PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
Education (Guidance about Costs of School Uniforms) Bill - 12 March 2021 (Commons/Commons Chamber)

Consideration of Bill, not amended in the Public Bill Committee.

Very helpfully, it sets out what the current rules are and gives us this reminder:
Very helpfully—I do not know whether the hon. Member for Weaver Vale is familiar with this—Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs sets out maximum measurements for VAT zero-rated clothing. I will not go through the whole list, but let me pick out one, which is the height of boys in inches. The maximum height for a boy is 64 inches before the uniform or the clothes that that child is wearing become subject to VAT and lose the zero-rated exemption. Do you know, Mr Speaker, what the average height of a boy on his 14th birthday currently is in the United Kingdom? It is 64.6 inches. In other words, it is just over 5 feet 4½ inches. That is the average, which means that many average 14-year-olds, and by implication those of 12 and 13 and some of 11, are already having school uniforms purchased by their parents that are subject to value-added tax. That is not acceptable. It does not fit in with the Government’s policy, which is to reduce the burden of the cost of school uniforms on families, and I hope that my right hon. Friend the Minister will use our new freedoms to take forward proposals to remove value added tax on school uniforms.
The reality check asks another pertinent question:
It says:
a long time ago, Mr Speaker—
We can see now that it is a burden not just on larger adults, but on children of average height. It goes on to say:
That is my purpose in raising this; it could link two particular elements of the school uniform affordability policy.
One of the complaints made is that if a large number of items in a school uniform incorporate the particular badge or logo into the design, that adds to the costs of that item or uniform. I understand that, but obviously if the value added tax rules were changed to exempt from value added tax any school uniform that had such logos or insignia on it, the cost of those items would be reduced by 20%. That is not a new idea. This idea was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) back in 1997, when he proposed that such a policy could be policed by the production of a school identification card or that the uniform could be ordered through the school. Interestingly, the Labour Government in place at the time did not support that. Since then, other Members of Parliament have taken up the cause, including my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker). When he was a Minister at the Department for Exiting the European Union, he basically said, “Be patient. Once we left have, we will have the freedom to deal with this”; and hopefully we will.
Now that we have left the European Union, we are no longer constrained by its restrictions on what we can do. If, prior to leaving, the Government had wanted to add all school uniform to the list of goods that are taxed at 0%, they would have needed the agreement of all other European Union countries. That would have been impossible, as we found out when we tried to remove the value added tax on personal items for women. Now that we have left, that restriction has gone.
The line from the Treasury is always that value added tax is a broad-based tax that contributes an enormous amount to the Revenue. The last time I discussed this with a Treasury Minister, he said that in Ministers’ inboxes these are about 50 or 70 different propositions as to reductions that should be made on value added tax. I point out that the difference between value added tax on school uniforms and general value added tax is that the Government’s avowed policy is to reduce the cost of school uniforms, and it is now within their power to remove the VAT. The leakage to which I made a reference—non-uniform items being bought up by adults who should be paying the value added tax—could be addressed through the combination of changing the rules and enabling those specific uniforms to be allowed to be exempt from VAT, as long as they had a specific design unique to that school, such as a prominent badge.
It may be helpful to the Government to be reminded that it is currently possible to get around the rules for people aged up to 14, irrespective of their size and waist measurement, by making it clear that the uniform is exclusively for the use of under-14s. This is the type of advice that I have in mind that the Government should be producing in the revised statutory guidance. The zero rate applies to organisations such as Beavers or Brownies for the clothing items that form the uniform, regardless of the size, as long as those organisations cater exclusively for the under-14s. It would, for example, be possible for a school to specify that uniform—

Turning to the other amendments in the order in which they appear on the amendment paper, amendment 3 is:
As it says in the Member’s explanatory statement:
Currently, the Bill says that the Secretary of State must issue guidance and that the
The question I ask is: why should this Secretary of State solely be in the position to decide what is relevant to the costs of school uniforms? Why should that not be an objective test, so that any aspects of school uniform policies that are relevant to the costs of school uniforms would be included in this guidance? I think the example of value added tax is a good one, because the Secretary of State might decide that he did not regard value added tax as impinging on the issue of aspects of school uniform policies or costs, and thereby be able to exclude any reference to that, despite its relevance. That is why I have put in amendment 3, which would introduce an objective test, rather than a subjective test.
Amendment 4 would incorporate within the guidance criteria
This is, in one sense, a highly topical issue because we know that there has been a lot of discussion in the context of the Trade Bill about whether our country should change its approach to international trade and whether Parliament should restrict the ability of the Government to enter into a trade deal with a country that is in the dock for genocide. I am not going to get into that debate, but the purpose of this amendment is to enable school governing bodies to take these issues into account when deciding on their school uniform policy.
We are talking about price, and I think that needs to be spelled out, but we also need to refer to issues of quality. That point was made very eloquently on Second Reading by, among others, as I recall, my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Nickie Aiken). I think even the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) made the same point that we should be talking not just about price but about quality and design, as well as the place of manufacture and the country of origin.
Increasing numbers of people in this country do not wish to purchase goods whose origin is China. In particular, they do not wish to purchase goods comprising cotton, which may have been produced under slave labour conditions in particular parts of China. Obviously, those goods from China are often less expensive than goods sourced from elsewhere, even from places such as India or Bangladesh. Surely it should be open to a governing body to discuss the merits or otherwise of having a school uniform that is sourced from China, or from some other country with which that governing body thinks we should operate at arm’s length, rather than indulging its breaches of human rights.
That is why I have introduced those criteria, and I was delighted when my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough supported the amendment. He has an enormous amount of experience on this subject and, as you may know, Mr Speaker, he was chair of the committee that took over from Sir Anthony Steen and deals with international people trafficking. He has shared with me the fact that the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery on 3 December tries to promote the suppression of traffic in persons and the exploitation of others. The idea is to eradicate contemporary forms of slavery because, according to the UN, an estimated 40.3 million people are in modern-day slavery, including almost 25 million in forced labour and some 15.5 million in forced marriages.
