Financial Education

4.34 pm

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): I apologise to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and to the Minister if it turns out to be necessary for me to leave the Chamber before the end of the debate.

It is almost a year to the day since I spoke in this Chamber about the need for better financial education in schools. I talked about the patchy or non-existent current provision in so many schools and about the sad results of the lack of financial capability, which I witnessed over many years in my community law firm. It was apparent not only in the levels of debt but in the breakdown of relationships and health. There is a huge cost to society of providing debt advice—essential though it is. Currently, citizens advice bureaux receive around £27 million, much of which is for debt advice.

The main thrust of my argument then was that better financial education is necessary because prevention is better than cure. Shortly after I spoke, the all-party parliamentary group on financial education for young people was founded. I am sure that I speak for all my colleagues who have served on the parliamentary inquiry

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into the need for better financial education for young people in schools when I say that it has been a real privilege to serve on that inquiry. It has been one of the most fulfilling roles that I have undertaken in my short time in this House. I pay tribute to the chairman of the group, my hon. Friend the Member for North Swindon (Justin Tomlinson) and to the chairman of the inquiry, my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy), for their vigour in leading this work and for the fact that this week, a substantial report on financial education and the curriculum has been published. I have to say also that they have stolen all of my good lines.

During the course of the inquiry, we took evidence from dozens of witnesses. I pay particular tribute to two witnesses from my constituency. David Black, who has recently retired, was head teacher of Alsager high school. He has spent years co-ordinating volunteer educators who advise young people in schools in Cheshire and train teachers to deliver financial education under the banner of “debt cred”. Will Spendilow of New Life church, Congleton, was one of those volunteer educators. Last year in Cheshire, 7,000 pupils benefited from this “debt cred” advice. Those pupils are fortunate, but what of the many across the country who receive no such advice? Even more worrying is the fact that many teachers do not feel up to the task of teaching financial education.

Our inquiry found that the whole area of financial capability urgently needs addressing. Some 70% of 18 to 25-year-olds are in debt. People in their 20s are the least capable age group in making ends meet, choosing financial products and balancing a budget. This lack of financial capability has cost Britain nearly £250 million in bank charges and penalties alone, and 71% of people say that a lack of basic financial understanding is to blame for debt.

While young people are faced with a financial world of baffling complexity, they are vigorously targeted at an early age by retailers and lenders and assaulted by a consumer culture that raises for them unrealistic lifestyle expectations. Our report found that two thirds of people in the UK feel too confused to make the right choices about their money and more than a third say that they do not have the right skills to manage cash.

In the 12 months to the third quarter of 2011, approximately one in 361 people became insolvent, which is significantly higher than the annual average of one in 1,655 people over the past 25 years. It was clear to us that without fundamental changes to the way in which individuals manage their money, the problem would continue to grow. Financial education is a long-term investment and a solution to what is now a widespread national problem. Teaching people about budgeting in their personal lives is also an essential basic component to equip the work force with the necessary skills to succeed in business and drive forward economic growth.

Where will young people improve their financial literacy, the costs of which are clearly set out in our report, if not in school? It is not from their parents; our inquiry found that a third of teenagers’ parents had never talked to their children about budgeting. They will not learn it from the banks; the era of the trusted family bank manager who knew people and took a personal interest in their financial welfare has long gone, although many banks do provide support for financial education

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in schools, which is valuable. It would be wrong to rely on voluntary organisations to give advice, although many do provide excellent advice; organisations such as Christians against Poverty, which was originally founded to help those in debt, has now moved into the proactive area of providing courses on personal financial management, and I commend it for that. However, such organisations should not be relied on to provide financial education, particularly in schools. That void makes it essential for financial education to be taught in schools to all young people before they enter the world of work and are faced with some of the financial challenges to which I have referred.

Let me now comment on the recommendations. The first is that personal financial education should be a compulsory part of every school’s curriculum, and that it should be assessed. David Black, whom I mentioned earlier, has said:

“Unless you test, it will not happen.”

I recall an amusing exchange at one of the inquiry’s evidence sessions. I said, “As a mother of two teenagers, I know that nothing focuses a pupil’s mind like an exam.” One witness responded, “And nothing focuses a teacher’s mind like an exam.” We also found that in 20 countries across the globe financial education is already compulsory, and has been for many years. It would be interesting to see whether they share our nation’s debt problems.

Kevin Brennan: The report says, and the hon. Lady has just said as well, that personal financial education should be a compulsory part of every school’s curriculum. Does the hon. Lady mean that the Government should make it a compulsory part of every school’s curriculum, or was that merely an exhortation that she thinks should be out there in the ether?

Fiona Bruce: I believe that it is such an important issue that space should be made for it in both the PSHE and the maths curriculums. Another of the recommendations makes that very suggestion: that financial education should be cross-curricular, overlapping with maths and PSHE. Pupils made clear to us that they enjoyed financial education. One said:

“I thought it was really interesting because, personally, I learnt a lot and a lot of my peers said they learnt lots too.”

We all know that we learn more when we enjoy a subject, and it seems that including financial education in the maths curriculum could well aid maths learning overall, which would be an important added-value benefit.

Again and again, teachers told the inquiry of their sense of inadequacy when it came to teaching financial education. It was almost a refrain. They talked of significant barriers to teaching it well, particularly their own lack of confidence in their knowledge of the subject, as well as a lack of awareness of suitable resources. One of the most important recommendations in the report is to establish a quality kite mark from a trusted body, which would assure teachers that if the subject took up valuable curriculum time, that time—if Members will pardon the pun—would be well spent.

The last recommendation that I would like to mention—by no means the least important—is that there should be a financial education champion in every school. Another head teacher giving evidence to the inquiry said:

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“if you asked me for the number one thing, and that is to have a senior member of staff responsible for it as the champion, who has enough resources or enough clout to draw people to work at it. Then you will find it will come together.”

It is vital to ensure that members of the next generation are better equipped than those of the present generation to make informed financial decisions, for the sake of their well-being and that of our whole society. That applies to a host of areas: mental and physical health, relationships and family life, career prospects and entrepreneurialism. I believe that, over time, investment in financial education will reap exponential benefits for our society, and I urge the Minister to give constructive support to the recommendations in the report that was published this week. Let us work towards prevention rather than cure.

Adding Social Value to Public Procurement

25^th November 2011

 

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): May I, too, pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Chris White) for the foresight, diligence and perseverance with which he has brought forward the Bill? He has already achieved much by influencing mindsets and stimulating public debate, and those involved in the commissioning of and bidding for public services have already become much more aware of the importance of social value to the process. So, even before the Bill has passed into law, I congratulate him on all that he has achieved.

In opposing the new clauses proposed by the hon. Member for Harrow West (Mr Thomas) I must say that if a key aim of the Bill is to stimulate and encourage creativity and innovation in the growth of social value and social enterprise, particularly locally, and if, as I think we all agree, we are on a journey in that respect, much can be achieved, as my hon. Friend has already demonstrated, without unnecessarily defining or delaying the process through a national strategy. Let us get on with it and see the Bill passed into law.

