Calderdale National

Union of Teachers
A manifesto for our children's
education
Responses to NUT 'Stand Up for Education Manifesto' from
Parliamentary Prospective Candidates (PPC) for the 2015 General
Election in Calder Valley and Halifax.

In September 2014, Calderdale National Union of Teachers requested the Parliamentary Prospective
Candidates (PPC) for the 2015 General Election in Calder Valley and Halifax, reply to our 'Stand Up for
Education Manifesto' we wrote to:

Parliamentary Prospective Candidates

Conservative

Phillip Allott

Green Party

no candidate at the time

Labour

Linda Riordan MP

Liberal Democrat

Mohammed Ilyas

Parliamentary Prospective Candidates

Conservative

Craig Whittaker MP

Green Party

Jenny Shepherd

Labour

Josh Fenton-Glynn

Liberal Democrat

Alisdair Calder McGregor

Halifax

Calder Valley

Our education manifesto calls for a broad, balanced and enriching curriculum with a wider vision of learning
and achievement.
The election provides a fantastic opportunity to make the case for the best education system for all our
children for a system that values every child and gives teachers the platform to bring out their full potential.
We informed the PPC that all replies - or lack of them - would be published, here they are .........

Halifax
Conservative

Phillip Allott

Green Party

no candidate at the time

Labour

Linda Riordan MP

no response

I am delighted to endorse and fully support this excellent document.

It is vital that as we build the best possible education system in the 21 st century that the values and vision
outlined in the manifesto are endorsed.
Issues like ending child poverty, focussing on teaching not testing, investing in the skills for the future should
be at the heart of education policy.
We need to fight for an educational future that benefits all children. That values teachers. That listens to
parents. That doesnt make a profit out of the learning environment.
This, and so much more, is what we are fighting for.
That is why I support this manifesto.
Liberal Democrat

Mohammed Ilyas

As Alisdair Calder McGregor has replied you in detail that is Liberal Democrats policy. I don't think I need to
add any more. So please take this from me as well.

Calder Valley
Conservative

Craig Whittaker MP

Green Party

Jenny Shepherd

no response

The GP education policy matches most of the recommendations in the NUT Education manifesto. So as Calder
Valley Parliamentary Candidate, I'm happy to endorse it.
Here is a summary of GP education policies with reference to the main points in your Manifesto.
Curriculum
The GP thinks school education should be child-centred - children's opinions about what and how they want
to learn should inform a broad curriculum. The National Curriculum will be replaced by set of learning

entitlements, as the context or framework for teachers and learners to develop a curriculum together.
The GP will move towards extending Early Years education to age of 6, so academic learning will start at the
age of 6.
Assessment, evaluation and governance
GP recognises the importance of running schools democratically through School Councils & Governing Bodies
that involve all parties - parents, students, staff & the wider community.
The GP encourages the formation of Parent Councils/Forums to enhance schools' accountability and improve
communication and collaboration between schools and parents.
The Local Authority and the National Council of Educational Excellence (replacing Ofsted) will monitor school
governance structures and processes to make sure standards are consistent & to share best practice.
Local authorities will monitor the quality of education, range of curriculum and consistency of internal
assessment of students' work.
The GP will strengthen Local Authorities through adequate funding, and seek to enhance their local
democratic accountability.
In the interests of child-centred learning that builds on children's interests and skills, the GP will end current
testing regimes and rigid age-related benchmarking. The GP will abolish SATs, and League Tables in their
current form. The GP will institute a system of local accountability using continuous collaborative assessment
of schools, to replace current methods of school inspection.
To nurture a climate of professional respect and responsibility, the GP will work with Unions to reverse the
process by which teachers have been deskilled and their autonomy eroded.
Qualified Teachers
All teachers will have Qualified Teacher Status (QTS), and every child should be taught by a teacher with QTS.
Teachers will take part in continuing professional development.
Diversity of teaching profession
Respect for diversity runs throughout the whole GP education policy. Higher Education institutions will
address accessibility issues by offering Widening Participation Programmes and creating firm targets for
increased social diversity. Since teachers enter the profession through HE, this should help increase the
diversity of the teaching profession.
Ending child poverty
The GP will introduce a Citizen's Income for everyone that will cover basic needs and eliminate
unemployment and poverty traps; a reduced Children's amount will be paid to parents/carers.
The GP's Public Administration policy recognises people's right to basic material security and shelter.
The 2013 GP Conference confirmed that the GP will abolish the Bedroom Tax.
The GP will provide high quality Early Years education up to the age of 6, through providing free and
subsidised Early Years education and building on and continuing successful schemes like Sure Start.
The GP aims to reduce youth unemployment through the UK implementation of the EU Youth Guarantee
scheme, already in place in Finland, Sweden and Austria. This offers young people work or a training place