Horrifically, there are 5.4 victims of modern slavery for every 1,000 people in the world, and one in four of those victims are children. This is an important issue, and it is relevant in the context of this debate because national and international companies supply school uniforms, and they need to know that it is open to governing bodies to inquire into the place of manufacture and country of origin of the school uniforms being sold. Some interesting data have been produced on this—I am trying to get to the nub of this issue. The garment industry turns over almost £3 trillion a year, yet garment workers, 80% of whom are women, work for poverty pay, earning as little as £15 a month. Human rights abuses are systemic throughout the industry. Poverty wages, long hours, forced overtime, unsafe working conditions and so on are all commonplace in the clothing industry, and as my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough knows, it is an industry built on exploitation that grows as a result of a lack of transparency, and makes holding brands accountable very difficult.
So how do we do that? We can put pressure on the suppliers of school uniforms to ensure that their sources of supply are worthy of our support and schools’ support. You may remember, Mr Speaker, that a campaign group, Labour Behind the Label, was established to
in the garment industry, because it wanted to ensure that companies took
The group works with trade unions worldwide and concentrates on protecting the human rights of garment workers.
Labour Behind the Label believes that
That is why, in 2019, it started a petition to challenge Trutex, one of the largest suppliers of school uniforms. This story actually has quite an encouraging conclusion, and it is possible that, if amendment 4 is accepted, we could have similarly successful outcomes based on pressure put on those who provide school uniforms.
Trutex is the United Kingdom’s largest specialist schoolwear brand. In 2019, its turnover was £27.5 million. It has supplied school uniforms across Britain for 150 years. It sells logoed uniforms and sportswear to thousands of schools, often operating exclusive contracts with schools and selling through individual retailers.
Labour Behind the Label said:
After collecting signatures for the petition to which I referred, it was able to establish that Trutex was working positively in some areas, which had not been recognised, but was doing a poor job of spelling out to others what it was doing.
The good news is that, in 2020, Trutex published a corporate sustainability report. That substantial document lists its suppliers around the globe and contains a list of 20 tier 1 suppliers, including in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Indonesia and the United Kingdom. Trutex has also joined the Ethical Trading Initiative as a foundation stage member and has accepted that organisation’s base code—a code of conduct based on key International Labour Organisation conventions. While membership of the Ethical Trading Initiative does not automatically mean that a member is ethical, or that it properly upholds labour rights, it is obviously a step in the right direction.
Because of that progress, the petition to which I referred has now been closed, but Labour Behind the Label continues to monitor Trutex and other uniform brands
Trutex responded to the concerns, and it should be congratulated on that. The strong message from that is that we should incorporate in the statutory guidance a reference to the ability of governing bodies to take into account the source of the school uniforms that they adopt for their school.
The Schoolwear Association represents all those involved in the supply of school-specific uniform, from direct retailers to school suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers, suppliers, agents and schools. Established in 2006, the association has over 200 members, and between them they clothe three quarters of Britain’s schoolchildren, so obviously it is an important organisation. It promotes best practice across the UK schoolwear industry and is committed to ensuring that a long-term, robust and competitive market exists for the supply of schoolwear. Its code of practice sets out its aims and values, including ethical compliance to ensure that workers are treated fairly. It states:
Obviously, that commitment could be built upon if individual governing bodies wanted to do so.
However, it is not only direct school suppliers for which there is an issue of transparency; the larger suppliers may well be the most guilty of using slave labour, and it is also an issue for the large supermarket chains. That brings me to an issue that was discussed quite a lot on Second Reading and in Committee: alternative sources of school uniform. How is it that some generic items are so much cheaper when purchased from a supermarket? The supermarkets are now able to produce this clothing at significantly lower costs, but the purchaser is unable to be sure about the sourcing. If we allowed governing bodies to deal with this as part of the school uniform, then these items would be subject to the same safeguards to which I have referred.
A 2015 investigation by the Daily Mirror—not an organ I read regularly, I must admit—highlighted that two of Britain’s top stores, Sainsbury’s and Tesco, were selling school uniforms made by workers who were paid just 25p an hour. The large retailer Next was selling uniforms from a 6,000-worker factory in Bangladesh. It vowed to look at conditions after admitting that staff had to put in unacceptable overtime. Sometimes they were toiling—I think that is the right expression—for more than 70 hours a week, and for just £51 a month. That was significantly  longer even than the country’s weekly legal limit of 60 hours. One mother working in one of those factories wanted parents in Britain to be aware of their poverty. She said:
It is an irony that should stop us in our tracks and make us realise how important it is to get the sourcing of school uniforms right.
The article described how most employees live in terrible conditions, with families in one room. The children often have to fend for themselves, and many leave school early so that they can find work to help the family. A 33-year-old stitcher said that his basic daily wage was equivalent to £1.97. Even with long overtime, he earned only £76 a month. He said:
That is a significant contrast with what we are lucky enough to enjoy in this country. The man said that he could not afford to educate his other son.
Those sorts of organisations make garments for large supermarkets which are often incorporated in school uniforms. A clothes finisher with a fixed monthly salary of £56.77 said:
For each hour of overtime, they get 34p. That is why we need to take action and encourage others to take action by naming and shaming these suppliers and giving the power to school governing bodies, which incorporate an enormous amount of collective wisdom, to take action on these issues. I have not even mentioned the Uyghurs, not because I have overlooked them but because the point has been made sufficiently and others may want to go further into the issue in the debate.
I believe that price, quality, design, place of manufacture and country of origin should be in the guidance. With reference to quality and design, I noticed when I looked at the statutory guidance issued by the Welsh Government that it requires schools to produce school uniforms that do not need to be dry cleaned. It seems to me that a school blazer that does not need to be dry cleaned is probably incompatible with desirable design standards. Design is important so I disagree with that prescriptive Welsh statutory guidance which deals with not just whether garments have to be dry cleaned but other issues. I throw that out as an example, which brings me on, you will be delighted to know, Mr Speaker, to amendment 1.
Amendment 1 was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, and I and my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley have supported it. The essence of it is that the guidance should make provision to ensure that there is an adequate market for second-hand uniform where that uniform is provided new by a single supplier and to establish a hardship fund for parents or guardians who struggle to meet the cost of providing uniform for their children. This is an important point. We all agree about the virtues of school uniform and we want to ensure that there is a vibrant second-hand market in school uniform because that can bear down on the costs and significantly improve access. Apart from anything else, if there is a vibrant second-hand market, that can also put emphasis on the quality of goods, because they will be able to last rather than going downhill very quickly. I cannot remember which hon. Member it was who referred in Committee and, I think, also on Second Reading to the fact that her son’s blazers lasted about a year each, but her daughter’s blazer, of a higher quality, lasted for about five years. I do not think that that was just because of the different treatment her children were giving to their clothes; it showed the quality of them, and obviously those that last longer are more able to be recycled.
