Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning

Check against delivery

Conference
We are all here today because we believe in working together for a Scotland of opportunity – a Scotland where you can get on whoever you are, wherever you live, a Scotland characterised by aspiration and social justice.

That’s what drives us in Labour, and that’s why education and our children are at the heart of our thinking – our values – our passion.

And our ambition is to have the best education system in the world.  Where no-one is left behind.  Where all young people can develop to their full potential.

As we seek to come through the global economic crisis, we cannot afford to waste the talent of a single person.  Conference, contrast that with the SNP Government.

After 100 days in office the SNP issued their own report card, patting themselves on the back for a job supposedly well done.  Unsurprisingly, it gave the SNP administration straight As.  But as we reach the mid-term of their time in office, I’d like to take you through the real report card.

That great work of fiction, the 2007 SNP election manifesto, made a raft of promises on education.

On class sizes, they said they would deliver class sizes of 18 in primaries one to three by 2011.  The latest figures show that at the current rate of progress that promise won’t be delivered until 2096.  Teacher numbers are falling and newly qualified teachers aren’t getting jobs.  So on arithmetic, they must try harder.

And on school buildings, the SNP said it would match Labour’s school building programme “brick for brick”. Again, they give themselves an A.

True enough, Alex Salmond and Fiona Hyslop have scuttled around in ministerial limos opening quite a few new schools …. Every one of them commissioned by Labour when we were in government.

New schools? The SNP are posted absent. Tens of thousands of children are being taught in substandard buildings because the SNP cannot get their Scottish Futures Trust to work. The real report card is that the SNP must try a lot harder

In music lessons, you have to hand it to Alex Salmond and his Government – they are absolute masters at blowing their own trumpets, even when they have no music sheets.

But the failures of this administration are a serious matter – they put at risk the progress Labour made at Holyrood and in local authorities across the country, because they are not prioritising education.  In fact, they delivered the worst ever budget for education. 

And don’t just take my word for it.  Listen to the furious criticisms from parents, from head teachers, from teacher unions, who are all facing the worst education cuts seen in Scotland for 20 years – under this SNP Government.

And listen to Sheena Dryden, chair of Lasswade High School parent council.  Lasswade High’s buildings are categorised as  “Bad - economic life expired … risk of failure”.

Sheena tells of shocking conditions which are impacting on the wellbeing and motivation of pupils.  Vast sums of money are being diverted from spending on teaching materials to fix leaking roofs and crumbling buildings. 

Labour’s Midlothian Council is desperate to build the new school which the pupils and teachers deserve, a learning and teaching environment fit for the 21st century.  But while the SNP try to figure out how to make their Scottish Futures Trust work, Lasswade High School pupils and thousands of other children across Scotland languish in school buildings that are simply not fit for purpose.

Conference, the real report card on the SNP is not ‘must try harder’, it is that they haven’t even begun to try.  They haven’t even turned up. They are missing … failing Scotland’s teachers, failing Scottish children, failing Scotland.

For Labour, there are four urgent priorities for schools.

First, build new schools. The SNP has cancelled Labour’s massive school building programme.  They have not commissioned any new schools that were not in the pipeline before 2007.  Teachers and parents know that children learn better in schools that are fit for purpose, and Labour believes that every pupil and community in Scotland should have the chance of a new school.

Second, make sure pupils can read.  Labour, like parents, expects children to be able to read by the time they leave primary school. We know that by primary five already a significant gap in pupil learning has appeared and continues to widen. According to the SNP’s own figures around a quarter of pupils leaving primary school are not functionally literate – inevitably leading to failure and frustration in secondary school and a handicap for life. Labour believes that is totally unacceptable.

That’s why Labour founded our Literacy Commission, with parents, experts from teaching, business and authors, such as Ian Rankin.  Every one of those members passionately committed to making Scotland the first country in the world to become fully literate. The Commission will be reporting shortly with their plan and we want the SNP to put party difference aside and work with the Commission in the interest of Scotland.

Third, we need to tackle violence and bad behaviour.  It is simply unacceptable that pupils and teachers face violence in the classroom.  The actions of a small minority can ruin the education of everyone else.  Labour wants to see good behaviour in every class rooms. 

We want to see every school have a discipline code, with behaviour support teachers and time out bases in schools for those pupils who need it, so bad behaviour can be tackled at an early stage. But when things get out of hand, we want more powers for headteachers to permanently exclude disruptive pupils, and more rights for teachers and schools to discipline pupils who persistently misbehave. That means reversing cuts and staffing schools properly.

Fourth, we need class sizes that are right for every pupil and every teacher.  The SNP class size policy is incoherent.  They want a P3 pupil to be in a class of 18, but think its okay for them to move into a class of 33 the next year. We already know that parents want good teachers in class sizes that are manageable.

What they don’t want is a situation where councils may be forced to double up classes, create more composite classes, or make class sizes bigger in secondary schools in order to deliver the SNP’s arbitrary target of eighteen.

Conference we meet here in Dundee the week that we heard of the tragic case of a toddler being murdered in the city by a drug addict living as part of the family. The inquiry will establish if there were actions that could have been taken that could have prevented this tragedy, but let’s not forget it was not social workers that were responsible for this little boy’s death. They do a really difficult job in often heartbreaking situations.

But we all need to face the facts – currently in the region of sixty thousand children in Scotland are living in families with addiction problems. Isn’t it time that as a society we take a very serious look at the needs of these most vulnerable children?

We target the drug dealers and put in place programmes to wean addicts off drugs. But how can we best support the children, the innocent victims who are born into the chaotic cycle of drug addiction and families failing to cope?    

Labour has called for a cross party approach to tackle the problem and we will shortly be making an announcement on the work we will be taking forward on this challenging area of policy.

Conference, we will strive to build a Scotland where children can feel safe, where parents are confident their children can get the best education in the world, and where teachers, parents and pupils know that school buildings are fit for purpose.

The message from this conference is clear: we in the Labour Party are focused on raising standards; the SNP only want to wave Saltires. We in Labour want the best schools colleges and universities for the Scots of tomorrow; the SNP only want to fight the battles of the past.

Our message to the SNP and to Scotland is this:
Put away the banners and slogans,
Put aside these childish things,
Let’s build a Scotland in which our children can thrive.