Cameron wants 'grammar streams' in every school

David Cameron has written for the Mail on Sunday about grammar schools.  The full article is on conservatives.com but here are a few key extracts and ConservativeHome responses:

"In eighteen years of Conservative Government, neither Margaret Thatcher nor John Major created grammar schools. That's why Conservative MPs and candidates in areas without grammar schools do not campaign for them to be brought back."

> True, Mr Cameron but John Major's 1997 manifesto promised a grammar school for every town. By then the Tory leadership had understood we needed a return to excellence in our schools.  Michael Howard, a long-time member of the 1979 to 1997 governments and with successful grammars in his county of Kent, certainly still supports these schools and we are sorry that your office chose to silence him.

"Far from being some winning slogan, a pledge to build more grammar schools would be an electoral albatross."

> Really?  A YouGov poll for The Daily Telegraph found that 49% of voters supported a larger number of grammar schools.  70% of Tories are in support.

"This is a key test for our Party. Does it want to be a serious force for government and change, or does it want to be a right-wing debating society muttering about what might have been?"

> This is unworthy of you, Mr Cameron.  On Thursday we published your list of other education policies and welcomed them.  Of course it's right that a one nation Conservative government will enact reforms that benefit the many, not the few but that does not mean the party has to rule out new grammar schools.  There is something very Henry Ford about your Mail on Sunday article trumpeting the Tory policy that says "any individual, company, charity, church, community group, teacher or parent co-operative who wants to set up and run a school - providing they meet certain minimal standards - will be able to" whilst saying that that school can be any school but not a grammar school.

"We need to create more good school places rather than argue abut how to divide up the ones we have. The fact is, we don't have enough and we need more. How do we do it? Not by dividing existing schools up into a thousand grammar schools and two thousand secondary moderns."

> This is a straw man argument.  Who exactly is arguing in favour of the centralised state deciding that 1,000 schools should become grammars?  Mainstream Conservatives are simply saying that a few more should we welcomed if that is what local parents want.

"Today, because of the way that league tables and inspections work, there is far too much teaching to the test and teaching to get children from D to C instead of stretching the brightest to get A and A star. That's why we will reform the curriculum, exams and testing, and that's why we want to see aggressive setting by ability - in effect, a 'grammar stream' in every subject, in every school."

> Good stuff.  We can end on a point of agreement.

Postscript: The BBC often fails to ask 'right-wing questions' of Conservative politicians - defaulting instead to attacking from the left - but Andrew Marr was excellent on Sunday AM this morning.  Interviewing David Willetts he championed the anger of the Conservative grassroots and noted that the only support for the new Tory position was coming from left-wing commentators.  David Willetts did finish his interview on a high note by revealing that he opposed David Maclean's attempt to exempt MPs from key Freedom of Information requirements. Mr Maclean got a nasty comeuppance on page one of the Mail on Sunday: One wife, two mistresses... and a quad bike on Commons expenses.

Comments

[Chris Palmer]

I think it's worth pointing out that, clearly, David Cameron does actually believe in selection – in the sense that he has been quite selective on which campaign pledges he has chosen to follow through or not.

He promised to take the Conservatives’ European contingent of MEPs out of the federalist European People’s Party grouping during his leadership bid – I think the phrase used was ‘immediately’. Of course, that failed to materialise and is now supposedly set for June 2009. However, he appears to have chosen to adamantly follow through on the ‘no to grammar schools’ policy initiative.

[Bishop Hill]

Willets doesn't seem to have opposed McLean's FoI bill enough to actually vote against it does he?

[Wat Tyler]

I must say when I actually read the Willetts speech, I was left feeling far more encouraged than the headlines suggested I would.

The reason was all the stuff he dropped in about new schools, choice, and most excitingly, vouchers.

I thought aha, I thought, this sounds exactly what we need. Not a return to the old top down Tripartite System, but diversity and excellence driven by customer choice. Just like the independent sector.

And just like in the independent sector we'd get excellent schools specialising in different types of education for different types of kids- the highly academic, and the not so academic.

But that of course would mean selection, just as exists at the schools attended by members of the shadow cabinet- ie King Edwards Birmingham, Eton, St Pauls etc.

Great I thought. Nobody cares that they're not called grammars, it's the substance that matters.

But sadly, having now heard the further elaborations by Willetts and Cameron, I think I spoke to soon.

It seems they will not be allowing selection after all. Instead, in the time honoured tradition of Whitehall Knows Best, they will be laying down one-size admission rules, and detailed organisational instructions on everything from streaming and setting to how to teach reading.

I'm sorry, but wtf do politicians know about that?

I'm depressed again.

[Jennifer Wells]

Good to see lots of ConservativeHomies being quoted in the Sunday Express today about grammar schools.

[HF]

Any hope that the PR lesson of avoiding unnecessary internal conflict has been learned?

Polly Toynbee etc?

I am begining to worry that that some people around Cameron actually want to pick fights on issues that concern them but that are not issues that the electorate are interested in.

