The Good Childhood Inquiry

Key Findings:

Educational inequality

Britain has a largely excellent school system, blighted by unequal outcomes. By 2006 only 28% of children in the most deprived quarter of schools gained five or more good GCSE passes at A*-C. That compared with 67% of children in the least deprived quarter of schools. We also have the weakest system for giving less academic children a proper training in a profession, craft or trade in Western Europe north of the Alps.

The key to educational progress is recruiting enough good teachers to our deprived areas. There is every reason to re-introduce higher pay for teachers, especially in secondary schools with a high proportion of children on free school meals. In addition, every young person with a reasonable school record should be offered an apprenticeship.

Testing and league tables

The Government has insisted that the overall test results for each school are published. But there are many problems with the tables that appear in newspapers. Some give only raw results with no adjustment for the type of children going to the school. The adjusted figures get much less publicity.

Most of the published scores relate to the percentage of children who reach a certain standard, such as gaining 5 GCSEs. If children are a long way below this threshold, even with good teaching, they are unlikely to get near this target and therefore will not impact on the schools overall published statistics. Therefore there is no incentive for schools to focus on these children

Material Inequality

After the USA, Britain is the most unequal of the rich countries and this affects our children. In Britain 22% of children are poor, defined as living on an income that is 60% below that of the typical income. This compares to 8% in Sweden and 10% in Denmark. Thirty years ago in Britain the figure was only 13%.

Poverty in childhood is one of the five most powerful and consistent predictors of subsequent disadvantage in later life.

Many people argue that a society with smaller differentials between rich and poor have less poverty but this would have to be at the cost of lower average incomes. We have two comments on this view. First the premise is not necessarily true. If we reduce child poverty, this may not in fact reduce average income. It may empower more youngsters, so that they become more productive. Moreover they may behave less competitively at work and be more cooperative. This too may raise national output.

But, second, suppose the premise is true, and national income is somewhat lower as a result. Is that a disaster? Would it mean that we could no longer compete in the international market place and would therefore lose jobs? Not at all – we should always be able to compete provided our wage levels stayed in line with productivity.

It is often said that policies to equalise income do so at the cost of social mobility – preventing the poor from rising. Nothing could be further from the truth. Countries with high inequality and high child poverty, like Britain, also have low social mobility.

The present Government has made the impact of taxes, tax credits and benefits substantially more redistributive. But to hit the child poverty target, more money must be redistributed from the rich to the poor. At present an unchanged fiscal policy would automatically lead to an annual increase in child poverty because most benefits and tax credits relevant to children are indexed to prices rather than earnings – driving more of those who depend on them towards relative poverty. Benefits and tax credits should be indexed to earnings.

Children’s evidence

My school helps people who are bullied and that's why I really enjoy going to school because the teachers and pupils are really nice and friendly.

- 11-year-old girl

My school is helping me prepare for life because it is teaching me so many useful skills - everything from how to cook to how to speak in public to how to climb mountains and how to communicate with other people well.

- 15-year-old girl