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Further Education and Training Bill [HL]

My Lords, I will deal first with the spiritual, moral, cultural and social needs, quite rightly highlighted by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester. I entirely agree with him that it is wrong to conceive of further education as purely a matter of technical and practical skills. We made clear in last year’s further education White Paper that education and training for community development and personal fulfilment have an important place. The White Paper states that, "““for young people in particular, [further education] must extend to inculcating the values, attitudes and knowledge that society seeks from its young people””." We are concerned to see that institutions educating 16 to 19 year-olds take the spiritual and moral well-being of their students seriously. We also recognise that many students want their faith or spiritual needs recognised, and that many colleges already provide a range of facilities to meet their students’ spiritual needs, including multi-faith chaplaincy services and prayer rooms. Indeed, under Section 44 of the Further and Higher Education Act 1992, there is already a statutory duty on further education colleges, in respect of 16 to 19 year-olds, to ensure that an act of worship is held at least once a week. We do not think that imposing a wide-ranging duty on the Learning and Skills Council, changing its remit, is the way forward for the reasons I set outin Grand Committee. I hope I can indicate our commitment to strengthening provision in this area in ways that the right reverend Prelate will welcome. In particular, Clause 7 of the Bill provides that the Learning and Skills Council must have regard to guidance from the Secretary of State on consulting with employers, learners and potential learners. The draft of this guidance, which I have made available to noble Lords, specifically recognises that, "““for many young people, their faith or spiritual needs are important defining characteristics of who they are””." The draft guidance also states that the Learning and Skills Council should, "““consider consulting learners and potential learners on their spiritual and faith or no-faith needs as a key part of reviewing student support services””." I stress the words ““a key part””. Consultation on these aspects could, where appropriate, include representatives of key faith communities or faith groups. I reiterate the undertaking I gave in Grand Committee to study carefully the review of the spiritual, moral, social and cultural needs of students in further education, being carried out by the National Ecumenical Agency in Further Education, of which the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London is patron. We look forward to the recommendations of the agency in April. Once this review has been reported in the spring, we will consider whether there is a need for further national initiatives or policy. Following the lead of the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, I undertake that the Minister for Further and Higher Education will be glad to meet the right reverend Prelate and any other noble Lords who wish to join that meeting to discuss the report and initiatives that it would be sensible to take forward in light of it. I hope that, while I have not been able to satisfy the right reverend Prelate entirely, I have at least been able to move some way in his direction, on the basis of our shared concern to see these issues taken seriously in further education, and not simply regarded as the preserve of schools and institutions dealing with younger people. On Amendment No. 14, moved by the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, and Amendment No. 49, moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, I agree strongly with them that there is a need for robust systems to ensure the well-being of students, promote community cohesion and ensure that all young people have access to appropriate pastoral care. Let me set out some of our provisions in this regard. First, it is a requirement that where 14 to 16 year-old pupils who are registered with a school spend part of their time in a further education college, they remain pupils of the school. That school, therefore, has a duty to promote their well-being. Amendment No. 49, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, seeks to place duties on FE colleges that mirror existing duties on schools. These are not needed. Colleges, through the work of their student support services, tutorial work and enrichment work activities, are constantly engaged in promoting the well-being of young people. That is underpinnedby Section 175 of the Education Act 2002, which requires governing bodies of further education colleges in England and Wales to ensure that they exercise their functions with a view to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of their younger students. Colleges are held to account for their performance in both these areas through the inspection arrangements. The common inspection framework in England has a range of relevant evaluation questions, including the extent to which the college is educationally and socially inclusive and the effectiveness of its links with other organisations, including organisations concerned with the care and welfare of children, in promoting the well-being of learners. Indeed, the common inspection framework makes clear that issues affecting the well-being of children have always been central to inspection judgments. Inspectors will evaluate the extent to which the five Every Child Matters outcomes of being healthy, staying safe, enjoying and achieving, making a positive contribution, and achieving economic well-being are being met by colleges. The common inspection framework in Wales requires similar evidence of the work of colleges in relation to their learners and their inter-relationship with local communities. It specifically asks how well the learning experiences meet the needs and interests of learners and the wider community and how well learners are cared for, guided and supported; but these judgments will necessarily be dependent on the context of the college. Colleges where the majorityof learners are adults, for example, will have very different arrangements from those where the majority of students are 16 to 19 year-olds. It is increasingly the practice in colleges that there are self-contained sixth-form centres for students under 19, not least to ensure that better and more focused pastoral arrangements are in place. As the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, has rightly observed, a small number of children of compulsory school age are, for a wide variety of reasons, not registered with a school. Some of those are enrolled on a full-time basis in a further education college. All 13 to 19 year-olds in England, whether they are registered with a school, with a further education college or with neither, are covered by provisions in Section 6 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006, which places a duty on local authorities in England to secure access for young persons in their area to sufficient educational and recreational leisure-time activities which are for the improvement of their well-being. ““Well-being””, under that section of the Act, relates to the five Every Child Matters outcomes and the educational activities must include those that are for the improvement of the young peoples’ personal and social development. Section 10 of the Children Act 2004 is also relevant. It imposes a duty on each children’s services authority in England to make arrangements to promote co-operation between the authority and each of its ““relevant partners””. The Learning and Skills Council is listed as a relevant partner, being the strategic commissioner of post-16 provision. The National Assembly for Wales is also listed as a relevant partner in relation to children's services authorities in Wales. Once the new First Minister is appointed in Wales in May 2007, these functions will transfer to Welsh Ministers. However, we propose to go further still. The White Paper, Further Education: Raising Skills, Improving Life Chances, published last March, stated that FE college governing bodies should consider how their pastoral arrangements should best reflect the characteristics of their student body of all age ranges. Taking this commitment forward, we are currently developing pilots which will test and evaluate different approaches to pastoral support. The pilots will include a particular focus on children and young people in care as part of our Green Paper commitments. We also want to explore how pastoral arrangements can best work to support those 14 to19 year-old learners who learn across more than one institution, and who have been of particular concern to the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne. The evaluation of these pilots will be built into guidance for providers by April 2008. I will keep noble Lords informed of their progress and my honourable friend, the Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education will be glad to discuss the outcome of those pilots with noble Lords before we develop that guidance for providers. So I hope that I have gone some way towards meeting the concerns that have been raised.