A Defense of the National Education Service in the United Kingdom

This essay defends the Labor Party's proposed National Education Service (NES) in the United Kingdom. It begins by outlining the existing education system in the UK, highlighting its challenges such as teacher shortages and educational inequality. The essay then examines the Labor Party's objections to the neoliberal structure of education, contrasting capitalism with democratic socialism and competitive individualism with socialism. It argues that the NES, modeled after the National Health Service, could benefit people from all social strata by providing free education and addressing the inequalities inherent in the current system. The essay further explores the elements of the NES, emphasizing its potential to promote a more egalitarian and holistic education system, ultimately aiming to mitigate inequality and improve the quality of education for all citizens. The essay concludes by emphasizing the perceived benefits of the NES and its impact on the people.

Running head: DEFENDING THE NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE
Defending the National Education Service
Student’s name
University
Author’s note

1DEFENDING THE NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Existing Education System in the UK.............................................................................................3
Labor Party’s Objection to the Neoliberal Structure of Education..................................................5
Capitalism vs. Democratic Socialism..........................................................................................5
Competitive Individualism vs. Socialism....................................................................................7
Elements of National Education System.........................................................................................8
The NHS Model...............................................................................................................................8
Radical Pedagogy of the National Education Service.................................................................9
Human Rights and National Education Service............................................................................10
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................12
Reference.......................................................................................................................................13

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Introduction
The Labor Party of The United Kingdom has recently proposed to implement the
National Education Service, ensuring quality higher education for all their citizens. The
underlying philosophy of this proposed education model aims to mitigate the inequality and
qualitative differences among the existing models of education, and promote a democratic,
egalitarian and holistic education system. In a press meet during The World Transformed festival
held on February 19th 2019, the former Labor Party MP Jeremy Corbyn, along with Labour MP
and Shadow Minister for Higher Education, Further Education and Skills, Gordon Marsden and
Shadow Education Secretary Angela Rayner, declared the Party’s mission and vision for a
renewed model of education. However, long before the 2019 TWT meet, the Labor Party has
expressed their intention to implement the National Education Service in their 2017 manifesto,
which articulated their mission for the initiative as “to move towards cradle-to-grave learning
that is free at the point of use” (labour.org.uk). The chief significance of the proposed initiative is
to provide free education for all, through introduction of a fairer funding formula.
However, the initiative is met with certain objections and criticisms, majorly based on the
aspect of funding, as well as its intended purpose. Several critics, such as George Ryan (2019),
argue that the NES lacks the required feasibility, especially when comes to its strategy of
funding. The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) estimates that the free education policies would
add around £17 billion to the public spending per year (Ryan 2019). Although, there are still
some uncertainties regarding the structure and strategies pertaining to the proposed educational
reform, it could take the British education system along with skill development to the right
direction.

3DEFENDING THE NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE
To this end, the present essay takes the position to defend the initiative of the National
Education Service (NES). It argues that the holistic and egalitarian approach of NES, modelled
after the National Health Service (NHS) could perceivably benefit people from all social strata.
Moreover, the proposed free education facility, although aimed for the entire educational levels,
would serve the post-18 educational level, benefitting the adults who wishes to pursue adult
education. To establish the claim, the essay would first evaluate the existing education policy of
the United Kingdom, followed by examining the Labor Party’s objection to the apparent
neoliberal structure of the education system. Further, the essay will undertake a critical analysis
of the proposed National Education Service, including its philosophical underpinning and the
proposed elements of the initiative. Finally, it would try to conclude with emphasizing the
perceived benefit of the NES, and its impact on the people.
Existing Education System in the UK
Education is a devolved matter with the individual countries under the United Kingdom.
Local governments are entrusted with the responsibilities of implementing policies for state-
funded schools as well as public education at the grass root level, whereas the matter is overseen
by the Department for Education on a national level. There are provisions for both state-funded
or public schools and private schools, while parents have the liberty to choose from several
government authorized modes of educations, such as grammar schools, religious schools, and
other academies. In general, the state-funded schooling system is categorized into two groups,
i.e. comprehensive school and grammar schools. Further, it is classified into stages based on age
group, namely Early Years Foundation Stage (3-5 years), primary education (5-11 years),
secondary education (11-16 years) and tertiary education (18+ years). In UK, education is
compulsory for every citizen upto 18 years, and school education is compulsory up to 16 years.

