools. We agree with the spirit of the amendment, but since our guidance makes it clear that head teachers and reviewing bodies should involve
1126
pupils, we do not believe that legislation is necessary. That will disappoint my noble friend and other noble Lords who have spoken.
However, we would like to reflect on the research that she has mentioned and the arguments that she has made. In the light of my assurance regarding the guidance that we use, especially regarding some of the arguments put about the importance of the child speaking when sometimes the parent is either unwilling or reluctant to come forward, perhaps the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment and allow us to consider what she and other noble Lords have said.
Baroness Turner of Camden: I am grateful to my noble friend for her comments. There was much support from all sides of the House for the principles in the amendment and the Government have taken on board the need to involve the children. I noted with satisfaction her comments about the research carried out by Save the Children and I am willing to provide her with a copy. If that can be reflected on between now and Report, it is to be hoped that the Government might themselves propose a suitable amendment if they do not like my wording. I thank those noble Lords who have participated and, meanwhile, beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Baroness Walmsley Baroness Walmsley moved Amendment No. 153ZA:
After Clause 112, insert the following new clause—
"EXTRA-CURRICULA ACTIVITIES: RISK

(1) A school or its servant or agent which, in addition to its curriculum, provides formal or informal educational activities for its students may provide to any parent or guardian a statement that the activities it provides may involve risks or personal injury or harm or risks to the property of the student.

(2) The statement shall be in writing and shall explain that the parent or guardian accept that participation of their child in the activities provided by the organisation may involve risks of personal injury or harm or risks to the property of the student.

(3) The risks shall only be those covered by the activity. including travel to and from the point where the organisation takes over the supervision of the student.

(4) The acceptance of the risks by the parent or guardian shall not exclude the organisation or its servants or agents from any criminal liability.

(5) The statement shall not apply to any activity which the student concerned is obliged to undertake.

(6) Where, in accordance with the Act, such a statement has been issued and accepted by the parent or guardian, this must be taken into account by any subsequent court proceeding for negligence or breach of duty, in considering the liability of the school or its servant or agent."

The noble Baroness said: I am sure that all noble Lords would agree that extra-curricular activities are enriching to a child's education and development—their mental, social, physical development and so on. Those activities that involve physical adventure are particularly enriching, because they help develop the person's character and their team-building skills. Many organisations other than schools also lead and organise such activities but, unfortunately, I was not able to include them in the amendment, due to the Long Title—I had to stick to schools. But I would like