Also that own goals like the FOI amendment are not anticipated and action taken before they blow up. Where are our PR gurus?

[William MacDougall]

"we want to see aggressive setting by ability - in effect, a 'grammar stream' in every subject, in every school."

So he wants to have a national diktat that every school must stream to supplement the national diktat that every school must be a comprehensive that replaced Labour's 1945 national diktat that every area must have a Grammar selecting at age 11 with a nationally dictated test.

Yet he claims to be freeing schools? Why not allow a school, if it is silly enough, NOT to stream? And why not allow it, if it is wise enough, to select by ability and at whatever age with whatever tests it wants?

Our 2001 education manifesto was consistent and excellent: free every school and allow new schools, and that should include freedom to select by ability. No national diktats.

[TomTom]

So now we have a policy debate. Will Gordon Brown continue Blair's polocies, or will it be David Cameron ?

And do the public think Blair has achieved anything apart from debasing educational standards; and is it the Conservative Party that will continue this policy knowing it will not affect their own children ?

[Richard Carey]

Good to see lots of ConservativeHomies being quoted in the Sunday Express today about grammar schools.

I didn't see that, Jennifer - do you have a link? I'm sure they did what they usually do - expressed their unqualified support for the leadership and their policies...

I think it's worth pointing out that, clearly, David Cameron does actually believe in selection – in the sense that he has been quite selective on which campaign pledges he has chosen to follow through or not.

While I've agreed with you previously on some issues, Chris (and indeed was a published supporter of your campaign to reinstate the Conservative Whip to Roger Helmer) I think you're in danger of overstepping the mark on this one, as well as encouraging the ConHomies here who try to pivot every issue to Europe on the first post! In addition, I followed your link from here and think that you should seriously question the wisdom of posting paragraphs on the Bath CF blog such as:

In a quest for his own ‘Clause IV’ moment, David Cameron is potentially sacrificing our children’s future – and I think that some people’s patience is wearing increasingly thin.

on a Conservative website under the Conservative logo. I'm aware that it carries a disclaimer rather than an imprint, but I'm not sure that it's a helpful intervention under that banner.

I'm not sure that the "this is a key test for our Party" sentence from Cameron was unworthy of him after all - leadership requires that you listen to the country, that you put forward ideas and policies based on the evidence that you genuinely think will benefit it, and that you then drive them through. In fairness, some conservatives have expressed concerns about the policy substance of Willetts' speech, and some (like the Editor here on ConservativeHome) have expressed them in measured and reasoned terms that might provide genuninely useful policy input. But equally, there have been a gang of the usual right-wing turkey-basters who immediately used it to slate not jut the policy as "absurd" and "ridiculous" but also to attack their own Party leadership and it should come as no surprise to people like that if they get slapped down instead of listened to.

There is indeed, as the Editor says, a lot to be commended in that education speech, as well as an evidence base presented by Willetts (which I'm sure can and has been debated in a civilised way if you want) that grammar schools are not going to accomplish going forward what they did quite successfully in the past.

...defaulting instead to attacking from the left - but Andrew Marr was excellent on Sunday AM this morning. Interviewing David Willetts he championed the anger of the Conservative grassroots and noted that the only support for the new Tory position was coming from left-wing commentators.

I did think this was unusual too! But I'm not particualarly keen to see our guys attacked at all, from whichever direction. I'm certainly not going to applaud the BBC for doing an unbelieveable volte-face and trying to attack our guys from the right... I thought Willetts did a workmanlike job of getting out there and selling the policy - it's just a pity that more of our colleagues here aren't willing to do the same and back up the useful substance. As I wrote the other night, I think that a lot of this is very saleable inside as well as outside of the Party if we make the effort.

[EdR]

This is a dire fuzzy-thinking article from David Cameron, and I say this as a younger voter and great supporter of the Cameron project.

There's no one-size-fits-all "good school". Grammar schools aren't magically better than other schools, they just suit a certain kind of kid.

We need choice and diversity . More areas should have a grammar school *option* as part of a palatte of educational possibilities. Kids with an academic bent need specialist education, much as kids with special needs require specialist education. Some kids respond well to strict discipline, others to more flexible learning patterns.

Only the parents can judge what's right for their children. That's why the state should make that choice as broad as possible.

To adapt a phrase, this is an analogue policy in a digital age.

[ThePrince]

Okay if Grammar Schools are wanted let us imagine the massive increase in spending for a Grammar in every town, then the important bit, which was the reason the Grammar School was basically a failure and that was to insure investment to make the secondary moderns and what not look worthless in the eyes of employers. Those systems only work in high tax and spend economies and to be honest we don't want that. Vouchers on the other hand have a track record of driving up standards without necessarily spending more, in fact in some american states with vouchers spending has decreased will standards have gone up.

[Umbrella man]

Tim/ Sam: Edward Leigh MP has an article in the Sunday Express on education. Could you find a link to it?

