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House of Commons
Tuesday 25 April 1995
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[ Madam Speaker-- in the Chair ]
Oral Answers to Questions
EDUCATION
Funding Agency for Schools
1. Mr. Key: To ask the Secretary of State for Education if he will make a statement about the relationship between the Funding Agency for Schools and local education authorities. [19168]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Mr. Robin Squire): The Funding Agency for Schools now has shared or sole planning responsibility for the supply of school places in 50 local education authorities. It also has regular contact with LEAs about the funding of grant-maintained schools. In my experience, those relationships are generally constructive.
Mr. Key: Is my hon. Friend aware that Liberal Democrat-controlled Wiltshire county council told his Department that it had a clear mandate and the agreement of heads to take money out of school budgets when neither of those claims was true? Does the FAS have powers to investigate such deception?
Mr. Squire: I know that my hon. Friend has corresponded with the FAS about this matter. I understand that the GM schools were initially consulted about the proposal to which he refers but that they did not respond as a result of a misunderstanding about the document that they were sent. From the evidence that I have so far received, it does not appear that the LEA intended any deception. In the event, as my hon. Friend knows, the proposal to which the GM schools eventually took great exception was at variance with the policy of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. It was accordingly modified by her before it was approved, and a ceiling of 0.5 per cent. was imposed on the percentage of the general schools budget.
Mr. Dafis: As the grant-maintained schools movement in Wales has run entirely into the sand, despite the constraints on local education funding and the enticements to schools to become grant-maintained, does the Minister agree that there is now no reason to establish a schools funding agency for Wales?
Mr. Squire: The hon. Gentleman knows better than to tempt me down the highways and byways of the Principality. However, if the energy of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales is as great as I know it is from having worked with him I am sure that
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he will draw inspiration from, for instance, the fact that, last month alone, eight out of 10 ballots in England resulted in a yes vote to become grant-maintained.Mr. Kilfoyle: I know that it is extremely difficult to obtain a straight answer to a straight question from the Government on education, but the relationship between LEAs and the FAS depends on the number of grant-maintained schools in a given part of the country.
Given all the Government splits--on nursery education or on funding--will the Minister give a straight answer to the rumours that are circulating in Conservative newspapers that the Government intend to make grant-maintained status compulsory for all schools after the next general election: yes or no?
Mr. Squire: The whole House enjoyed that one. The answer to the hon. Gentleman's question is, as he has been told many times from the Dispatch Box, that we have no plans to make such a change. I could not let slip the small side comment that the House heard--something to the effect that the Government were split on education. I say only that, if all Opposition Members who had enjoyed a privileged education, who had sent their children to a privileged education or who simply enjoyed the benefits of grant- maintained status had instructed their councillors and activists throughout the country not to campaign so hard against GM status, the figures would be even better than those that I gave to the hon. Member for Ceredigion and Pembroke, North (Mr. Dafis) a moment ago.
Mr. Harry Greenway: Does my hon. Friend agree that teachers who behave like yobboes and hooligans in public, whether they are employed by GM schools or local authority schools, are likely to be unsatisfactory in professional terms? From experience, I know that often they are the people who do least in the classroom and elsewhere in the school.
Will my hon. Friend give the House and the country a guarantee that people who behave unsatisfactorily in professional terms in schools will be properly disciplined, however they behave in public?
Mr. Squire: As my hon. Friend knows from his wide experience, those are matters for governing bodies. I doubt whether many governors across the country would have been other than appalled at some of the scenes at the National Union of Teachers' conference, which did no service to the union. There is no place in the classroom for politics; what teachers do in their spare time must be a matter for them. The incident did not assist in the projection of teaching as the honourable and proper profession that we know it to be.
Teachers' Pay and Conditions
2. Ms Quin: To ask the Secretary of State for Education when she last met teachers or their representatives to discuss pay and conditions; and if she will make a statement. [19169]
The Secretary of State for Education (Mrs. Gillian Shephard): I discussed pay and conditions with representatives of each of the main professional teacher
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associations at meetings held in March. At the end of March, I announced my acceptance of the independent review body's recommendations.Ms Quin: Does the Secretary of State realise that vague promises about possible jam tomorrow are simply not good enough and that parental support for teachers and for a better education service remains strong? What will she do, here and now, to tackle the problems of class sizes and to ensure that the teachers' pay award is fully and properly funded?
