§ Mr. StrawTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science if, pursuant to his answer to the hon. Member for Blackburn,Official Report, 13 December, column 560–61, he will give the names of the 106 grammar schools which have ceased to exist since 1979.
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§ Mr. Kenneth ClarkeThe situation is much more complicated than suggested in the question. It is not true that 106 schools have closed. Some schools will have merged to form other schools; others will have become independent and moved out of the maintained sector; others will have changed their status and become comprehensives and some comprehensives will have become grammar schools. Without painstaking investigation we cannot know how many schools fall into each category. It is likely that we would need to list considerably more than 106 schools in order to provide a clear picture.
This information can be provided only at disproportionate cost.