Schools White Paper

My Lords, education is a substantially devolved matter in respect of Wales. The regulation of the school system there and the reforms that I have talked about this afternoon are a matter for the Welsh Assembly. I cannot answer for them this afternoon. In respect of head teachers, my noble friend makes an important point, which is that the leadership of our schools is critical to their success. We have invested substantially in school leadership since 1997. We set up the first national college for school leadership in Nottingham, which oversees all of the training programmes for head teachers and has outstanding courses and leadership programmes for aspiring head teachers. We have significantly improved the pay of head teachers—both primary and secondary—since 1997 and we have introduced new professional qualifications for leadership, all of which, according to Ofsted, have played a significant part in raising standards in our schools. He is right to highlight school leadership. Without effective leadership our schools would not have the capacity to succeed in the way that they do.