Examination Reform

Michael Gove Excerpts

Wednesday 16th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Twigg]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right and that is part of the reason we have said that English and maths should continue beyond 16, right up to 18. As an advanced industrialised country we are unusual in not requiring learners to continue with both mathematics and the home language, and we have put forward that positive reform precisely to meet the concern raised. I see nothing in the Government’s proposals for EBCs that will address that bad situation, and a real risk that it will make it even worse.

When the Secretary of State set out his proposals last September he had no plans to include vocational education. A few weeks later, the Labour party set out its proposals, including for a technical baccalaureate. How did the Secretary of State respond? The Conservatives put out a press release stating that the certificates would “make young people unemployable.” That is what they said in September. Two months later the Under-Secretary of State for Skills, the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matthew Hancock), who is not in the Chamber today, supported Labour’s Tech Bac. We have seen from the Secretary of State that vocational education is, at very best, an afterthought, and in reality his policy on vocational education is a total shambles. I believe that education is crucial.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

The hon. Gentleman’s predecessor as shadow Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), welcomed in full the Wolf report on vocational education, which preceded consultation on academic subjects. Does he welcome it in full, or has he changed Labour’s position?

[Stephen Twigg]

I certainly welcome the Wolf recommendations in full—absolutely in full. They provide an important guide for the work we are doing to develop vocational education. However, the Secretary of State may want to return to the Dispatch Box to explain why the Conservatives dismiss the technical baccalaureate—will he take this opportunity to support it?

[Michael Gove]

I am delighted to take this position again. I do not want to turn this into a conversation, but it is striking that before I asked my question the hon. Gentleman said our plans for vocational education were a shambles and he now says that the report, which we have implemented in full, was absolutely right. I am therefore in two minds about what the shadow Secretary of State’s position is on vocational education. On the one hand he endorses the Wolf report, which we have implemented, and on the other hand he says that our proposals for vocational education are a shambles.

[Stephen Twigg]

The reality, as a number of colleagues on my side were shouting, is that the Secretary of State has not implemented fully the Wolf report. We will support him in doing so. We will work with the Government to develop a technical baccalaureate if they are serious about it. However, if the Government were really focused on these issues, they would not have done what they did to the engineering diploma.

[Michael Gove]

rose—

[Stephen Twigg]

The Secretary of State is keen to intervene and I will take his intervention. Why did it take the intervention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to reassemble the engineering diploma?

[Michael Gove]

Which parts of the Wolf report implementation have we not fulfilled that the shadow Secretary of State would like us to fulfil?

[Stephen Twigg]

The full implementation of English and maths right through to 18 is in the Wolf report and the Government have not said that that is one of their plans. We believe, for the reason given by the hon. Member for Henley (John Howell) on the Government Benches, that English and maths to 18 is vital to our future. The technical baccalaureate is a proposal that we have made and the Secretary of State’s junior Minister has backed it. We want to see movement forward. It is not just about the Wolf report; it is about moving forward to a system where we have vocational qualifications that are fit for purpose and where English and maths sit alongside those good, vocational qualifications.

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Gentleman says that there is one thing in the Wolf report that we have not implemented—English and maths to 18. I would contest that. Is that the only thing that he can think of? Have we implemented everything else? I should point out that there is no reference to the technical baccalaureate in the report.

[Stephen Twigg]

I am sorry that the Secretary of State seems to regard young people continuing with English and maths to 18 as a trivial proposal in the Wolf report—it is a central, important proposal. If he moves to implement it now he will have our full support, because it is vital to the future of this country. If vocational education really was at the heart of the Government’s proposals, why was he silent about it when he made his announcement in September? Why was the focus of the announcement in September on the EBacc subjects and anything else an afterthought: EBacc certificates for English, maths and science, EBacc certificates later for the other EBacc subjects, and then some vague possibility that Ofqual would devise other certificates for other subjects? If vocational education in creative and other academic subjects were really being given the seriousness that the Secretary of State claims, we should have a set of reforms that apply across the entire curriculum, not the narrowing of the curriculum that the Government have proposed through their English baccalaureate certificates.

