What recent assessment he has made of educational standards in secondary schools; and if he will make a statement.

Let me take this opportunity to welcome the new schools Ministers, Mr. Vernon Coaker and Diana Johnson, the new Children's Minister, Dawn Primarolo, and the new 14 to 19 and apprenticeships Ministers, Mr. Kevin Brennan and Mr. Iain Wright. May I also thank Jim Knight, Bev Hughes and Sarah McCarthy-Fry for all that they did to improve the lives of children and young people in our country, and congratulate them on that? As a result of their efforts, standards in school have risen. In 1997, more than half of all secondary schools were below our benchmark of at least 30 per cent. of pupils getting five good GCSEs. When we launched our national challenge a year ago, that number of schools had fallen to 631. Today it is down to 440 and we are on track to meet our goal of zero by 2011. To help ensure that we do, I can tell the House that I have today approved seven new national challenge trusts to raise school standards in Birmingham, Torbay, Nottingham, Rochdale, Staffordshire, Chester and the Medway. In recent weeks, we have approved four new academies to replace national challenge schools in Bradford, Bournemouth and East Sussex.

I visited a secondary school in my constituency—Tytherington high school—last Friday and it is doing an excellent job. The Secretary of State will know that the well-known independent education foundation, Edge, recently stated in a report that one in four pupils are being failed by their secondary school and that a quarter of parents are also deeply concerned that their child is being let down and believe that the education system needs an overhaul. That is slightly different from the response that the Secretary of State has given. Is there not a problem? Will the right hon. Gentleman give the matter serious consideration, as it is an issue of concern to a lot of parents?

I repeat what I just said. In 1997, more than half of our secondary schools were below our basic benchmark. That number is now down to one in seven—from more than 1,600 to just 440 today. We have further to go, and that is why we are taking forward our national challenge reforms. I would encourage the hon. Gentleman to praise the children in Macclesfield, who have seen a 17.9 percentage point increase in their GCSE results since 1997. That is ahead of the Cheshire average. He should be congratulating pupils in his constituency on their efforts rather than running down the state school system.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that standards have improved quite dramatically in our secondary schools? If he had a priority list, would it include improving the quality of teachers—that is vital—improving transition from primary to secondary and looking again at the national curriculum?

We are always looking at that curriculum. In fact, we have made important reforms to the key stage 3 national curriculum. I am very proud of the fact that, according to Ofsted, we have the best generation of teachers that we have ever had in our country. However, there is more to do to ensure that we get more people to join the teaching profession. The transition from primary to secondary school is crucial to ensuring that children flourish in secondary school, so I was very concerned to see Sir Jim Rose's comments yesterday that the Opposition's proposals to shift testing to year 7 would set back that vital transition, to the detriment of children's learning across our country.

May I also welcome the new ministerial team and, of course, congratulate the Secretary of State on managing to keep his position in the Department? The Government used to say that they would help to improve standards in secondary schools through the Building Schools for the Future programme. Given that the Government are planning a 50 per cent. cut in real capital spending after 2011, will the Secretary of State tell us how much of that programme will survive the Government's axe?

If I remember the content of a private conversation involving the leader of the Liberal party that was overheard on an aeroplane, I think that the hon. Gentleman's job was rather more insecure than mine. As for Building Schools for the Future, I think that he has got the parties confused; it is the Opposition who are proposing a £4.5 billion cut in that programme. We are determined to ensure that we keep our school building programme moving forward. I wish the Liberals would support investment in our schools rather than choosing to cut it.

May I first congratulate my right hon. and hon. Friends on their new appointments? My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will be aware that different high schools and secondary schools with identical pupil intakes perform very differently, which in my view is overwhelmingly due to teaching methods and classroom regimes. Has he made specific comparisons and will he ensure that in future schools adopt the best forms of teaching and the best forms of classroom culture?

A very important report from Ofsted published just a few weeks ago considered the 12 top performing secondary schools in the most disadvantaged areas and showed that the vital factors were the quality of their leadership, their commitment to consistency, the quality of their teaching and the high expectations that they had of every child. The fact is that many schools in challenging circumstances are delivering brilliant results. We want to make sure that that happens everywhere, at all times. That is why we are the party that is taking forward the expansion of trusts, academies and specialisms, to make sure that the best leadership is put to work in schools right across the country.

The Secretary of State seems to have dismissed out of hand the innovative proposals from my hon. Friend Michael Gove for ascertaining the quality of children leaving primary school and entering secondary schools. Should he not listen to his friends in the National Union of Teachers, or his friends who are heads of secondary schools up and down this country? They will tell him about the need to understand the capabilities of children when they enter schools—information that standard assessment tests simply cannot provide.

