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The Prosser Perspective.... a weekly column from Dover and Deal MP Gwyn Prosser

10 July 2008

Last month I used this column to praise the sterling efforts being made by non grammar schools in my constituency to raise standards, and to criticise the Secretary of State for Schools, Ed Balls for suggesting he would shut down what some commentators described as ‘failing schools’.

There are no failing schools in my patch but everyone connected to the three that were listed shared my anger about the way the matter was handled and I have complained to Ministers.

I sent Mr Balls copies of our local newspapers with their front page headlines about shut-downs and closures, I provided him with the reactions of the effected schools and I spelled out my misgivings about the potential damage caused.

In Parliament I raised the issue on the floor of the House and pressed for a debate and this week I confronted the Secretary of State further at a crowded meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party and asked him to join me in a visit my local schools to explain his actions and consider making an apology.

He said that he regretted the way that the announcement had been reported but went on to say that Labour’s progressive mission is, and has always been, to end cycles of disadvantage so that poverty does not pass from one generation to the next. Instead of preserving opportunity and excellence for some, our purpose must be to actively promote and pursue excellence for all and central to this is breaking the link between poverty and low attainment in education. Everybody should have the opportunity, he said, to fulfil their potential regardless of their background or the income of their parents.

I think most people would sign up to that and it’s what any Labour Government’s education policy should be all about and it’s at the heart of the National Challenge that the Minister launched last month which I strongly support. Its aim is simple but challenging: to ensure that every school gets at least 30% of its pupils achieving five or more higher level GCSEs including English and maths by 2011.

He then talked about the massive progress already made which had whittled down the number of schools failing to achieve the standard to just 638 but in response to my input he said “I am clear these are not 638 ‘failing schools’ - far from it”

In reference to our situation in Dover and Deal where up to 40% of the high achievers are creamed off by the grammar schools he said he knew that it was particularly challenging for non-selective schools in areas where there are grammar schools and that’s why the government does not support academic selection and will not allow new grammar schools but he felt it was right that decisions on existing grammar schools are made locally and he re-stated that he would give extra support to the non grammars in areas like ours.

And he finished by agreeing to a Ministerial visit to Dover and Deal but as to an apology – we’ll just have to wait and see.