I write in response to your article “Quarter of poor pupils get good school grades”, (Gazette, December 30).

What prompted me was the feigned interest in educational attainment in deprived areas from Tory shadow children’s secretary Michael Gove.

It is true there are wide differences in attainment in Essex secondary schools and some do not meet the Government’s floor target of 30 per cent with five GCSEs at grades A-C.

In fact, there are 200 schools across the country in this position; but, when the Tories were in power, there were 2,000.

Michael Gove talks of the discrepancy in educational attainment as being a tragedy and he is right, but, over the course of the last 12 years, the Government has invested heavily in education to change this.

Under the Tories, there was virtually no state provision of nursery education and support for the under five year olds was non existent. Under Labour, we have nursery education and the fantastic Sure Start scheme, which the Tories planned to scrap for a long time.

We have seen unprecedented investment in primary and secondary education under Labour because we believe in state education and know that most people cannot afford a private education at Eton, like David Cameron.

So, we will take no lectures from the Tories on education, and the Goverment will press on with its zero per cent target of schools which do not meet the floor target on attainment, as one school in this position is one too many, and 2,000 schools in this position was indeed a tragedy, which is why the country kicked the Tories out in 1997.

Julie Young
County councillor
Wivenhoe St Andrew
Mascot Square