HC Deb 02 November 1976 vol 918 cc1186-8
10. Mr. Michael McNair-Wilson

asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if she has now met the Schools Council to discuss its proposal to replace the GCE and the CSE with a single examination.

Mrs. Shirley Williams

I met the Chairman of the Schools Council on Monday 25th October, and look forward to further discussions.

Mr. McNair-Wilson

Is the right hon. Lady aware that she deserves our congratulations for her answer to Sir Alex Smith and his proposals? Can she ever envisage a common examination standard for all 16- to 19-year-olds which will not tend to impair examination standards and thus harm the employment chances of young people?

Mrs. Williams

The hon. Gentleman may not have understood what was proposed by the Schools Council. It was not a common examination standard or even, for that matter, after the first stages, a common examination. What the Council recommended ultimately was a common examination system. I want to make it clear that, for obvious reasons, with small groupings of a specialised kind, there would be great advantages in a common examination system. I believe that we have first to satisfy ourselves on two points, the first being that a common examination system can be applied across what is now nearly 80 per cent. of the school population taking some formal examination at 16 and, secondly, that the administrative and financial complications, which are quite considerable, can be satisfactorily resolved. If these two criteria can be met I, for one, would welcome a common system of examination. I remain to be persuaded that they can be met.

Mr. Spearing

Does my right hon. Friend agree that even if there were two or three separate examinations at 16-plus, many of the qualities which are required could not be examined? Does she also agree that having a universal system of examination would take some of the responsibility from future employers for making their assessment of these other qualities, which at the moment they are sometimes not anxious to do?

Mrs. Williams

I see my hon. Friend's point. I do not think that examinations should be asked to do what they cannot do. Where we have, as at present, a fair amount of employer and industrial confidence in the CSE and GCE system, it is important to establish that there would be equal confidence in any successor system. I am talking just about examinations.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton

Does the right hon. Lady agree that if more parents and industrialists were members of the Schools Council, instead of just teachers, these ridiculous proposals of the Council would never have emerged?

Mrs. Williams

The hon. Gentleman may have noticed my reply to one of his hon. Friend's earlier questions on the subject of the Select Committee's recommendations. I must ask the House to await my considered reply to its report.

Dr. Boyson

Is the right hon. Lady aware that many of us are dubious about a common examination at the age of 16? We are worried that the attempt to have such an examination may throw doubt on the credibility of academic standards in examinations at the very time when education is in turmoil—

Mr. Speaker

Order. May I say that both sides of the House today are altering Question Time and making speeches? It is not on one side; it is on both sides. It has been happening all afternoon.

Dr. Boyson

The point was made by the Minister—[HON. MEMBERS: "Question."] Is the Minister aware that 40 per cent. of the least academic children currently take no examination? Would it not be practical to have a vocational examination for these people, so that they are not put into CSE classes, where most of them fail, to the disadvantage of themselves, the schools, and the country?

Mrs. Williams

I have already said that there are great advantages in a common system of examination, because it would enable considerable teaching economies to be made. As to the second part of the hon. Gentleman's remarks, I would point out that whereas only three out of five children in our secondary schools passed some public examination of any kind in 1972, by 1974 the figure had risen to four out of five. Many of the criticisms that educational standards are falling are utterly beside the point.