[Michael Gove]

I would just like to repeat my question. Are there any other recommendations in the Wolf report that we have not implemented?

[Stephen Twigg]

The Secretary of State should stop digging. I welcome the Wolf report. It was published, as he pointed out, when my predecessor was in this position. I have been in this position for 15 months. The Wolf report is important, but the world is moving on. It took us to propose a technical baccalaureate. I am delighted that, albeit belatedly and half-heartedly, the Government seem to be supporting that, but my central point is that he set out proposals last September that were silent on the technical and practical subjects that are so vital to vocational education. I look forward to the day when I answer the right hon. Gentleman’s questions from the Government side of the House, but he seems very keen to question me today. I will of course take his final intervention.

[Michael Gove]

I am sure we are all grateful that this will be the final one. First of all, the hon. Gentleman says that we have moved on from the Wolf report, so having welcomed it he now believes it is obsolete—that is interesting. [Interruption.] Well, if it is not obsolete, can he tell us which aspects of the Wolf report—not the one that he has mentioned; we will return to that—we have not implemented? Are there any others at all? I am all ears.

[Stephen Twigg]

I reaffirm that we welcome the Wolf report in full. We are in favour of English and maths to 18. As the right hon. Gentleman acknowledged, the Government did not come forward with proposals for that. When and if they do so, we will give them our support. The Wolf report is very important. It is not obsolete; it is an important piece of work that needs to be fully implemented. We will support full implementation, but we need then to move to build on that. The technical baccalaureate is a proposal to achieve that. English baccalaureate certificates that will not be in crucial creative, technical and practical subjects risk undermining the progress that the Wolf report has given us. If he says that we are going to have a new—I think he has used the term “golden standard”—qualification called the English baccalaureate certificate that will apply only to certain subjects and will be given a high status in the accountability framework, that is bound to lead to an acceleration of the trend that I have already described, where fewer schools are doing design technology, fewer schools are doing art and fewer schools are doing drama. That is surely something that all sides of the House can be very concerned about.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Esterson]

Yes, and of course Lord Baker was one of the architects of the GCSE system. He recognised the need for change, so he is in a strong position on this matter. He has credibility and a track record, and the Government should certainly listen closely to what he has to say.

Standards in English and maths are crucial. We can all agree on that and we all do, but the question is how those standards are measured. I do not believe that we measure them effectively, either for young people or for the economy, purely through the use of a linear exam system.

In my business career I worked with many young people in telephone call centres, among other places. Call centre managers often bemoaned the lack of basic literacy of the younger recruits. Often those with GCSEs in English of grade C or better were unable to write properly and struggled when talking to customers on the phone. There is clearly a problem, but the solution we found was to help young trainees with practical skills. They included literacy skills, because they had not picked them up at school. The key was to make training practical—to make it relevant to their jobs and to their lives outside of work. Because the training took place at work, it was in context and they understood for that reason. The students were motivated to learn and to do well at work. How do we replicate that within the education system before students go to work? I do not see how it can be done in the artificial environment of a linear exam process.

To make learning practical and real is a simple concept, and we should be able to do it in school. In short, we should be able to design a system where young people learn what they need for life, in a way that motivates them and helps businesses to flourish. However, to make sure young people are ready for life, they need to learn skills that they can use and which are of use to employers.

[Michael Gove]

I am listening with great interest to the hon. Gentleman. He has made a number of interesting and worthwhile points, and has outlined some of the weaknesses that he sees with existing and proposed qualifications. Are there are any qualifications that he thinks hit the nail on the head and do the job that he has described?

[Bill Esterson]

I am certainly familiar with some work qualifications. If the Secretary of State is looking for ideas, I hope he will look at them as examples and consider how they could be introduced, with good work experience, into the education system.

