Education Bill

I absolutely was comparing like with like, because the whole point about these tables is that they show us how we are doing relative to our competitors. Much as I admire the right hon. Gentleman, and much as I am grateful to him for embarking on a course of reform which, sadly, was thwarted subsequently, I have to acknowledge, as does he, that the statistics produced by the OECD are ungainsayable. I would love to be able to celebrate a greater level of achievement, but I am afraid that this is the dreadful inheritance that our children face as a result of the Government whom he latterly supported from the Back Benches.