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough for bringing to my attention the fact that in September 2020, at the height of the covid pandemic, Hope Uniform Exchange started a pop-up store in Weston-super-Mare, which saw an average of 40 families a day picking up free or affordable second-hand school uniforms. At the time a parent was interviewed by the press about the challenges of keeping up with their rent, bills, job and the overall impact of covid, which had made money tighter for them. They said:
Hope Uniform Exchange received about 200 bin bags of branded and non-branded uniforms from its donation points around the town, and that is just in one town. It asks parents to bring in clothes to swap or, if they did not have any, to offer a donation to the surplus.
This amendment would ensure that schools provide a second-hand uniforms shop where parents could buy affordable second-hand uniforms. It would ensure that, as I said earlier, the blazers could be reused or handed on to another child; not every family has a whole lot of siblings who can take the same blazer on successively as it goes down the age range.
In Committee, the hon. Member for Weaver Vale mentioned the situation of a parent who was concerned about purchasing a child’s uniform because the branding on the clothing might limit the ability of family and friends to use hand-me-downs. This amendment would also ensure that, where there is a single supplier, adequate markets for second-hand uniforms would be available. That would address the issue where a school uniform needs to have a logo, since there would still be availability of second-hand uniforms. I remember that, on that recent occasion when I was at school, we had an active second-hand uniform shop, of which my parents made great use, if I may say so.
Sustainability is crucial. We have seen some people anticipating the growth in size of their children by purchasing blazers three times the size they need, in the hope that it will last longer. This amendment is about trying to avoid those distortions through behavioural consequences in people because of the lack of affordable alternatives to the new uniform.
I refer also as an example to Uniform Exchange, which is based in Huddersfield. It operates across 182 schools in Kirklees and has collected and recycled thousands of donations of outgrown school uniforms and transformed them into new clothes, given for free to local children in need. The Prime Minister, no less, congratulated Ms Kate France on setting up the scheme and honoured her with a Points of Light award. He wrote to her, stating:
Uniform Exchange is just one example of thousands of schemes in place to ensure that school uniforms are reused. Not only are they environmentally friendly, but they help tackle the costs, especially for struggling families. The amendment would ensure that every school had a second-hand uniform shop.
On Second Reading, the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi) said of the Bill:
That is why the second part of the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough deals with the issue of financial help for purchasing school uniforms. Each school would have to have a hardship fund for school uniforms. That would mean that every family, however difficult their financial circumstances, would be able to dress their children in a school uniform like the uniforms of every other child in that school. That might be a very low cost for the school as a whole, but it would be immensely valuable to those children, who would then have a proper school uniform that fit them properly. It would also be perfectly consistent with a school’s having an exclusive uniform supplier. That, in itself, enables a school to establish a strong ethos around its logo, mottoes and so on.
I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Minister would very much encourage all this and say that it does not need to be put into the statutory guidance. But the perennial issue with guidance is what should and should not be put into it—I see my right hon. Friend nodding. That is why it is a bit frustrating that we are having this debate without actually having seen the draft statutory guidance; if we could actually see it, we would know the context and the extent to which any omission would be remedied by the amendments or whether what is in the amendments was already incorporated. It is important that we steer the Minister in the right direction, and I hope that amendment 1 does that.
It is a great pleasure to see you in the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker; you will be pleased to see the progress that I am making in dealing with this large group of amendments. I now turn to amendment 6, which would relieve schools of having to have regard to the statutory guidance and leave the issue to their discretion.
The essence of this is a chicken and egg thing—it depends what is in the statutory guidance. If the statutory guidance is perfectly bland and reasonable, I do not see any problem with requiring schools to have regard to it, but if it is unreasonable and unnecessarily demanding, it could ultimately be counterproductive. Hon. Members may recall that there is currently no requirement in law for a school to have a uniform policy. We have been talking about what should be in a uniform policy if it exists, but if a school takes the view that the guidance is unreasonable and demanding, its best way of avoiding having to do anything set out in the guidance is not to have a uniform policy at all, and it is perfectly entitled to do that.
This is an interesting lacuna, and my right hon. Friend the Minister may wish to comment on it in his response. Why is there no requirement for a school to have a school uniform policy, and why is it that we are going to great lengths to introduce statutory guidance that could effectively, as I have said, be totally ignored? The reason behind the amendment is to ensure that there is a means by which some of the steam can be let out. Obviously, responsible school governing bodies will look at these issues and ask whether the guidance is sensible and whether they should follow it, and if so, how.
A lot will depend, again, on how much discretion the guidance gives. I referenced the Welsh statutory guidance, which I think now requires that there should not be more than one bespoke item with a badge or insignia on it. How ridiculous is that? Ironically, I do not know how the Government are now doing their counting, but at one stage they were counting a pair of gloves for personal protective equipment as two items, so I do not know whether that would leave a Welsh school that wanted to have the school colours on two socks in breach of the Welsh regulations. I make that point, in a sense reduced to absurdity, because that sort of prescriptive guidance would ultimately lead to school governing bodies saying, probably wisely, to parents that they will have a school uniform, but it will not be the subject of a policy, because if they have a policy they will fall foul of these unreasonable regulations that the Government have introduced. Method and thinking have gone into amendment 6.
Amendments 7 and 8 are, in a sense, alternatives. Amendment 7 would leave out “developing and” from clause 1, page 1, line 12, which would make that provision read:
It seems to me that that would be a simplification, because we would be talking about implementing a policy rather than developing one. The authority would be able to look at its policy to see whether it fitted in with the Government guidance before implementing it.
In a sense, the alternative is to keep the existing words—
and add in “publishing”, as in amendment 8. I tabled amendment 8 to re-emphasise the point that I was making in relation to the previous amendments, because there is no requirement for a school to publish a school uniform policy. In a sense, that would go as far as the Government could, because they are not changing the primary legislation to require a school to have a uniform policy. These measures would require a school to have regard to whether it wanted to have a uniform policy. I would be interested to hear what the Minister thinks about that. As ever, I am trying to be helpful to the Government in their policy development.
