My Lords, I would like to speak to the group containing Amendments 8B, 9B, 10B, 15B and 24, tabled in my name, regarding coasting schools and academies, and Amendments 8A, 8C, 8D, 9, 9A, 10, 10A, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 and 15A regarding coasting schools, tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Addington, Lord Watson, and Lord Hunt, the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, and the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland.
First, on my most substantive amendment, Amendment 24 on academies, I am grateful for the support that the House has given this amendment. The vast majority of academies are performing well and the academies programme remains central to the Government’s commitment to secure excellent education everywhere. The programme is firmly based on an approach that freedom, combined with strong accountability, raises standards. We have been clear right from the start that we will tackle underperformance wherever it occurs, whether in a maintained school or in an academy. I recognise, however, that our formal powers in relation to failing and coasting schools vary depending on the age of an academy’s funding agreement. Indeed, the older the funding agreement is, the weaker the powers are—the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, referred to that variation. In some cases, that can restrict our ability to take action as strongly or swiftly as we would like. This is not acceptable. As the Secretary of State has said, and as a number of noble Lords have reiterated, a single day spent by a child in an underperforming school is a day too many.
Our amendment will ensure that we have the powers to hold all academies to account when they do not meet the high standards that we rightly expect and will create a more consistent framework for tackling underperformance across different types of schools. This is something that we have been considering for some time. We have listened to what noble Lords have said on the matter during the course of debate and have spoken to some of our leading sponsors. They—all of them charities, of course—tell us that they find the inconsistencies in the present system frustrating. The few cases of high-profile academy failure create a misleading picture of the excellent work being done by academies across the country. These cases have also allowed the myth to grow that the Government somehow favour academies and hold them to account less robustly than maintained schools. That is not the case, and I have in previous debates elaborated on how tough the regional schools commissioners have been, as my noble friend said, in rebrokering many cases.
This amendment will further strengthen the ability of regional schools commissioners to take action where academies underperform. When an academy’s performance meets one of two triggers in legislation—an inadequate Ofsted judgment or performance that falls within the coasting definition—and it cannot satisfy the regional schools commissioners that it has an adequate plan, as in the case of maintained schools, its funding agreement will be read as having, in effect, the same provisions around failing and coasting schools as are in our latest model funding agreement.
I hope that answers the point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes. We have already changed our new model funding agreement so that the coasting definition applies to academies, and the latest funding agreement has for some time had the ability to intervene rapidly in failing and inadequate academies. Where a school is failing or has failed to come out of a coasting situation, we will now read all funding agreements as if they had that clause in them.
In practice, this will give regional schools commissioners consistent powers to move a failing academy swiftly to a new sponsor and to require a coasting academy to demonstrate that it can make sufficient improvement. Where an academy is coasting—as with a coasting maintained school—the academy will be given the opportunity to demonstrate that it can improve sufficiently. Where a coasting academy does not have a credible plan to improve sufficiently, this amendment ensures that further action can be taken by the regional schools commissioner. This could ultimately include terminating the funding agreement and bringing in a new sponsor if this is the best way to ensure rapid and sustained improvement.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, referred to the concept of a warning notice—I think she was referring to the warning notice in new Section 2B in my Amendment 24. She will be very familiar with the fact that academies operate through this contractual arrangement and the funding agreement. The termination warning notice in Amendment 24 is part of the process for terminating a coasting academy contract in those circumstances. The powers provided in this amendment take effect only when an academy is failing or meets the coasting definition. We will not interfere in the arrangements or freedoms of academies and free schools that are performing well. This approach reinforces the central principle of the academy programme: trusting heads to run their schools through freedom and autonomy, but at the same time holding them to account for the results their pupils achieve.
I hope the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Watson, and the noble Lord, Lord Addington, whose amendments 8A, 8C, 8D, 9A, 10A and 13 all seek to apply the coasting definition to academies, are reassured that we take academy performance very seriously and intend to hold academies to account in the same way we do maintained schools. I therefore urge the noble Lords not to press their amendments.
Turning now to my other amendments regarding coasting—Amendments 8B, 9B, 10B and 15B—I listened closely to all the points raised during the informed and wide-ranging debate we had on Clause 1 in Grand
Committee. I know there is widespread support in this House for tackling schools that are not fulfilling the potential of their pupils, and I am grateful for that support. We all want every child, regardless of their background, to have the opportunity to go to a good school and receive the highest-quality education they deserve. Noble Lords have raised some very helpful and relevant points regarding the detail set out in Clause 1. I have considered these points very carefully and have decided to lay a number of government amendments, which will, I believe, further strengthen the Bill and address many of the points Peers have raised.
