Good morning. The first item of business is a debate on motion S2M-4464, in the name of James Douglas-Hamilton, on education.

This debate takes place against a background of radical education reform in England, which includes proposals for city academies, foundation schools and even trust schools. I mention in passing that there is a total lack of ministerial enthusiasm for such possibilities in Scotland.

I will set out 10 principles that we are right to support. First, Scotland must have an education system that is second to none, which equips our young people with the qualifications and expertise that they need to flourish in the job market. Secondly, parents and teachers must have more say over the running of schools and there should be more local decision making, to help to drive up standards of attainment and ensure that resources are directed to the areas in most need. Thirdly, the curriculum should have the flexibility to provide the subject matters that are necessary to respond to pupil choice in, for example, modern languages, science and history.

I am grateful to Lord James Douglas-Hamilton for giving way so early in his speech. Will he clarify whether the Tories stand by the pupil passport scheme? If not, what do they stand for?

I have only just begun to assert the principles that we support, so if the member listens I will explain with great clarity exactly what they are. Of course, our policy on choice has not changed, just as the Prime Minister's policy, which I understand that the member does not support, has not changed.

Fourthly, there must be enhanced possibilities for school pupils to learn vocational skills when they want to do so, so that young people can respond effectively to the demands of the job market. Fifthly, special schools should be regarded as essential centres of educational excellence, which provide invaluable support for children who have additional support needs. Any existing presumption of mainstreaming should not be allowed to displace the need for such schools, whose worth is well proven. Sixthly, the teaching profession should not be overburdened with paperwork, form filling and minor bureaucratic requirements. It follows that all factors that cause teachers to leave the profession early, including stress, should be addressed.

Seventhly, discipline and truancy matters should be dealt with effectively and head teachers should be given the power permanently to exclude pupils if that is necessary. Eighthly, health education, including an emphasis on nutrition, should be recognised as a key element in young people's education. Ninthly, physical education and sport should be promoted and are conducive to a good quality of life and a school ethos that has its roots in the community. Tenthly, the invaluable work of Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Education must continue, so that every effort is made to ensure that standards in schools are maintained and that recommendations are made for improvements when that is necessary. We await with keen interest HMIE's report on the implementation of the McCrone agreement.

I am impressed with Lord James Douglas-Hamilton's statement of principles. Does he agree that his approach requires teachers? If he does, why did the number of teachers in Scotland fall by 6,000 under the Conservative Governments of 1989 to 1997?

It is essential that we deal with the present situation, as the agenda has moved on considerably. I will not say that everything that happened in the past was perfect. I defended the teachers in the House of Commons when there was a dispute with the Conservative Government. I put their case firmly and I was glad when the eventual settlement materialised, as I supported it early on in a speech in the House of Commons. Teacher retention is vital. I cannot give the exact figures for that under the Conservative Government, but I suggest to the minister that they are no longer relevant. The relevant point is that his Administration has been in power for several years and we are entitled to examine what he is doing.

On the principles that I mentioned, there is no difficulty in achieving agreement that the Scottish education system should be second to none. However, devolved school management is contentious. Fred Forrester, formerly of the Educational Institute of Scotland, has said:

"the blunt truth is that DSM is a tawdry and threadbare substitute for real devolution of education decision making to school level. If the majority of parents and the majority of head teachers want schools to have more autonomy, then they must go down the road of freeing schools from local authority control ... It could be kick started if some successful secondary schools demanded the same direct grant status as Jordanhill School".

I acknowledge that, at this stage, there is not a majority in the Scottish Parliament in favour of establishing self-governing schools or of the education reforms that Tony Blair is pioneering south of the border. However, surely to goodness the coalition Government should be able to implement consistently the policy of devolved school management. According to the latest estimates from the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy for 2004-05, Clackmannanshire Council and Fife Council devolved slightly more than 50 per cent of their education spending to head teachers, whereas South Ayrshire Council gave its teachers control of more than 90 per cent of its budget. The Scottish average is 68 per cent, which is well short of the target figure. We want devolved school management to be implemented successfully throughout Scotland so that we have more local decision making that focuses on areas of highest priority, improves schools' ethos and drives up standards.

Incidentally, with regard to the question that the minister asked a few moments ago, I point out that one factor in the figures on teachers to which he referred was that, at the time, school rolls were declining because of the end of the effect of the post-war baby boom. However, it is today's figures that matter. The minister's policy on devolved school management is not materialising.

It follows that we must have a flexible school curriculum, which is a subject that we debated recently. On that issue at least, I welcome the Executive's review. However, we need a sufficiency of teachers who teach subjects that pupils wish to learn. That may not be an easy task, but ministers should work to achieve the aim. To give maximum effect to the principle of a flexible curriculum, it may be necessary to deploy a larger pool of supply teachers to meet demand.

We have pursued consistently the issue of vocational education. In fairness to the Executive, it has moved considerably on the issue, but pupils should have more access to careers advice so that each pupil knows the relevant options that are suited to his or her aptitude, inclination and ability. We want to encourage greater co-operation between business, industry and schools to ensure that careers advice is as up to date as possible with the skill needs of the job market.

We remain seriously concerned that the interpretation of the presumption in favour of mainstreaming may militate against special schools that engage in teaching children with additional support needs. We have felt that all the more strongly since the Minister for Education and Young People, Mr Peter Peacock, admitted that the Scottish Executive has no idea of how many mainstream school teachers are qualified to teach children with additional support needs. The ministers will be only too well aware that, last week, the EIS expressed grave concern about that issue in relation to children with emotional and behavioural difficulties. Our point is that special schools have a place and that that place should not be under threat as a result of the presumption in favour of mainstreaming.

Does the member share my concern that in the latest census of primary school teachers, only four teachers in the City of Glasgow designated their sole subject as special educational needs? The mainstreaming issue is not necessarily just about what is happening with special schools, but about special education within mainstream schools.

The member's point adds considerable weight to what I have been saying, which is that this is a matter that we need to address with the utmost urgency, especially in view of the recommendations of the EIS.

Will the member take an intervention?

No. I have given way three times and I am nearly at the end of my allotted time.

With regard to teachers being overwhelmed with excessive paperwork, I have repeatedly mentioned to ministers that if they can simplify the work of teachers by reducing pressures upon them, they will be contributing a service. However, there is little evidence that that has been done. On the subject of discipline, I return again to the very timely representations of the EIS, whose convener, Sandy Fowler, said last week that

"the Scottish Executive should provide, as a matter of urgency, additional off site behaviour facilities for children and young people displaying particularly challenging behaviour."

The Conservatives have supported teachers on that matter by suggesting that head teachers should have the power permanently to exclude when there is no other reasonable alternative and that excluded pupils should go to a learning centre where they cannot disrupt the learning of the entire class.

We strongly support health education, physical education and sport. In years to come, those areas will no doubt be given a wider focus, consistent with pupil and parental demand. I have mentioned the role of HMIE in monitoring the McCrone agreement. We will no doubt return to that subject when the full facts become abundantly clear.

I return to the point that in order to drive up standards in our schools, we have to give parents and teachers greater involvement in the running of those schools. The Conservatives are on record as having voted against the diminution of the statutory rights of parents. I am concerned that the policy of presumption to mainstreaming may be given an interpretation in practice that is contrary to the best interests of those with additional support needs. In our view, every single child with additional support needs should have his or her case considered on its merits rather than be reduced to a cipher in a rigid formula.

Tony Blair spoke of the deadening uniformity of the comprehensive system. His action to promote diversity has much to recommend it. I challenge the minister with the words of the former special adviser to the Prime Minister, Julian Le Grand, who said:

"Policies designed to extend users' choices within public services are ... likely to do a better job of empowering users and promoting quality services in an equitable fashion than a no-choice system where providers have a monopoly, people are chained to their local school or hospital and where their only 'choice' if they are unhappy is to go private or to move house."

Surely it is not too much to hope that the minister will look sympathetically on the words of the special adviser to the Prime Minister.

The Conservatives recognise that teachers and parents know very much more about running schools than politicians, who are far removed from the immediate scene. It will be our purpose to set them free to do so.

I move,

That the Parliament believes that creating a greater degree of school autonomy, devolving more powers to head teachers and giving greater say to parents and teachers in shaping the education system will raise standards; is therefore disappointed at the abolition of school boards which will dilute parental representation in schools; notes that Jordanhill School, Scotland's only remaining independently run but publicly funded school, has consistently been among the top-performing schools in Scotland and won the SQA "School of the Year" award; notes that teaching unions are voicing concerns over the Scottish Executive's discipline and mainstreaming policies, and calls on the Executive to introduce reforms to create a more diverse education system in Scotland to raise standards, tackle discipline and serve the needs and aspirations of all pupils.

I am grateful to Lord James for lodging today's motion on education because it gives the chamber the opportunity to consider the Executive's ambitious vision for Scotland's young people, the substantial effort that has gone into our education system since 1999, the process of improvement in which we are engaged right across the board to widen, deepen and enrich the educational experience of Scotland's young people, and to compare that experience to the situation we inherited.

It is difficult now to recall the disastrous industrial relations in education under the Conservatives: the low classroom morale; the reduced numbers of teachers; the inadequate salary levels; the crumbling school buildings; the sense of drift; the lack of being valued that was felt by many teachers and children. That is the legacy of the Conservative years, when Lord James and his colleagues had the opportunity to put their education theories into practice.

Will the minister take an intervention?

Perhaps the member will give me a moment to move on a little bit.

As Lord James rightly says, the agenda has moved on. Today, Scotland's schools are recognised internationally as a success and, in many fields, we are seen as an international standard: teacher induction, continuing professional development, enterprise in education, our provision and framework for additional support needs, and our support for leadership in schools. In the highly-regarded Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development programme for international student assessment studies, Scotland is in the top third of performers, having been outdone significantly by only three other countries. We learn from what works in Scotland and elsewhere and we share ideas with the world's other leading education systems.

As we are currently making comparisons between the past and the record of this Government, is the minister proud of the fact that, since 1997, we have seen a ninefold increase in violent and disruptive incidents in the classroom?

I will deal with discipline in a moment. I accept entirely that it is a serious issue that I suspect has been a problem since education began.

We are now a country that celebrates success in education. I had the privilege recently of presenting the standard for headship certificates in Glasgow to the cream of our up-and-coming education leaders. Peter Peacock and I have met teachers, classroom assistants, school cooks, janitors, special needs support staff, and many new and dynamic probationer teachers, in visits across Scotland and in receptions at Bute House and elsewhere. I would also like to congratulate all the schools participating in tomorrow's Scottish education awards.

No one who visits schools up and down the country, or talks to the staff and young people, can fail to be impressed by the achievements of the system, the buildings that have been built new or refurbished in historically large numbers, and the new teachers—we are heading for our 53,000 target—and the opportunity that they give us when set against the parallel decline in school rolls, to which Lord James referred. Above all, people cannot fail to be impressed by the articulate young people that we are turning out, such as the third year girl at Holyrood secondary school in Glasgow who led the backpack for Malawi venture with huge panache.

I would like to address the minister's point about reducing school rolls. Will the minister acknowledge that that is not the case throughout Scotland and that some local authorities, such as West Lothian Council, have seen an increase in school rolls and that our funding mechanisms need to be sensitive to that?

I take Bristow Muldoon's point. Sometimes the Conservatives do not always recognise that we have a system in Scotland in which the structure and framework are laid down by the Executive, which also provides the resources to a significant extent, but the schools are operated by local authorities that have to deal with their own individual situations.

Pursuant to the question just asked by Bristow Muldoon, will the minister support popular schools and allow them to expand?

That is part of the Conservative credo but the parallel situation is sink schools that contract; that is the unfortunate by-product of the Conservatives' ideas. We are interested in education for all, not in education for some.

