See more Daily Mail on Google - save us as a Preferred SourceBy LAURA TROTT Published: 23:00 BST, 8 September 2026 | Updated: 23:09 BST, 8 September 2026
English schools are one of this country’s great success stories – and you don’t have to take my word for it.Statistics from the Programme For International Student Assessment (Pisa) released yesterday put England in the top ten in the world for English, maths and science.These results did not come about by accident. They are down to hard-won, evidence-led reforms and brilliant teachers.We should be hugely proud of how far we are punching above our weight. In science, English pupils are now ranked eighth in the world, up from 13th. In reading, we are ninth, up from 13th. And in maths, we are tenth, up from 11th.Sadly, Labour is hell-bent on taking a sledgehammer to a part of the state that is actually working well. Once again, we are gearing up for a battle over academic standards and rigour.Under successive Conservative administrations, brave teachers, educationalists and politicians – notably former education secretary Michael Gove and his schools minister Nick Gibb – made the case for evidence-led reform. We have in Lucy Powell an Education Secretary who callously claimed in her first week in the job that we have had ‘an over-focus on academic outcomes’They believed in something that should never have been controversial: children are capable of good academic outcomes regardless of their upbringing.When Mr Gove was first appointed in 2010, the UK’s Pisa scores were at an all-time low. Between 2000 and 2009, England dropped from seventh to 25th for reading, eighth to 27th in maths and fourth to 16th in science. Now look at where we are today.But here’s the rub: we have an Education Secretary who callously claimed in her first week in the job that we have had ‘an over-focus on academic outcomes’.Yes. You read that correctly. You might have thought academic outcomes would be the primary focus of an Education Secretary. But Lucy Powell would rather interrupt the huge progress English pupils are making and spearhead a campaign of national sabotage against our education system. We only have to look across the border at Scotland and Wales, where Conservative reforms were not implemented, to see what the future holds.Pupils in both of those countries have fallen behind, reaching a two-decade low in maths and reading. Most strikingly, the most disadvantaged pupils in England are performing better in reading and science than all pupils in Wales. You could hardly ask for clearer evidence that education policy matters. Labour’s decision to change course is a kamikaze act.This week, the Education Secretary has proved she cannot even keep schools open, refusing to intervene when a number of schools in Middlesbrough announced their intention to close or shut down early as the funeral of one of the A66 joyriders took place.This followed her remark at the weekend that education ‘should be about what you can do, and not what you can’t’.This is quite simply mad. The whole point of school is to teach children things they do not already know.The tragedy is that the consequences of the Government lowering standards will not be immediate. Education reform takes time to bear fruit and the same is true in reverse. Lower expectations today and the damage will emerge slowly, with the most disadvantaged pupils paying the highest price.It is frankly bonkers to look at the latest Pisa results and conclude we should lower the bar. They prove that children in England are capable of great academic outcomes.They show what a belief in the potential of children and brilliant teachers, coupled with an unswerving commitment to high standards and evidence-led reform, can achieve. Labour should welcome that success, not vandalise it. I hope that Lucy Powell thinks again.