Amendments 8B and 10B remove an element of subjectivity from the coasting definition that could be implied by the current wording of the Bill. The text currently states that a school will be eligible for intervention when it has been notified that the Secretary of State considers it to be coasting. We have been clear from the outset that we want schools to be certain about whether they have fallen below the coasting bar. That is why our proposed coasting definition is clear, transparent and data-based. To make sure that schools are in no doubt about this, we are proposing to revise the wording of Clause 1 to remove the reference to “considers”. This will also help ensure that schools are treated consistently across regions, as whether a school falls in scope will be down to data not someone’s judgment. I hope noble Lords will agree that the amendment will increase transparency and certainty for schools and remove any unnecessary and unintentional anxiety teachers and head teachers may feel about whether their school could be identified as coasting.
Amendment 9B provides the Secretary of State with the power to disapply the coasting clauses from certain type of schools. The Bill as it is currently drafted applies to all maintained schools, including schools which we have no intention of applying the definition to, such as maintained nursery schools. As our proposed definition is based on key stage 2 and key stage 4 results—assessments pupils take at the age of 11 and 16—it would not be possible or appropriate to use such an approach to identify coasting maintained nursery schools. They will continue to be held to account through the Ofsted inspection regime.
Special schools are also currently included in the scope of the clause, and the noble Lord, Lord Addington, referred to this. Special schools should provide excellent education to their pupils, and we have high expectations for what children with special educational needs can achieve. However, it would be inappropriate and unfair to apply exactly the same expectations of pupil performance to these schools. We are consulting on whether and how we can develop a separate coasting definition for special schools. I am aware that this will not be easy but we are consulting on it. That consultation closes this Friday, and we expect to publish our response in the spring.
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Amendment 9B would give the Secretary of State powers to disapply the coasting definition from certain types of schools. It would allow Clause 1, the coasting clause, to be disapplied from maintained nursery schools and give us the scope to do the same for special
schools, should this be the outcome of the consultation. I am pleased to see that the noble Lord, Lord Addington, has proposed the almost identical Amendment 15A, and I hope that the House will join him in agreeing that this is a sensible change that will help improve clarity for schools and ensure that they are in no doubt about whether the coasting definition applies to them.
I turn to my Amendment 15B and Amendments 11 and 15 tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Hunt, Lord Watson and Lord Addington, regarding the affirmative procedure. In Grand Committee I undertook to consider carefully the concerns raised regarding this matter, and those highlighted by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. As noble Lords are aware, we published illustrative regulations in June so that both Houses could understand and scrutinise our proposed approach to the definition of coasting.
A number of Peers have also had the opportunity to meet the department’s statisticians to discuss the coasting definition in more depth. I know that the noble Lords, Lord Addington and Lord Lucas, took up the offer, and I hope that they found the meeting helpful. I believe that they were satisfied, with regard to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, about schools with high-ability intakes, that the coasting definition, particularly when Progress 8 comes in for the full three years, will catch all schools, including grammar schools and selective schools. From the illustrative regulations, all Peers will know that our approach is firmly based on the department’s long-established school performance tables.
As I have said previously, results for primary and secondary schools are published in the performance tables at two different points each year. This could necessitate changes to the regulations as national performance standards change. The performance tables are also technical and so, if minor changes are made to their layout or content, this may also necessitate minor consequential amendments to the regulations. The regulations by necessity refer very precisely to detail in the performance tables—for example, key stage 2 progress is defined as,
“the percentage shown in the ‘all pupils’ column of the KS2 performance table of each of the following rows in that table”.
The regulations go on to list the precise headings of each row. If the wording in these performance table row and column headings changed in any way, the regulations would need to be amended under the affirmative procedure—laid before both Houses, debated and approved—before the updated regulations could be made. And this is just for key stage 2 progress; there are similar sections for key stage 4 progress, for attainment and for arrangements under the new accountability arrangements from 2016.
Similarly, if the department were to tweak or merely update the title of published guidance regarding Progress 8, for example, again the regulations would need to be updated as the proposed regulations refer to a specific version of the guidance. As noble Lords can see, the scope for minor changes needing to be made to the regulations is substantial. Requiring the consent of both Houses each time they are needed would seem an excessive use of Parliament’s time.
