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Education and Inspections Bill

My Lords, I rise to support the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, as I am one of the signatories of Amendments No. 7 and 19. I attended a comprehensive school—I was not fortunate enough to get into a grammar school—and all my children also went to comprehensive schools. I support faith schools because they have provided good education, whether they are Church schools, Jewish schools, Sikh, Hindu or Muslim schools. There are only seven or eight state-funded Muslim schools, not 124. I heard the noble Lord, Lord Baker, saying on television this morning that they might be applying. The Association of Muslim Schools told me this morning that only seven are seeking voluntary-aided status. We need to have facts rather than scaremongering to the effect that there are hundreds of Islamic and Muslim schools that want state funding; we need to make sure that all the rules are in place. I apologise to the House that I was not here on Report—I was discussing bail, which was a big national issue for us all. The Association of Muslim Schools told me that it already does as much as it can and it is prepared to do more in terms of intra-community relations and with community cohesion work it already teaches the common vision, common purpose and core values that the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, talked about. We need to make sure that our children have a sense of belonging, citizenship, rights and responsibilities. There is more in terms of recognising diversity. Cohesion is not a single way process; it is a two-way process. We have to recognise and celebrate our diversity. We need to create an environment to strengthen relations in the workplace, in places of worship and the community, wherever we can. We need to have a process of cohesion that is important and the empowerment of communities so that they can engage. When we give the example of state-run schools in Tower Hamlets, we are not talking about Islamic schools, faith schools, or Jewish schools. Even the state-run schools have 98 per cent children from one community, so it is wrong just to target faith schools. If we go to Bradford, Leicester or Southall we will find state-run schools with 98 or 99 per cent of children from one community. So community cohesion needs to be taught and promoted, but in every school. We all need to do it. I was speaking in Nottingham yesterday and I said that we have to open up our mosques every Friday for a samosa and cup of tea for every member of the community who wants to come in, because there is nothing to hide. It is such misunderstandings, whether in the media or through politicians, that lead to people thinking that there is an alien community. On that issue I could not understand why the Muslim community has suddenly become a burden in society when we all recognise that during the Second World War Muslims gave their lives to save the way of life of our democracy. There are cemeteries in Woking commemorating Muslims who died for Britain fighting against the fascists and the Nazis. Muslims were part of the British society that helped to rebuild this country's economy after the Second World War—in the steel and textile industries—and they have been very good contributors to British society. Very recently, because of a few criminals, because of a few who were given time on television and in our newspapers to provoke entire communities—andalso to insult and demonise our religion and communities—we have this huge debate. The Muslim community and the Association of Muslim Schools welcome any opportunity to be able to meet requirements for community cohesion and I am delighted to support the amendment.