It is very revealing that the NUT executive leadership should be making Conservative party policy. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that that does not happen on the Labour Benches. I have looked very closely at the arguments, and the conclusion that I have reached on the basis of the expert group report is that objective measurement of the performance of primary school pupils is vital if we are to keep raising standards. As for the Opposition's proposals, they were roundly criticised yesterday by teaching unions and experts alike because they would lead to less accountability and a poorer quality of marking, with parents being denied the information that they need to track the progress of their child. If I were Michael Gove, I would not be bowing to pressure from some unions. I would be doing the right thing by the children of our country—which is what I, unlike him, am determined to do.

On the quality of teaching, the Secretary of State was unable to tell me in a written answer what proportion of lessons in state secondary schools are taken by people who are not qualified teachers. Why is that? Does he not care who is teaching our kids?

I care very much about who is teaching our kids, which is why I am proud that, as I said earlier, we have the best generation of teachers that we have ever had. If the previous schools Minister did not provide a proper answer to my hon. Friend's question, I will make sure that the new one does so forthwith.

May I join Mr. Laws, and indeed the Secretary of State, in wishing well all those Ministers from the Department who have gone on to higher things? May I also commiserate with the right hon. Gentleman on remaining in his current post? I assure him that that is not a commentary on his Department's Aimhigher programme.

I also congratulate the Minister of State, Mr. Coaker, on being appointed Minister for schools and learners. He is a member of the NUT, and I am delighted that his union endorsed our proposals yesterday, calling them "imaginative" and in the interests of pupils. It is good to have his support, and I look forward to more of it. The Minister is also a member of the Socialist Education Association, which is committed to equality. Like me, he will be disturbed by the fact that barely 2 per cent. of pupils eligible for free school meals sit physics or chemistry GCSE, with under 4 per cent. sitting biology. Such pupils are 25 times less likely to sit any of those subjects than their wealthier peers.

While the numbers of poor children getting competitive qualifications are declining, so are standards. This will be of interest to the Secretary of State: in the latest GCSE biology paper, students are asked if we sweat through our kidneys, liver, lungs or skin. Was not the Royal Society of Chemistry right to suggest that Government changes to the science curriculum had been "a catastrophe"? Is it not true that the poorest pupils are being hit hardest?

The fact is that it is our national challenge programme and our approach to school improvement that will drive up standards in schools across the country, including in the most disadvantaged areas. It is hugely disappointing that the hon. Gentleman refuses to support the school improvement steps that we are taking. He is the shadow schools Minister, and it is a great relief that he is finally willing, for the first time in five months, to ask me a question. The actions that we are taking to drive up standards in all schools, including those in the most disadvantaged communities, are consistently opposed by the Opposition.

Actually, I asked the Secretary of State questions on "The World at One" just 90 minutes ago, and I am surprised that that experience has been wiped clean from his memory, because once again his figures and arguments were utterly discredited. Will he answer the questions that I asked, which were about the science curriculum? The people who work for the right hon. Gentleman point out that, under him, that curriculum has, I am afraid, deteriorated. Ofqual, the exams watchdog, has said that there has been a fall in the quality and rigour of science exams since 2006. Sir Peter Williams, who chaired the Government's maths reviews, has said:

"I don't think there's any doubt whatsoever that absolute A-level standards have fallen".

Sir Adrian Smith was No. 2 at the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills—remember that?—and he has said that the Government's plans for science diplomas are wrong, that they simply have not got their GCSEs and A-levels right, and that their whole approach to science is poorly thought through. Until recently, Ralph Tabberer was the man responsible for schools in the Department, but now he has blown the whistle by saying that current education policies fail to emphasise scholarship and high-quality study, and that the Secretary of State is simply going in the wrong direction.

All those experts have worked up close and personal with the Secretary of State. Are they all wrong?

I was very pleased that the hon. Gentleman was willing to go on "The World at One", and the fact that he has matched that with asking questions in the House of Commons is a real step forward.

I have written to the hon. Gentleman seven times asking for a commitment to match our September guarantee to young people in our country, and seven times there has been no reply to my letter. On the issue of science, the fact is that the number of children doing single, double and triple science exams in state schools has risen year on year in recent years. As he knows, Ofqual had some concerns about the quality of the new science exam, and they are being addressed, but the fact is that across English, maths and many of the single sciences, we are maintaining standards as take-up increases. He is wrong to spend the whole time running down the achievements of pupils in our state schools, who achieved half of the increase in three A-level passes in recent years. The fact is that we are investing and raising standards through policies that are consistently opposed by the Conservative party. The fact that he will not reply to my letters is very revealing indeed.