Summary
Here’s a roundup of this afternoon’s key UK coronavirus developments:
- Public Health England is to be scrapped and replaced with a new government body, the National Institute for Health Protection (NIHP). During an announcement in Westminster on Tuesday morning, the health secretary, Matt Hancock, said the Joint Biosecurity Centre and NHS Test and Trace would also operate under the NIHP to investigate and prevent infectious diseases and external health threats.
- Leicester’s local lockdown is to be eased tomorrow, allowing nail bars, beauty salons and tattoo parlours to reopen. Hancock said current restrictions on social gatherings would remain in place, but that guidance for music venues and theatres to stay closed would be dropped.
- Oldham in Greater Manchester could be on the brink of a “catastrophic” local lockdown, its council leader has warned. The town has the highest coronavirus infection rate in England despite restrictions on social visits imposed three weeks ago. Ministers are expected to decide on Thursday whether to order the closure of the town’s bars, restaurants and gyms in the first local lockdown in England since hospitality businesses reopened last month.
- Pizza Express has confirmed plans to close 73 restaurants across the country, putting 1,100 jobs at risk. The chain has formally launched a proposal to reduce its restaurant estate and rental cost base through a Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA). This morning, Marks & Spencer announced that it would cut 7,000 jobs over the next three years following the economic fallout from the pandemic.
- A further 12 people have died after testing positive for coronavirus in the UK. The new figures, which relate to the 24 hours up to 5pm on Monday, bring the government’s total number of confirmed deaths from Covid-19 in the country to 41,381. As of 9am on Tuesday, there had also been a further 1,089 lab-confirmed cases of the virus.
- Northern Ireland’s health minister has warned that cases are on the rise. “We are in danger of slipping down a very dangerous and slippery slope,” Robin Swann told a Stormont media briefing, adding that he was more worried about the virus than he had been in some time.
- Statistical models used to award A-level and GCSE exam results before the government’s U-turn are to be reviewed by the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR). The OSR said its review would consider to what extent qualifications’ regulators across the UK developed their models in line with the principles set out in the code of practice for statistics.
That’s it from me, Amy Walker – we’ll be closing the liveblog for the day soon. I hope you have a good evening.
Updated
Pizza Express confirms plans to close 73 restaurants, with 1,100 jobs at risk
Pizza Express has confirmed plans to close 73 of its restaurants, impacting 1,100 members of staff, as part of a major business rescue plan.
The chain has formally launched a proposal to reduce its restaurant estate and rental cost base through a Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA).
UK & Ireland managing director Zoe Bowley said the impact of the coronavirus pandemic had led to some “incredibly tough decisions to safeguard Pizza Express for the long term”. She added:
Today we have confirmed that 73 of our pizzerias are proposed to close permanently.
“In most cases, there is another Pizza Express nearby, either already open or reopening soon, to welcome our customers. Our focus is on our people whose jobs are impacted and we will be doing everything we can either to redeploy them or to support them in finding roles elsewhere.
“Hard as this process is, it will protect the jobs of over 9,000 of our colleagues and provide a strong footing for Pizza Express to meet future challenges and opportunities.”
The company said it would seek approval of the CVA proposals from its creditors by way of a virtual meeting on September 4.
Updated
Amid the gloom of the ongoing pandemic, and frustration of thousands of pupils across the country following the results chaos, there is some joy around, namely among the business owners who can reopen following the easing of Leicester’s local lockdown.
Nail bars, beauty salons, tanning booths, spas, massage and tattoo parlours are among the traders that can reopen in the city from tomorrow, while guidance telling outdoor music venues and theatres to stay closed will be dropped.
Minal Parmar, owner of the Beauty Refinery in Leicester, said she was “super excited” about the easing after five months of closure.
“I’ve answered so many phone calls from clients during lockdown and I just can’t wait to be open tomorrow,” she told the PA news agency.
“Luckily, we have four treatment rooms so we can take one client at a time in each room. We have PPE (personal protective equipment) too, face masks and we’ve obviously always been using the gloves.”
The permission to reopen after months of hardship was also welcomed by Aleksandrs Cibulskis, the owner of the Route 66 tattoo studio.
“It has been difficult. I understand (it) has been nobody’s fault with the virus and everything,” he said.
“For the whole time I have had to pay for rent and bills – I was given a grant but it was not enough.
“But now we can open - it is fantastic. I’m happy, very happy.”
A Conservative MP has suggested A-level students should be compensated with reduced tuition fees following the results fiasco.
Speaking to the BBC’s PM programme, Huw Merriman said:
I’d like to see more of an offer now to some of these younger people who have been impacted with A-level grades.
“So do we need to look at their student loan rates for their first year, for example, do we need to make it up to them as far as that’s concerned?
“For those that defer do we need to make sure that they are guaranteed one of these kickstart jobs so that they can work for six months?”
Asked if he was referring to compensating students, Mr Merriman said: “I think for the cohort coming up to university, I think it’s all about making it up to them and saying ‘we understand that you have been messed around over last week’.
“I think to make it up for them we should be looking at what their student loan provision should be for the year coming into university.”
Statistical models used to award A-level and GCSE exam results to be reviewed
The Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) will carry out a review of how the statistical models designed for awarding this year’s exam results were developed.
On Tuesday, the OSR said its review would consider to what extent qualifications’ regulators across the UK developed their models in line with the principles set out in the code of practice for statistics.
It will not review the implications of the model on individual results or take any view on the most appropriate way to award grades in the absence of exams, the OSR added.
The review comes after the The Royal Statistical Society (RSS) wrote to the OSR highlighting its concerns about the models used to determine students’ grades following the cancellation of exams during the coronavirus outbreak.
The Government announced a U-turn on Monday when it said students would be able to receive grades based on their teachers’ estimates, following anger over the downgrading of thousands of A-level results.
Ed Humpherson, OSR director general for regulation, said that despite the changes to awarding grades there was “still value in a review”.
In a letter to the RSS he said the OSR planned to undertake a review focused on the process of developing the statistical models. Humpherson added:
Our review will consider the extent to which the organisations developing the models complied with the principles set out in the code of practice for statistics.
“We will not review the implications of the model on individual results or take any view on the most appropriate way to award exam grades in the absence of exams.”
The OSR said its plans to publish the findings from its review in September.
Updated
The number of people having flu jabs “needs to improve”, according to official NHS documents.
Officials are planning to vaccinate more people than ever in the coming flu season to alleviate the added pressure on the health system due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The list of people who qualify for a free flu jab on the NHS has been expanded to reduce seasonal flu pressures hitting the health service at the same time as a possible second peak of Covid-19 cases.
But documents released before the flu season begins state that “vaccine uptake for all clinical risk groups needs to improve”, while documents from soon-to-be defunct Public Health England show that for a number of years only around a half of patients aged six months to under-65 in high-risk groups have been vaccinated.
It is hoped this year that at least 75% of those deemed clinically at risk from flu will be vaccinated, while officials are aiming to get 100% of health and care staff vaccinated.
Overall, it has been anticipated 30 million people across the UK will be eligible for the flu jab this year.
Priority will be given to at-risk groups and those aged 50 to 65 will also be eligible for a free NHS jab for the first time.
Those eligible for the free flu jab this year include:
- Children aged two to 11 on 31 August 2020.
- Those deemed to be in “clinical risk groups” aged six months to under 65 years.
- Pregnant women, including those who become pregnant during flu season.
- Over 65s.
- People living in long-stay residential care homes or other long-stay care facilities.
- Carers.
- Household contacts of those on the NHS shielded patient list and immunocompromised individuals.
- All frontline heath and social care workers.
- People aged between 50 and 64 may be offered a jab under the NHS flu vaccination programme following prioritisation of other eligible groups and subject to vaccine supply.
Updated
Oldham could be on the brink of 'catastrophic' lockdown
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Ministers are expected to decide on Thursday whether to order the closure of the town’s bars, restaurants and gyms in the first local lockdown in England since hospitality businesses reopened last month.
The town has the highest coronavirus infection rate in England despite restrictions on social visits imposed three weeks ago. However, figures due to be released on Wednesday show the number of new cases is declining.
