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Business of the House

I think that that is one of those provocative questions. The hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton), who was sitting next to the hon. Gentleman a moment ago—[Interruption.] Well, I thought that the question was party political point scoring, but I will answer it in any event. I thank the Select Committee for its work on testing and on standards across the piece. This Government have given great priority to investing in education and to ensuring that there is a fair and open system of testing that is helpful for parents, pupils and teachers, and that there is individual personal tuition for each child. We want more people to get education further on in their lives. That is why we are introducing an apprenticeship programme and increasing to 18 the age at which some education should still be going on. If the Opposition are as concerned as we are not only that every individual should achieve their potential but that the economy should have the supply of skilled and qualified workers it needs, I hope that they will back us in these proposals.