[simon]

Willetts on that f'kwit Marr's programme was VERY good. Clear, claratative. Something which the new policy announcement was not. I think the direct criticism of team-Cambo is the 'Eton' connection. A bunch of 'ok-yah' numpties. When the party has had it's best successes , it has been at the stewardship of 'working-class' Tories. Cameron has been 'promoted' too soon. It's a shame. Granted, he has strengths, but he is no 'claratitive' leader. He's been tainted by the ongrowth of rampant 'pc-ism'. I may be wrong, but any more of this (ie) debacles over Grammar schools) and we will not win the next GE with a Commons majority. The lost Conservative voters post 1992 will just sit on their hands.I want Cameron to win, his innate personal decency shines, but his policy pronouncements do not. He has to turn this round and pronto.

[Editor]

I can't find a link Umbrella man but hopefully it'll be on the Cornerstone blog tmrw.

[YHN]

In eighteen years of Conservative Government, neither Margaret Thatcher nor John Major created grammar schools

Nor did they propose tax on flights, or an extension to state funding of political parties etc etc, but that hasn't stopped Cameron....

As long as private schools exist and produce those who get the best jobs, grammar schools will be needed to enable those who cannot afford private school fees to compete.

Would Cameron propose banning private schools but introducing a 'private stream' in state schools?

[Chris Palmer]

Fair point, Richard - knowing what people are like on ConHome, perhaps adding in 'Europe' was not a good idea.

I will also bear in mind what you say about writing under a Conservative banner. That said, I feel the bit about Clause IV was justified criticism, and further was qualified by the word 'potentially'. I'll think more on that one...

[Scotty]

I have stated my views about grammar schools not being the panacea for an education system which is failing everyone on so many levels on other threads so will not repeat them here.

I find the fact that we are "fisking" our own party leader's article in a Sunday newspaper deeply depressing and it just shows how unable we are to get around the fact that David Cameron has to balance a tightrope on policy which incorporates Conservative values of the members of his party with a policies which resonate with a wider group of the electorate.

"Far from being some winning slogan, a pledge to build more grammar schools would be an electoral albatross."
David Cameron is right to highlight what is yet again a fundamental mistake that the Conservative party has continued to make time and time again, we will be passionate about and prepared to fight each other like ferrets in a sack over not just endangered policies but also over issues which the electorate has long seen as extinct.
We have the Telegraph almost hysterical over a policy which will benefit at most 30% of children while leaving the other 70% the parents of which will not even buy the rag.
David Willets made a speech which was aimed at understanding addressing the concerns of all parents and children going through the education system. Instead of embracing the arguments to provide a choice of schools for all talents yet again a rear action is mounted to attack the leadership in an attempt to protect the few on one battle front instead of trying to win the war.
I bet that some of our more vocal MP's this week have grammar schools in their constituencies and now have parents concerned that they will be closed down when in fact like previous leaderships both of the Conservative and Labour governments have not done this.
It was a massive own goal not by the leadership but by the usual suspects and does nothing to bring us closer to the voters throughout the UK and certainly does not help all those candidates desperately trying to win a seat of Labour or the Libdem's.
Make the return of GRAMMAR schools a manifesto plate form and you simple say that we are the party of the few not the many.
Same old tories trapped in a time warp.

[Richard Carey]

Thanks, Chris. While I'm well aware that we all probably have differing, legitimate views that should go into policy development (and indeed that has probably been part of the intellectual revival in the Conservative Party of recent years), as an active campaigner like you I'd hate to hear some of the more strongly expressed ones here thrown back at me on the doorstep!

More debate, more inclusive policy development, more explanation at all levels is always a help in bringing people along with us to move the Party forwards, and I'm happy it works both ways round.

If we need to engage a wider audience inside the Party on this, we as grassroots members also need to demonstrate like Chris that we are not going to jump off the deep end in explosive fashion but are going to make a responsible and serious contribution of ideas.

[malcolm]

I have to agree with your editorial Tim, a couple of very poor attempts to defend this weeks furore from David Cameron.David should resist the temptation to make 6th Form debating points as with his his attempt to paint those who don't agree with him over Grammar schools as being members of 'a rightwing debating society'. I think he may come to regret that remark. The speeches following the Grammar school announcement have in my opinion been as disappointing as the original policy.Much grater attempts to carry party opinion are going to be needed in future, disagreements which are then written off as 'pointless debate' will lead to disaster.

[IRJMilne]

I think people are being unfair on Mr Cameron; I don't like what they're saying about grammar schools but I certainly sympathise with the argument that we don't have the money to enact such drastic restructuring of the education system. Mr Brown will leave us a great big PFI bill, he's sold our gold and lots of other assets so we can't fund it by an assets sale...

On a point raised earlier, I don't see what's so terrible with Whitehall giving a degree of instruction to schools; certainly some schools need it. Certainly I'm all in favour of inviegling some Tory ideas into left wing educational bastions. I think people are being too dogmatic about localism. Taken to its greatest extreme isn't localism nine tenths of the way to anarchy?

I think it's important that Mr Cameron knows that there is still a lot of support for grammar schools - it will help ward off future attempts to scrap them, or encourage an expansion of that system at a later date. For now, I just wish they'd keep schtum on the whole issue.

