Lord Storey (LD)

My Lords, I will deal first with Amendment 306 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, which we also support. I am interested in hearing from the Minister about why we would not want to do this. On Amendment 316, in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, it is easy to say, “You chose to let your children not be part of the school system, so you can just get on with it. You chose to home-educate them, so we are not going to pay for exams or whatever”. That would be the wrong way to approach this. If we really want to make home education closer to local authorities, so that they support each other, there are a number of supportive things we can do. Not every home educator has the financial resources to pay for examinations. We saw a huge rise in home-educated children during Covid, many of whom come from deprived areas. Families really struggle to find the costs for examinations, so supporting this amendment would be a hand of educational friendship. We know that home educators take huge pressure off the education budget as a whole and off school rolls, so I just think it is the right thing to do. I am quite fascinated by Amendment 478 and looking forward to hearing the Minister’s reply. I thought that all high achievers—super-high achievers, if you like—whether they are educated at home or at a maintained school, academy or free school, would get that recognition. I do not quite understand this amendment, so perhaps the Minister will enlighten us.