Amendment 9 reads:
The explanatory statement is:
This is crucial. The current non-statutory guidance has been in place since 2013. It is important that we should not have chopping and changing at short notice, which could make it expensive for schools to comply with any changes to statutory guidance. It is less significant if the guidance is not statutory, but we are talking about statutory guidance. Those involved in the manufacture and supply of school uniforms have made strong representations such that adequate notice should be given of any changes to the requirements. It should be a reasonable expectation that when the new guidance is issued, it is not going to be just for a year or two—that it is not going to keep chopping and changing, as the guidance has in relation to the covid-19 pandemic. The covid-19 pandemic is an emergency, whereas I do not think anybody could argue that the price and quality of school uniforms is an emergency.
The Government should be able to think ahead and say, “This is the guidance we are going to give and it will be in place for five years minimum.” That would enable schools to enter into contracts for supply, subject, in my view—I do not know whether this will be in the guidance—to proper competitive tendering and clear specification. If one goes out to tender and gets a supplier, one will probably get a much better price if one gives a reasonably lengthy contract period, rather than saying in the tender, “This may have to change after a year because the guidance might be changed on the whim of a change of Minister, Secretary of State or even Government.”
Amendment 9 is, then, designed to introduce some stability and predictability into the process on the basis that that will ultimately result in better value for money. I hope the Minister will be able to respond positively to that, and, even if he does not accept the amendment, at least give some sort of public undertaking as to the length of time for which he intends any guidance issued to be operative. This amendment makes it clear that my preference would be for a period of at least five years.
We now come to amendment 10, which is deregulatory. It is designed to ensure that the guidance does not apply to an alternative provision academy. I will also discuss here, if I may, amendment 11. Amendment 11 would exclude a non-maintained school from the provisions of the Bill. The reason I tabled those amendments is that, of all the issues that are faced by schools, particularly schools offering alternative provision, organising school uniforms should not be at the top of the list.
Amendment 12 proposes that we should also exclude pupil referral units. A pupil referral unit—certainly from my limited experience—comprises pupils who have been excluded or whose attendance has been suspended from a whole range of different schools. I would have thought that the idea of having a school uniform policy for those pupils would be superfluous to requirements. The hope must be that, when pupils go to a pupil referral unit, they will continue to wear the uniform belonging to the school from which they have been excluded in the hope that, as a result of the successful tutelage in the referral unit, they are able to return to the school from whence they came, so that they can rejoin their peer group in that school after they have learned better manners or whatever it was that caused them to be suspended in the first place.
I would be interested to know the Minister’s thinking about this. I understand that the Government wish to deal with these issues of costs in relation to academy schools and maintained schools, but do they really need to get involved in these other schools, as set out in clause 1(5)? My answer to that rhetorical question is that they do not need to get involved in all that. Indeed, there is probably something to be said for using the pupil premium income that local authorities have to deal with any issues to do with the clothing and shoes that those attending these particular schools have. These amendments try to reduce the already very considerable burdens. I take my hat off to all involved in teaching, running and managing alternative provision—academies, non-maintained special schools and pupil referral units—and we owe it to them not to add to their burdens through this legislation. I hope that the Minister agrees.
At the moment, there does not seem to be any discretion under the legislation, because “relevant school” means all those schools set out in proposed new subsection (5). Unless I am wrong about this, there does not seem to be any scope in this primary legislation to remove any of the requirements in that subsection. That is my concern, dealt with in amendments 11, 12 and 13. Amendments 13 and 14 are consequential on those, so I do not need to address them.
I am now getting, delightfully—from my point of view anyway—closer to the end of my remarks, because we are almost at the end of this large group of amendments. Amendment 15 would insert proposed new subsection (7):
This might be described as a bit of a probing amendment, because the Minister has not so far shared with the House exactly what his plans are for consultation on this draft guidance, once it has been issued. As I said earlier, in Committee we got the impression that he was champing at the bit to really engage with—to use this ghastly expression—stakeholders without further ado. That does not seem to have happened, so we now have a danger that the national governors association, the parent teacher association and other representatives may find themselves left out of the loop, because the Government might suddenly say, “This is all incredibly urgent. We’ve got to get on with this”, and so on.
I hope that the Minister will be able to give some sort of undertaking—perhaps that is too strong a word—or expression of good intent to engage with this list of stakeholders, as well as with other stakeholders whom I have not specified in this amendment. This amendment is not meant to exclude other stakeholders, but just to make the point about, in my view, the absolute necessity that, before any guidance is issued, there should be proper consultation.
That brings me to amendment 16, which is the last of my amendments. I thought it would test the patience of the House if I put down too many more, so I confined the number of amendments to 15, and obviously, we had the extra one from my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough. We talk about burdens. This Bill will impact not just on headteachers, governing bodies and parents but on the providers of school uniforms, the designers of school uniforms, the procurers of school uniforms, suppliers of school uniforms, the retailers that are involved and the manufacturers. It is therefore important that there should be proper notice before any of the guidance comes into effect.
As we said earlier, tomorrow will be the first anniversary of the Bill’s Second Reading; I cannot remember whether you were in the Chair at that time, Madam Deputy Speaker. At that stage, the hon. Member for Weaver Vale, like me, probably expected that his Bill would have been on the statute book and the statutory guidance in place long before now, so that it could take effect in the academic year 2021-22. For reasons beyond his control, my control and perhaps—I am being generous to my right hon. Friend—the Minister’s control as well, that scenario has not come about.
I thought it would be good, in the course of the debate, for my right hon. Friend to be able to put down a marker as to whether it is his intention that the Bill should still come into effect and become operative in terms of new guidance being applicable in time for the new school year starting next September. Actually, it will effectively start much sooner than that, because if there are going to be changes to school uniform, that uniform will need to be available in the shops in August, and school governing bodies will need to be able to make up policies in the light of any guidance prior to that.
I am inviting my right hon. Friend the Minister to say that, through no fault of anybody’s, time has now passed to such an extent that it would be unreasonable to expect this legislation to take effect, in terms of the statutory guidance being mandatory for school governing bodies, for the 2021-22 academic year. If he were able to give that assurance, it would allay a lot of concerns. I am not a school governor at the moment—I used to be an acting chairman of a school governing body in Wandsworth some time ago—but I am well aware of the burden and responsibility that people take on when they are running governing bodies. I do not think anybody could do anything other than give them the highest praise for the way in which they have been dealing with the consequences of this pandemic, so let us not burden them with having to respond to statutory guidance for implementation prior to this coming academic year.
