Barton urges new government to review White Paper

The government’s Schools White Paper risks flogging “the system to death” by attempting to do too much, MPs have been told today.

Speaking at the Commons Education Select Committee, Geoff Barton warned that the Every Child Achieving and Thriving White Paper was creating more than 100 new expectations on schools and colleges.

The former union general secretary and chair of the Oracy Education Commission urged the prime minister and education secretary to review the plan to identify what the “key elements” are and how reforms should be timed.

The committee took evidence today as part of an ongoing inquiry into the Department for Education’s planned reforms.

‘White Paper tries to do too much’

Mr Barton, former general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “I think the White Paper tries to do too much. It adds 104 new requirements on schools and colleges, and if we are not careful we are going to flog the system to death.”

He added: “The starting point should be: we’ve got a good education system in England. What would be the game changers?”

He identified transition from primary school, focusing on students who do not get a grade 4 pass in English and maths at GCSE, and technical education as areas that ministers should prioritise.

He added: “There’s too much in there, and too many of the people I used to represent will feel that they’ve got to jump through too many hoops.

“I think that we do have an opportunity with a new education secretary, a new prime minister, to look back at that document. So, what are the key elements, and what’s the timing? What should we be expecting people to do?”

Concern that technical routes ‘lock in’ 14-year-olds

The session also discussed the government’s plans to create new technical education routes for 14-year-olds, which was announced by Andy Burnham shortly after he took over as prime minister.

Leora Cruddas, chief executive of the Confederation of School Trusts, said that technical awards at age 16 do not currently have “the same rigor” and that the government was right to shine a light on this area.

She added: “They’re not underpinned by national standards. They don’t have nationally determined content, and they’re not regulated in the same way as GCSEs. So there is a problem to be solved.”

Ms Cruddas said that this problem was actually identified through the Francis curriculum and assessment review.

“Our position is that the government could bring the review of those technical awards forward by a year and start doing that work now on applying that same rigour to technical awards,” Ms Cruddas said.

She also warned against “inadvertently” starting a process that “selects young people at age 14 onto pathways that lock them in”.

Ms Cruddas said the best way to “open the horizons for our children and young people is to keep the breadth of education at least until the age of 16, which then allows young people to make choices that aren’t just immediately tied to local economies, but opens horizons more broadly”.

Natalie Oliver, chair of the Local Government Association’s children, young people and families committee, said that delivering technical education with employers would be more challenging in rural areas.

Ms Oliver, who is a Reform county councillor in Lincolnshire, added: “I definitely think there will be far greater obstacles in delivering this in more rural areas, so that needs to be a consideration from the government.”

Committee warning on falling pupil rolls

MPs on the committee also discussed the issue of falling pupil rolls.

Ms Cruddas told the committee that the solution to the falling rolls issue “is one of partnership”.

She spoke of “working together with strong strategic intent in partnership to look at the pattern of school places, the pattern of provision across a local area, and then [making] good decisions”.

Committee chair Helen Hayes warned that in London, some schools are becoming academies to avoid being involved in area-wide plans to reduce school places.

“In my constituency in London, we’re very severely affected by the issue of falling school rolls and falling numbers of children,” she said.

“We’ve seen schools academise in order to take themselves out of the local authority pupil place planning rationalisation process.

“So that’s not partnership working. That’s individual organisations working in their own best interests, directly counter to the interests of sufficiency across the wider area.”