Primary school class sizes to be capped at 30 under Labour

Ed Miliband will today reveal the central pledge of Labour’s election offer on education, when he announces a cap on primary school class sizes.

Speaking at the comprehensive in north London he attended as a child, Miliband will say that under Labour class sizes for 5, 6 and 7 year olds will be capped at 30 pupils. No class for that age group will have 30 pupils in for more than 12 months.

More school places would be created in high-need areas, and the practice of opening new free schools in areas which already have a surplus of places will be banned.

The cap on class sizes was pledged by Tony Blair in the run-up to the 1997 election, as part of the “education, education, education” focus. The Coalition Government ended the policy, and the number of classes with over 30 pupils has since trebled. If this trend carried on, there would soon be around 11,000 classes of this size – almost as many as there were when Blair first made the promise in the 1990s.

Miliband will describe the level of money wasted in the free schools programme as “scandalous”, saying:

“Successful teaching and classroom discipline is made harder when classes are so much bigger.

“Since 2010, the number of the youngest children taught in classes bigger than 30 has gone up by almost 60,000. It is treble the number it was. And it is set to get far worse.

“Currently, the government is spending money on new Free Schools in areas where there are surplus places. This simply makes no sense when class sizes are rising in the way they are. Or when people can’t get their kids into the good schools they want.

“So by ending the scandalous waste of money from building new schools in areas of surplus places, we will create more places where they are needed.

“This will allow us to cap class sizes for 5, 6, and 7 year olds at no more than 30 pupils.”

The Labour leader will also promise that children are taught by qualified teachers, and aims to raise the status and quality of vocational and skills-based education:

“If we are to restore the Promise of Britain, we need to equip all our children with the skills and knowledge they need to succeed with excellence from the first steps a child takes to the day they stride into the adult world: education today for the economy of tomorrow.

He will highlight that last year alone 50,000 experienced teachers left the profession, while the number of unqualified teachers in classrooms has risen to 17,000, and that there are now 1.6 million children educated in schools rated less than “good”. This will be tackled by ensuring that all teachers are at least working towards a qualified status, with the introduction of a College of Teaching, introducing a Master Teacher status that can be worked towards, and issuing a “call to arms” to those who have left teaching to return to the profession.

Latest figures show the number of 16-18 year olds not in education, employment or training (NEET) is over 200,000, and Miliband says Labour plan to tackle this with a new focus on skills-based education. This will include compulsory work experience for 14-16 year olds, a new Technical Baccalaureate for 16-18 year olds, Technical degrees, new Institutes of Technical education, and raising the quality of apprenticeships so they offer A-Level standard qualifications.