Curriculum and Exam Reform

Chris Skidmore Excerpts

Thursday 7th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I certainly shall not stop challenging the entire school system to do better for all our children, because my first priority is always to ensure that the generation of children who are in school—who, as the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), has pointed out, only have one chance—get schools that are pressurised to do even better for them.

As for micro-management, almost all the changes that we have made during my time as Secretary of State have been to allow teachers and heads greater control and to free them from micro-management in order to ensure that they can concentrate on teaching and learning. The success of the academies programme, which more than half of secondary schools have now adopted, shows that head teachers are enthusiastic about this Government’s desire to empower them with greater control over the curriculum and how teachers are rewarded.

[Chris Skidmore (Kingswood) (Con)]

As a member of the Education Select Committee, I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement. I thank him for listening to what the Committee said in its report “From GCSEs to EBCs: the Government’s proposals for reform”, which was published last week. It is a rare thing for a Minister to pay attention to a Select Committee, and I am sure that all the members of the Committee will be grateful to him for doing so. Will he tell the House whether there will still be significant reforms of the content of GCSEs? Will there, for example, be an opportunity in the history GCSE for a narrative British history qualification to be created?