6.14pm on June 2 1997 Theresa May spoke for the first time in the
Commons against Labour’s abolition of the Assisted Places Scheme. I remember it
well – my own maiden speech was in the same debate.
Assisted
Places made a small but important contribution to increasing life chances for
children from more deprived backgrounds, allowing them the same opportunities as
those who could afford the best schools.
The
first legislative act of the Blair government purported to make life more equal
but actually snatched opportunity away.
“I
totally refute the concept that underpins the Bill – that, if everybody cannot
have it, nobody should have it,” Mrs May said, focusing not just on the very
brightest children but on those from “difficult family backgrounds or with
particular social needs” for whom access to independent schools, sometimes
boarding schools, meant a fair chance in life.
Last week Prime
Minister May continued her argument, promising to make Britain a “country that
works for everyone” and
highlighting the underachievement of white working-class boys and a system
seemingly tilted to help the privately-educated to reach the top professions
over those educated by the state.
Improving
opportunity for people of all backgrounds is at the heart of her beliefs – and
everything that she has said suggests that she will be open-minded about how to
achieve it.
Progress in state
schools in recent years has come from a readiness to promote more diverse
provision, to trust schools and head teachers with more freedom and to allow new
types of schools to flourish.
Against
this backdrop, it has increasingly jarred that a Conservative government
maintained New Labour policies. If we believe in choice and variety in education
and we are driven only by what works, how can we maintain the statutory ban on
new selective schools?
As
Justine Greening, the new Education Secretary, said at the weekend, the debate about
grammar schools is no
longer about the binary divide of the 1950s.
The
state grammar schools that remain and thrive today work alongside academies and
free schools with a range of specialisms.
In
a selective area like my own in Trafford, we get the best state school outcomes
in the country but that isn’t driven just by the seven grammar schools. Our
outstanding high schools often outperform all-ability comprehensives in more
affluent areas.
Everyone sensible now
accepts that teaching is best done by ability. This may be through streaming and
setting within a school or it may be done by different schools specialising in
teaching with the right pace and style for their pupils.
Lord
Baker’s excellent University Technical Colleges are specialising in a more
technical offer post-14 and there is a new strain of highly-selective sixth form
colleges.
All
have their place. All can contribute to providing not just the best but also the
most appropriate education for all.
Mrs
May has a great opportunity to sweep away silly ideological hang-ups and embrace
educational models that are proven to work. Grammar schools are not a silver
bullet but they can make an important
contribution.
