A leading politician has launched a robust defence of faith and free schools in the wake of the controversy surrounding Derby’s Al-Madinah Muslim school.
Minister for Faith and Communities Baroness Warsi would not be drawn on whether she would have sent her children to the school had she lived in Derby.
Asked if the Al-Madinah situation disappointed her she said: “You will always have occasions, whether they are in the private sector, whether in the state sector, or whether they are a free school, where some schools will not be up to the standard we would like them to be.”
The Baroness, who was the first Muslim woman to serve as a minister in the UK, spoke during her visit to the Multi-Faith Centre at the University of Derby yesterday.
Up to 412 pupils, aged four to 16, could find themselves without school places if Schools Minister Lord Nash decides that Al-Madinah, which opened in September 2012, should lose its public funding, which he has threatened if improvements are not made.
A report revealing poor standards at the Muslim faith free school by Ofsted, the Office for Standards in Education, brought the likelihood of closure a step nearer.
As a free school, Al-Madinah’s governing body is answerable only to the Government and Ofsted, with funding coming directly from the Department for Education.
Asked if she would have sent any of her five children to Al-Madinah, the Baroness said: “I don’t want to hypothesize. It would be wrong. As each child gets to the point when you’re looking for a school for them, you make the best choices that are right for them at that time.
“For me, this comes back down to parental choice and a good education. What free schools do, and we’ve seen this up and down the country, in some of the most deprived communities, is they have been an opportunity for an excellent education which is aspirational and pushes children to want more for themselves.”
She said that one of her children had gone to a Muslim faith school and another to an Anglican faith school.
Asked if she felt recent coverage of Al-Madinah had done damage to the Coalition’s free school programme, she said: “It’s not for me to control what the media does and doesn’t put out but, for many years now, I’ve been saying Muslim news makes news.
“Therefore, tragically, sometimes these things are covered, maybe, in a way that doesn’t particularly do a great amount of credit for what is actually happening on the ground.
“What I’ve heard today is that Derby has a great record and a great history of multi-faith work.
“Derby has communities from across the world, from different origins, from different religions, who don’t just co-exist.
“And, actually, the fact that we are sitting here in a centre which has been designed with the co-operation of several different faiths speaks volumes.”