Political parties, like people, have obsessions. They might be idiosyncratic or mainstream; based on evidence or a hunch; serious or minor. But, like an unreachable itch, all these obsessions demand to be scratched periodically and, in education policy, Tories are riven by itches.
One of their most intractable obsessions is the grammar school. In 1998, Tony Blair’s government banned new grammar schools (a good fact to remember for the next time you are branded a Red Tory). For actual Tories ever since, the ban has been the itch that cannot be scratched. For many Tories, a politician’s support for new grammar schools is proof that they are ‘one of us’. Hence, in recent weeks, the chairman of the Tory backbenchers has called for a new wave of grammar schools and the new education secretary has said that she is ‘open minded’ about it. If she truly is open-minded, most of her colleagues are not.
For grammar schools are an obsession and, like many obsessions, this one is both idiosyncratic and based on nothing more than a hunch. Grammar schools make up only around five per cent of English secondary schools. Caring so much about grammar schools is a substitute for thinking in any way about the pupils who attend the other 95 per cent of schools. And the grammar school obsession is ideology, pure and simple. There is no evidence at all that grammar schools improve social mobility, but there is plenty of evidence that they damage the vast majority of children who do not happen to jump through the 11-plus hoops. This is an obsession about the few, not the many.
Why should the education secretary talk about what teachers actually do in the classroom, or of raising standards for all pupils, or of funding teachers and schools properly when she can plough the well-furrowed fields of her party’s ideological obsessions? Her predecessor tried the same trick with academies, relying on an article of faith that the only way to raise standards is to force every school to academise, against their will if necessary. Her only problem was that she mistook a personal obsession for a party one, and her party rejected her. As the last two months have shown us, where Michael Gove treads, the Tory party does not necessarily follow. Justine Greening’s message on grammar schools shows that she might understand the location of the Tory itch better than Nicky Morgan or Michael Gove did.
In the light of this ideological obsession from the Tories, surely there must be space for a sensible Labour education policy? Labour’s approach to schools has generally been pragmatic rather than ideological. Parents do not want ideological tub-thumping – they just want a decent local school for their children. Labour created academies pragmatically to drive up standards in the poorest-performing schools, not because ministers thought that only academies could succeed. They were a response to a problem, not an ideological obsession. You might say that what mattered is what works – no longer.
That allows space for Labour to claim the mantle of sensible, evidence-based approaches to improving education for all children, and particularly the poorest. Yet, when faced with ideologically obsessed Tories, the temptation for some in our party seems to be to adopt an ideologically-opposed, yet equally-obsessed position. The Tories say that every school must become an academy, whether parents, teachers and governors want it or not. So some in Labour argue that no school should become an academy, even if the school community wants it. That is policy based on ‘I’ll take your fundamentalism and raise it’ and it will not wash with the vast majority of parents or voters.
Instead, Labour needs a policy which is focussed on improving standards, rather than obsessing over structures and then scrabbling around for pseudo-evidence to justify their actions. Labour should focus on what goes on in the classroom – how do we instil a lifelong love of learning in every child, while preparing every child for their futures outside school? And while the Tories wallow in their obsessions, Labour should focus on the real challenges affecting education. How can we narrow the gap in achievement between the richest and poorest students, which should be seen as a national disgrace? Why are so many teachers leaving the profession, not to be replaced? Why are school budgets being cut while demand rises? Why are so many school buildings not fit for purpose? How can teachers be afforded the respect and autonomy that their profession should confer?
None of those challenges will be addressed by opening more grammar schools or forcing every school to become an academy. But Labour will not make itself a credible opposition by being a mirror-image of the Tories’ ideology. It is time that all politicians rose above this and put students first, not their own obsessions.
———————————
Mark Rusling is cabinet member for children and young people in the London borough of Waltham Forest. He tweets @MarkRusling
———————————