This time a little bit more specific. It’s the Muslims who need watching dontchaknow.
There should be some safeguard against home educated Muslim girls, or any others, not receiving the equality of opportunity that would be offered at school, or should be; and reassurance that children who are not English speakers are learning the language.
but having just had our feet run over by the cart I suspect that a lot of home educators will NOT feel like taking part in any research commissioned by the DCSF.
DCSF intends to commission a study to investigate the.feasibility of embarking on a longitudinal project investigating the provision of teaching and learning for, and the attainment of, home-educated children.
The overarching aim of the feasibility study will be to:
A small-scale investigation at LA-level to assess numbers of home-educated children known to them;
Research with voluntary organisations to establish number and type of children known to them; and
Research with families who home educate.
It is anticipated that the project will start in April 2010.
(the above was a direct copy/paste and all typos and grammatical errors are the business of the DCSF)
It’s a lovely little touch that this research falls under the DfES Objective “Close the gap in educational achievement for children from disadvantaged backgrounds”.
They kicked off pandering to the Labour Class War agenda then let one HE question through:
[Comment From naomi naomi: ]
Why is home education such a problem to you? These families cost the state nothing regarding educational funding and yet gain excellent results by adapting the education to suit their childs needs.Why do you insist on treating them like potential abusers? There is no evidence that large numbers of home ed children are at risk.The current system if implimented correctly would be more than satisfactory.Why put the blame on caring devoted parents ,when in fact it is often local officials and social services that let children down and allow KNOWN abuse to continue?Ed Balls:
Home education is part of our education system. I fully support the right of parents to educate their children at home if they choose. To say that I am labelling them as potential abusers is just plain wrong. But as a society we do have an obligation to make sure that the rights of all children, to learn and be safe, are respected too.
and that was it, on to SATs and more opportunities for Balls to attempt to come across as if he gives a stuff and of course try to plug his worthless policies. One question and the answer was, in order, WRONG, LIE, LIE and WRONG.
Memorandum submitted by LGA (CS 23)
Thus it is our understanding that councils have a statutory duty to promote high standards, ensure fair access to educational opportunity and promote the fulfilment by every child of his or her educational potential. This applies whether or not children attend school.
And? So what? I’m fairly confident that government guidelines don’t generally use slang so ‘promote’ is unlikely to mean “to get possession of by doubtful means or by ingenuity” on this occasion. No, I suspect it means “to help or encourage to exist or flourish”, which is NOT the same as ‘ensuring’ or ‘enforcing’. You can promote something without controlling it, without monitoring it, in fact in the case of home education doing either of those things will achieve pretty much the opposite of encouraging it exist or flourish. As an excuse for more power this is a really, really lame argument and simply demonstrates how some people in local government need things explained very slowly and carefully, using only short, simple words.
I was going to fisk Diana Johnson’s contributions to the debate but to be honest every time she opened her mouth such utter garbage spewed forth that I’d be working on it for a week and nobody would want to read it. So here are just two choice quotes to demonstrate what a bizarre, delusional, alternate reality world she seems to be living in.
“the issue is about moving home education to a new way of working in a spirit of collaboration and co-operation with local authorities.”
Yes, she actually said that! She stood there and said that on the record. How can you possibly even try to talk to someone who is THIS out of touch with the real world? Seriously?
“Our proposals are not about state control of home education. They are about acting when a child’s rights are not being met by their parents. The proposals are moderate and proportionate, and they will keep England among the most liberal countries in the world for home education.”
What do you think, does she know she’s talking crap or is she totally and utterly awaaaaaaaaaay with the fairies?
The speeches against the bill varied from good to magnificent and I couldn’t really quote from them without spoiling the effect, go read them (starting half way down this page) or watch and listen here.
I’m solidly and embarrassingly mono-lingual, so this is about as far as you can get from an issue that would ever effect me. However I found myself very uncomfortable listening to the following exchanges yesterday, and reading the transcript today has intensified that feeling.
Mrs. Ann Cryer (Keighley) (Lab): The hon. Gentleman keeps talking about certain aspects of my constituency, but I have been living there for a long time and the children are very dear to my heart. What if an inspector went into a home and discovered that the parent who had decided to home educate spoke no English? What is the hon. Gentleman’s remedy if we are not to have inspectors?
Mr. Gibb: Those issues apply in other parts of the education system. The hon. Lady has been complaining that there are children who are not getting English lessons in the schools that they attend, so I do not think that that is an issue solely related to home education.
Mrs. Cryer: I have never said that children do not get English lessons. They could not possibly join or perform in the school if there were not dedicated groups of reception class teachers teaching them English on arrival. My complaint is that there is no English spoken in the home so they are thrown in at the deep end once they arrive at age four.
