Education and Adoption Bill

Is the Secretary of State worried about the number of people who are saying that when students ha...

I think that Members in all parts of the House would very much agree with the hon. Gentleman that...

On the point about an individual school achieving a big difference, a strong academy sponsor in m...

I thank my right hon. Friend. I hope that hon. Members in all parts of the House will be generous...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

I will finish answering this point, and then I might give way to the hon. Gentleman.

I welc...

The Secretary of State is extremely courteous and I am extremely grateful. I am a supporter of ac...

Without going into the detail of all the schools in the hon. Gentleman’s area, I would say that s...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

No, I have given way sufficiently. I will make some progress.

The evidence shows that schoo...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

No, I am going to set out the results first.

The first sponsored primary academies had been...

rose—

I wonder whether the right hon. Lady is going to offer her support.

The interesting thing about the Bill is that it gives the Secretary of State powers to intervene ...

The right hon. Lady is welcome to write to me about those specific cases. If those young people w...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

No, I will make some progress.

I turn now to regional schools commissioners. As the number ...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

No. The hon. Gentleman will have plenty of time to make his points when we get to his speech. Tho...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

No. The hon. Gentleman is about to make a speech in which he will be able to demonstrate why he w...

On that point, will the Secretary of State give way?

No. I am going to make the case for the Bill, and the House will then have the opportunity to lis...

The Secretary of State knows that it is complete nonsense to pretend that Opposition Members are ...

I am delighted to hear that the hon. Gentleman and other Opposition Members are in favour of acad...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

No. I am going to turn to failing schools.

No one in this House can argue that we do not ha...

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way, and for that example. Does she therefore ...

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention and welcome him to the House, as I have not heard...

There is a lot in the Bill that is good and academies are clearly part of the solution, but so is...

I am conscious, Madam Deputy Speaker, that funding is not at issue in the Bill, but it is importa...

I am interested in what the right hon. Lady has to say about failing academies because, as she wi...

Order. An awful lot of Members want to speak and the interventions are getting very long. If we k...

I will, of course, adhere to that restriction, Madam Deputy Speaker, and take only a limited numb...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

No, I am going to make some progress. The hon. Gentleman will have a chance to make his point, bo...

rose—

I am not giving way to the hon. Gentleman, because he will have a chance to tell his hon. Friend ...

Will the Secretary of State give way?

I will if it is about adoption.

It is. I think it was remarkable that the Secretary of State would not give way to my Front-Bench...

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. Of course, the routes available for giving children ...

Will my right hon. Friend say a little more about the rationalisation of the large number of agen...

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. I will talk about that and about why we are bringing...

In my previous life I placed a number of children for adoption. Quite often, mental health proble...

The hon. Lady raises an important issue. I have mentioned the £19.3 million adoption support fund...

I am extremely grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way, especially because I have not bee...

I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. I am sure that, in our casework, all individual Mem...

rose—

Order. Before I call the shadow Secretary of State for Education, I should tell hon. Members that...

I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add:

“t...

Given the shadow Secretary of State’s welcome commitment to improving schools as quickly as possi...

I welcome the hon. Gentleman to the House. One of the issues before us today is the evidence for ...

As the shadow Secretary of State and his party seem to agree with the aims and main purpose of th...

Given that the Secretary of State will not even take an intervention from Opposition Members, it ...

Does my hon. Friend share my disappointment that the Secretary of State failed to meet parents fr...

My hon. Friend makes a valuable point, not least because Ofsted removed more than 1,000 inspector...

Is my hon. Friend also aware that we face a recruitment crisis, because teachers are overworked a...

My hon. Friend makes a very valuable point. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Loui...

I am concerned about the oversight function of local authorities. All too often when prospective ...

My hon. Friend makes a very valuable point about accountability procedures and that is certainly ...

The definition of “coasting” is not the only thing that is missing from the Bill. A number of oth...

My hon. Friend has made a valuable point. All that we have here is yet more relentless focus on s...

Did the hon. Gentleman not hear the Secretary of State say that the definition of coasting would ...

Does the hon. Lady mean the progress 8 data, the EBacc data, or the data relating to free school ...

Work has already been done in the House. The Education Committee published a report in January, a...

My hon. Friend has made an extremely valuable point about the excellent report produced by the cr...