Mrs. Shephard: Each year local authorities say that funding is insufficient. The settlement is manageable, although it is tough and has a variable impact across the country. The vast majority of local authorities have managed to fund the teachers' pay award in full, many of which are funding other aspects of education in addition. There is no accumulated evidence to link class size with attainment. Class sizes have edged up over the past couple of years and, I am glad to say, standards have risen a great deal.
Mr. Peter Atkinson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that Northumberland county council has cut £800,000 from its schools budget amid a well-orchestrated campaign to convince parents that it is the Government's fault? Does he realise that the county council decided, at the same time, to spend £700,000 a year funding road races? Furthermore, a few days ago it decided to award county councillors higher allowances--it will spend a further £400,000 a year on allowances, including a 260 per cent. increase in the basic allowance. Does that not show that Labour local authorities are more concerned with propaganda than with educating children?
Mrs. Shephard: It seems extraordinary that a local authority should place greater emphasis on councillors' allowances than on spending in the classroom. That merely goes to prove what we have been saying all along-- that the vast majority of authorities are able to identify their priorities and protect front-line services. What a pity it is that Northumberland is not prepared to do so.
Dr. Marek: In the light of the right hon. Lady's statement about class sizes, will she tell us why class sizes in public schools are much lower than in state schools?
Mrs. Shephard: I find it difficult to understand why Opposition Members so frequently raise the subject of independent education. I should have thought that they might be embarrassed that so many of their colleagues are in the awkward position of wanting to exercise choice for their own children while opposing it for other people's. Conservatives have no such difficulty: we believe in choice, diversity and excellence, and we have the added advantage of practising what we preach.
Mr. Pawsey: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the overwhelming majority of the nation's teachers are dedicated to their profession and to the children in their charge? Will he therefore make it clear to teachers that those who argue the case for selective strikes or who seek to introduce a rota under which children are sent home will damage not just the children's education but teachers' standing in the eyes of parents?
Mrs. Shephard: Yes, industrial action by teachers, whatever form it takes, can only damage children,
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children's education and our schools. It will certainly infuriate parents and it will yet again harm teachers' professional reputations, which had begun to recover after the regrettable industrial action of the mid-1980s.Teaching Posts
3. Mr. Ainger: To ask the Secretary of State for Education what estimate she has made of the number of teachers' posts that will be cut in the current financial year. [19170]
Mr. Robin Squire: My right hon. Friend has not made any such estimates.
Mr. Ainger: I am extremely surprised by that answer because in a letter to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster the Secretary of State for Education predicted that a teachers' pay award of between 2 and 3 per cent. would be the resource equivalent of the loss of between 7,000 and 10,000 jobs. She went on to say that that would mean a tightening of pupil- teacher ratios and, to use her words, class sizes would "shoot up". Was she right then, or is the recent research published by the University of Manchester in The Times Educational Supplement , which predicted teacher job losses of 14,000 this year, more accurate?
Mr. Squire: As the hon. Gentleman knows, Ministers have never commented and will never comment on allegedly leaked documents. On the substance of the hon. Gentleman's question, on reflection he will understand why, with decisions lying with some 109 local education authorities--some of which, certainly the
Conservative-controlled ones, have sought to protect and enhance education while others have not done so--there is a wide variation in any such prediction. When one includes in that equation the 24,000 separate governing bodies, it is obvious that making predictions will be difficult.
The hon. Gentleman will bear in mind the fact that the Manchester university survey was conducted in January and February, before any school knew what its budget would be for the forthcoming year. If one invites people to assume the worst from a position of temporary ignorance, they will no doubt do so.
Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Is the Minister aware that 776 schools in Lancashire employ 12,300 teachers to educate 217,000 children? That gives a ratio of 17.64:1, yet when a constituent of mine rang county hall and asked how many teachers were teaching classes of over 30 he was told that three quarters were doing so. He then commented acidly to county hall that that means that between 3,000 and 5,000 teachers are doing absolutely nothing at all.
Mr. Squire: Not for the first time, my hon. Friend has put her finger on a very important point. The whole House, and certainly I as a Minister, awaits with interest the next instalment, when we shall hear Lancashire education authority's explanation for that astounding disparity.
