Oral Answers to Questions Debate

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Department: Department for Education

Oral Answers to Questions

Phil Wilson Excerpts
Monday 3rd September 2012

(12 years, 2 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Michael Gove Portrait Michael Gove
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My hon. Friend makes a very good point. The greater the transparency in the grade setting and marking process, the better. That is one of the reasons Ofqual exists as an independent regulator, and one of the reasons it should continue to do that job, not Ministers.

Phil Wilson Portrait Phil Wilson (Sedgefield) (Lab)
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If, when Mo Farah had run the 10,000 metre final in the Olympics, he had been told he had to run a further 10,000 metres before he could claim that he had won the gold medal, he would say that that was wrong, so why is it right to change the way GCSE exam results are marked halfway through the academic year, which is what happened this year?

Michael Gove Portrait Michael Gove
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What is right is to allow the independent regulator and exam boards to decide how these exams should be graded—not, as the Labour party seems to be suggesting, to have Ministers marking papers.