Education (Scotland) Act 2025 (Consequential Provisions and Modifications) Order 2025

Lord Bruce of Bennachie Excerpts

Monday 8th December 2025 Grand Committee

[Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing this measure. It is not a controversial measure in itself, but I probably need to declare an interest as all five of my children have been through the Scottish educational system—the older two, at a time when it was the admiration of the world. The latter three did all right but, I have to say, they were in the system at a time when Scottish education was not performing to its previous high standard.

The consequence of that was the legislation that is this order’s precursor—namely, on the abolition of the SQA, which was deemed pretty unfit for purpose. One of the things that did for it in the end was Covid. Children in school—I speak of my own—were in a situation where even the teachers did not know what they were preparing them for in terms of examination. In the end, awards were given without any examinations having been taken on a “here you go” basis; that was not at all satisfactory and raised questions, which have probably gone by, around whether the qualifications the children got were as valid as they might have been. It was a very unfortunate situation.

Going back, before that there was the establishment of the curriculum for excellence in Scotland. I genuinely believe that it was introduced for the best of reasons but, over a number of years, it became clear that it simply was not working effectively. I never quite understood the Scottish Government’s problem with the curriculum for excellence. It was established not by them but by the previous Scottish Government, yet they did not seem to be willing to accept the fact that something was not working and needed to change. They felt that that would somehow be an admission of failure on their part, as opposed to what it should have been: leadership.

I have to talk about anecdotal evidence. There were concerns about the way the curriculum was influenced by political undertones. What I would call nationalistic elements were introduced into the curriculum, with some subjects taught selectively to promote Scottish otherness rather than the UK dimension or Scotland’s role within it. That caused some concern and I know that some teachers, because they were allowed to do so under the curriculum for excellence, made their own interpretations and gave children the benefit of a broader assessment.