Education Bill

My Lords, we have had two debates on this amendment. The latter one that has emerged about the power to innovate and accessibility to current legislation for schools has been interesting. I urge the Minister to reconsider whether the existing law enables the Government to achieve what they want to happen. Should it not do so, I shall want to come back to some of the comments made by other noble Lords today. There are key safeguarding issues relating to short-notice detention outside school time. That is the fundamental concern behind both these amendments. It is a question of trust in teachers, as espoused by the Ministers, or safeguarding children. Frankly, I think that the balance there always has to be in favour of children. I absolutely take the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, and others about children who act as carers. Children may also have non-caring roles that they need to fulfil or other commitments outside school with classes to go to where their non-attendance would cause problems. There are many things that schools do not know about where a short-notice detention out of school time could cause very serious implications for a child. Parental support is absolutely vital, as many noble Lords have commented. Since the beginning of Second Reading, we have talked repeatedly about partnership between parents and schools. Parents’ support for outside-school-time detention must be a priority, not least because that gives them the chance to make alternative arrangements and it also gives them a chance to say to the school, ““In this instance, it is not appropriate to do it straight away””. I have to take issue with my noble friend Lord Lingfield about this being a new tool in the toolbox. It is a very weighty tool and an absolute sledgehammer to crack a nut. The Minister cited Section 91 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006, as well as another Act, and was confident that all the legislation was in place and that all we were being asked was to trust teachers. However, this amendment and Amendment 62 set out a simple and clear way of making it absolutely unavoidable for a school to contact a parent and get a response. My noble friend Lady Benjamin talked about the importance of a letter going to the child’s home. She is right that in this day and age there are much faster ways of contacting parents, including by text and mobile telephone. Even five or six years ago, as a parent I got messages from school as my eldest had accidents at school and was required to be taken to A&E. If something is that urgent, frankly the school can make contact. If the school is required to contact parents, they must do so. I come to the final point about a nine year-old at primary school walking home late in November without their parents’ knowledge. In the main, most schools would not want that to happen, but there are occasions when it might. That is why I come back to safeguarding. If it is safeguarding versus trust, safeguarding must come first.