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Education and Skills Bill

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. That point can also be seen on an international scale. The PISA—programme for international student assessment—studies look at the OECD countries, which have comparable western-style economies. I think three studies in that sequence have been conducted now. All of them show that the more comprehensive the school system is—as in Finland, which tops the league tables every time—the better the whole cohort of the school population does, whereas the more selective systems tend to sink down to the middle of the performance table, although the amount of money that is spent has to be allowed for, too. The PISA studies have specifically cited countries such as Germany, the UK and the USA, where there are wide variations of selection in the system, because while selection is undoubtedly good for the 10, 20 or 30 per cent. who are selected and taken into the elite schools, it has a very negative, downward effect on the vast majority of our pupils who are left out. I entered into politics to try to improve the life chances of everybody, not of a selected elite minority.