Angela Rayner, Shadow Education Secretary, commenting on the Education Select Committee’s report into the evidence for grammar schools, said:

“When even the Conservative-dominated Education Selection Committee calls Theresa May’s new grammar schools an ‘unnecessary distraction’, it’s time that ministers finally sat up and took notice.

“There is a crisis in teacher recruitment, schools budgets are being cut for the first time in decades and hundreds of thousands of pupils are in super-sized classes. The Tories should be keeping their pledge to protect school funding rather than pressing ahead with this policy which will only make things worse for the majority of children.”

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