Acting Presiding Officer, could I thank Paul Davies, who is double-jobbing once again as the Conservative education spokesperson? He really should be asking for a slice of the wages of his counterpart. But I genuinely thank him for his thoughtful analysis of the report that is before us.

The Member’s first question was: why have we decided to act now? Well, Paul, I can’t account for the decisions that others have made before me. This summer’s results were the first set of early entry results under my watch. You’ll be aware that I’ve been expressing concern since I became aware of the high levels of early entry. But, to be fair to my predecessors, if you look at the data in the report, this is a relatively new phenomenon over the last two years, and a lot of that, as is accounted for in the report, is driven by a nervousness around the new specification of GCSEs. Now, whatever the rights or wrongs of that, we can debate, but that’s been a driving factor behind some of the scores. So, although there has been a rising trend, over the last two years it has been particularly acute. But we’re acting now. I’m acting as quickly after the publication of the report as I can, but we do also have to give schools the time and opportunity to plan appropriately. It simply would not be fair to say that we’re going to use this new measure for reporting next year for the students who have already done exams. It simply wouldn’t be fair to the sector. So, this gives people the time to plan accordingly.

Paul is right that individual schools have used this practice to different effect, but there has undoubtedly been, in some schools, the pressure to do early entry because others are doing it, and they have felt that maybe their school would be put at a disadvantage if they don’t follow suit. I am also aware of some schools who do not do early entry because of the financial pressures rather than any other reason, and by having this rule across the board, it creates a parity for all schools in that regard, about how they will be assessed.

Can I make it absolutely clear? If there is a school in Wales that is thinking about asking parents to pay for resits, they need to think again. It is not acceptable, and I am aware that this is happening. Only yesterday, I had an e-mail from a grandfather whose granddaughter sat English this summer. She got a C at the end of Year 10. She and her family are very anxious that she should have another opportunity to do that English examination, and the school have asked for them to pay for the resit. Now, in that particular case, the grandfather says that he is in a position to help, but how many other children’s parents and grandparents will not be in that position? That is not a reflection of the values of the Welsh education system, where we are striving for excellence and equity.

The Member will be aware that a lot of this behaviour has been driven around accountability measures, and as I announced in my statement, and in the written statement I made two weeks ago with regard to school categorisation, we’re in a process of transitioning to a different set of accountability measures. But again, let me be clear: accountability is here to stay, and to be fair to the headteachers and teachers I meet, they know that, they understand that, and they want to be held accountable for their practice. We need to work with the profession to find a fair way in which we can create an accountability system that drives the kind of behaviours in schools that we want to see and, crucially, measures the impact that that school has on individual pupils, and not an accountability set of measures that perhaps narrows the focus onto a very small number of children in the cohort, which you have quite rightly identified as those on the C/D borderline, to the expense of other people within the system, whether that be lower attainers or the more able and talented.

I want to be in a position to have that new set of accountability measures in place by next year. The revised guidance to schools will be released later this year, but we will be communicating this change to all stakeholders—schools, challenge advisers, regional consortia and LEAs—and I would expect challenge advisers in regional consortia to have to be monitoring their individual schools’ performance and patterns around early entry. Let me be clear: we’re not stopping early entry, but it does have to be taken in the best interests of individual children, for them to be sitting their exams at a time that is right for them and gives them the best opportunity to achieve the very highest grades that they are capable of.