When the Department for Education was asked about quality gradings for academy chains, its respon...

My hon. Friend makes a valuable point. We are talking about taxpayers’ money, so where is the tra...

I am baffled, because the hon. Gentleman has mentioned several things in the Bill he supports yet...

The question is: what is the best mechanism for dealing with improvements to failing schools? The...

rose—

I will give way in a moment. Let us take as an example the case of a school such as St Peter’s Ac...

My hon. Friend is being generous with his time and is giving a good example of how to take interv...

My hon. Friend makes a strong and valuable point. This is further evidence of the atomisation and...

rose—

I am now delighted to give way to the right hon. Lady.

The explanatory notes state:

“Clause 12 inserts a new section…into the Academies Act 2010. ...

This Bill gives an extraordinary amount of new powers to the Secretary of State, but the Governme...

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech, and I commend him on that. He has drawn attention t...

Order. Interventions are getting very long. The hon. Gentleman is on the speaking list, so he may...

My hon. Friend makes a valuable point that there should not be a hierarchy of school type. What m...

I am disappointed by the hon. Gentleman’s accusation of Soviet-style centralisation on the part o...

The hon. Lady was not listening. That is not my comparison; it was made by Mr Steve Hilton, who w...

I rise to speak in my capacity as Second Church Estates Commissioner, but first I would like to b...

I am delighted to have the support of so many of my colleagues here today as I make this, my firs...

It is a great pleasure to speak in this debate, not least because it is the first one on educatio...

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way before he gets to the adoption section of his speech, a...

This is actually about whether we should intervene in coasting schools. The hon. Lady is rightly ...

Last September could well turn out to be the most important month in my life. I began the month b...

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for calling me to make my maiden speech. It is a pleasure to fol...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (James Berry). I am fairly s...

I am enjoying my hon. Friend’s speech. One issue I have with academies is that they have a body o...

Absolutely. When there are concerns about a school they must be investigated and tackled appropri...

rose—

Order. Before I call the next speaker, I thank the hon. Gentleman for his perfect timing. For the...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne). I am sure his ...

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to make my maiden speech in this debate. As usua...

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston and Surbiton (James Berry), and...

Rydw i yn ddiolchgar i’r Dirprwy Lefarydd. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Hazel G...

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to make my maiden speech in this House. I congra...

I congratulate the hon. Member for Thornbury and Yate (Luke Hall) on sharing his experiences with...

I thank my hon. Friend for raising other issues and the causes of the difficulties, including rec...

My hon. Friend raises so many of the issues that are impacting on school standards today and the ...

I am particularly pleased to be called to make my maiden speech in this important debate and to f...

I congratulate the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Michael Tomlinson) on making a gre...

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck) and the excellent maid...

I declare an interest, having worked as a psychologist in a school. I would be interested in the ...

We should provide mental health support to all children going through the care system.

I sh...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Telford (Lucy Allan), and to hear such wonderful m...

rose—

Order. I am now increasing the time limit to eight minutes for those who wish to take advantage o...

Oh!

I am sorry about that.

7.34 pm

I congratulate all hon. Members who have made their maiden speeches this afternoon, especially th...

The hon. Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately) mentioned the freedoms that academies ...

On that point, I wonder whether my hon. Friend saw recently in Tatler—I am sure he is an avid rea...

Like my hon. Friend, I am of course an avid reader of Tatler. The Select Committee found that sch...

I congratulate all those who have made their maiden speeches today, in particular my hon. Friend ...

The hon. Lady, a former lay inspector, raises a very interesting point. When she was inspecting a...

No, under the old system it would be a failing school if it was coasting. Nowadays, it would be s...

Thank you for calling me, Mr Deputy Speaker. I congratulate you on your re-election as Chairman o...

I have listened with admiration to many of the maiden speeches made by hon. Members on both sides...

I join others in congratulating hon. Members who have made their excellent maiden speeches today....

Order. I call Suella Fernandes.

8.13 pm

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury) and I congratul...

rose—

I wish to make progress. We are the only party that is courageous enough to talk honestly about f...

rose—

I will not give way. Teachers are wonderful, but endemic weaknesses in the system stop our childr...

Will the hon. Lady give way on that point?

