Exam Reform

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Monday 17th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

May I push the Secretary of State a little on the level and depth of the consultation he is suggesting? He will know that many people of good will on both sides of the House, and outside it in the education world, want reform and change, but they are willing to work with him to get change fit for the 21st century. Many competitor nations are moving to a system that looks at 14 to 19 in a very different way, and the crucial turning point in education for many of those economies is 14, not 16; 16 is becoming rather redundant. If the Secretary of State is genuine about consultation, many of us on the Opposition Benches will work with him, but not if he is too fixed and too belligerent about today’s announcement.

[Michael Gove]

Again, I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for arguing that we should take a less belligerent tone, but I could not help feeling that those remarks would have been better addressed to his Front Benchers rather than ours. It is in that spirit that we will work with others to identify best practice internationally. [Interruption.] I think we have had another outbreak of belligerence from some of the more rumbustious elements on the Opposition Front Bench. Of course we are happy to work with the profession, hence the period of consultation on which we are now embarking, but we want to make sure that it is informed by evidence, and the evidence is that the highest-performing jurisdictions ensure that there is an academic core that students follow to the age of 16. There is growing concern in other countries that premature specialisation at the age of 14 actually condemns some students to a lower place in a two-tier system that perpetuates the social division that I know the hon. Gentleman and I want to end.