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Education and Inspections Bill

At this late hour, I am in the happy position of being able to fulfil some of the dreams of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. We have given a lot of consideration to the matter, and we think that we can move part of the way that she described. Amendment No. 217 would amend Clause 81, which concerns consulting a sample of pupils on a school behaviour policy. Our view, having considered this also in the light of the ongoing discussions that there have been on the Childcare Bill, is that we can move further. We agree with the point that a discipline policy is central to a well functioning school, and the maximum possible engagement of the pupils in that process is important. I emphasise the word ““consult””. It is not a requirement for them to make a decision; I completely agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Buscombe, that you do not want to put young people in the position of becoming the decision makers. To consult all the pupils is not in principle an over-burdensome requirement. They do not have to respond to the consultation; noble Lords are asked to participate in many consultations on which they do not give their views. Having listened to what the noble Baroness said and having reflected on it previously, without giving an absolutely firm commitment—we need to look at it further—we are minded to table a similar government amendment on Report that would simply remove the sample requirement and have a general requirement to consult. I cannot give an absolute assurance, but we think that that is likely to be an appropriate policy. I am in the even happier position of being able to respond positively to Amendment No. 253, in the name of my noble friend Lady Turner, who is not even here. I hope that, when she wakes up in the morning and reads Hansard, this might please her. The Government unreservedly agree with the second part of the amendment, which aims to remove the current exemption of nursery-age children from the consultation duties on schools and local authorities under Section 176 of the Education Act 2002.The amendment in this respect reflects what the Government have already provided for in the Childcare Bill through the amendment that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, referred to. Therefore, we will consider tabling an amendment on Report that brings children of nursery age on to the same footing in terms of consultation requirements, irrespective of the setting in which they may find themselves. I will be glad to tell my noble friend that I have been so persuaded by her arguments that we have decided to move in this respect. The first part of Amendment No. 253 proposes duties on schools to consult pupils. Section 176 of the Children Act 2002 already provides for the consultation of pupils on issues affecting them. The section provides for statutory guidance to which local authorities and governing bodies must have regard about the consultation of pupils in connection with the taking of decisions affecting them. We are encouraging schools to put the 2004 guidance issued under Section 176 into practice in ways that are meaningful to children and young people. One prime means of giving effect to that guidance is the establishment of school councils. I am a great believer in the role of school councils; it is one of the areas that I have been most impressed by in terms of changes in the education system over recent years. When I and many other noble Lords were at school, the idea of any form of consultation with pupils was regarded as a somewhat outrageous act of lèse-majesté. Now, it is common not only in secondary schools but, increasingly, in primary schools. I had the privilege recently to launch School Councils UK, which is an excellent organisation providing training materials for the establishment of school councils in primary schools. I launched those materials in a primary school in Hackney that has an outstanding school council in a very challenging area. It takes a real sense of responsibility and leadership for developing the behaviour policy in the school, tackling bullying and helping to improve the school in a number of ways. We are looking to see how we can take that forward, although it does not require statutory duties in the Bill. We have taken two substantive steps. I have asked Professor Geoff Whitty, the director of the Institute of Education at the University of London, to examine the experience of the operation of school councils and to report to the Secretary of State, which he will do later this year. We have indicated that we will consider his report with a view to updating the guidance under Section 176 of the 2002 Act to provide stronger advice to schools and more best practice guidance on how they can establish school councils and involve them meaningfully in the work of schools. My noble friend Lady Massey also referred to the important work of school councils in primary schools, and it has become increasingly widely understood that they can play that role. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, will accept that, given our bona fides, which, I think, is clear, we do not need to put new statutory duties in the Bill and that the work is proceeding in any event. I encourage the noble Lord and other noble Lords who have experience and views in this area to speak to Professor Whitty. I will draw his attention to the debate that we have had this evening. He is taking this work very seriously, and in terms of pupil engagement in the life of schools and in the taking of decisions affecting them this could turn out to be path-breaking. Amendment No. 52, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, in respect of youth, would clarify the process by which authorities should consult young people about positive leisure-time activities. The new duty in Clause 6 includes a requirement for local authorities to consult young people about the provision of facilities in their area, the need for further provision and any access issues. The duty focuses on securing access to activities. Therefore, to fulfil the duty, authorities will need to focus their attention on the groups of young people who face the greatest barriers to participation in their area, and the consultation offers a powerful means to assess the nature and extent of those barriers. We, therefore, do not expect local authorities to consult every young person in the area, but equally we expect that any sampling will be robust enough to capture the views and needs of young people belonging to those high-risk groups. That is not the same as a representative sample, which, for example in an area where the majority of the population were from the same socio-economic or ethnic group, could mask the views of a minority facing disproportionately challenging barriers to participation and which a local authority may with to consult specifically on the provision of these activities. Therefore, the legislation needs to offer authorities some flexibility in order to target their consultation in the most effective way in terms of the types of services that they believe they may need to provide in an area; and that a requirement to consult a representative sample would reduce the ability of authorities to undertake this and, in turn, reduce the effectiveness of the duty for the young people whom we most want to help. Amendment No. 20, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, seeks to ensure that, in carrying out their new duties under Clause 3 to respond to parental representations, local authorities should in certain cases ensure that the views of a particular child are taken into account. We entirely sympathise with the spirit of the amendment, but it goes beyond the scope of the clause. The duty in Clause 3 does not apply to complaints or representations in respect of individual pupils who might, therefore, have a right to be consulted individually but to how a local authority discharges its general duty under Section 14 of the Education Act 1996 to secure sufficient schools for providing primary and secondary education in their area and the new duties added by Clause 2 of this Bill to secure diversity and increase opportunities for parental choice in the provision of schools. The duty to consider and respond to parental representations, does not apply to complaints or representations about the access to education or quality of education provided to an individual child, where the existing arrangements for making complaints remain in place. The draft illustrative guidance on parental representations that we have made available reinforces that point. It states that such representations might cover, for example, a request for a new school with a particular ethos, or a general complaint about the quality of provisionin schools in the area, but such representationswould not concern individual circumstances or the education of an individual child. The existing references to a ““qualifying child”” in Clause 3 are simply to specify that the duty to respond is triggered only if the representation is made by a parent who has a child in the local authority’s area who is of or under compulsory school age. It does not mean that representations should specifically be in respect of the education of a particular child. I hope that I have clarified the issue and that the noble Baroness will be satisfied with that position.