Party says era of selective schools belongs to ‘dustbin of history’, while Lib Dems vow to block any proposed vote in the Lords

Labour has criticised reported plans by the prime minister to launch a new generation of grammar schools, saying they belong “in the dustbin of history”.

The Liberal Democrat leader, Tim Farron, also vowed to oppose the plans, including attempting to block any proposed vote in the Lords.

The Sunday Telegraph reported that Theresa May, who attended a grammar school, could announce a new wave of selective schools as early as the Conservative party conference in October.

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Allowing new grammar schools would be about “social mobility and making sure that people have the opportunity to capitalise on all of their talents”, the paper quoted an unnamed government source as saying.

The proposal is something of a reversal of previous Conservative policy: David Cameron resisted backbench pressure to reintroduce grammar schools throughout his time as Conservative leader.

The creation of new grammar schools, which select pupils based on their performance at exams when they are 11, was banned by Tony Blair in 1998, although he allowed the approximately 160 such schools in England that had survived the educational changes of the previous two decades to continue, as well as a further 69 in Northern Ireland.

In recent years there have been some efforts to expand selective education by opening “annexes” to existing schools. May is thought to be a supporter of new selective schools, having backed a grammar school’s proposal to open an annexe in her Maidenhead constituency. Downing Street’s co-chief of staff Nick Timothy has also backed new selective schools in the past. Last year he told the Telegraph that his own experience of going to a grammar school “changed my life”.



But Downing Street sources pointed to the education secretary’s comments last month that the issue was in her in-tray and that she would take time to consider it before any announcement is made.

Justine Greening said at the time she was prepared to be open-minded about school selection, but signalled that this might not mean a return to the old pattern of grammar schools and secondary moderns. She stressed that education was no longer a binary world and that there were already a range of different types of school on offer.

A Downing Street spokesman said education policies would be published “in due course”, adding: “Every child should be allowed to rise as far as their talents will take them and birth should never be a barrier.”

Responding to the Sunday Telegraph report, the shadow education secretary, Angela Rayner, said there should be “no going back” to the grammar-school era.

“Rather than harking back to a mythical ‘golden age’ of grammar schools, the Tories must work tirelessly to improve every school in the country, to work with teachers to drive up standards, and to give our schools the investment they need in the 21st century,” she said.

Former shadow education secretary Lucy Powell said: “All the evidence tells us that, far from giving working-class kids chances, [grammar schools] entrench advantage and have become the preserve of the privately tutored.

“If this is the new direction of Theresa May’s education policy, it’s a bad move and shows us, yet again, why we need a Labour government.”

Farron has promised that the Lib Dems would “work to block any Tory attempt to create grammar schools”.

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Last week he told the Guardian his party would mobilise its strong presence in the House of Lords, where it has 106 peers, and would aim to work with Labour and crossbench colleagues to defeat any attempt by the government to reintroduce grammar schools.

Farron said selective education was divisive and pointed out that a reintroduction of grammar schools was not in the Conservative 2015 election manifesto.

“Those who hold up grammar schools as the gold standard are less keen to talk about what happens to those children who, at the age of 11, are told they are not good enough … This rose-tinted view of grammar schools might play well for a nostalgic few on the right of the Tory party but make no mistake about it – they are not the drivers of social mobility they would like to claim,” he said.