The reason I make a bit of a meal of this is that my right hon. Friend the Minister said in Committee that it was still his intention that the Bill should come into effect in time for the next academic year. He said that on 15 or 16 September 2020, so I think it is reasonable that he should be able to give us an update six months later as to what his intentions are.
Having said all that, I hope from the tone and the content of what I have been saying that it is clear that I am very enthusiastic about school uniforms. I want to see good-quality school uniforms at a price that people can afford. If this Bill contributes to facilitating that, all to the good. It has been a useful exercise, on Second Reading and in Committee, for people to have been reminded that there is almost unanimous cross-party support for the principle of school uniforms, and for the belief that school uniforms are a means of levelling up—to use that in vogue expression—and ensuring an improved ethos and even discipline in a school.
There are often schools that get into really hard times. When I was the leader of Wandsworth Borough Council, we had just been able to break free from the constraints of the Inner London Education Authority, and I can think of lots of schools in Wandsworth then of which the council was, frankly, quite ashamed. Now there are some brilliant schools in Wandsworth. I see that the hon. Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson) is nodding enthusiastically. I am delighted to see her in her place. If she does not know, let me tell her that I was born in Putney many years ago. Indeed, my grandfather founded a prep school in Putney because he could not afford to educate his six children. I will not go into that, but I think it is relevant to this debate. That school had a very good uniform, which I remember from when I went to celebrate the school’s 75th anniversary. Sadly, it is no longer there, but it was in Carlton Drive—the hon. Lady may know about it. I am going to leave that there; I was going back to my happy memories of when I lived in the Putney constituency and was on Wandsworth Council.
The point that I am making is about the burden on governors, governing bodies and all those who have to deliver for parents and pupils across the country. I hope that my right hon. Friend the Minister, in responding to this, will accept that I am trying to get a proportionate response from the Government so that we minimise the unnecessary regulation and do not have the application of the law of unintended consequences, which I think is what is going to happen in Wales. I hope that we can in due course—later today, perhaps—congratulate the hon. Member for Weaver Vale on having steered this Bill through, even if none of the amendments to which I have spoken are accepted by the Government. There is a problem of which you are probably aware, Madam Deputy Speaker: however meritorious an amendment, the Government are always reluctant to accept it because of the “not invented here” syndrome.
Finally, let me revert to the point I was making about value added tax. For all that we are talking about, changing the rule on value added tax would deliver a bigger financial relief for parents and children up and down the country, including girls of average girth aged 11 and boys of average height aged 14 across the piece. This is the area on which we should now concentrate. I hope that when we come to the new Session, with the opportunity for fresh private Members’ Bills, the Government may even be prepared to sponsor a hand- out Bill to remove value added tax from all branded school uniforms.

Border Embroideries is located in the Scottish borders, but it serves the whole UK. Roughly 25,000 items are delivered each week to the four corners of the country. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch is right to be concerned about the quality of garments and the working standards of those involved in producing them, but many local producers across the UK are producing high-quality school uniforms, and there are no concerns about how they are produced or the workforce standards.

Amendment 3 would introduce an objective test of relevance, in place of the subjective test, by amending the Bill to say that the
Again, this would give greater certainty by ensuring that different Secretaries of State could not just make new judgments on the situation willy-nilly, which could create untold issues for suppliers, parents and students and again could mean parents having to fork out more in uniform costs, rather than less. The change would mean that only factual considerations should be taken into account, not the prevailing fad of the day, as it were. If we are going to have guidance—on anything, for that matter; not just this—it should be based as far as possible on fact rather than fad or any prevailing opinion that any Minister may have at that particular time in order to justify its imposition. So again, I think amendment 3 would be helpful and would actually do what the promoter of the Bill rightly seeks—to keep down costs for parents.
Amendment 4 would ensure that the following aspects’ bearing on costs are addressed in any guidance: price, quality, design, place of manufacture and country of origin. As I have said, the figures on the costs of uniforms from the Children’s Society that inform the Bill have been disputed. The Schoolwear Association states that
which is considerably lower than the Children’s Society figure that I mentioned at the outset. Quality and affordability, which the hon. Member for Weaver Vale states to be the prime objective of the Bill, cannot be separated, in my opinion. Focusing on cost alone is only half the story. Quality has to play a huge part in this, and therefore schools should focus on value, rather than solely on cost. The better the quality of something, the longer life it is likely to have, and therefore the lower the overall cost to parents in the long run, although obviously it is not lost on us that a high up-front cost is difficult for many parents.
However, as my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South (Andrew Lewer) said on Second Reading, someone who has to buy three pairs of trousers for £10 each, instead of one pair for £25 that will last three times as long, is not saving any money. It is therefore absolutely vital that price and quality go hand in hand in this regard. As for design, well-designed uniforms, and manufacturers and suppliers that prioritise durability, should be a big consideration. Many school suppliers already do both, in response to consumer preferences. It is absolutely vital that the design of the uniform is part of the guidance that is in place.
My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch spoke at length about the importance of the place of manufacture of school uniforms, and he made some important points. Obviously, it is important that schools are able to make sure that their uniforms are ethically sourced. That may be a big part of the values a school adopts, and it would in many respects be perverse if a decision that they wish to take to ensure that their school uniform is ethically sourced was taken away from them because of a Government diktat. I hope that the Minister will bear that in mind when he brings forward the guidance. My hon. Friend covered that particularly well in his remarks.
Country of origin, which my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch also mentioned, is an interesting consideration and another balancing act that the amendment addresses. I am sure that we all want to support local businesses, so considering whether something can be produced in this country, rather than abroad, is certainly worthwhile. Uniform produced by a local supplier might end up being marginally more expensive, but reduced transport costs and a potentially easier and more convenient returns process are clearly factors that a school should be able to consider, rather than cost alone. Schools should take into account the wider cost of uniform, not just the headline cost.
There is also the wider issue, which my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch also mentioned, of the suppliers to the supplier. If the supplier of a component part is also in the United Kingdom, that has knock-on effects for transportation. If we can help to keep local jobs by not pricing them out of the market, it is our duty to do so. It would be a perverse outcome if, as a result of the Bill, we ended up with Government guidance that in effect priced good UK suppliers and manufacturers out of the market. Indeed, it would be outrageous if local businesses were to go bust because of regulation passed in this House without proper consideration.
