00:00 Well, we have devolved administrations in Wales and Northern Ireland and indeed in Scotland,
00:04 so we have different education policies.
00:07 Sixth form colleges, sixth forms, FE colleges, they are aware of the different grading systems
00:12 in the different jurisdictions of the UK, as universities are aware of the different
00:17 A-level systems that we have.
00:19 Young people will be treated very fairly.
00:21 We know they've been through disruption, but it was important to get back to 2019 grading
00:26 after the teacher assessed grades led to higher levels of top grades than normal.
00:33 We've also put in place help for young people because they've been through disruption, so
00:37 there are equations for them, there are formula sheets so they don't have to memorise as much.
00:42 And also the senior examiners will look at the national performance of this cohort compared
00:47 to 2019, and where they see lower levels of performance because of the disruption, that
00:52 will be taken into account in the grade boundaries that will be issued today.
00:57 What I would say is that in all the regions of the country there are very high proportions
01:03 of good and outstanding schools, and when we came into office in 2010, 68% of schools
01:08 were good or outstanding, today that's 88%, and in some regions of the country that 88%
01:14 is even higher.
01:15 We're doing everything we can to level up the quality of education around the country.
01:20 In some parts of the country there are higher proportions of disadvantaged children, and
01:24 that can lead to differential results.
01:27 We are doing, all our reforms since 2010 are about closing that gap between children from
01:32 disadvantaged backgrounds and their more advantaged peers, and we did close that gap by 9% prior
01:38 to the pandemic.
01:39 It widened during the pandemic, and now we need to get back to that pre-pandemic position.
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