To ensure that young people are ready for life, they need to learn skills they can use and which are of use to employers. Someone who has a qualification that shows they can already do a job is of much greater interest. Perhaps the answer I gave to the Secretary of State demonstrates a way of doing just that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

We have had a high-quality debate this afternoon with contributions from my hon. Friend the Member for North West Durham (Pat Glass), the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart), my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns), the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb), my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), the hon. Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy), my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon North (Steve Reed), the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) and the hon. Member for Kingswood (Chris Skidmore). We found out from him that at 6 am in the morning, he is checking Lord Knight’s Twitter feed—not something the rest of us would necessarily do at that time. We also heard contributions from my hon. Friend the Member for Sefton Central (Bill Esterson) and the hon. Members for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) and for Stroud (Neil Carmichael). The hon. Member for Kingswood was obviously only half awake because he seemed to think that Lord Knight’s Twitter feed said that he supported the proposals, which is certainly not the case.

It is more and more clear that the Government’s proposed EBacc certificate is the wrong reform on the wrong timetable. What is more, the Secretary of State has got it the wrong way round. In one sense, I am certain that he agrees that it is the wrong reform, because we know that it is not the reform that he wanted. He announced the reform that he wanted using the now traditional method for making important Department for Education announcements—via a leak to the The Mail on Sunday. He was celebrating his great news triumph when word got through to the Deputy Prime Minister in his hotel room in Rio, presumably wearing his onesie—[Interruption.] That is true; it might be too hot in Rio for a onesie.

The Deputy Prime Minister was so furious with the Education Secretary that he not only made him withdraw his plans and modify them into the incoherent mess that we have been hearing about today, but made him sack his trusted lieutenant, the former schools Minister, and replace him with the current part-time schools Minister, who I think is off in the Cabinet Office doing his other job—a Lib Dem incubus in the Secretary of State’s lair. [Interruption.] He has now come to the Chamber. A bit like horsemeat in a burger, it can be swallowed but it is not very palatable. Even the Secretary of State thinks that it is the wrong reform, because he has had to drop the overtly two-tier approach that he favoured for the covert one that we have heard about today. Everyone else knows that it is the wrong reform, because it does not address, as we have heard overwhelmingly from Members on both sides of the House, the real issues and challenges for education at 16.

First, the reform is anti-creativity. Many people are asking: what do the Secretary of State and the Government have against creativity? As we saw in a debate on the EBacc certificate in another place on Monday, he calls his new qualification a gold standard, but how can a qualification on which the Secretary of State places such a valedictory appellation have no place for the arts? As the former Education Secretary Baroness Morris of Yardley in another place said:

“How can an assessment that marks the end of the national curriculum not recognise achievement in music, dance, drama, art, design and craft?”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 14 January 2013; Vol. 742, c. 547.]

The EBacc is also the wrong reform because it does not seriously examine the purpose and relevance of high-stakes public examinations at 16 when the participation age has been raised to 18. That topic is causing a veritable buzz in the world of education. The Secretary of State needs to listen not just to his closest advisers and cronies and his own soliloquies. We need a proper debate and consensus around reform, which addresses the key issues that the Chair of the Education Committee has often cited, as he did again today—in particular the long tail of underachievement. Perhaps we should rename the EBacc certificate the GOVE—general opposition to vocational education—because the Secretary of State has nothing to say on how we can have a gold standard in vocational education. That is why we have had to take the initiative in developing the Tech Bacc, in which he seems so uninterested.

Another reason the EBacc certificate is the wrong reform is its rigid and mystifying insistence that it should be assessed by final essay-based examination only. The Secretary of State was rightly asked earlier whether it is his role to decide that anyway, and perhaps we will get an answer in his speech, but essay-based exams measure only a narrow range of skills and knowledge. I have been trying to understand what makes the Secretary of State so against controlled assessment and practical exams and why he thinks the only valid way of testing anything is a three-hour written examination at the end of a course. What traumatic event in his past could have led him to have this seemingly inexplicable aversion to the appropriate use of controlled assessment and his insistence that only written exams should count? Then I remembered—

[Michael Gove]

The driving test.

