Merits of Statutory Instruments Committee: Post-implementation Reviews

My Lords, the Department for Children, Schools and Families did not have its statutory instruments under the scrutiny of the committee of which I am a member and was a member when our report was published. But that department stands out as one that requires considerable enthusiasm within it to look at post-implementation review, to the degree that we on the Merits Committee produced the report to which the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, referred on the accumulative impact of statutory instruments on schools on 13 March 2009. I want to concentrate on that government department because it is a good example of bad practice and therefore should be under the microscope generally. An advisory committee, the implementation organisation unit, advises the schools department. However, it has become very clear that its advice is not necessarily listened to, which is, and has been shown to be in our report on schools, quite a serious factor. In that report, we expressed concern about the impact of large numbers of statutory instruments on schools, particularly on small schools, without sufficient staff to deal specifically with the volume of the statutory instruments that came through day by day and week by week. When one looks at that report, the peak in July 2008 of statutory instruments is almost off the page. The impression is that that government department does not take on board the effect on schools of the volume and complexity of the statutory instruments that pour out. The National Governors’ Association reported to us, at paragraph 4 of the relevant report: ""For the professionals in schools the endless piecemeal change has become one of the main reasons given for leaving the job. It is not unruly and undisciplined children that are forcing good teachers and governors out of our schools; it is unruly and undisciplined legislation"." That requires PIR to see what is going on because the National Governors’ Association is a highly respectable association giving evidence to a Select Committee. Therefore, it is pre-eminently an area in which this government department should engage in PIR. In a letter from the Schools Minister dated 10 January 2009, having been asked whether PIR focused on individual statutory instruments, he said that it was the exception and not the rule; I paraphrase. The Association of Teachers and Lecturers said in its evidence to us that it was, ""rare for government to invite feedback on its practical implementation. There is a ‘policy lag’ … which means that, by the time a SI comes into force … government has already moved on to"," its next policy. They do not want to look at the policy that is in the statutory instrument because they are working on the next policy coming up. As teachers say, that means that feedback from them will not change the policy once it is implemented because, among other things, they know that the change that has been implemented will be short-lived because there will be another policy. The Implementation Review Unit—this time round I have its name correct—said that the DCSF was "very poor" in the area of feedback, and that, ""there is little evidence that a post implementation evaluation takes place nor that lessons learnt are applied to subsequent implementations"." That is an extremely sad state of affairs. It said in its evidence, recorded at page 5, paragraph 8, of our report of March of last year: ""Recent research commissioned by the IRU shows that in the 2006/7 academic year the Department and its national agencies produced over 760 documents aimed at schools. The research also found that no single part of the Department was aware of the totality of what was being offered"." What appears to be happening—and what the Merits Committee was being told—was that individual policy-makers in the department had a specific issue, created a statutory instrument and did not look to see what other statutory instruments were coming out from the same department initiated by a different person with a different policy issue. They particularly did not look to see first, whether they clashed; secondly, whether they were co-ordinated—many times they were not—and, thirdly, how the schools were coping with them. This was another example of the lack of PIR. The sadness, it seems to me, is that there is not a specific set-up in this government department to look to see, across the board, what policies are being produced in statutory instruments and what the effect is on the schools, and to review them after three years or so. I am not, of course, suggesting that every single statutory instrument should be reviewed, but there are so many and they produce so much and such changeable policy—as, indeed, the Government themselves have recognised—that it is time that something was done. Recommendation 5 from the 13 March report of the Merits Committee states: ""We recommend that the DCSF should ensure that all significant statutory instruments are subjected to post-implementation review, and that the review findings are made known to Parliament"." That was in March 2009; we are nearly in March 2010. So far, to my knowledge, we have not heard any review findings of any sort. I wonder whether, in fact, that government department has yet got round to thinking about our recommendation 5. I therefore ask the Minister to pass a message to the Schools Minister asking him to look at recommendation 5 of our 13 March 2009 report, because I entirely and respectfully agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, said about the requirement that the centre should provide good practice. However, while the centre is looking at it, the individual government department should be getting on with it. In particular, each department requires a push in the right direction, none more strongly than the schools department. More than anything else, it seems to me that we need a change of culture in government to make it important to know the outcome of what the Government put through as legislation, and that is for those sitting behind the Minister. We know that the majority of legislation coming through for schools is by negative statutory instruments. Unless someone stands up every now and again and comments on them they pass through without a word, and it is the schools and pupils who suffer.