Mr. Gibb: I have friends who speak only French in their homes. It is not for me to object to the way those parents bring up their children. We have to be careful what powers we take for ourselves as the state, and this issue treads over the line between the duties that the state has and those that families have for bringing up their own children.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr. Gibb: I will give way to the hon. Member for Battersea and then the Minister, and then I will crack on, if I may.
Martin Linton: Is the hon. Gentleman saying that he and his party would be happy if children in this country were educated without any knowledge of English?
Mr. Gibb: No, I am not. The issues are very difficult and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath said during the debate on Second Reading, things are not satisfactory at the moment, and we will have to look at this issue. But this is not the right approach to tackle such difficult matters. In the words of an old clichÃ(c), it is a sledgehammer to crack a nut, and it is offending tens of thousands of people. That is the problem. We have to consider this again, more sensitively, to tackle the problems that both hon. Members have highlighted.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families (Ms Diana R. Johnson): Will the hon. Gentleman comment on one of the recommendations of the Select Committee? On home education, it believes that the prospect of a child gaining basic literacy and numeracy skills and a breadth of education is right. How does that fit with the hon. Gentleman’s comments on having perhaps only one language in the home, which is not English?
Mr. Gibb: There are many schools in this country where 8 per cent. of young people are not learning to read. The way the Government are trying to tackle such matters is not right. For one thing, it is costing between £130 million and £567 million a year, which will be completely wasted if their approach is designed to change the way children are home educated.
Mr. Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con): I wonder, following the Minister’s intervention, whether—from what she said about the system of local authority inspectors looking to see that a suitable education is being provided— any family who cannot demonstrate suitable English skills will automatically be deprived of the right to home educate? That seems to be the logical conclusion of what the Minister suggested. If that is the message she wants to send out to people in such a situation in this country, perhaps she can say it more clearly.
What kind of logical scrutiny does Diana Johnson’s concern about “a child gaining basic literacy and numeracy skills and a breadth of education” in a language other than English stand? What does she imagine happens in other countries?! Yes, it’s true that children starting at a school where classes are all given in English will probably have problems if they don’t speak good English, but if they’re being home educated in the family language then that problem just doesn’t exist. You can learn numeracy perfectly well in French or Punjabi. I have no direct evidence but suspect that literacy is a much more transferable skill than Ms Johnson thinks and a “breadth of education” whatever that is, is just as likely in Polish as English.
Which leaves me with this uncomfortable feeling that ignorance and racism are at work. Of course the people involved will no doubt throw up their hands in horror and deny such a charge, how DARE anyone accuse them of racism! But still, there they are trying to justify sweeping new powers on the basis of … what? A belief that anyone with a native language other than English is somehow automatically ill-educated and incapable of providing their children with a suitable education?
I’ll do a detailed analysis once the Hansard transcript is published but the long and the short of it is that despite the Labour Whip meaning Schedule 1 survived the Committee stage, the government totally and utterly LOST the argument.
Diana Johnson trotted out the same lies that we’ve all become so familiar with but they sounded very weak today and she came across more than a little bit whiny. Graham Stuart was all passion in a just cause. David Laws, Nick Gibb and Annette Brooke all argued well. We had the pleasure of seeing one Labour member (Caroline Flint) standing up to say she thought Schedule 1 was a bad idea, not that her commitment carried over into a vote of course. Another Labour MP (Ann Cryer) turns out to be a wee bit of a racist, she’s very worried about people talking something other than English in their own homes apparently. If we had a decent system of government Schedule 1 would have died today … what am I saying, if we had a decent system of government it would never have been drafted.
Observations from the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families , received 26 January :
DCSF commissioned the Badman review of home education in January 2009 and the report was published on 11 June 2009. As part of the review, Graham Badman took written and oral evidence from a range of individuals and organisations who responded to his public call for evidence, including home educators and local authorities. Alongside this he also considered published literature, the current legal position and guidance and the approaches taken in other countries. He was also assisted by an expert reference group. I am confident that his report draws from a wide and heterogeneous evidence base.
I am confident that Badman dismissed any published literature that didn’t fit your predetermined outcomes, misrepresented the current legal position and ignored the opinions of home educators and those experts[sic] who did not agree with him. Unlike you Mr Balls, my confidence is genuine and based on observable facts.
The recent Children, Schools and Families Select Committee report also considered the Badman report and was supportive of most of the recommendations. It agreed that a short statement of educational approach would be helpful in establishing dialogue between home educating families and local authorities; that an annual meeting between local authorities and home educators was needed; and that better support for home educators and better training for local authorities would together lead to an improvement on the current arrangements.
That a Labour dominated committee didn’t give Badman’s report the total trashing that it deserved is no great surprise but even they can hardly be said to have given it a glowing recommendation. Not that any of this has much to do with the measures suggested in the CSF Bill.