We already consult widely when significant changes are made to accountability systems; we did so for the new measures coming in in 2016. I can reassure noble Lords on a point that the noble Lord, Lord Storey, was concerned about: if similar major changes to the accountability system underpinning the coasting definition were proposed, we would again undertake such a public consultation, with due time for debate. In fact, in response to the Workload Challenge, the Secretary of State committed in February that the department would introduce a minimum lead-in time of one year for significant changes that it makes to accountability, qualifications and curriculum. Finally, under the negative procedure Members in both Houses can still call for a debate and vote on the regulations should they have any concerns about the changes proposed.
For all these reasons, it would not be right or sensible to subject the regulations to the affirmative procedure every time they are amended. However, I appreciate that we are still consulting on the coasting definition and as such, Parliament has not had the opportunity to scrutinise the final version of the regulations during the passage of the Bill. I have therefore laid Amendment 15B, which will subject the regulations to the affirmative procedure when they are laid for the first time next year. I hope that the House will agree that this represents a sensible way forward, allowing both Houses to scrutinise and approve the details of the final regulations without creating an unnecessary and bureaucratic burden on parliamentary time. I therefore urge the noble Lord, Lord Addington, to withdraw his amendment and urge the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Watson, not to press theirs.
I will also speak briefly on Amendment 10, which has been proposed by the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Watson, and which proposes that the Secretary of State must make regulations under Clause 1 to define coasting. It has always been our intention that coasting regulations would be made and I am happy to remove any doubt regarding this matter. I am pleased that the noble Lords agreed with the undertaking I gave the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee last month on this matter and have tabled an amendment which has this effect. I am therefore very happy to support their amendment.
Amendment 15, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, seeks to require regional schools commissioners to take account of the entire activity of a school when deciding whether that school has a credible plan to improve sufficiently. Such consideration would include looking at achievement in sports and the arts as well as access to training, further education, apprenticeships and work placements. These factors are, of course, extremely important. However, it is not right to include them in primary legislation.
I reassure the House again that we recognise the importance of taking into account the wider context of the school. The draft Schools Causing Concern guidance, which is out for consultation until the end of this week, already makes this clear. On page 10 it reads:
“In making decisions about which coasting maintained schools require action, and what action is necessary for those schools, RSCs will take into consideration the characteristics of a coasting school, and seek to understand the school, its context, and what factors may have led it to meet the coasting definition. For example,
a school may have a large Special Educational Needs … unit. In this circumstance, the RSC may wish to examine the data from the different parts of the school and not make their decisions solely on the basis of the overall results. They may also consider data and other evidence which might indicate the causes of the school’s current underperformance, and therefore what the most appropriate action would be to bring about sufficient improvement”.
It carries on in more detail, setting out that the RSCs may look at a range of factors, including, but not limited to:
“Educational performance and progress data for that school, further to the data that meant the school was identified as coasting … other data about the school, such as pupil attendance”,
and:
“Recent judgements and assessments that Ofsted has made of the school”.
This last factor is particularly relevant in the context of the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Addington. Ofsted already looks at a wide range of factors to inform its judgments. This includes how well prepared pupils are for training and employment, the use of the PE and sports premium, and the delivery of a broad and balanced curriculum. The guidance also makes it clear that RSCs can take a range of actions once they have considered all the evidence about a school’s performance, including its characteristics and its context. This can include taking no further action where an RSC is satisfied with the data and evidence they have seen.
I therefore hope that having been able to consider the Schools Causing Concern guidance in its draft form in detail, the noble Lord will be reassured that a school’s context and wider achievements are exactly the kind of evidence that regional schools commissioners can look at when assessing the capacity of schools whose performance puts them within a data-driven coasting definition. I am happy to commit to do more in the final version of the guidance to make this explicit, but I hope that the noble Lord will understand the Government’s intentions here.
Amendment 14, from the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, and the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, seeks to exclude from the coasting definition the performance data of pupils absent from school for medical reasons for more than 15 days in any one year. I fully understand the noble Lord’s concern that the coasting definition could be seen as a disincentive for mainstream schools to reintegrate pupils who have missed school for medical reasons if the school feels that it will be penalised for the progress or lack of progress made by these pupils while they were absent. However, I assure the noble Lord that this will not be the case. Intervention in coasting schools will not be automatic.