You can read the full report from my colleagues Josh Halliday and Jessica Murray here:
Updated
More from the protest in Leeds, where teachers and students are calling for the education secretary, Gavin Williamson, to resign over his handling of the A-level results debacle.
Dozens of people attended the demonstration in the city’s Millennium Square on Tuesday afternoon to voice their anger over the downgrading of thousands of results.
Speakers told the crowd that their lives had been put on hold and they no longer knew if they would be able to go to university, despite the government’s U-turn on Monday that meant students would be able to receive grades based on their teachers’ estimates.
Olivia Hullah, 18, who studied at Heckmondwike grammar school, told the crowd that she had been rejected by both of her university choices after her grades were downgraded.
“Because of the Tory government decision to use a computer algorithm, I have to put my life on hold for a year. This is a real experience and real people are dealing with these problems,” Hullah said.
James Fishwick, a 19-year-old history student at the University of Bristol who co-organised the protest, said: “Hopefully we can move forward now and make sure Gavin Williamson is resigned from his position as secretary of state for education because frankly he’s been a failure in his department, he has no authority, no credibility and he needs to leave.
“It’s a bit too late for apologies. People have had their lives upturned by this, people have been in five days of turmoil.”
Sam Kirk, a science teacher at a school in Leeds, spoke to the crowd – who held signs that read “Five days too late” and “Gavin get gone” – and encouraged the group to chant “Gav must go”.
She said: “He has ruined so many lives. It’s an absolute travesty for him to continue in his role. He’s still in post and thinks he can get away with a mealy-mouthed apology. It’s not good enough, you have to resign.”
Updated
The government’s axing of Public Health England has sparked worries in the town where the agency’s £400m public health science campus and headquarters was due to be built.
In its annual report, PHE said the campus in Harlow, Essex, due to be fully operational by 2025, would be “world-leading”.
Mark Ingall, the leader of Harlow council, told the PA news agency he would write to the health secretary, Matt Hancock, to seek reassurances that the campus would still be built and for an update on what changes there may be. Ingall said:
I think people are worried about how this might affect the town.
It’s probably the most important development in Harlow since Harlow existed. But I want to allay people’s fears.
Whilst Public Health England may not continue to exist, the work still needs to be done, the premises still need to be found and Harlow still is in the best place to deliver for that.
Updated
Oxford University’s Pembroke College is to provide places for all offer holders, following the government U-turn over A-level grades.
As a result of the decision, more than 70% of the UK student intake to the college this year will come from state schools.
In a statement, the college said: “We have taken time to carefully consider the merits of our individual offer holders and have made a decision about each one separately.
“We have respected the grades predicted by their teachers, our own assessments of their abilities and the evidence-based learning of our Fellows, as well as taking into account the effect of the uncertainty that any further appeals process will involve.”
It added that while it will try to admit all offer holders in 2020, it respected Oxford University’s advice to consider whether a small number of students will be asked to defer their place until 2021 to ensure “the health and safety of students, staff and members of the public is not compromised”.
Six other Oxford colleges – Jesus College, Keble College, New College, St Edmund Hall, Worcester College and Wadham College – have said they will honour all the places offered to UK students, irrespective of their result
- This post was amended on 19 August 2020 to include Keble College in the list of Oxford colleges that will honour all offers made.
Updated
Reports of rough sleeping in the UK rose sharply during lockdown, despite claims by the government that more than 90% of homeless people had been helped off the streets at the height of the pandemic, my colleagues Sarah Marsh and Niamh McIntyre have revealed.
While the government launched a multimillion-pound scheme to rehouse people during the coronavirus crisis, charities said the pandemic had also led to a new cohort of people being made homeless as the services and facilities that they normally relied on closed.
Many were forced on to the streets when they lost jobs as the economy closed down, with those who did not have access to public funds – such as some foreign nationals – particularly affected.
You can read their full report here:
Updated
Exam boards have now confirmed that pupils in Northern Ireland, Wales and England will receive their final GCSE grades on Thursday morning, comprising their centre-assessed grades or, if higher, the moderated grades generated by their national algorithms.
The Joint Council for Qualifications, representing the combined examination boards, said: “All schools and colleges will receive their results ... on Wednesday 19 August, allowing students to receive their final grades as usual on Thursday.”
The announcement ends the brief confusion created by the Department for Education on Monday, when it said pupils would be given their centre-assessed grades on Thursday and their “final results” the following week.
Northern Ireland health minister warns coronavirus cases on the rise
Stormont’s health minister has warned that Covid-19 cases are rising again in Northern Ireland.
“We are in danger of slipping down a very dangerous and slippery slope,” Robin Swann told a Stormont media briefing, adding that he was more worried about the virus than he had been in some time.
He said Northern Ireland successfully repelled the “nightmare scenario” in the first wave of Covid-19.
“The threat that stared us in the face back in March is still there but this is not the time to blink,” he said.
A restaurant that hosted a wedding reception of more than 100 people has been closed down for breaching Covid-19 restrictions.
Police in Blackburn – where extra restrictions are in place due to a rise in cases – broke up the party at Waheed’s Buffet and Banquet Hall on Sunday evening.
Blackburn with Darwen council said the restaurant was shut down on Monday using new powers to tackle premises that have breached restrictions.
Two premises in Blackburn have been closed down using Health Protection power after breaching Covid-19 restrictions.
— BwD Council (@blackburndarwen) August 18, 2020
Waheed’s Buffet and Banqueting Hall and Roberto’s Bar and Bistro were shut down yesterday (Monday 17 August).
Read the full update here: https://t.co/oOiXGM7gj1 pic.twitter.com/Oo1fPaZxib
Another venue, Roberto’s Bar and Bistro, was also closed by the public protection team, a council spokesman said.
Lancashire constabulary’s superintendent, Andrea Barrow, said:
We understand that times are currently difficult for businesses across the borough and we know that the majority are complying with the coronavirus guidelines.
We will continue to engage with people and explain the rules but we do want to be really clear that we will enforce them where we need to, especially around repeat offenders, significant gatherings and people who deliberately flout the regulations and put others at risk.
The closures are in place for a month but will be reviewed weekly and premises will be able to reopen if they can show they are Covid-safe, the authority said.
Updated
The Welsh government’s education minister has apologised “directly and unreservedly” for the effect the country’s controversial A-level grading system had on students.
Kirsty Williams said in a statement to the Welsh parliament’s children, young people and education committee: “For our young people, just like everyone else, the last few months have been and continue to be a stressful time.
“Many of us will know people who’ve been ill or have lost someone. I certainly do. And it’s been a time of anguish for people right across the country.
“And I am sorry that for some of our young people the results process has made that worse. That was not the intention of anyone. Not me, not Qualifications Wales, not teachers, not (exam board) WJEC.
“But it is right that I apologise directly and unreservedly to our young people.”
Updated
A further 12 people have died after testing positive for Covid-19 in the UK
A further 12 people have died in the UK after testing positive for Covid-19 as of 5pm on Monday, government figures show.
The total number of people who have died within 28 days of testing positive for the virus now stands at 41,381.
The government also said that as of 9am on Tuesday there had been a further 1,089 lab-confirmed cases of the coronavirus. Overall, a total of 320,286 cases have been confirmed.
Separate figures published by the UK’s statistics agencies show there have now been 57,000 deaths registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate.
Updated
In Leeds city centre, dozens of angry students and parents have gathered to protest against the government’s A-level results fiasco and demand the resignation of the education secretary, Gavin Williamson.
Co-organiser Martha Storey, a University of Oxford student, told Leeds Live: “If we had been born a year later, there is a high chance that our grades, lives would be completely different to what they are now. Especially saddening is the effect that this year’s results will have on students from underperforming schools.
“Undoubtedly, this policy will be extremely detrimental to the social mobility that university access schemes claim to aid. What’s worse is that Ofqual had months to plan for this, yet the appeals system is still not ready, leading to thousands of children unable to prove that they can perform better than what an algorithm predicts.”
A number of college tutors have also joined demonstrators in the city’s Millennium Square.