-----------------------------------------

As for Mr Maclean:

"Scots-born Mr Maclean, 54, has multiple sclerosis and walks with the aid of a shepherd's crook, or cromach as it is known in Gaelic. He claimed the quad bike helped him get around events in his Penrith and the Borders constituency.

The MP said that the Commons authorities had approved the claim for the quad bike.

"I just asked whether I was eligible for it and was told yes,' he said."

After the breakdown of his marriage he has gone out with some woman; they split after a while and he is now going out with a second woman who lives near his house. What are the Mail insinuating with "two mistresses" and "colourful love-life"?

I don't consider this vaguely scandalous. I don't trust anyone involved in journalism on this issue, as they just want to dig up dirt more easily, and want to be able to write a piece on MPs expenses once a year to fill some inches - nor do I trust the Lib Dem opposition to this bill. "One wife, two mistresses... and a quad bike on Commons expenses" is an article which illustrates well why I'm inclined to be vaguely in favour of Mr Maclean's bill. I don't understand why some of those MEPs wouldn't answer questions on things but, I do not like this ultra-cynical attitude to politics and politicians as a sort of giant gravy train for the depraved.

[Editor]

Scotty: "I find the fact that we are "fisking" our own party leader's article in a Sunday newspaper deeply depressing."

Two responses:

(1) According to CH polling of members this policy on grammars is the most unpopular of DC's leadership.
(2) Last week I was defending DC's remarks on Islamism and welcoming the 'tough on the causes of crime' sentiments behind the 'hug-a-hoodie' thing. This site is not routinely negative about our leader's more controversial interventions.

[Scotty]

"Much grater attempts to carry party opinion are going to be needed in future, disagreements which are then written off as 'pointless debate' will lead to disaster."

Malcolm, I am sorry but I laughed at this piece of advice to the latest in a long line of Conservative leaders since and including Mrs T.
After what I have witnessed as a Conservative party member and ordinary voter over the last 17 years I would just like the PARTY to prove that it is capable of being led by ANY leader.
I am sorry but we have been fighting like ferrets in a sack for so long the voters want that question answered before they elect us not the other way around!

[ACT]

I'm loving this stuff from Cameron that anything Mrs T didn't do, he won't do, and anything she did do, he will do. Oh wait. Gordon Brown is going to effortlessly outflank him from the right, and what then? I can already hear the Cameroon excuses for that 4th term in opposition. It'll be because 'we didn't modernise enough'. In fact, it won't be the leadership's fault at all that we lost, but the fault of the activists for having 'unsuitable debates'.

[ThePrince]

Grammar Schools are not inclusive, all modern evidence points to this conclusion, the argument in favour, though it barely warrant the word, is just some unfounded belief in them or founded on anecdotal evidence from 30 years ago, like "I had a poor friend once", that seemed to be Heffer's argument against Willets in the telegraph's audio debate.
Even if one does accept that Grammar Schools work, which I don't, the important debate is not over Grammar Schools it is about every other school, the +70% of children that don't go to them. After all that is why the Grammar School social experiment failed is because a sequence of Conservative and Labour governments were unwilling to raise the extra revenue (TAXES) to spend on that 70% of children in secondary moderns. It is utterly absurd to propose that Grammar School will fix the education system when they only cater for a tiny %.

[Denis Cooper]

Selection by academic ability and aptitude is what works, both for children who have a lot and equally for those who are less well-endowed ... the name given to schools which cater for the former is a minor issue, it's the foolish prohibition on selection by academic ability and aptitude that is the real heart of this debate, which will continue even though Cameron has now surrendered hands down to the socialist ideologues - and at a time when even they are beginning to admit that they were wrong. Unbelievable!

Anyway a lot's been said about this, and I've got something else to attend to -
I'm writing to Kew Gardens to complain that they don't have properly inclusive comprehensive glasshouses, but cling to an outdated right-wing apartheid-style policy of segregating different types of plants according to their optimal growing conditions ... it's outrageous that they're still doing that in this day and age!

[Bill]

Re "Grammar Schools are not inclusive": what is that meant to mean?

[Scotty]

"Selection by academic ability and aptitude is what works, both for children who have a lot and equally for those who are less well-endowed ..."
So looking at today's grammar school we can expect to see the brightest children attending but no correspondingly high figure from one particular social grouping. We will then see a complete mix with no favour or extra tuition being needed and therefore proving that those that can pay for that tuition are not in fact giving less bright children an advantage over brighter kids who's parents are less well off?

[martin]

I think it's fairly obvious the handling of this grammar school debacle could have been so much better.

Watching This Week on Thursday i agree with Portillo, Cameron has boxed himself in a corner.

All Brown has to say now is, we won't scrap Grammar schools, we just won;t build any more and extend our Academy programme.

I don;t understand why DC couldn't say that?

Very stupid. If this was somekind of publicity stunt designed to take the headlines off Brown, well it backfired catastrophically.