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your Lordships to keep in mind credible and responsible organisations such as the Scout Association, the Guide Association and Outward Bound, which, in addition to schools, lead such activities.
A difficulty is that many schools and other agencies feel constrained about organising such activities—that stretch young people and are good for them—because we live in a litigious society, where some people believe that you should not do anything with any risk attached at all. But the very risk itself helps young people to develop. They need the opportunity to practice assessing the risks and behaving in a responsible manner, taking into account not only their own safety, but that of the group in which they are working. So I am sure we would all agree on this, but the problem is the constraint posed by the danger and the organiser's career being completely destroyed if something goes wrong.
I would never suggest a measure that would protect people who are genuinely at fault, who behave in an irresponsible manner and who put the safety of children at risk, but there is an inherent risk in some activities. If both the children and their parents undertake such activities in full knowledge of the risks, and accept them, it is reasonable to suggest that, should something go wrong, the fact that they have accepted those risks should be taken into account in any legal proceedings that might ensue.
I would hope that once parents understand and accept risks, they would not go running to the courts if something goes wrong, and they can see that it is "just one of those things" and not the result of criminal irresponsibility, which can never be condoned. I believe that it would be reasonable to insert into the Bill this new clause to allow for the risks to be assessed, to be agreed to in the full knowledge of what they entail and to be taken into consideration in any legal proceedings. I ask the Minister to bear in mind in his reply that such a provision could apply equally to non-school organisations that carry out similar activities. I beg to move.
10 p.m.
Lord Hanningfield: Whether or not this clause is exactly right, we support a provision of this kind being included in the legislation.
Lord Dearing: The Committee will recall that the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, and I raised this issue in connection with school trips some time ago. I accepted the Minister's comment to me at that time that very few suits are initiated, but this proposal is wider. I know that there is great anxiety among teachers about such matters. The Government are very committed to encouraging much more physical activity and games in schools and they are putting a lot of money into that. If this is to fructify to the fullest possible extent, it will involve extra-curricular activities by teachers; for example, refereeing matches. I know that they can be at risk for allowing an activity to take place.
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I believe that this amendment constitutes very good practice and should be standard practice. Perhaps it should be in the Bill although perhaps the final subsection is not quite right. I believe that this new clause makes good sense and practice.
Lord Filkin: I understand the intent, but the amendment certainly does not achieve its intent, as I shall explain. As yet, we remain unpersuaded that the route to solving the problem is through legislation, although solving it is undoubtedly important. As the Committee knows from previous debates, the issue is as much about the perception of the fear of litigation as of litigation itself. The Better Regulation Task Force was very clear on that. Nevertheless, that does not mean there is no problem, but what is the right way to solve it?
Clearly, we strongly support the aim of offering children the opportunity to learn through experience in the world outside the classroom. There is a consensus in the Committee on that. We are also glad to know from local authorities that the number of school visits overall remains stable or is increasing. So we are not facing a reduction in activities and the world is not about to collapse.
Our belief is that we need to respond by supporting and spreading the wealth of good practice shown by teachers and employers which we know is taking place in schools. I shall set out what we are doing to achieve that. The amendment would entitle any school, or any member of its staff, when providing extra-curricular activity for educational purposes, to provide a statement that there are risks associated with the activity. Where that statement has been accepted by the parents of a student, a court would be required to take this matter into account in any subsequent proceedings for negligence or breach of duty. That might appear to provide some incentive to schools.
In reality it may have the contrary effect, in that, by reducing the legal protection of pupils against the negligence of a school or its staff, parents and schools may be less inclined to allow children to participate in such activities. Clearly, that would not be the intent; but it is certainly plausible that it may be the consequence.
We are also concerned that it might only serve to obscure the legal position while not actually contributing to the culture and mindset that undoubtedly the noble Baroness and the Government want to promote.
I shall set out what we are doing to support and spread further the wealth of existing good practice. We have issued guidance for local authorities, teachers and schools regarding safety, especially on school visits. That has been warmly received by local authorities and described by them as a "quiet revolution". It recommends that local authorities and schools ask parents to sign a consent form, which is designed to inform parents about the risks of the activity, the measures taken and the need for their child to behave responsibly. The guidance encourages schools to involve pupils, so far as is practical, as the

