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Children, Schools and Families

My Lords, I accept that streaming can keep friendship groups more together, as the noble Baroness said, but the advantage of setting is that it enables judgments to be made on the aptitude of students in individual subjects. Student aptitude varies between subjects. We favour setting over streaming because it enables the aptitudes of students to be much better reflected in the quality of teaching that they receive than is possible if one were simply to put them in a standard group across all subjects. In respect of the national council, the Statement said that our aim is, "““to mobilise every section of the community behind our national mission to become a world leader in education, and in particular, our aspiration that every secondary school should have a business and university partner””." That is why we are so keen to engage business and university leaders in the council. We will set out a more precise work plan in due course. Although I do not imagine that we will set out the precise cost, I hope that I will be able to provide more ballpark figures once the council’s work is under way.