Lord Johnson of Marylebone (Con)

My Lords, I am delighted our report has been the source of so much agreement and near-consensus this morning. As the noble Lord, Lord Addington, observed, this was not a big surprise, given the weight of evidence that we had in front of us. It has been a very rich debate and I want to briefly point to a couple of highlights. One of the main ones for me was the noble Baroness, Lady Blower, I believe, recalling the delightful and revealing origins of the English baccalaureate with that funny story from Sam Freedman’s book. There were also the reflections of the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, on the evolution/ revolution trade off and her gentle admonishment that, while there was much that was good in the report, it was not nearly bold enough. That felt like a school report and we are happy to have had it. Many noble Lords and noble friends made excellent points about the importance of getting this right to drive growth and productivity in the years ahead. Finally, I much enjoyed the call from the noble Lord, Lord Knight, for a more joyful 11 to 16 phase. That has to be a really important ambition for the new Government. In response to the former Minister, my noble friend Lady Barran, and her lonely defence of the status quo, I would simply say that resting the Government’s case for the defence, a case for inaction, on some limited progress in the Pisa rankings over recent years just will not cut it. Pisa is a very partial measure of the success of an education system. When you look at England’s absolute scores in recent years in key subjects, they have been going backwards—albeit, I admit, by less than the scores of some other countries, hence the rise in our relative performance. It is also worth pointing out that there is nothing in our committee’s recommendations that would reduce the emphasis on English and maths. Finally, I thank the Minister and congratulate her on taking her new role in DCMS and on her thoughtful and engaging responses to the committee’s report. It is very encouraging to hear that the Minister feels that it will be relevant to the new review just announced by the government. I am sure everybody on the committee welcomes, as they have today, the announcement of that review and will be working hard to support it on a cross-party basis.