11/12/2013 Newsnight Scotland

Class sizes for primary school children are creeping up. Is the

policy to cut class sizes the right one? 18 pupils per car lasts was the

SNP manifesto promise in 2007. Now 25 is the statutory upper limit but

only for primary one classes. I believe that we have had a

Scottish Parliament now for eight years and it is time we had a

Scottish Government as well. The promise could not have been

clearer. The measures that we care about and have not been delivered by

the current illustration but must be delivered now. Lower class sizes for

primary is one to primary three. Every single piece of major

educational research demonstrates that the early years, early

intervention, is crucial. Four years later the SNP returned to the

subject. There was also an acknowledgement that there was more

work to be done. The aspiration was rewritten with a new promise of a

limit of 25 on class sizes in primary one which has now been put

into law. Scottish Government statistics published today shows

that has been almost met. Just 600 primary one pupils are being taught

in classes of over 25. But the number being taught in classes of

fewer than 18 has fallen. Average class size is have gone up. The

number of teachers have gone down my daughter is in a class of 25. That

seems a lot. It is a small classroom. They are crammed in. It

is not great. I know there is a 25 student limit. 25 is a good limit. I

would not want to see it go over that. They are already quite high. I

did not know that they were rising. I suppose it is down to how the

school managers and how the teachers manage their classes.

Political opponents have been piling into accuse the Government of

letting children down. It is embarrassing for Mike Russell. In

2007 the SNP promised that all primary one to primary three classes

would be 18 or fewer. Less than 20% of the classes now heads that figure

up the Education Secretary visiting a high school today took the chance

to trumpet Government success. The number one priority is to make sure

that the schools are renewed. We have two maintain teacher numbers.

Those are all important things. It is a question of priorities. We are

doing well in class sizes. We are not getting to the lowest level I

would like to see. That has not been possible given the financial

squeeze. But Scottish education continues to improve. But there is a

warning that the statistics reveal a reduction in resources for preschool

children. The financial constraints make it all but inevitable that they

will be focused on things that they have two do, rather than things that

are aspirations. At the impact is wider than just on

baby schools. The Scottish Government has made clear its

determination that there should be access to a nursery teacher for

every nursery age child within Scotland. It has made clear his

determination that the entitlement should increase. If that access is

not provided through nursery teachers then the service moves

towards education -- away from education towards care. This issue

matters because trust is important for politicians. Parents will not

forgive or forget if they think their children's feature is being

put at risk. Earlier I asked Mike Russell that

the child entering primary one this September will be in a larger

lasts. Some children will be but not all children. These have been tough

financial times. We have still got lower class sizes than anybody

thought we could achieve. We have got a legal maximum for primary one.

The tables you could use in your own document today show that the average

class size in primary one, primary two, and primary three have gone up

since you took office. That is not strictly true. Class numbers in

primary one remain lower. These are marginal increases we have seen in

these sets of figures. What we have got is continuing improvement in

Scottish education. We have been able to secure it in difficult

financial times. We report twice per year on educational figures. We are

continuing to make progress. We are closing the attainment gap. They are

difficult times. But progress is being made. Just to refer to your

own data, . Those numbers are making progress. 22.8 in 2007, 20 3.7 more

recently. You said class sizes have not gone up. I have quoted figures

from your own documents that show the opposite of what you have said.

I do not think they do. We have made progress over the last seven years.

Would I like to have made more progress? You are working on some

weird feeling of suspects. I am not working on a weird really. I am

working on the reality of Scottish education. I am setting the legal

maximum. There is a basic question about the openness of opticians. I

have quoted your own document showing the opposite of what you are

seeing. Instead of addressing that you are saying, it does not say

that. We can argue this all evening. I was quoting your own document that

you produced this morning. We have had four minutes and we have not got

to the substance of this. We need to have continued drug arrest in

Scottish education. We have got lower class sizes than we have had

in a long time. -- we need to have continued progress in Scottish

education. We have managed to continue with progress. I would like

to make data progress. After you gave up on the original target, the

next one was that you had an agreement that 20% of primary one

students would be in classes of 18 or under. Not only have you not

achieved that, but the proportion has fallen sharply. But what you

have got to look at is the agreement we made was to do with ratios. There

have been lots of pressures. We have tried to maintain ratios. We have

not totally managed to keep that in terms of teacher numbers. The deal

after that was to keep the ratios the same. You have not managed to do

that either. I am afraid we have. The ratio is the same as last year.

The figure is the same as last year. That is the headline figure in the

report. Not-for-profit mini one, primary two and primary three. The

local authorities have said today they are glad they have been able to

honour that. We have been able to maintain teacher pupil ratios. I was

like to see us make further progress in class sizes. One of the things I

did in 2011 was to try and set a legal maximum. That is what we did

for primary one. We are a long way from your original promises. It was

not journalists like myself that the big fuss about class sizes. It was

not educational experts. It was the SNP. It was you that said this was

the most important thing. You have failed in every target you have set

yourself. Now you try to pretend that the statistics in your own

document at either wrong or irrelevant. I do not want to pretend

anything. We have made some progress. Would I like to make more

progress? Yes I would love to make more progress. Can we make more

progress? That'll depend on resources. Having made an agreement

about maintaining ratios? Yes we have. Can we do more? I hope so. How

does this relate to education? It was you that made it an issue, not

me. Have you not created a rod for your own back cushion Mark would not

be better to say that class sizes are not important, let us be framed

the discussion? You have been going on about it. What I have been trying

to say was the connection between class sizes and attainment. It is

one of the factors. All the evidence now shows there are other factors.

We are now working on more data. We are working on making sure there is

better leadership. We are making sure there are partnerships in that.