after four months as claimants. The GP is committed to restoring the Educational Maintenance Allowance for
post-16 students.
Providing enough school places
Local Authorities will determine admissions arrangements for all their state schools - which will include
Academies and Free Schools, which will be integrated into the LA school system. This will return control of
buildings as well as admissions arrangements to Local Authorities.
The GP will strengthen Local authorities through adequate funding and seek to enhance their local democratic
accountability.
Ending Academies and Free Schools
The GP will not create more Academies or Free Schools and will integrate existing Academies and Free Schools
into the LA school system. Education is social not a market provision and the GP opposes privatising state
schools or allowing them to become profit-making.
Investing in education
The GP will restore the right of LAs to plan and build new primary schools of an appropriate size.
The GP will strengthen Local Authorities through adequate funding. Sixth form colleges will be VAT-exempt.
Teachers' retirement age
The Green Party's Citizen Income scheme would enable the retirement age to be completely flexible,
recognising that some want to retire as soon as possible and others want to continue working.

Labour

Josh Fenton-Glynn

This document is a fantastic start to the ideas we need for education, I believe in much of what it says. Chiefly
I think for too long expert voices have been ignored in teaching and front line staff such as your members
views discounted. I'm also glad that we have promised an end to forcing schools to become academies and I
believe that all teachers should be qualified or working toward qualifications.
As someone who has spent a large part of my career working on policies to end child poverty I think you are
right to identify ensuring we hit our targets as a key priority for the next Labour government (in fact when at
CPAG I helped get the child poverty act through parliament).
On a personal level I would also say that we need to change the discourse toward public servants. People
need to recognise that what you do is vital to our society and we should be proud of our public sector workers
rather than acting the way this government - and sadly some in all parties do - as if those who give their lives
to public service are in some way the problem.
Liberal Democrat

Alisdair Calder McGregor

I thoroughly agree with the proposition that Politicians should listen to teachers more. Just yesterday (the
22nd of October) Liberal democrat Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg announced that the Liberal Democrats in

government will do exactly that - asking teachers to tell us where they feel their time is wasted on red tape, so
that we can target and remove it. This will in turn make teaching a more attractive profession to those who
want to enter it, and drive up numbers & quality of teachers.
I do agree that a wider variety of examination types, including continuous assessment, are preferable to
courses aimed at a single end exam. In the real world, learning and assessment are continuous processes.
That's why the Liberal democrats have promoted apprenticeships as an alternate form of learning for
vocational skills, and why our education paper calls for changes to assessment methods.
We entirely agree that league tables should be removed, and have opposed them since they were imposed in
1992, when I was still in school.
The Liberal Democrats are 100% clear on the need for properly qualified teachers. This matter was debated
and strengthened at the most recent Liberal Democrat conference in York.
Regarding child poverty, one of the crowning achievements of the Liberal Democrats in government has been
the provision of extra funding for disadvantaged children through our Pupil Premium policy, which specifically
targets government funding at disadvantaged children, rather than the expensive& ineffectual "scattergun"
approach favoured by the last government. Just today, the government will announce an additional 245,686
in Early Years Pupil Premium funding for 3 & 4 year old children in Calderdale, in addition to the regular pupil
premium already spent. This funding will significantly boost assistance for disadvantaged children in
Calderdale, and has been welcomed by the Child Poverty Action Group.
Regarding the so-called "Bedroom Tax", the Liberal Democrats support the removal of the policy because it
has fundamentally failed to achieve the objectives we hoped it would reach. The point (for the Liberal
Democrats, anyway) of the "Bedroom Tax" was to encourage those people in houses larger than they need to
vacate, so that families in overcrowded accommodation could move in. It's very important to remember that
overcrowding impairs the ability of children to learn in their own home, due to lack of space. A family with 3
children in a 2 bedroom house just do not have the space to have a quiet area for children to do their
homework, so while the current policy has failed to free up the under occupied housing, something will need
to be done to get those families who currently live in overcrowded conditions into decently sized
accommodation. Part of this is of course the Liberal Democrat commitment to build an additional 300,000
houses in the next parliament - the most ambitious program of house building in a generation.
Regarding the school places issue, the Liberal Democrats believe that this is a matter that should be devolved
to as local a level as possible. We question whether the appropriate level is the local authority as currently
constituted or a regional level which would exist in our plans for devolution within England.
I do thoroughly agree that VAT exemptions for Sixth Form colleges would be a good idea, but I am wary of
specific funding commitments for the next parliament because funding constraints due to the economy will
continue, and the more areas of spending are ring-fenced, the more cuts will have to fall elsewhere. Local
government is already under exceptional pressure and I am not sure that in the present climate the local
government budget can bear additional expense of the kind your plans call for on their part. This is a matter
which will have to be approached cautiously to ensure the knock-on effects on other critical public services is
not too harsh to bear.

pp Calderdale NUT. Prospect House, 18 Clare Road, Halifax, HX1 2HX