Mr. Don Foster: Does the Minister personally believe that over the next 12 months teaching posts will be axed and class sizes will rise, and does he believe that rather than attacking local government bureaucracy it would be more appropriate to look at central Government
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bureaucracy in education? Does he acknowledge that there has been a significant increase in the administrative costs of quangos from £3 million to £98 million and a significant increase in the cost of departmental publications? Does he accept that, with all that going on, central DFE administrative expenditure has also risen?Mr. Squire: There was a lot of fluff in that question. I am not sure what it adds up to, but I agree that it is correct for Government to look to control their administration, which we certainly do and will continue to do. The hon. Gentleman glosses over not a few Liberal Democrat councils that have deliberately chosen to maintain staffing at county hall or town hall and put teachers' jobs at risk. As for predictions about teachers, I can only say to the hon. Member that over a year ago we heard similar stories about chaos and calamity, yet the net result has been that 1,000 extra teachers have been employed.
Further and Higher Education
4. Mr. Fabricant: To ask the Secretary of State for Education what plans she has to broaden the education base for sixth formers, and others, currently taking A-levels for entry to university; and if she will make a statement. [19171]
Mrs. Gillian Shephard: I have asked Sir Ron Dearing to review the qualifications framework to see whether there is scope to achieve greater coherence and breadth of study post-16 without compromising standards.
Mr. Fabricant: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that reply. With one in three students going into further and higher education, which is a huge contrast to the appalling record of the Opposition under whom fewer than one in eight did so, does my right hon. Friend agree that we need a broader-based curriculum for those studying for A-level and planning to enter university? Does she agree that we need more articulate engineers and more numerate arts graduates and--dare I say it?--Members of Parliament?
Mrs. Shephard: I expect that my hon. Friend will dare to say it. I know that he has taken a particular interest in the range of courses available to 16 to 19-year-olds. The new qualifications framework offers the opportunity to mix and match qualifications--A-levels, AS levels, general national vocational qualifications and so on--so that learning programmes can be suited to individual needs. However, we want Sir Ron Dearing to advise on what more we can do to extend the benefits of that framework to make it easier for young people to mix and match so that they will satisfy the needs of admission tutors and employers or be fitted for further training, but, of course, always without compromising standards.
Mr. Gunnell: What study has the Secretary of State made of the international baccalaureate, especially two aspects of it that relate directly to this question--the fact that more subjects are studied and that studies are undertaken at two different academic levels, with half the subjects being taken at a higher level than the other half?
Mrs. Shephard: I am aware of the nature of the international baccalaureate and of its popularity in certain quarters. There are those who say that the standard A-level course is too narrow but, of course, it is open to young people to enhance A-levels with AS levels or
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GNVQs. We want Sir Ron to look at ways to extend the benefits of mixing qualifications. I am sure that he will take into account the lessons of the baccalaureate, and I dare say that the hon. Gentleman will draw its advantages to Sir Ron's attention, which he is most welcome to do.Mr. Jenkin: Is my right hon. Friend aware of some public concern that public examinations are not as rigorous as they used to be? What assurance can she give that not only will the A-level remain the gold standard in the education system but that other public examinations, especially GCSEs, will be toughened to ensure that people are tested on what they should be tested on and that we are not aiming simply for large numbers of examination passes?
Mrs. Shephard: Perhaps I could reassure my hon. Friend immediately. We certainly have no intention of scrapping A-levels. GCSE A-level standards are of paramount importance and have to be protected. A-levels have been tried and tested and are
internationally respected, but a number of questions have to be tackled in Sir Ron's review. One is the 26 per cent. drop-out rate among A-level students. Clearly, that must be examined because it is a waste of young people and resources. Sir Ron will also examine the standard of all the qualifications that have already been studied by the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority and Ofsted, and the effect of increasing modularisation. Given Sir Ron Dearing's reputation, I do not think that my hon. Friend need have any fear.
Further Education Funding Council (Grants)
6. Mr. Burden: To ask the Secretary of State for Education what conditions attach to the release of £50 million grant withheld from the Further Education Funding Council for 1995-96. [19173]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Further and Higher Education (Mr. Tim Boswell): Grant will be released to the council as colleges certify their commitment that all contracts entered into with lecturers during 1995-96 will be as flexible as their contracts signed with newly appointed lecturers last year.