Amendment 1, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, would require the guidance introduced by the Bill to include guidance on:
Let me deal with each point in turn. Paragraph (a) relates to situations where uniform is provided new by a single supplier.
I should just say in passing that I think we should protect sole suppliers of school uniform. I have a school uniform supplier in Shipley, Whittakers Schoolwear, which provides a very good service to my constituents, and I certainly would not want anything in the Bill to be detrimental to its long-term interests or the way it looks after its customers.
Sole suppliers should be protected if that is a school’s preferred arrangement. I understand that two thirds of schools work with their uniform retailer on a sole supplier basis. A school having one supplier means that all children wear the same brand of clothing, which can mitigate teasing and bullying in cases where some children might otherwise wear cheaper alternatives. It can also eliminate the risk of different suppliers not having enough stock in the right sizes all year round, which is an important consideration. Supermarkets are rightly praised for selling school uniform items cheaply. Having spent 12 years working for Asda before becoming an MP, I bow to no one in my admiration for supermarkets, which have done an awful lot to make school uniform much more affordable for parents, for which I praise them more than anyone.
However, we must not forget that school uniform is very much a seasonal product for supermarkets—it is often available only at the start of the school year. A few months in, people might struggle to find items of school uniform they need in the supermarkets, because they will have moved on to the next seasonal product. Sole suppliers can ensure that all school uniform in all sizes is available all year round. I think that that point is not given enough consideration.
In answer to a parliamentary question that I tabled in January, in which I asked what assessment had been made of the value for money of sole supplier arrangements for school uniforms, the Minister said:
Now, guidance alone will never be sufficient in ensuring that uniform is affordable to all, and for that reason, there should be a safety net. Second-hand uniforms have many benefits, not least when it comes to cost. During the Second Reading debate there was cross-party support for second-hand uniforms, which amendment 1 deals with.
The answer to my parliamentary question went on to say:
I understand that these regular competitive review mechanisms are in place in some schools. Some could be looked at, say, every three to five years, although that should be a matter for the school to decide. The provision of second-hand uniforms, whether that be through the single supplier themselves and officially a factor in the procurement process or through a school-run scheme, or even through families making use of good-quality uniforms with different children, is a sensible consideration for any uniform policy.
I would like to mention in passing Dawn Coleman, who is the founder of the Shipley area school uniform bank in my constituency. She has won volunteer of the year award for the work that she does in ensuring that second-hand uniform is available to parents. She runs its with other volunteers based at the Shipley Salvation Army. They provide a fantastic service to the local community, and I would certainly like to pass on my thanks for everything that they do. That goes to highlight how important it is that there is a thriving second-hand market for school uniforms, and it goes to show the demand for it, not just in my constituency. We have heard from other speakers about the demand in their areas for second-hand uniforms, so amendment 1 is really important.
I understand that the Schoolwear Association has already provided the Department with draft tender documents that it drew up to support schools and its members to ensure that this process is relevant and not too onerous. The Department for Education passed it to its procurement specialists and did not have any comments.
Subsection (2A)(b) of the amendment deals with hardship funds as an additional assistance for parents or guardians who struggle to meet the cost of providing uniform for their children. Many schools have for many years operated their own systems and initiatives to support low-income families, including second-hand sales. They have also helped with discounts for multi-sibling families, because obviously uniform is a big cost for many such families. Initiatives such as these must be protected and promoted by the Government to avoid overregulation, which would mean that suppliers were the only option.
To support parents, the association makes the case for the Government to mandate schools to offer hardship support to parents who need it. School uniform must be affordable for parents, and I know that the Schoolwear Association members already offer several cost-saving initiatives to struggling families, including the hardship funds that are the subject of this part of the amendment. They also help with swap shops and payment plans, which must be a great relief to parents who need that support as well.
For example, I also understand that one supplier—Stevensons, I believe—which works with schools on a contract of sole supply arrangement, offers support through the donation of gift vouchers for parents in situations of hardship. Those are provided annually direct to the school, allowing the school to recognise situations of poverty and support those families who are in need. Stevensons also supports local charities, which often procure uniform for low-income families, and supplies the uniform to those charities at heavily discounted prices. There are a range of measures already being taken, and amendment 1, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, is incredibly helpful in ensuring that we keep to the purpose of the Bill, which is to make school uniform as affordable as possible.
Amendment 5 would mean that any guidance issued must include advice on ways of minimising the payment of VAT as a component of the cost of school uniforms. I wholeheartedly support the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch in that regard, and I was delighted that the hon. Member for Weaver Vale appeared to agree with them. Leaving the EU has provided the perfect opportunity to revisit the VAT policy for school uniforms, and such a review received cross-party support on Second Reading.
On compulsory items such as school wear, VAT should be minimised. Taking VAT off branded uniform items is an entirely logical and sensible approach since, quite clearly, these items will only ever be worn by schoolchildren. There is currently a 20% VAT charge on uniforms for children over the age of 14 or approximately the size of a 14-year-old. That seems to be a relic from the days when many children left school at the age of 14, which has not been updated since. There is no logical justification for 14 being the age at which VAT should start to be charged on uniform—or clothes, for that matter. That is senseless, and the Government need to update it urgently.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch pointed out, it is worse than that, because it is based on sizes, and out-of-date sizes at that. The parents of even average children under the age of 14 have to pay VAT, but, if someone has a particularly tall child, for example, they will be paying VAT at a much earlier age.
That is completely unjustifiable, as my hon. Friend said, because the sizes have not been updated, while the sizes of children have been changing rapidly in recent years. It is a stealth tax that must be addressed. The VAT imposed on secondary school uniforms, in particular, coincides with a time when parents see not only a jump in the amount of items required by schools, so that they have more items to buy and an increased outlay, but the double whammy of VAT added on to that.
I understand that this policy has not been reviewed since it was introduced in 1973, and by anybody’s standards it urgently needs a fresh look. Amendment 5 would force the Government’s hand to do that. As my hon. Friend touched on, as far back as 1980, Her Majesty’s Customs and Excise, as it was then, considered the possibility of scrapping VAT on school uniforms, but concluded that the zero rate aimed at children would be exploited by adults in the larger sizes.
But that is a nonsense when it comes to school uniform, because why on earth would any adult want to purchase and wander round the streets in branded school uniform? Of course they would not—it is a complete and utter nonsense. Even if the Government did not want to go the whole hog on children’s clothing generally, which could be used by smaller adults, that is no basis at all for continuing VAT on branded school uniform.