[Kevin Brennan]

He is ahead of me—he is very quick. The driving test is administered on a basis of a written test combined with a practical controlled assessment, and the Secretary of State failed his driving test on six occasions. And this is the man who does not believe in re-sits!

Had the driving test consisted of a course in the theory of driving followed by a three-hour written test, the Secretary of State would no doubt have passed first time, with flying colours. He might have achieved a merit, perhaps even a distinction, maybe an A* for demonstrating his in-depth understanding of the intricacies of the highway code. But would that have made him a better driver, and would the public have been safe with him behind the wheel? Possibly not.

This is the wrong reform, and it is also being carried out according to the wrong timetable. It is not just the foot-draggers, the naysayers and the vested interests who are saying that. It is being said by Glenys Stacey, the head of Ofqual and the Secretary of State’s guardian of exam standards, who has written to him expressing her concerns—incidentally, we know about her letter only as a result of dogged forensic questioning of the Secretary of State by the Education Committee—and it is not being said just by Ofqual either. In response to a recent survey, more than 80% of teachers said that the changes were being rushed, adding to the huge majority of heads who said that the changes would not be an improvement, and reinforcing the call from the CBI—about which we have already heard today—for a pause in the Government’s timetable.

I am old enough to have taken O-levels—I also have a CSE in woodwork, a grade 1—and A-levels, and I taught for O-level, GCSE and A-level. One thing that I do know is that it is impossible to introduce successful examination reform without being clear about the curriculum, without consensus, and without proper piloting of new qualifications. GCSE reform was kicked off by Shirley Williams, and brought in by Keith Joseph after many years of development. It is necessary to aim for that breadth of consensus at the start if lasting reform is to achieved. However, the English baccalaureate certificate proposal is not a product of consensus based on evidence; it is being rushed through to meet a political, not an educational, timetable. That is the wrong recipe for reform, and the right recipe for chaos.

The Secretary of State’s reform is being introduced for the wrong reasons, the wrong way round. The Secretary of State says it is about rigour, but rigour is achieved through engaging, imaginative, high-quality and creative teaching, not through dispiriting learning by rote that is based only on facts. That is not a recipe for rigour; it is a recipe for rigor mortis in the classroom—the stiff dead hand of Gradgrindian misery about which we heard earlier.

In a recent television interview, Lord Baker reminded us of the welcome contrast between the current CBI report on education and that of one of its predecessor bodies, which states that all that was, or should be, required of the curriculum was that it should teach “literacy, numeracy and obedience”. Sometimes, listening to what is said by members of the Government, I wonder whether that is what they believe now. As Lord Baker also said, if that is all we think is required today, God help us, because that is the attitude that has created

“the long tail of underachievement”,

demotivated generations of young people, and wasted the talents of so many.

It is, however, the background noise that hisses around the Secretary of State’s approach to this reform. The proposal is the wrong way around. It puts the cart before the horse, the exams before the course, and the outcomes before the aims.

Here are some possible aims of a curriculum for the Secretary of State. It should produce

“a confident person who has a strong sense of right and wrong, is adaptable and resilient, knows himself, is discerning in judgment, thinks independently and critically, and communicates effectively; a self-directed learner who takes responsibility for his own learning, who questions, reflects and perseveres in the pursuit of learning; an active contributor who is able to work effectively in teams, exercises initiative, takes calculated risks, is innovative and strives for excellence; and, a concerned citizen who is rooted”

in his country,

“has a strong civic consciousness, is informed, and takes an active role in bettering the lives of others”.

The Secretary of State may think that that is wishy-washy. It is, in fact, a list of the aims of the curriculum in Singapore, and perhaps he ought to take a look at it before he starts to design a new exam system. How can this style of examination achieve those aims? It cannot, which is why Singapore has been reforming its education in our direction.

