Tories promise expansion of faith schools

Wednesday, 13 April 2005 12:00 AM

Shadow Education Secretary Tim Collins has pledged an increase in the number of faith schools under a Conservative government.

In a speech on education excellence, Mr Collins said the Conservatives want a radical expansion of faith schools.

"Parents want them. Children benefit from them. Society is stronger for them," he continued.

"We must have more of them - not a handful here and there, but hundreds, ultimately perhaps thousands, more."

At a prize giving ceremony at St Ambrose College Greater Manchester, Mr Collins said faith schools "consistently offer higher academic standards and a stronger ethos than purely secular schools" and are "more likely to provide clear moral guidance and are more insistent upon school uniform and effective discipline."

The Conservatives would fund faith schools providing they accept Ofsted inspections, teach the national curriculum, and accept 10 per cent of pupils from different or no faith backgrounds.

He said: "The long-term consequences of the decades-long departure from faith and family are all too evident around us - broken homes, children without a moral compass, more drug usage, hundreds of thousands of abortions, feral scavenging youngsters preying on the old and vulnerable in their homes and on their streets."

Mr Collins said it was time to "redress the balance" in society and "reassert simple commonsense truths which are shared by all the major religions and form the bedrock of the inherited wisdom of the ages."

And, he rounded on political opponents, saying: "(The Left believes) faith has little or no place in schools. They see religion solely as a source of division, and cannot see its role in providing inspiration, guidance, solace and hope. They want us to pursue sterile, soulless secularism at all costs. Labour do not favour further selection on religious grounds - the Liberal Democrats oppose all faith schools in principle.

However, this accusation was sharply rebutted by the Lib Dems.

A spokesman said that they had "no proposals whatsoever" to close faith schools, or prevent the establishment of new schools.

Education spokesman Phil Willis, said: "This is a deliberate Tory attempt to mislead the thousands of parents who send their children to successful faith schools all around the country.

"The Liberal Democrats are committed to providing all children with a quality local school and we recognize both the popularity and the success of many faith schools. We do not and have not advocated their removal from state funding."

Labour has also said it is happy for more faith schools to be established where local communities want them, and many of its new City Academies are funded by faith groups.

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