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I want to begin by making a general point. In all divided societies, schools always face a paradox. On the one hand, a lot is expected of them by way of healing the wounds and divisions that characterise divided societies. At the same time, their capacity to do so is greatly limited, for two reasons. Children come to school bringing all kinds of prejudices that they have learnt from their parents and, although they learn something at school, when they go home at the end of the day, whatever they have learnt—the good that has been done—is negated by parental prejudices and remarks.
The question is: on what do we rely? We cannot wait until social divisions get sorted out but, at the same time, we cannot expect schools to perform miracles. It is in that context that we should approach the question of integrated education, or integrated schools, in Northern Ireland.
I greatly welcome the popularity of integrated schools in Northern Ireland. Although only 5 per cent of pupils go to such schools, almost 60 per cent of parents want to send their children to them. That shows that, increasingly, integrated schools are acquiring democratic legitimacy and considerable popularity. But unless we realise the kind of problems that they face, we are likely to run the danger of expecting far too much from integrated schools. I want to raise six questions for the Minister.
First, the number of integrated schools is inevitably limited. That is for obvious reasons—not because of reluctance on the part of the Government but for purely financial considerations. As a result of demographic changes, there are 50,000 empty places, which is likely to rise to 80,000 within the next three or four years. One always wants to use the facilities of existing schools, rather than open new schools. Obviously, the question arises: what should be our priority and how do we cope with the financial problem that that poses?
Secondly, integrated schools do not necessarily mean integrated education, just as segregated schools do not necessarily mean segregated education. One may lead to the other, but the two need not be equated. We might have integrated schools, in the sense that they accommodate both Catholic and Protestant pupils, but do they provide the kind of education that we want? Here, the important question is: what is an integrated education? We know what is an integrated school, but what is an integrated education? There are two very different views and we need to be very careful what we ask for. Integrated education has been greatly in demand in the United States in the aftermath of the civil rights movement of the 1960s. Israelis have been wanting to concentrate on integrated education to accommodate the 17 per cent of their population constituted by Arab minorities, which is both Christian and Muslim.
If we consider all those experiments, including those in Northern Ireland, there are two different
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Thirdly, in an integrated school, we have to ask what kinds of teachers are available. So far as I can see, teachers have not undergone any kind of specialised training in integrated education. They, too, are the product of sectarian schools. Some teachers in integrated schools also seek employment largely because it is easier to be promoted, for the very simple reason that these schools are relatively new. I am sometimes told, and the research I have seen seems to suggest, that teachers sometimes lack commitment. I am not saying that they do or do not; I am saying simply that we need to address this question because I very much want integrated schools to succeed in providing integrated education.
Fourthly, if we are to have integrated primary schools, we will obviously have to have a similar number of integrated secondary schools, because otherwise parents will have the problem of wondering whether there are enough spaces in secondary schools for children who have gone to integrated primary schools. If not, parents might be discouraged from sending children to them.
My fifth worry is the way in which certain subjects come up again and again and need to be taught in integrated schools. I have seen research done by various academics, including friends of mine at Queen’s University, Belfast, which suggests that two subjects—religious education and history—have proved to be the most contentious. It is very important that we find proper ways of teaching these two subjects in particular and develop appropriate textbooks and pedagogical methods.
My sixth point is that when sectarian schools transform themselves into integrated schools—I am delighted that they do, and I hope they will do so in larger numbers—the question arises: do the ethos and culture change as well? It is not enough for a sectarian school to accommodate a certain percentage of minority students from either of the two communities; it is also important that their teachers undergo a different kind of training. The ethos also has to change so that the schools become genuinely integrated.
I have not said all this with a view to criticising integrated schools; on the contrary, I have said it precisely because they are the only way of dealing with the deep divisions of Northern Ireland. We should therefore address this question so that they can deliver the kinds of result that we expect of them.
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Secondly, much of the curriculum should be in common. I see no reason why different kinds of sectarian schools, while emphasising different kinds of ethos, should not have 90 or 95 per cent of their curriculum in common. After all, our concern is to ensure that they produce citizens who are perfectly at ease with each other.
Thirdly—I may be slightly controversial here—it might be useful to take a second look at the employment law that allows schools to employ teachers from their own denominations. I see the point of that, but it may sometimes be worth asking whether a Protestant teacher, for example, is unequipped to teach English literature, mathematics or science in Catholic schools, or vice versa.
As I said—I shall end by ensuring that I am not misunderstood—integrated schools are the only way forward. They will not perform miracles by themselves, because changes have to take place in the wider society, but, so long as we retain a bifocal approach, there is a good chance of success.
9 pm
Lord Dubs: My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Blood for giving us the opportunity to debate this fundamentally important issue for education in Northern Ireland. This year, the integrated education movement is 25 years old. I pay tribute to the many dedicated teachers and governors who have worked so hard to make their schools a success, as well as to the Northern Ireland Council for Integrated Education and the Integrated Education Fund for the very important part that they have played in developing integrated education.
