Clarke calls for education crusade
The Secretary of State for Education has urged the Labour Party to join him on a “crusade” to improve education and child care provision across the country.
Charles Clarke though refused to back down on the controversial policy of introducing university top-up fees, saying: “It was controversial. But it was essential to enable our universities, which are world-class, to thrive and grow to meet the aspirations of our young people.”
“And there is a limit to the amount we could ask taxpayers to contribute when there are so many other competing priorities, like investing in the futures of under-5s.”
In his address to the Labour Party conference, Charles Clarke told delegates that “education is the route to opportunity for every citizen” and that it “enriches our life. It increases our choices. It empowers us in the decisions we have to take.”
Outside the benefits of education for the individual, Mr Clarke stressed the social and economic benefits for society as whole, pointing out the need for education in the new knowledge society, and that “over half of all those sent to prison have no qualifications at all. Many cannot even read or write.”
Outlining his education vision, Mr Clarke said: “Poverty is not a barrier to success. Failure is not inevitable. Cynicism is not warranted.
“Educational opportunity for all can be a reality and not just a slogan. Education is opportunity in action.”
Looking to the future, he said that the party should be proud of what has been achieved, but must be more ambitious still. “Our ambition must be to create for every citizen, throughout their life, the educational inspiration and support which enables them to fulfil their aspirations and raise their confidence and achievements.”
He promised an “education and childcare revolution in the early years, before 5′ with the development of ‘high quality, flexible and affordable’ universal childcare, extended hours in primary schools so that: ‘By the end of the next Parliament primary schools will offer parents and pupils education and childcare from 8am to 6pm all the year so that children have a genuinely exciting choice of learning, sports and cultural activity and families can make the best choice to balance their home and working lives.”
There would also be a continued investment in refurbishment of secondary schools and investment in new technology as well as an expansion of the specialist schools programme. Mr Clarke also promised a reform of the 14-19 curriculum, following on from the Tomlinson report due to be published shortly.
He also promised an extension of educational skills and training programmes offered in the workplace to tackle the “appalling backlog of those millions of adults who do not yet have the equivalent of five good GCSEs.”
Mr Clarke’s political Shadows were unimpressed with his comments. Conservative spokesman Tim Collins, said: “Labour’s rhetoric on education gets more and more outlandish – Charles Clarke is talking about it as his “crusade”, but once again it is all talk. Ministers are now running from one desperate measure to another as the evidence of falling standards mounts daily.
“The fact they are trumpeting the success of City Academies is a clear admission of failure of all the other initiatives they have tried to impose on our schools.”
The Liberal Democrat spokesman, Phil Willis, was equally scathing. He said:”Whilst the mantra of choice is paraded before the electorate, what parents desperately need, particularly in early years, is a guarantee of high quality service delivered locally.
“The Liberal Democrat pledge to match Labour on child-care, but divert the wasteful Child Trust Fund money into reducing infant class sizes to 15, delivers what every parent wants – yet only the private sector provides.”
