A-levels to get tougher

The Government today promised to restore A-levels as the education system's gold standard by making it tougher for pupils to get the highest grades.

Ministers have decided to ignore advice to scrap the exams amid concern about the growing numbers of students with three straight A grades.

But they promise that Alevels will be made harder so universities find it easier to identify the best candidates. Tougher questions and a new top grade would be introduced in the next Parliament.

Before the new top award is introduced, universities will be helped to spot the brightest candidates by getting access to their percentage marks, as well as overall grades. At the other end of the ability spectrum, pupils will be discouraged from leaving school at 16 and warned they must pass practical maths and English courses before being able to get a job.

The Government wants to boost the profile of vocational education by stressing that it will provide an alternative route to top universities, including Oxbridge. Education Secretary Ruth Kelly insists her plans, published in a White Paper tomorrow, are "truly radical".

However, the Tories accused the Government of trying to "spin" away Labour's failure to improve standards.

Shadow education secretary Tim Collins said: "They have not achieved literacy and numeracy for all schoolleavers - one in three have functional problems." Meanwhile, Oxford and Cambridge are rejecting thousands of applicants with three or more A grades at A-level.

Cambridge is among the supporters of plans put forward by former chief schools inspector Sir Mike Tomlinson to replace A-levels and GCSEs with a diploma.

Sir Mike wanted A-levels and GCSEs merged into a single diploma, which would bring academic and vocational subjects into the same qualification.

But despite his plea to ministers not to cherry-pick his proposals, the White Paper will show that is precisely what they have done. It will agree with him that the status of vocational education must be enhanced. It will also support his call for measures to stretch the brightest pupils. However, it will reject his call for GCSEs and A-levels to be scrapped.

Ms Kelly also said it was unacceptable that Britain came 24th out of 28 industrialised countries in terms of its post-16 staying-on rate, saying: "We have to tackle that."

Ministers have resisted all calls to move the school leaving age up to 18. I nstead, Ms Kelly will be hoping that a mixture of sticks and carrots - the threat of unemployment for 16-year-olds who leave with no qualifications, the prospect of higher salaries for those that stay in school - will do the trick.