The broad potential improvements and impact of the Bill are substantial. I shall touch on some of them now and, if time permits, on some of the ways in which, in my local authority already, there is refreshed thinking about the importance of considering social value when awarding contracts.

One of the key merits of the Bill is its proposal to expand and embed the concept of social value in the bidding process for public sector funding, and that is true not just when social enterprises are involved, but when private sector providers compete against one another. Providers are likely to lever social value into many more submissions for public funding, and in that respect the Bill will have an exponential effect on the bidding landscape.

The Bill will, I hope, introduce more flexibility to tendering. When I discussed it with the head of CVS Cheshire East, she said that the tendering processes need reviewing and

“need to be relevant to the service that is being commissioned”.

She went on to say that

“grants are often used to encourage creative solutions to a need or problem…A tender often doesn’t enable this to happen, as the method for solving the need has already been set.”

Another way in which I hope the Bill will add social value is by opening up the often complex and baffling area of public procurement to smaller local social enterprises. They work at the grass roots of their community and with an ear to the ground, and they are often best placed to work most effectively for their communities and to add social value by levering in, for example, volunteering, but until now they have felt that the bureaucratic barriers to tendering have been just too great. For local authorities to say, “We welcome you, recognise what you have to offer and are going to proactively work with you through the application process to help you successfully bid,” will be a real step change for such enterprises.

Many faith-based organisations augment our local communities, adding so much social value through youth work and work with the homeless, the elderly, the addicted and the lonely and in many other areas, but in recent years they have felt discouraged from applying for public sector funding, perhaps because of concerns that in procurement their ethos does not tick all the right boxes. I therefore hope also that, as a result of the Bill, they will be encouraged to make such applications in future. So often, what injects faith-based organisations with their tremendous energy, dedication and perseverance springs from that very ethos, and in a truly diverse society let us celebrate, not seek to neutralise it, because at the end of the day all organisations have an ethos; none can be wholly devoid of one, or totally neutral. So let us welcome such valuable organisations fully into the public procurement process. The Bill sends out the right signals in that regard, and I welcome that aspect of it.

I now quote some specific comments on the Bill from social enterprises in my constituency and cite some examples of good practice among them, showing how very much they welcome the Bill. Plus Dane is a housing association based in Cheshire and Merseyside that manages 12,500 homes and works as a neighbourhood investor. Mike Doran, its manager, who is based in Congleton, said:

“I believe the Bill will be of great benefit both to organisations such as ourselves but also to the wider community of locally based social enterprises…The need to demonstrate social value within procurement activity will ensure that a double bottom line of both economic and social good can be generated.”

I congratulate Cheshire East council as a forward-thinking council in this respect which absolutely recognises the value that organisations, community groups and social enterprises can add to our community livelihoods. I am delighted that in the recent past it has worked with Plus Dane on various projects. Plus Dane is delivering grounds maintenance and environmental service to the local authority. It is providing training and work for young people who have been long-term unemployed or have a history of getting into trouble with the law, enabling them to go on to gain full-time employment elsewhere. Plus Dane is working with the council in the provision of house building, with 35 apprentices, and it is supporting the development of a local apprenticeship initiative in Congleton that has involved the chamber of commerce, Congleton town partnership and local schools. This type of project is laudable, and this Bill will encourage a far greater recognition of such partnerships across local communities, which can make an exponential difference.

Another example is an enterprise called Visyon, which provides advice to young people who are suffering from abuse, the results of family breakdown, bullying and so on. It recently acquired devolved premises in my constituency through the local authority community transfer of assets scheme. In this respect, I commend the work of the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears), who did so much to instigate that scheme. The hon. Member for Harrow West, who is not in his place, talked about the possibility of assets going out on the cheap. Visyon has received a local hall that was not being used to its maximum potential. The local authority has awarded it a contract that will enable those premises to support the development of many other groups across the constituency and their work within the local community. It is not about assets being passed across on the cheap but about a broader, better and more beneficial use of those assets for the whole community.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington. I feel privileged to have been able to support him on the journey that this Bill has undertaken, and I will continue to do so in future. I look forward to its outworking right across our nation.

Fuel Prices Debate

15^th November 2011 – 4.40pm

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): The high cost of fuel is impacting detrimentally on families, pensioners and businesses in my constituency, comprising as it does rural areas interspersed with market towns. I want to concentrate particularly on the small businesses in my constituency and the impact that it is having on them.

In my constituency there are just a handful of large businesses, the largest of which employs just over 500 people, but there are 4,000 small businesses, which are therefore the engine of the local economy. For most of them, car travel and other vehicle travel is not an option but a necessity. As someone who has run a small business for 20 years, I know the reality behind the phrase “living on the margins”. That is a constant reality for many small businesses today. Because transport costs are a substantial component of their outgoings, fuel price rises have eroded those margins to almost unsustainable levels.

Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) (LD): I share my hon. Friend’s concern about small businesses, and I recently found a statistic of which she may not be aware. Over the past year the UK’s 4.8 million small and medium-sized businesses have paid over £260 million more for fuel than they did only 12 months ago. Does she agree that sometimes the price of fuel becomes a step too far for small businesses?

Fiona Bruce: I entirely agree. Small businesses are being forced into an impossible predicament. Do they transfer the increased costs to their customers, do they lose their customers, or do they sacrifice the making of any profit just to keep going, which is not sustainable in the long term?

Esther McVey: We are talking about small businesses, which I too represent here today. In the Wirral there is the double whammy of not only increasing fuel prices but increasing toll prices. Marginal profit is completely wiped away when both of those are taken into account.

Fiona Bruce: My hon. Friend makes a very good point.

Let me give the House some specific examples of small businesses in my constituency that are suffering in that way. Smallwood Storage Ltd is a transport and storage business in Sandbach employing nine people. This week it told me:

“We need a level playing field, the price of fuel has become too high as a percentage of our overheads and is out of proportion

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with the rates we charge. As a small business, we do not have the power of larger companies and are being squeezed from all sides.”

Another local company, B Lakin Transport, a haulage businesses in Somerford employing 10 people, said:

“Increased fuel costs have knock-on effects on everything…as the price continues to creep up, customers will go elsewhere and even look to foreign drivers who can use cheaper fuel from the continent; avoiding the extortionate prices in Britain.”

It continued:

“A driver from Luxembourg can fill up their petrol tank in Luxembourg at a fraction of the cost here. In October 2011, 1000 litres of unleaded fuel would cost £1130 in Luxembourg compared to £1350 in the United Kingdom—that’s a saving of £220 each time the tank is filled.”

