14.
asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what obligations are imposed in the Education Act 1944 on the governors of secondary schools to provide an O-level syllabus.
My right hon. Friend has written to the hon. Member to explain that no specific obligations are imposed by the Education Acts on schools to provide O-level courses and that the question whether such an obligation was implicit in the provisions of the Acts, if raised, would be one for the courts to decide. I understand that Nottinghamshire has now decided as a matter of policy that comprehensive schools in the county should offer both O-level and CSE courses.
I am grateful for that reply. Is the Minister aware that until recently the Sutton Centre comprehensive school in Sutton-in-Ashfield did not offer an O-level syllabus to its pupils? Was not this a grave dereliction of duty, and is not the decision of the newly elected Conservative education committee, to which the Minister has referred, most welcome?
My right hon. Friend has recently made clear that she regrets that some comprehensive schools, such as the Sutton Centre, have chosen not to offer O-level courses. She is grateful that the decision has been changed.
Does not my hon. Friend find it extraordinary that a Conservative Member should be so ignorant of the extent to which the selective system of education, which the Conservatives have purported to support for the last 25 or 30 years, created precisely the situation in which only a small number of schools had the opportunity of providing O- and A-level syllabuses? Is it not one of the greatest features of the development of comprehensive education that this sort of question can be asked by Conservative Members?
My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. I was careful to say that we regretted that such courses were not offered in comprehensive schools. We are all too well aware that in the selective system these courses were frequently not offered to many children who could have benefited from them.
Does the Minister appreciate the strength of the point that many people supported comprehensive schools because they wanted their children to go to schools that could offer GCE courses? Is it not ironic that certain comprehensive schools taking children of all abilities do not offer O-levels, which are necessary for professional and higher education. How many comprehensive schools follow the example of the school in my hon. Friend's constituency and do not offer O-levels?
I cannot give the hon. Gentleman an accurate figure, but I can tell him that it is a very small number indeed, and it has been made more than clear that we do not believe that this is a satisfactory policy.