Official Report 296KB pdf
We will resume with item 3 on the agenda, which is a consideration of the evidence that the committee has taken for the Standards in Scotland's Schools etc Bill. All members have a synopsis of that evidence, along with a note from the clerk. We must decide today how to present our evidence to the Education, Culture and Sport Committee. We can delegate a member, or members, of this committee to give evidence to the Education, Culture and Sport Committee on 1 March; submit a written report to that committee; or do both. Perhaps if we decide between those options first, we can go on to discuss the actual evidence.
Our synopsis is an important piece of work, because all the evidence indicated considerable dissatisfaction that an equality perspective had not been built into the bill. As far as I can see, the Executive has indicated only that it will include the assumption about mainstream education for children with disabilities in the bill at a future date. That is important, but people might have questions about what it actually means. There has been no movement on issues that were raised by groups such as the Commission for Racial Equality and the Equal Opportunities Commission, so this committee and the Education, Culture and Sport Committee should produce a written report that encapsulates those organisations' main points, if the committees agree with them. Furthermore, perhaps more than one member should attend the Education, Culture and Sport Committee to speak to the report. This is an important test case; the bill is very important and we will be failing in our duty if we do not feed into it.
Are members happy with Malcolm Chisholm's suggestion?
The members who will attend the Education, Culture and Sport Committee can work with the clerk to produce the report. Are there any volunteers?
I could produce a draft report that might be circulated to committee members for comments beforehand.
Could we have another volunteer? It might be better for two people to go along. Johann?
My perspective is probably too hidebound by teaching.
Two teachers would not be that terrible.
Do any other parties want to be represented at the meeting?
Will the process involve producing a draft report that will then come back to the committee?
The time scale is the problem.
There is no time. The synopsis of the evidence contains all the points that we might include in the report. We must delegate the matter to the clerk and the members who will report to the Education, Culture and Sport Committee without bringing the matter back to the committee. Are members happy with Malcolm Chisholm and Johann Lamont reporting to the Education, Culture and Sport Committee, or do other parties wish to be represented?
I will take the opportunity to provide a non-teacher perspective.
Is that agreed?
The CRE's paper is in the form of line-by-line amendments to the bill and is probably more appropriate for stage 2 of the bill. Do members agree to keep that on the back burner until a more appropriate time?
Do members want to go through the Scottish Parliament information centre's synopsis page by page or do they want to highlight particular aspects? It might be useful to hear from the members who will report to the Education, Culture and Sport Committee.
Although the committee agreed with the general thrust of the Equity Group's evidence, we were aware of the resource implications and of the fact that it was more appropriate that some groups of children should not be in mainstream education. For example, I recently visited a school for the deaf. The percentage of deaf children in the community is so small that the children would suffer total isolation in a hearing environment, and it is better for that particular group of children to be in a non-hearing environment where they can communicate fully with everyone. Although it is better for most children to be in mainstream education, that is not true across the board.
There are very good examples of units for the hearing-impaired in secondary schools. The choice should not be between being totally isolated in a mainstream school and going to a specific institution; there should be flexibility. The Equity Group's point that the bill should include an assumption that those children would stay in mainstream education made sense. To be honest, that probably applies to any disability. It is quite remarkable how provision can be made imaginatively where there is no special provision.
Achievement Bute gave an example of the difficulty that it has with assessments for mainstreaming. We should try to skew the balance towards the children and their families. At the moment, the assessment seems to be directed towards stopping children getting into mainstream education. Parents should have the right to put their child through mainstream education; it should be for local authorities to prove that that is not possible, rather than for the parents to have to fight for that right. We must shift the balance.
In some cases, a child's educational needs could be met by a mainstream or local school, but a residential school is necessary because the respite and support package is not available at home. I raised that point when the Equity Group gave evidence. Children often go to residential schools because of behavioural problems, rather than because their educational needs cannot be met. If there is to be a presumption in favour of mainstream education, it must be clear that the support that will be needed by the family must also be in place. Although that point is not a direct concern of the Education, Culture and Sport Committee, it is worth making.
The evidence from the Scottish Executive education department took matters further in terms of involving pupils in decisions about their education. The education department gave more general evidence on a range of discrimination issues, not just those that relate to children with disabilities.
Is the point about ensuring that employers' views on education are taken into account something that we thought the department was not pursuing sufficiently, or were we concerned that it was pursuing it too rigorously?
The summary says that
If employers are saying that there is a skills gap, that should be recognised and acknowledged. However, it would be difficult to discover the balanced position of employers in determining the curriculum.
