---

Schools White Paper

The answer is quite simple: I want parents to be able to choose schools. I do not want schools to be able to choose parents, which is what happens under a grammar school system. The schools cream off the children who are able to do well and to pass the 11-plus, and the others are left behind. I want every school to be a centre of excellence so that parents can choose between them. If that means raising parents’ aspirations for the children in our most disadvantaged communities and getting them to think more broadly about which school might match their children’s talents, I want them to do that. If there are financial barriers to their getting into a school that is, for example, slightly further away than the one at the end of their street, we should help them to overcome those barriers. This is about widening choice in the system, and about making that choice work for the people who want it and need it most.