🎥WATCH: A parent became emotional giving a speech At the Leeds protest over the Government’s handling of A-level results. She says her daughter may still lose her place at uni despite the Government’s U turn. pic.twitter.com/Is63HR3sTg
— Vicki Smith (@VickiSmith_) August 18, 2020
Updated
Labour has called on the education secretary, Gavin Williamson, to provide urgent clarity on what GCSE results day will look like following the grading U-turn.
A press release from the Department for Education on Monday evening said schools and colleges would inform students of their GCSE centre assessment grades on Thursday, and official results will be released to students next week.
But when asked on BBC Breakfast what GCSE students will receive on Thursday, Williamson said: “Youngsters will be told whichever is their highest – whether it is that centre-assessed grade or whether that is the moderated standardised grade that has been provided by Ofqual. Certification will follow later.”
Kate Green, Labour’s shadow education secretary, said: “Only a day after the government were dragged into a screeching U-turn, we have seen fresh confusion on what will happen to young people in the days ahead.
“The repeated incompetence of the education secretary and this government are creating confusion and unease for a generation of young people and their families.
“If young people do not know all of their grades they could be concerned about losing college and apprenticeship places. This is not acceptable.”
Updated
The PA news agency has rounded up an alarming list of the UK companies that have announced job cuts this month, following the announcement by Marks & Spencer earlier that it would reduce its headcount by around 7,000 workers.
Last week, more than 4,300 major job losses were at announced at big British employers due to the economic fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic. The Office for National Statistics has said 730,000 people have been taken off payrolls since the beginning of the crisis in March.
Here are the major potential job losses that have been announced in August alone:
August 18 - Bombardier - 95
August 18 - Marks & Spencer - 7,000
August 14 - Yo! Sushi - 250
August 14 - River Island - 350
August 12 - NatWest - 550
August 11 - InterContinental Hotels - 650 worldwide
August 11 - Debenhams - 2,500
August 7 - Evening Standard - 115
August 6 - Travelex - 1,300
August 6 - Wetherspoons - 110 to 130
August 5 - M&Co - 380
August 5 - Arsenal FC - 55
August 5 - WH Smith - 1,500
August 4 - Dixons Carphone - 800
August 4 - Pizza Express - 1,100 at risk
August 3 - Hays Travel - up to 878
August 3 - DW Sports - 1,700 at risk
According to PA’s tally, 178,943 job cuts have been announced by major UK employers since March 23.
Updated
The Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) has announced it will conduct a formal review of Ofqual’s statistical model to award A-level and GCSE grades, following a complaint by the Royal Statistical Society that Ofqual’s algorithm was flawed and that it ignored offers of help.
Ed Humpherson, director general for regulation at the watchdog, said his office would examine whether Ofqual followed its code of practice for statistics in drawing up its algorithm.
“Our review will seek to highlight learning from the challenges faced through these unprecedented circumstances. We will not review the implications of the model on individual results or take any view on the most appropriate way to award exam grades in the absence of exams,” Humpherson said.
The review is expected to be published in September.
Sharon Witherspoon, the Royal Statistical Society’s vice-president for education and statistical literacy, said: “We are glad that the Office for Statistics Regulation has listened to our call for an urgent review into the process for developing the statistical models used by exam regulators.
“The lack of transparency around the process has not only caused significant distress for thousands of students, it has threatened to undermine public trust in statistics and their use. It is therefore right that the Office for Statistics Regulation looks into these issues to ensure this does not happen again.”
Updated
The UK government will pay out £180m to cover the cost of the 35m meals that have been claimed so far under its “Eat Out to Help Out” scheme.
Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs revealed the cost hours after the Treasury said it had received 48,000 claims from the 85,000 restaurants that have signed up.
The payment averages £5.14 per meal. As part of the scheme, restaurants charge customers half price – up to £10 per diner – then claim the money back from the government.
Updated
In a message to staff published by Public Health England (PHE), its chief executive, Duncan Selbie, thanked them for being the “rock stars of the health and care system”.
The most obvious next priority is to secure the right and best future for all those other responsibilities of PHE that are not about health protection and I can assure everyone that there will be more on this to follow soon.
It has been the honour and privilege of my career over 41 years to lead PHE and I want to convey my heartfelt thanks to my colleagues for the remarkable contribution each has made to protecting and improving the public’s health over our eight years together.
I have been immensely proud of what we do under intense public and political scrutiny, always with professionalism and dignity and with the values that matter the most: decency, kindness and respect.
I wish Baroness Harding as the chair of this new organisation and the transition every success, and I know everyone will be delighted to hear that Michael Brodie will be returning as the interim chief executive officer to PHE, from tomorrow pending the appointment of a new leadership team.
Updated
Hancock admitted the details of the break-up of Public Health England’s responsibilities were still being worked out.
We are going to set out in the coming weeks where the other responsibilities of Public Health England are best exercised.
Tackling obesity, improving our health by improving air quality – these sorts of issues must be embedded in government policy right across the board, in the NHS as well.
I want it so that people who go to their GP, if they have a condition of obesity then their GP will ask them about that and tackle that, that’s got to be embedded in the NHS.
I want to tackle air quality, which is essentially an environmental lead in government but has a massive impact on everybody’s health.
Updated
Hancock defends Harding appointment
The health secretary, Matt Hancock, has defended the appointment of the Tory peer Dido Harding, who is currently the head of England’s widely criticised test-and-trace system, to run the new public health agency. He has told reporters:
We need to bring together the response to the pandemic in one institution.
Baroness Harding has been the chair of NHS Improvement, worked in the NHS, as well as having excellent experience externally, where she has run very large organisations.
That combination of experience externally and experience in the NHS and then over the past several months she has been running NHS Test and Trace and building that from scratch into what is now one of the biggest testing and diagnostics organisations in the world.
So her leadership will be vital in driving this forwards.
Updated
Weir also responded to criticism that he had followed the lead of London over A-level grading, describing an “inextricable link” between Northern Ireland and Great Britain.
For our students, we have always tried to create a three-country equivalence between England, Northern Ireland and Wales.
And that is of significance both in terms of the examination boards, the results, but also because, for example, we have such a large percentage of our students go across to universities across the water.
Therefore, having some level of linkage is very important and I think that if we were seen simply to be – forgive the pun – ourselves alone on that basis and took entirely a view that deviated from everything, I think in the longer run the people who would suffer would be our students.
Updated
The Stormont education minister Peter Weir has responded in the assembly chamber to criticism of his handling of the grading of A-levels. He described the Covid-19 pandemic as having “inflicted much suffering and hardship in our society”.
Weir pointed out the A-level results last Thursday saw a rise of 1.6% in the number of A* to C grades, as well as a fall in the numbers awarded a U grade from 1.7% to 0.9%. He told MLAs:
We set out to provide a system that was fair and credible ... any system that was going to be put in will have problems with fairness.
As much as possible, it was based on well-established examination processes, including standardisation to maintain standards because it was also the case that the cohort in 2020, while they are facing a very different situation, they have got to stand in a position which enables comparisons to be made with other years.
Covid meant that there was no established process for how to achieve this so all processes had to be developed at a pace.
Alternative arrangements were put in place after careful consideration from a wide range of options put forward by CCEA [Council for the Curriculum, Examinations & Assessment] and that took account of the view of education stakeholders and experts.
These included headteachers, the education and training inspectorate and the teaching unions. Everyone recognised there was no perfect solution but the arrangements were the best available given the circumstances.
Updated
Changes to public health responsibilities would need to be supported with the “necessary funding”, the Local Government Association has said. Ian Hudspeth, the chairman of its community wellbeing board, said:
Councils have a proven track record in improving public health services over the past eight years. National policy making has an important role to play, but this cannot be a substitute for local leadership and local responsibility.
We need to establish where the core health improvement functions of any future public health system are best held, backed up by necessary funding.
We will need to reflect on how we as a country responded to coronavirus, but for now our focus needs to firmly remain on how best to prevent and manage a possible second wave later this year, as well as on future disease outbreaks.
Updated
Leicester: bars, outdoor pools and beauty salons to be allowed to reopen
Nail bars, outdoor pools and beauty salons will be allowed to reopen in Leicester from Wednesday in a relaxation of the local lockdown after a drop in Covid-19 cases, the health secretary has said.