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noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, wanted—and she is right—in assessing and managing the risks themselves so that they both own that and also use it as a learning experience in future. It is vital that children taking part in these events are risk-aware, not risk-averse.
At each stage of the planning of the event, schools are encouraged to discuss safety and other issues with parents and pupils, while ensuring that risks are managed in context. This kind of close working relationship is fundamental.
Also, my right honourable friend Charles Clarke, previously Secretary of State for Education, in November said in his speech to heads that we recognise that, when accidents occur, teachers and schools can face investigations and possible penalties. Parents should expect a school to tell them the full story and explain how they did all they reasonably could. By the same token, a school and its members of staff have the right to expect parents to support them by taking a fair view. We need to investigate serious incidents and to take all necessary steps to manage risks. Where negligence is proven, it is of course right that the law should take its course. But we absolutely agree that teachers deserve the starting point of a presumption that they have carried out their duties conscientiously.
We have also recognised the concerns of the National Association of Schoolmasters/Union of Women Teachers on school visits, and we are in active consultation with them and other teachers' groups on whether we might take any further steps to maintain and promote both safety, and fair treatment for all concerned.
I shall finally set out my concerns on the possible legal implications. First, the provision seeks to restrict the likelihood of claims in negligence. We fear that its effect would be to lead schools to believe they could afford to take less care of a student whose parents had accepted a statement of this kind. Clearly, that would not be the intent but we think that it is at least plausible. It requires a court to treat a claim by an injured child whose parents have accepted a statement differently from a claim where no statement is accepted. We are concerned that this should not be the case, as any harm to a child arising from the negligence of another party should be treated with the utmost seriousness irrespectively. We are doubtful, therefore, whether a court would, in any event, treat cases arising in that way.
As drafted, the amendment extends to risks involved in travel even where the children concerned are not under the supervision of the school.
It is proposed that the provision of a statement applies only to non-compulsory extra-curricular activities. We fear that this will lead to uncertainty; the amendment would also result in the law of negligence for some activity by schools being different from the law for other activity by schools or others. That is not what the noble Baroness wanted to hear. She did not want a legal diatribe on why it was the wrong amendment, even though we think that that is the case.
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The issue is whether it is realistic to find the solution to this through legislation or other means. Our current mindset is that it should be through other means, while recognising that the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs is looking seriously at the broader issue about trying to deter unnecessary litigation when people should be accepting that accidents do happen and that that is part of life.
Therefore, we want our department to take promoting a culture of trust and awareness very seriously. We would like to continue to involve Members of the Chamber in our progress, so that we give you the fullest picture on how we seek to address the issue. I will make sure that we will do that in the future.
In conclusion, we share the objective; we do not think that this is the right means; and we are doubtful whether legislation is the right means. No doubt we shall all reflect on that issue. We certainly want to give noble Lords a fuller picture of what we are doing and what is being done across government to seek to make these issues better managed in the future by parents and by schools. I hope that that is helpful.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank those who have supported the amendment and the Minister for his response. It is very difficult to table an appropriate and watertight amendment to cover this issue. My noble friend Lady Sharp and I looked at three or four different alternatives for the opportunity to discuss the matter, before eventually tabling this amendment. If the Government felt that legislation were the right approach, they could bring all their legal brains to bear on producing the right amendment. However, the Government clearly do not. I—and, I am sure, other Members of the Committee—look forward to hearing the ongoing story of the Government's efforts to address the issue, albeit that it is a perception, not a reality. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 113 agreed to.
Schedule 18 [Further amendments related to provisions of Part 4]:
Lord Filkin Lord Filkin moved Amendment No. 153A:
Page 143. line 7, leave out "funding" and insert "prescribed"
The noble Lord said: I have a short but perfectly formed speaking note on the amendment. We had a full debate on three-year budgets earlier and a number of detailed questions were raised, but there was general support for the principle. The amendments are consequential on the introduction of three-year budgets. They will allow us to adapt the existing requirements on LEAs relating to the provision of information on school funding to fit the new three-year regime. For example, they will allow us to require LEAs, once they have fixed their overall school budgets for three years ahead, to include the relevant figures in their annual budget statement. That budget is sent to all schools, as well as to the Secretary of State. The details of the requirements will be set out in

1131
regulations, as some minor amendments are needed to the primary legislation to ensure that we have the necessary flexibility. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Filkin Lord Filkin: moved Amendments Nos. 153B to 153D:
Page 143, line 8, at end insert—
"(2A) After subsection (1) insert—
"(1A) The periods prescribed for the purposes of subsection (1)—

(a) must consist of one or more funding periods, and

(b) may include funding periods in respect of which (by virtue of their inclusion in one or more earlier periods prescribed for the purposes of that subsection) information relating to planned expenditure has previously been required under that subsection.""

Page 143, line 10, leave out "funding" and insert "prescribed"
Page 143, line 11, at end insert—
"(4) After subsection (2A) insert—
"(2B) The periods prescribed for the purposes of subsection (2) must consist of one or more funding periods.""
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Schedule 18, as amended, agreed to
Clauses 114 to 119 agreed to.
Schedule 19 [Repeals]:
Lord Filkin Lord Filkin: moved Amendments Nos. 154 and 155:
Page 145, line 43, column 2, after "(6)," insert "and"
Page 145, column 2, leave out lines 46 and 47.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Schedule 19, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 120 to 124 agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported with amendments.