Mr. Burden: Is not the reality that the Government are using cash penalties to force college managements to impose on their staff the conditions that the Government want? Does not that make nonsense of the Government's claim of flexibility, and does not the Minister realise that it is undermining industrial relations, prolonging the dispute in places such as Birmingham and doing nothing to improve relations between college managements and their staff?
Mr. Boswell: The Government and the taxpayer have a very strong interest in flexibility and efficiency in the delivery of the further education system, expenditure on which runs to nearly £3 billion of public money and which has targeted an increase of 25 per cent. in student enrolment in a short period. It is imperative that that is delivered in general. The Government have no intention of intervening in the day-to-day or detailed negotiations that take place between individual colleges or, indeed, the colleges employers forum and the respective unions. We said that we would welcome the opportunity for those parties to come together. I have today written to the general secretary of the Association of Teachers and
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Lecturers commending him on his readiness to take his union into discussions at the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service with the colleges employers forum. I hope that the National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education will follow suit.English Language
7. Mr. Hawkins: To ask the Secretary of State for Education what are the aims of her campaign to promote the English language. [19174]
Mrs. Gillian Shephard: Raising standards in English has been at the heart of our education reforms.
Mr. Hawkins: I welcome my right hon. Friend's answer. Does she agree that, in the interests of children, parents and employers, it is absolutely essential for children to learn to use plain, correct and effective English? Is not one of the great problems with the socialist ideas in education peddled since the 1960s that employers complain that those leaving state education after 11 years are unable to use their own language properly?
Mrs. Shephard: Indeed, it is very important that the revised national curriculum puts greater emphasis on the teaching of written and spoken standard English, on grammar, spelling, punctuation and the need for correct English across the curriculum. It is a great sadness that Opposition Members chose to vote against the national curriculum, means of testing it and independent inspections.
Mr. Tipping: Will the Secretary of State look specifically at management-speak in education, where better class sizes has come to mean more pupils and fewer teachers? Is not that a perversion of what parents want?
Mrs. Shephard: I am not sure that the hon. Gentleman's use of English was entirely correct, but you, Madam Speaker, are in charge of such matters. I have already made my views on class size perfectly clear. Many variables affect how teachers perform in classes of different size, but there is no accumulated research evidence to link class size and attainment.
Mr. McLoughlin: When my right hon. Friend looks at the promotion of the English language, will she consider the video that has been released by her Department to commemorate VE day and VJ day? Is she not concerned about some of the criticism levelled at the video by a certain newspaper, or is she satisfied that it will ensure that the right message reaches all our children throughout the country?
Mrs. Shephard: The point of the videos and the packs is to help pupils understand the significance of VE and VJ commemorations. They will run alongside the national curriculum. For the sake of reassurance, I am glad to say that my hon. Friend the Minister of State for the Armed Forces has examined the packs in detail, was involved in monitoring them and is delighted with them. Given his relationship to Sir Winston Churchill, the House can also be reassured.
Teachers' Pay
8. Mr. Fisher: To ask the Secretary of State for Education when she last met local authority associations to discuss the funding of teachers' pay. [19175]
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Mrs. Gillian Shephard: I discussed the funding of the 1995-96 school teachers' pay award at a meeting with representatives of the National Employers' Organisation for School Teachers on Monday 13 March.
Mr. Fisher: Does not the Secretary of State understand the frustration of teachers throughout the country at the Government's refusal to fund the teachers' pay review and at their phoney explanations for that refusal? She knows that surplus funds are not evenly distributed or available for that purpose. She knows that LEAs such as mine in Staffordshire have taken effective action to remove surplus places. She knows the damage that the refusal to fund the settlement will do in terms of larger class sizes, fewer resources and lower standards. Why does she not fund it? Is not the answer that her Government neither care nor want to fund the award?
Mrs. Shephard: We are spending record amounts on education. I remind the hon. Gentleman that the independent review body took into account the affordability of the teachers' pay award. It took into account the £700 million held in schools' balances, the £500 million held in local authority balances, the £250 million taken up by surplus places, the £500 million being spent on administrative and clerical posts that the Audit Commission said could be done without and, finally, the £1.2 billion in uncollected rates, community charge and council tax. All that confirms the independent review body's view that the pay award was affordable if local authorities identified their priorities--unlike Northumberland.