This is a case of wrong reform, wrong timetable, wrong way round: wrong, wrong, wrong. The new three Rs are all spelt with a W, standing not for “reading, writing and arithmetic” but for “wrong, wrong, and”—as the Secretary of State might say—“thrice wrong”.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

First, may I congratulate the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), on securing this debate? It has been advantageous to the House and of benefit to me to be able to hear a range of views about how we might reform our examination system, and I am grateful to all Members who spoke in what felt at times almost more like a seminar than a parliamentary debate. As well as speaking with passion from the heart, many Members had specific experience. The hon. Member for Croydon North (Steve Reed) was a distinguished leader of a successful Labour council, and the hon. Members for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) and for North West Durham (Pat Glass) have both had council responsibility for children’s services, and under their stewardship standards for their children were high. [Interruption.] Forgive me: the hon. Member for North West Durham has a range of past experience that qualifies her to speak on these subjects, but, sadly, she was never a councillor.

All the contributions have given me an opportunity to reflect on what we should assess and on how we should assess achievement at the age of 16. One of the important consequences of the process of consultation we have initiated is that a vigorous debate has been taking place, not only in schools and among teachers, but also, as the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) pointed out, among people in the creative and cultural worlds. As the shadow Secretary of State pointed out, business organisations and associations have also engaged in that debate.

There was, perhaps, consensus among Members that the current situation is unsatisfactory. The shadow Secretary of State quoted the CBI liberally in his speech. The CBI is no friend of the situation that prevailed under Labour for 13 years, however. This is what the CBI report on education says about the situation we inherited from Labour:

“This approach represents a triumph for relativism, with pupils either taught to the test while developing no real mastery of the subject being studied or left to fester in study of subjects where they will do least harm to the school’s overall results and league table position. In truth, however, this cult of relativism has blighted every stage of their educational journey.”

Those are strong words and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Kingswood (Chris Skidmore) pointed out, they reflect a broad consensus in the business sector that we need to change our examination system.

Understandably, the CBI and others have questioned the purpose of assessment at 16. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb) pointed out in a brilliant speech, it is important that we have rigorous, summative assessment at that stage. The Labour party has questioned the appropriateness of that. If Labour believes we should get rid of proper, rigorous assessment at the age of 16, it should say so. If, as the shadow Secretary of State hinted in an interview in The Guardian, Labour believes we should go back to the 14 to 19 Tomlinson diploma approach, it should say so. Disappointingly, although the critiques mounted from the Opposition Benches had much to recommend them in terms of forensic detail and passion, precious few positive alternatives were offered.

We were accused of having neglected the vital importance of a rounded education in two specific areas: cultural subjects and vocational subjects. I want to say a little about each. There was an exchange—I was tempted to call it a dramatic monologue, or soliloquy, punctuated by noises off—between the shadow Secretary of State and myself on the Wolf report, but putting that to one side, I am pleased that there seems to be consensus about the Wolf report and its recommendations. The shadow Secretary of State says it is important that English and mathematics are taught to the age of 18. We should bear in mind that Professor Wolf says people who have not secured a good GCSE pass or equivalent in English or maths at the age of 16 should carry the subject on, and that is Government policy. We would only contend, however, that people who secure a good pass in English and maths at 16 but who wish to specialise in other, perhaps creative or vocational, areas should not be forced to carry those subjects on. We should develop courses for such people who want to move beyond GCSEs. Someone may not want to pursue A-level mathematics, but may believe that a mathematical course would be appropriate, and we have worked with Cambridge university and Professor Tim Gowers on that area.

The care we have taken to implement every detail of Professor Wolf’s report reinforces the fact that before we said how we were going to reform academic qualifications, we said how we were going to reform vocational qualifications. We have heard a lot about carts and horses, and about priorities, in this debate. We put vocational qualifications ahead of academic qualifications in our desire to reform. I am not just talking about the Wolf report; the Richard report on apprenticeships, which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills rightly welcomed recently, as I have done, sets a path for the reform of the most trusted brand in vocational education—the apprenticeship. The Richard report was welcomed yesterday by Lord Adonis and it points out the steps we have been taking to change apprenticeships so that they are no longer a theoretical driving test, such as that described by the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan). They are no longer the inadequate, poor qualification that, sadly, used to exist in some cases. An apprenticeship will now be conferred on somebody only where they not only secure English and maths to an acceptable standard, but have an occupationally specific qualification which guarantees or confers mastery in a specific area and can be graded on more than simply a pass-or-fail basis. The fact that this reform was so carefully designed and has been so widely supported underlines our support for improving vocational education.