Home Education registration and monitoring proposals are included in the Children, Schools and Families Bill which has now had second reading in the House of Commons. They will put in place light touch regulation and monitoring arrangements and our guidance will make it clear that this will be proportionate and focused on support and encouragement for home educating families. We have also committed around £21 million in the first year to additional support for home educating families, which has a focus on children with SEN and home educated children who would like to attend FE College courses.
I don’t care how many times you and your minions say that the proposed licensing scheme in the CSF Bill are ‘light touch’ it is and will remain A LIE. It is NOT proportionate. It provides NO support. Your financial commitments in the bill are NOT for support they are for licensing and monitoring ONLY, as Lord Lucas put it, £1,000 per child to audit them.
Home education is an established part of the British education system and the vast majority of home educators who do a good job will find monitoring supportive and-for the first time-backed by real resources. Our reforms will not require home educators to adopt a particular approach, to teach a specific curriculum, or for their children to take SATs tests or specific public examinations. After these reforms are implemented, England will remain one of the most liberal countries in the developed world for home educators to live in.
Home Education is NOT part of your system and that is one of its greatest attractions. *I* do a damned good job of educating my child and would NOT find your licensing and monitoring scheme in the least bit supportive. Again you LIE when you claim that there will be ‘real resources’ made available, there will not. The CSF Bill does NOT provide ANY funding for resources. What your reforms[sic] will require of home educators is at this time totally unknown as the CSF Bill contains no details, simply granting you the power to demand anything you choose, without any Parliamentary oversight at all. *IF* these measures are implemented England will move from being a liberal place for home educators to live into one of the most draconian.
Your ‘observations’ are lies and spin.
The CSF Bill Committee has got as far as Clause 6 which leaves the following with amendments to be debated on Tuesday and Thursday next week:
Children with special educational needs etc
7 School inspections: pupils with disabilities or special educational needs
88 + 170 + 171 + 169 + 172 + 89 + 1478 Right of appeal against determination by local authority not to amend statement
75 + 157 + 233+165Exceptional provision for ill or excluded children etc
9 Exceptional provision of education in short stay schools or elsewhere
166 + 168
192+167 + 187 + 191+158The curriculum
10 Areas of learning
54 + 52 + 238 + 50 + 182 + 53 + 183
148 + 159 + 48 + 150 + 160 +193+ 51 + 161
18611 PSHE in maintained schools
55 + 58 + 106 + 56 + 59 + 77+NC6
76
78 + 57 + 79 + 6013 Sex and relationships education: manner of provision
197+62+17314 Exemption from sex and relationships education
63 + 162 + 163 + 164 + 65+ 64 + 112+195Powers of governing bodies
15 Power to provide community facilities etc
23418 Power to propose new schools
67 + 66School improvement etc
19 School improvement partners
68 + 198+194+87+19920 Provision of information about schools, etc
200+69+201+202+23522 Schools causing concern: powers of Secretary of State, etc
203School teachers’ qualifications
23 Licence to practise
20424 Requirement to be licensed
196Home education
26 Home education: England
210+152+211+213+151+212+215+216+ 214+217+70+107+108+153+218+114
71+110+219+220+109+221+222+111+223 +224
229+230
225+NC5
226 +73 + 115 + 116 + 227+72+231+228
113 + 117Local Safeguarding Children Boards
28 Supply of information requested by LSCBs in England
239+240+241+242+81+205+243 to 248
20630 Review by Chief Inspector of performance of LSCBs in England
82+83+207+84New clauses
NC1 NC2 NC3 NC4
I must admit to being rather surprised that there aren’t any under Family Proceedings, clauses 32 to 41, but even without that, it’s a LOT to get through isn’t it?
as Diana Johnson and others keep insisting, why do they continually use the phrase “safe and learning”? Why keep pushing the almost subliminal message that it’s also about protecting children from abuse when we know there’s no case to answer, no evidence of greater risk?
I think the answer is fairly simple. Public opinion. Joe Public is perfectly aware that not half of state school pupils manage the magical 5 ‘good’ GCSEs so he’s not going to be keen on millions of his tax money being spent making sure a handful of home educated kids get them. The DCSF simply isn’t going to be able to SELL their plan on the basis of improved educational outcomes when their own schools are failing so spectacularly to meet the same target.
Child abuse on the other hand is a PR winner. Say the magic phrase “if it saves just one child” and all debate, all critical thought, is meant to come to an end. People aren’t expected to ask if it’s true, if there’s any proof that whatever-it-is really is a genuine welfare issue and the suggested response proportionate.
If “saving just one child” really was worth any price wouldn’t cars be banned? They won’t be of course because people accept, even if they won’t talk about it, the trade off between lives lost against the convenience and economic benefits of widespread car ownership. However when it isn’t YOU being asked to give something up it’s much easier to get up on your moral high horse and tell other people that what is being taken from THEM is a small price to pay, and it will save a child’s life because the government wouldn’t lie about a thing like that … would they?