Time For Change in Education. Vote Labour
The SEA publishes its election statement. Reverse the damage the Tories have inflicted and start rebuilding a fair, more democratically accountable education service
The Tories have caused a major crisis in state education through underfunding, marketisation and central ideological control. Child poverty is reaching record levels. Absence rates among pupils are increasing, the attainment gap between disadvantaged children and others widening, and teachers are leaving in droves. Provision for children with specials needs and disabilities (SEND) is being cut back leaving the most vulnerable bereft. School buildings are crumbling. Early years provision is in crisis too through underfunding and privatisation. Apprenticeship schemes are inadequate and post 16 vocational students are forced to follow untried T level courses, whilst successful qualifications are being defunded. There is a blatant attempt by the Tories to make courses in the arts and humanities unviable in universities which cater for a more working-class intake. Universities are under threat from the current funding regime based on tuition fees and restrictions on recruiting international students.
The Tories have created their own ‘blob’ made up of academy chiefs, OFSTED and a few chosen academics to run the system. They ignore and actively deride the voices and experiences of the profession through their professional and subject associations and their education unions. Most academics, parents, governors and, of course students, are similarly marginalised. Instead they have built a rigged market around unaccountable and wasteful academies.
In order to stop this mismanaged Tory project in its tracks and start to build a fairer and democratically accountable education service, we urge everyone in education to vote Labour.
We welcome Labour’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity and commitments to:
- tax private school fees to free up resources for the state sector
- recruit more teachers- we hope the 6500 figure is in addition to the massive shortfall in recruitment caused by the Tories
- improve mental health services in schools, make quality careers advice available to all pupils and provide breakfast clubs for all.
- review curriculum and assessment giving a higher priority to oracy and creative subjects.
reform the apprenticeships programme - Labour should recognise the depth of the crisis in the service and go further.
We urge Labour to:
- provide healthy free meals for all starting with primary pupils as Labour Wales and London plus Scotland have done, as part of a child poverty strategy
- tackle the funding crisis by committing to spend, over time, the same proportion of GDP (5.4%) on education as the last Labour government
- bring back an integrated, local authority run, early intervention programme similar to Sure Start
end academisation and bring academies back under local authority oversight - develop an in-depth response to the teacher recruitment and retention crisis, by restoring pay levels, removing unnecessary testing of pupils which check on schools and teachers, replacing OFSTED with a peer review process, instigating national pay and conditions for education workers and giving the teaching profession back its autonomy
- give parents, students and local communities a voice in the running of schools
- conduct a root and branch review of SEND and alternative provision with inclusion as its aim
- commit to a new qualification framework along the lines of Tomlinson which treats academic and vocational elements equally
- tackle the higher education funding crisis by moving away from tuition fees and towards a grant-based system
This statement should be read alongside our SEA Manifesto.
Socialist Educational Association 