Echo Comment on the growing exams performance gap between regions

In London, 71.7 per cent of pupils passed, compared to 65.2 per cent in the North East and just 62.4 per cent in the West Midlands, the worst performing region – a gap that has widened to 9.3 percentage points from last year’s 8.7.

In London, 28.6 per cent of grades were at the top ones at seven and above, compared to just 17.7 per cent in the North East, a gap that in the last year has widened from 10.6 per cent to 10.9 per cent.

Why is this? Unless pupils in the regions are substantially thicker than in London, which we do not believe, there have to be profound social and educational reasons for this. Are our schools demonstrably worse? Do we not have a fair share of resources? Is the fact that so many more children are growing up in poverty hampering their live chances?

It is wrong that in 21st Century Britain, an accident of geography should have such an impact on educational outcomes, and we suspect that at the heart of these figures there are small pockets of deprivation where children are denied any opportunity.

This is not just a question for the North East: can the country as a whole afford so much talent to be overlooked? It is a waste of their live chances and the whole nation’s potential prosperity.

Levelling up, the Conservatives’ idea of bringing the regions up to the levels of the south east, has failed to address this problem, and last year, Bridget Phillipson, a Sunderland MP, was Education Secretary and made all the right noises about tackling it – and yet the gap has widened.

Will the new devolution agenda of the new Prime Minister and the new Education Secretary – the 11th in the last 12 years – bring fairness and equal opportunity to our next generation?