Although current restrictions on gatherings in private homes and gardens will remain in place, guidance for music venues and theatres to stay closed will be dropped.
Making the announcement, Matt Hancock said: “My gratitude goes out to the people of Leicester who have all made sacrifices to keep the virus at bay and protect their local communities.
“The rate of infection has now dropped to a safe enough level to allow further businesses including beauty salons, nail bars and some outdoor venues to reopen in the area.
“Current restrictions on gatherings must remain in place to further bring down the rate of infection.”
Updated
The Association of School and College Leaders has demanded that education secretary Gavin Williamson hold an independent review into what it calls the “grading fiasco” to avoid similar errors.
Geoff Barton, ASCL’s general secretary, said: “This degree of transparency is necessary at a time when public confidence has been badly shaken.
“It seems to be clear that the statistical model for moderating centre-assessed grades was flawed, and that it produced many anomalous results. But how did this happen, why were the problems not foreseen, and why were ministers not on top of this?
“Most importantly, what lessons can we learn for the future? While the government plans for students to sit GCSEs and A-levels next summer, there is currently no plan B if there is widespread disruption because of coronavirus.”
Updated
A further five people who tested positive for Covid-19 have died in hospitals in England, bringing the total number of confirmed deaths in hospitals to 29,465, NHS England has said.
The patients were aged between 64 and 86, and all had known underlying health conditions.
No deaths were reported in the Midlands, north-east, Yorkshire or south-west regions.
Another two deaths were reported with no positive Covid-19 test result.
There have been no further reported deaths of people who tested positive for coronavirus in Wales. The total number of deaths in Wales since the beginning of the pandemic remains at 1,589, health officials said.
Updated
Students in Wales may face further disruption to their education next year, a Welsh government minister has warned.
Vaughan Gething said there may not be a “normal exam season” in 2021 and that he could not “look anyone in the eye and say that everything will be fine”.
Speaking during the weekly Welsh government briefing, the health minister also apologised to those affected by Wales’s controversial grading system for A-levels and GCSEs, which saw Wales follow all three other UK nations in scrapping moderation.
Like elsewhere in the UK, Welsh pupils will be awarded results on the basis of teacher assessments rather than an algorithm following an outcry from students, teachers, unions and politicians.
Gething said the education minister, Kirsty Williams – the sole Lib Dem MS in the Welsh Labour-led government – had already announced an independent review of this year’s exam fiasco.
“I’m sorry for any anxiety or stress caused to learners or their families in what has been an understandably difficult time for them and for our whole education system,” he said.
Updated
Prof Maggie Rae, president of the UK Faculty of Public Health, has said the way the announcement of the scrapping of Public Health England had been briefed to a newspaper in advance added “stress and uncertainty” to a workforce already under strain.
It was important that the new arrangements recognised the need for an “effective, well-resourced” public health system, she told PA Media.
“With Matt Hancock today officially announcing the formation of the National Institute for Health Protection, we hope that the successful aspects of PHE’s response to Covid-19 are retained and strengthened, that public health leaders will be at the centre of shaping the forthcoming reforms to the public health system and that public health will now face investment rather than the cuts of the past decade,” she added.
“Whilst the new organisation will exist to protect the public from external threats to health, it is so important that we have an effective, well-resourced, public health system which will improve health as well as protect it.
“Government needs to recognise the importance of all functions and domains of public health – not just health protection.”
Updated
If you’re eager for more on the government’s dramatic U-turn following the A-level exams fiasco, my lobby colleagues Simon Murphy and Kate Proctor have put together this handy list of all the times the government has backtracked in its response to the pandemic.
With all the policy announcements made over the past few months, it can be difficult to remember exactly what happened and when, but the list makes for some pretty eye-opening reading.
Ministers U-turned twice this month, four times in June and three times in May.
You can read the full list here:
Our North of England editor, Helen Pidd, has interviewed Greater Manchester mayor, Andy Burnham, on the lessons he learned from the 2009 swine flu pandemic and holding the government to account on its handling of the coronavirus crisis.
The government announced last week that Greater Manchester would remain subject to enhanced lockdown restrictions for a third week, and Burnham is threatening to withdraw his support unless they compensate those who cannot work – either because they are told to by contact tracers or because their workplaces are shut.
Though denied a place on the government’s emergency “Cobra” committee (unlike his London counterpart, Sadiq Khan) he has used a constant stream of media appearances, press conferences and dawn-till-dusk video calls to expose the literally fatal flaws in its centralised approach which for four key months deprived local experts of real-time infection data.
You can read more on what Burnham had to say during a stroll around Pennington Flash Country Park in Wigan here:
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Nicola Sturgeon has stressed the need to balance the harm of coronavirus with the importance of children returning to full-time learning, as she updated the media on further clusters involving school pupils and after Scotland’s largest teaching union called for more effective safety measures in classrooms.
The Scottish first minister said:
It is the case that the longer children are out of school the more damage is done to their education and wellbeing, including potentially their mental wellbeing, and the longer that goes on the more risk we face of that damage being longer term. We have to get to a position where we can have young people back in school and have, within the guidance that’s in place, as normal as possible an educational experience.”
At her daily briefing, Sturgeon said eight cases have now been identified in a cluster in Lanarkshire, including five pupils from three different schools, while one in north-east Glasgow now has 14 cases – including pupils at Bannerman high school, Ballieston, adding that the two clusters are still believed to be linked. Three pupils at separate primary schools in Paisley, Blairgowrie and Perth have also tested positive.
She emphasised that these were “community clusters with an impact on schools” rather than school-based clusters.
Reiterating her warnings about house parties and gatherings of young people outside school, she said: “The biggest risk to schools are outbreaks that start outside schools and find their way into schools. So far none of what I have reported today is transmission within schools.”
She also asked employers to be “understanding and considerate” to parents whose children were told to isolate as a result of contact tracing.
The general secretary of the Educational Institute of Scotland, Larry Flanagan, took the unusual step of writing directly to the first minister as a number of new pupil infections emerged, asking why pupils were expected to wear masks at shops at lunchtimes but not in classrooms, and calling on the government to fund the hiring of 3,500 new teachers “so that we can reduce class sizes and make possible physical distancing”.
Sturgeon said guidance on face covering was under constant review.
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Criticisms have been rolling in from experts and shadow ministers about the timing of Matt Hancock’s announcement that Public Health England is to be scrapped.
Shadow public health minister, Alex Norris, described it as “a desperate attempt to shift the blame after years of cutting public health budgets”.
He added that what was needed instead of a new body, was “an effective local test-and-trace system that delivers mass testing and case finding.”
“Matt Hancock himself was responsible for Public Health England and in setting PHE’s priorities last year - ministers didn’t even mention preparing for a pandemic.”
Richard Murray, the chief executive of the King’s Fund health thinktank, said the public body had been “found guilty without a trial”.
“It is unclear what problem [the] government are hoping to solve by carving up PHE and redistributing its responsibilities,” he added.
“Undoubtedly, there are questions to be answered about England’s handling of the Covid-19 crisis, but the middle of a pandemic is not the time to dismantle England’s public health agency.”
Meanwhile, Richard Tedder, a visiting professor in medical virology at Imperial College London, told the BBC that PHE was an “assembly of some of the wisest and most committed microbiologists and epidemiologists you could hope for anywhere”.
He also warned that the plans to merge existing laboratory staff with NHS test and trace would dismantle the “irreplaceable” expertise within PHE.
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Specialists are working on the biggest cleaning programme at the British Museum in decades after dust accumulated on artefacts during the national lockdown.
More than 30 experts have spent the last three weeks cleaning the surfaces of exhibits in order to prevent them from being damaged by dust particles.
The museum is scheduled to reopen on 27 August.
Ladders and a cherry-picker have been used to clean larger objects, including a totem pole.
Fabiana Portoni, the museum’s preventive conservator and dust expert, said the accumulation of particles on the museum’s ancient artefacts can cause long-term damage.
The major sources of dust included visitors, who could bring in dust from hair fibres or their clothes, and nearby traffic pollution, she said.
“During lockdown, all of these sources were reduced, however there was still dust present around the museum,” Portoni said.
