Education and Inspections Bill

I rise to speak to Amendments Nos. 24, 26 and 26A standing in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Sharp. Amendment No. 24 would do something similar to Amendment No. 23 moved by the noble Lord, Lord Judd. It would require the local authority to be the educator of last resort. In other words, the LEA has to find a place for a child who fails to secure a place at a secondary school and an alternative school, home tuition or a PRU for pupils who are excluded, for whatever reason. It is one thing identifying the children not receiving a suitable education, as this Bill seeks to do, but someone has to have the duty to provide that education. In the current climate of schools becoming independent and having the right to refuse admission to particular children, there is no mechanism to rectify that situation. I am not normally someone who wants local authorities to have a duty to pick up the pieces of other people's messes, but someone must, in the last resort, have the duty to provide a child with an education—the education to which it has a right. That will have to be the local authority. Amendments Nos. 26 and 26A have already had the implicit support of the noble Lord, Lord Judd, in what he said in his excellent speech. Amendment No. 26 would end the current exclusion of children detained under an order of court from the statutory right to education. It is currently the case that Section 562 of the Education Act 1996 effectively permits the Secretary of State, local authorities and parents to opt out of any obligations under the Act if the child is detained by the order of a court. Although the local authority may make arrangements for educational provision for such a child, it is under no obligation to do so. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child stated in its concluding observations on the UK's second report to the committee in 2002 that it was particularly, "““concerned that children deprived of their liberty in prisons and juvenile detention centres do not have a statutory right to education and that their education is not under the responsibility of the Departments responsible for education and that they do not enjoy support for special education needs””." Further, in its report on the UNCRC in 2000-03, the Joint Committee on Human Rights concurred. It said: "““We do not find the arguments presented by the Minister for Children and Young People against giving detained juveniles the same rights to education as other children persuasive—indeed we find them puzzlingly contradictory. He argues that such guarantees are unnecessary because the Government is doing all that is required. The same sorts of arguments were made against the application of the Children Act and the consequence was a judicial finding against the Government. We consider that the persistence of the Government's resistance to placing the educational rights of young offenders on a statutory footing is a contravention of the UK's international obligations””." The JCHR scrutiny report on the current Bill also highlights as concerning the fact that as a result of Section 562, Clause 4, which puts local authorities under a new duty to identify children not receiving education, will not apply to children in custody. The report says: "““These will be some of the most vulnerable children in the LEA's area and in our view it would be preferable if the duty to make arrangements to identify children not receiving education applied to them””." Without relevant statutory duties in place, the current situation for young people in custody with regard to education is currently very poor. Many of them start with very poor levels of education, and that is widely considered one of the causes of crime. Prison Service Order 4950 stipulates the requirements for prisons holding children. Education should be provided for at least 15 hours a week and the remaining 15 hours must be spent in accredited educative activities, which may include work-based learning. However, there is evidence, as the noble Lord, Lord Judd, said, that these levels of provision are not being consistently met. In April, in response to a Parliamentary Question, Fiona Mactaggart said: "““The Youth Justice Board … set the young people's secure estate a national average of 25 hours a week education and training provision, rising to 30 when resources become available. Between April 2005 and March 2006, eight young offender institutions … met the national average and eight did not.""In the 2005–08 service level agreement between the YJB and the Prison Service, each YOI was set an agreed target for the provision of education and training. Between April 2005 and March 2006, five YOIs met their individual target and 11 did not””.—[Official Report, Commons, 27/4/06; col. 1262-3W.]" Less than 50 per cent reaching their targets is pretty appalling, especially when we know that improving levels of education and training to help a young person get a job is one of the most effective levers to help them to avoid reoffending and to keep out of the downward spiral that is too often the result of getting involved with the criminal justice system. Furthermore, a recent inspection report of Her Majesty’s young offender institution, Wetherby, published in January 2005, found that four out of 10 of the young people were not accessing education or training. The Government in their recent Green Paper, Reducing Re-offending Through Skills and Employment, recognise these serious deficiencies in the current arrangements. In the light of the Government’s own plans, the Government stated during the Committee stage of the Bill in the House of Commons that they do not feel that the repeal of Section 562 is either necessary or desirable. I find that very puzzling. I believe that by failing to end this discriminatory exemption the efforts to improve the situation will be undermined. As long as that section remains in place, it will continue to be a major barrier to the effective provision of education for children in custody. Amendment No. 26A probes whether the duties placed on local authorities under the Education Act 1996 apply to children in immigration removal centres. Under that Act, children subject to an order of court are currently exempt, but the situation relating to children in immigration removal centres is not clear. Children in those centres are not placed there by order of court. However, there are clear differentials in standards between education provision in mainstream schools and in immigration removal centres, which calls the status of their education provision into serious question. The following quotation was taken from a recent inspection of Yarl’s Wood immigration removal centre last March. It said that the provision for children’s education was unsatisfactory and depressing and that: "““Accommodation for older children was poor, and the broad range of ages and abilities prevented effective work. There was an over-reliance on agency staff, insufficient resources and no system to measure the quality, rather than the amount, of teaching””." When this issue was debated in Committee in another place, the Minister, Phil Hope MP, said that due to the very low numbers of children detained in IRCs it would be disproportionate to extend local authorities’ education duties to include them, and a more appropriate way to tackle the current deficiencies in the system was through the contract to run the centre. He said: "““Of the three immigration removal centres that hold families with children, two hold families for a maximum of 72 hours””," while at Yarl’s Wood, "““in individual cases, families with children are held there for longer periods. Most will be held for just a few days prior to removal from the UK””.—[Official Report, Commons Standing Committee E, 18/4/06; col. 258.]" If the scale of the problem is so small, it would be a very small burden on local authorities. Besides, we refute the contention that the scale of the issue is quite that small. Government figures show that of the 540 minors recorded as leaving detention, excluding Oakington, during the fourth quarter of last year, 465 were asylum detainees, a rise of 19 per cent from the third quarter of that same year. Three hundred and eighty-five of all minors had been in detention for seven days or less, 60 of them eight to 14 days and 70 had been detained for something between 15 and 29 days. That is a considerable period of time during the education of a child. A recent report from Save the Children estimates that the numbers are much greater than those quoted by the Government. I will not detain your Lordships by quoting it, but the report is easily available. The fundamental objection to the current situation is that segregated education provision is regressive and discriminatory. One of the founding principles of the Education Act 1944 was that school-based education should be universally available. Allowing a child’s immigration status to determine whether or not they can attend a mainstream school is a dangerous and unprecedented attack on that principle and may violate the right of the child to be educated under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.