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 ITEM CA10 - ANNEX 1

CABINET – 7 MARCH 2006

Council, 10 January 2006

White Paper: Higher Standards, Better Schools for All Motions referred to the Cabinet via the Children’s Services Scrutiny Committee for advice to the Council at its April meeting

MOTION (1) FROM COUNCILLOR JEAN FOOKS

"This Council notes the launch of the Government’s Education White Paper on 25 October 2005.

This Council supports the Government’s wish to improve schools for every child but has serious doubts that the proposals in the White Paper would achieve this.

It believes that:

• The aim of education is to help every child reach their personal potential in preparation for a fulfilling adult life
• The best results are achieved when schools collaborate and the local authority is best placed to play a co-ordinating role
• Local schools should be funded locally, with decisions made by elected bodies accountable to local people, rather than by funding formulas dictated by central government
• The White Paper would raise barriers to delivering the Every Child Matters agenda which sees schools, alongside the Extended Schools initiative, as a key part of integrated children’s services.

This Council therefore calls for:

• The restoration of financial and planning powers to Oxfordshire for 16-19 education to enable a coherent 14-19 education policy to be developed
• The Leader of Oxfordshire County Council to lobby local MPs to campaign actively for education services to remain accountable to local people through local democracy and to vote for this principle when the White Paper is debated in Parliament.

This Council reaffirms its commitment to providing good local schools for every child and asks the Chief Executive to write to the Secretary of State for Education and Skills to set out the concerns and proposals in this Motion."

MOTION (2) FROM COUNCILLOR JEAN FOOKS

"This Council has particular concerns that proposals concerning school admissions in the Government’s White Paper ‘Higher Standards, Better Schools for all’ would work against the provision of good local schools for every child. This Council believes that Admissions policies should not encourage schools to ‘poach’ pupils from each other.

This Council is concerned that implementing the White Paper would lead to:

• An admissions ‘free for all’ where schools could choose the pupils they want and leave some parents without the school place they wanted for their child
• School closures in deprived areas, contrary to the government’s own policies on neighbourhood regeneration

This Council therefore wants Oxfordshire to continue to lead and co-ordinate local admissions to ensure fair access for all, including hard-to-place children, and asks the Leader to write to the Secretary of State requesting that this be protected in any new legislation."

MOTION FROM COUNCILLOR VAL SMITH

"This Council recognises that the Education White Paper has many strengths including money for personalised learning, action on behaviour and discipline, and more challenge for "coasting schools".

However, there are other issues that cause concern - for example on admissions policies, the proposed ban on new community schools, the practicalities of expansion and contraction of schools in response to parental choice, and the risk that schools serving disadvantaged children may lose out in a more choice-driven system.

This Council feels that as an LEA it should also have a say and requests the Cabinet Member for Schools Improvement to initiate discussions with officers and members in consultation with school governing bodies and parents with a view to the Council putting forward its views on the White Paper and any legislation to follow."

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