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Post 16 years of age, children may opt for either academic or vocational education. The tertiary
education, also known as higher education, is optional, which students are supposed to enter
through the qualification of exams for the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE).
The entire schooling system, including its examination procedure and curricula, is subject to
inspection and assessment by Children’s Services and Skills, the Office for Standards in
Education or Ofsted. (Falk et al. 2015)
Although education is compulsory and the literacy rate is over 99% in the UK, the
present state of education is suffering from a steep crisis. As Alpesh Maisuria, Senior Lecturer in
Education Studies, University of East London opines, the major challenges that the current
education system is facing includes teacher shortage and the alleged ‘test-based’ education
culture (2019). The teachers serving in the state-funded schools are under enormous pressure to
achieve significant results in the important league tables. With the severe shortage in teaching
staff, mostly due to incompetent strategies of staff recruitment and retention, they are often
adopting result-based teaching, rather than assisting students with effective learning. Many
teachers in the state-funded schools stated that their work has been rendered meaningless, as they
are to strive for metrics rather than educating. (Maisuria 2019). At the same time, to ensure good
grades, the admission procedures have also become opaque and inconsistent. This tendency often
leads to ignore the requirements for education for children with special needs. Besides, the overt
competition for good grades takes a toll on the mental health of the pupils, ensuing stress and
anxiety.
Apart from the competitive nature of the existing education system, the most significant
criticism that the current educational system faces points to the chronic inequality present in the
different levels of education. According to the findings in An Unfair Start, the UNICEF reports

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that the UK ranks 16th in secondary education and 23rd in primary education among the list of 41
developed countries in terms of educational inequality (Unicef-irc.org (2018). The inequality
includes economic inequality, difference of quality in education at various levels and unequal
access to educational facility. According to Reay (2018), the children from affluent families are
likely to have access to the major share of educational facility as compared to children from low
income group families. The scenario is same regarding the free school provisions in London,
where children with less economic support are outnumbered by children of rich families.
Therefore, the current framework of the English education system is undeniably suffering from a
crisis, to which the proposed National Education Service is directly addressed. (Ryan 2019)
Labor Party’s Objection to the Neoliberal Structure of Education
Capitalism vs. Democratic Socialism
According to the Labor Party’s standing on social issues, they define education as the
means to provide the necessary start in life irrespective of social or economic class of the
recipients, as everyone deserves a fair start in life. However, they argue that the present system is
systematically violating the fundamental purpose of education. In their manifesto, Labor party
criticizes the current educational framework by arguing that it is a direct result of the neoliberal
approach to the distribution of social goods. They maintain in their statement “The education
system isn’t bridging the gap between richest and poorest. It’s reinforcing it.” (labour.org.uk).
The fundamental nature of neoliberalism has promoted deregulation, capitalism, and most
importantly, the laissez-faire economic model, which in turn has proliferated the economic
inequality in society. Moreover, due to the ever increasing privatization, education and health
care have gone out of common people’s access to a significant extent. According to the

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Keynesian criticism of the ideology, neoliberalism is fundamentally flawed due to the resultant
macroeconomic instability (Chari 2015). Kotz (2015) opines “Neoliberalism is based on the
thorough domination of labor by capital”. Thus, he maintains that capitalism has predominantly
taken the form of global neoliberal order, forcing all the neoliberal structures to systematically
ignore the poor. Also, Marxian economic geographer David Harvey (2016) has argued that
neoliberalism is essentially designed to enhance the class power of economically elite group of
the society, subsequently dominating and depriving the poor of their rights.
In purview of the scholarly discourse on the impact of neoliberalism on social justice, it
can be argued that an education system based on the neoliberal model cannot advocate equality
either, as it essentially follows a capitalist approach (Gunter and Fitzgerald 2015). And this is the
central contention of the Labors’ objection. They maintain that education should be accessible
for all, while empowering people to overcome the economic as well as social difference through
education, skill development as well as economic opportunity. This approach of the Labor Party
is aligned with their political ideology of democratic socialism. Emerged from the trade union
movement in the United Kingdom. As the chief purpose of the historic competitor of the
Conservative Party, Labor Party aims to create economic prosperity and ensure social services in
the country. As embedded in their ideology, democratic socialism advocates for a sovereign
political democracy, along with a socially owned economic system. Moreover, such form of
socialism argues that capitalism is essentially against the fundamental rights of freedom, equality
and justice (Harnecker 2015). Therefore, to ensure equality in education, the neoliberal structure
must be replaced with a democratic socialist structure, which is reflected in the Labor Party’s
proposed National Educational Service.

