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Education and Inspections Bill

I still hold the philosophy to which the hon. Gentleman refers. In my time as shadow education spokesman, I have visited many good community schools and state schools around the country. I am not talking about all schools; I am talking about the 23 per cent. of schools to which the National Audit Office has referred, and the similar percentage of coasting schools. We must tackle those schools. Clauses 3 and 7 are significant, and they are the principal reasons why we support this Bill. They enable parents to make representations to the local authority calling on it to establish a new school because they are dissatisfied by the quantity or quality of existing provision. We hope that over the next few years we will see the establishment of a large number of trust schools with greater autonomy and independence in their day-to-day running. The Thomas Telford city technology college in Telford, Shropshire, is not a trust school—it is a CTC, which is similar to the academy model—but the principle of autonomy in the day-to-day running of the school is similar. The principal of that school, Sir Kevin Satchwell, has told me that one of the great advantages of CTC status is that heads do not have to attend interminable meetings with the local authority, which means that they can stay in school and focus on raising standards. That is why at the Thomas Telford school, which has an intake of all abilities and in which 11 per cent. of pupils are entitled to free school meals, 100 per cent. of pupils achieve not only five or more GCSEs at grades A* to C, but 12 or more GCSEs or equivalent at grades A* to C. Even when one strips out the GNVQs, it is still the best performing comprehensive school in the country—as I have said, 100 per cent. of pupils achieve five or more GCSEs at grades A* to C, including English and Maths. That is what autonomy can achieve, which is why the Conservative party is so serious about the benefits of the Bill and so excited about the prospect of hundreds of trust schools being established in the years ahead. It became clear in Committee that the Government too are serious about promoting new trust schools and helping parents.