I will talk a bit more about some of the schools that I have seen. There is the impressive pupil council at St Machar academy in Aberdeen, one of our schools of ambition that is developing its sporting and activity prowess. There have been impressive musical and scholastic achievements at St Joseph's college in Dumfries; there are the lively and attractive children at Hallside primary school in Cambuslang and—one of my favourites—Annette Street primary school in Glasgow, which has a rainbow of colours, creeds, languages and backgrounds and, more important, young children who are hugely motivated and excited by their eco-school activities inside and outside the school.

The partnership Government is committed—as I am sure everyone in the chamber is—to providing the best education for all our young people. We know that the world does not owe us a living and that our education system must have a culture of continuous renewal and improvement if it is to continue to fit our young people for the challenges of today's global economy. We are well aware of the challenges and the wasted potential of too many children, not least looked-after children and the wider group who leave school with few qualifications, little motivation, and who are not in education, employment or training.

We do not pretend to have all the answers to those complex issues, but we believe that there is consensus across the political and educational spectrum on many of the key ingredients: the importance of a strong school ethos and values, clear and professional school leadership, early intervention against the background of the achievement of near universal nursery education for three and four-year-olds, and a motivating curriculum that offers relevant and interesting choices for young people in academic and in vocational areas, in school and college settings, but above all in a way that helps to develop responsible citizens, effective contributors, successful learners and confident individuals, building life skills and not just learning subjects. Although those words might be considered by some to be a matter of public relations, they are meaningful to teachers and educators across our system.

The Conservatives talk a lot about choice, reform and devolution of powers to head teachers, but their concept of choice has always been choice for the few, not quality for all. To be fair, the terms of their motion are similar to those of previous motions that they have supported throughout the existence of the Parliament, but I have two complaints about it.

Will the minister take an intervention?

No, I need to make progress, as I have taken three interventions already.

First, the Conservatives have not moved on. They do not recognise the radical, life-enhancing changes that have taken place in Scottish education since they were last in charge. Their policies have about them a whiff of formaldehyde, which is the stuff used to embalm bodies. Secondly, there is a curious lack of detail about what the Conservatives mean by "reform". It is all a little curious. Perhaps they are waiting for instructions from David Cameron who, like the grand old duke of York, marched them up the hill with the most reactionary manifesto in history and is now set to march them down again in his new guise—or disguise—as a liberal-conservative. We should perhaps celebrate today's debate as the last of the debates on the old Conservative education policies.

The Executive, on the contrary, is providing more freedom for teachers and schools, more choice and opportunity for pupils, better support for learning, and what the EIS described as an "unprecedented level of activity" on the part of the Scottish Executive and others in response to concerns relating to pupil indiscipline. We have a shared agenda, which is not top-down or dictatorial. Our agenda is about the empowerment of schools, teachers and pupils and about removing barriers and extending flexibility. It is also about trust and respect and an enriched experience.

Let me say a word about discipline. I wish that the Conservatives would read what the EIS committee on pupil indiscipline said in its well-balanced and constructive report. The report, which was primarily directed at assisting teachers to tackle school indiscipline, points out:

"There are no simple solutions, no 'silver bullet' which will solve the problem of pupil indiscipline."

The EIS report agrees with us that the most important things are full and local consultation at school level, clear and concise policies, good communication and consistent application. That is borne out by report after report from HMIE. Evidence shows us that a well-led school with a strong sense of values and motivated teachers and pupils will have less truancy and fewer discipline problems both inside the school and in the surrounding community. The EIS report also makes the vital point that teachers have the right to clear guidelines and practical support, but also have a responsibility to have high expectations of their pupils and to develop their own professional skills in managing children.

Without wishing to rerun the many previous debates that we have had on additional support needs and inclusion, I remind members that there has been no sudden rush to include all children in mainstream accommodation. Indeed, the number of places in special schools or units has changed by only 0.01 per cent in recent years.

The minister will recall the meeting that he, Maureen Watt and I had with a group of primary schoolteachers who came to the Parliament last week. Was he deaf to what they said when they highlighted some of the real problems that the policy is causing?

I heard what was said in that regard. I do not pretend that the situation does not vary across Scotland according to differing local needs, but I believe that the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 and the substantial resources that we have put in place to back that up provide a framework for dealing with such issues in an adequate way. A goodly part of the solution is continuing professional development and the additional specialist support, such as classroom assistants and others, that we have put in place to support the system. That support has changed the face of education substantially over recent years and it will continue to do so as the new act begins to bear its weight.

We have promoted the individually based education that Lord James called for. Our legislation and guidance has increasingly stressed that the objective is education that is suited to the individual needs of the child. We have made it clear that it is up to the head teacher to decide when to exclude children, if that is necessary, but that we want schools and local authorities to provide appropriate alternative provision for children who are excluded. They should not be left simply to stagnate at home or to run about the streets and get into further trouble. That has been an issue from time to time in the past.

We can speak strong words in the chamber about the details, but I know that there is no member who does not believe in the central importance of education to our society and its future. In recent months, I have sensed increasing agreement about the broad vision and direction of travel.

I believe that pride in the many marvellous achievements of our schools in Scotland unites us all. There is also a fierce determination that Scottish education should be the best in the world, bar none. We have a superb generation of young people, who will do great things in the world. It is our job as an Executive and a Parliament to rise to the challenge. I invite the chamber today to support that vision through constructive, forward-looking analysis of the Executive's policies and not to refight the sterile battles of the 1980s and 1990s.

I move amendment S2M-4464.2, to leave out from "believes" to end and insert:

"applauds the fact that the Scottish education system is recognised by international benchmarking exercises as being amongst the best in the world; recognises the commitment of the Scottish Executive to sustained improvement in education and the biggest school buildings modernisation programme in our history, unprecedented stability in industrial relations and increased numbers of teachers and classroom assistants; welcomes the educational legislation which has, for example, established a more individual and supportive framework for children with additional support needs and increased the opportunities for parental involvement in education; notes that the top-performing schools in Scotland have served a wide variety of communities and congratulates all the winners of the SQA "School of the Year" award; welcomes the measured comments of the EIS in relation to discipline policies of the Scottish Executive, and believes that the model for continued improvement for Scottish schools should build on current strength and success and tackle known challenges by fostering the leadership skills of head teachers and other teaching staff, reforming the curriculum, widening choice and reducing unnecessary paperwork, ensuring that teachers are freed up to teach, and pupils to learn, all with a view to equipping young people with the skills and values needed in the modern world."

When I saw the text of the Conservative motion, I had a sense of déjà vu. Yet again, the Conservatives are cleaving to the mantra of the market and competition in education—a mantra that has been rejected repeatedly by the Scottish people. I remember 1996, which was the last time the Conservatives were in charge of Scottish education, when 30,000 people on the streets of Edinburgh marched against Conservative education policies. They were not just trade union members, teachers or even parents; the community of Scotland turned out in its tens of thousands to reject the Conservatives' management of education. When we consider the issues that we are debating today, it is clear that what the Conservatives are offering has changed little from what they were pushing in 1996.

Choice in education is an issue in the current debate, but the issue is not choice between schools, but choice in schools. There is a lack of breadth in the opportunities that are available to some of our children in the education system. There should be diversity in education, but there should not be division. The Conservatives are about driving wedges between communities. The Scottish National Party—with the grain of Scottish views on education—believes in a national, comprehensive system in which schools are at the heart of communities.

Will Fiona Hyslop expand on SNP policy? I understand that it is to allow comprehensive schools to develop specialisms—in sports or music, for example. How can that system work if we do not allow a degree of choice? If I have a child who is gifted in music and their local school specialises not in music but in sports, do they have to go to a school that specialises in sports? Why can they not go across town to a school that specialises in music? Is the member's policy not somewhat confused?

I explained the comprehensive system. I will now give one reason why I think that the Conservatives are wrong. Most of Scotland exists not in the city of Edinburgh, where one pupil in four goes to a private school, but in small-town Scotland. At the moment, the top 20 per cent of pupils are performing well, 60 per cent are doing fairly well, but 20 per cent are not achieving. My approach is to allow and encourage schools to have a specialism, so that every pupil can taste excellence in some subject. I want to ensure that excellence is available to all schools and pupils.

That is not market choice, selection and shopping around for schools, which the Conservatives would like to have.

I believe that there must be diversity.

Will the member give way?

I want to continue.

We want a national comprehensive system in which there is a broad curriculum, which is one of Scotland's strengths. We send our pupils to school for far longer than any other European country—for 1,000 hours a year, compared with the OECD average of 750 hours—but they have less time than others for their own history, for languages, for science and for physical education. What are they doing? In the debate on the national curriculum review, the Executive acknowledged that overassessment is burdening and causing difficulties in our system. I want to push the pace on reviewing assessment, to open up the curriculum and to provide the space and time for the extra specialism that I want every school to have.

Here in Lothians, pupils leave school at 12 o'clock on Friday. Afternoons are already free in this region and we should be using the opportunity that that represents for the curriculum. I believe that, if the 20 per cent of pupils whose performance HMIE tells us is flat-lining got a chance to taste what it is like to be successful in languages, science, sport, drama or whatever, they could spread the motivation that they gain from that across other subjects.

I support the schools of ambition initiative, but I think that it is not ambitious to have only 20 or 30 schools in that category. I want all schools to have that opportunity.

I agree with the minister about the Scottish Qualifications Authority awards and I am glad that pupils and staff from Linlithgow academy will be attending. However, the reason why Linlithgow academy is successful is because it is comprehensive and takes pupils from all backgrounds and social areas. That is its strength. That lesson should be learned.

The EIS report that has been mentioned must be taken seriously. I have great concerns about the implications of mainstreaming. My concern is not about reviewing the policy. I acknowledge that special schools are not closing. However, there is an issue about special units. I will be meeting parents in West Lothian who have concerns about special units being closed.

Last week, Jack McConnell said that education and knowledge transfer should be at the heart of making Scotland successful and competitive. I agree with that. However, it took seven years of audit for the Executive to discover that. Further, on Tuesday of the same week, I met university principals and vice-principals and the European education commissioner to discuss Scotland's input to the European institute of technology, work on which is being done here and now. Scotland can help to shape that institute. Why does it take the SNP to take Scottish education to the heart of Europe and drive forward that agenda?

Political leadership is about making things happen. The SNP has pillars that it wants to drive forward in relation to education. The early start is the best start and I think that we can get consensus across the chamber in that regard. We must ensure that our education system is accessible internationally. I believe in aspiration. We should end the complacency culture and generate ambition for all. At its heart, the Scottish education system is egalitarian. It is based on the ability to learn, not the ability to pay. Unlike the Conservatives, the SNP, the other parties in the chamber and people in the rest of Scotland believe in schools that operate at the heart of their communities. Education is not something that is boxed off; it is at the heart of Scotland.

I move amendment S2M-4464.1, to leave out from "believes" to end and insert:

"supports greater choice within schools, rather than between schools, in order that pupils can benefit from breadth in the curriculum and believes that the agenda for education in Scotland should be focused on raising the levels of achievement for all and should include a review of the deployment of education resources at school level against the national resources provided, an analysis of over-assessment in schools and policies to drive forward the pursuit of excellence."

I am always pleased to have the opportunity to debate education matters in Parliament, so I am grateful to the Conservatives for selecting education as their topic for debate and for making it the sole topic rather than using their time to have two debates, which gives people time to address some of the issues. However, that is the last time that I will be nice to the Tories in my speech, because I believe that their motion is misleading in a number of respects.

The Executive has devolved and will devolve more power to head teachers. The amount of budgetary control that head teachers have under devolved school management has increased. It was interesting that Lord James Douglas-Hamilton used the example of South Ayrshire, as the decision that he mentioned was taken when I was the chair of educational services in South Ayrshire Council. Labour-led councils have taken the decision to devolve more power and financial power to head teachers over a period of time.

