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Education and Inspections Bill

moved Amendment No. 123: Page 72, line 38, at end insert- ““(7) The Secretary of State shall issue, and may from time to time revise, statutory guidance setting out aims, objectives and other matters he thinks appropriate in respect of the discharge by persons to whom this section applies of their functions under this section. (8) It shall be the duty of governing bodies of all publicly funded schools, including special schools, to ensure that the persons to whom this section applies are trained in accordance with the provisions of the guidance issued under subsection (7).”” The noble Baroness said: My Lords, we move to the issue of physical restraint of pupils. In our debate on 25 July, the Minister said that school staff already had a statutory power to use reasonable force. He pointed out: "““We are not aware that this essential legislation has caused problems over the past eight years in which it has been in effect. Therefore, we believe that it would be disproportionate and impractical to require every school to give every member of staff who has any responsibility for supervising pupils specialised training in physical intervention””.—[Official Report, 25/7/06;col. 1688-9.]" What about the Minister’s inclusion agenda? The Government say that every teacher is a teacher of children with special needs, and it is those children who are disproportionately affected by this problem and whose needs must be seriously taken into account, if there is to be any kind of physical intervention without damage. The Advisory Centre for Education, the National Autistic Society and the charity TreeHouse all have significant concerns about the broad powers given to the schools’ workforce to use force and the likely disproportionate impact on disabled children and those with special educational needs such as autism, whose behaviour can often be extreme and very difficult to deal with, unless all those members of staff have training in intervention in an appropriate way and in de-escalation strategies. The Steer report, about which we have heard much, deliberately set aside consideration of children with special educational needs, yet they make up 90 per cent of those at primary school and 60 per cent of those at secondary school who are excluded from school and with whom those situations might arise. In debates in another place the Schools Minister, Jim Knight, was most helpful in clarifying that when, "““deciding whether to use force and what sort of force to use, school staff will have to take account of all the relevant ""circumstances. Those will certainly include a pupil’s special educational needs or disability””.—[Official Report, Commons Standing Committee E, 10/05/06; col. 835.]" The Minister is entirely correct in saying that there is non-statutory guidance on the use of force. Schools already have guidance on the use of restrictive physical interventions for staff working with children and adults who display extreme behaviour in association with a learning disability and/or autistic spectrum disorder, and separate guidance on the use of restrictive physical intervention for pupils with severe behavioural difficulties. The problem is that those two sets of guidance are neither statutory nor well known in mainstream schools. As anybody with any knowledge of working with children with autism will know, it is imperative that mainstream schools also receive such guidance, especially on avoidance and de-escalation of problems. Special schools have developed great expertise over the past few years in dealing with such issues, and we would hope that their expertise can be spread throughout the mainstream school community through dissemination of best practice. We warmly welcome the Minister’s pledge to update the guidance, but could he clarify how it will be distributed to schools, whether it will be made statutory and how the DfES will ensure that all schools will act in accordance with it? For example, will Ofsted monitor its use? We believe that unless this clause requires statutory guidance, uneven professional practice will result, with consequent risks to children and the staff involved. The Minister said at Second Reading that, "““we need to further nurture the training and development of teachers and head teachers””.—[Official Report, 21/6/06; col. 863.]" That is exactly what our amendment seeks to do. The need for this will become increasingly pressing as more children with complex behavioural and communication difficulties, such as autism, are included in mainstream schools. They will gain many advantages from that, but only if they are properly resourced and the staff are properly trained to meet their particular needs, not least in a situation where physical restraint might be required. Jim Knight suggested in Committee in another place that he did not see SEN behaviour and physical handling as a mainstream issue and maintained that it was only so in, "““some schools and units … where situations requiring physical intervention may be more frequent and more serious””.—[Official Report, Commons, Standing Committee E, 10/5/06; col. 860.]" But, as I said, his comments seem at odds with the Government’s excellent 10-year strategy for children with special needs, Removing barriers to achievement, which states: "““All teachers should expect to teach children with special needs””." If all teachers need to teach children with special needs, then all teachers need the appropriate training. If they have the power to use physical restraint where appropriate, they need to know how to use it properly and in a way that does not endanger the child, themselves or any other child. A thorough consultation process leading to statutory guidance aimed at all school staff would be the most appropriate step. As any teacher might at any time have children with special needs in their class, all teachers should receive the appropriate training. No teacher takes physical restraint of a child lightly. It is a very difficult and sensitive area and teachers are very reluctant to do it because of the danger of misinterpretation of their behaviour. I am sure that most teachers will apply it only when it is absolutely necessary to secure the safety of the child and other children in the class. However, we have a duty to ensure that teachers are properly prepared for that responsibility by ensuring that they are all properly trained. I beg to move.