Mr. Dunn: Is the Secretary of State aware that on the day that Lib- Lab controlled Kent county council decided not to fund the teachers' pay settlement it had more than £150 million in reserve? The same county council spends £12,000 per week on conferences and hospitality and £10,000 per week on periodicals and magazines for officials and last year it underspent by £17 million. It is fast becoming one of the worst-run local education authorities in the western world.
Mrs. Shephard: My hon. Friend, as ever, gives a cogent illustration of the point that Conservative Members have been making consistently--poor old Kent.
Dr. Wright: Is the Secretary of State aware that 20 schools in my constituency will lose 18 teachers between them this year? Does she understand that she adds insult to injury by apologising for the meanness of this year's settlement, which does nothing to help schools? I relay to her a question put to me by the head teacher of one of those schools, which is due to lose three staff this year. He wrote to me this week and asked, "Will the Secretary of State please stop sending me expensive brochures about things I have to do when I do not even have the books and the teachers to do the basics?"
Mrs. Shephard: Perhaps I could offer the hon. Gentleman a question to relay to Staffordshire local authority, which I understand has about £68 million in reserve.
Mr. Haselhurst: Does my right hon. Friend agree that there is a significant difference between the number of teachers who might lose their posts and the number who
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need to lose their posts? When a school with a budget of £1.75 million must make a saving of £20,000 the obvious conclusion is not to make teachers redundant.Mrs. Shephard: Teacher numbers fluctuate each year. There is a turnover in such a large work force of some 30,000 annually. I do not expect large numbers of redundancies this year. Last year we were told that there would be many redundancies, but in fact teacher numbers increased by 1,000. There may have to be some adjustments in some areas, but one would expect that in view of fluctuations in pupil numbers and other organisational changes.
Mr. Blunkett: Does the Secretary of State agree that her recent so- called charm offensive would have been a great deal more charming and a great deal less offensive if she had decided to provide the money for children in the coming year rather than salting it away for tax cuts next year?
Mrs. Shephard: The hon. Gentleman has been practising that point in his press release. Whatever the Chancellor of the Exchequer may decide about tax policy, firm control of public finances must be at the centre of successful economic policy. I do not think that that lesson has ever been learned by Labour Members.
Mr. Patrick Thompson: In any discussions that my right hon. Friend may have with local education authorities or others, will she continue to emphasise the damage that any strike or industrial action could do in our schools? Is she aware that the result of a massive vote was announced yesterday by the Professional Association of Nursery Nurses, which has decided to join with the no-strike Professional Association of Teachers? Is that not an important and welcome development?
Mrs. Shephard: I certainly think that the Professional Association of Teachers sets a marvellous professional example to its colleagues. I hope that other organisations will take the message that the number in the Professional Association of Teachers is being enhanced by so many. My hon. Friend, as always, makes a very useful point.
Grant-maintained Schools
9. Mr. Morgan: To ask the Secretary of State for Education what plans she has for amending the law in relation to the holding of financial balances by (a) locally managed and (b) grant-maintained schools. [19176]
Mr. Robin Squire: My right hon. Friend has no such plans.
Mr. Morgan: Do the Government agree in that case that it is totally two faced to set up a large number of systems for grant-maintained schools, for the local management of schools, for training and enterprise councils and GP fundholders--all of which require these new mini-quangos to hold financial balances--and at the same time criticise them for holding those balances? If the Government did not want them to have to hold balances, why did they set up all those mini-quangos in the first place?
Mr. Squire: Within the rules of the House, I might ask the hon. Gentleman to repeat that question, because I
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think that I lost him a bit when he got on to GP fundholders, which is not something I have previously answered for at the Dispatch Box. On grant-maintained schools generally, unless things are organised dramatically differently in the Principality, balances are held by grant-maintained schools in roughly the same way as they are by local education authority schools. The majority of schools save for specific projects, but Ofsted and the Audit Commission have commented that a number do not. That is what has attracted comment.Sir Malcolm Thornton: Is not it a fact that many of our schools hold balances for a huge variety of reasons? Is not it also a fact that one of the reasons is the way in which the local funding formula operates, and that some of the questions that have been directed to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State should more properly be directed to the LEA, questioning why the funding formula can so often disadvantage many schools in that LEA?