The shortage of people flowing through the galleries and disrupting the air meant dust accumulated in places where it wouldn’t normally be expected to be found, she added.
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Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, has been highlighting the plight of students taking vocational BTec qualifications, who appear to have been overlooked in the exam debacle.
While A-level students are still reeling from the U-turns on grades and university places, many students taking level 3 BTecs, equivalent to A-levels, are still to receive their results or discover what the impact on their grades has been from the BTec exam board, Pearson.
Khan said:
Yesterday’s U-turn was welcome news for thousands of A-level and GCSE students – but we now also urgently need the government to ensure BTec students are not left behind. A high proportion of BTec students are from BAME communities and low-income families. They have already suffered immeasurably from Covid-19 and the least they deserve is to be given fair results.
“It is truly appalling that the government has tried to lay the blame for the sorry A-level debacle at the door of Ofqual – and by making universities responsible for clearing up the mess, they have only increased confusion and uncertainty as many courses have now been filled.”
Yesterday Ofqual said that for qualifications such as BTecs each awarding organisation “has been responsible for developing its own model for issuing results”, and that “in only a very few cases” have their assessed grades been through the type of statistical treatment used on A-levels.
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Veering away from the government’s scrapping of a public health body and its U-turn after the exam results fiasco briefly now. More than 35m meals have been eaten under its “eat out to help out” scheme.
New figures from the Treasury show that more than 85,000 restaurants have signed up to the scheme, while at least 35m discounted meals were served in the first two weeks of August.
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Following the government’s exclusion of BTec students from its U-turn on A-level and GCSE exam results, our community team are looking to speak to those left disappointed.
Share your experiences
We want to hear from BTec students about how they’ve been affected by their results being downgraded and delayed. Whatever your story, and wherever you’re headed next, we want to hear from you.
You can get in touch by filling in the form here. The form is encrypted and your responses are only seen by the Guardian. You can also contact us via WhatsApp by clicking here or adding the contact +44(0)7867825056.
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European officials have said “proper negotiations” on a post-Brexit treaty between the UK and European Union have barely started, as time runs out to secure a deal.
The EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier will meet his British counterpart David Frost in Brussels for a working dinner on Tuesday evening, which will be followed by two days of talks on all the main sticking points, including “fair” competition, fisheries, police and judicial co-operation.
This will be the seventh negotiating round, but EU officials are concerned that the two sides have yet to begin detailed talks on a legal text - the EU has submitted a 440-page draft treaty, while the government has published 723 pages of text over 12 documents.
“On most topics we are not in proper negotiations,” said one EU official, referring to the absence of talks on a legal document. “We are still talking about the framework. On no issue are we discussing text.”
Frost has said an agreement can be reached in September, while insisting the government will not compromise British sovereignty “over our laws, our courts, or our fishing waters”.
The Brexit transition period ends on 31 December 2020 and the EU says a legal text must be nailed down by October at the latest.
Barnier last month accused the British of not showing “engagement and readiness to find solutions respecting the EU’s fundamental principles and interests”. EU sources say that the absence of UK “engagement” raises doubts about the prospects of an autumn breakthrough. “You need incremental changes to have a big breakthrough,” said the official.
While the EU has floated a compromise on fisheries and the UK has softened its stance on dispute settlement and governance of the agreement, the two sides remain deadlocked on the crucial issue of “fair” competition.
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That’s it, Matt Hancock has put his “protect the NHS” face mask back on, marking the end of his speech.
Hancock is answering questions following his speech announcing the scrapping of Public Health England and creation of the National Institute for Health Protection.
Here’s a few more details on what the health secretary said, including his “biggest fear” that another health crisis will emerge while the country is still dealing with the coronavirus pandemic.
He told reporters at the Policy Exchange building in Westminster: “My single biggest fear is a novel flu, or another major health alert, hitting us right now in the middle of this battle against coronavirus.
“Even once this crisis has passed – and it will pass – we need a disease control infrastructure that gives us the permanent, standing capacity to respond as a nation and the ability to scale up at pace.”
He added that the NIHP would be able to solely focus on preparing for external threats such as pandemics, and that the system would learn from South Korea and Germany “where their health protection agencies have a huge, primary focus on pandemic response”.
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Hancock also said he would consult on how the improvement of public health could be embedded in the health system, noting that obesity had been linked to an increased risk from Covid-19.
“Of course the two are linked, protection and prevention, we’ve seen how conditions like obesity can increase the risk for those who have coronavirus,” he said.
“We will use this moment to consult widely on how we can embed health improvement more deeply across the board and I’ll be saying more on this over the coming weeks.
“This will in turn allow the National Institute for Health Protection to focus, focus, focus on the science and the scale needed for pandemic response.”
From today Public Health England (PHE), the Joint Biosecurity Centre (JBC) and NHS test and trace will operate under a single leadership, reporting to the Conservative peer Dido Harding, the health secretary has said.
Hancock added: “The National Institute for Health Protection will also work closely with the devolved administrations, taking on existing UK-wide responsibilities and supporting all four chief medical officers with access to the best scientific and analytical advice.
“By bringing these parts of the system together, we can get more than the sum of the parts. And the mission, that mission, is for a purpose, so we have a stronger, more joined-up response to protect people and the communities in which they live.
“It will be dedicated to the investigation and prevention of infectious diseases and external health threats, that’ll be its mission. It’s conceived amid crisis but it will help maintain vigilance for years to come.”
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Hancock announces new National Institute for Health Protection
Matt Hancock has announced the forming of a new public body, the National Institute for Health Protection (NIHP), which will replace Public Health England.
“To give ourselves the best chance of beating this virus and spotting and tackling other external health threats now and in the future, we need to bring together the science and the skill into one coherent whole,” he said.
“The National Institute for Health Protection will have a single and relentless mission: protecting people from threats to this country’s health.
“External threats like biological weapons, pandemics and, of course, infectious diseases of all kinds.”
He continued: “It will report directly to ministers and support the clinical leadership of the chief medical officers. It will be dedicated to the investigation and prevention of infectious diseases and external health threats.”
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Back to Hancock’s speech. The health secretary has started by praising the efforts of public health workers.
“You’ve been working around the clock since January. You have done exceptional work and I am so proud of the part that you have played in tacking this pandemic and winter ahead,” he said.
“The life saving work that you’re doing is more important than ever. The changes I’m announcing today are designed entirely to strengthen our response to ensure that the system works to help you do your vital work.”
Scotland’s largest teaching union has made a direct plea to Nicola Sturgeon, urging her to do more to make schools safe from the risk of coronavirus.
In an unusual move, the general secretary of the EIS, Larry Flanagan, has written directly to the first minister as a number of new pupil infections emerge: since Monday, there have been eight cases of pupils with coronavirus at six different primary and secondary schools across three NHS boards. Yesterday nearly one in four new infections were among school pupils.
After a staggered return last week, all pupils across Scotland are now back at school full-time. Yesterday, the Scottish government’s national clinical director, Jason Leitch, warned about the infection risk from older pupils attending house parties and large social gatherings with no distancing, as well as parents gathering at school gates and families failing to quarantine after returning from holidays abroad.
In his letter this morning, Flanagan asked “why the Scottish Government thinks that it is acceptable that inside schools these rules don’t apply, where up to 33 pupils may be in a closed confined area, ie, a classroom, with as many different households as there are people?”
Flanagan also called on the government to fund the hiring of 3,500 new teachers “so that we can reduce class sizes and make possible physical distancing” and provide stronger advice on face coverings: “You cannot visit a museum without one but again schools are different?”
Sturgeon is expected to address the matter in an unscheduled coronavirus briefing later this morning.
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Health secretary about to make speech on scrapping PHE
Health secretary Matt Hancock is about to begin his speech at the Policy Exchange building in Westminster. He is expected to announce plans to scrap Public Health England (PHE), following its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
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The number of staff who have tested positive for Covid-19 at a dessert factory in Nottinghamshire has risen to 72.
On 7 August, the county council announced that all staff would be tested at the Bakkavor site in Newark after 39 coronavirus cases among workers.