Let alone the FOI fiasco, what a joke. Do the people at CCO ever think before they open their mouths?

[Richard Carey]

All Brown has to say now is, we won't scrap Grammar schools, we just won;t build any more and extend our Academy programme.

DC has said just that. Except that he's said it first, and the signs so far are that Brown doesn't especially like the Academy programme, and would probably seek to give it less freedom rather than more. I'm not sure what your problem is?

As for taking the headlines off Brown, you seem more intent on chastising your own Party's leadership than attacking Brown at the moment, so it's obviously taken your attention off Brown...

[spagbob]

i went to a grammar school so cameron's opposition to it is a bit concerning, but im getting a bit fed up with this obsessing about our grammar school policy - it was officially dropped by cameron in january 2006. come on people! ok, it was very badly handled by willetts and it might have been better to not have mentioned grammar schools or at least not made that pledge to not allow any more to be set up. however, I wish people, especially the press) would read the full speeches before they comment. Willetts made some excellant points (as conservativehome pointed out) about putting conservative/ grammar school teaching into every school in britain without a return to selection thereby allowing everyone to benefit from grammar school education even if they arent bright enough. The people that criticise Cameron should realise that he wants to give every child a grammar school type education, rather than a few, but can only do that by leaving the commitment to selection in the past. stop being so negative and try to understand their heart - it is not about trying to pick a fight with the right, it is about trying to give everyone a good education, a grammar school education for every child in every school not just for those in grammar schools. now please stop this bickering!

[Richard]

"We have the Telegraph almost hysterical over a policy which will benefit at most 30% of children while leaving the other 70% the parents of which will not even buy the rag."

Yet which seems to have support running at almost 50%. Hardly unpopular.

That said, the danger of championing grammar schools is that we don't say enough about those who don't get into grammar schools. That is why the best option is to give schools independence to set their own admissions criteria. No state compulsion either for or against grammars and inevitably grammars will rise while other schools will develop in ways that support the needs of their particular pupils.

"Taken to its greatest extreme isn't localism nine tenths of the way to anarchy?"

If you mean anarchy as lawlessness than no. One only has to delve into the writings of the anarchocapitalists to see that one can have anarchy with law (if one defines anarchy as a lack of state diktat and allowing people to form their own contracts with each other in accordance with a libertarian law code of private property rights). Personally I'd be quite happy to see vast swathes of the state sector freed from government direction and left to the free market but that isn't politically possible at the moment.

[spagbob]

we must make a decision - either support cameron's aim of a grammar school education for every child, or an elitist aim of grammar school education for a few. your choice!

[Richard Carey]

Do the people at CCO ever think before they open their mouths?

Oh,and for the 200th time (sorry, pet bug-bear of mine), it's been called CCHQ for over two years!

I know it's not relevant to the point here, but the fact that I still hear this so much does highlight the absolute inability of some to adapt to any kind of change, even the most basic!

[Richard]

"We will then see a complete mix with no favour or extra tuition being needed and therefore proving that those that can pay for that tuition are not in fact giving less bright children an advantage over brighter kids who's parents are less well off?"

Welcome to reality, the middle classes and the super rich will always have an advantage. Only utopian socialists think they can cure that. Under the current system the wealthy can buy themselves into the catchment areas of good comprehensives (which seem to have few working class pupils) or buy their way into private schools (ditto). The point about grammars is that they at least go some way to helping those who are less fortunate with their wallets and moreso than comprehensives. In socially deprived Northern Ireland their secondary moderns have better results than our average comps.

[Stewart Geddes]

David Cameron's comment in the Mail on Sunday 20th May :-"That's why we will reform the curriculum, exams and testing, and that's why we want to see aggressive setting by ability - in effect, a 'grammar stream' in every subject, in every school."

My post on Conhome on 16th May 20:33...

"...lets not have any more nonsense attacking Grammar schools. Just get on with improving the system so that every school becomes a grammar school and every school also caters for the less academic."

Hmmm, a coincidence? or does DC read all the posts on this site?

[Richard]

"we must make a decision - either support cameron's aim of a grammar school education for every child, or an elitist aim of grammar school education for a few. your choice!"

That was the argument made by Labour in the 1960s in favour of comprehensive education. And since when were Conservatives opposed to elitism?

[ToMTom]

Which is why Spagbob, public schools must become Academies and be open to all instead of selecting-by-money.

Most people would prefer abolition of fee-paying education so Cameron's aim of a grammar school education for every child could be a reality.

Will Willetts have a Manifesto Pledge to convert all fee-paying schools into Academies drawing their intake from a broad cross-section of society ?

It would be "modern" for Cameron to propose integrating Eton into the state education system under a Conservative Government open to all.

[Bill]

There is some logic in TomTom's reasoning. But I suspect the Tories get out of jail free card of personal choice will continue to enable to throw bricks with impunity.