In integrated schools we have 18,000 pupils, 58 schools and between 5 per cent and 6 per cent of the school student population. It has already been said that there are 50,000 empty school places in Northern Ireland and that by 2015 there will be 80,000. Although the case for integrated education becomes stronger through the empty places that now exist, the case for integrated education in principle does not depend on that. I shall develop the argument on empty places later.
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Some years ago, when I was a junior Minister in Northern Ireland, I went to an event in Dungannon for parents who had played a part in a project in which their children lived for six weeks with families in the United States. American families each took one Catholic and one Protestant child. The event was a reunion of the parents and children who had been on the project. I talked to people as they drank cups of tea at long trestle tables. It was dismaying to meet many Catholic and Protestant parents who had never before had a cup of tea with a member of the other faith. In a nutshell, that was the argument for integrated education. If children do not know members of the other faith or community, they tend to demonise them. That demonising has played a corrosive part in education and communities in Northern Ireland.
A couple of years ago, I opened a new integrated primary school in Cookstown. It was an exhilarating experience to see a community made up of members of all faiths—Catholic priests and Protestant, Church of Ireland clergymen—supporting the new integrated school. Most of the governors were local women who had got together to set up the school. It was an exciting occasion. Of course, new schools are bound to be rare at a time when there are 50,000 empty school places. The key is of course to transform existing schools to integrated status, probably through the merger of schools that have plenty of spare places. Otherwise, we will continue having Catholic and Protestant children leading separate lives.
Those of us who support integrated education in Northern Ireland do not believe that there is one model for education or that it should always be integrated. We have a much more modest request: parents and children should have the choice of an integrated school. At present, parents do not have such a choice, which is the burden of our argument: do not force one type of education on parents—give parents the freedom to choose. In a recent survey, 82 per cent of parents personally supported integrated education; 81 per cent believed that integrated education was important for peace and reconciliation; and 71 per cent said that they would support a request to transform their school to integrated status. The 71 per cent divided into 69 per cent Protestant parents and 73 per cent Catholic, so there was no religious difference in the wish that local schools should be transformed.
It is also depressing that the bulk of teacher training is segregated. As my noble friend Lord Parekh said, it is difficult for teachers to teach in integrated schools when their training has been largely on the basis of segregation. Of course, some schools have a mix of children, but they have not adopted the full practice and philosophy of integrated status. Teachers and governors should believe in the philosophy of integrated education, and schools should teach respect for members of other faiths and be balanced in their composition with children of the main faiths as well as those of none. At the moment, just over 2 per cent of Northern Ireland schools are mixed without being integrated, having 30 per cent of more of their pupils from the other religion. That is better than total segregation, but it does not meet the
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The 50,000 empty school places, while presenting a problem, provide a real opportunity. I believe that many schools with spare places could be merged, leading to an integrated school. Why not ask local parents whether in such a situation they would favour a merger of two or more schools with the result being a properly integrated school? The transformation of an existing school to integrated status takes place when parents vote by a simple majority in favour of change, but depressingly the vast majority of parents in Northern Ireland—86 per cent—do not know that that is possible. That becomes even more important as education information for parents when we consider the problem of declining numbers and the need to reduce school places.
Every Northern Ireland Minister with whom I have discussed this supports integrated education. A Shared Future, published last year, states:
“All schools should ensure through their policies, structures and curriculae, that pupils are consciously prepared for life in a diverse and inter-cultural world”.
In a recent speech in Donegal, Peter Hain said:
“Two segregated primary schools in a village are doomed to closure where a merger might be viable and produce a higher standard, where separately they cannot. Secondary schools with inadequate facilities where a rational school estate with integrated or shared facilities could produce high quality ... The educational future of Northern Ireland must be shared and focused on what unites, or divided it will be bleak”.
Let us ensure that the young people of Northern Ireland are, wherever they wish it, educated together with respect for those of another faith based on shared experience at school.
Integrated education in Northern Ireland will not solve all the problems of a divided society—no one claims that—but over time it will go a long way towards lessening the divisions. We all remember those terrible scenes at Holy Cross School in north Belfast, when children from one faith had to run a gauntlet of protestors who were violent and intimidating. But then I saw a television news programme featuring children at Lagan College, the first integrated school. When asked what they thought of it, the children said that they could not understand it: “Here we sit next to each other in the classroom, and there is no problem. Yet up there, there is hostility, tension and division”.
There is no problem with government Ministers supporting integrated education. It has been government policy in Northern Ireland for a long time. What it needs is political will.
9.07 pm
Lord Hylton: My Lords, I have been a friend and supporter of integrated education in Northern Ireland since well before the days when Lagan College opened with 28 pupils in a borrowed Scout hall. I intervene because I have seen it stated in print that Northern Ireland now has 50,000 spare school places. If that figure is anything like correct—it has been confirmed in the debate by the noble Lords, Lord
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Enabling new integrated schools to start would not only please parents who opt for integrated education only to find that all the places in the existing 58 schools have been allocated, it would remove many suspicions and fears that arise as young people grow up in segregated schools, where pupils often have no friends of the other sort. Finally, it would enable parents and staff to co-operate in many ways, thus doing something useful to bring together a deeply divided society.