On Tuesday, it said 701 workers had been tested and 33 more cases had taken the total to 72, although 33 “fully fit and healthy” employees had returned to work after isolating.
Testing will continue until Wednesday to enable all 1,600 employees to be included.
Jonathan Gribbin, the director of public health at Nottinghamshire county council, said: “Bakkavor have been very cooperative and we hope that the testing of their employees will allow us to find out more about where people are acquiring the infection.
“However, we know that not all the cases in Newark are linked to Bakkavor so it is vital that people continue to follow the strict guidance to prevent the transmission of Covid-19 across the whole community.”
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That’s it from me. My colleague Amy Walker will be taking over in a moment, bringing you live coverage of Matt Hancock’s speech in which he is expected to announce the axeing of Public Health England at 11.30am, and much more besides.
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Gavin Williamson’s U-turn on exam grades excluded BTecs and other vocational courses, prompting Labour to point out that many of those who take BTecs are also hoping to go to university and are “in the same position as their A-level counterparts”.
Asked about the issue this morning, Williamson said the government was working with Pearson, the exam provider, to resolve the cases of the 2% of exams which were downgraded. He said “there wasn’t the same issue with BTecs”.
But Greg Walker, the chief executive of the MillionPlus group of universities, has called on the government to make sure that BTec students and mature learners are not “squeezed out” of higher education after the U-turn on A-level grades.
“While much of the attention is paid to A-level students, we must ensure that other learners and applicants are not forgotten,” Walker said.
“These include BTec and other applied generals students whose grades may now be delayed for a significant period to rightly ensure they will be on a par with A-level candidates.”
He added that mature learners, who usually apply to university later in the Ucas cycle, could be affected by a surge in interest from A-level pupils.
“Both the government and universities should ensure that these applicants don’t get squeezed out in these unprecedented circumstances,” he said.
Walker also called on the government to give financial investment to universities and the NHS to ensure capacity issues for student places on health programmes can be met in light of the changes.
“The government’s overarching aim of ‘stabilising the HE sector’, by ensuring that there are no shocks to the system which may threaten the sustainability of universities, must remain in place.”
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People living alone are twice as likely to test positive for Covid-19, and the vast majority of new positive cases detected appear to be asymptomatic, according to analysis from the Covid-19 infection survey from the Office for National Statistics.
The survey shows individuals in a one-person household are twice as likely to test positive for the virus, compared with individuals from a two-person household. However, there is no evidence that individuals living with three or more others are at a higher risk of testing positive than those living in two-person households.
The survey also shows just over a quarter (28%) of individuals who tested positive reported having symptoms, which suggests the majority of new cases may be asymptomatic. However, as the analysis is based on the ONS infection survey, these symptoms were self-reported as opposed to being professionally diagnosed. The analysis was based on 165 individuals who tested positive.
The survey also includes antibody tests to assess who has had the virus in the past. Minority ethnic people are twice as likely to have coronavirus antibodies. Asian or Asian British people are five times more likely than white respondents to test positive for the virus from a swab test.
People working in patient-facing healthcare or resident-facing social care roles also have a higher rate of testing for antibodies than for other adults of a working age.
Age and sex appear to have no impact on the likelihood of individuals testing positive for the virus. Over an eight-week period, there was no evidence for A difference in likelihood of males contracting the virus compared with females. Younger people were no more or less likely to have the virus than older respondents.
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New data released by consultancy firm Kantar suggests that while shoppers are returning to supermarkets, they are spending less on each trip than before. There is an upside, though, for healthy options like vitamins and herbal tea, and, er, booze.
PA reports:
Morrisons was the biggest winner among the Big Four - alongside Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Asda - in the 12 weeks to August 9. Asda saw the biggest fall in share of customers, according to Kantar.
Customers spent £9.7bn over the past four weeks, the lowest level since February, although this is higher than pre-pandemic levels with restaurants and the hospitality sector remaining significantly subdued.
But shopping trends are shifting towards healthier options, with sales of vitamins and minerals up 34%, herbal teas up by 19%, and nuts up 21%, although this was offset by alcohol sales rising 28.3% over the past four weeks.
Charlotte Scott, consumer insight director at Kantar, said: “The relaxing of rules across much of the country means shoppers are less inclined to stock up their cupboards with regular large trips. That has seen average spend drop below 25 for the first time since March. However, at 24, it is still a world away from the pre-Covid average of 19 per trip.”
She said the current average of 14 shopping trips per month per household is lower than it was last month but still up on April and May.
Ms Scott added: “The number of supermarket trips was two million lower than would have usually been expected in the week after the rule was adopted, and currently just over half of shoppers say they feel safe in stores.
Online food shopping hit another new record in the four weeks to August 9, with 13.5% of all sales now ordered online, Kantar said.
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Guardian columnist Frances Ryan argues that the exams fiasco “is simply a blown-up version of the reality we’ve long known: working-class kids work hard and too often get tossed away, while private-school families buy their way in”.
She goes on:
Just look at how the exam crisis is being discussed. The focus in much of the media has been on A* students missing out on a place at Oxbridge (perhaps in part because much of the media followed this route themselves) with barely any attention on working-class teenagers who hoped to go straight into employment or on the fact that the proportion of people awarded grade C and above fell most in deprived areas. Even the supposedly comforting claim that “exams don’t matter” is steeped in privilege. It is easy to say grades are irrelevant if you have parents with connections and a flat in London, but considerably harder if you’re at your local comp in a low-income town.
You can read her piece here.
As part of his media strategy to deal with the fallout of the government u-turn on exams, Gavin Williamson had some pictures taken. The fairly intense way in which Williamson seeks to look purposeful while holding a mug on the front of this morning’s Telegraph has drawn some comment. Our Kate Proctor points out a Newsnight clip of the moment that immortal image was captured:
Just. What. Is. Going. On.
— Kate Proctor (@Kate_M_Proctor) August 18, 2020
This is the weirdest bit of political imagery.
All credit to @BBCNewsnight for filming this excellent moment. pic.twitter.com/bmrZWmTnkk
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More from ONS on that depression data and who is most at risk:
Adults most likely to report some form of depression during the pandemic were:
— Office for National Statistics (ONS) (@ONS) August 18, 2020
▪️ aged 16 to 39
▪️ female
▪️ unable to afford an unexpected expense
▪️ disabled
➡️ https://t.co/2RnyVDbcas
Number of people with depression has nearly doubled during pandemic, ONS says
The number of adults experiencing depression has almost doubled during the coronavirus pandemic, Office for National Statistics (ONS) figures have suggested.
ONS data showed that nearly one in 10 (9.7%) British adults had some sort of depression between July 2019 and March 2020. But when the same 3,500 participants were assessed again in June, the figure had risen to 19.2% - nearly one in five.
The majority (84%) of people experiencing some sort of depression cited stress and anxiety affecting their wellbeing and 42% said their relationships had been affected.
Tim Vizard, from the ONS, said: “Nearly one in five adults were experiencing some form of depression during the pandemic, almost doubling from around one in 10 before.
“Adults who are young, female, unable to afford an unexpected expense, or disabled were the most likely to experience some form of depression during the pandemic.”
Commenting on the data, Dr Billy Boland, chair of the General Adult Faculty at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said: “The doubling in the numbers of people experiencing depressive symptoms is another warning of the looming mental health crisis and the tsunami of referrals we are expecting over the coming months.
“The government must speed-up the investment to mental health services if we are to treat the growing numbers of people living with depression and other mental illnesses.”
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8,945 deaths in week ending 7 August; 152 mention Covid-19 on death certificate
A total of 8,945 deaths were registered in England and Wales in the week ending August 7, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) - 157 fewer than the five-year average of 9,102.
This is the eighth week in a row that deaths have been below the five-year average.
Of the deaths registered in the week to 7 August, 152 mentioned Covid-19 on the death certificate – the lowest number of deaths involving Covid-19 since the week ending 20 March (103 deaths).
Just over 57,000 deaths involving Covid-19 have now been registered in the UK.
Figures published on Tuesday by the ONS show that 51,935 deaths involving Covid-19 had occurred in England and Wales up to 7 August, and had been registered by 15 August.