[Scotty]

"The point about grammars is that they at least go some way to helping those who are less fortunate with their wallets and moreso than comprehensives."
Which choice did the voters opt for 30 years ago when we could in honesty use that argument that grammar schools help the less fortunate?
Right so we can expect that 70% of parents are going to vote for Christmas(grammar schools) like a bunch of turkeys and hope that they are in the lucky 30% who manage to escape, instead of opting for the vegetarian option of (better schools for the majority)?

[Buckers]

Can someone explain to me why we should harp on with the need to actively build more selective grammar school, when Cameron is alluding to introduce firstly, the fundamental grammar school ethos of streaming into every lesson of every state school, and secondly by allowing schools greater freedom to exclude disruptive influences? Is this not a case of problem solved without invoking the arguments of yesteryear for grammar schools themselves?

As far as I gather, not only will this neutralise those opposed to age eleven selection by granting pupils a renewed ability to move up and down sets as determined by their developing (or diminishing) ability, but by effectively turning every state school into a proto-grammar school, which will also deliver the meritocratic results of the 1960's grammar schools at a fraction of the price of spending billion on building Sir. John Major’s “Grammar school in ever town”. Of course as Willets puts it, this effectively offers the grammar school ethos to the whole of society, not just the select fraction who made it into a grammar school at the age of eleven, be it through an army of private tutors, house-hopping, or sheer working-class toil.

If this is the case, what actual difference will exist between Cameron’s policy for schools and the original grammar schools, and why is it evoking this sort of Madeleinian grief seen here over the last few days?

[Chris]

Buckers, a truly excellent post, and I think it sums up our education policy perfectly. These proposals effectively take the grammar school and put it inside of a normal school.

Maybe we can placate people by ensuring that all top set lessons in schools are taught in the "Grammar Building", where pupils have to change into a different uniform before entering. Lets be honest these are the only differences between these proposals and actual grammar schools!

[TomTom]

1960's grammar schools at a fraction of the price of spending billion on building Sir

but the building programme is underway - it is PFI Academies nationally - they are all new build under PFI

[ToMTom]

I wish you would actually research things - they are rebuilding ALL Secondary Schools in England under PFI but scaling up the schools to have around 2000 pupils and using fewr sites.

The old schools can then be sold to developers for housing.

Labour has won....the Tories hope to be allowed to carry out Labour policy....but Brown won't let them.

New Build

http://www.bsf.gov.uk/index.html

Introducing Building Schools for the Future

Welcome to the official website of Building Schools for the Future (BSF). BSF is the biggest single government investment in improving school buildings for over 50 years. The aim is to rebuild or renew every secondary school in England over a 10-15 year period.

The Government is committed to devolve significant funds – about £3 billion in 2005-06 – to local authorities (LAs) and schools to spend on maintaining and improving their school buildings. But it also wants to promote a step-change in the quality of provision. That is the focus of Building Schools for the Future (BSF).

BSF – worth £2.2 billion in its first year (2005-6) – aims to ensure that secondary pupils learn in 21st-century facilities. Investment will be rolled out to every part of England over 15 waves, subject to future public spending decisions.

* By 2011, every LA in England will have received funding to renew at least the school in greatest need – many will have major rebuilding and remodelling projects (at least three schools) underway through BSF and the remainder will have received resources through the Academies programme or Targeted Capital Fund.
* By 2016, major rebuilding and remodelling projects (at least three schools) will have started in every LA.

Through this investment, BSF aims to drive reform – such as Academies, new options at 14-19, provision for special needs and extended schools. Innovation in delivery, through the creation of a national delivery partner for schools and LAs –Partnerships for Schools– will bring greater value for money, as well as effective implementation.

[Dave Wilson]

The main point, I suggest, is that schools should have a say in who they admit.

Some will emphasise highly academic criteria, others less so. The independent schools are like that now - there is a range of schools catering for a range of pupils.

[UKIP Webmaster]

Farage vs Willetts:
http://www.ukip.tv/?page_id=3

[malcolm]

Really Chris how do you work that out? Are you trying to insult the intelligence of readers of this blog or are you being a bit thick?
Scotty, for about the fifth time why are a bunch of huge City Academies going to provide a 'vegetarian option of (better schools for the majority)?
Re your post Scotty @14.58 are you happy with the points made by DC that this is a 'pointless debate' etc.

[Chris]

Malcom,
I am by no means trying to insult the intelligence of anyone on this blog. I have enjoyed reading your comments over the past few days, and have been glad to see that you unlike some posters have at least taken the time to read all of Willets speech. I'm sorry if I offended you in any way.

The argument being put forward for grammar schools has been that children learn best when amongst those of similar academic ability (I fully agree with this point). This can be achieved in an academy with 100% setting, and will be more effective than having separate schools as there will be fluidity between the sets. It was this point that I was trying to highlight with my comment.

[Gunther]

Does this episode prove that Cameron is a Conswervative ?

[Chris]

Gunther,
No, the "grammar stream" is the top set which was going to exist anyway under the proposals outlined this week. DC has simply resorted to spelling it out.

[Jonathan]

If a grammar stream in every school is the policy ie universal setting, then I am sure we can all - even a dissident like me - get behind it. It doesnt matter whether we have grammar schools if it is possible to have a grammar education.

