Academies Bill [HL]

My Lords, I congratulate the Minister on the way in which he has introduced his first piece of legislation. His speech was very conciliatory and I think that the ensuing debate in Committee will be much welcomed by the rest of the House. I look forward to taking part in that Committee stage with him. I also want to put on record my congratulations to the academies which have done some magnificent work over the past decade and to the city technology colleges which did the same in the preceding years. I also make clear my admiration for the work of the noble Lord, Lord Harris, who has contributed to this debate, and the chain of academies which now bears his name—the Harris chain—and operates in some of the most challenging areas of London. They have transformed opportunities not only for his students but for their families, communities and every generation to come—because that is the way it goes. I am in awe of what he has managed to achieve. The noble Lord, Lord Baker, was right when he said that the Bill’s origins lay in the city technology Bill of the 1980s. They can be traced through the city technology colleges, grant-maintained schools, specialist schools, academies, these sorts of academies and free schools. You are left thinking that if something was meant to be that good back in the mid-1980s, why did we not just get on with it and do this before in the past 20 to 30 years? Why did we need five categories of school, with five titles and umpteen pieces of legislation, to try to get all schools to be like these schools, which are meant to be the ideal? When I look at the description of each of these categories of school, I see that they all say the same. They are intended to build a school system of independent state-funded schools that are free from local authority control. The key words are "independent", "free" and "free from local authority control". I differ with the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Baker, and the Minister in that I do not think there has been an even-handed approach to the issue of category of school throughout those 30 years. I do not accept that previous Governments—certainly not previous Conservative Governments—introduced city technology colleges or grant-maintained schools without an ambition that they would become the norm. I believe that they had that ambition but that they did not introduce the legislation necessary to make it a reality. They went to the ballot, and they sought external funding for city technology colleges. This Bill is another attempt to establish a norm without showing the necessary courage and making the necessary provision to make it happen. Over the past 30 years we have had a period of not knowing, of uncertainty and flux. These independent state-funded schools exist alongside other structures of school. They are also excellent and I always make that clear. I often speak in favour of local authority-maintained schools, because excellence is found in every structure. But these independent schools have always been the favoured child. They were the favoured child of both the previous Tory Government and the previous Labour Government—my Government. They are also the favoured child of this Conservative Government. This favoured child has never quite achieved its potential. It has never quite taken over or grown to the extent necessary to make independent free schools the norm rather than the exception. The Minister was right. I believe that it was the intention of some members of my party—including my former party leader, for whom I have the greatest respect and affection—to make these free schools the norm. They were wrong, and that is where I disagreed with them. But regardless of whether it was the intention, the truth is that the academies are now focused on the least affluent schools in the most deprived areas and not on the rest. Given that so many schools which are not academies are also successful—some are as successful as the academies, and some are more so—what is the justification for speeding up the move to academies? When Ofsted has already described a school as outstanding, what is the justification for changing its structure from community school to academy? There are three key questions here. First, what evidence is there that a system that is in its entirety independent, with schools free from local authority control, will be more effective than what we have at the moment? The evidence which the Minister quoted is that schools that had been underachieving and were turned around improved their attainment more than the average across the nation. I am sorry, but that is to be expected given the attention that they had. Quite honestly, with all that we put into the academies, if we could not have turned them around, we would not have deserved to hold the job. Moreover, it is not only academies that can do that. It is not a trick and we know what to do with underachieving schools. You put in damn good head teachers and let them attract really good staff. You support them and give them some more money. You monitor them, but you let them get on with it. It was not the freedom of the academy status that caused the improvement in results, but something quite different which I shall come back to. So my first question is this: what is the evidence that there will be a systemic improvement and not just improvements for individual schools? Secondly, what will be the effect on the rest of the education system, which will consist of an increasingly small maintained sector? Thirdly—and for me the key question—is it really worth focusing the attention of the Secretary of State, of the department, of local government and of both Houses on going through this structural change? As the noble Lord, Lord Turnbull, said, this will be a big move. What is the justification for taking the focus of the whole machinery of government and the education service away from teaching and learning and putting it on whether to apply for academy status or not? The only justification for this Bill is if the noble Lord can prove that, in itself, it will improve the quality of teaching in the classroom. I am glad that there is agreement across the Chamber that it is that which makes the difference. Which clause in this Bill means that schools with academy status will see improved teaching and therefore improved learning? There is actually nothing about teaching and learning in the Bill; no mention is made of them. So I am left to conclude that the intention of the legislation is that these freedoms will somehow improve the quality of teaching and therefore the quality of learning. I do not believe that and I have never believed it. Indeed, that has been the cause of some of my unhappiness with some of the things that my own Government have done. I