9.10 pm
Lord Smith of Clifton: My Lords, I, too, welcome the debate initiated by the noble Baroness, Lady Blood. It is worth mentioning that, with the exception of the noble Baroness and the noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, we have no speakers—or even attendees—here from Northern Ireland. That is deeply significant.
Of course, noble Lords who have spoken before me have given all the statistics about opinion polls, redundant schools on so on. I think that the crux can be summed up by saying that, although Northern Ireland has the highest expenditure on education per capita of any part of the United Kingdom, less is spent per pupil than anywhere else. That is the cost of maintaining two overlapping systems. There is a great deal of redundancy and, I have to say, having lived there for eight years, that it is helping to sustain the polarisation of the two communities.
Our sister party in Northern Ireland, the Alliance Party, has proposed a 10-point plan. I shall briefly go through the points. My good friend, the noble Lord, Lord Parekh, always enumerates his points, and I shall follow him. First, the Government should set a minimum target of 10 per cent of children being educated in integrated schools by 2010. Secondly, the duty on the Department of Education to encourage—not merely to facilitate—the development of integrated education should be extended to the education and library boards and the new single education authority to be established under the review of public administration. Thirdly, the department and other education authorities should have a duty to strategically plan for the future provision of integrated education, including identifying where additional provision needs to be situated. The noble Baroness, Lady Blood, made the point that it was rather pathetic that the Government
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Fourthly, where new schools are being built in Northern Ireland—for example, to service new housing developments—there should be a presumption that they shall be integrated. Fifthly, the Government should encourage the transformation of existing schools to integrated status and review the current procedures to make that easier. The noble Lord, Lord Dubs, referred to that, and all noble Lords who have spoken tonight would agree with that. Sixthly, the Government should reform and relax the criteria for the creation and maintenance of integrated schools, giving recognition to children of mixed, other or no religious background. The noble Baroness, Lady Blood, pointed to the increasing diversity of Northern Ireland’s population. It no longer consists of only the two traditional communities; there has been a significant rise in the Chinese and Asian populations.
Then, the Government should give formal recognition to the contribution being made to the process of reconciliation by mixed schools, those with a mixed enrolment but no formal integrated status. The Government should encourage existing schools to share facilities and, ultimately, campuses. The Government should oppose any creation of a perceived right to a guarantee of public funding for segregated schools, as that could forever entrench segregated schools and frustrate the process of integration. Finally, the Government should advocate the desegregation of teacher training courses and facilities and the familiarisation of integrated education policies and practices in such institutions.
When we discussed the Stranmillis Bill that would give it a proper legal basis, I remarked that, although Stranmillis and St Mary’s had produced some outstanding teachers, leading, particularly at secondary and grammar school level, to Northern Ireland being the best region in the UK for A-level results, the teaching was done with a silo mentality. Stranmillis and St Mary’s, while having the virtues of being very good educational facilities, have perpetuated the divide. I should have thought that it would be relatively simple to undertake an initiative so that those two colleges could begin to work side by side to integrate and to teach what integrated education is.
The noble Lord, Lord Parekh, said that although teachers who came from different backgrounds taught together, that does not mean that they are teaching in an integrated way. We must look at that seriously. I declare an interest: the university over which I had the honour to preside—the University of Ulster—is the only integrated provision in Northern Ireland. That is an example of what might be achieved in the future.
The expansion of integrated education and shared campuses by both sectors is the only rational way forward. As has been mentioned, the Republic of Ireland is leading the way and has in the past 20 years become a much more secular society than anyone
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9.16 pm
Lord Glentoran: My Lords, I join others in thanking the noble Baroness, Lady Blood, for giving us this opportunity to speak on this very important subject. The undemocratic nature of the Orders in Council used under direct rule to govern Northern Ireland means that opportunities to debate Northern Ireland issues such as this are few and far between. It has been good to hear noble Lords around the House expressing so clearly their views and their encouragement of the main topic.
Schools in Northern Ireland have already been subjected to enormous changes in the recent education order—some of them, such as the banning of selection, in the face of enormous opposition from the Northern Irish public. More thought, time and attention needs to be given to the wishes of the public before such draconian orders are put through in the future. Integrated schools are a matter that, more than most, should be governed with great sensitivity to public opinion and local, as well as national, feeling. These points were made very clearly by the noble Lords, Lord Parekh and Lord Smith.
On these Benches, we have been consistent supporters of integrated schools ever since Lagan College opened in 1981. In 1989, we laid a statutory duty on the Department of Education to encourage integrated schools in our education order, and we have never looked back. Lagan College was the first site that the leader of our party visited in Northern Ireland in 2005.
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