Let us remember that haulage competitors from Luxembourg can fill their tanks there, drive to the UK and then return to Luxembourg without having to fill up here at all. B Lakin Transport tells me:

“Combine this with the exemption from road tax for foreign drivers, and we are clearly at a significant disadvantage to these foreign drivers from the outset.”

Mr Watts: Does the hon. Lady agree that it is very important that we are honest with the British public in saying exactly what sort of cut we are looking for? I expect that the level that the Chancellor will look at will be a lot less than is being suggested here today.

Fiona Bruce: Through the motion, we are asking the Government to explore a number of ways in which they could assist small businesses, such as the ones that I am describing, with this predicament.

I will cite another business in Cheshire. It is not a small business, but it is an interesting comparison, because it is not a haulage company. Roberts Bakery is a large family business that produces bread in Northwich, just outside my constituency. Just yesterday, it informed me that the increase in fuel prices since last year alone has added £10,000 a week, or £500,000 a year, to its delivery costs. That is a serious additional overhead for such a family company.

The price of fuel is hindering such businesses from playing their essential role in the economic recovery and job creation that we so desperately need in this country. It is effectively pricing UK businesses off the road, driving people out of work, preventing companies from taking on and holding on to contracts, and fuelling further economic difficulties.

I signed up to support the motion, and I applaud all the other Members who have done so. I ask the Government to consider as a matter of urgency the impact that high fuel duty rates are having on local economies such as the one in my constituency, and to take action to address the issue accordingly.

Sex and Relationship Education

Sex and Relationship Education – 25th October 2011

12.1 pmFiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom) for raising this important issue. I congratulate her on an excellent speech on a subject that is of great concern to parents in my constituency and across the country. I welcome her positive contribution and her constructive ideas, as well as the fact that she has expressed concerns about some of the educational materials in primary school classrooms.
The debate is about how, when, where and what sex and relationship education should be promoted in primary schools. Crucially, it is also about involving parents in deciding content. Equally, it is about promoting the outcome I think we all want: a generation of young people who fulfil their potential in all areas of life, including personal relationships.
Although “Sex and Relationship Education Guidance”, which was published in 2000, gives schools guidance on working with parents, such work is not a requirement. The guidance says:
“Schools should always work in partnership with parents, consulting them regularly on the content of sex and relationship education programmes.”
In practice, that does not appear to happen, and there is no legal requirement for schools to enter dialogue with parents. The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) queried whether graphic content of the type that has been described was causing parents concern, but a group of parents came to see me in my
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surgery because they were concerned about the content of the sex education materials that it was proposed to use in a primary school; I think they were based on some of the media productions mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire. The parents felt there was no appropriate route for them to register their serious concerns about the content of those educational materials, so they had to come to see me about them. The opt-in requirement my hon. Friend proposes for parents would ensure that there was such a route.
My hon. Friend’s positive contribution is welcome. The previous Government should perhaps have considered rating the content that could be used in this sensitive and delicate subject. As the hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay (Stephen Gilbert) said, the evidence shows that this country should be far from proud of its levels of sexually transmitted disease, teenage pregnancy and relationship breakdown, and one cause among others for those things may be the lack of parental involvement in our sex education content.
We should be moving towards an environment where, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire said, parents make a more active choice regarding the material they believe is fit for purpose for their child, and where they can actively opt into the curriculum. If they participate in that way, it might improve the dialogue between themselves and their children, which might be a better way forward for our society.
Pamela Nash: I appreciate the point the hon. Lady is trying to make about parents being more involved in making these decisions in schools, but does she not agree that the children of parents who do not opt into SRE if they are given the option will be at serious risk of receiving no SRE at all?
Fiona Bruce: If we have a satisfactory procedure, such as that proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire, schools and the responsible teachers hon. Members have described should ensure that that does not happen.
Let me add another suggestion to those that have been made. To aid parents and schools, the Government could create a website where varied sex and relationship tools and programmes could be explained. That would offer schools, governors and, above all, parents a diverse range of options. The recently launched ParentPort website is a model of how we could move forward and engage parents and others who are concerned about content. The website was recently launched by the Prime Minister as a result of the Bailey review and is aimed at helping parents to navigate the regulatory media and broadcasting framework. I was struck by the fact that within a few days of its launch about three weeks ago, 10,000 people had registered concerns. That shows the desire of many—I am sure many parents were among those who registered concerns—to have a say over such issues.
I am glad the Conservative-led coalition Government are taking their localism agenda forward. For it to be a success, an informed citizenry is required, and that is as true in respect of relationship and sex education tools as it is of any other area.
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Rural Broadband

Rural Broadband (Cheshire East)