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Competitive Individualism vs. Socialism
The concept of individualism is closely related with the political ideology of
neoliberalism. Historically, liberalism emerged as a form of political individualism, which serves
as the foundation of neoliberalism. According to the tenets of individualism, individual
autonomy should be preserved over obligations imposed by social institutions, such as state or
society. Although individualism emerged as a response to the state-imposed oppression and
limitation on individuals during the pre-Enlightenment era, soon it was transformed to
competitive individualism, allowing room for a capitalist competition over limited resources.
Competitive individualism further entails a competitive system in the society, which maintains a
status quo of inequality in the field of social welfare and human engagement. It affirms the
privilege theories, which maintains that there is a hierarchy prevalent in the society based on
socioeconomic class, gender, race etc. (Shephard 2020.)
The current scenario of the UK’s education practices could arguably be described as
inclined to competitive individualism. As mentioned earlier, the tendency of test-based learning,
with the sole purpose of scoring high grades, reflects the steep competitive environment in the
education system. Besides, students with higher economic and societal resources, i.e. belonging
to rich families or ethnically superior groups, dominate the educational arena, depriving the
students from lower social class. Thus, inequality persists in spite of allowing everyone to have
access to education. To this end, the rationale of the proposed National Education Service is also
applicable, which undertakes free education for all. The majority of funding for school and
college education, as in the contemporary timeframe, is sourced from the students’ fees. Besides,
the tuition fees in the United Kingdom is one of the highest among all the countries across the
world. And the better infrastructure and results a school has, the more it costs (Maisuria 2019).

8DEFENDING THE NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE
Hence, the average population of all the standard schools is dominated by students from wealthy
families. With the free education program, if the financial restriction is abolished in the field of
education, children and adult alike, irrespective of their social class, could have access to quality
education. Thus, it could be really beneficial to mitigate the evident inequality. Moreover, in
contrast to the inherent competitive individualism, the Labor ideology of socialism ensures social
justice and equality. If the socialist goal of collective ownership could be realized through the
NES program, the apparent competitiveness in the education system is also expected to decrease
due to the equitable distribution of goods and services.
Elements of National Education System
The NHS Model
As Corbyn and Rayner stated in their speech addressing the press, the proposed Natinal
Education Service will essentially be modellede after England’s celebrated national healthcare
system, i.e. the National Health Service (NHS). The NHS is perhaps the world’s largest public
funded healthcare system that provides free healthcare under the government-run medical
facilities to all its citizens. Moreover, some of the services, such as treatment for infectious
diseases and emergency treatment are free for everyone, including immigrants and visitors. The
rationale underlying the NHS initiative is similar to that of NES’s democratic ideology, which
suggests that healthcare, as a basic social amenity, should be available to all, irrespective of
social class or wealth. A research conducted in collaboration by The Health Foundation and
Institute for Fiscal Studies points that since the implementation of NHS, people in the UK are
generally less likely to be put off from medical treatment due to high financial cost as compared

