---

Education and Inspections Bill

No, my Lords, absolutely not. I shall come to the issue of the three individual sciences in a moment. Pupils have an entitlement to the two new science GCSEs and the programme of study that goes with it. As to the issue of the three individual sciences, which the noble Baroness, Lady Buscombe, is seeking to promote, there is a great deal of unity of purpose across the Chamber. I need to describe our policy because it accurately reflects what both the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, and the noble Lord, Lord Lewis of Newnham, set out in their criteria for how we should approach the subject. Taking up the point that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, made earlier, there has been no statutory entitlement to the three individual sciences. Before 1988, in the national curriculum there was no entitlement whatever—that was part of the great problem with the education system. There was an entitlement to the double science course thereafter, but not an entitlement to the three individual sciences. However, when we sought systematically to review the improvements we needed to make to school science and to ensure an adequate supply of students going through the system, and published in March our Science & innovation investment framework 2004-2014, which my department conducted with the Treasury—it is a detailed publication which owes a great deal to the work of the committee of the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, and I pay tribute to the work that he did—we identified precisely the point highlighted by the noble Lord, Lord Lewis of Newnham: that for those students who perform more highly in science and wish to proceed to AS and A-level, the individual sciences were likely to prepare them better than the general science GCSE courses, and that we should seek to extend the availability of the individual sciences alongside the new science in society syllabus and the new general science GCSEs. The document Science & innovation investment framework 2004-2014 set out very significant new entitlements that we intend to introduce to the three individual sciences. It sets out two which are precisely captured in the noble Baroness’s AmendmentsNos. 96 and 97. First, those pupils who achieve level 6 or above, who are the higher performing pupils, in the key stage 3 test at the age of 14, should from 2008 have an entitlement to study the three individual sciences. To give your Lordships an idea of the scale of the entitlement we are introducing, this year 41 per cent of pupils achieved level 6 or above in science—that is 259,000 students. As of this year, only about 45,000 students are doing the three individual sciences at GCSE. So we are increasing from about 45,000 to 259,000 over the course of the next two years the group of students who will have an entitlement to study the three individual sciences. As I say, that is about 40 per cent of the cohort going into GCSE which is a very generous interpretation of the group described by the noble Lords, Lord Sutherland and Lord Lewis. Our second policy announcement was that comprehensive schools which have a specialism in science, of which there are nearly 300, should also, from 2008, have a requirement to make available the three individual sciences, on the grounds that in addition to schools already offering the three individual sciences—and quite a number of state schools do—they would have the greatest capacity to have teachers in physics, chemistry and biology to offer the individual sciences. That highlights the type of networking and cluster-type arrangements which the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, described. We see them as hubs in their communities for excellence in science education; they are the schools most likely to be able to offer the three individual sciences, and to do so on a collaborative basis with other schools. That is a very substantial addition to the entitlement that will be available to the three individual sciences. We believe that that very ambitious programme of extending entitlement to the three individual sciences is as far as it is practical for us to go at the moment, given the supply of teachers in the system. Despite the big incentives we have put in the system, which have led to significant increases in the recruitment of science teachers in all three disciplines, it is still not sufficient for us to have a universal entitlement in all schools and for all pupils to study the three individual sciences, much as I would like to make that available now. As of January this year, the National Foundation for Educational Research found that 26 per cent of schools for 11 to 16 year-olds had no physics specialist, while 12 per cent had no chemistry specialist. We are significantly increasing the supply of both physics and chemistry teachers; we have set targets in the documents to which I referred earlier for a very significant further increase in both disciplines, and are increasing the golden hellos and other payments to encourage graduates to come forward. But I do not believe it would be appropriate and right for us to put in legislation requirements on schools which they simply cannot meet at present. While Amendments Nos. 96 and 97 reflect accurately the policy we have set out to increase the availability of the three individual sciences and to extend the entitlement substantially in the way in which I have described—up to about 40 per cent of the cohort over and above those who can do the general science—to make it a universal entitlement at one stroke, as the noble Baroness proposes in Amendment No. 95, would simply put a burden and a requirement on schools which they are unable to meet. It is much better to go down the path described by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, of having a great increase in the supply of science teachers, focused particularly on the science specialist schools, and then seeing how, from those hubs, we can spread out a steadily wider availability of the three individual sciences. I hope that the noble Baroness will not press Amendment No. 95. If she does, we will simply be unable to support it because I cannot say that the school system can deliver the objective she wants. However, with regard to Amendments Nos. 96 and 97, under Clause 71(5)(b) the Secretary of State has a power to prescribe entitlements in respect of science within the curriculum. If she does not press those two amendments, I will undertake to see how the requirements that the Secretary of State prescribes reflect our policy on the further extension in availability of the three individual sciences. I believe that that will secure the objective that she is seeking in respect of her second and third amendments. However, as I say, Amendment No. 95 is simply not deliverable on the current scale of resources and the current capacity of schools.