However, if it is the policy, the way the policy was presented last week was shambolic, stupid, counterproductive, unnecessarily PC, criminally inept etc. etc.

Who is going to fall on their sword at CCHQ? This is the worst policy announcement I have ever seen from CCHQ snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Someone has to suffer.

[John]

In case anyone hasn't seen it. One Conservative MP's view. Shame the Shadow Secretary for education cannot be so concise!

http://www.dorries.org.uk/Blog.aspx?Y=2007&M=May&d=20#20

[Justin Hinchcliffe]

F***! Chad's back - he's YHN @ 13:52

[Dave Wilson]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6673827.stm

[Giffin]

A couple of years ago, research of high ability children (top 5%) showed they need to be in groups of around 20 in order to achieve their potential. It also showed that these groups pulled up standards for all pupils in the schools. Below that, you can't achieve a "grammar stream". Statistically, you need 400 pupils per year to achieve 20 in the top 5%.

However, other research shows that intelligence is a combination of genetics and environment. Before 11, high-ability children in a poor environment will have lower performance than lesser ability children in a good environment.

So high ability kids are not evenly distributed. Some comprehensive schools, like those in Winchester, can have 30 high ability children in a 210 pupil roll, and achieve great results (over 30% at A or A*). An 1100-pupil school is pretty manageable so discipline can be enforced.

Inner City comprehensives might need 2-2,500 children to get the critical mass of 20 high ability kids to form a 'grammar set', but there are management problems when schools get that big, and poor discipline not only undermines performance but deters parents of bright kids from sending them there.

Then there's the problem of rural schools. Would it be better to create large comprehensives and bus every pupil there, or have central grammar schools but local secondary moderns, to reduce the cost and environmental impact of mass transportation?

It's not an easy decision. The question is whether we should allow local communities the freedom to debate and decide, or continue with central prescription?

My view is that we should focus on fixing the supply-side problems of teaching and school management skills, abolish the LEA's and set up a local oversight structure for schools that frees them to choose the format that suits their community.

[Andrew Mays]

Chris and Buckers;

The problem wasn't that we haven't pledged new grammar schools. I wouldn't have expected that at all. The problem is, after talking about making sound improvements to academies they decided to tell us that grammars don't work and are unfair as the entrench advantage.
They made a direct attack on grammars and Willetts even said "We must break free from the belief that academic selection is any longer the way to transform the life chances of bright poor kids."

That's the problem! Hands up who trusts a word that comes out of Camerons mouth?

[YHN]

That's the problem with paternalists like Cameron, they seek to coerce rather than give people the freedom to choose.

Our kids do not belong to the state. We should be able to choose the structures we believe are best to educate them.

Here's an education policy for you:
"Every child will be given a voucher and local communities will be able to choose whatever structure they decide is best for them which may include selection by ability".

We really shouldn't be having this discussion at all. We should be giving the money to kids and letting their parents decide without any governmental interference.

It is time for politicians to butt out of education.

[Justin Hinchcliffe]

"...there have been a gang of the usual right-wing turkey-basters who immediately used it to slate not jut the policy as "absurd" and "ridiculous" but also to attack their own Party leadership and it should come as no surprise to people like that if they get slapped down instead of listened to..." This is, well, crap.

I consider myself to be a liberal Conservative. In fact, I was a liberal Conservative before I even knew of David Cameron's existence. I have repeatedly stood up for the changes that David Cameron has introduced that have taken us back to the centre ground of British politics. And I've lost count of the number of times that I've been attacked on this site for doing so.

I am still a huge fan of David's - make no mistake about it. But, on this issue, he's wrong.

As a Tottenham resident and campaigner, I see bright kids, mainly black, on a daily basis who are let down by the comprehensive system.

By the very name, comprehensives do not distinguish between bright and not-so-bright children - everyone is treated and taught the same. Expectations are low and discipline almost non-existence. Locally, if a child makes it to Oxford or Cambridge, it’s the headline of the front page in the local rag. That’s how rare it is.

The Tottenham Grammar School provided a 'leg up' to bright children, including Lord Ralph Harris. Had it not been for the fact that he attended a grammar school, we would not have been paying tribute to his life and work as we did a few months ago.

The idea that ALL schools should be, in terms of standards and results, like the grammars is a myth that was dispelled a couple of years after the comp was first introduced. If the leadership *really* believes that, then they are living in Utopia.

Not only should we support existing grammar schools, we should pledge ourselves to expand them and build new ones - as John Major rightly wanted to do in 1997. We should also consider introducing school vouchers and definitely re-introduce the assisted places scheme.

On this issue the bright Tottenham kids who are condemned to failing comprehensives are my priority, not appeasing Cameron or CCHQ.

[Graeme Archer]

So you think we should be the party of a national 11 plus, or we are nothing, Justin? What is your proportion to be permitted entry to the grammar school system in the first term of a Tory government? i.e. what proportion of the IQ distribution as measured on an 11plus rating scale is deserving of the leg up?