I hope the Minister will address this in his remarks. Accepting this amendment would go a long way to reassuring parents that this stealth tax will come to an end. Now that we are free from the shackles of the EU, scrapping VAT on all school uniform items would be a perfect Brexit dividend for parents, and I hope the Government will take this very seriously indeed. Given that we are trying to cut the cost of school uniforms, this is the best way possible for many parents of kids at secondary schools.
Amendment 6 would enable the appropriate authority to exercise its discretion as to whether or not to have regard to the guidance. The hon. Member for Weaver Vale rather pooh-poohed it, but this is a key amendment. It would mean that schools maintained the right to assess and set their own uniform policy independently, without having to adhere to any centrally prescribed rules. The guidance would be there, but it would just be that—guidance. That must be better, especially if these rules are constantly subject to opinion rather than fact, which I mentioned earlier in support of amendment 3. If amendment 3 were adopted, it would reassure people, and maybe amendment 6 would not be so necessary.
I believe that schools should retain the ability to make decisions about what is the most appropriate approach to uniform for pupils in their care based on their local circumstances, which they certainly know better than Whitehall. One of the key purposes of the roll-out of academy schools was to enable schools to have more autonomy. As it says on the Government’s website:
For a school to have autonomy in the areas of the national curriculum and term times and yet to have every nook and cranny of school uniform policy forced upon it by a Minister seems highly contradictory to me and seems to fly in the face of the whole academy process.
As is the case with special educational needs schools, which I will discuss when I come to amendment 11, it should be for the school to decide whether there should even be a school uniform. I make no apology for the fact that I am a big fan of school uniforms and believe they provide many benefits. Many others agree with that, and it seems to have support across the House. They provide academic and behavioural benefits. Six in 10 school leaders believe that a school uniform helps to improve students’ educational outcomes, and nine in 10 teachers believe that it positively affects pupils’ behaviour. I hope that school uniforms will always be required by schools where appropriate, but it is important for them to distinguish their own policy to suit their specific school needs.
I have always been a believer in trusting the people who are on the frontline. They tend to know better than we do about virtually everything. I trust the teachers, headteachers and governors to be able to make a better decision for their schools than any Minister. Guidance should also not be so harsh as to restrict admissions to schools, and that important point was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Rob Butler) on Second Reading.
Amendment 7 would restrict the guidance to policy implementation by leaving out “developing and” from subsection (3) of proposed new section 551A of the Education Act 1996:
As I said, I believe that schools should retain the ability to make decisions about the appropriate approach for their school and their pupils, but schools should also have discretion in how they develop their school uniform policy. The amendment would mean that schools would not have to have regard to the uniform policy when developing it as well as implementing it. We should surely trust the headteachers and the governors to develop the policy in the way that they think is best for their school.
Amendment 8 would require appropriate authorities to have regard to publishing requirements in the guidance about the costs of school uniform. Requirements could be published to ensure transparency over costing and the sourcing of uniforms. By publishing a school uniform policy, following the introduction of new guidance, schools can perhaps benefit by learning from other schools’ school uniform strategy. One problem with a centralised approach that is too prescriptive is that it knocks out anything new that might emerge from schools—good, innovative ideas that other schools might want to follow. We should not be trying to knock out any kind of school innovation in this area. Again, it is really important that we do not become too prescriptive in this area.
Amendment 9 would ensure that any guidance remains in place for at least five years. Again, this is very important, as a definitive minimum period for the guidance to be in place will help schools plan their uniform policy and avoid any unexpected sudden changes. A longer period for the guidance to be in place would allow the Department to measure the efficacy of the new guidance, which will hopefully lead to a more accurate assessment of the success of school uniform policy and better inform future policy decisions. It will also protect against the introduction of more guidance against the will of schools and local uniform retailers.
This minimum period will prevent the guidance falling victim to the various opinions of different Secretaries of State, as opposed to facts and research, which again brings us back to the purpose of amendment 3. The point is that suppliers need certainty if they are to produce a sufficient stock of school uniform for people when it is required. The amendment means that they would not be left with having to destroy huge quantities of uniform at huge cost at the whim of a new Minister coming along wanting to impose their particular ideas on everybody.
The important point about this, coming back to the whole purpose of the Bill, is that if the suppliers do not have this certainty, they will, when they come to bid for the tender for the school uniform, put up the price. If they think that they might be left with a load of stock that they cannot get rid of, by definition they will have to put their prices up. Amendment 9, therefore, is critical in making sure that suppliers have no reason not to give the best possible price for schools when they are bidding for the school uniform contract. Again, I hope that the Government will look very closely at this matter to make sure that there is a period of time—I think five years is an absolute minimum—that the guidance remains in place, and it should remain in place for at least that length of time.
Amendment 10 would exclude an alternative provision academy from the provisions of the Bill. I mentioned earlier why academies should be given freedoms. Amendment 11 would exclude a non-maintained special school from the provisions of the Bill. Schools that provide for children with special educational needs often do not have a school uniform. The Good Schools Guide explains that for children with special needs, such as physical disabilities or sensory difficulties, traditional school uniforms are often not appropriate. Parents of children with special needs will often need to go further than their local uniform store to find appropriate uniform for their children. Government guidance on sourcing local affordable uniform might therefore be misinformed as to the nature of this particular market. This is a very important amendment, as it would be wrong to have statutory guidance that covers schools that do not normally have school uniforms for good reason. It could be said that the guidance would specifically exempt them from it. If they had to have regard to the guidance when it was never going to apply to them, that would be a bureaucratic burden that they could do without. If it is clear that the guidance is not to apply to them, let us adopt the amendment and make it clear now. I hope that the Minister will confirm in due course whether my understanding of whether the guidance will apply to schools that provide for children with special educational needs is correct.
The Government may say, “We will look at this issue at the time,” but as someone who used to chair the all-party group on state boarding schools, I know all too well how the Department for Education often forgets about certain categories of schools when it introduces new policies and guidance. Amendment 11 would ensure that certain schools did not suffer from that tendency in respect of uniform policy. Even if the Government say they will make special provision for certain schools, in my experience with state boarding schools the Government often introduce things that apply to such schools, having not given them any consideration, and then have to make a hasty change afterwards.
