Education Bill

My Lords, I will be brief and, I hope, to the point; I want to record my support for the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Knight. The TTA, followed by the TDA, were like a breath of fresh air in teacher recruitment. We have had a problem for many years and what they did—the figures bear this out—suggest that this amendment probes well and accurately. A number of years ago, I took a group of Malaysian senior politicians and administrators to visit these organisations. It was embarrassing to see how much they appreciated what was being achieved in the agency—they were facing some of the same problems. I have one question for the Minister. If this goes, would the Government be prepared to put down measures against which we can assess the impact of this policy? In other words, if the numbers of teachers drop, or the quality, will Ministers put their hands up and say, ““We got this wrong””? But if there is a rise, fine—perhaps we will put our hands up and say, ““Yes, we got it wrong””. This will be a constant refrain from me, I am afraid. We need targets from the Government that change policies.