Mr. Squire: My hon. Friend is, of course, absolutely right that there are a variety of reasons why schools hold balances and, indeed, acquire them. The central issue is that the success of the local management of schools has encouraged governing bodies to take a much greater say in the control over their schools, and a logical extension of that is grant- maintained status, to which earlier comments have been addressed.
Mr. Jamieson: Is not the Minister concerned that, because of the liability for grant-maintained schools to pay value added tax in the past financial year, £17 million was spent on tax rather than books?
Mr. Squire: The short answer to the hon. Gentleman is, no, I am not concerned. Their VAT treatment follows from the nature and status of grant- maintained schools, and the Government have no plans to change that.
Drug Abuse
10. Mr. Butler: To ask the Secretary of State for Education what action to discourage drug abuse is under way in primary and secondary schools. [19177]
The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr. Eric Forth): My right hon. Friend has committed the Department and the education service to playing a full part in the Government's strategy for drug prevention. The national curriculum requires all primary and secondary schools to teach about the harmful effects of drugs. Following recent consultation, we shall issue next month our circular on drug prevention and schools, with curriculum guidance on teaching about drugs, and a digest of drug education teaching materials. In addition, a range of innovative projects on drug prevention, supported by the Government, started this month.
Mr. Butler: Will my hon. Friend take the opportunity to refute the mendacious and malicious misinformation put about by Nigel de Gruchy, which suggests, totally falsely, that the Government recommend that we go soft on the use of drugs in schools? Does my hon. Friend share my regret that, once again, one of the leading teacher
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unions has shown itself incapable of properly representing the interests, not of its extreme left wing, but of the pupils whom it is supposed to serve?Mr. Forth: Could that possibly be the same Mr. de Gruchy who was reported in The Independent on 22 April as saying:
"is it better for a child to steal a car or to disrupt classes . . . I suppose I would choose kicking a car in."?
I would have thought that the judgment of anyone who makes a statement such as that must be--I shall put it as delicately as possible--somewhat suspect. That same individual has obviously failed to read my right hon. Friend's circular on drugs in schools, which states quite unequivocally that the Secretary of State would normally expect teachers to report matters related to drugs to the police. There is no softness of approach here. My right hon. Friend and I are absolutely determined to tackle the problem of drugs in schools with great vigour.
Mr. Ronnie Campbell: Does the Minister agree that in our wish to tackle the drugs problem, especially at primary school level, there is a fine balance to be struck in the way that we teach children about drugs and what they can do to people? It is a thin line because if we teach them too much, they get to know too much and by the time they reach secondary school they are actually taking drugs.
Mr. Forth: I well understand the hon. Gentleman's point; it is a concern that is frequently raised. We have to judge whether it is better to tell our young people sensibly and responsibly, and in the right context in schools, about matters such as sex and drugs, or whether to allow them to remain ignorant and to learn, in the wrong places and from the wrong people, the wrong message about those matters. The balance of our judgment- -which is widely shared, as has been shown by the wide support for our circular--is that the right way to proceed is to tell young people in the proper way about the dangers of drugs, sex and sexual abuse, rather than leave them in ignorance.
Truancy
11. Mr. Ian Bruce: To ask the Secretary of Statefor Education what action she is taking to combattruancy. [19178]
Mr. Forth: In addition to the publication of pupil absence data, the Department is supporting locally devised projects to a value of £15.4 million in some 90 English local education authorities under the truancy and disaffected pupils programme of the grants for education support and training--GEST--scheme for 1995-96.
Mr. Bruce: I thank my hon. Friend for his excellent answer about what the Government are doing. Does he agree that the primary group dealing with truancy must be the schools, working with parents to ensure that we cut down truancy as much as possible? What effect will the spotlight of publicity on recording the level of truancy in every school have on the truancy figures for the coming year?
Mr. Forth: I am convinced that, for too long, we have allowed absence from school to go unreported, unrecorded and, to a large extent, unnoticed and not properly dealt with. My firm belief is that in highlighting the problem and bringing out the facts about
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non-attendance at school, we, working with people involved in education, can tackle the problem and ensure that all our young people are in school or being educated--because if they are not in school, they are at risk.Mr. Blunkett: Will the Minister tell the House what he would think of a head teacher who had a group of disaffected students outside his school, but allowed them back in even though they had not promised to improve their behaviour or to agree to follow school rules? Does he agree that the result would be to undermine the credibility of the head teacher and the discipline of the school?
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