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Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill

My Lords, I will seek advice on what the noble Baroness has so far told us. Before we leave Amendment 128, I ask her to note that it not only sets out that a programme should be put in place but obliges the host authority to report every week on the progress made by the pupil. That information is then put together with the programme, to be sent on. It may not be enough just to say "This should be put across", because those of us who have worked in school staffrooms know that at the end of 18 gruelling weeks either you say, "Little Johnny could try harder", or one can give a blow-by-blow statement of his progress. What is required is the information needed by the next person to take little Johnny on, in order to be able to teach him adequately. That brings me to SEN. I am delighted to join my noble friend Lord Lucas in welcoming the intention at last to screen all incomers. The Minister said that that will take time. It will, I think, inevitably throw up a number of cases which need statements. However, in the same paragraph that she announced that, she said that they will not be in the same place long enough for a statement to be drawn up for them. That lends great force to the point of my noble friend Lord Lucas that a regulation should require at least certain aspects of the educational programme to take priority in the list of criteria that are applied to prisoners before they are moved. Having given good warning, I am not finished with Amendment 128 or the principles therein. Subject to what I may cull from Hansard later, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment 126 withdrawn.