Clause 42
Education and Inspections Bill
9:30 pm
John Hayes (Shadow Minister (Vocational Education), Education; South Holland and The Deepings, Conservative)
We are making great progress and we now turn to clause 42 in that spirit. The clause allows anyone to make an objection to a proposed admissions system, regardless of their evidence or reasons for doing so. There is at least a possibility of vexatious objections that are motivated by some personal grudge, not by the school’s best interests. Our proposals suggest that safeguards should be put in place to protect what might already be a complicated and bureaucratic process. As I said on amendments tothe previous clause, the White Paper was clear about the three-year period, but it was just as clear about the need to avoid the process becoming bureaucratic and complex.
Under our proposals, any objector would be expected to lodge a proper case, which should ensure that the admissions process is undergone easily. Amendment No. 92 goes into detail about how an objection might be handled, providing a meritorious and detailed case for an objector’s decision, setting out why the specific arrangements to which he objects damages his school or, in the case of a local education authority, other schools in the local authority area, and providing substantive evidence to support his case. The amendment goes on to state that an adjudicator should not hear an objection that cannot meet that test. It mentions specifically
“unreasonable, vexatious, frivolous or otherwise unmeritorious”
objections.
That is not an unreasonable addition to the Bill, given that there may be those who lodge objections without good or just cause. For those reasons, the amendments are helpful. They are probing amendments because, generally speaking, as you know, Mr. Chope, we support the Bill and are anxious to ease its passage through the Committee and the House, although that will not always be easy.
I read at the weekend that a number of people on the Government Benches who oppose the Bill, perhaps having heard the contributions made by me, my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton and other members of the Committee, are growing in number. I gather that the hon. Member for Bury, North is whipping up discontent among his hon. Friends. I am anxious not to have any truck with that; as I have said before, we want to help the Minister on her journey towards enlightenment, which is why we tabled these simple amendments.