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Children, Schools and Families

My Lords, exactly what will the Council for Educational Excellence do and exactly what will it cost? In addition, why are the Government still so much against streaming? I think that it was my noble friend Lord Blackwell who said that they accept that setting is a way of getting away from mixed-ability teaching—people are being are taught among their peers. However, people of secondary school age value their friendships greatly and develop through them. Where setting takes place in a big school, and you are with one group of people in one subject and another group for another, you keep losing your friends, whereas with streaming you are with the same group and you benefit from being with friends throughout your time at school, except that you have the flexibility of moving between streams if you develop in such a way that you can. Why are the Government still so against streaming?