Ed Balls fears plan will create 'form of social apartheid' and undermine local authorities
Plans to create hundreds of Swedish-style free schools in England will prove a costly experiment and risk increasing racial and social segregation as middle-class parents pull their children out of comprehensives, according to a major study.
The research by a leading academic also warned that the flagship Tory policy to transform the country's schools would bring little or no improvement in pupils' results but would lead to a "significant increase" in public spending.
Education secretary Michael Gove's academies bill, which is being pushed through parliament this week, will enable a radical overhaul of England's schools, giving every school the chance to convert to an academy and giving parents the right to create free schools outside the control of local councils. The Tories claim the new schools will drive up standards.
But a leading academic at the Institute of Education, part of the University of London, found that even in Sweden — one of the world's most egalitarian countries — free schools increased segregation. The schools are predominantly based in rich, urban areas and middle-class parents take their children out of community schools to attend them, Dr Susanne Wiborg found.
She also discovered that while free schools improved pupils' results at the age of 15 or 16, there was no difference in results between free school pupils and children at other schools by the equivalent of A-level.
"The advantage that children schooled in areas with free schools have by the age of 16 is not translated into greater achievements later in life as they score no better in the final exams at age 18 and 19. They are no more likely to participate in higher education," she said.
Wiborg also found that local authorities had to pay for costly surplus school places and that the planning which went into allocating student places had become complex and expensive. Her research is due to be published in Inside Government, a journal aimed at policy-makers.
The education secretary has said that half of the applicants who have shown an interest in opening free schools are teachers, many from the charity Teach First, which encourages graduates to work in deprived areas. Gove believes that greater choice for parents will result in rising standards as existing schools are spurred to improve.
But this has not proved to be the case in Sweden, Wiborg warns. "Competition from independent schools is no panacea. Despite almost 1,000 new [free] schools and 150,000 students attending them, ... the outcome in terms of achievement induced only slightly higher pupil attainment, but also higher costs and greater segregation."
The shadow education secretary, Ed Balls, says that free schools in England will increase segregation between social classes, and that the academies bill would undermine local authorities. Labour plans to table an amendment giving local councils a statutory role in ensuring the schools system promotes social cohesion and fairness. Gove's bill is currently going through the committee stage — when it is meant to be subject to detailed scrutiny by MPs — before a final vote next week.
"I fear there will be a new form of social apartheid — educational apartheid," Balls told the Guardian. "There is a very important role for local authorities, when they plan schools, to seek to bring communities together, to make sure schools have a comprehensive attendance.
"We are going to have less investment for the most challenged schools, while parents are being supported to opt out and go it alone. It's the biggest assault on comprehensive education for 60 years. I'm very fearful for what it might mean for the education of our children."
Concerns about segregation have also been raised by a headteacher in Suffolk, who expressed fears that a new free school being proposed in his catchment area would draw away the children of wealthier families. Mike Foley, head of Great Cornard upper school, said: "Although it's in Suffolk, there is a London overspill, the north ward of Great Cornard is very deprived by any measure.
"Stoke-by-Nayland is very much small villages, affluent and middle-class. The suspicion is that parents in that group don't want 'our children mixing with oiks'.
"Whatever the motivation, the impact of it is to create this division. Although we have children from diverse backgrounds, they flourish here. The view here is that children shouldn't be educated in a bubble."
A spokesman for the Department for Education said there was already a social divide in England between the poorest children who were often left with the worst education, while more privileged children could buy better schooling either by going private or living in the catchment area of the best state schools.
The spokesman said: "By allowing teachers to set up new schools we will give all children access to the kind of education only the rich can afford — small schools with small class sizes, great teaching and strong discipline. The coalition's commitment to the pupil premium will mean free schools will be incentivised to cater for the poorest children.
"President Obama supports free schools in America because they have benefited the least well off the most and the evidence from Sweden shows that they raise standards for all."