I knew the noble Baroness and I had a lot in common and now we have even more. As she knows, I agree with just about everything she had to say about what a proper education means, the importance of social skills, et cetera. As I have made clear, we just do not think it is right to put this in the definition, but regional schools commissioners, who are extremely experienced, will take this into account in their analysis. If any noble Lord who was not able to be there on Monday would like to meet any RSCs or any members of the head teacher boards, I would be delighted to set up another conversation about this. The noble Baroness talked about teachers’ stress levels. As I have said, I am genuinely fearful that having an uncertain, vague definition will just add to teachers’ stress levels, and I am sure we are all anxious to avoid that.
3.15 pm
The Government have published their response to the Commons Education Committee’s inquiry into PHSE and SRE. As stated in the response, we are working with head teachers and other leading experts on PHSE to understand how best to achieve high-quality PHSE for every pupil. We intend to make significant progress on the issue during this Parliament and will report back to the Education Committee on progress later this year.
The noble Lord, Lord Addington, talked about sport. As I have already mentioned, Ofsted do look at that. I could not agree with more about the importance of sport, but as I have said, it is just not possible to legislate for this in a definition of coasting. I would be interested to discuss this more with the noble Lord when he has had a chance to analyse the Schools Causing Concern guidance in detail. He talked about the potential for litigation and uncertainty. My fear is that a vague coasting definition which is not absolutely clear and based on facts, like the one we have, would set up the potential for litigation and uncertainty.