Programmes such as the schools of ambition initiative, which Fiona Hyslop mentioned, will allow head teachers to develop their own programmes to tackle issues in their schools and to formulate best practice that can be rolled out to other schools. That will allow diversity within our current education system.

The Executive has encouraged and will encourage parents to become more involved in their children's schools. Reference was made to recent legislation. Contrary to what the Conservatives' motion says, the replacement of school boards by parent councils is intended to give parents greater flexibility in determining how the parent body operates and places a duty on local authorities and ministers to encourage parental involvement. As we said in the debate that dealt with the matter, legislation alone cannot ensure that that happens, but we have created the legislative basis for it by placing that duty on those who are responsible for education.

The Scottish Parent Teacher Council welcomed the new Scottish Schools (Parental Involvement) Bill, declaring it to be parent friendly and focused on the issues that are of most concern to parents, and saying that it should deliver what parents have long said they want. If the legislation reduced the amount of parental control, why on earth would a national parental body welcome it? It just does not make sense. Even the Scottish School Board Association, which was originally opposed to the bill, felt that its views were taken on board and that the functions of the new parent councils, which are dealt with in section 8 of the bill, would enhance the effectiveness of school boards. The Tories are beating on a broken drum.

The motion goes on to congratulate Jordanhill school on its successes, which the Conservatives seem to attribute not to the hard work of teachers or pupils but to the simple fact that it is the only publicly funded school that is not under local authority control in Scotland—a somewhat simplistic analysis.

Is Elaine Murray suggesting that pupils and teachers in other schools in Scotland are not hard-working?

I do not think that Murdo Fraser was listening.

Since the days of Mrs Thatcher, opting out in a variety of guises has been the Tories' magic wand for education. In February last year, Mr Fraser claimed that £600 million could be saved by removing responsibility for school education from local authorities, which would reduce council tax by 35 per cent. What he failed to say was how the money would be found in the Scottish Executive's budget to provide the public funds for each publicly run school. Would the Conservatives like to explain?

How the money would be found is an interesting question. I remind Elaine Murray that the Minister for Finance and Public Service Reform, Mr McCabe, has boasted in this Parliament that we are about to achieve £1 billion of cash-releasing efficiency savings. The money is available; what is lacking is the political will.

What Mr McCabe is looking at is the way in which we configure public services, not removing schools—

That is what we are looking at.

It would not necessarily be cheaper. What the Conservatives are talking about would mean that we could not have such efficiency exercises across public services, because they would break things down into smaller and smaller units.

Bill Butler asked where the Conservatives now stand on passports. Before the general election, school passports were the best thing since sliced bread and Mr McLetchie swanned off to Sweden to tell us how wonderful they were. Mr Cameron does not think that they are such a good idea, so perhaps the Conservatives could explain where they now stand on the matter.

On school discipline, Lord James Douglas-Hamilton's press release last Friday claimed:

"The EIS report is firmly in keeping with what Scottish Conservatives have been saying for years."

Setting aside what the EIS might think about claims that it endorses Tory education policy, let us have a look at some of the things that were said in "Supporting teachers, tackling indiscipline". I quote from page 7, which states:

"At the present time there is an unprecedented level of activity on the part of the Scottish Executive, local authorities, the EIS and individual teachers in response to concerns relating to pupil indiscipline."

It states that there is no precedent for the current level of activity, not even when the great Tories were in control of the Scottish Office.

The EIS is asking for a number of things. Quite rightly, teachers are asking for sufficient funding for additional support needs. The Deputy Minister for Education and Young People has indicated the resources that have gone in and we must ensure that they are channelled properly. Teachers are also calling for additional staffing for in-school behaviour bases and units for the most challenging pupils, for early intervention and, if that is not successful, for off-site behavioural facilities.

Part of the Tories' solution—not in Lord James Douglas-Hamilton's speech, but in some of their press releases—is to use exclusion as a blunt instrument. Of course, exclusion has a role to play, but it is certainly not a solution, and I do not believe that young people should be rewarded for bad behaviour by being given holidays, especially if they just transfer their bad behaviour to the local community.

Will Dr Murray take an intervention?

I am afraid that I must make progress.

What we need is specialist training, more continuing professional development, a more flexible curriculum, the ability for young people who are seriously disruptive to work with teachers and trained assistants to confront and address their problems and the curriculum to be adjusted accordingly. The way in which some schools treat young men is an issue. I do not have time to expound on that, but the way in which young men are treated in schools can cause problems.

The motion concludes with some guff about a more diverse education system. Lord James claims that that refers to some of the educational reforms south of the border. I am certainly not embarrassed to say that we are not seeking the same solutions for Scotland. The Tories managed to all but destroy the state education system in parts of England during their rule in the 1980s and 1990s. I lived in England from 1976 to 1988, but I was determined to return to my homeland. That was partly because I knew that we would get our own Parliament eventually and I wanted to be there when that happened, but I also knew that I certainly was not going to educate my kids in the corrupted and deformed education system in England. We resisted the introduction of such a system in Scotland and, as Fiona Hyslop rightly said, the Tories' philosophy and our education system is all the better for it. We do not need the solution of opted out schools and so on.

Will the member give way?

No, because I have to finish now.

We must offer choice within schools and excellence within schools. There must be ambition for all pupils, excellence for all pupils and all pupils must fulfil their potential. We reject the solutions that seem to be necessary south of the border. We have a better system here. We will improve on it and will ensure that it delivers for all our children.

Much has been said today about the record of the last Conservative Government. Elaine Murray managed 23 seconds of praise for it before she launched into seven minutes and 20 seconds of fairly extreme criticism.

I have what is probably a unique perspective on the last Conservative Government—at least among the members who are currently in the chamber—because I was educated from primary through to university level entirely under the last Conservative Government. I am certainly very appreciative of the standards in the schools that I went to and the standard of education that I achieved.

A member who is not present today is Richard Baker. He and I were at university together at the same time in Aberdeen. I seem to recall that when I was at university, a rather large march, perhaps analogous to the one that Fiona Hyslop mentioned, went down Union Street in Aberdeen. The march was led by the aforementioned Mr Baker and it called on the Government to cut the debt, not the grant. About a year later, his chosen party was elected to power and chose to reverse that policy. If we are going to talk about the record of Governments, we should talk not only about the record of the last Conservative Government, which in my view was significantly better than what has happened under Tony Blair or this Executive.

One of the other achievements of the last Conservative Government, which we often do not hear about, was the significant expansion in the number of people who went to university. The proportion of those who got to university under the last Conservative Government represented a significant increase on the figure that was inherited from the previous Labour Government and the previous Lib-Lab pact. Unfortunately, this Lib-Lab pact seems to have lasted rather longer than that one. We should scrutinise the records of Tony Blair and of this Executive. The comments that the minister made seemed to be more about the past than the future.

Lord James Douglas-Hamilton mentioned 10 fundamental principles in education. I would have thought that most members would consider them to be relatively uncontroversial. If any member disagrees with or objects to any of them, it would be interesting to hear which ones they disagree with and on what basis they disagree with them. As the minister indicated, it would be helpful to have a degree of consensus, at least on the direction of travel of education policy. Lord James Douglas-Hamilton has set out a good set of principles that might guide education policy in the long term. Whatever happens next year, this Executive is surely not going to be in power for a significantly longer period of time—the shorter, the better.

Attainment is one of the fundamental issues in education. The partnership agreement is clear on the matter. It refers to raising attainment and is right to do so. Last week, the Minister for Education and Young People assured Parliament that all the education measures in the partnership agreement are on course to be met, which I presume includes raising attainment. However, the report produced by the futures project last week showed, as Fiona Hyslop indicated, that there has been no progress at all in the attainment of the lowest 20 per cent. That is surely one of the fundamental failures of this Executive. About a fifth of students currently in schools are being failed, whether by the system, the curriculum or whatever else. That is a consistent problem year after year and the situation is getting no better. The futures project, which is meant to set the course for the next 20 years, does not indicate any sign of progress. The minister must come back and say in what measurable ways he will be able to improve attainment, in particular the attainment of those whom the system is currently letting down. All of us would agree that the most able students tend to do okay wherever they are in the country; it is those at the very bottom whom the education system is failing most.

Given that attainment levels have been raised in comparison with international standards, as the PISA study has reported, can we have the benefit of Derek Brownlee's ideas for tackling the admittedly significant problem of the lack of attainment in the lowest 20 per cent of the school population? As I touched on in my opening contribution, those children pose the biggest challenge for the system in future.

The PISA study may have talked about attainment levels, but I understand that the reference was to overall attainment levels. The futures project report, which was published last week under the auspices of the Executive, said very firmly that the attainment of our bottom 20 per cent is not improving.

Surely one way in which the Executive should consider improving attainment is to put more emphasis on expanding vocational education. If that is what a young person seeks, we should give them the option of making that move rather earlier than is the case at the moment. That would give those who have particular problems more class time; the issue does not need to be intractable.

Businesses tell us that basic literacy, numeracy and information technology skills are not present in the young people they interview. In the debate on education, we should hear less from the Executive about structures and less of its obsession with reeling off statistics on funding. No one doubts that funding on education has increased under the Executive—indeed, spending on everything has increased under the Executive; it is just that the results do not necessarily improve by the same proportion.

Does the member agree that, despite national resources going into education, we have an increase in the number of teacher vacancies? Is not the real and systemic problem the fact that the resources that the taxpayer has provided may not be reaching pupils in the classroom?

Absolutely. I was just about to ask that question of the minister. Last week, we were told that the education measures in the partnership agreement are on track to be implemented. It set a target to devolve 90 per cent of budgets to schools. Perhaps the minister will tell the chamber the number and proportion of schools for which that target has now been met—after all, we cannot rely on all of them having Tory councils.

How many pages of new guidance have been issued to schools and how many have been withdrawn since the Executive took power? It would be interesting to hear those statistics from the minister today.

When I first saw the motion and amendments for today's debate, I thought that they were pretty arid and would lead to a debate that would be divided by inter-party factionalisation and finger wagging. However, I am glad to say that there has been some meat to the debate. In my contribution, rather than read out a pre-prepared speech, I will address some of the issues that have been raised thus far.

First, I turn to the discipline and truancy matters that members on all sides of the chamber have raised. Let us imagine that a 12-year-old child is standing on the floor of the chamber. Having done so, we would think of children not as people to be educated but as people with limitless possibilities, all of which we should try to develop. We would have not the usual, arid debate about where we are in the league of nations at passing exams, assessments and all the rest of it, but a debate that was much more child-focused.

I was on the children's panel, the inspiration for which was the interests of the child. When we debate education, we should be thinking in the interests of the full development of the child and young person. All too often, we have no more than a knee-jerk reaction to discipline and truancy matters. Instead of considering why the child is failing at school, people tend to say that we must do this, that or the other.

Children who do not do well at school or who do not want to be in school are often typified by a lack of self-esteem, an inability to plan for themselves and a lack of support at home. Derek Brownlee raised the serious problem of the lack of attainment among the lowest-achieving 20 per cent of children. The overall approach that we take needs to look at the child from birth right through to leaving school. We need more support for single-parent families and children who are in trouble. Those young people are often the ones who are not in school. We also need more support for children who are carers and children who are in care.

All those things need to be tackled. That cannot be done simply by education or in school, but schools can help by taking full advantage of the freedom that the Executive wants to give them to develop flexible curriculums. By doing that, they will be able to construct curriculums that are relevant to the needs of the children who are in the school and acknowledge the diversity of needs. Perhaps we need to set targets that are beyond simple academic excellence—that is, targets for all our children to leave school with qualities of tolerance and patience, independence of thought, initiative, communication skills and the ability to assess risks and to co-operate with other people.

I hope that Robin Harper accepts that that is exactly what the curriculum review and the leadership initiatives in schools are trying to do.

Yes. I am not saying this in a spirit of criticism. I am simply trying to be encouraging and to point out that there is an opportunity.