Figures published last week by the National Records for Scotland showed that 4,213 deaths involving Covid-19 had been registered in Scotland up to 9 August while 859 deaths had occurred in Northern Ireland up to 7 August (and had been registered up to 12 August) according to the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency.
Together, these figures mean that so far 57,007 deaths have been registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate, including suspected cases.
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Gavin Williamson was repeatedly asked this morning about the education select committee’s warning of problems with exam systems and appeals. He said there was “broad political consensus” about a standardisation model “so this wasn’t something that was just felt by the government”.
So is Williamson right about that consensus and in his implication that everyone agreed that this was the right thing to do? Here are some extracts from the education select committee report, titled ‘Getting the grades they’ve earned: Covid-19: the cancellation of exams and ‘calculated’ grades’.
It’s right to say that the committee broadly backed a standardisation model:
Given the potential risks of bias, inaccuracy and grade inflation, it is clear that standardisation will play a crucial role in ensuring fairness. We call on Ofqual to make a transparency guarantee — a commitment to publishing details of its standardisation model immediately. Ofqual should not be afraid of scrutiny or open debate over whether its model offers the fairest outcome for every pupil and provider.
But the committee also registered significant concerns over how the plans would play out in practice, noting issues which have been matters of broad concern since Thursday:
It is right that pupils should be able to appeal their grade if they believe bias or discrimination has occurred, but Ofqual has not given enough thought on how to make this route accessible to all pupils. Without support, proving bias or discrimination would be an almost impossible threshold for any pupil to evidence. Disadvantaged pupils, and those without family resources or wider support, risk being shut out of this route. Ofqual must urgently publish the evidence thresholds for proving bias and discrimination, clearly setting out what evidence will be required.
Little detail has yet been published on Ofqual’s [standardisation] model, and we agree with the Royal Statistical Society’s conclusion that “more transparency” is needed urgently.
We agree that the principles of statistical soundness and reliability must be followed, but remain concerned that schools on an upward trajectory may lose out. It is right that Ofqual has recognised that in exceptional cases there may be instances where there is “a substantive difference” between the 2020 cohort and historical cohorts, and we agree that in these cases schools and colleges should be able to make an appeal.
Given the potential risks of bias in calculated grades, it is clear that standardisation will be a crucial part of ensuring fairness. We are extremely concerned that Ofqual’s standardisation model does not appear to include any mechanism to identify whether groups such as BAME pupils, FSM eligible pupils, children looked after, and pupils with SEND have been systematically disadvantaged by calculated grades.
Ofqual must identify whether there is evidence that groups such as BAME pupils, FSM eligible pupils, children looked after, and pupils with SEND have been systematically disadvantaged by calculated grades. If this is the case, Ofqual’s standardisation model must adjust the grades of the pupils affected upwards.
We are extremely concerned that pupils will require evidence of bias or discrimination to raise a complaint about their grades. It is unrealistic and unfair to put the onus on pupils to have, or to be able to gather, evidence of bias or discrimination. Such a system also favours more affluent pupils and families with resources and knowledge of the system.
All in all, the report’s conclusions do not point to the “broad political consensus” that Williamson described. You can read the report in full here.
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Ahead of health secretary Matt Hancock’s speech later this morning at which he is expected to say that Public Health England will be axed, his Labour shadow, Jonathan Ashworth, has attacked the move as “irresponsible” and “desperate blame-shifting”.
Talking of desperate blame shifting Matt Hancock will attempt that re Public Health England - a body he is responsible for & who take direction from him.
— Jonathan Ashworth 😷 (@JonAshworth) August 18, 2020
Last year ministers outlined PHE’s priorities. They didn’t mention preparing for a pandemic...https://t.co/MneWJJE7qo
He goes on:
A structural reorganisation mid-pandemic is time consuming, energy sapping. It’s risky, indeed, irresponsible. And what an insulting way to treat hardworking staff who heard about this from a pay-walled Sunday newspaper, leaving them with questions and worries about their jobs.
PHE has a wide range of health priorities – addiction, sexual health, obesity, children’s health, anti-smoking, antimicrobial resistance and (of obvious increasing importance) key role in supporting uptake and access to vaccinations. Who will be responsible for these priorities?
We went into this pandemic with health inequalities widening and life expectancy going backwards for [the] poorest. Covid thrives on these inequalities, disproportionately impacting the poorest and BAME communities. A strong, well-funded public health sector is needed more than ever.
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Universities that fail to offer a place to students who have now met their offer after the government’s A-levels U-turn risk being sued for breach of contract, the higher education policy website Wonkhe has said.
Students who have now met their offer grades have a right to be admitted, despite university vice-chancellors saying this might not be possible.
If the rumours of some universities and/or admissions tutors just leaving up recorded messages saying “sorry, we’re full” are to be believed, to avoid a legal problem those universities are going to want to swing into action with a little more reasonable effort this morning.
The Guardian community team wants to hear from students who are encountering difficulties in getting a university place despite their results being upgraded. If that’s you, click here:
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Williamson interviews: key points
If you’re just joining us, here’s a summary of some of the main issues that arose in Gavin Williamson’s three broadcast interviews this morning:
- Williamson declined to say whether he had offered his resignation. He said that he expected to remain in post to continue the government’s “incomplete revolution” in schools.
- He said he was “incredibly sorry” that the problems with the exam system had caused young people distress.
- He sought to emphasise that others had reached the same conclusion as he did that Ofqual’s system would be more robust than that which failed in Scotland, noting that ministers in Northern Ireland and Wales took the same view. When his “cast-iron guarantee” last week that there would be no U-turn was pointed out to him he said: “We had every confidence and reassurance that there was a system that was both robust and fair, something that had broad support right across the political spectrum”.
- He struggled to answer questions about why the education select committee’s warning in July was not heeded, but said that “at every stage DfE and Ofqual have put the interests of the most disadvantaged young people at the heart of what it does”.
- He declined to say that he had confidence in the Ofqual chief, Sally Collier, but said she had worked “incredibly hard” and he would continue to work with her.
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Education Select Committee chair and Conservative MP Robert Halfon takes a pretty different view of the situation to Williamson, calling the situation with exams a “mega-mess” after he had warned of the risk that disadvantaged pupils could be negatively impacted.
Asked who is to blame for the problems in the exams system, he told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “We need to find that out. I’d like to see the minutes of everything that has gone on.
“We warned in our Education Select Committee report that was published in early July that there would be significant problems with this and it might hurt the disadvantaged.
“We urged Ofqual to widen the appeals process and publish their model, this so-called algorithm, so it could be subject to scrutiny. They refused to do this.
“I think we should see the minutes from Ofqual and what’s gone on with the Department for Education (DfE), I also think we should find out how much this has cost the taxpayer just so that we make sure that this never happens again.”
He added: “What has happened has been a mega-mess and I really feel sorry for all the pupils and students and parents across the country who’ve had so much anguish over the past week through no fault of their own...
“This has been a mega-mess and should not have happened and (Education Secretary Gavin Williamson’s) got to, I think, learn from this and just make sure these kind of things do not happen in the future.”
Updated
Williamson declines to say he has confidence in Ofqual chief
Williamson says that if he had taken charge of the situation earlier he would have faced the “exact same challenge”... of how do we expand capacity within the university sector. That’s why we’re working with the universities sector to lift student number caps and looking at how we can expand their capacity. He says that from the earliest moment when doubts were raised “in terms of taking the action to put the most robust system in place” and then trails off a bit.
Williamson says that young people are having a “tremendously difficult time” as a result of Covid. Asked if he has full confidence in the head of Ofqual, he does not answer the question directly, but says he will “continue to work with Ofqual and the head of Ofqual”. Asked if Sally Collier should stay in post he says she has worked “incredibly hard” and that he will “continue to work” with her again, but again does not answer the question directly.
Asked if he has considered his own position, he talks about an “incomplete revolution” and the need to stay in post “driving up standards” for schools. “Every bit of focus is making sure that we deliver those grades to those children... and making sure that schools return in September”. He says he’s “very excited” about delivering that. And thus Williamson’s morning of trial by interview comes to an end.