4 pmFiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): I will first speak about the need for rural broadband, particularly of the superfast variety, in Cheshire East. I will then go on to describe the benefits it will provide for that area and the wider region, to talk about the gaps in coverage and funding, and to ask for reassurances and a response from the Minister.
Cheshire East council considers that investment in superfast broadband is the single greatest action that can be taken to drive economic growth and improve the quality of life of residents. The area served by the council includes my constituency of Congleton and those of Macclesfield and of Crewe and Nantwich, and I am grateful to the Members who represent those constituencies for being here today, and also to my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat), to whom I will refer later.
The local enterprise partnership has designated the roll-out of superfast broadband across the area, and across the wider area of Cheshire West and Warrington, as its top priority. The Cheshire and Warrington superfast broadband partnership has been established by three local authorities—Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, and Warrington—which, working together, aim to achieve 100% superfast broadband coverage by 2015. To maximise the economic, social and environmental benefits for businesses and residents right across the region, that aspiration exceeds Broadband Delivery UK’s 90% target. Much of what I say today will be in support of the work of that partnership, and I shall highlight the needs of constituents in Cheshire East.
The economic growth that the area needs, particularly to provide jobs for the next generation, will largely be driven by small businesses, and in my constituency it will be almost entirely so, because almost all its 4,000 or so businesses are small. They need the high speeds that superfast broadband provides to be able to compete nationally and globally with their more urban competitors that already have the service. Superfast broadband will enable them to offer existing services at lower costs, expand their market reach, increase productivity, develop new products and provide new services. The area needs high-speed broadband not only to ensure that existing businesses develop but also to attract new ones, but the benefits would not be for just businesses. I heard recently of a business man who was considering relocating to the area but was deterred by his school-student son, who said that he did not want to move because of the poor broadband connections.
It is not just the young who want high broadband speeds; the elderly, and the public and voluntary sectors that serve them, recognise the transformational social impact that comprehensive superfast broadband can bring, through technology that supports health care delivery. This includes telehealth, which is the remote capture of information for clinical review, telecare, which is a range of alarms and sensors in the home to enable independent living, and medical consultations through video teleconsultation. In the Cheshire East area, with its considerably higher than average ageing population, the benefits would be substantial. An excellent example, which demonstrates how the council is keen to capitalise
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on the use of technology to benefit older people, is the recently developed DemenShare scheme. This is a web-based scheme through which dementia sufferers and their carers can access and share support and know-how.
The need for superfast broadband in rural areas is well documented, and Cheshire East has a higher level of rurality than one might realise.
Karen Bradley (Staffordshire Moorlands) (Con): I am pleased that my hon. Friend has secured this important debate, and I welcome much of what I have heard about the introduction of high-speed broadband in Cheshire East. However, the benefit will be spread much wider than the residents of Cheshire because many of my constituents receive their broadband and their telephone line through the Congleton exchange.
Fiona Bruce: That is a point well made. Staffordshire Moorlands is a highly rural area, and it will benefit exponentially from the support.
Cheshire East is 64.4% rural. Rural areas can benefit disproportionately from investment in superfast broadband, and they are there to be benefited. The growth rate in VAT-registered businesses in rural areas is 2.7%, compared with a decline of 0.3% in England and Wales as a whole. Home-based businesses are becoming increasingly important in rural economies. An academic study by Mason and others reported that 50% of businesses in rural areas are home based, compared with 26% in urban areas. In a more local study—of Alsager, in my constituency—of which I was advised by the Alsager partnership, it was calculated that approximately one in 10 homes hosts some form of home-business working.
Bearing in mind the historically low levels of state-funded investment in recent years in many rural areas—including in my constituency and in Cheshire East as a whole—compared with their urban counterparts, there is significant potential to add economic value through superfast broadband investment. England’s rural areas host at least 27% of the country’s enterprises but only 9% of its business revenue. There is genuine potential, and superfast broadband is the platform for unleashing it in Cheshire East.
Turning to the benefits that superfast broadband coverage will provide, I have already touched upon those for the rural economy and for older people. In addition, exponential benefits can be gained in this region as a result of the already-skilled entrepreneurial population. The area is home to a high proportion of knowledge-based industries. In my constituency, there is already a significant presence of digital and creative industries, with a potential for great growth that could be magnified by the benefits of comprehensive superfast broadband coverage. Lying as it does just beyond the main commuter belts of Manchester and Liverpool, the high-level digital connectivity to new business provided from MediaCityUK in Salford has a particular potential to provide transformational impact, both in strengthening existing businesses and in promoting the area as a business location of regional significance. For example, a graphic designer who is able to download large files quickly could work efficiently mainly from home in Cheshire East, with occasional face-to-face meetings in MediaCityUK.
Turning to the educational benefits for our young people, educational attainment is higher than average in Cheshire East, and that is important because young
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people are likely to adopt superfast broadband and play an important role in using it to create and distribute content. In a constituency from which a disproportionate number of young people have migrated in recent decades to find work, it is particularly important for the intergenerational balance of our communities that we provide work for, and retain, young people within the area, and superfast broadband will be a key factor in ensuring that. In other words, the social and economic returns to the region—and, in turn, the support for the national economy—from investment in superfast broadband through a combination of private and government funding will, I am assured, be disproportionately greater in the Cheshire and Warrington area than in many other regions.
Guto Bebb (Aberconwy) (Con): I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. It is fair to say that some of the issues she has raised and the opportunities she has identified are similar across the border in north Wales. Does she agree that in rural areas an industry that would benefit greatly from increased access to fast broadband is the traditional agricultural community? In view of all the paperwork and forms that have to be completed online these days, that community needs superfast broadband.
Fiona Bruce: I agree, and I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. When I speak of the rural economy, I speak on behalf of the farming community in my constituency.
What current gaps in coverage and funding do Cheshire East and the wider Cheshire and Warrington sub-region seek to cover through the superfast broadband initiative? At present, 67% of the population of Cheshire East is covered, a figure provided by Ofcom in August 2011. That figure will increase to 86% by next year through private investment, mainly from BT, leaving a 14% gap representing 50,932 Cheshire East residents. The funding allocation for the area from Broadband Delivery UK will bring the figure up to 90%, but there are complications with the date and procedure for releasing that funding. I will return to that issue later.
The Cheshire and Warrington superfast broadband partnership is also seeking funding from the European regional development fund, but ERDF allocations will not be finalised until March 2012. Meanwhile, the BDUK approval framework will not be concluded until May 2012, leaving a disconnect between the two sets of funding, which are effectively interdependent. I am grateful to the Minister for having met me and representatives from Cheshire East some weeks ago to discuss the issue. I will appreciate his comments today, after his agreement to look into it. Underwriting such funds could be a considerable stretch for local authorities in these constrained economic times.
David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con): I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate and recognise some of the concerns that she is discussing, particularly broadband access in communities such as Rainow—which I think she will mention in a minute—those in the peak district such as Wincle and Wildboarclough, and Flash in Staffordshire, Moorlands. Is it not important for Government to signpost further and give local authorities such as Cheshire East greater support in securing access to those funds? It is not clear how to secure them quickly and in a co-ordinated way.
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Fiona Bruce: I agree entirely that the picture is confused and detailed. As I will mention later, it is also split among Departments.
The total funding needed to achieve our aspiration of 100% broadband coverage across the Cheshire and Warrington area by 2015 is £40 million. Although we welcome the BDUK funding support, we recognise that under current plans, it will increase coverage only to 90%. The rural areas to which my colleagues have referred will be among that 10%.
David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con): I, too, congratulate my hon. Friend on leading the charge in this debate and on this subject. During her remarks, I think I have heard the word “rural” two dozen times. Does she accept, however, that it is also an urban issue? In parts of Warrington, urban development has massively outstripped broadband infrastructure capability, and the need there is as great as in some of the rural areas mentioned by her and others.
Fiona Bruce: I agree entirely. Chapelford, which I know well from my time as a Warrington councillor, is one such area. One cause of difficulties is that although approximately 85% of telephone exchanges can be upgraded, about 15% of telephone cabinets are deemed by the private sector to be uneconomic or unfeasible to upgrade. BDUK financial support will not necessarily include those, either. Will the Minister comment on how they will be provided for, particularly in the areas to which we have referred?
In some areas, broadband coverage appears on paper to be provided, but the area contains white spots. Timbersbrook in my constituency is a good example—it has no adequate coverage at all—as is the Congleton business park. In the neighbouring constituency, the village of Rainow, only a couple of miles outside Macclesfield, is similarly affected. I heard a councillor for the area say only this week that it is faster to post a letter than to use the internet there.
Mr Edward Timpson (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con): I join the chorus in congratulating my hon. Friend on securing this debate, which is timely given the efforts being made in Cheshire East to introduce superfast broadband across the county. Will she add to that list some areas in my constituency? Businesses have contacted me that are already operational and want to expand, but are frustrated by extremely poor telecommunications infrastructure. If we are to attract new businesses to our county as well as keeping existing ones, we must ensure that we can provide them with that secure future.