The minister mentioned the leadership programme for head teachers. I am familiar with St Machar academy, as I presented the prizes there last year. I do not know why the school invited me, but it did, which was kind. Perhaps it was because of my rectorship at the University of Aberdeen. St Machar academy serves five of the six poorest districts in Aberdeen but it is a superb school with a tremendous ethos. I am sure that it also has fewer discipline problems than many schools in similar areas of Scotland—I am not saying that it has none, as I would never say that of any school. If that is the case, it is down to the school's accent on music, drama and developing the full range of talents and skills in the young people who are in the school. Many other schools are doing that, but the important point for the Conservatives is that we do not need to devolve even more power to head teachers. The head teacher who led St Machar academy, Mr Taylor, did so with the powers that he already had. His initiative and his ability to take the staff with him developed that school to where it is now, although he has now retired.

If the Education Committee cared to do some research into discipline in schools that concentrate on the arts, it would find that there is growing evidence that schools that give their pupils a full range of possibilities by putting art, music, drama and sport at the centre of the curriculum, not simply adding them on, have fewer discipline problems than any others because the young people can express themselves.

On behalf of the Education Committee, I point Robin Harper to the report on pupil motivation that the committee produced recently, which will be available in the Scottish Parliament information centre.

I thank Fiona Hyslop very much indeed. I will read that with interest.

You should be finishing now, Mr Harper.

Oh dear. I have spent all that time on only a couple of subjects. I will close by referring to what Frank Pignatelli from learndirect Scotland has said and what the Prince of Wales said at the reception for the Prince's Trust. In many cases, people who work with young people who have just left school are doing a repair job, because the bottom line is that they must increase those young people's self-esteem. How do they that? I am sorry, but I mention it again: many of them use outdoor education.

You should be finishing now, Mr Harper.

As Mr Pignatelli said, let us do better things, as well as doing things better.

I mention for the record my 26 years' membership of the EIS.

I oppose the motion in Lord James Douglas-Hamilton's name. I note that it mentions Jordanhill school, which is located in my constituency. That is quite right too, because it is a good school. I have previously remarked in the Parliament on its good work in turning out successful, rounded individuals, such as we wish all our young people to become.

At the same time, I have voiced my approval of many other schools in my constituency where, under different circumstances, excellent work is being done to produce responsible citizens and effective contributors to Scottish society. Drumchapel high school springs to mind. There, indigenous Scots and our new Scots work well together, each group influencing the other in positive ways. I applaud all the good work that is under way across the public sector in Scotland.

For the sake of accuracy, let us get a few things right about Jordanhill school. It is proud to proclaim:

"Jordanhill is the local community comprehensive school which caters for all children whose needs it can meet."

That is quite right. It views itself as an integral part of the state sector and works closely with Glasgow City Council. Indeed, it has an agreement with the council's education improvement service in respect of staff access to business meetings, in-service courses and the full range of support mechanisms, on the same basis as the city council's staff. Its unique funding position is the result of historical circumstance. It is important that the school does not view itself as a model that can be rolled out across the public sector.

To complete the picture, I will remind the Tories about this in case they have forgotten: the school's unique position was a result of the parents' utter rejection of the Tory Government's dogmatic desire in 1987 that the school should become completely independent and fee paying. The parents' wish was to have the school become the responsibility of Strathclyde Regional Council. That proved unachievable. Thus, a compromise was arrived at.

A deep-seated distrust of comprehensive education lies behind and informs the terms of the Conservative motion. There is a philosophical antipathy among many Conservatives to the notion of socialised education. Even the innate good manners and inclination towards consensus of Lord James Douglas-Hamilton failed to conceal his party's in-built opposition to it.

Mr Butler will be aware that I was closely involved in the Jordanhill situation around 1985. Would he not agree that, while the parents rejected a number of solutions that were put forward, they worked very hard, with others, to achieve the solution that was obtained? Will he acknowledge that the person who made the decision to enable Jordanhill school to carry on as it had done was Margaret Thatcher, following representations from me and the parents?

I think that the member has been reading too many Daily Mail editorials and, worse still, believing them. I would recommend a lengthy period of reflection in a darkened room for Mr Aitken.

I am not saying this to be an apologist for the present system. In the Government's document "Ambitious, Excellent Schools", which was published in October 2004, a range of significant challenges was noted. The document acknowledged:

"the performance of the lowest attaining 20% of pupils in S4 has remained flat in recent years and around 15% of 16-19 year olds are not in education, employment or training".

That is unacceptable. Derek Brownlee and the Deputy Minister for Education and Young People mentioned that. That is one of the challenges that we face. Many boys are underperforming, which is a deficiency that must be remedied. There are certain weaknesses in a minority of schools at leadership level. That cannot be allowed to continue.

The task of the Government and the Parliament is to face those challenges in a fashion that allows us to create a system in all our schools that is flexible and imaginative enough to allow every young person to achieve their potential. The Executive's approach is not uncritical. The education system is not and has never been perfect, and improvements are required. For instance, the need to refashion the curriculum to enable all our young people to compete and to reach the highest possible level of achievement in an increasingly competitive world must be treated as a matter of some urgency. That is being tackled.

I believe that the challenges are being faced. The trend is one of improvement. There is verifiable improvement in attainment throughout primary schools. Five-to-14 test data show that since 1997, in primary 7, attainment is up by 7 per cent in maths, 10 per cent in reading and 14 per cent in writing. In the early years, 89 per cent of primary 3 children reached the expected level A or better—an increase of 8 per cent from 1999. At secondary level, overall pass rates have risen at every level. We should be proud that more than half our young people go on from school to higher education at university or college. To state those facts is not to be complacent but to describe a trend of improvement and ensure that the debate surrounding the present condition and future direction of education is balanced and based on evidence.

What the Tories offer us is not a solution but a recipe that will return us to their years of chronic underinvestment, chaos and confrontation. I remember Michael Forsyth—he was no friend of Scottish education.

You should be finishing now, Mr Butler.

Peter Peacock, thank God, is no Michael Forsyth.

You should be finishing now, Mr Butler.

I would much rather have innovative thinking informed by principle, which is the foundation of the Executive's education strategy, than a return to the failed Forsythian nostrums of the 1980s, which were driven by inflexible, purblind dogma.

I remind members that if they run over their time, they stop someone else getting in at the end. Most members who have spoken so far have gone nearly a minute over their time.

Like Bill Butler, I acknowledge readily the excellence of Jordanhill school, but the example illustrates the serious methodological flaw at the centre of the Tory motion. In performance ranking Jordanhill school, it assumes that every Scottish child has an equal chance of being enrolled there, which is inherently false. Are we expected to believe that the students there are a random sample of Scotland's children? Can we say honestly that children whose parents are poorly educated and of low income will have the same opportunity to apply to go there? In theory, that is the case but, in the real world, we know that it is not. Generalising that exceptional and specific example represents a futile attempt by the Tories to resurrect their past policy failures.

The Tories are clearly still besotted with league tables, which compare school outputs without any regard to school inputs. That is highlighted by Harvey Goldstein of the institute of education at the University of London, whose paper "Measuring the performance of educational systems" states:

"The apparent simplicity of rankings of average student test and exam results is deceptive: they largely reflect 'intake' achievements and, at the very least, we should adjust for intake differences - a value added approach."

Jordanhill school has in many ways won the intake lottery. Do the Tories really think that it is pure coincidence that Glasgow, which has the highest percentage of school pupils who are eligible for school meals, also has the second-lowest achievement and attainment scores? In the three councils with the lowest number of youngsters eligible for free meals, pupils are 30 per cent more likely to be successful in their fourth-year exams.

The motion does nothing to address the real problems that our national education system faces. Family background and social and economic circumstances play a role in determining a child's chances of success. Quoting the example of one successful school does not prove anything.

According to Keith Topping, professor of education at the University of Dundee, when deprivation is factored in, some schools in deprived areas are shown to be doing much better than expected in pupil achievement, while some schools in areas of low deprivation are shown to be performing relatively poorly.

Tory policy logic is that if one person can be a smoker and live for 100 years, smoking is obviously not bad for us. We all know that such examples attract our attention because they are stories of people who have beaten the odds.

Scotland requires a well-thought-out national education policy, which is suited to the needs of all Scotland's children; which targets resources to where they are needed most; and which allows every child the opportunity to succeed. Good-quality Scottish education, which is available to all, is the essential key to prosperity for us all.

In my constituency of Angus, we have succeeded in increasing the level of parental involvement. Angus Council has worked closely with parents to develop a parental involvement and consultation policy that encourages meaningful parental involvement in a climate of trust. The policy emphasises the valuable role that representative groups of parents play in fostering good relationships between parents, schools and the education service, with effective co-operation between home and school to support pupils' learning and to allow potential difficulties to be identified at an early stage. The work in Angus was recognised by the Scottish Executive, which seconded the council's principal officer for school and family support into its Scottish Schools (Parental Involvement) Bill implementation team.

That kind of positive initiative shows that the SNP is delivering. Our national policies on class size reduction, the review of the national curriculum and the power of headmasters to exclude have been taken up by the Executive.

There are still major hurdles to overcome in the educational system. The Tories' blinkered motion is simply a disgrace when poverty is still a major hurdle and 25 per cent of Scots children live below the poverty line. Class sizes are still too large and less time is spent on history, languages and physical education in Scotland than in other OECD countries.

Scotland has one of the highest percentages of 16 to 19-year-olds who are not in education, employment or training. The Tories make a fundamental mistake when they choose elitism and neglect the Scottish tradition of education that is open and available to all. By praying in aid one example, the Tories are not diversifying education; they are avoiding the real needs and problems that have to be tackled and beaten. The SNP believes that a broad-based curriculum is essential and that the current overassessment and curriculum management increasingly restricts the choice and experience of our young people.

Scotland does not need a one-size-fits-all education policy that caters only for those who already have every advantage in life. Scotland must address its systemic problems by raising standards and ensuring the highest quality in teacher training and resources as well as in school buildings and equipment as part of an education system that involves and engages parents, pupils and teachers as an essential part of their local communities throughout this land.

I recommend to Parliament the practical work and initiatives of Angus Council and its consistent 22-year programme of school refurbishment, improvement and new building.

You should be finishing now, Mr Welsh.

By reinforcing traditional strengths and providing a national system that values the worth of every individual within a well-resourced environment, we can create an education system that is truly fit and worthy for 21 ^st century Scotland.

Iain Smith will be followed by Marlyn Glen. I point out that after Iain Smith has spoken, speeches will go to five minutes because people are not listening to me.

"Scottish education does many things well and some things particularly well. Most learners are well supported and well taught. The quality of service provided at the pre-school stage is strong overall, and most children are given a very positive start in their learning. In primary and secondary schools, young people generally make sound progress in their learning, behave well, have good relationships with their teachers and ultimately achieve an appropriate range of formal qualifications. Provision for children and young people with additional support needs in mainstream and special schools allows many to make considerable progress in their personal and social development. Parents report high levels of satisfaction about their children's schooling. Teachers are also positive about their own work despite its often challenging nature."

Those are not my words—they are the words of Her Majesty's chief inspector of schools in his opening remarks to the HMIE "Improving Scottish education" report, which was published earlier this year. His words show that Scottish education is largely doing a very good job and that, as the minister said in his opening speech, it does well in international comparisons.

We have a world-renowned, child-centred and responsive education system that works to find the best route for each child. Additional support for learning provisions that came into effect at the end of last year will further that aim.

Curriculum reform, lower class sizes, better facilities and improved procedures to deal with indiscipline have all been introduced by this Liberal Democrat-Labour partnership Executive and will contribute to better behaviour and learning in schools.

It is unfortunate that the Tories want to manipulate every area of dissatisfaction and call for improvement to justify their so-called choice agenda, which would see our responsive system replaced with one of elitism, closures and lower standards.

