Labour will fight to retain parents’ voice in the schools system

Last week the Tory mask slipped and their real agenda for our schools system was revealed. Forcing schools to convert into academies will be a costly and unnecessary reorganisation of the education landscape and will do nothing to tackle the real problems in the classroom.

The Tories’ latest wheeze will see parent-governors scrapped, taking parents’ voices out of the running of schools and further reducing the partnerships between families, school leaders and the local community that help so many of our schools to flourish.

This approach to our education system is just plain wrong. It suggests the Conservatives view parents as a part of the problem rather than as allies in the fight for a better education for all children. The Government has form in this area. These new plans to remove the role parents play on governing bodies build on the Government’s decision to get rid of the requirement to consult with parents on changes to school leadership – a decision they took in the Education and Adoption Bill that has only just gone through Parliament. As a result it will see parents’ voices further gagged when it comes to their child’s school.

Parents want to be involved in their children’s education. Evidence shows that when mums and dads are engaged then their children do better at school. Yet the Tories are setting themselves against both this evidence and the wishes of families by shutting parents out of these important decisions on their children’s education.

A recent survey found 97 per-cent of parents feel they should be consulted when big changes are proposed to how a school is run. A similar proportion say that being consulted makes them feel included in their child’s education. Yet, already less than one in five feel this Government is listening to their views.

Not only will the wholesale forced academisation of the schools system ignore the views of parents, it will also be costly and disruptive. It is apparent to everyone except the Tories that smiply turning every single school into an academy will not solve the key challenges in our schools system caused by Tory Ministers over the past five years.

Rather than focus on solving the teacher shortage crisis in our schools; or fixing the broken school places system; or renewing their efforts to tackle the attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and their peers that has widened on David Cameron’s watch, they have decided to embark on a further and unnecessary round of forced academisation. This once again takes education policy away from the fundamentals and drags energy and resources out of the system that could be far better spent improving failing schools and driving up standards for all.

Some 8 out of 10 community schools that are not academies are already good or outstanding. This forced wave of academisation will hit thousands of high-performing primary schools up and down the country. Forcing these head teachers to spend precious time and money on turning their school into an academy and then turfing out parent-governors along the way will have disastrous consequences on outcomes for children.

The schools white paper and the scrapping of parent-governors crystallises the Tory view that parents are not to be trusted when it comes to their children. This is wrong. We’ll fight to safeguard parental choice and voice in our education system as we focus on improving standards for all.