London Local Authorities (Prohibition of Smoking in Places of Work) Bill [H.L.]
The Bills were presented and read a first time.
House adjourned at fourteen minutes past ten o'clock.

  Iraq: "Interim Government Statistics"
  Iraq: "Interim Government Statistics"
  Iraq: Civilian Casualties
  Iraq: Civilian Casualties
  Iraq: Non-violent Death and Disease
  Iraq: Non-violent Death and Disease
  Iraq: International Advisory and Monitoring Board Report
  Iraq: International Advisory and Monitoring Board Report
  Iraq: Cost of Operations
  Iraq: Cost of Operations
  Iraq: Kirkuk
  Iraq: Kirkuk
  Madagascar: Closure of British Embassy
  Madagascar: Closure of British Embassy
  Sudan: Darfur
  Sudan: Darfur
  China: North Korean Refugees
  China: North Korean Refugees
  Israel and Palestine: London Conference
  Israel and Palestine: London Conference
  Palestinian Authority
  Palestinian Authority
  Israel: Palestinian Prisoners
  Israel: Palestinian Prisoners
  International Atomic Energy Agency
  International Atomic Energy Agency
  Dr A.Q. Khan
  Dr A.Q. Khan
  North Korea: Reverend Kim Dong-sik
  North Korea: Reverend Kim Dong-sik
  Identity Cards: Consultancy Contracts
  Identity Cards: Consultancy Contracts
  Immigration Acts: Reasons for Detention
  Immigration Acts: Reasons for Detention
  Future Aircraft Carrier
  Future Aircraft Carrier
  HMS "Invincible" and HMS "Illustrious": Annual Operational Costs
  HMS "Invincible" and HMS "Illustrious": Annual Operational Costs
  Firelink Radio Procurement
  Firelink Radio Procurement
  Asylum: Appeals
  Asylum: Appeals
  Intestacy
  Intestacy
  Schools: Instances of Violence
  Schools: Instances of Violence
  School Transport Bill
  School Transport Bill
  Victims of War or Civil Disaster: Silences
  Victims of War or Civil Disaster: Silences
  Financial Services Compensation Scheme
  Financial Services Compensation Scheme
  Self-invested Personal Pensions
  Self-invested Personal Pensions
  Hotels and Boarding Houses: Grading Signs
  Hotels and Boarding Houses: Grading Signs
  Health and Safety Executive
  Health and Safety Executive
  Oil Reprocessing
  Oil Reprocessing
  Jet Lag
  Jet Lag
  Student Nurses
  Student Nurses
  Foot and Mouth Disease
  Foot and Mouth Disease

  Asian Tsunami: Death Registration of British Victims
  The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean)
  As we have made clear before, it is a priority for the Government to ensure that effective arrangements are in place to support the families of people missing following the tsunami. We are conscious that, despite the efforts of the local authorities in the countries affected and the on-going work of my officials and the police both here and in the region, many bodies may never be recovered. This would cause unacceptable uncertainty for the families concerned.

  We have therefore agreed, as a response to the exceptional circumstances we face, that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office will register the death overseas and issue a certified copy of the register entry for missing British nationals where no body has been found. This will be done at the request of the family, and based on advice from the police, and will be provided free of charge.

  We have agreed with the police, who are investigating all reports of missing British nationals, that they will provide my officials with advice as their inquiries conclude as to whether the missing person was in fact killed by the tsunami. We will then decide, in the light of the evidence, whether to register the death. In order to arrive at the judgment, we and the police will be applying four criteria, all of which must be met:

  that evidence exists beyond reasonable doubt that the missing person had travelled to the affected region (e.g. that they had booked, paid for and made a journey to the region); and

  that on the balance of probability, the person was in the affected area at the time the tsunami struck; and

  there was no reasonable evidence of life since 26 December (e.g. contact with relatives or transactions on their bank account); and

  that there was no reason, again on the balance of probability, that the person would want to disappear.

