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National Assembly for Wales (Legislative Competence) (Education) Order 2010

My Lords, once again I thank the noble Lord, Lord Davies, for his explanation of this legislative competence order. The purpose of the proposed LCO is to confer on the Welsh Assembly additional legislative competence in education, primarily relating to the governance of maintained schools. The Assembly already has extensive competence in education. This proposed LCO, however, would extend the competence further to relate to the governance of maintained schools in Wales. The role of the governing body in maintaining schools is, of course, of crucial importance. The Explanatory Memorandum tells us that studies of school governance have been commissioned by the Assembly Government which conclude that the effectiveness of governing bodies varies and that the training being made available to governors is uneven, with weaknesses in consistency of approach, availability and take-up. The three matters proposed to be inserted into Field 5 of Part 1 of Schedule 5 to the Government of Wales Act 2006 would provide the Assembly with competence to legislate with respect to the conduct and governance of maintained schools. There are a few issues which I wish to raise with the Minister and I hope that he will address them in his closing remarks. First, I am rather concerned to see that the Assembly could, pursuant to the powers proposed to be devolved, pass legislation not only in relation to the creation of bodies responsible for school governance, but also their abolition. Can the Minister say whether this means that boards of governors could be abolished altogether? It is clear from the Explanatory Memorandum that the merger of governing bodies of different schools is already contemplated. However, the role of governors is crucial in relation to public accountability. It would be extremely worrying if such accountability were to be removed by their abolition. Secondly, the Explanatory Memorandum makes clear that changes to school finance and school staffing are not within the competence proposed to be conferred by the LCO. It states that: ""If new models for governance arrangements were created as a result of the LCO, there would be some linked changes to the persons or bodies exercising functions relating to staffing and finance, but the LCO does not confer competence to change the substantive nature of those functions"." Is that a weakness in the proposed order? If new governance arrangements are created, would the Assembly not need the flexibility to deal with the consequent necessary changes relating to staffing and finance? Thirdly, Matter 5.2C confers competence on the Assembly to create new bodies for the carrying out of activities relating to education or training and exercising education functions on behalf of local authorities. This is a very wide power indeed. Although the Explanatory Memorandum gives a fairly narrow example of what the Assembly might do pursuant to the power—creating an educational body to provide services to schools and FEIs—the power is manifestly much broader in its scope. Is the Minister able to give other examples of actions that might be available to the Assembly under the terms of this matter and which are presently being contemplated by the Assembly Government? These questions are important and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.