Ever since David Blunkett said "I'm desperately trying to avoid the whole debate in education concentrating on the issue of selection when it should be concentrating on the raising of standards. Arguments about selection are a past agenda."(2000) our parties policy on the future of the existence of grammar schools seems to have taken a back-seat. Whilst I shall not argue that the regurgitation of this debate will be beneficial to the fortunes of the national party, but I wondered, as a new member to this site, what other members believe the next step (if there ever is one) on this issue should be.

The news that up to 50 Labour MPs are preparing to call for academic selection to be scrapped will, inevitably, re-ignite the debate about the future of England’s 164 remaining grammar schools. This will undoubtedly create a real headache for the Conservatives who, under David Cameron, have adopted a ‘no more selection’ policy for the nation’s secondary schools. The problem with this position is that it is inherently flawed. If, as Mr Cameron and David Willetts have argued in the past, selection by ability is wrong, why is it still right in some parts of England? It is surely an absurd that we have outlawed selection via the back door and but still allow it through the front door in 36 local authorities in England. If David Cameron really is a conviction politician, he could easily take the position that being opposed to selection does not automatically mean that you want grammar schools to close. In a post-selection world, there is absolutely no reason why the remaining 164 grammar schools in England (there are no grammar schools in Wales or Scotland, and they are on the way out in Northern Ireland) should not remain pretty much as they are now. They would have the same buildings, the same governors, the same headteachers and staff, the same resources, the same curriculum, uniform and largely the same funding. The only real change would be to the academic profile of the pupils attending the school.

What Cameron, Willetts and others apparently now accept is that the familiar claim that grammar schools offered an "escape from poverty" to bright working-class children otherwise denied real educational opportunity relied heavily on highlighting individual successes, without ever establishing how representative they actually were. In 2006, the proportion of children eligible for free school meals (an imperfect but commonly used indicator of social disadvantage) was much lower in selective than in non-selective schools in every one of the 36 local authorities that retain at least some grammar schools. In the 15 boroughs with around 20% or more of their pupils in grammar schools, the average percentage of children eligible for free school meals in those schools was 1.8% - compared with an English average of 18.1%. It would appear therefore that England’s remaining 164 grammars are schools for the middle classes.

The shortlist for Streatham has been announced:

Hull East has selected 7 people to go forward to its hustings meeting on 16th March.

This one's really interesting, particularly as it looks like the Midlands and Kent will host most of the big battles this time around.