The draft Schools Causing Concern guidance, which, as I said, is currently out for consultation, is clear that, while data will allow us to determine which schools fall within the coasting definition, RSCs may consider a range of other factors and quantitative information when deciding the best course of action to take with a coasting school. The guidance also explicitly states that this could include looking at pupil attendance data, which are published annually for all schools as part of the performance tables. I hope that this will reassure the noble Earl that the requirement that his amendment seeks to introduce is not necessary.
Amendment 9, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, seeks to take our proposal that coasting will be measured over a three-year period and place it in primary legislation rather than in regulations, as we propose. It also requires schools to be notified during the initial three-year period of whether their performance in any one year is such that, if repeated over a three-year period, they would fall within the coasting definition. Our proposed coasting definition, based on three years of performance data, is clear and transparent to schools. Schools will know themselves when their performance has fallen below the coasting bar and, just as importantly, when it has not. The amendment, which proposes that schools should be notified each year they fall below the coasting bar, is therefore not necessary. All schools will already know where they stand.
We have also been clear, right from the start, that one of the fundamental principles of our coasting policy is that it should measure a school’s performance over time. Our proposed definition suggests that this should mean where a school’s data show that it is failing to fulfil its pupils’ potential over a three-year period. We are still consulting on this proposed definition, including whether it is right that it should be based specifically on three years’ performance. I believe that teachers would prefer such an approach rather than looking at results in just a single year. The CEO of the Burnt Mill Academy Trust has supported this view, saying that,
“having a coasting definition which is based on performance over time, rather than snapshot judgement is really important”.
Even once our consultation has concluded, I do not think it would be right to be as detailed or prescriptive on the face of the Bill as this amendment proposes. However, it is certainly right that this House has the opportunity to understand and debate the final proposed approach when we lay our coasting regulations for the first time. That is why we have brought forward government Amendment 15B, which will apply the affirmative procedure to the coasting regulations when we first lay them. This will give both Houses the opportunity to debate and approve the detail of the coasting definition, including the length of time that a school must fall within the definition to be classed as coasting. I therefore urge the noble Lord not to press this amendment.
Amendment 12, tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Watson and Lord Hunt, proposes that a governing body must inform parents that the school has been notified that it is coasting. I assure the House that I understand the intention behind the amendment but I do not agree that there is a need to legislate to place such a requirement on governing bodies. The purpose of the coasting definition is to identify the schools that are not enabling pupils to fulfil their potential. We do not want to use legislation to create more duties and more bureaucracy for governing bodies.
However, my noble friend Lady Evans undertook to consider what, short of legislation, could be done through the Schools Causing Concern guidance to ensure that parents were aware that their child’s school had been identified as coasting. Having considered this issue further, I am pleased to be able to confirm various commitments today. We will use the notification that regional schools commissioners will have to send
to the governing bodies of coasting schools—by virtue of Clause 1(3)—to make very clear our expectation that governing bodies will inform parents that the school has been identified as coasting. We will reiterate this expectation in the Schools Causing Concern guidance and in the Governors’ Handbook—a very important document for all governors. I hope that this undertaking will reassure the noble Lords and I urge them not to press this amendment.
I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, for her comments about putting the interests of children first. I assure her that we regard the interests of children as paramount in all this.
The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, made a number of points and I shall attempt to deal with them all. He again referred to the fact that he thought I never had anything nice to say about maintained schools. I agree that there are plenty of excellent maintained schools in the country, and I referred to an excellent visit that I had to Morpeth School in Tower Hamlets with the noble Baroness, Lady Jones—a maintained school which was incredibly impressive.
The noble Lord went a bit off piste on Amendment 20 but I will not comment on that now. I am sorry to disappoint him but nothing that he has said has surprised me, and I am not really any the wiser as to what he might say.
I can confirm that the coasting definition does not apply to 16 to 19 academies. We are basing it on data for key stages 2 and 4.
The noble Lord also made a point about the use of the articles in some of the earlier, Labour-originated funding agreements. I can explain that to him in more detail—it is quite technical—but it is not a clause that has ever been used and nothing turns on it. So it is absolutely clear from the funding agreement that people will not be able to step out of this in any way by any clever tricks in relation to changing the articles.
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The noble Lord also asked what a registered parent was. A registered parent is the person or persons whose name is shown in a school’s register of pupils as a pupil’s parent, which includes carers and guardians. The school must keep a register containing, among other things, the name and address of every person known by the school to be a parent of a pupil.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, asked about timescales. I think she was referring to the timescale in which parents could be informed about what was going on in relation to a school becoming an academy. I assume that that is what she was referring to.