In 1999, we inherited an education system in crisis. Staff morale was at its lowest and the school estate was crumbling because of decades of lack of investment, particularly during the 18 years of Conservative government. For example, when I started my secondary education at Bell Baxter high school in Cupar, the old and crumbling school building was due to be refurbished and the proposal was to move the whole school to a single site. However, because of the lack of investment in education under the Conservatives, that exercise took more than 30 years and, indeed, was completed only a few years ago.

The recent HMIE report on Madras college in St Andrews in my constituency concluded that the quality of the accommodation is "unsatisfactory".

But it has been like that for 10 years.

Let me finish the point. "Unsatisfactory" is the lowest grade that can be given for accommodation in an HMIE report. We have not been able to bring all Scottish schools up to the desired standard because so much investment has been needed to catch up with the decades of underinvestment by the Conservatives.

I endorse the member's comments. In fact, the BBC filmed the hut that I taught in to highlight the desperate state that the school estate had reached under the Tories.

I thank the member for her intervention. We must recognise that we still have a lot of catching up to do to get our school estate up to the required standard. The Executive is making record investment to deal with that matter.

Does the member accept that some of that record investment has been made as a result of a financing mechanism that was pioneered by the Conservatives and disparaged both at the time and subsequently by the Liberal Democrats?

I think that the member will find that we have significantly improved on mechanisms such as public-private partnership and have introduced other mechanisms such as prudential financing to allow local government to improve the school estate and the community to make better use of school facilities. The Tories introduced PPP in such a cack-handed way that many communities found that they had less access to such facilities.

The Conservative motion harks back to the days when the Tories were destroying Scottish education. Indeed, one sometimes thought that they were doing so deliberately to promote their so-called choice agenda. They might well emphasise the importance of devolving school management and responsibility for school budgets, but that point is relevant only if there is a budget to devolve. When the Conservatives were in power, they cut money from schools left, right and centre. Giving schools more control over a diminishing budget will do nothing to improve the education system.

Although I support devolving more school management, we need to acknowledge that head teachers do not want to be accountants or managers. They want to be involved in education and I do not want a huge increase in bureaucracy in our schools because budgets have to be managed. Someone somewhere has to determine the resources that should be given to schools and, under the Conservatives, such decisions would be made not by local councillors in local council offices but by civil servants at Victoria Quay. Even though they are sometimes wrong, decisions about schools should be made by local councillors who are accountable to local people.

The so-called promise of greater choice means that schools will choose pupils, not vice versa. That is what has happened in England, where, as a result of the so-called choice agenda, the gap between sections of the school population has widened. The evidence is that the bottom 20 per cent of pupils that Derek Brownlee rightly referred to will be left behind even more than they are at present.

So they are being left behind at present, are they?

No one has denied that. We have all recognised that there is a problem with the bottom 20 per cent. However, that can be dealt with by investing more in early years education, before formal schooling begins. In fact, that is one of the Executive's priorities.

Although there is much that we can praise in Scottish education, we can never be complacent. The Executive will never be complacent and will continue to strive to improve.

I remind members that we have now moved to five-minute speeches.

One of the most perturbing aspects of the Conservatives' education policy is its price to Scotland's pupils and teachers. The Conservatives' familiar rhetoric of independence and autonomy fails to acknowledge local authorities' fundamental role in the effective delivery of education policy.

The Government provides £29 million to local authorities every year to be used for flexible support provision. Local circumstances and factors are central in the allocation of those funds and valuable measures can be identified locally to deal with problems.

The scrutiny role of local authorities and HMIE is equally important in guaranteeing that the highest standard of education is on offer to our children. Any dilution of the role of local authorities in the implementation and delegation of education policy would run the risk of leaving schools and pupils vulnerable to the internalisation of problems, which would inevitably lead to falling standards.

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the Conservatives' proposals is their aim of tackling discipline while slashing the education budget. I liked almost all the 10 principles that Lord James Douglas-Hamilton set out, but he was rather silent on the education budget and Tory plans to cut funding. For example, his support for special schools is admirable, but such schools come at a cost.

Will the member accept that we have absolutely no plans whatever to cut funding?

I am sure that all members are delighted to hear the Conservatives promise to maintain funding—if they are ever in a position to make such decisions.

How do we maintain standards while tackling behaviour in schools? The exclusion of pupils must be and is regarded as a last resort. Off-site provision is the answer for some pupils, but it creates problems to do with reintegration into the main stream, which can multiply pupils' difficulties. On-site units are the answer for a minority of pupils, but such units need to be well staffed and working in them is hugely challenging for teachers and classroom assistants, who must daily deal with some of our most difficult young people. There is no point in talking about diversity while ignoring the pupils who have the most challenging additional learning needs.

The Government has been fervent in its commitment to tackling indiscipline in schools, through the implementation of the first national policy on discipline ever to be developed. The Government has invested £11 million in seeking alternatives to exclusion and £34.9 million in additional funding for specialist behavioural support staff in school. The Government relies on local authorities for efficient implementation and members are right to say that the issue is not just money but how services are delivered.

The recent EIS report "Supporting teachers, tackling indiscipline" cemented the role of local authorities in matters related to better behaviour. A multi-agency approach is needed if practical actions are to make a sustainable difference. There is no single way to solve the problem of pupil indiscipline, but the removal of options and players from the table would reduce the dynamics of available choices.

I commend the minister for his on-going dialogue with teachers unions. All members must accept that such dialogue is central to making progress across the board in education. The Executive has remained committed to diversity for children through pooling resources to offer community schools and schools of ambition, as well as 34,000 modern apprenticeships. The Executive is committed to universal provision and excellence based on equality of opportunity, while it acknowledges the need to address varying performance within and between schools.

The Tories' emphasis on autonomy and parental choice coupled with independent financial provision for schools would run the risk of creating a two-tier system, in which excellence for all would be lost in the name of diversity and choice for the few. All in all, we can grade the proposals from the Scottish Conservatives as C minus. The proposals are familiar and average. The Conservatives must try harder.

I will highlight the important contributions to the debate on education that Lord Sutherland and Baroness Warnock have made in recent months, which should give all members cause to reflect on the direction of policy.

In February, Lord Sutherland gave a lecture at the University of Strathclyde in which he said that the funding of schools in Scotland should be taken out of local authority hands and the money distributed through a new funding body that would be accountable to the Scottish Executive and the Scottish Parliament. He said that the current system is wasteful because of the costs of bureaucracy that are incurred in distributing money through 32 local authorities and that a schools funding council would be more effective by ensuring that more money reaches classrooms to tackle problems such as large class sizes and underachievement among the 20 per cent of pupils who are the lowest performing—the very problems that members have highlighted during the debate.

I could not agree more with Lord Sutherland. Direct funding could march hand in hand with devolved management, on the lines of the Jordanhill school model. We all know that that is one of the most successful schools in Scotland—so successful that it was a former education minister's school of choice for his children. As we know, sauce for the gander is never sauce for the goose.

Is Mr McLetchie stating that Lord Sutherland's proposal is now Conservative policy in Scotland, or is he simply giving his opinion?

I was about to inform members that Lord Sutherland's proposals bear an uncanny resemblance to the Scottish Conservative party's policy, which we have advocated consistently for the past two or three years. Just because it is our policy, members should not let that discourage them. Our party is happy to be a font of wisdom and good sense in the development of education policy in Scotland. It is not the origin of a proposal that matters, but its merits. Accordingly, the Conservatives warmly welcome Lord Sutherland's contribution to the debate. I hope that it will enable others to remove their mental blocks and give his sensible ideas fair consideration, untrammelled by political prejudice.

Another benefit in what we can now call the Sutherland proposals is that, by relieving local authorities of responsibility for funding schools, we would relieve them of the obligation to levy council tax for that and transfer that obligation to the Scottish Executive and the central budget. That would enable council tax bills throughout Scotland to be cut by 35 per cent. Correspondingly, it would create a requirement for about £600 million from the Scottish Executive budget but, as I said earlier, financing the measure would not be a problem, given that Mr McCabe and the Scottish Executive tell us constantly that more than £1 billion of efficiency savings are there for the taking and can be redeployed elsewhere. We have a proposal on how to redeploy the money that is fully costed and which will put more money into our schools, improve standards, cut waste and lower council tax bills across the board. That can be achieved; it simply requires political will and imagination, although imagination is sadly lacking in the Executive.

The second contribution to which I would like to draw attention is the lecture that Baroness Warnock delivered to the General Teaching Council for Scotland in October last year on the education of children with special educational needs. Baroness Warnock speaks with particular authority on the subject, as she chaired the committee of inquiry on that issue that reported in 1978 and transformed the education of such children. Incidentally, I remind members that the Warnock committee was established by Mrs Thatcher when she was Secretary of State for Education and Science and that its proposals were implemented when she was Prime Minister.

In many respects, the high-water mark of mainstreaming was reached with the Parliament's enactment of the Standards in Scotland's Schools etc Act 2000, section 15 of which required councils to provide education in mainstream schools unless exceptional circumstances apply. Of course, when a high-water mark is reached, the tide starts to turn, which was illustrated by Baroness Warnock's observations that it is little short of cruelty to educate some children in mainstream environments—she was speaking with particular reference to children with Asperger's syndrome.

The so-called right to mainstream education has resulted in a distortion of provision of education for children with special educational needs; is leading to the closure of local authority special schools; and is placing unacceptable burdens on teachers and staff, who, as Lord James Douglas-Hamilton said, are not always equipped or qualified to cope with such children's educational requirements. We need to re-examine the subject to redress the balance and give parents a matching right to have their children educated in a special school, so that we put children first, not some ideology or orthodoxy. I support the motion.

It is interesting to hear the Conservatives continue to expound their ideas on education. It is also interesting that they are happy to take schools away from local accountability. In local authorities, councillors can be involved in helping head teachers to deliver education to communities. The Conservatives would be happy to create a new quango—I presume that that is because it was proposed by Lord Sutherland—that would be modelled on the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council. It is good that people have such alternatives from which to choose: they will have the opportunity to make that choice in less than a year, when that alternative will, I suspect, be rejected.

I wish to talk about the Executive's plans—what it has suggested it will deliver, what it has delivered and what it has not delivered. We have heard much talk of standards, goals, commitments and partnership agreements. In all those areas, the Executive has either changed its mind, failed to deliver or is yet to deliver. Although that can be seen as a criticism, it is to the Executive's credit that it has changed its mind on some issues, particularly where there were problems.

However, the Executive has abandoned its goal for exclusions and there is not yet a helpful alternative in place. There is no doubt that indiscipline is one of the most serious problems and that the inclusion policy has contributed directly to it. Other members have suggested that resources are required, and a series of alternatives are being considered. The EIS's recent report has been used both in support of the Executive position and against it. Executive party members have suggested that their role has been commended for the amount of activity, but activity does not necessarily reflect a solution to the problems. I commend the Executive for addressing the problems, but what we need are solutions that work. I suspect that, as in many instances of its trying to create a more inclusive society, the resources have not followed the policy.

Normally, when an MSP visits a school, everything is organised and that MSP sees the school in its best possible light. However, I visited a school in my constituency in which I could see the problems that are directly associated with inclusion and the lack of alternative provision. The problems were highlighted to me by a young man who was being followed around by a classroom assistant throughout my visit. He had had to leave his class because he was not coping with circumstances in the class at the time, so the assistant was employed almost to deal only with that young man. It was not working; there was no adequate alternative provision—a base in the school or a base elsewhere within the city's education provision—that could adequately cope with his needs. A number of alternatives are available, but the necessary resources have not been delivered.

The Executive is guilty of failing to deliver on education. I commend the Executive for being willing to recognise where it has got it wrong and for being willing to change its policies, but we have yet to see delivery.