That is progress. Would I like class sizes to be smaller? Yes. Can we

make progress in education? Yes they are making progress. I enjoyed no by

the general secretary of the EIS Larry Flanagan, and by expert in

primary and early years education. Actually, should we just give up

with this session about class sizes, because as far as I am aware, the

research shows that while it might help it is not the be all and end

all. It is not a signal to -- significant factor on its own. It is

a factor along with a whole load of others, like the teacher

relationship, the class behaviour, the environment in the classroom. I

would not want to see it set aside because I think to have an ambition

for reduced class sizes is an ideal and we have to hang onto those

ideals. But I also think that this is a relative concept, and in

knowing I was coming on to talk to you this evening I was looking at

the English statistics as well, and they capped at 30. We capped at 25,

and I think that capping in 2011 has had a significant shift in what

local authorities are attempting to do in keeping class sizes from

escalating. Do you mean both England and here? So it is not the levels of

the argument, it is about statistics? It is a good argument to

have to keep yourself on the right track? The cap is helpful and it is

in the best interests of children that we have a smaller figure in

Scotland than in England. Most teachers will say, give me a smaller

class and I can be more flexible and effective. Do you agree, Larry

Flanagan? Should we stop obsessing with class sizes? I think class

sizes are crucial to attainment across the board. One of the reasons

there is difficulty with the backward train in the classroom

sizes is because we have failed to maintain the teacher numbers which

were promised two years ago. There were cuts in the education budget.

If you do not have the teachers in place, you cannot control class

sizes. We are talking about the local authority that is replacing

nursery teachers with non-teachers. It is not only class sizes that the

Government has pledged, it has pledged to improve access for

teachers in nursery education and that is not being met and it has

been reversed. There are significant concerns about the failure of the

Scottish Government to deliver its policy objectives. If we are looking

for other factors, Aline-Wendy, what should be looked at? For example, it

is often cited that in Japan's schools there are systems of groups

where the more able pupils help the less able. That happens in Finland

as well. Is it that sort of thing we should be trying, to change the

culture of angry schools rather than just obsessing about how many

students they have? The countries that do well on these statistics,

the evidence is strong, but it is not so much the class size as the

quality of the teacher, and I think we are actually doing a good job. I

hear what Larry is saying about teacher numbers and budgets and that

is a serious issue and the question of who worked in nursery education

is dear to my heart as well but I do think... Aren't we addressing that?

Aren't the new rules coming in about the qualifications that you need to

become a primary school teacher in Scotland? The qualifications have

remained the same. The competencies have shifted. There is a BA at my

own university which is a new and exciting focus on teacher education.

But in terms of preschool education, it is a teacher from the age of

three upwards in Scotland. Everyone training for primary school has

preschool experience. We have done a great job in the last... Since 2008

since raising the qualifications. But it is the teacher who leads a

class in primary school and it is a mixed group of professionals in the

preschool sector. Larry's point about access to a teacher is

incredibly important. He was talking about preschool, so we will come

onto that in a second. Larry Flanagan, there does not seem to be

much hard evidence that class sizes in primary school, the lower they

are, it might help. There does not seem to be much hard evidence that

they are quite as crucial as you are suggesting. I accept the point has

been made about teachers' professionalism, and we need to

develop the skills of the teacher because that is crucial, but that is

not mutually exclusive to the issue of class sizes. It was interesting

introduction... All the parents that you spoke to instinctively realised

that if their children are in smaller classes, there will be more

one-to-one attention, and those who teach a class understand that. If

you have a smaller class size, you get more individual attention.

Picking up on some of the issues you mentioned, using tables to support

each other, Curriculum For Excellence, that is much easier and

more practical with smaller class sizes. What do you make of this

issue that Larry Flanagan referred to about access to teachers for

preschool children? I think it is a Fort concept and it has not been

defined properly in Scotland at all, so that access could range from

maybe use the a teacher once a month or went a week or maybe you have a

full-time teacher in your setting, in some local authorities. So there

is a disparity for children across Scotland. We need to address that.

Humming back to settings where a teachers employed, we know that the

quality of education for children rises, but we also know that degree

qualified people, and we have many in Scotland, make a really important

contribution. You have to look at what it is... You are still talking

about preschool? I am talking about preschool. What do you think the

frequency should be? You have talked about how the access is varying... I

started teaching in preschool education in an era where you had

one teacher for 20 children, and I think that would be absolutely ideal

if we want to make a difference for Scotland's children, but what is

quite different now than when I started teaching so long ago is the

fact that the staff that teachers work with, the wider teams, are all

extremely well qualified now. We have to leave it there. Thank you. A

quick look at tomorrow's front pages. The Scotsman. RBS pays out

?61 million to the US for sanction breaking. Lloyds is fined ?20

million. And there is a picture there of the funeral of WPC Kirsty

Nelis on the front, who was killed in the helicopter crash. The Daily

Telegraph, Cameron threatens to axe MPs' a watchdog is the lead story.

The Independent, GCSE results are majorly determined by the NA.

-- by the NA. That is it for tonight.

Goodbye. File may be a problem again across

the Southeast first thing on Thursday morning. A few of us will

be affected by that fog in the morning. Look at these temperatures.

A very different picture really compare it to what we will have seen

on Wednesday. A sunny day. Thursday will be mostly cloudy across the

bulk of England at least. In Scotland, also cloudy. Similar for

Northern Ireland. The best chance for prolonged sunshine is the very

far North of Scotland. Friday, the wind continues from the South or

Southwest Musso stained mild but some rain through the country.

Writer later on in Northern Ireland but essentially an unsettled day.

For the weekend, stormy and potentially quite stormy across the