  These inquiries will inevitably take time to complete, although the police are confident that they will be able to complete the overwhelming majority of investigations for those people most likely to have been caught up in the tsunami within 12 months—in many cases, much sooner.

  Throughout this difficult period the police will continue to make family liaison officers available to support the families of those thought highly likely to have been involved in the tsunami. The family liaison officers will ensure that they are kept fully informed
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  during what we recognise is likely to be a harrowing process. They will also help them gain access to emotional care and other advice and welfare services, including any financial assistance available to them through the state benefit system.

  Criminal Justice Act 2003
  The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Scotland of Asthal)
  On 4 April 2005 the majority of the new sentences introduced in the Criminal Justice Act 2003 will come into force. The key provisions are: public protection sentences for dangerous offenders; the new community order; custody minus; and the new release and recall arrangements for all custodial sentences of 12 months and over.

  These new sentences are a key part of the Government's tough and effective sentencing framework which targets resources where they are needed. The Criminal Justice Act 2003 is the most significant piece of legislation in this area for over a decade. It introduces wide changes to sentencing principles and the sentencing powers of the courts.

  The public must be protected from dangerous criminals. That is why the Criminal Justice Act created new public protection sentences aimed specifically at sexual and violent offenders. Offenders convicted of specific sexual and violent offences will be assessed by the court as to whether or not they pose a serious risk to the public. Those who are considered to be such a risk will be subject to the provisions for dangerous offenders.

  These new sentences will ensure that dangerous sexual and violent offenders are subject to assessment by the Parole Board. They will not be released from prison until and unless their level of risk to the public is assessed by the Parole Board as manageable in the community. If the risk is not reduced to a safe level, they may never be released.

  For other sentences of 12 months and over, if prisoners have not been classed as dangerous by the courts, they will be released into the community under licence conditions halfway through their sentence but supervision in the community will continue to the end of the entire sentence, rather than to the three-quarters point as now. Recalls to prison following breach of licence conditions will take place under the new scheme outlined in the Act and will no longer need to be authorised by the Parole Board.

  The new community order will allow sentencers a much greater degree of flexibility in putting together tough community sentences that will be tailored to the needs of offenders and the seriousness of their offence. The full range of community punishments will be available for all offenders whose offence is serious enough to merit them and not just for imprisonable offences as is the case now. Powers to deal with offenders who breach are also stronger: courts will have the option of making the requirements more onerous, revoking the order and re-sentencing the offender, or if the breach is wilful and persistent, imposing a custodial sentence even if the original offence was not imprisonable.
  WS 39
  Custody minus is a new suspended sentence, which allows the court to impose community requirements together with a suspended custodial sentence which is activated if the offender breaches the community period. This new suspended sentence will be much more demanding than current suspended sentences. Not only will an offender be required to refrain from committing another offence during the period of suspension; he or she will have requirements to fulfil in the community, as with a community sentence.

  Offenders can be brought back to court during a custody minus sentence for a review hearing. The new power of review will allow sentencers to play a more active role in determining what is needed, not just at the point of sentence but also during its course. As the review process for the drug treatment and testing order has shown, better information about the outcome of their decisions will improve sentencers' decision- making, as well as benefit the offender's rehabilitation.

  The new sentencing framework will help to cut crime through effective punishment; protection of the public; reparation to communities; and the prevention of re-offending.

  Prisoners: Technical Lifer Status
  Baroness Scotland of Asthal
  From 2 April 2005 life sentence prisoners who have been transferred to psychiatric hospital for treatment will no longer be considered for technical lifer status. All life sentence prisoners will have their future release determined by the Parole Board and be subject to life licence on release. This decision has been taken in light of the judgment in the case of Benjamin and Wilson v the United Kingdom, which found that technical lifer policy was in breach of Article 5(4) of the European Convention on Human Rights. This will not affect those who have already been granted technical lifer status, or the consideration of any pending applications. No new applications however, will be considered after 2 April 2005.

