Education secretary Damian Hinds appeared before the education committee for the first time this morning. Here are five things he told MPs:
1. He hopes ‘the spread of best practice’ will bring down exclusion rates
Asked about “off-rolling”, Mr Hinds said he would like fewer children to be excluded.
However, when asked whether schools should be held accountable for the attainment of pupils they exclude, he would not commit either way.
The first priority, he said, should be “spreading information” on how the best schools are handling exclusions.
He was also asked about the “off-rolling” of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).
Labour MP James Frith asked whether schools were “overplaying their part” in the “explosion” of alternative provision, adding: “I’m hugely concerned we’re creating an apartheid system.”
Mr Hinds said he wanted to reduce the number of excluded SEND pupils. He said: “A really important role here is to spread knowledge and best practice from the schools that do it particularly well to the others.”
2. Schools can address budget pressures by looking at non-staffing costs
Labour MP Thelma Walker asked what Mr Hinds would say to a headteacher who was losing £550 per pupil as a result of the school funding squeeze.
Mr Hinds said he recognised the “cost pressures” facing schools and that there was more that the Department for Education could do “to bear down on cost pressures”.
But he also highlighted a “variation” across schools in the amount they are spending on non-staffing costs, suggesting there were further efficiency savings to be made.
3. He doesn’t want tighter rules on how schools spend pupil premium money
He said it was right that “we don’t have a prescriptive system”, adding: “Headteachers in a particular school are most likely to know what’s right for that place and it can be a range of things that money is spent on.”
4. There is an “awful lot” of work to be done on improving the attainment of looked-after children
However, he did not appear to support significant changes to the admissions system which, committee chair Robert Halfon, pointed out, has been shown - through a Tes investigation - to be failing children in care.
He said society owes looked-after children “the very best shot” at a good education, adding: “But have we cracked this? Absolutely not... there’s an awful lot more work that needs to be done there.”
5. There are no plans to expand opportunity areas to the North East
Mr Hinds said “more improvements are needed in the secondary phase” in the North East, despite its strong standards in early years and primary schools.
But he said the pupil premium fund - and a range of other programmes and tools - were available to disadvantaged areas.
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