Fiona Bruce: Absolutely. If we in the county of Cheshire are to achieve our aspiration to compete with the northern cities, we need that infrastructure in place for our businesses.
Funding is available from the European regional development fund—£43 million has been allocated to the north-west region as a whole—and Cheshire and Warrington will bid for £15 million to add to the £3.24 million in BDUK funding and the £430,000 secured from the rural development agency. It is hoped that the balance of the required money will be matched by the private sector. However, the £15 million bid to the ERDF is aspirational. We believe that Cheshire and Warrington have a strong case for the additional economic
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and social benefits that investment from the fund would secure for the local, regional and national economies, and a strong case within the north-west for securing that sum.
I am aware that there are other bidders to the ERDF funds for the north-west allocation for superfast broadband. Any comments or suggestions from the Minister on how funding towards superfast broadband in Cheshire East and the wider region might be secured from alternative sources, should our £15 million bid not be successful, would be appreciated. Will he also confirm whether today’s announcement from Europe of a further £8 billion in superfast broadband funding is new money? If so, how can our aspiration, and those of other areas of the UK, to attract money from that funding provision be improved?
I seek further support from the Minister on streamlining the time frame for the BDUK and ERDF funds. Also, as my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (David Rutley) mentioned, interdepartmental help could be provided to streamline the complex application process for local authorities.
Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con): I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. I am grateful to her for mentioning my home town of Rainow. I wonder whether she can do something about the mobile phone signal, which is also weak. Earlier, she mentioned young people leaving Cheshire, Congleton and so on. Young people need places to live, and there is a shortage of affordable homes for newly-weds and young people. Does she agree that any future planning permissions should include good broadband provision as a condition?
Fiona Bruce: I agree entirely. I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention; his constituency is part of the Cheshire and Warrington partnership area.
At present, various Departments are involved in funding streams. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport—we are grateful for the Minister’s presence here—is responsible for the BDUK allocations, while European funding for broadband lies within the remit of the Department for Communities and Local Government, and rural development funding is under the control of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. In summary, Government support, which is much appreciated and clearly demonstrates the importance the Government place on this issue, is found across Departments. Any help the Minister can give to ensure that funding streams, time scales and application procedures are harmonised would be appreciated.
While I am discussing Government support, I commend the Government’s work on digital inclusion through the website Race Online 2012, which is dedicated to promoting digital inclusion among older people. I ask that similar thought be given to promoting small businesses’ use and maximisation of the benefits of technology, particularly superfast broadband, perhaps through a national business-focused campaign similar to Race Online 2012. It would encourage a groundswell of interest from businesses, which could in turn encourage much-needed additional private sector investment.
In conclusion, it is projected that a superfast broadband-enabled Cheshire and Warrington could add up to £197 million of growth annually to the region, create
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5,500 jobs in the area over the next 10 years, and provide innumerable valuable social and economic benefits to the whole connected community.
4.20 pmThe Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey): I am grateful for the opportunity to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hood. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) on securing this debate. She and I have already met executives from Cheshire East council to discuss the issue. I also know from her own personal history that, before entering the House, she did some extraordinary work in her local community, which she continues to represent forcefully now that she is in Parliament. There could not be a stronger champion than her for broadband in her part of the world. I also thank my hon. Friends the Members for Macclesfield (David Rutley), for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley), for Crewe and Nantwich (Mr Timpson), for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb), for Warrington South (David Mowat) and for Weaver Vale (Graham Evans) for their interventions, which show the astonishing amount of engagement and interest from colleagues in this important issue.
I want to use the brief time remaining to outline the progress that we have made in bringing greater broadband access to rural areas, and to try to answer some of the specific points that my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton has made. It is the coalition Government’s aim to have the best superfast broadband network in Europe by the end of this Parliament, with 90% of households having access to superfast broadband, and universal broadband access of at least 2 megabits. It is an ambitious programme, but we have secured more than half a billion pounds to ensure that it happens.
As my hon. Friend has said, in her constituency some 14% of premises are unable to receive a good level of broadband, even after the private sector investment that is already taking place in the area. One in five people live in a rural community, and rural communities are home to more than 1 million businesses, so this is not just a “nice to have”—getting broadband out to rural areas is essential to our economic growth, as my hon. Friend has made clear. Reliable broadband also underpins the social fabric of our rural communities.
We published our plans for superfast broadband in detail at the end of last year. Through Broadband Delivery UK, the Government are working with local authorities and the devolved Administrations to ensure the delivery of broadband infrastructure to those areas that the market will not reach on its own. We have announced indicative funding allocations for every local authority area in England. As my hon. Friend has pointed out, £3.2 million has been set aside for Cheshire and Warrington. If that can be matched with local funding, we believe that that will make it possible to bring superfast broadband to 90% of properties, and standard broadband to all premises.
We are not dictating to each local authority how it should go about installing broadband in its area. It has been our view from the very beginning that local communities and, therefore, local authorities are best placed to determine their own priorities. Every local authority has therefore been asked to produce
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local broadband plans for each area that set out its approach, how it will deliver the economic benefits from broadband, and how it will ensure local match funding. Many local authorities throughout the country have made clear, detailed and imaginative proposals, and I am confident that this is the right approach.
As my hon. Friend has indicated, I was able to find out about the good progress being made on Cheshire’s plans when I met her and officials from Cheshire East council recently. In my view, the Cheshire local broadband plan is well on the way to being ready, and my officials in BDUK are working closely with council officials on it.
I realise that match funding, particularly money from the European regional development fund, to which my hon. Friend has referred, is key to Cheshire’s broadband future, as well as that of many other parts of the country. We have vigorously pursued the issue with colleagues in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Department for Communities and Local Government, to try to ensure that broadband can be funded from the north-west region’s programme, and likewise in other regions. We need to ensure that expenditure on broadband is consistent with the ERDF regulations. We recognise the critical nature of this funding to Cheshire and, indeed, others, and I want to make sure that we give as much scope as we can to allow funding for broadband projects.
I will briefly indicate the nature of the problem. Given that ERDF funds exist to promote economic growth and are, therefore, targeted at small and medium-sized enterprises, it has been a task to try to get some flexibility in the programmes. As my hon. Friend has made clear, a pipe going into a domestic home that houses a graphic designer will clearly promote economic growth, but, under current ERDF regulations, that would not be seen as funding to support economic growth, because it would not be going directly to business premises. We have, however, secured a revised definition of the final mile with DCLG, which should allow ERDF funds to be applied. The issue is with DCLG at the moment, and it is important that we work with it to communicate the revision to local offices of DCLG around the country. The issue was raised at the ministerial group on growth, and there was agreement that DCLG needs to address the issue. We continue to work with it on it.
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We are also awaiting decisions from the cabinets of Cheshire councils to underwrite the ERDF funding, in lieu of a decision on ERDF to speed up so that we can speed up project approval of the local broadband plan. I would be happy to write in further detail to my hon. Friend on that progress, and to the Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark), to impress on him the need for clarity from my hon. Friend’s point of view.
The procurement process has been mentioned. There are 40 local broadband projects across the country. We have worked with BDUK to put a framework contract in place to speed up the procurement process and to help local authorities minimise the costs and time taken for procurement. We also have to be mindful of physical limitations. Clearly, we cannot network the entire country at once and it will be important, as I think my hon. Friend has indicated, to ensure that we progress projects in a timely manner, to ensure that the operators who win contracts have the resources to implement them.
We are making a number of other key policy interventions. We will publish a second consultation on the deployment of new overhead lines, which should allow the deployment of broadband much more cheaply. Next month, we will issue guidance on microtrenching and street works. I also impress on my hon. Friends how important it is for them to work with local councils to ensure that the planning process is as simple and as low-cost as possible for operators when they are laying new fibre.
Finally, we have commissioned a review of the electronic communication code and how it applies to wayleaves and access to private land. I recently wrote to the Country Land and Business Association and the National Farmers Union to ask them to speed up the voluntary agreement at which they are meant to arrive to ensure that wayleaves can be dealt with. We have also made significant progress in reducing the cost of access to BT’s ducts and poles. At the Conservative party conference, the Chancellor announced an additional £150 million for mobile coverage.
I hear what my hon. Friend says about responsibility being parcelled among a number of Departments, and I agree with the implications of her remarks, namely that the responsibility should be mine. I hope that she will lobby the Prime Minister on that later tonight.