  Planning for Housing
  The Minister of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Lord Rooker)
  My right honourable friend the Minister for Housing and Planning has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.

  This Statement concerns the planning system's role in providing sufficient homes to meet the variety of housing needs in England. The intention is to remove barriers to delivering the housing needed in our communities and ensure the planning system is not a brake on an adequate and continuing supply of sites for housing in sustainable locations.

  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is publishing today two updates to planning policy guidance Note 3: Housing (PPG3), entitled Supporting the Delivery of New Housing and Planning for Sustainable Communities in Rural Areas. Both updates will help to increase the supply of housing where it is
  WS 40
  needed in the most sustainable way possible. They reflect the changes to the planning system made in the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004.

  These updates were the subject of consultation in July 2003. The remainder of the PPG3 update Influencing the Size, Type and Affordability of Housing, of which Planning for Sustainable Communities in Rural Areas was a component, is being further consulted upon. I am making a separate Statement on this today.

  Supporting the Delivery of New Housing

  PPG3 requires local planning authorities, when preparing their local development frameworks, to review all their non-housing allocations and to consider whether some of this land might be better used for housing or mixed-use development. The Government's experience is that nevertheless many local planning authorities continue to reserve an excess supply of land when it would make sense to consider this for housing.

  The consultation update proposed an approach to the handling of applications for housing and mixed use development on land allocated or previously used for industrial or commercial use which is no longer needed for that use, and which is both suitable for and needed for housing. The Government have considered the responses to the consultation and are adding today the following new paragraph 42(a) to PPG3:

  "Local planning authorities should consider favourably planning applications for housing or mixed use developments which concern land allocated for industrial or commercial use in saved policies and development plan documents or redundant land or buildings in industrial or commercial use, but which is no longer needed for such use, unless any of the following apply:

  the proposal fails to reflect the policies in this PPG (including paragraph 31), particularly those relating to a site's suitability for development and the presumption that previously-developed sites (or buildings for re-use or conversion) should be developed before greenfield sites;

  the housing development would undermine the planning for housing strategy set out in the regional spatial strategy or the development plan document where this is up-to-date, in particular if it would lead to over-provision of new housing and this would exacerbate the problems of, or lead to, low demand;

  it can be demonstrated, preferably through an up-to-date review of employment land1 (refer to Annex D for practice guidance), that there is a realistic prospect of the allocation being taken up for its stated use in the plan period or that its development for housing would undermine regional and local strategies for economic development and regeneration".

  1 Employment Land Reviews: Guidance Note ODPM 2004

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  In December 2004 the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister published practice guidance for local planning authorities on carrying out employment land reviews to assess the demand for and supply of land for employment. The guidance aims to help local planning authorities assess the suitability of sites for employment development, safeguard the best sites for employment and identify those which are no longer suitable for employment development and which should be made available for other uses. A copy of the practice guidance is available in the Libraries of the House.

  Planning for Sustainable Communities in Rural Areas

  The consultation PPG3 update Influencing the Size, Type and Affordability of Housing proposed to replace the rural exception policy with an allocation policy, which would enable local planning authorities to allocate sites solely for affordable housing. In the light of the consultation responses a revised approach has been developed, aimed at meeting concerns expressed about the practical effects of the proposed approach. The Government are today amending PPG3 policy, adding a new section which will enable local planning authorities to allocate sites in rural areas, but also to take advantage of windfall sites through a continuing rural exception approach. The intention to retain the rural exception policy alongside a new allocation policy was signalled by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs when she published her department's five-year strategy Delivering the Essentials of Life on 8 December 2004.

