Mr Robin Squire: I start by commending my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Mr. Jessel) for raising this important issue on the Adjournment, and for the way he has done so. Exclusions from school are self-evidently a sensitive and emotive issue; discussion of drugs in schools is equally sensitive and emotive. Combining the two can be a recipe for a great deal more heat than light. My hon. Friend has...
Mr Robin Squire: Yes, I accept that. From what my hon. Friend has said about the qualities of the school and its head, I am sure that the school will come out of this difficult situation with honour. It is clear that it continues to enjoy strong support from parents. Indeed, letters received by the Department refer to widespread anger at the LEA's decision. Given that support, I trust that the school will be...
Mr Robin Squire: The Secretary of State has no plans to issue such guidance. However, she has stressed in a White Paper entitled "Self-Government for Schools" and in a new circular on school admissions that grant-maintained schools should have the maximum flexibility to shape their admission arrangements to reflect the wishes of local people.
Mr Robin Squire: While I have no reason to dispute the figures that the hon. Gentleman has submitted, I dispute the conclusions that he draws from them. Instead of the conspiratorial thesis that the hon. Gentleman puts forward—which reflects the anti-grant-maintained view of the hon. Gentleman and his party—a more prosaic reason is that virtually all grant-maintained schools are over-subscribed and full,...
Mr Robin Squire: My hon. Friend makes an interesting suggestion. As he knows, since April the Government have been consulting on the way in which 14 to 16-year-olds are educated and the other opportunities that are being developed. Schools should be able to find the correct way to educate children, whatever their particular talents. I am happy to look at my hon. Friend's suggestion.
Mr Robin Squire: Last week we announced extra funding for security cameras in 112 schools in England under the Home Office closed circuit television challenge scheme. The Department for Education and Employment contributed £2 million to the scheme. The Government also accept in full the recommendations of the working group on school security, including the provision of new money. That will support a further...
Mr Robin Squire: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his welcome of last week's announcement. I am sure that all hon. Members welcome it because school security is important. I can confirm to my hon. Friend that all the winning schools in the announcement will receive the money directly, but money for the new security measures, for which we will make provision in the annual grant guidelines, will be paid via...
Mr Robin Squire: Our plans for nursery education vouchers are transparently well known. We expect to extend the voucher scheme to all local education authority areas in England in April 1997.
Mr Robin Squire: We are, naturally, considering the matter in light of the vote in the other place, but we remain confident that the scheme has many attractions for parents. I hope that when the hon. Lady next meets parents she will point out to them the result of the survey of parents in phase 1 areas, which disclosed that 87 per cent. of Norfolk parents already rate the scheme as very good or quite good....
Mr Robin Squire: I congratulate my hon. Friend on his last question, but he will understand if I cannot give him that commitment this afternoon. The structure and sense of his comments is absolutely right, and his findings in Norfolk are reflected in each of the phase 1 authorities. The only danger is not the scheme itself but the distortions spread by Opposition Members.
Mr Robin Squire: Much as the Government's commitment to open government becomes more apparent week by week, I hesitate to embrace these discussions on the Floor of the Chamber. Labour has no policy on nursery education, despite 17 years in opposition in which to plan for one. All Labour is prepared to do is to seek to frustrate the expansion of a scheme to provide quality nursery provision across the country....
Mr Robin Squire: My hon. Friend is right. If only Opposition Members, including those representing Sheffield, would give the same consideration to spreading the range of choice of pre-school provision that the Government are delivering, matters would proceed more smoothly and parents would be the gainers.
Mr Robin Squire: Once again, the debate has illustrated the gulf between the Government and the Opposition on education matters. We have taken actions to improve standards: they have resisted those actions. We have recognised the need to build up this country's competitiveness: they have, for far too long, been concerned with levelling down, if indeed they have been concerned at all. My right hon. Friend the...
Mr Robin Squire: Of course I will give way to the hon. Gentleman.
Mr Robin Squire: I do not blame the hon. Gentleman for attending at age 11 the school that his parents selected, any more than I blame him for keeping his child at a school that has gone fully selective. It is extraordinary that, out of the hundreds of thousands of people who have benefited from a grammar school education, there is a massive concentration of individuals who did not and do not like grammar...
Mr Robin Squire: Local education authorities retain significant responsibility for planning the education they deliver. I am delighted that some far-seeing LEAs have retained their grammar schools. The hon. Member for Brightside, responding to an intervention by my hon. Friend the Member for Calder Valley (Sir D. Thompson), inadvertently implied that money was going from Calderdale—or any other authority...
Mr Robin Squire: The hon. Gentleman confirms what I just said. He implied in an earlier response that the money travelled around the country.
Mr Robin Squire: The hon. Gentleman does not understand, which is even more worrying. I am reaffirming that the money will be spent by parents within the LEA as they see fit. It is astonishing that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Kilfoyle), who is a likeable cove in many respects, can sit through two months of nursery education debate yet still repeat the tired and wrong statement that £20...
Mr Robin Squire: indicated assent.
Mr Robin Squire: That is absolute rubbish.
