Are Tories anti-Grammar School?

David Cameron has taken something of a knock over the past week for his stance on Grammar schools and, to some extent, rightly so. There is a great deal of confusion over the attitudes that he actually represents and the idea of social mobility that the conservatives have traditionally stood for.

Tories are rightly wedded to the idea that a good standard of education is the key to social mobility and the environment that the grammar school provides is an excellent vehicle for this. However, I do not think that it is these that the new Cameron tories are against.

What this stance signals is not a lack of faith in grammar schools, it is a lack of faith in secondary moderns. The idea that, at the age of 11, the child can irrevokably decide the class into which they will fall - those of the labouring (all-be-it skilled labour) classes and those of the intelligensia - is intolerable. Secondary moderns have always been a repository for people in whom society no longer takes an interest, and on whom intellectual resources need no longer be spent. This is not the way in which a modern society should treat its children, who should recieve a decent standard of education as long as they require it.

The grammar system is not one that allows a greater deal of social mobility - if it is social mobility that is a problem, then an increase in the standard of education of our children is in order. The grammar school system mainly entrenches a two-tier class system.

The key to social mobility is aspiration and if we encourage children to know their place, rather than to aspire, then we condemn generations into not realising their potential.

I know that this is a rather hard policy to swallow to the right wing who, quite correctly, would like to encourage intelligent people from poorer backgrounds to realise their potential, however times change. We are now in a position where we should be able to give every child a decent education. If we do not do this, then we are failing half of our society. It does not necessarily require a change of attitudes to take a change of policy. Sometimes times just change, and talismans should not be held to just because of what they represent - but should be evaluated in relation to what they actually do.