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Education and Inspections Bill

I will come on to that matter in a moment. I may wish to test the opinion of the House on the amendment on diversity—I understand that a vote would happen tomorrow—depending on the response from Ministers, whom I hope will reassure me that the Government will take diversity into account. Amendments Nos. 9 to 11 relate to the maximum percentage of members on a foundation nominated by a local authority. We heard earlier that the Government will resist those amendments because they believe that trusts should be treated in the same way as companies that include a local authority. I contend that that is exactly the wrong model to apply to a school, because if a school is to succeed, it needs to be involved in a partnership. If we want a partnership, we should give people the opportunity to form real partnerships, where those from trusts, the local authority and others have the chance to be equally represented, which may well be a model that many schools want to adopt. If that is not possible, it will raise a number of problems. The Government have said that they want trusts to be part of the local family of schools, but much of what is now done in schools and much of what we want to do in the future depends on co-operation between different bodies. The 14-to-19 agenda, ““Every Child Matters””, the youth service White Paper and the extended schools programme depend not only on schools themselves, but on interaction between schools and other services run by local authorities. It may well be that some schools think it appropriate to have a more equal partnership on their governing bodies. I think that we should allow them to make that choice, if they so wish. That is particularly true in the case of local authorities, which may want to federate all their schools into one foundation. Are we saying that if that were to happen, local authority nominees can hold only 20 per cent. of the positions? In my view, that would be a disincentive to taking such an approach, rather than an incentive. The Select Committee also pointed out that when local authorities have to hand over their schools to another body to run, it is difficult for them to take long-term decisions on investment, because they have received no assurance that they will have a stake in those schools in the future. I think that it would be much better for local authorities to have that stake, which would encourage them to undertake long-term financial planning. I support the amendments on ballots and hope that I will hear more from Ministers about my other amendments. Some of the comments that we have heard today are worrying in a democracy, particularly when we are discussing ballots. If one is a democratic politician, one needs to trust the electorate and to accept that people will sometimes make decisions that one does not like and with which one disagrees. That is democracy, and when the amendment on ballots is moved tonight, I hope that my hon. Friends will bear those points in mind.