Funding and Schools Reform

Part of Opposition Day — [6th Allotted Day] – in the House of Commons at 4:59 pm on 17 November 2010.

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Photo of Michael Gove Michael Gove The Secretary of State for Education 4:59, 17 November 2010

The right hon. Gentleman is taking no responsibility for what happened on his watch, for the inequality in the school system, and for taking no steps to deal with the mess that was left to us. We are the party that is saying to Russell group and elite universities that they must do more to ensure that talented children can go to top universities. Unfortunately-this is a fact that he cannot run away from-social mobility went backwards on his watch. This country is less equal as a result of a Labour Government. There were 13 years of shame and 13 years of hurt, and the Labour Government were responsible.

In place of the Labour Government's failure, we are introducing a wide range of reforms, all of which are based on best international practice and all of which have been proven, in other nations, to drive up standards. We are ensuring that we learn from all the best performing education nations. We are improving teacher recruitment and training. It is our Government, not theirs, who have doubled the number of students entering Teach First, to ensure that we have top graduates going into the most challenging classrooms. It is our Government, not theirs, who have changed the rules on discipline and behaviour to provide teachers with stronger protection and to ensure that we no longer have the absurd situation in which teachers have to wait 24 hours before issuing a detention to an unruly pupil. It is our Government, not theirs, who are changing the national curriculum and introducing an English baccalaureate to ensure that all students, from whatever background, have access to an academic core by the age of 16.

It is our Government, not theirs, who are reforming key stage 2 tests to ensure that all students have accurate information on their progress at primary school, and that we end the damaging "teaching to the test" that has characterised those tests in the past. It is our Government, not theirs, who have given head teachers in all schools the degree of autonomy and independence for which they yearned for 13 years. So it is unsurprising that, in the 37 minutes of the right hon. Member for Leigh's speech-[Hon. Members: "Forty-seven!"] Forty-seven? Just see how numeracy went down on Labour's watch. In the 47 minutes of the right hon. Gentleman's speech, there was not a single new idea on how to improve our state education system. He is an IFZ: an ideas-free zone. Those beautiful eyelashes might flutter, but behind them there is a dusty plain where a single idea has yet to take root.