No, I will not. I teamed up with a group of teachers to set up a free school in Wembley, my home ...

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way; she is being very generous. Earlier in her remarks...

I will not name any schools, but I have adequately defined the features and the hallmarks of coas...

Why has £241 million been spent on free schools in areas that do not have a crisis in school plac...

A key criterion for gaining Government approval for a free school is to establish need. There nee...

rose—

I will make some progress. My point is that it was teachers, not the state, who saw the need and ...

I congratulate the hon. Member for Fareham (Suella Fernandes) on her speech. She spoke with singu...

I, too, congratulate those hon. Members who have made their maiden speeches this evening. In part...

rose—

I think it would be appropriate to raise the time limit on speeches to 10 minutes.

8.31 pm<...

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, for giving me the opportunity to speak on this important Bill. I co...

I have listened with care to the eloquent representations that are being made, but is it not dang...

Order. The hon. Gentleman should resume his seat. Interventions must be short. He cannot make a s...

Yes, Mr Deputy Speaker.

I am grateful for the intervention, because the hon. Gentleman makes precisely the point that I a...

I rise to support clause 13, which promotes best practice on adoption through regional adoption a...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce), and a particular pleasure...

Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the other problems with the Bill is the lack of academies a...

My hon. Friend makes an important and alarming point. Like many other trusts, the Inspiration Tru...

Given the case that my hon. Friend described from his constituency, does he agree that there are ...

My hon. Friend is right: there is neither sufficient consultation nor sufficient scrutiny.

...

It is a great pleasure to follow so many excellent maiden speeches, especially those by Governmen...

I, too, congratulate hon. Members who have made their initial contributions in today’s debate. It...

Is my hon. Friend aware that these problems are not just happening in Cambridge? The headteacher ...

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is shameful that in one of my schools one in seven teacher...

At Tang Hall School in my constituency the children are freezing in the winter. They have to wear...

Indeed it should, and that resonates with those of us with long memories who remember what life w...

We have had heard much discussion from Members on both sides of the House today, and a lot of que...

The regional schools commissioners report to the headteacher boards. In my constituency, one pers...

I totally agree, and that is what I want to ask the Minister. Does he not think that such people ...

I say to the hon. Lady and to the hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) that the Inspiratio...

Order. Minister, I want you to save some speech for later.

I would ask the Minister to be open, and to ensure that those of us representing constituencies w...

The debate is not just between my hon. Friend and the Minister. A great many other stakeholders s...

Parents should be totally involved in the education of their children. In the new academisation p...

Does my hon. Friend agree that there is something curious—I welcome it—about the development of r...

I totally agree with all the interventions apart from the Minister’s. On that ground, I will not ...

It is an early hour for me to be speaking in such a debate, but I am pleased to have the opportun...

Fairer funding is vital to my area. Does the hon. Gentleman and the Labour party back the F40 fai...

I recommend to the hon. Lady the very good debate we had on this matter in Westminster Hall just ...

Does my hon. Friend agree that Councillor Simmonds has also added to the debate about school plac...

I agree with that and say to my hon. Friend that teacher recruitment and the problem she raises a...

This has been an excellent debate on issues that could not be more important to hon. Members and ...

Schools in my constituency of Aldridge-Brownhills are a key issue. I welcome this Bill. May I put...

I would be delighted to visit my hon. Friend’s constituency. The Chief Whip is in his place, and ...

The Minister is more than welcome to visit my constituency, as he did during the election campaig...

The hon. Gentleman will just have to be patient. I will say a bit more about that later.

By...

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. Will he now provide us with the legal definition of...

We have made it very clear that the hon. Gentleman will see the legal definition of a coasting sc...

May I follow my maiden speech with a request that the Minister meet me and other new colleagues w...

I would be delighted to meet my hon. Friend. That sounds like an invitation to meet in the Palace...

Is my hon. Friend aware that when I was on “Any Questions?” with Carwyn Jones, who is the leader ...

I think Mr Jones is absolutely right, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention.<...

Is it not the case that Ofsted recently dispensed with the services of up to 40% of its inspector...

Including the outstanding grade awarded to St Martin’s Academy in the hon. Gentleman’s Chester co...

Perhaps I can appeal for the co-operation of colleagues. They should follow the example of the ri...