Schools in the more deprived areas are often those in which the problems are greatest. Such areas contain a substantial part of the 20 per cent of people for whom we are not delivering educationally. In terms of joined-up government—a phrase that is rightly beginning to disappear from the lexicon of political speech—we are not delivering beyond schools. Schools are not the only part of education; we also have higher and further education and vocational training. We are not delivering for people who are not in education or training because the Scottish Enterprise budget cuts will impact disproportionately on that part of the budget. We will therefore see even more people being abandoned because Scottish Enterprise could not do its budget sums properly.

I believe firmly in integrated schools that are part of our communities, that are comprehensive and that provide equal opportunities and equality of education across the board for all our young people. The part of the Tory motion that I can address is about raising standards, tackling discipline and serving the needs and aspirations of all pupils. All members would agree that that is the one point on which we can all move forward and that we would all wish to achieve.

I have heard many concerns about inclusion today. Mr McLetchie told us about Baroness Warnock's lecture. I was at that lecture as a teacher who was trained in additional support needs—state enrolled nurse qualifications, as they were called at that time—just after Baroness Warnock's policies were put into practice. It was like a mantra as far as I and the people who trained with me were concerned. We believed in moving forward and in taking children away from a deficit model. We believed in including children in the classroom and not in having remedial teachers teaching them in cupboards and taking them away from the curriculum. I still believe that that is important and that we need to get the quality right. There are some major concerns that I would like to express, and possibly some solutions.

First, there is nothing wrong with the inclusion policy or the policy of mainstreaming—the problem is that our schools and teachers are not ready and are not fit to embrace mainstreaming. I suggest to the minister that he should look at the good practice that is going on in schools on the islands that have had to include everyone because there have been no alternatives.

I say also to the minister that it is very important to train our teachers adequately to meet additional support needs. Sadly, that is not happening across the board. We have teachers who are not able to identify that children have dyslexia or who are, because they have not had enough background training, unable to cope with children who are on the autistic spectrum. In some cases, they are sitting in classes with children who have many additional needs and they must also manage classroom assistants, but they have not been given adequate training to do all that and they are not given the right support.

Also, it is all very well to have classroom assistants, but they might or might not be trained and provision is patchy across the country. In some areas, excellent training is provided, but in others we could almost bring someone in off the street and stick them in the classroom. The system does not work and we need to get it right.

Does Rosemary Byrne share the concern that the budget that was allocated for the Education (Additional Support for Learning)

(Scotland) Act 2004 was for administration of the act and not for training and support?

Yes—that is part of the problem. I know that all members have casework about education; much of my casework is on education and Parliament has also just set up a cross-party group on dyslexia. The minister should come along to that group to meet people and find out where the gaps are. Also, when the minister listens to the parents of children who are on the autistic spectrum, he will see that their needs are not being met, either.

There is much to be said today, but I will finish by saying that it is very important that we look across the board at quality and class sizes. That means that we need a new national minimum standard. It is no use telling me that average class sizes are going down when I know that one school has a primary 1 class with 16 children while up the road, another school has a primary 1 class of 30 pupils. That is not equality and it is not good enough. Such large classed do not give the teacher the chance to tackle discipline and to deal with additional support needs.

Children who come from deprived backgrounds—I refer not just to deprivation because of poverty, but to deprivation among children who have no parents at home who have time to engage with them and the deprivation of those who live in areas that are not nice environments—need us to give schools the status of being a good environment, where there are people who will engage with them and who will provide the running commentary that I always go on about and which is so crucial to young people's future.

You must wind up now.

It is time we considered having no more than 15 pupils in primary 1 classes, in practical subject classes and in composite classes, and no more than 20 pupils for other mainstream classes. That would be a move forward and it would be a start, although much more remains to be done.

I would like to talk more, but I am unable to do so.

The opening of the Tory motion states that

"creating a greater degree of school autonomy, devolving more powers to head teachers and giving greater say to parents and teachers in shaping the education system will raise standards".

For a number of reasons, that is misleading.

The motion suggests that schools currently have little say in how they operate and that there is too much power at the centre because of legislation by the Scottish Parliament and direction by local authorities. However, the motion fails to appreciate that local authorities have for a considerable time worked more closely with schools via devolved school management. I suspect that the Tories really want local authorities to shed all responsibility for primary and secondary schools. Essentially, they want to return to the vision of the Michael Forsyth era, when central Government tried every incentive to entice state schools to opt out of local authority control. It did not work then and it will not work now.

What further powers would the Tories give to head teachers, teachers and parents? The Tories may be good on principles, but they are short on details, especially on how devolving more power would help the vast majority of Scottish pupils. We can only speculate about what some of those increased powers might be. Would schools have the power to select pupils on ability or aptitude? If so, what would happen to pupils who were not selected for the top schools? Would we return to a two-tier system, such as existed when I went to school, when pupils from the same village travelled in separate buses to two different schools? Do the Tories want that kind of system, or do they want children to be in the same school but to be streamed? If so, when would streaming start?

In previous debates on education, the Tories have highlighted the need to improve the provision of technical and vocational skills learning in school. Is their solution to segregate children at post-primary level into academic and vocational streams? Late developers have always been an issue; segregation would limit such pupils' chances in secondary school and, invariably, their later life chances.

Does the member accept that, in many schools in Scotland, setting already takes place?

I do not think that many people are averse to setting. There is a big difference between setting and streaming, but the Conservatives have never got to grips with that.

On the role of parents, how would parental input be channelled so that, in the words of the Tory motion, they would have more say in "shaping the education system"? Without a doubt, parents have a crucial role to play in the life of a school and there is a need to ensure that adequate structures are in place to provide them with information on the curriculum and on how their children are progressing. However, in addition to that, the Tory motion suggests that parents could have a more direct role in determining the curriculum and the teaching and learning methods that are employed. It is right that teachers and senior managers in schools have the main responsibility in those areas; doctors, for example, would not look kindly on patients telling them how to treat other patients.

In our consideration of the Scottish Schools (Parental Involvement) Bill, we examined many of the pertinent issues surrounding parental involvement in schools, but no one suggested that parents should interfere directly with the job of teaching. Yes—there will always be concerns about certain aspects of the curriculum at certain times and parents must always be able to voice their concerns and have them dealt with, but that is totally different from the emphasis that the motion puts on giving parents greater say in "shaping the education system".

Let us look again at the reason that is given for giving schools greater autonomy—it is the raising of standards. Of course we want to raise standards. That is why the EIS—of which I am a member—strives so hard to improve the teaching and learning environment for our pupils. New schools are one way of doing that and smaller classes are another. Both issues are being tackled, and at a far quicker rate than was the case in the Tory years.

Finally, I turn to appropriate provision for pupils who have special educational needs, which is high on the Scottish Executive's and Parliament's agendas. It is not an easy aspiration because there are considerable resource implications, mostly in human terms. I worry that giving schools greater autonomy and moving them away from local authority control would be dangerous for the educational provisions for that group of pupils, for whom local authorities provide considerable resources at present.

The Tories want to create a more diverse education system. We can only speculate about what that would mean in reality—a reality that, I hope, will not materialise. I ask all members to reject the Tory motion.

This has been a very good debate on the most important of all the subjects that fall within the remit of this devolved Scottish Parliament. Education is the future of this country, and it is the inalienable duty of every Parliament and Government to endeavour to raise the standards of the educational programme that they deliver. I utterly reject any insinuations—some have been made this morning—that the Scottish Conservative party does not hold that principle dear.

Much has been said about how to raise standards, so I make no apologies at this stage in the debate for focusing my contribution on one issue and concern that has been brought to my attention very vividly in my constituency—the mainstreaming of education for children who have additional and special support needs. Like most policies, this one has as its background nothing but the best of intentions but, as has been highlighted all too vividly to me in Castle Douglas primary school recently, unless it is backed up with adequate resources, the results can be close to catastrophic, as some members have mentioned this morning.

I make it plain that Castle Douglas primary school has just received one of the finest HMIE reports that I have ever read. It is an excellent school, whose head teacher and staff match that description. Several special needs children have already been successfully assimilated into the school and, on the whole, the policy works reasonably well. However, one pupil has needs that are so specific that a specialised facility has had to be provided for that child alone. Until very recently, the child was taught in a converted cupboard, and it was not much of a conversion. Now, after months of wrangling with the local authority, in which many departments appeared to be incapable of communicating with one another, a portakabin has been brought in and adapted for the child's use. That will at least prevent the complete trashing of several rooms in the main school, which this poor individual has brought about on more than one occasion.

The onset of the child's violent behaviour is often put down to the fact that the school simply does not possess either the human or the physical resources to provide the full-time specialist teacher input that is required, in the appropriate facilities. The result is that the child must be excluded from time to time. I dread to think what would happen if his mother was working and was unable to take him on those occasions. On other occasions, he is sent home at lunch time because teacher resources are urgently required elsewhere. Regardless of how we look at the matter and whatever the circumstances, that child is being failed, rather than supported, by the system. That is no fault of the school which, as the headmaster told me, would be bitterly disappointed if it were unable to handle such situations. However, he also emphasised the desperate need for the resources that will make that possible without its disrupting the workings of the rest of the school.

The nub of the problem is the disruption that can be caused to the education of the rest of the school. The problem was underlined last week when, as I said earlier, Robert Brown, Maureen Watt and I met in Parliament a delegation of primary schoolteachers from across Scotland. For some reason, no representative of the Labour Party was present.

How do Lord Sutherland's ideas on centralised control and the devolving of more responsibility to schools get over that problem?

Contrary to one or two suggestions that were made earlier, that policy and our policy would deliver more money to education, which would improve the provision of classroom facilities.

Robert Brown, Maureen Watt and I met a delegation of primary school teachers from across Scotland. It was abundantly clear that disruption was a big issue with them—it was the first thing they asked about. I am in complete agreement with Steve Sinnott of the National Union of Teachers, who said that there has to be

"a halt to the closure of special schools".

I go further: I suggest that a special unit in a mainstream school is not always the right answer, however well intentioned the idea might be.

One of the most enjoyable parts of my job is visits to schools across my constituency—at least, it is once the pupils have got over that fact that I am not the manager of a well known football club in Manchester. Most of those schools are doing well under the watchful eye of dedicated and enthusiastic staff. However, we must be careful because there is a danger that we could undermine that dedication and enthusiasm by asking too much of them through this mainstreaming policy.

I declare that I am a member of the General Teaching Council. Like other members, I am pleased that the Conservatives have selected education for debate. It has given the Scottish Executive and backbench Labour members the opportunity to show the people of Scotland that we are committed to a modern, comprehensive and ideal school education that is based on universal provision and excellence, and is rooted in the principle of equality of opportunity. We have done that throughout the debate.

The debate also allows us to reflect on the dark years of Tory Government when, as a young woman, I was keen to teach but had to compete with more than 50 qualified applicants for one place at teacher-training college. Happily, I got that place, but I had then to worry about getting a job that was, if I was being realistic, going to be either a temporary job or a supply job. Now, however, we have a guaranteed one year post-training placement for teachers coming out of college, the lowest pupil to teacher ratio for more than 15 years, nearly 6,000 classroom assistants, and guaranteed training and skills enhancement for teachers.

While I am singing the praises of the Executive and the Labour Party, I point out that we now have free nursery places for all three and four-year-olds, if a place is wanted; investment in early-years education and child care that is well above the OECD average; the first national policy on discipline; and we have introduced community schools. On health and nutrition, we have improved the standards and nutritional quality of school meals, we provide free fruit for primaries 1 and 2 and there is chilled water available in schools. All those things help children to learn and none of them was available under the Tories.

Will the member give way?

Sorry—I do not have time.

On mainstreaming, there is a place for special educational units in schools, particularly for autism, which has been mentioned by other members. However, I aspire to a society in which every child has the choice of accessing their local school and receiving an excellent education that is specific to their needs rather than having to travel miles for their education. That is worth aspiring to; I wonder whether the Tories are against mainstreaming as an idea.