Updated
Martha Kearney points out that there was clear evidence on Thursday that there was a disparity between privileged and disadvantaged pupils. He says that “we were confident with the assurance we had got... when the evidence mounted working with Ofqual to see if there were measures that could be put in place to address this”.
Kearney repeats: Shouldn’t that have been clear on Thursday? “We saw from universities the largest number and the largest proportion of young people getting their first choice university places than we ever had before,” Williamson says.
Williamson begins his Today programme appearance with an apology. “This is something none of us wanted to see,” he says, adding that fairness was important at every stage in the process. He reiterates his point from his TV appearances that the issues became “increasingly apparent”.
Asked if Scotland should have been seen as a warning, he says it was a “common view” that “actually the robustness and strength of the model that had been developed was significantly better and fairer than what happened in Scotland. You didn’t see the same disparity” in results between young people from privileged and disadvantaged backgrounds.
Should he have accepted those assurances, he is asked? He says the government received “absolute reassurance that this was the best and fairest route forward” and again refers to a “broad consensus”.
Gavin Williamson will be on the Today programme shortly. Before we strap in for that one, let’s note a couple of other key moments expected today: at 0930, ONS will publish new data on the characteristics of people who test positive for Covid-19 in England. There will also be new analysis of coronavirus and depression in adults in Great Britain.
At 1130, Matt Hancock will make a speech on “the future of public health” in which he is expected to confirm plans to scrap Public Health England and replace it with a new body.
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Meanwhile, Marks & Spencer has announced that it will cut 7,000 jobs after its clothing and homeware business saw a 30% slump since stores reopened in mid-June, with in-stores sales down 47.9%.
You can follow the latest on those huge cuts on our business live blog.
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For some background on the issues surrounding the U-turn, take a look at our explainer from education correspondent Sally Weale, including this point from Nick Hillman, the director of the Higher Education Policy Institute:
The university admissions round usually last for months. Universities try to look at candidates as individuals and to make careful and considered judgments, just as the government has repeatedly urged them to do.
If you rip up the rules after the results are out and with only a few weeks to go before the academic year starts, it is a major challenge. Institutions will do their best by their applicants but there are always limits, internally imposed and externally imposed, on how much they can expand and that is doubly true when social distancing rules are in force.
More here.
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Williamson says he will be in his job 'over the coming year'
Williamson on BBC Breakfast is on a roll, giving many of the same answers he did on Sky. He is again confronted with the education select committee response from July and again uses the phrase “broad political consensus”.
“This wasn’t something that was just felt by the government but by all parties,” he said, and then a bit of word soup: “The action we have consistently taken working with Ofqual is to highlight the fact and the need that the issues that were highlighted by the education select committee as well as by many other different organisations, the issue to ensure that children from disadvantaged backgrounds weren’t going to be disadvantaged as a result of the standardisation systems... we had a confidence and belief and reassurance that that is what was going to happen.” But he says there were “too many children whether from a disadvantaged background or a privileged background” that had not got the grades they deserved.
He adds: “As someone who went to a comprehensive school, who went to a sixth form college, I’m not going to be sat there when the evidence is there that there are problems, action has to be taken.” He says again that he is “incredibly sorry” for the distress caused to young people.
He is asked for the second time this morning if he is going to resign. He says that there was “total consensus” by all parties that the system the government used was the right one and that he was reassured by Ofqual.
A video is played of Steph, the first member of her family to be going to university, who missed her offer of a place at Cambridge by two grades. “We’ve had to work extra hard for where we are and we still haven’t got anything out of it,” she says, her voice breaking as she speaks. Williamson says a record number of young people are going to university. He says that the government is working with the university system and has set up a taskforce “to ensure they are able to welcome as many youngsters to them as possible”. He doesn’t address Steph’s situation directly.
He says the government is working with exam operator Pearson after a delay in the results of BTECs. And he says that GCSE students will get their results this week with certification to follow later.
Asked if he offered his resignation to Boris Johnson or intends to resign, he avoids the question, then says he expects to be in his post “over the coming year”, delivering “the world’s best education system”. And that’s it.
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Williamson has already been on Sky News, with the first question: how did you so badly mislead the prime minister? He says that the government consulted “extensively and widely” and suggests there was a “broad political consensus” backing his decision. He points to a similar approach being taken in Scotland and Wales.
Asked when he first became aware of problems with the algorithm, he says it became apparent “when results were coming out” and then became clearer over the weekend. Sky’s Niall Paterson points to evidence given to a select committee in July that there were likely to be problems and says “the idea that this problem has somehow come up and bitten you in the backside is nonsense”.
Williamson replies that “at every stage DfE and Ofqual have put the interests of the most disadvantaged young people at the heart of what it does.” He says there was confidence that the system was more robust than that which prompted an earlier u-turn in Scotland.
He also notes that the government has lifted the student number cap to give universities extra capacity and points out that a larger number of students have got places at their first choice university than last year.
Paterson points out that last week Williamson offered a “cast-iron guarantee” that there would be no u-turn, and he again seeks to broaden responsibility for the crisis. “We had every confidence and reassurance that there was a system that was both robust and fair, something that had broad support right across the political spectrum,” he says. “But when it became clear that there were anomalies that weren’t going to be able to be dealt with by an appeals system... we had to take further action. The issue for me has got to always be about fairness. Every reassurance that we had had was that this was a system that delivered the maximum amount of fairness.”
He says “right across the political spectrum” for at least the third time. Paterson says “I’m just asking why you haven’t done the honourable thing and resigned”, and Williamson answers about standardisation systems and says that the actions we took made a real difference in protecting the most disadvantaged children. “As I said yesterday I’m incredibly sorry for the fact that this has caused distress... but it was still the right thing to do to make the changes that we made yesterday,” he says. “I’m very sorry for the people it’s affected.” And that’s it. Just BBC Breakfast and the Today programme to go!
Good morning, and welcome to the UK coronavirus live blog for Tuesday August 18.
If you feel like crawling back underneath the covers, consider this: at least you’re not Gavin Williamson. The education secretary has a tough broadcast round first thing having woken up to a slew of front pages covering his decision to reverse the government’s position on exam grades, and if he had any hope that his u-turn would draw a line under the affair, that has presumably been dispelled.
The Guardian’s full-width story describes the decision as “humiliating” and notes that Williamson has sought to pin the blame for the fiasco on exams watchdog Ofqual, saying that he had only become aware of the scale of the problems with the algorithm “over the Saturday and Sunday”.
The Times focuses on the “scramble for university places”. It also features a sketch on the political class’s “world-beating ineptitude” and reports that Conservative MPs suggested that Williamson should resign.
THE TIMES: Scramble for university places after exam U turn #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/QePG6LYsoH
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) August 17, 2020
The Daily Mail isn’t particularly comfortable reading for Boris Johnson, either, featuring the two politicians as Laurel and Hardy along with the headline “ANOTHER FINE MESS”.
MAIL: Another fine mess #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/UfNBrkZ5TA
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) August 17, 2020
The Daily Telegraph also notes Williamson’s attempt to shift the blame to Ofqual and trails a column by former minister William Hague warning that this could be a “poll tax moment for the Conservatives”.
TELEGRAPH: @GavinWilliamson shifts blame on to exam watchdog #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/yFw2B1seT5
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) August 17, 2020
“This is no way to run a country”, declares the Daily Mirror, quoting Labour leader Keir Starmer.
MIRROR: This is no way to run a country #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/SMPZX27jll
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) August 17, 2020
The Sun front page features unhappy words like ‘anger’, ‘balls-up’, and ‘dunces’ and concludes in the headline “F=FARCE”.
The FT, Express, i, and web-only Independent also focus on the exams story. And the Daily Star takes a robust view of Williamson’s job prospects, with a picture of him in a giant red nose, a sugestion that he couldn’t “organise a booze up in a brewery”, and the headline: “SACK THE CLOWN”.
STAR: Sack the clown #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/XAGaW2tNUF
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) August 17, 2020
All in all, then, it’s a difficult morning for the former chief whip. More on the aftermath of the exams u-turn, and much else besides, on your super soaraway liveblog today. I’m here for the early shift and you can reach me on Twitter or by email.