Video of this speech can be found at http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/house_of_commons/newsid_9617000/9617597.stm

High Speed 2

5.16 pm

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): As a north-west MP, I wish to represent the concerns that my constituents have expressed to me both in correspondence and at

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meetings. The area of Cheshire that my constituency covers lies some 25 miles south of Manchester. Over recent years, journey times to London by rail have improved and the area is now well served, with a journey time of less than two hours from Euston. On the basis that stops reduce journey times, a new HS2 track is likely to run through or near my constituency but with no HS2 stops or links. An area that is currently well served might find not only that HS2 bypasses it, but that existing services become fewer and slower. Services from Crewe and Stoke-on-Trent, both of which serve my constituency, could suffer considerable disadvantage. Passengers from London using a new HS2 line could have to travel north to Manchester, then make a connection and return south on a local line. It is difficult to see how there would be much, if any, time saving on a journey from London.
Let me turn now to the economic regeneration argument. The north-west is a wide area, and although HS2 might benefit the area immediately around Manchester—assuming that is the key north-west HS2 stop—it is questionable whether such benefits would radiate across the north-west region so as to benefit constituencies, such as my own, that are further afield. There is the additional concern that the flow of economic regeneration could be towards London and away from the north-west, so a project designed to bridge the north-south divide could have the opposite effect.
The cost, some £32 billion, is perceived by many of my constituents as an inordinate amount of money at a time of severe economic pressure for the questionable benefits they will gain, particularly the many who do not use train travel at all. Several transport pressure points in my constituency are of far greater concern to them, and attention to those would immediately bring clear economic benefits to the area and the region, including freeing up not just local traffic but the M6 traffic flow from Birmingham up to the north-west.
Notably, those would include opening up to passengers the Middlewich rail link, which is currently used only for freight, improvements to junction 17 of the M6 at Sandbach, and action to protect the Holmes Chapel community from the excessive speed and volume of vehicles that they constantly endure. All those issues could be resolved at a fraction of the £51 million that I understand would be the cost of HS2 to my constituency.
When it comes to international travel, it is unlikely that an HS2 line north of Birmingham to Manchester would make much material difference to residents in my constituency, living as they do half an hour from Manchester and only a little further form Liverpool airport.

Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con): May I clarify something? On the one hand, my hon. Friend is saying that living near Manchester airport is a good thing for her constituents—but is she also saying that living near the Manchester hub for high-speed rail would not be a good thing for them? I do not see how the two ideas run together.

Fiona Bruce: I am saying that to travel from London to the north-west by HS2 would not benefit my constituents materially. Nor would it benefit them to travel by HS2 down to the continent, because it is quicker, and certainly more economical with the current fares, to go from Manchester or Liverpool airport.

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I agree that there is a strong case for enhancing the capacity of our inter-city rail network, including the west coast main line, but there are a number of solutions that could be achieved at a fraction of the cost of HS2 to my constituents. Many of those solutions have already been mentioned, such as improving provision for freight transportation or signalling. Others include improving the integrated regional network to take communities out of their cars in the north-west, increasing the number of platforms at Manchester Piccadilly to improve the commuter trains that are available, and increasing track numbers between Crewe and Manchester. I accept that the route of the extension from Birmingham to Manchester has not yet been specified, but I want to assure my constituents that if it runs through any part of my constituency, with the attendant environmental and other damage to farmland, residential areas and communities, they can be assured of my vigorous opposition to any such plan on their behalf.

Religious Education

Westminster Hall

17^th May 2011



Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): I am privileged to raise the role of religious education in schools under your chairmanship, Mr Brady. A number of colleagues have joined me for today’s debate; I thank them.

First, may I state that I know that the Secretary of State for Education takes very seriously the issue of enabling every child—whatever their background—to achieve their full potential by promoting the highest quality of educational standards? He is doing a sterling job in that regard and I thank him for that.

I turn specifically to religious education in schools. Hon. Members will all be aware that RE in schools is, and has long been, a compulsory subject. The Government do not intend to change that. That is good. If RE is important enough to be compulsory, why not include it in the English baccalaureate? In late 2010, the Secretary of State announced that the new E-bac certificate will be awarded to students who achieve grades A* to C in English, maths, science, a foreign language and a humanity. Of the humanities, the choice is history or geography. Why not add RE to the humanities choices?

In response to that question, the Secretary of State has answered:

“because it is already a compulsory subject. One intention of the English baccalaureate is to encourage wider take-up of geography and history in addition to, rather than instead of, compulsory RE.” —[Official Report, 7 February 2011; Vol. 523, c. 10.]

That sounds laudable, but there are serious concerns that that will produce unintended consequences. Since school league tables will now take into account the percentage of students awarded the certificate, the E-bac is increasingly being emphasised as the primary qualification for 16-year-olds, and the teaching of RE in schools risks being undermined. Indeed, according to new research by the National Association of Teachers of Religious Education, one in three schools, in a survey of nearly 800, say that they will significantly reduce the amount of resources and numbers of teachers dedicated to teaching RE in the approaching academic year. In a recent joint letter published in The Daily Telegraph, leading academics revealed that 45% of university teacher training places in RE have been cut. Therefore, non-specialist teachers will be left to teach the subject.

One reason for varying quality in RE provision in the past—less so today—has been the lack of RE teachers who are subject specialists. There has been considerable progress in increasing their numbers, due in part to the popularity of the subject at GCSE and A-level. If that progress is reversed, the overall quality of RE teaching, even as a compulsory subject, could suffer. The status of the E-bac means that, already, fewer pupils are opting to study RE, as discussions that I have had in my constituency have shown.