Willowbank school in Coatbridge in my constituency offers day support to young people who have experienced social, emotional or learning difficulties that have impaired their academic and social progress and their experience of school. It provides full-time and part-time day placements for up to 50 young people of secondary age. Pupils and staff have visited Parliament and I have visited the school and can say that it is an excellent school in terms of discipline and supporting pupils. I want to take the opportunity to commend the committed teachers in that school.

On the wider matters of indiscipline and violence in our schools, a number of informed and innovative projects are being developed throughout Scotland. For example, the Zero Tolerance Trust has developed the respect initiative, which uses curricular materials in primary and secondary schools and youth settings and promotes the values of good citizenship, respect for oneself and others, avoidance of violence, respect for difference, avoidance of gender stereotyping and other forms of discrimination, and the value of collective powers.

Will Elaine Smith give way?

The member is in the final minute of her speech.

The pack of materials addresses all forms of discrimination, including bullying, gendered bullying and abuse, racism and homophobia. Although ZT's main aim is the prevention of violence against women, the respect campaign addresses all the underlying attitudes, actions and beliefs that surround that. The materials are being used in 19 local authority areas. I ask the minister whether all schools could start using the respect materials and I invite him to comment on that.

The debate should be consensual, but sadly—as usual—the chamber has divided along party lines. It is time all members got their blinkers off, because the most important thing is the education of the children, not members' party-political allegiances. It is time all members got that through their heads.

I am probably the only MSP to have been educated under a coalition Government—during the war, when parties on all sides were in power. Exclusion has been mentioned: it was never a problem when I was at school, because anyone who needed to be disciplined was belted or given a punishment exercise to carry out. It is strange to think that the yob culture seems to have coincided with the lack of discipline in schools. That is something that the politically correct members should perhaps consider closely, because how any teacher can control a class without some form of discipline is beyond my comprehension.

Is John Swinburne suggesting that we should reintroduce the licensed assault of pupils by use of the belt?

I do not know whether Robin Harper is advocating a continuation of the yob culture, but I am just pointing out the coincidence of the fact that, when teachers stopped belting children in school, there seemed to be a lack of discipline out in the streets, which endangers people's lives in many cases.

School buildings are being thrown up all over the place under public-private partnerships or private finance initiatives. The only drawback is that, for the next three or four decades, local authorities will have to pay over the odds for the schools in those communities.

One problem that has already been aired is that of education for disabled people. Disability does not always equate to a person's being in a wheelchair. I was privileged to be invited, along with Donald Gorrie, to Glencairn primary school in Motherwell, which is attended by a large number of central-belt children who have hearing impairments. The school is absolutely brilliant—the quality of teaching is superb. It is beyond my comprehension how the children overcome their difficulties, but they do it to such an extent that, when it came to the question-and-answer sessions—Donald Gorrie will bear this out—it was impossible to differentiate between the pupils who have hearing impairments and those who are not so unfortunate. The work that it does is a great credit to that school, but the big drawback that the teachers encounter is that its excellent provision is not replicated when the children go to secondary school. Children are reluctant to move away from an environment in which they are comfortable to an environment that does not have such specialised facilities. That is one of the many matters relative to disability that we have to look at.

I have become acutely aware of the shortcomings in the education system for children who are disabled in many ways. There must be greater financial input to that area.

I apologise to Lord James Douglas-Hamilton for missing all of his speech and, to a lesser extent, to Robert Brown for missing part of his. I was asked to a meeting by a very important person—even more important than Robert Brown—to discuss policies and ideas that are of particular interest to me. I am afraid that I did that first.

I am happy to support the Executive amendment, which is one of its more sensible ones. It strikes the right balance between setting out the good things that we are doing—we are doing many good things in education—and not being complacent. We must strike that balance.

We must encourage innovation, initiatives and so on from the bottom up rather than have cascades of paper come down from Edinburgh to schools and local authorities. We should develop the enthusiasm, skills and new ideas of teachers, head teachers and even councils. We should also learn from one another. We are very bad at doing that in Scotland. Lots of people do good work through teaching in a particular way that works splendidly. Other people should learn from such examples, but that does not happen. I hope that the minister can encourage innovation from the bottom and stop having innovation from the top.

The Executive has made serious efforts to address indiscipline and difficulties with individual pupils, but there are still problems. We all hear horrific stories during our work or in our social life about teachers being assaulted or, as Brian Adam mentioned, about situations in which the system is trying to help an individual pupil but is failing to deliver. We must scrutinise the support that is given to pupils who have problems. We should not be hooked up to a doctrine either for or against integration into mainstream schools. We want to do the best that we can for each pupil.

We could do some things better, such as outdoor education, which is still in a very poor state. We should also do more to support education outside school. People learn more outside the classroom than they do inside the classroom. We still do not put enough support into youth work and charges for the use of school premises are often too high. Often there is not a good system for supporting people with coaching, such as having teachers help them. We could do a lot better on those matters, but in general the minister and his colleagues are doing a good job and we should support them.

I place on record my whole-hearted support, and that of the Scottish Labour Party, for the comprehensive model of education in Scotland. I remind members that when we had the national debate on education a few years ago, the majority view of parents, current students and wider Scottish society was in favour of the comprehensive model.

The debate, which has been wide ranging, has gone much further than the terms of the motion and the amendments; that has been good.

I agreed with Fiona Hyslop's introductory comments, in which she illustrated clearly the problems that plagued our education system the last time that the Tories ran it. She referred to the industrial strife that characterised our schools and the low morale that existed among teachers. She acknowledged that we have moved on considerably.

The speech by Bill Butler, who is the constituency member for Jordanhill, was very useful because it put that school in context and reminded us how it came about. He showed that the Conservatives, by trying to extrapolate from one particular school—out of all our schools—and saying that it is a model for the rest of Scotland, are making a false argument that does not get out of the starting blocks.

Indiscipline is a problem in our schools and the effect that some children's poor behaviour has on others cannot be underestimated. However, we must get away from the idea that excluding pupils for bad behaviour or indiscipline is a solution to the problem. When I returned to work in Fife in the 1980s, it had the highest exclusion rate of any regional council in Scotland. Certain schools in Fife had an even higher exclusion rate. However, that did not make Fife's schools any better. All that it meant was that a large proportion of our secondary school population was being excluded from education, which was what a lot of those pupils wanted. Elaine Murray was right to say that there is no point in rewarding bad behaviour by giving a pupil time off. We must be much more imaginative if we are to produce solutions for school indiscipline rather than think that exclusion is the only answer.

Many members spoke about the lowest 20 per cent of pupils and the difficulties that they experience. I will touch on that issue in my closing remarks. The local authorities of Scotland's former coalfield communities have been aware for some time that poor results and underachievement are a feature of secondary education in their areas.

Analysis of education and skills levels over the years in the Scottish index of multiple deprivation have revealed the extent of the problem, which was also highlighted in a recent independent survey that was carried out by the coalfield communities campaign Scotland, which was formed by the local authorities for Clackmannanshire, Dumfries and Galloway, East Ayrshire, East Lothian, Fife, Midlothian, North Lanarkshire, South Ayrshire and West Lothian. The conclusion of the survey report says:

"What the figures show is that the cycle of educational disadvantage in Scotland's coalfield communities has not been broken. Twenty or more years ago perhaps no-one would expect the educational achievement of people from coalfield areas to be particularly high. Indeed, it was the 'norm' for education to take a low priority when industrial jobs were more readily available. But to participate fully in the modern changing economy needs much more emphasis on education. The Government itself needs to have much higher ambitions for the coalfield areas. There is no excuse to settle for second best or to perpetuate what has become the 'norm'."

That is absolutely right.

The biggest challenge that faces our education system is not whether we want, or do not want, a comprehensive model—that debate has long since been won—but what we want to do for the young people whom our education system is failing. Absolutely nothing that any of the Conservative members said this morning addressed that issue; nothing was said about what we should do for those young people. If Scottish education is to move forward, we need to concentrate on that issue.

Does the member agree that, if we are to motivate the young people in those communities, the first thing that we need to do is to ensure that there is a future for them? The best motivator for a young person is to see that there is something that they can move on to, which will give them a structure in their life—a job and a decent standard of living.

I agree absolutely. However, what is interesting about the survey report is the difference between the young people who come from the coalfield areas and those who come from other parts of the same local authority area—sometimes even from the same school. We need to break that cycle.

Elaine Murray and Bill Butler touched on the issue of underachievement in our schools, particularly by males. The gap in achievement between girls and boys appears to be widening rather than narrowing.

One minute.

We must consider the whole issue of gender in our schools, by which I mean the gender of the teaching staff. Although we have made some small progress with regard to male teachers in primary schools, far too many of our primary schools are still all-female enclaves. If we are serious about tackling the underachievement of boys, it is important that we have good, male role models in our schools. Boys need to see that education is something for them, as well as for girls. If we tackled that issue, we would go a long way to reducing some of the difficulties that boys encounter when they enter high school where there is a far greater prevalence of male teachers.

Much has been said in the debate about special education provision and some members have grossly exaggerated the difficulties around the concept of mainstreaming. I agree that there are challenges, but it is not the case that every child will attend a mainstream school. We have had debates on the subject in the past.

The member must close.

It is about time that some members spoke about the situation as it actually is, rather than what they pretend it is.

It is clear from the debate and from other education debates in the past that the Scottish Conservatives will not reconcile themselves to the comprehensive system of schooling that we have in this country. I cannot decide whether their desire to break up the system is motivated by nostalgia for the days when the lower ranks knew their place and rarely impinged on the natural order of middle-class progression through the grammar schools to university, or by right-wing ideology that views education not as a public good but as a marketable commodity that should be subject to consumer choice in order to ensure economic efficiency in its allocation and distribution. Brian Monteith—before he cast himself into the darkness—and Murdo Fraser typify that strain of Tory thinking. I will be interested to hear what Murdo Fraser says on the subject, although I guess that it really does not matter why the Conservatives take that view because they have taken themselves well out of the Scottish mainstream by continuing to hold it.

However, there is no doubt that there are deep-seated problems and challenges within our educational system that need to be addressed if the system's current standing in the international ratings is to be maintained, let alone enhanced. First among those is the fact that one in five of our pupils gets little or nothing out of the school experience. The lowest-achieving 20 per cent are flat-lining in performance according to HMIE reports and, with 14 per cent of our 16 to 19-year-olds not in employment, education or training, the knock-on effects of that system failure are socially and economically damaging.

Poverty and deprivation are at the root of the problem, and the Executive has proved to be ineffective in tackling the vicious cycle in which low educational attainment leads to low pay or unemployment. Early intervention through the provision of high-quality child care in early years education is the key to breaking that cycle. It provides children from deprived backgrounds with the early cognitive and behavioural gains that can help to equalise their life chances and educational opportunities if they are properly supported throughout their school journeys. That will, of course, require significant investment, not least in a highly qualified workforce. It is disappointing to witness the Executive's tacit support for the cutting back of nursery teachers from family centres in Glasgow as well as the interminable delay that has been built into the national early years workforce review.

Another big challenge is the need to renew the teaching profession. As 40 per cent of the current profession are due to retire in the next 10 years, that is no small task. Despite its rhetoric, the Executive is clearly struggling to hit its targets for increasing teacher numbers. For evidence of that, we can point to the rising vacancy rates—for maths and science teachers in particular—and the minister's climb-down on class size targets.

There is no doubt that the McCrone deal has helped to create a better climate for recruitment—we will leave aside the impact on pupil attainment—but we need a culture change and an enhancement of the profession's status. As the Education Committee's inquiry into pupil motivation found last year, the teacher makes the difference in motivating pupils and engaging them in the learning process. Teachers will raise the standards but, as Matthew MacIver of the General Teaching Council for Scotland pointed out to us, politicians have all too often undermined the profession through endless initiatives, constant analysis of every action in the classroom and overloading teachers with unnecessary administrative burdens. That disempowerment of teachers, coupled with the lack of appropriate support systems to cope with pupil indiscipline, acts as a constant drag on their recruitment and retention.

