Former education secretary warns against ‘politicisation’ of national curriculum
Conservative MP Damian Hinds said the ‘broad framework’ has ‘helped to guard against the politicisation’ of subjects like history and religion.
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Your support makes all the difference.A Tory former education secretary has warned of the danger of the Government taking a “prescriptive approach” to the national curriculum.
In debate on the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, Conservative MP Damian Hinds said the “broad framework” has “helped to guard against the politicisation” of subjects like history and religious education.
The Bill would introduce a requirement for all academies to teach the national curriculum.
Local authority-maintained schools are currently required to follow the national curriculum while academies are not, although they are obligated to offer a “balanced and broadly based curriculum”.
It would be very dangerous if they came up with, instead, a more prescriptive approach... and especially so if this Bill removes the safety valve of schools being able to deviate somewhat from that
The Government claims the change will provide assurance and transparency to parents who will know the details of what their children should be taught, regardless of the type of state-funded school they attend.
In mid-July the Government launched an independent Curriculum and Assessment Review, spanning Key Stage 1 to Key Stage 5, chaired by Professor Becky Francis.
Mr Hinds, who was education secretary for eight months under Rishi Sunak, said the curriculum review is “potentially the biggest thing of all”.
He told MPs: “Now this Bill says that schools must follow the national curriculum before the new national curriculum is actually set out. It pre-empts it.
“And we don’t know what will be in that review and we have to keep an open mind and see what comes forward, but I would also remind colleagues that the Government is not forced to adopt what the independent reviewers come up with. Nor are they obliged, of course, to stop where the independent reviewers come to.
“And in sensitive subjects – subjects like history, like English literature, like RE – we have always, in this country, since the start of the national curriculum, taken an approach of not specifying exactly what kids will learn.
“Quite often people misunderstand this, but it’s not actually a list of things that you learn in school, it’s a broad framework, and that has helped to guard against the politicisation, or the over-politicisation, of our education.
“I say to ministers, it would be very dangerous if they came up with, instead, a more prescriptive approach to the national curriculum, and especially so if this Bill removes the safety valve of schools being able to deviate somewhat from that.”
After the launch of the curriculum review Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said it will be “built on a foundation of high and rising standards” and will “set up all our children to achieve and thrive in the workplaces of the future”.
Mr Hinds expressed disapproval at a number of the Government’s education measures, saying: “If you look at the broader set of measures this Government has been putting forward of late, the Latin Excellence Programme – scrapping it.
“Scrapping the expansion of the cadets programme in state schools, making Ofsted judgments less transparent, putting tax on independent sector education for the first time in the history of our country, and almost uniquely in the world, in a way that will just fill up more of the most popular state schools and make it harder for families to get their child into the state school of their choice.”