Why is RE so important that so many people are asking for a reconsideration and for its inclusion as a core E-bac humanities subject? Before I explore that question, I should say that the many people I refer to include 100 MPs, who have signed an early-day motion tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Stephen Lloyd), calling for just that. That was doubtless prompted in large part, as I have been myself, by constituents’ letters, representations from local schools

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and a public petition signed by more than 115,000 members of the public. That petition was promoted by the REACT campaign, which stands for putting religious education at the heart of humanities, and it has successfully united religious leaders from a number of faith groups, including Christians, Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs.

Why is RE important? It is important because it is a subject taught distinctly from other humanities subjects. It is quite different from the RE, or scripture, that many of us of a certain age may have studied by learning passages from the Bible by rote. Admittedly, that sometimes produced unintended consequences—some humorous, such as the answer in an exam paper that an RE teacher told me about. In response to the question, “Who was most disappointed at the return of the prodigal son?”, a pupil wrote, “the fatted calf”.

Today’s RE has moved on, as I know from closely looking at the subject with one of my sons, who is a GCSE RE student. Today’s RE is not about promoting one religion, but about understanding many and understanding many other aspects of life from a faith perspective. My son tells me that RE includes topics such as environmental issues, discrimination, law and punishment. It also includes an understanding of the cultural and religious values of different peoples and faiths. One sixth former, who recently studied GCSE RE along with total of nine GCSEs, told me:

“it was the only subject in which I got to discuss current affairs and responses to them.”

Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con): Perhaps RE has become so wishy-washy that it is not worth preserving.

Fiona Bruce: I dispute that. My hon. Friend would, I think, respect my view, on which I shall elaborate now.

Religious issues are frequently at the top of any news agenda. Today’s RE helps young people make sense of that and wider world affairs. It also promotes community cohesion, as it allows young people, who are growing up in a diverse society, to discuss and understand the views and opinions of people whose beliefs and values differ from their own, in the safety of the classroom environment. One RE student told me:

“many societies and cultures have strong religious foundations and understanding their methodology and thought was very helpful. I thoroughly enjoyed it.”

Enjoyment is key to learning well. We all learn better when we enjoy it, and GCSE RE is popular. In the past 15 years, the number of students taking GCSE RE has quadrupled from 113,000 to approximately 460,000. The Archbishop of Westminster, the Most Reverend Vincent Nichols, has said:

“In an increasingly confusing world, Religious Studies gives young people perhaps their only opportunity to engage seriously not only with the most profound philosophical questions concerning human existence and the nature of reality, but also with the most fundamental ethical dilemmas of our day”.

Where else will our young people obtain that? To put it more grittily, I cite a real life example from a teacher of almost 30 years’ standing, who has taught near where I have lived for much of my life. She has been a deputy head teacher with management responsibility for developing spiritual, moral, social and cultural values policy in schools. She recalls:

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“On the day after 9/11, a 12-year-old Muslim girl ran to me in tears saying that she had been taunted, chased and threatened on her way to school. Other pupils and youngsters, many older than her were accusing her of being responsible for the destruction of the twin towers and multiple murders. She was identifiable because of the colour of her skin and she wore a scarf. Up until that day, there was no evidence of…any problem. She had received interest and questioning, but she never experienced hatred. Overnight, the media’s coverage and the need to find someone to blame meant that she became a target. She was the only Muslim child in a mostly white school. There had to be an immediate response to identify the main bullies, but for many weeks, through RE, there was specific teaching about Islam and Islamophobia. The outcome was positive, with the girl being accepted and becoming a senior prefect who was respected and valued by others.”

Cultural diversity is explored through teaching RE. Pupils are able to share their beliefs, arrange church visits, demonstrate how a turban is worn, demonstrate how others pray, bring in homemade food for festivals and share the meaning of specific rituals. As well as promoting community cohesion and giving young people an insight into their own and other cultures and heritage, RE also supports pupils in articulating moral judgments and dealing with misfortune, death, loss, and issues in their neighbourhoods and workplaces. It prepares them for adult life.

As one teacher told me:

“good RE teaching can promote positive values for young people and society.”

She cited the example of James Delaney, a twelve-year-old boy from a Traveller family, who was murdered in Ellesmere Port in Cheshire. She speaks from a close perspective, with experience of teaching in the boy’s area. She said:

“Traveller children often have strong religious views…however, if they move into communities, there can be hostility…often their children in school…are exposed to bullying in response to what they may hear their parents and other adults saying. Getting pupils to empathise and ‘step into the shoes’ of a family whose 12-year-old son was murdered…because he was a traveller, proved to be a powerful way of challenging perceptions and wrongly held views, as children should not be held to blame for things their parents do.”

RE lessons also develop transferrable skills such as critical analysis, essay structure and general written and verbal language skills. Those benefit other subjects as pupils learn how to express and articulate their views and, equally importantly, to respect those of others. Questioning, reasoning, empathy, philosophy, values and insight are all highly valuable skills fostered within RE learning. One student told me:

“It focused my thinking on areas of abstract thought, it improved and developed my analytical skills and logical reasoning”—

quite powerful points, in his own words, from a student who has recently studied GCSE RE. Another pupil told me how each essay is commented on according to the qualities of K, U and E——knowledge, understanding and evaluation—which appeared in the margin of all his essays and had to be demonstrated.

Research among 1,000 16 to 23-year-olds has found that 83% felt that RE could promote understanding of different religions and beliefs, while more than half agreed that it had had a positive influence on them. So what would be the negative results, however unintended, of excluding RE from the E-bac as proposed?

Currently, most state secondary schools arrange their timetables with a humanities bloc of geography, history and RE. An experienced teacher told me that

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“under the new system if RE is not part of the E-bacc, I can foresee that schools will no longer want to pay exam fees as it will not be acknowledged in the new targets or E-bacc. Pupils will be forced to study either geography or history and will not have space on their timetable to study a full GCSE in RE. Whilst RE remains a compulsory subject, it will have to be taught, but it will be relegated and in pupils, parents and many teachers’ eyes, it will soon become the Cinderella subject it was many years ago.”

RE, even as a compulsory subject, might be increasingly merged with PSHE—personal, social and health education—and citizenship at key stage 4, something I understand Ofsted does not appear unduly concerned about. If those subjects are merged, to overcome a timetable or time issue, staff might not be specialist RE teachers, and the more media-focused or sensational topics within PSHE and citizenship might dominate. Scaling back might also affect the post of RE adviser, a role that ensures that appropriate importance is given to the content of the RE syllabus in response to the needs of a local community, taking into account such factors as the numbers of a particular religious or ethnic group.