[Justin Hinchcliffe]

I would support the 11+ in a modern setting, Graeme.

[Richard Carey]

This is, well, crap.

Thankyou for that quality point, Justin - please put it back in the box it came in.

[Matt Wright]

I watched the Willetts interview by Andrew Marr and was impressed by him. It stated what he believed in and the evidence that led to that conclusion. I bleive his veiws were far more likely to be in tune with the vast majority of the public than some of the posts on this site. As the Editor has said above, many of the ideas set out by Willetts are good although perhaops fvor some reason the hadling of the news went wrong. I strongly agree that we need to get the suply side sorted before we can contemplate vouchers otherwise we will have a very gappy provision. I see a good policy and a logical sequence as to how we build on what has been done before and make it much better. I think the debate has been hysterical and quite potty,

Matt

[Annabel Herriott]

I have just picked up the transcript of Cameron's speech from my in box, and read it slowly. He makes absolute sense. The 11 plus WAS deeply unpopular with parents. Mine whipped me out of the system before I got anywhere near taking it! They knew I would fail it, as I have an uneven set of abilties. "Aggressive setting by ability" Yes David, that is the way to go.
Some of our party dont seem to be able to make the stretch of the imagination to encompass any other way of delivering a "grammar school" type of education for the academic child, apart from that child being housed in a separate "grammar" school.
This may be down to the fossilisation of the mind that affects older people. "in my day......" My dearest partner, retired head, now aged 81, is a prime case of the condition!! They find it really impossible to change their mindset, so David, you know you are right, you will just have to push it through regardless. The penny will drop with them eventually.

[Scotty]

"Scotty, for about the fifth time why are a bunch of huge City Academies going to provide a 'vegetarian option of (better schools for the majority)?
First of all as I pointed out in an earlier post I don't have a city academy in my area nor am I likely too. I did not go to a grammar and again they were never in existence in my area when I went through the education system. Having read David Willets speech and David Cameron's response in the Mail today I am optimistic that they have grasped what is wrong and what needs to done to improve education for everyone not just the brightest few in some area's.
Just looking at the threads on this site over the last few days has shown just how divisive this issue is among conservatives and this will be replicated on a bigger scale outside the party faithful.
The fact that it is so divisive even now goes a along way to explaining why most grammar schools went under both Conservative and Labour governments, it also explains why neither Thatcher or Major tried to bring them back. I am sorry but I don't think that Major promising to bring them back in his manifesto in 97' was anything other than a desperate attempt to hang on to a few middle class voters when he knew he had lost and lost big.
I usually agree with many of your comments on various issues on this site but again this divisive issue is splitting people who are normally pro David Cameron, this is because just about everyone of us has a very dug in view about this which was there before the present leadership and will in all probability be there when they are gone.
I have children going through the secondary education system just now one of whom has special needs, my other children have been streamed into the top group classes and will do well in this present but very poor education system.My major concerns about the state of the education system will not be fixed by providing more grammar schools in some area's, but improving the curriculum , discipline, and exams they take might. The leadership also seem committed to helping provide special provision for the most needy in my immediate family which to me is far more important because that is the area where we really are failing children, their parents and everyone else in the same system including teachers on a shocking scale.

"Re your post Scotty @14.58 are you happy with the points made by DC that this is a 'pointless debate' etc."
Hopefully answered this point in above comments.
I could not give a toss where David Cameron, David Willets, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown or any other cabinet or shadow cabinet minster sends their kids to school, what I care about is what they are going to do in government to make the education system better for my kids in my area.

Annabel, as usual you are a breath of fresh air to the debate. My other half(also a tory member) and I have had a few heated discussion on this issue over the last few days. I put it down to the fact that I went through the Scottish state system without a grammar school, they on the other hand went to a highly sought after grammar school in Buckinghamshire!!!

[TomTom]

Locally, if a child makes it to Oxford or Cambridge,

Forget O & C...let's have them getting into Imperial College, London....if they can. That is the powerhouse in Europe for Physics and Science subjects.

The fact is there are 486 million people entitled to work in Britain in the EU. There are 400.000 "EU" trained engineers living in the USA because opportunities in Europe are so dire.

We are not even catering for the top end of the education spectrum properly - medicrity is the watchword

[malcolm]

I think we'll leave this there Scotty. I assume privately you have no liking for City Academies either, despite my constant invitations to do so you have made absolutely no attempt to try to explain their benefits.
I also do not mind where Tory MPs educate their children and have never criticised Willetts for his choice. But DCs and Willetts failure to try and sell this policy to the Party or defend it from the criticism afterward is the most disappointing aspect of the whole affair.
I hope that lessons have been learned and that we have no repeat of these events.

[IRJMilne]

Unusually, I agree with Mr Hinchcliffe, who has certainly been a Cameron loyalist.

Having said this, Mr Cameron has surely got the message by now. We don't need to promise grammar schools in our first term, city academies are grant maintained schools reheated by Mr Blair, I think the pro-grammar lot are doing more harm than good now.