9DEFENDING THE NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE
to other developed countries in the world. As a result, the general health of the public has visibly
improved. (Benn 2017)
The outline of the proposed National Education Service, Rayner states, is constructed
drawing inspiration from the success and effectiveness of the NHS. Like the Health Service, the
Educational Service is also expected to be publicly funded from general taxation and government
contributions. The program will free of cost education to all levels, including enhancement of
skill development through vocational education and apprenticeship. Thus, similar to the
healthcare sector, the National Education Service is set to reduce inequality in the field of
education, ensuring accessibility and effective educational resources. Moreover, following the
Finnish education model, the teachers and educators will be encouraged to develop a co-
constructed localized curriculum, and engage in research and development. They will be given
more autonomy and value, thus mitigating the factors of recruitment and retention (Ryan 2019).
Radical Pedagogy of the National Education Service
Since their 2017 election manifesto, Labor Party with the aid of Shadow Education, has
come up with several promising educational policies which will effectively bring about change
and equality in the field of education. However, to materialize the vision of free education for all,
Labor Party has sought counsel from eminent educationists such as Diane Reay, Alpesh Maisuria
and Karma Nabulsi to design a radical pedagogy. This specified framework of education, as
Rayner opines, would be attempt to design a pedagogy as an alternative to the existing neoliberal
capitalist pedagogy, which effectively advocates equality, serving for a collective benefit instead
of individual benefit. (Redpepper.co.uk)
As Maisuria opines, the present education structure is fixated with the aim of producing
economically productive individuals. And in the due process, schools, colleges and universities

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are nurturing the reproduction of societal inequality. Further, Howard Stevenson indicates that
this tendency of unequal advantages in education has proliferated a hegemony, restricting the
access to education for a limited amount of population. To mitigate this challenge, Rayner has
extended a call to every concerned citizens, including, educators, policy makers, parents,
students and every other citizens to contribute to develop an alternative pedagogy that would
promote equality, social justice and empowerment for all. . (Redpepper.co.uk)
As of now, Labor strategies to achieve such a radical pedagogy has proposed to abolish
SATs and Ofsted. During TWT discussions, panelist Holly Rigby has also proposed a movement
called Abolish Eton. One of the most premium educational institutes of the England, Eton
symbolizes elitisms and the parameter of private education. By discarding Eton, Rigby suggests
that it would communicate a clear call to do away with privilege and class supremacy in
education. With Rigby’s proposal, a nationwide movement, although weak, of abolishing private
schools have also started. However, Labor is not yet ready to tackle such a sensitive and massive
issue. . (Redpepper.co.uk)
For a feasible and realizable model, Labor Manifesto has proposed several elements of
NES, accessibility and equality ranking top of the list. It has also pledged to introduce a new
curriculum, compatible with the socialist ideology. Through this curriculum, the party aims to
promote societal justice and equality, which in turn is expected to reduce the competitive nature
of the current education system, relieving the students from the mounting stress and anxiety. On
the whole, the pedagogy will not be modelled after individual productivity, but after the
realization human development and fulfillment of fundamental rights. (Reay 2019)

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Human Rights and National Education Service
Along with the democratic socialist ideal, the proposed structure of the National
Education Service is also envisioned to meet the fundamental right of education. Right to
education. Along with the international declarations of human rights, is also recognised as a
fundamental right under the Schedule 1, First Protocol, Article 2 of the Human Rights Act 1998.
The act stipulates that under the legislation of the United Kingdom, no person shall be denied the
right to education. However, the declaration is rather paradoxical in the current situation in the
UK, given the high cost of school and college education. To elucidate, the basic fees for a regular
five year course in Eton costs approximately £204,000 (Maisuria 2019). This is not very different
in other private schools of England. The public schools, on the other hand, are suffering from a
funding shortage, which has reached almost an all-time low. Students are compelled to carry the
burden of students’ loan for the rest of their lives with an interest rate as high as 3.3% to 6.3%.
Thus, the citizens are not literally denied to avail education in any institution, although the cost is
making education inaccessible to many. In this sense, they are indeed denied education if they
could not meet the financial requirements.
The free education policy of the National Education Service, is a rather effective means
to ratify the declaration of rights as compared to the educational policies of Michael Gove, the
former education secretary. It is argued that the current education system perceives students as
commodities, given the stark competition among schools and employability as the parameter of
students’ success. In contrast to this, the NES, modelled after NHS, is about to transform the
ethos of education, encouraging schools to serve as collaborators and facilitators, rather than
competitors, and the students to realize the ideals of equality and social justice, instead of
employability.