Education and Skills Bill

As the Minister said, the Lords amendments reverse the provisions in the Bill that transfer registration and regulation of independent schools from the Department for Children, Schools and Families to Ofsted. That is welcome. We argued against that transfer in Committee, and my noble Friend Lady Morris continued the battle in another place. Her powers of persuasion were obviously much stronger than my own and resulted in the amendments tabled on Report in the other place that we are now being asked to agree to. The policy behind the provisions in part 4 that sought to make the transfer have been fraught with error and poor policy making right from the start, even during the consultation process. The regulatory impact statement said, erroneously:"““Independent schools will benefit from only dealing with Ofsted.””" However, half of independent schools are inspected not by Ofsted but by the Independent Schools Inspectorate. The ISI inspects schools that teach about 80 per cent. of pupils educated in the independent sector, so those schools will not deal only with Ofsted. That is an extraordinary factual error of understanding that no doubt contributed to the original decision to move the registration and regulation of independent schools to Ofsted. The original consultation document was also materially wrong. It stated at paragraph 2.23 that the reason for the transfer"““has been prompted by the transfer of boarding school and children's home registration and regulation to Ofsted from CSCI ””—" the Commission for Social Care Inspection—"““from April 2007.””" That is wrong, too. Ofsted does not register or regulate boarding accommodation—that stays with the Secretary of State. What transferred at that point from CSCI to Ofsted was the inspection of boarding provision. Again, this is not a minor drafting error—it goes to the root of the Government's understanding of how these activities are carried out, and it undoubtedly led to the policy that the Minister is now seeking to reverse. The ISI and the Independent Schools Council were strongly opposed to the transfer. They have very good relations with the Department's officials in the independent education and boarding team—they are able to pick up the phone to them when issues arise, and that has worked well for many years. They also feel strongly that the role of inspection should be separate from that of registration and regulation, particularly as there may be disputes over how an inspectorate interprets the regulations with which they are checking compliance. Given that there was no credible policy imperative driving the change, the only reason left was that of efficiency, or alleged efficiency. During the Committee's evidence sessions, I asked officials about the extent of such purported savings. One senior official said:"““We are still discussing costs with the Department””." She went on to say:"““We are still working on the exact numbers. I am not quite sure exactly what numbers we will need to transfer to us, to do that work.””––[Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 24 January 2008; c. 95, Q223-225.]" Another official from Ofsted said confidently that he thought that Ofsted could do the work with between seven and 12 people. The Minister went even further when he said:"““I anticipate significant savings. I cannot predict whether we will move from 18.2 members of staff to approximately 10, but savings will be made””.––[Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 28 February 2008; c. 784.]" Contrast those statements with the words of Lord Adonis in another place six months later:"““having taken a long, hard look at the best estimates that we have of the cost savings from the proposed transfer of functions to Ofsted and balanced those against the potential disruption to the sector that would be caused by the transfer, I have concluded that the case for change is not compelling.””—[Official Report, House of Lords, 21 July 2008; Vol. 703, c. 1598.]" That was a very welcome change of heart by a much-missed Minister. I wish that Ministers in this House, and Ofsted officials, would take the same assiduous approach to calculating possible cost savings before announcing that the policy would save money. We need less bluster and more facts from the Government. Having said all that, better the sinner that repenteth. This is a welcome U-turn that we have been calling for in both Houses. As is the way of this Government, they put through their change of mind in the other place instead of here. That is partly down to the powers of persuasion of my noble Friend Lady Morris and partly due to the Government's mistaken belief that a U-turn in the other place is less noticeable than one here. These Lords amendments take out a large proportion of part 4 by replacing the words ““chief inspector”” with ““Secretary of State””, and they constitute a large proportion of the amendments that we are discussing. They do not remove all of part 4, however, which will dismay some people, particularly those who teach their children at home. Part 4 gives a definition of an independent educational institution because the Government wanted to ensure that a small number of independent schools that provided only part-time education were properly regulated. Through parliamentary questions and confirmation by the Minister during the debate in Committee, such provision turned out to be just four schools. Education Otherwise, which represents tens of thousands of parents who educate their children at home—an increasing phenomenon as parents worry about standards of behaviour in too many of our schools—said that these provisions might inadvertently catch informal arrangements to educate home-educated children using shared teachers, who have a particular specialism, in someone's home. In Committee, the Minister confirmed that the four institutions that he intended to be caught by the clause were Tyndale academy, Kids Company, Headstart Early Learning Centre and The Children's Garden. It is rather alarming, in terms of competence of policy making and administration, that the Government now say that that figure is not four but 1,100. In a letter to my noble Friend Lady Morris on 7 November, the Minister, Lady Morgan, wrote:"““When the Education and Skills Bill was introduced, we were aware of only four part-time providers…as more evidence emerged of local authorities increasingly using private sector and voluntary providers…an estimated 1,100 providers…might need to register as independent educational institutions””." What is astonishing is the phrase, ““as more evidence emerged””. It appears that the Government responsible for education in this country were unaware until this autumn that local authorities around the country were using at least 1,100 private education providers for alternative pupil referral-type education. It would be helpful to our discussions if the Minister could explain that confusion.