Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill

My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 217A, and I apologise that it was tabled late. This group of amendments and the next are about behaviour in one way or another. A similar amendment to this was tabled by us in Committee to ensure that the head teacher who knows the child and his family may use his discretion as to whether to report the use of force on every occasion to the parent or carer. Having studied the current guidance since then, I have added Amendment 217A to ensure that, when using that discretion, the head teacher—as well as the governors, who are already included in the Bill—have regard to the guidance. I understand from the Minister that the guidance will be revised following the passage of this Bill. Having read the guidance, I think it is very sensible, but I accept that some further development of the concept of the term "significant" will be needed. It might be argued that the head teacher’s interpretation of "significant" will give him or her sufficient discretion in the matter, but I am afraid that I must tell the Government that head teachers out there in the real world do not think so. They are concerned that they, who know the child better than anyone in Whitehall writing guidance, will be put into some sort of one-size-fits-all straitjacket which may have unforeseen adverse consequences. For example, a child from a violent home may be so used to violence that it is the norm for him. He gets into fights in the playground frequently. The incidents are recorded and reported to the violent father who beats the child as a consequence. One can easily envisage it happening. Even worse, a child who displays challenging behaviour may have to be restrained by staff, quite properly. However, if this is reported to the parents and they do not understand the underlying cause of the child’s distress, they may punish the child, when in fact they should be co-operating with the school to help the child. I am grateful to the Minister for her letter of two weeks ago in which she explained the background to this part of the Bill. It goes back to a child with a learning disability who was properly restrained 25 times but the parents were not told. We do not need this legislative sledgehammer to crack that particular nut. In so many cases with this Government we have, "Here is the nut; on the one side we have a nutcracker, on the other a sledgehammer"—guess which one the Government choose. The case I refer to was simply bad practice under the current guidance and should never have happened. That is why I have tabled Amendment 217A, which emphasises that the head teacher must have regard to the guidance when using his or her discretion. Those parents should have had a thorough discussion with the school about the child’s needs and an appropriate protocol agreed long before the number of restraints reached double figures. That was not even in line with the current guidance and best practice on how to deal with children with learning difficulties who sometimes display challenging behaviour. The Government often tell us that hard cases make bad law. They are making the mistake of reacting to a hard case by making bad law and I hope that they will think again. It is extremely important and I really hope that we can get some movement on it. I beg to move.