RE might not be taught or advised on by specialists to the standard of other subjects, and fewer students and teachers might be able to understand and communicate the impact of religion on culture, society and current affairs. Without that guidance, young people might find it more difficult to cope with the more difficult moral, philosophical or cultural challenges that they find today; to form good relationships with others, especially those of a different cultural background; or to maintain secure values and beliefs enabling them to make good rather than bad choices, in particular in early adulthood. It is also argued that without RE, the influence of simplistic or extreme sources of information on religion could increase, at the risk of greater stereotyping and prejudice; a less tolerant society might ensue.

If faith schools continued to prioritise GCSE RE, they might fall down the school league tables. Some schools might even stop offering GCSE RE as a separate subject or course, putting resources into priority E-bac subjects to raise or maintain the school ranking. Students who devoted time to study GCSE RE could be penalised, as it does not qualify as an E-bac subject.

What am I asking the Minister to do? Primarily to protect, support and sustain the increasing improvement of religious education in our schools, ideally by including the GCSE full course on religious studies as one of the humanities choices in the E-bac, in addition to geography and history. Students could be able to opt for any one of them, or, under a changed specification, to take two of the subjects, so that history and geography retained the same status as currently proposed under the E-bac. Whether or not the Minister responds favourably to that request, which, as I mentioned at the outset, has huge public support, RE will remain a compulsory subject for all school students, even if they do not study GCSE RE, so I ask the Minister to consider my next points as well.

It is critical that RE should not be unintentionally downgraded, that the teaching of RE as a compulsory subject, quite separately from the teaching of GCSE RE, should be accorded the priority it merits, and that appropriate signals should be sent out to such effect from the highest level. Will the Minister kindly consider how the Government can ensure that the appropriate resources are applied to the teaching of RE in schools and that an appropriately robust approach is taken

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regarding the nature of such teaching and of the Ofsted inspections for the provision and quality of RE? That would reaffirm the important role of RE in schools and its vital contribution to the whole school curriculum. It would recognise RE’s importance to pupils as a preparation for the character that they will require in adulthood, as well as throughout the whole of a child’s school life.

Family Policy

Westminster Hall

4^th May 2011

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Meale. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee) on securing this important debate. I thank her and my other hon. Friends in Westminster Hall today for all the excellent contributions that they have made.

This debate on family policy comes at a particularly auspicious time following the royal wedding, which I mention because I believe the most important relationship is marriage. I believe that Government should support marriage, particularly for the sake of children—many of which I wish upon the happy royal couple, in the fullness of time.

Like many of my hon. Friends in Westminster Hall today, I have practised in the field of law. I did so for well over 20 years—actually, nearly 30 years, but I was reluctant to say that—as the head of a high street law firm. As a result, I do not have a completely doe-eyed view of marriage. In my time practising law, I witnessed the incalculable cost of relationship breakdown, not least the financial price and the personal price paid by children. However, even after taking that cost into account, I still believe that it can be argued persuasively that marriage is good for the stability of family life and that stable families are good for society.

That being the case, if a key question in policy making is about fairness, why do many parents who choose to marry feel penalised for doing so by our tax system? Fiscal policy that was intended to help single mothers, which is a wholly worthy cause, has created the odd situation whereby some couples who want to live together actually live in separate homes because the tax system rewards them for doing so. On a national scale, that is terribly wasteful, not only because shared housing is more efficient but because, as we have already heard today, cohesive family life brings immeasurable benefits to both individuals and society as a whole.

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In a research paper produced by the Christian charity CARE in January 2011, “The taxation of families 2009/10”, Phillip Blond, the director of ResPublica, wrote:

“The family is the most fundamental, basic and rooted unit of society…The centre of the family, the thing that holds it together…is the relationship between parents… There is an increased unwillingness for parents to commit to each other which has given rise to a significant increase in cohabitation which in turn has major implications, not only for adults but also for children… A child born to cohabiting parents has a nearly one in two chance of living in a single parent family by the time they reach their fifth birthday, whilst a child born to a married parent has only a one in twelve chance of finding themselves in this situation. The consequences are far reaching. Children from lone parent families—who today constitute nearly one quarter of all children—are 75 per cent more likely to fail at school, 70 per cent more likely to become drug addicts and 50 per cent more likely to become alcohol dependant. Girls from fatherless homes are an over-represented demographic in teen pregnancy statistics, while boys from fatherless families are typically over-represented in criminal gangs.”

Even if one’s ideals do not include marriage as a public act of commitment, there is evidence that marriage as an institution is mutually beneficial, both to the partners in the relationship and to society as a whole. It is also the most important factor in predicting a child’s well-being. Some see supporting marriage through the tax system as regressive, but I see it as progressive.

In the UK, we support single parents financially—directly or indirectly—because it is right to recognise that bringing up children is a hard job at the best of times, particularly if one is more or less alone in doing so. Many single parents are courageous, self-sacrificial and deserve commendation. Sadly, it is also true that many children who grow up in a single-parent household live in poverty. That is not right, but it is also true that almost half of children who live under the poverty line come from two-parent households. It seems wrong that we should incentivise single parents through the tax system to remain single, simply because of the financial benefits that that status affords.

Other research shows that it is harder for couples with children to lift their children out of poverty than it is for single parents. Again, I quote from the CARE paper:

“Although designed to deal with child poverty, tax credits are now locking children into poverty in working households, especially couple households. The latest poverty statistics are those for 2008/2009 which show that of the 2.8 million children living in households with incomes below the official poverty line (60 per cent of median equivalised income), 1.5 million were in households with one or both parents in paid work, 1.3 million (a number that is increasing) were in couple households… The problem arises because tax credits do not take account of the way income is measured for calculating the number of children in poverty. The DWP say that a lone parent with two children would have required net income of £293 per week to be on the poverty line, whereas a couple with two children would have needed £374 per week. However, a couple family’s entitlement to tax credits is the same as that for a comparable lone parent family. Couple families therefore have to earn more, but because of the way the means testing formula works they receive fewer credits… However, there is a further problem. As pre-tax income increases, tax credits reduce… In 2008/09, a lone parent would have needed to earn only £95 per week to be out of poverty. By contrast, the couple family would have needed to earn £283 per week.”

For a number of years, CARE has been pointing out that many couples would be better off financially living apart than living together. Seventy-eight per cent. of the families in CARE’s sample were shown to be better off living apart, even after the additional housing costs

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were taken into account. Families find themselves better off living apart principally because of the way in which tax credits are structured and means-tested.

Mr Alan Meale (in the Chair): Order. May I ask the hon. Lady to proceed very quickly? I need to call the Front Bench speakers.

Fiona Bruce: Certainly, Mr. Meale. I will conclude my remarks.

Marriage is good for society. It is a public institution as well as a private relationship, and as such society as a whole has a stake in supporting the family unit. If society benefits from the family, as it undoubtedly does, families should benefit from society and its fiscal policies, especially for the sake of our children and their children.

Mr Alan Meale (in the Chair): I thank the hon. Lady for speeding up. It is unfortunate that she was called at the very end, but we have to give the Front Benchers time to speak.