Articles and Speeches

Education Reform - Get on with it
10-Feb-06, Windsor Express Article.

My post bag often contains letters from Windsor parents concerned that their children gain a place at one our excellent local schools.  Indeed at certain times of year, MPs spend much of their time putting the case for children to be granted access to a particular school of their parents choice.

It strikes me that the choice of school is one of the most important decisions that parents make for their children, because good parents will naturally want each child to have the best opportunities possible.

We all want a choice of excellent local schools.  The question is, how do we improve the standards in existing schools?

The Government’s recent announcement of its plans for education was warmly received because good schools would be allowed to expand and enjoy some degree of independence and specialisation away from central Government control.

So it is a disappointment to discover that the Prime Minister may need to water down his proposals so that Labour backbenchers, hostile to any idea of school selection, can be pacified.

But this results in a curious anomaly.  Whilst schools will be allowed to select on the basis of musical or sporting ability, they will not be allowed to select on the basis of academic ability.  This seems to indicate that children lucky enough to be good at football or playing the piano will have greater opportunities than those who are good at maths.  Surely there is some degree of unfairness here.

The Labour Party must sort this out quickly, so that we do not delay some of the excellent educational reforms which are so obviously required to improve the education of our children.