Sats marking fiasco delays publication of league tables

Parents who use league tables to help them choose primary schools will have to rely on out-dated information due to the Sats fiasco.

The tables ranking 18,000 primary schools on their Sats results were due to be published in December but will now not appear until next March. This could be too late for many parents as council deadlines for primary school applications are often earlier in the year.

Even if application deadlines are extended, families face a scramble to complete paperwork in time.

A spokesman for the Department for Children confirmed that the publication of performance tables for primary schools was being delayed by up to four months. The decision was taken after problems with the marking of Sats taken by 1.2 million 11 and 14-year-olds this year. A series of blunders and computer errors left thousands of schools without results for maths, English and science tests.