How do we tackle that? We must give teachers more freedom to teach. The problem with the mainstreaming policy, for example, is not its principle but the fact that its implementation has been underresourced, as Rosemary Byrne eloquently expressed during her speech. Graham Donaldson's report "Improving Scottish Education" got to the heart of the matter with its call for space for imaginative teaching that can capitalise on approaches that make learning relevant, lively and motivating and for the system to be much more rigorous and explicit about the development and certification of essential skills such as literacy and numeracy for all pupils.

Getting rid of the current assessment overload is an absolute priority. In the current system, teachers are training pupils to pass exams rather than teaching thinking skills and opening minds. The result is the creation of a growing proportion of false positives from the system. People can be qualified, but illiterate, much to the consternation of universities and employers.

You must close now.

The SNP's amendment encapsulates our approach to meeting the fundamental challenges that face Scottish education—

You have to close.

I now close.

Thank you. I call Robert Brown to speak for precisely seven minutes.

This has been a high-quality debate, in which many good points have been made. I do not want to lose the point that Adam Ingram made about the centrality of teachers to the process. We can put the structures in place, but it is teachers and educationists who do the business at the chalk face.

I want to put in context the various positions that have been expressed from different parts of the chamber. The debate has centred, rightly, on the Scottish Executive's programme for making Scottish education the best in the world once again. That programme consists of three prongs, the first of which is the necessity to lay the foundations by addressing issues around buildings, teacher numbers and the overburdening of the system. Those measures are well down the line, but they are not yet complete.

Secondly, the programme aims to enrich and widen the school experience. That is under way, with the school curriculum review, the leadership stuff, the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004, the greater involvement of parents and the discipline stuff, as we have been discussing.

Thirdly, there is the iceberg of those whose needs the system does not meet. There are a number of potential directions or solutions, including early intervention, nurture classes, family support, improved support for the transition between school and college or work, effective work experience and alternative education options. Those are all part of the current response to a seemingly intractable challenge, which Peter Peacock described as requiring the work of a generation to resolve.

Even children from the most difficult backgrounds can grow up and seize their opportunities, with the right support and encouragement. That is the optimistic and central point that we must keep our eyes on. There is a great deal of consensus about all that and a lot of good work is taking place throughout Scotland. The Conservatives are giving us what purports to be a critique of that. They say that tinkering with school structures is the right approach. I believe that their view is based on a faulty analysis. They speak about poor attainment levels, problems with teacher retention, the restriction of parental choice and particular problems with special schools.

The Conservatives are wrong on all those counts. As we heard, attainment levels are up according to international standards, by which they are benchmarked. Teacher recruitment and retention have been revolutionised since the McCrone settlement. The number of special units and special schools is up. The number of places in those units, as part of the total number of school places, is about the same as it was in the past.

It is time for the Conservatives to apologise to parents for the mess in which they left Scottish education and to recognise the real achievements of the Parliament and the Executive in revitalising our schools. More to the point, the Conservatives are heavy on complaints and light on solutions. Does anyone really believe that allowing schools to opt out will solve discipline challenges? I challenged Derek Brownlee, during his speech, to give us a flavour of what the Conservatives would do about the problem of the underachieving 20 per cent. We have heard nothing from him or from any other Conservative members about that.

On the basis that the minister and the other parties agree that no progress has been made on the bottom 20 per cent and that attainment is going up, what specific things is the Executive doing now—it is, after all, in power—that are different from what it was doing before and which might actually make an impact on the problem?

I was just telling the member—as a number of members on the coalition benches, and indeed on the SNP benches, have been telling the Conservatives throughout the debate—about the sort of things that have been taking place in Scottish education to achieve exactly that. The Conservatives are putting forward a critique, raising a number of challenges and suggesting that the Executive's policies are not working. They suggest options involving school structures. I suggest that that is not the central issue, which is in fact to do with a much more complex pattern of addressing those challenges across the board with a series of initiatives.

There has been some talk about off-site units, but nobody touched on the provision that exists, apart from Elaine Smith, who mentioned the provision that exists at a school in her area. A considerable amount of services are offered by organisations such as Fairbridge and Spark of Genius, which provide just such off-site facilities for some of the most challenging children in our society. We need to develop more of a mix of experience and different approaches, but it must deal with the needs of individual children. As Scott Barrie said, simply excluding pupils from school—temporary solution as it might be in some situations—is not the answer to the problem. All that it does is put the children back on the streets, which creates other, run-off problems.

Fiona Hyslop dealt ably with the issue of choice between schools and within schools. She made the point that most Scots live in small towns where there is a choice of only one school for most people. I attended such a school, as did many other members. She also made the important point that schools operate at the heart of the community.

Will the minister take an intervention?

I am sorry, but I cannot take any more interventions, because time is short.

As Elaine Smith said, we are not seeking solutions that are anything other than specific to the Scottish situation. That is an important aspect of our approach. We are building on the successes of the system to try to make it even more successful.

The motion mentions Jordanhill school. Given that the school is in a Liberal Democrat ward in Bill Butler's constituency, I, too, have an interest in it. Jordanhill is an excellent school, but excellent work is done in many other schools, such as Lochend community high school in Easterhouse, which also received the SQA school of the year award, in much more challenging circumstances. We are not necessarily suggesting that the form of organisation of those schools be used across the board, but are building on success by considering what works.

We have discussed the problem of inclusion. I do not want to rehearse that debate, because some provisions of the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 came into force only six months ago. The new framework needs time to bed in, but it is improving, and will continue to improve, the provision that is made.

We need to concentrate on raising quality to the same level throughout Scotland and to deal with issues that emerge—nobody pretends that the system is perfect.

We are ambitious for our schools and young people. We are building on a strong system. We challenge ourselves on our performance across the board and ask whether we can do better with regard to looked-after children and young people not in education, employment or training—the NEET group. We want to use information and data intelligently, not least the benchmarking information from throughout the country, to highlight specific issues and target our efforts. Those are the things that will achieve success. I support the Executive amendment.

This has been a wide-ranging and instructive debate. When my colleague James Douglas-Hamilton opened the debate, he set out 10 principles that he felt should underlie education policies and on which we hoped we might find common ground with other parties.

What has been striking about the debate is that, far from finding common ground, we have seen a fundamental divide between the Conservatives, who believe that the core of education policy should be what parents want for their children, and those in other parties who think that it is right for the state to decide what sort of education children should have.

We believe in greater local decision making and in more power being devolved to head teachers.

James Douglas-Hamilton talked about our support for devolved school management and quoted in support of his views Fred Forrester, formerly of the EIS—not a natural Conservative supporter—who said:

"the blunt truth is that DSM is a tawdry and threadbare substitute for real devolution of education decision making to school level."

People who have experience of education who are not Conservatives share the general thrust of our policy.

We support greater parental involvement and greater powers being given to school boards. It is disgraceful that the Executive is considering reducing the role of parents in schools and taking away school boards' statutory rights. We reject the Executive's nanny-knows-best approach, which is all about ministers handing down directives from the centre and local authority officials telling schools how to run themselves. We want maximum power for schools and those who are involved in contributing to the running of them, whether they are head teachers or parents.

Will Murdo Fraser explain why he thinks that head teachers are so keen on the system that the Conservatives support, given that in England, which has such a system, one in four schools do not have a permanent head teacher?

I cannot speak for Mr Blair's education system in England; the member will have to raise that point with his Labour colleagues. Every head teacher to whom I have spoken wants more control over budgets because they are interested in having more power. Good head teachers would welcome more responsibility and less interference from the centre.

Robert Brown said in his opening speech that he and the Executive were interested in education for all and not for some. The problem with the Executive's approach, however, is that it defends a system that means that the least well-off—those from the most disadvantaged communities—have the poorest access to the best education.

The minister and Executive members perpetuate the myth that all schools can be just as good as each other. That seems to be the holy grail of the Executive's education policy, but no number of Da Vinci codes will help the minister find it. The simple fact is that some schools are and always will be better than others. The problem with our current one-size-fits-all comprehensive system is that better schools are available only to those from better-off backgrounds.

The example of Jordanhill school has been quoted in the chamber and referred to in our motion and by Bill Butler.

rose—

The houses in the Jordanhill catchment area in the west end of Glasgow command a premium compared with identical houses a couple of streets away that do not fall within that catchment area. That is because people appreciate the value of living in the Jordanhill catchment area and are prepared to pay for it. The consequence of that is that people are being priced out of accessing education at Jordanhill. Our system of educational apartheid, which is being supported by the current Executive, disadvantages those from less well-off backgrounds. The minister needs to get his blinkers off and realise what is going wrong.

Will the member give way?

If the member will forgive me, I will allow the minister to intervene first.

That was why I mentioned, in both my opening speech and my earlier intervention, a series of schools in different social catchment areas, including Lochend community high school in Easterhouse—hardly a leafy suburb—that won the SQA award.

I accept absolutely that schools in different social areas are doing well, but Jordanhill makes my point exactly. It is a magnet school, it is doing well and we need more like it. However, most important is the need to ensure that there is access for all to our best schools and not just for those who can afford to live in those catchment areas. That is the problem with the current system.

We reject a one-size-fits-all approach. We believe in greater diversity in the state sector. Why should we not have in our towns and cities schools with different specialities?

I welcome the fact that the SNP is moving towards a more diverse system. The pity is that for reasons of blinkered ideology, the SNP cannot take its policy to its natural conclusion, which is choice for parents. Fiona Hyslop said that we cannot have choice because there is only one viable option in many rural areas. Although that is true to an extent, in European terms, Scotland has a heavily urbanised population. Even the small town of Elgin, with which Fiona Hyslop will be familiar after the recent by-election, has two secondary schools. Every candidate in the by-election supported the retention of those two schools. Why can we not have one secondary school with a science bias and the other with an arts bias? Just because we cannot do that everywhere does not mean that we should not try to do it in many places.

Fiona Hyslop tied herself in knots trying to explain the SNP policy. She said that all pupils should have the opportunity to know excellence. However, if a local school had a speciality in, say, music, and I, who am tone deaf and completely unmusical were to attend that school, does she mean to tell me that I would benefit from attending a school with excellence in music? It is sensible to give someone the opportunity to go to a school with excellence in arts, science, mathematics, sport or whatever, but it is an absolute nonsense to say that there can be excellence in only one subject, whether or not a child has aptitude for that subject.

Jordanhill is an example of a magnet school, but Murdo Fraser neglects to say that nobody from Shettleston or any other place can go there because it is exclusive to those who are resident in the area. That policy was in the regulations that the Conservatives introduced.

I agree absolutely; Mr Welsh makes my point exactly. The problem is that such schools are exclusive when they should be open to all. We should allow everybody to access the best education, not just those who can afford it.

In the very brief time that remains, I want to touch on the important issue of mainstreaming, which was the subject of some very informed speeches by David McLetchie, Rosemary Byrne, Alex Fergusson and others. There is widespread concern about the presumption in favour of mainstreaming, which is causing huge problems in the classroom not only for teachers but, equally important, for children, not least those with special needs, who are simply not getting the care and quality of education that they need. Indeed, it has been a particular problem for children on the autistic spectrum. Instead of pursuing an ideologically blinkered approach based on the presumption that mainstreaming is best in all circumstances, we need to think about what is right for the child and consider each child on his or her merits.

Our current comprehensive system leaves too many children behind. There is no point in being ostriches and pretending that there are no problems with it. We accept that school education has improved since devolution, but the glowing picture that was painted by the minister will be unfamiliar to far too many people in our classrooms who are struggling with indiscipline and disruptive pupils. The Conservatives are happy to find common ground with other parties to pursue common goals and to drive up standards; however, we will not hesitate to say what is right—even if we are, for the moment, the only ones who are doing so.