  The replacement paragraph 18 of PPG3 is as follows:

  "18. It is important that there is adequate housing provision in rural areas to meet the needs of local people and to contribute to the delivery of sustainable communities. Regional spatial strategies should set out how planning at the local level is expected to contribute to meeting identified rural affordable housing needs (including Gypsies and Travellers where relevant). Local planning authorities should make sufficient land available either within or adjoining existing rural communities to enable these local requirements to be met in a manner which contributes to the achievement of sustainable communities. Affordable housing provision in rural areas should be supported by a rural exception site policy (see Annex B). Rural exception sites should be small, solely for affordable housing and on land within or adjoining existing small rural communities1 which would not otherwise be released for general market housing. The affordable housing provided on such sites should meet local needs2 in perpetuity and count towards the overall level of housing provision. The rural exception site policy applies to both allocated or windfall sites."

  An addition to paragraph 36 of PPG3 is highlighted in bold below:

  36. Authorities should make specific allowances for all the different types of windfalls in their plans. Allowance should be made on the basis of examining
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  past trends in windfalls coming forward for development and on the likely future windfall potential as assessed in a capacity study. No allowance should be made for greenfield windfalls (except for rural exception sites, see Annex B and refer to Annex D for good practice advice on capacity studies).

  1 Small rural settlements have been designated for enfranchisement and right to acquire purposes (under Section 17 of the Housing Act 1996) by S.I. 1997/620–625 inclusive and 1999/1307.

  2 Should be set out in the local development document and can include key or essential workers and those with a family connection.

  The replacement Annex B of PPG3 is as follows:

  "Annex B: Rural exception sites

  1. All local planning authorities that include rural areas should include a rural exception site policy in the relevant development plan document. A rural exception site policy enables the authority to allocate or release small sites within and adjoining existing small rural communities1, which may be subject to policies of restraint, such as green belt, and which would not otherwise be released for housing, but only in order to provide affordable housing to meet local needs2 in perpetuity.

  2. In preparing local development documents, local planning authorities should take account of their local housing assessment and should consider the benefits of preparing village appraisals, which encompass assessments of housing, economic and environmental profiles of rural communities. In doing so, they should work closely with their local communities, landowners and housing providers to prepare strategies for implementing exception schemes, including identifying possible sites. Based on these assessments, the local planning authority should set out:

  what the local planning authority considers to be "affordable" housing for the purpose of the rural exception site policy in the context of its local housing assessment or other appraisal; and

  the area within which needs will be considered "local", for example, in terms of market towns, groups of villages or parishes, or even a single parish. In some areas it may be possible to name particular settlements where there is evidence of need and where opportunities for affordable housing on rural exception sites will be explored.

  3. Development plan documents may allocate sites solely for affordable housing and should set out the criteria against which windfall sites will be considered.

  4. Rural exception sites are not appropriate for general market housing or market housing for local needs only. It is unacceptable to include clauses in planning obligations which would enable lenders of private finance to dispose of property on the open market as a last resort if a borrower were to get into financial difficulties. Such clauses should also be unnecessary in the case of loans to registered social landlords, in part, because of the safeguards to private

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  lenders offered by the Housing Act 1996. Planning obligations should be used to set out a cascade mechanism3 that will ensure that occupiers are always found for affordable housing provided on rural exception sites".

  1Small rural settlements have been designated for enfranchisement and right to acquire purposes (under Section 17 of the Housing Act 1996) by S.I. 1997/620–625 inclusive and 1999/1307.

  2Should be set out in the Local Development Document and can include key or essential workers and those with a family connection.

  3A mechanism which sets out the procedure to be followed to secure an occupant for affordable housing on rural exception sites, when such housing is vacated. This might set out the geographical areas or types of households that would be eligible for such housing.

  Planning for Mixed Communities
  Lord Rooker
  My right honourable friend the Minister for Housing and Planning has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.

  Government policy is to create sustainable communities that contain a well integrated mix of decent housing of different types and tenures to support a wide range of households of different sizes, ages and incomes. Planning has an important role to play through the provision of an appropriate mix of housing which addresses the needs of households, including in terms of how much they can afford to pay for housing.

  In July 2003, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister issued for consultation Influencing the Size, Type and Affordability of Housing which proposed changes to planning policy guidance Note 3: Housing (PPG3) in relation to its approach to planning for affordable housing and mix of housing.