Amendment 12 would exclude pupil referral units from the provisions of the Bill. Pupils at pupil referral units have specific challenges that vary significantly from those of other children in mainstream education. Such schools often concentrate on the social and emotional wellbeing of their students, rather than on their academic flourishing, as the extent of the personal challenges that students face can be enormously demanding and difficult. Claire Lillis, ex-headteacher of Ian Mikardo School in London, said:
As I have mentioned, many agree that uniforms are a force for good because they instil a sense of discipline and belonging, but for schools at pupil referral units uniforms could be an issue in some instances, and such schools may refrain from enforcing strict uniform policies, where appropriate, in case it is counterproductive. I believe that it should be for the school to decide for itself and that a Government Minister should not try to impose something against its wishes.
The enrolment turnover rate at pupil referral units might be high, so a school uniform policy will have to take that into account. The uniform is often more flexible at such schools, and parents might not be forced to buy a uniform when their child starts a new school. This puts pupil referral units in a position completely different from that of other schools. It would be helpful and give certainty to those schools if it was made clear in the Bill that they will be excluded from its provisions; otherwise, they will always be at the whim of a particular Government Minister, who may have their own ideas about this issue. Statutory guidance might mean that they will have to be a lot less flexible in their approach.
Amendments 13 and 14 are consequential on other amendments, so there is no need for me to talk about them. Amendment 15 would require the Secretary of State to
As I said at the start of my speech, we all want to ensure that parents who are struggling with costs, many of whom are reluctant to discuss the financial challenges of school uniforms as that can be a sensitive issue, are assisted wherever possible. If parents are not consulted, the guidance cannot properly reflect the needs and interests of the parents the Bill is ultimately trying to help. Governors will understand the needs of parents, as will parent teacher associations, so by including them as consultees we can hopefully provide valuable information and feedback.
If representatives of the different categories of schools are consulted, it would ensure that if special educational needs schools are included in the Bill yet the guidance should not really apply to them, they will be able to reaffirm that when they are consulted. It would be especially helpful to make sure that they are guaranteed consultees. The amendment would also ensure that any other categories of school have a voice in respect of the school uniform policy guidance. Hopefully, that would provide all kinds of different perspectives to make sure that the best and most appropriate guidance is adopted for each individual type of school.
Amendment 15 would mean that the Secretary of State should develop policy after in-depth consultation with the national governors association, the parent teacher association UK, representatives of the relevant categories of school and, ideally, industry players. Given the fact that uniform suppliers are largely high street, family businesses, which I am sure we all want to see flourish, it is vital that the Secretary of State engages with industry players when consulting on potential changes, which will ultimately take place at a local level. I am sure that this Minister and this Secretary of State would do that, but we have to future-proof the legislation for when we might not have Ministers who are as sensible as the current ones. That is why this amendment and the others are essential in doing just that. It is about protecting schools and others from the whim of a Secretary of State or a Schools Minister who are not as sensible as the ones that we have.
The final amendment—amendment 16—would mean that any guidance under this Act will not apply to the 2021-22 academic year. Again, it is absolutely vital that the guidance does not come into effect too quickly, or many parents may have already bought uniform for the start of the next academic year. Given everything that has been going on recently, with schools being closed and all the uncertainty surrounding covid, it would certainly be a kick in the teeth for anything to change too quickly that would add costs for families who have already been through so much, when this is part of a Bill that is designed to try to reduce the cost for families. I understand that uniform retailers, whose sales will have been impacted by the lockdown, are sitting on high stock levels, so to avoid wastage, they need sufficient time to sell their existing stock. I hope the Minister is aware of that and is not planning on doing something that would have the unintended consequences that I talked about regarding unnecessary cost.
In conclusion, as I just mentioned and as the Schoolwear Association, with its expertise on the subject, said, if the Bill is not implemented appropriately—these amendments go through a large range of areas where there could be unintended consequences—this could cause difficulties and undermine the whole basis of the Bill, which I think everybody in the House supports. As I said at the outset, I am particularly grateful to the Schoolwear Association for its assistance, as its membership includes over 250 small and medium-sized enterprises—principally local family businesses—based in high street locations that support their local communities. Together, they clothe over three quarters of UK schoolchildren, so their insight is invaluable when considering the Bill. Their major concerns are that relaxing uniform requirements risks creating greater inequality in schools; deregulating or removing branded items from school uniforms undermines consistency and uniformity, making it harder for schools to have an identity; and ending sole supplier arrangements would make it harder to guarantee uniform supply and potentially drive up costs for families.
I hope that people will see that these amendments are very sensible and are designed to protect the integrity of the Bill, not undermine it. I am very sorry that the Bill’s promoter decided that he would agree to the amendments but did not agree to implement them in the Bill. That is the whole point of legislation in this House. It seems perverse that he thinks they will be beneficial but is not going to adopt them. I therefore hope that the Minister will intervene in this, accept that these amendments would make the Bill better and say that the Government will agree to adopt them, so we can have a Bill that everybody can be confident will deliver the benefits that we all want to see.

Will there be financial support, such as school uniform grants, for struggling parents, and will it be promoted and properly funded? That is addressed in amendment 1, but it does not need to be in the Bill; it can be in the guidance. Finally, will the Minister give an assurance that schools should not send home or exclude children who fail to comply with uniform policies for financial reasons? I have welcomed the Government’s support for the Bill so far, and the support of organisations such as the Children’s Society and of colleagues across the House, but parents now urgently need to see that support turned into action.

My hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) referred to the manufacturer and supplier in his constituency. Like many other colleagues who have detailed knowledge about the supply of school uniform, he praised the quality of the products and underlined the importance of a strongly competitive market that is easy for small and medium enterprises to enter and leave and in which they are able to flourish. Coherent and effective competitive tendering is one of the watchwords that I have supported in my time in the House. Years ago I campaigned successfully for the incorporation of CCT for local authority services.
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Weaver Vale for introducing the Bill. I was disappointed that he felt inhibited about expressing his support for some of my ideas. I put that in the context of the shadow Minister’s comments that compromise is necessary and the Opposition do not always wish to undermine things. The hon. Gentleman may have been under pressure from his Front- Bench colleagues not to be more robust in his support for me. Having said all that, I appreciate his continued support for the campaign to remove VAT from school uniforms. As one campaign, which has taken a long time—we have talked about it going back to 2015—comes to a successful conclusion, we have today given added oxygen to that new campaign, which I hope will not take so long to reach a conclusion. It is good to see you in the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Third Reading.