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State Schools (Independence)

I believe that if we gave schools the ability to manage their own admissions, in a few instances safeguards would need to be built in. For example, in a remote rural village where there was no effective choice, safeguards might be needed to ensure that no child was left out of the system and that no child was left behind. However, the number of cases in which such safeguards would have to apply would be few and far between. In most cases—indeed, overwhelmingly—if schools were allowed to set their own admissions criteria, few children would be excluded. There would always be a school for them. A school different from the one they attend at the moment might have to be chosen, but there would be effective choice. Constituencies such as mine have a number of secondary schools, and if we were to scrap the arbitrary catchment areas, we would allow people a choice that they are currently denied.