want to look at this in a little more detail. Many of these freedoms are illusory. The letter sent to schools by the Secretary of State does not set out a long list of extra freedoms because many of those freedoms are already available to maintained schools. It is not the local authority that stops schools using the freedoms they have; it is fear of the accountability mechanism. The problem is not that schools do not have enough freedom, but that not enough schools use what is available to them. As we have heard in some speeches, the Government feel that two specific freedoms will do the trick: freedom from the curriculum, and freedom from the local authority. Whether teachers should have control of the curriculum is a different debate for another time. I do not think that they should. The knowledge that we pass down from generation to generation is not the responsibility of teachers to decide; it is a responsibility for us all. It is a civic responsibility and duty. What I know is this: a poor teacher does not become a good teacher just because you change what they teach. Changing the history syllabus will not make a poor teacher a good one. As for freedom from local authorities, it should be noted that they do not run schools or have such powers over them. I find it incredible that both the Minister’s Government and my own Government have spent two and a half decades removing the powers of local authorities. When I was Secretary of State I intervened on underperforming local authorities by outsourcing to private or third sector contractors probably more often than any other Secretary of State. Having achieved that and changed the role of local authorities, why do we still talk about them as though they are still running schools? It is as though we do not want to claim the success we have had in terms of local authorities. We have had successes in our party, and the Minister’s party has had successes as well. Academies under the Labour Government were successful not because they were free to develop their own curriculum or because they were free from their local authorities, but because they were a small group of disadvantaged schools in disadvantaged areas that were given a lot of high quality attention and clear focus. Let me list some of these things. Those schools attracted some of the best head teachers in the country, along with some of the finest teachers we can offer. They did so because they were seen as the place to be. If I had been a young teacher when the academies were introduced under Tony Blair, I would have gone for them. They were the sexy sort of school, the club where things were happening. If I wanted to get on, that is where I would have sent my first job application. That is also why, when it was set up, Teach First operated predominantly if not solely in the academies. The academies had banded intakes. They changed overnight in a very good way by taking not only children from the local area but—as the noble Lord, Lord Harris, described—by ensuring a mixed ability intake. Every single academy has that sort of intake. The schools were given external support by the department, from sponsors, from the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust and from anyone else who wanted to contribute. Quite frankly, far from being free, independent schools, the academies were the most monitored, watched, weighed and measured we have ever seen in this country. And the result was that they improved in the way that the Minister described. But unless we understand why they improved, we will get it wrong again. They did not improve because they were given extra freedoms; they improved because they were supported and given the best quality leadership and teaching. I see nothing in the Bill that can possibly make those advantages available for every school that applies to become a city academy. Indeed, by the very nature of what my Government did, they cannot be replicated until you have more good teachers and school leaders being given lots more support and a bit more in the way of resources. If this Bill is passed, there will be consequences for the education system. Many noble Lords have talked, first, about the important role played by local authorities and how they need the capacity to fulfil it, and, secondly, about the fragmentation of the schools system. To tell the truth, I object to the notion that schools which become academies will be made to link with other failing schools. Why would anyone think that that is the preserve of the academies? It is what schools are already doing and is one of the greatest achievements of the last Labour Government. They joined schools together to teach each other and enable all to learn from the best. Church schools, community schools and special schools link in with each other. We do not need an Academies Bill to ensure that underperforming schools are supported, because that is already being done. So we must not allow the academies to be seen as the group that makes it happen. I shall finish with some questions, many of which have already been referred to by other speakers, but one or two of which have not. On admissions, like other noble Lords, I would welcome an assurance that the admissions code of practice will apply. I can see, even though I might not be thrilled about it, how it is possible legally for a grammar school to be transferred into an academy and still be allowed to select under existing legislation. What I cannot see is how Clause 1(6)(d) can state that academies must have, ""pupils who are wholly or mainly drawn from the area in which the school is situated"." I do not know of one grammar school that draws wholly—100 per cent—or even mainly from the area in which the school is situated. Will the Minister clarify that, in the future, grammar schools will have to accept pupils wholly or mainly from the area in which they are situated? Secondly, there are two routes for funding: academy agreement and academy financial assistance. I do not know why the second route has been introduced, or indeed what it is for and how it will be used. Thirdly, I add my voice to the others which have said that we must consult parents and look at charitable status. My final question—which I have not heard mentioned; I may have misread the legislation—is what does the Minister envisage will be the role of sponsors? Does he believe that, with 1,000 applications of interest in gaining academy status by September this year, and with six weeks of the school term left, he can put in place sponsors for each of those academies? That external sponsorship, that external eye on the role of education, has been a power of good. I look forward to the rest of the debate today, certainly to the Committee stage, and to gathering responses to my questions when the Minister replies.