  Part of this consultation document related to rural areas. In a separate statement to the House today, I have announced the publication of the final update to PPG3 entitled Planning for Sustainable Communities in Rural Areas which deals with the provision of affordable housing in rural areas.

  Following extensive consultation discussions about Influencing the Size, Type and Affordability of Housing, it became clear that there was no consensus view among practitioners about how best to plan to achieve an appropriate mix of housing in an area. Some practitioners have advocated an approach by which local planning authorities make provision in their local development documents for a specified mix based on the size and type of housing. Others feel that this approach would be too prescriptive, particularly when applied to specific sites, where they feel account needs to be taken of the particular circumstances of each site and the housing market at the time a planning application is made.

  In the light of the consultation and post-consultation discussions, we have developed further the approach to planning for a mix of housing. The revised approach is reflected in the consultation document Planning for Mixed Communities. This is
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  being published today by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister and copies are available in the Libraries of the House. The consultation document incorporates draft policy for planning for affordable housing and for a mix of housing.

  The proposed approach on mix, in relation to market housing, focuses on household types and recognises that planning for households requires local planning authorities to take account of market considerations and to provide for a degree of choice. It is proposed that local planning authorities should plan for the range of different households to be provided for over the plan period and not for a range of housing sizes and types based on floor space or room numbers.

  The proposed approach on mix in relation to affordable housing is that the approach to planning for an appropriate mix of affordable housing should continue to be based on the size and type of housing. This appears to be generally supported by local planning authorities and housing providers.

  The wider approach to planning for affordable housing in this consultation update has been redrafted in the light of the previous consultation exercise. The changes are primarily to improve clarity in the operation and scope of the policy, particularly where there is explicit flexibility, such as in the approach to site-size thresholds above which affordable housing is to be sought. The policy objectives remain the same, namely to increase the amount of affordable housing where it is needed, in the context of delivering agreed housing numbers. The proposals include: a requirement that all local planning authorities should have an affordable housing policy; a stronger regional role, including co-ordinating the preparation of local housing assessments; the lowering of site size thresholds above which affordable housing is to be sought; and the requirement that local planning authorities balance the need for affordable housing against the likely development potential of sites.

  A key objective of the policy is to create mixed and inclusive communities that offer a wide range of housing and promote social inclusion. To do this local planning authority policy must be based on a robust evidence base. A key component of the evidence base is the preparation of a local housing assessment. The consultation update emphasises to local planning authorities the importance of keeping the assessment up-to-date and developing the assessment in collaboration with key stakeholders, including housebuilders, who understand, and have to take account of housing markets.

  The final policy will be accompanied by practice guidance on carrying out local housing assessments and on planning for mixed communities. A key objective of the practice guidance will be to set out clearly the roles and responsibilities of different stakeholders in the planning for housing process. The guidance is currently in preparation. The intention is to involve stakeholder representative bodies in developing and finalising this guidance.
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  The proposed policy changes would replace paragraphs 9 to 17 of PPG3, Annex C would be updated with new definitions, and Annex D would be updated with the details of new practice guidance and relevant ODPM circulars. DETR Circular 6/98 (Planning and Affordable Housing) would be cancelled.

  This consultation update addresses the demand-side aspects of planning for housing. Later this year, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister will consult on proposed changes to the way in which the planning system allocates and releases land for housing in response to market signals. The supply-side update to PPG3 will take forward the Government's response (with respect to PPG3) to the recommendations in the Barker review of housing supply.

  General Commissioners: Amalgamation of Divisions
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Constitutional Affairs (Baroness Ashton of Upholland)
  On 20 January 2005 I made an order under Section 2(6) of the Taxes Management Act 1970 amalgamating the Saffron Walden and West Essex divisions in Essex with effect from 24 January 2005.

  The amalgamation was made at the request of the general commissioners in the divisions with the aim of improving the organisational efficiency of the divisions. I have placed a copy of the order amalgamating the divisions in the Libraries of both Houses.