That is not an equal opportunities point. The education department has given evidence to the Education, Culture and Sport Committee and we need to pick up on points that relate specifically to equal opportunities. The education department asked for the inclusion of anti-racist education and gender equality issues in the curriculum; other organisations have also asked for that. The committee would support that. The inclusion of quality objectives and performance indicators was probably a more important point about which the committee might want to make representations to the Education, Culture and Sport Committee.
I want to make a general point. I did not have this material until very late—
It was sent out last week.
I am not blaming anybody; I just did not bring the material with me.
Does everyone agree?
Do you have enough information to write a report?
The question is whether members disagree with anything, or whether we can presume that we agree with most of the evidence.
Let us move on to the Equality Network's evidence. We should not cover in our report the point about the clarification of the impact on local authorities of section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988. We will take evidence on that when we consider the ethical standards in public life bill. The Education, Culture and Sport Committee may expect us to make some comment on that.
Perhaps it would be more appropriate for us to comment on the review of the guidelines that will take place as a result of the possible repeal of section 28.
It is difficult to comment on something that is just being set up. I hope that in time we will have an opportunity to comment on the guidelines; the Education, Culture and Sport Committee should also have that opportunity. We are at the start of the process. We can comment only on the make-up of the panel that will consider the guidelines.
We could make the general point that the guidelines will have to satisfy equality standards.
Yes, we could say that.
The issue of attracting men into the teaching profession is much more complex than this paper presents it as—I am not sure that the EIS presented it as it is here. Men who come into teaching are more likely to be promoted than women are. We have to be careful about how the issue of the relative attainment of girls and boys is presented. The temptation is to blame women for their own lack of ability and attainment and then to blame them for boys' lack of ability and attainment because we do not teach them properly. We must not reinforce attitudes and assumptions about male and female jobs. I do not concur with the view that boys do badly because they are taught by women. The EIS and the Equal Opportunities Commission made many interesting points about how girls come through the education system and how they progress beyond the education system regardless of their attainment levels at schools.
You are stressing that we should ask the Education, Culture and Sport Committee to consider that whole area rather than saying to it that we need to attract more men into teaching.
We will probably need to re-examine the evidence of the EIS and the EOC. The issue is not as simple as saying that we need more men in teaching and that boys do badly in school because they do not have positive male role models. It is partly about our attitudes to women and women teachers, and therefore to teaching generally; those attitudes are perhaps getting fed through to boys' attitudes at school.
Some parts of the EIS's evidence, such as the material on devolved school management, are perhaps outwith the remit of this committee and we should not focus on them. As Malcolm Chisholm said, anybody who disagrees with any of the evidence that the committee has heard should let us know. Moreover, members should give us a steer on the priorities in the evidence that is within this committee's remit. We will have a limited opportunity and should use it to highlight the collective priorities rather than trying to cover everything.
Are there any views on the evidence that was jointly given by the Commission for Racial Equality and the Centre for Education and Racial Equality in Scotland? Are there any problems or issues on which members wish to expand? Members can refresh their memories by reading the more detailed evidence and can then ask Johann Lamont, Malcolm Chisholm or Shona Robison to take specific points on board. Of course, those points will be the views of individual members rather than the agreed position of the committee—that is not a problem, as it can be made clear in the report.
The degree of overlap between the views of the CRE and the EOC is noticeable, even though they are discussing different things.
If anybody wishes to feed any comments into the Education, Culture and Sport Committee meeting on 1 March, they should pass them to Malcolm Chisholm, Shona Robison or Johann Lamont at least three days before the meeting.
I thought that the Education, Culture and Sport Committee wanted something by 23 February.
I am sorry; you are right.
Is the Education, Culture and Sport Committee meeting on 23 February or does it want submissions by that date?
The Education, Culture and Sport Committee wants to receive our submission by 23 February.
It wants the submission by 23 February; the meeting is on 1 March.
Members should pass their comments to Martin Verity at least three days before 23 February.
Convener, should we work up a draft quickly on which members can comment, or should we wait for comments before we produce a draft?
You should work up a draft first. Members should make their comments to you as soon as possible, but the time scale means that it is not feasible to pass the draft around for members' comments. The committee has delegated Malcolm Chisholm, Shona Robison and Johann Lamont to produce a report.
You do not want us to show the draft to members?
If you have time to do that, you can, but, given the time scale, the committee cannot insist on it.
Perhaps the draft could be circulated to committee members as an e-mail attachment.
That is fine if there is time. However, we should be aware of the pressure on members to produce the report in the time scale that has been set. We went through the evidence and did not find anything to which any member took exception. It would be useful if members could see the draft report, but we should not insist on that.
We will aim to produce a draft report this week.
That is agreed. That was a very ambitious statement from Malcolm Chisholm—good luck.