---

Education and Inspections Bill

It is a great privilege to follow those words from such an expert in this field. I say first how much I agree with the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, on the early days of selection. When she was Secretary of Sate for Education, while I was trying to make my way in politics, I was pleased with what she did and supported her. Now, however, times have moved on. I shall respond to the two arguments that have been put. The first is that people really just want a good local school; the second that people who are disadvantaged or less well off are unable to choose. Both those assumptions are, in large part, false. People do not want a good local school. More and more, they want the best possible school for their children. The idea that parents will now in some way just accept a good local school has just gone. Parents and children do not want that anymore. They want the best education, opportunity and the best chance to fulfil their lives’ potential that they can get. You can only get that through diversity and choice in the system.