Education and Inspections Bill

The hon. Lady is absolutely right; there are problems and difficulties with any system of education. The point is that, in Trafford, we managed to overcome those problems and get the best results in the country. The hon. Lady should be pleased about that. The rigour and transparency of selection helped to ensure high standards of primary education long before the publication of performance data. Equally striking is the extent to which these high standards are maintained throughout a pupil’s school career. Richmond-upon-Thames tops the league table for primary schools; Trafford is second. Yet at GCSE level, Richmond slides down the rankings to 69th place, with only 55 per cent of children getting five good GCSEs. Trafford maintains the momentum; we continue to top the table at GCSE and at A-level. None of this, of course, is new. We heard an excellent speech earlier about the Northern Ireland selective system, which gets the best results in the whole of the United Kingdom. Last year, even the DFES admitted that"““between the ages of 11 and 15, pupils in wholly selective local education authorities make more progress than pupils in partially selective or non-selective authorities and that extra progress equates to pupils in wholly selective LEAs achieving approximately two grades higher in one GCSE than in non-selective LEAs.””" The fact is that selective LEAs do better for all children across the board. If seven out of ten children in Trafford can get five good GCSEs, why not in Oxfordshire, where only half of children reach that level? If seven out of ten children in Redbridge, with selection, can get five decent GCSEs, why not in Hampshire, Westminster or Manchester—or why not in Bristol, where only half as many children get five good GCSEs as those living in Trafford or in Redbridge? We all know that the same few LEAs dominate the top of the table for GCSE achievement: Trafford, Redbridge, Sutton, Buckinghamshire and Kingston upon Thames, all of which are selective. The case for selection has been made as eloquently by the Government’s own value-added tables as by anything else. The value-added tables had been expected to knock the grammar schools off their perch. But between the ages of 11 and 14, of the 21 schools adding most value, 18 were grammar schools and the other three were independent. If value-added tables were a wheeze to show the effectiveness of comprehensives, it did not work. Of course some comprehensives do work well—usually ones where pupils are taught in classes set by ability, because pupils learn better when they are engaged at the right level of ability. That is the way grammar schools operate; if grouping pupils according to ability within schools is effective and desirable, it should be acceptable also to group pupils according to ability between schools. What matters is what works. Perhaps that is why today’s ICM poll shows that 70 per cent. of the public would like more grammar schools, while only 21 per cent. oppose them. Trafford’s outstanding results are achieved not just because of the grammar schools, but because of the quality of the high schools that stand in the place of the failed secondary moderns of the 1960s—proud, high achieving schools with a rich pattern of specialisms, from sport to technology. We can judge the effectiveness of the high schools by the results that they produce. Do not forget: the most academically inclined children have gone elsewhere. The national average for children achieving five good GCSEs in 2005 was 57 per cent. Ashton on Mersey high school in my constituency, also a specialist sports college, easily beat the national average: 62 per cent. of pupils got five good GCSEs. Down the road at Wellington, 73 per cent.—16 percentage points above the national average for children of all abilities—got five good GCSEs. Children at Trafford’s high schools are receiving a better education and getting better results than at most comprehensives. Indeed, if you exclude the performance of Trafford’s grammar schools, with roughly the top 40 per cent. of the ability range, the high schools on their own would come 65th out of 148 LEAs in England, ahead of Richmond-upon-Thames and many others. Trafford is perhaps the perfect example of the successful, diverse state education system that the Prime Minister and Lord Adonis so rightly want to achieve—a system that, in the words of the White Paper, takes full account of"““how different young people acquire knowledge and skills””." All of us here today want higher standards in schools. I am not claiming that what we do in Trafford can work everywhere, and I certainly would not seek to impose it on other parts of the country. But I am asking all hon. Members to look at the facts that I have put before the House. If they do so with an open mind, they will find it impossible to rule out the use of selection as a part of the modern, diverse provision of schools that our children need.