[Stephen Twigg]

May I bring the Secretary of State to the subject of today’s debate? In my opening speech, I asked him about the issue about which Ofqual has raised real concern: the preparedness of the system to be implemented in the way that he says. Is there any possibility that he will change the time scale in response to the real concern that hon. Members on both sides of the House have reflected today?

[Michael Gove]

I was grateful that a number of concerns were raised about different parts of implementation, and they have been raised during the consultation. It is important that I look seriously, as I am doing, at all the points raised in the consultation. Following on from the very good speech made by the Chairman of the Select Committee, it is important that we respond having reflected on all the points that were made and that our response is not simply yes to this and no to that in a piecemeal and cherry-picking way. We should present a sustained and coherent response to what has been an informed and helpful consultation.

I wish briefly to discuss creative subjects, because, in a brilliant speech, the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) both paid me a compliment and set me a challenge. One thing I would say is that there is ample time in a well-constructed curriculum for creative subjects, as was pointed out by my hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) and a number of other hon. Members. The idea that this Government have not been taking creative and cultural education seriously is belied by the facts. First, we ensured that we had a national plan for music education, following on from Darren Henley’s report, that has seen not just sustained investment in new music hubs that provide high-quality music education and increased access to instrumental tuition, but our expanding of the In Harmony orchestra initiative, which was borrowed from the El Sistema idea in Chavez’s Venezuela. We have also commissioned a report on cultural education from Darren Henley, which has led us to implement a variety of changes, including having a cultural passport for every child to record their cultural and creative engagement during their time at school. We have provided extended access to Saturday schools for those able and capable in art and design. In addition, a Conservative Government—not a Labour Government—have for the first time introduced a national youth dance company for talented and gifted individuals who want to and should make a success in dance. So the future Akram Khans and Michael Clarks will have that opportunity as a result of our changes.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Michael Gove]

We have only two minutes left and there are still a number of points to cover—

[Stephen Twigg]

I gave way five times.

[Michael Gove]

In a speech that was significantly longer. In the time available, I wish to deal with one or two of the other points that were raised, particularly the one discussed by the Chairman of the Select Committee. He asked whether qualification reform is the key driver of change and improvement in education. The answer, which I wanted to underline, was given by my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton: it is a key driver. The hon. Member for Cardiff West pointed out that nothing matters more than the quality of teaching, and that is right. But the qualification reforms that we have put forward will ensure that there is more time for teaching. If we remove controlled assessment, which teachers tell us takes between six and eight weeks of what could be teaching time, we allow more high quality teaching to be made available to the students who need it. So there is a link between the style of assessment and the capacity to improve a child’s education.

Let me take this opportunity to point out that we do not need to change, nor is it the case simply that we can make requests of Ofqual. Ofqual can consider them and has in the past made wise judgments. I should say that the shadow Secretary of State has consistently questioned the judgment of Ofqual. We have been clear that it is an independent regulator and we back it.

In the course of the debate, a number of misconceptions were repeated. It is the case that we believe that a move away from modular towards linear assessment reduces the chance of gaming and frees time for teaching, but it is important to say that we do not think that every subject should have three-hour exams. Nowhere in our consultation have we said that three, six, nine or 12-hour exams are appropriate. We believe that rigorous examination in academic subjects requires the deployment of end-of-course linear assessment, but there are a variety of subjects, many of them creative, which, as the Arts Council recognised, should be assessed in other ways.

I note that it is 4 o’clock. I hope this conversation can continue. I thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and the House for your indulgence and, in particular, I thank the Members who contributed to the debate for the brilliant speeches that I so much enjoyed the opportunity to listen to this afternoon.

Question put.