Education Bill

My Lords, I believe that these amendments should be resisted because they are discriminatory. I was fortunate enough to be able to pay for my children’s education. I did so because I wanted my children to go to Catholic schools. I do not think that we should discriminate against poorer people who cannot make that choice. It is perfectly reasonable to choose that you do not want your child to go to a faith school, but to deny the right of people without the resources to choose a school in which the fundamentals are faith-based seems to me a retrograde action that is entirely unacceptable. It is perfectly reasonable to have some categories of school in which this issue does not arise. These amendments seek to limit even more those categories that exist at the moment. I say to those who put them forward that there is a new kind of illiberalism, which is very determined to remove from parents what for many of us is the most important element in education: we want our children brought in the fear and love of our Lord. We should have that right whether we are rich or poor. After all, it is the church that started education in this country and it is the church that has upheld that education. It is a historic agreement between state and church that has enabled us to have a society in which secular people and religious people can live together in harmony. The increasing demand of those who want a society in which their particular—I have to say—arrogant determination that everybody shall be educated in their way is wholly contrary to the liberal society that we have created. There used to be a very nasty phrase, ““Scratch a liberal and you find a totalitarian””. I am afraid that this is increasingly true in our society. People who claim to be liberal are determined that their liberalism shall—