Contribution
My Lords, like others I really regret that we are debating these amendments so late, because they are very important. I will try to get to my key points.
I thank the Minister for Amendment 192 in relation to Clause 50; this addresses some of the concerns that we raised about its scope in Committee and again in the other place. The main substance of this group, as we have heard, is the lengthy, prize-winning Amendment 193, which would allow the Government to introduce mass inspection. We debated this in Committee. It is curious that the Bill has gone through all stages in the other place and only now are we seeing this on Report. Some of the gaps that it reveals are highlighted in the amendment from the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Portsmouth and in my Amendments 193D and 193E. We can see that in the breadth of drafting of this amendment, with so much left to secondary legislation giving Secretary of State extremely broad powers—which suggested to me that it was an amendment that was drafted in haste rather than one that was on the shelf. Officials kindly invited me in to talk about the amendment before Christmas, and they argued the case for giving the Secretary of State maximum flexibility. As the noble Baroness, Lady Blower, said on an earlier group, we have talked about this ad nauseam, and the Government have acted to correct some of it, but this new clause goes in the wrong direction in relation to those powers.
If we think back to the introduction of the new school inspection regime, we see that there was a huge consultation and piloting of the approach, and now we are seeing it rolled out. All my Amendment 193D asks is that we mirror that and do exactly the same. I have suggested a focus in terms of the pilot, which would be to look at MATs that have groups of schools in the following categories. There would be one category where they are significantly underperforming and where there might be a case for intervention; and another would be where they would like to grow and take on other schools—quite rightly, the department would want reassurance that they had the skills to do that well. And then there would be a universal group—at this hour of the night, I cannot think of any other description—to see whether there is a case, at this point, for universal MAT inspection alongside school inspection. In a perfect world, one would have designed a new school inspection regime and a MAT inspection regime together to avoid some of the duplication to which other noble Lords have pointed.
When the Minister sums up, I would be grateful to know whether she can confirm that there is not a plan to inspect single academy trusts, and if there is, what the point of that would be, and that the Government plan to reawaken—or whatever you do to dormant legislation—the inspection of local authorities with regard to that school improvement function. If the Government want to look at school groupings, they should look at all school groupings rather than just one type.
I turn to my Amendment 194, and I thank my noble friend Lady Morgan of Cotes for her support for it. I did an interview with Schools Week not so long ago—which probably only my children have read, or, in fact, not even my children have read. They asked me what element of the Bill I was most worried about, and I said that it was this clause, which will delay intervention in schools that Ofsted has found unable to meet the new standards and intervention is required.
When we debated this in Committee, the Minister talked about the length of time for intervention, but she knows that the very long cases—some of the same cases are probably still running—typically reflect one of two things, or possibly both. One is where you have rural schools in very remote areas, where there is no other school or trust nearby that could take on and support the school adequately. The second is where significant funding is required from the department, particularly in relation to buildings or to bridge budget deficits if the school role has fallen significantly, and a lot of arm wrestling goes on, which takes time.
The new RISE teams will not be able to address either type of case any faster than the previous system. My amendment would avoid delay and judicial review, and, most importantly, it would make sure that children were back in high performing schools as quickly as possible. I also agree completely with what my noble friend Lady Morgan of Cotes said about Amendment 197. With that, rather than having to test the opinion of the House, I hope that the Minister will come back with more positive and constructive responses.