Following discussions with the opposition parties, the Government tabled amendments to the Children, Schools and Families Bill to enable some parts of the Bill to be passed into law before Parliament is dissolved. The provisions that remain cover:
- Special Educational Needs (SEN) – requiring school inspectors to report explicitly on provision for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities, and giving parents a new right to appeal if their child’s special educational needs statement is not amended at annual review.
- Alternative Provision – local authorities will be required to provide full-time education for children and young people who for medical, social or emotional reasons, or because they are waiting for a place in a maintained school, are not in school but in alternative provision.
- Powers of Governing Bodies – giving school governing bodies greater powers on how they use their budgets, and the power to set up new schools and academies.
- Local Safeguarding Children Boards – new provisions will be introduced to ensure effective information sharing and strengthen the evaluation of Serious Case Reviews (SCRs) to improve safeguarding arrangements.
- Family Courts – provisions to build public confidence in family courts through allowing greater media reporting of proceedings.
- Amendment to Apprentices, Skills, Children and Learning Act – on the role of the Local Government Ombudsman.
However, some key provisions have been taken out because no agreement could be reached between the Government and opposition parties. These provisions covered the following policy areas:
- The Pupil and Parent Guarantees – which guarantee core rights and entitlements for pupils and parents, including catch-up lessons, 1-2-1 tuition and small group support for pupils needing extra support.
- Home School Agreements – the Bill strengthens Home School Agreements, making them more personalised for each pupil, and new and stronger powers to enforce parents’ responsibilities in supporting the school in maintaining good behaviour including the possibility of a court-imposed parenting order.
- Reform of the primary curriculum – the reforms to the primary curriculum, following Sir Jim Rose’s extensive expert review, provide greater flexibility for schools to tailor teaching to the needs and interests of their children while also focusing on the basics of literacy, numeracy and ICT.
- Introduction of compulsory Personal Social Health and Economic (PSHE) education – the PSHE provisions ensure that all children receive at least one year of compulsory sex and relationship education (SRE) by making PSHE compulsory, and lowering the age at which parents can withdraw their children from PSHE from 19 to 15 years old. Legal advice to the Secretary of State was that increasing the age of the PSHE opt-out to 16 would have made the bill non-compliant with the ECHR.
- The new Licence to Practise for teachers – this licence, accompanied by a contractual entitlement to continuing professional development, will establish the professional standing of the workforce and provide teachers with the status they deserve.
- Registration and monitoring of home education – following Graham Badman’s independent report into home education, these provisions put in place a valuable tool for local authorities in their work to safeguard all children.
- School Improvement Partners (SIPs) – the powers of SIPs will be updated so headteachers receive peer support, and challenge.
- Data for the school report card – the new school report card gives fairer and more accurate accountability for schools and gives parents even more information about the schools their children attend.
- Schools eligible for intervention and schools causing concern – the Bill strengthens local authority powers to intervene in schools causing concern, and more powers for the Secretary of State to intervene where improvement is not good enough.
- Youth Offending Teams – the Bill gives powers for the Secretary of State to intervene where an inspection or other evidence reveals a significant failing in a Youth Offending Team (YOT) which may be putting young people or the wider community at risk.
- Parental satisfaction surveys – this duty on local authorities would require them proactively to seek parents’ views on the range and quality of secondary school places in their area and then act on their responses.
The remaining stages of the Bill will be debated in the House of Lords tonight and the House of Commons on Thursday, 8 April.