Exam Reform

Nick Gibb Excerpts

Monday 17th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for West Derby—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), yes. I am grateful for his questions.

The hon. Gentleman’s first point was about the secrecy with which these plans have been drawn up. He then went on to complain that they had been shared with the second-best selling tabloid and the second-best selling Sunday tabloid in our country, as a result of which millions have had an opportunity to comment on them. Which is it? It cannot be the case simultaneously that the plans were drawn up in secret, and that they stimulated a widespread debate.

It would have been helpful if the hon. Gentleman had engaged with what we had announced today rather than engaging with what he had hoped we would announce, for his own reasons. He asked us what we would do in order to deal with the students—the weakest 20%—who were currently unable to secure good GCSE passes. We had explicitly said that we expected more students to be able to secure good GCSE passes, and that for those who did not, we would provide enhanced support and an assessment giving an all-round view of how they had done, enabling them then to take examinations at the age of 17 or 18.

The hon. Gentleman asked us what we would do for students who wanted to take examinations in English and maths at 17 or 18. We had explicitly said that students who could not secure a good pass in those subjects at that age would be offered the new certificates so that they could make the progress that they wanted to make later. He asked us what we were doing to deal with the problems that we had inherited with GCSEs which were dysfunctional this year and which had caused students suffering. We are explicitly addressing the problems with modules and controlled assessment that were introduced by the previous Government, and making sure that as a result of those changes, students will never again face the difficulties that they face this year as a result of dysfunctional examination design.

The hon. Gentleman asked about the cost of these qualifications. Getting rid of modules, coursework and controlled assessment means that less time will be spent on sitting and resitting examinations, and more time can be spent on teaching and learning. Schools will save money, and they will be able to reinvest that money in high-quality teaching, high-quality learning, and the stretching of every child.

The hon. Gentleman was faced with his own test today. He was faced with an opportunity to embrace the reform that has been outlined on this side of the House, and he flunked that test by making clear that he would engage in blind and partisan opposition. He asked us to build cross-party support for these proposals, but the best minds in the Labour party have already endorsed them. Conor Ryan, former special adviser to the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett) and to the former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has said that there are good ideas in what the coalition Government are doing. He has said that it is right to end competition between exam boards—the hon. Gentleman did not address that issue. He, Conor Ryan has also said that it is right to have more rigour at the top, and the hon. Gentleman did not address that argument either. Conor Ryan has also said:

“More rigorous GCSEs, particularly for top achievers, do not have to place a cap on ambition for many other students.”

That is another argument that the hon. Gentleman failed to address.

There will be an opportunity for the hon. Gentleman to resit this test. There will be an opportunity during our consultation for him to rethink his blind opposition to this progress. I hope that we can count on him to reflect on the decision that he made today, and decide that he will join this side of the House in delivering better, more rigorous and more inclusive qualifications.

[Mr Nick Gibb (Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his statement. He will be unsurprised to know that I fully support his proposals. The current structure of our school exam system, in which exam boards compete with one another for a market share, has meant a year-on-year incremental reduction in the academic rigour of GCSEs, a narrowing of the breadth of the curriculum examined, and an increase in the predictability of the exams themselves.

May I ask my right hon. Friend to go one step further and address the issue of school textbooks, so that we can encourage publishers to move away from textbooks that are a step-by-step guide to passing a GCSE and towards textbooks that are rich in knowledge of the subject, encourage pupils to read beyond the confines of passing the exam, and provide greater scope for academically able children to flourish?

[Michael Gove]

I thank my hon. Friend for his kind words. Let me first take this opportunity to say that, during his two and a half years in the Department for Education, he did more than anyone else to ensure that rigour was injected back into our education system—[Interruption.] I shall ignore the graceless remarks from the Opposition Front Bench.

I want to underline my gratitude to my hon. Friend for doing such an exemplary job, from the introduction of the phonics test at the end of year 1 and the reform of key stage 2 tests to ensure that spelling, punctuation and grammar were properly marked, to the groundwork that he carried out in this examination reform. Future generations of teachers and pupils will be grateful to him. His comments on exam textbooks are very well made, and I believe that the reforms we are making to eliminate the race to the bottom will provide room for education publishers to do just what he hopes they do: to enhance the quality of textbooks.