Boris Johnson left another toxic legacy behind for our school children

This is a story – one of many – that speaks a truth about the Johnsonian administration

On Monday, as Johnson’s government unravelled, the Department of Education quietly published results of the 2022 Sats (PA Wire)

What will be Boris Johnson’s legacy? What will be the thing for which he will best be remembered?

Will it be Brexit? Will it be his handling of the pandemic, the lockdowns and the vaccine roll-out? Or could it be the massively undignified nature of his going?

Inevitably, it is all of the above. But, for me, there is one thing that best exemplifies his unique blend of dishonest and self-centred ineptitude. I’m talking about the disgraceful manner with which he and his government handled the strategy and funding of education catch-up.

On Monday, as Johnson’s government unravelled, the Department of Education quietly published results of the 2022 Sats, the tests taken by 11-year-olds at the end of primary school. This summer was the first since 2019 they had been set.

The results – which were largely missed in the political maelstrom – were evidence of the terrible sacrifice that so many young people were forced to make when asked to stay away from schools.

In maths, the proportion of 11-year-olds meeting the “expected standard” fell from 79 per cent in 2019 to 71 per cent this year. The proportion reaching the standard in writing fell from 78 per cent to 69 per cent. Overall, just 59 per cent of pupils achieved the expected standard in reading, writing and maths, down from 65 per cent in the year before Covid.

These figures represent an educational crisis, not only for children but the country too. They will have consequences for our productivity and our national output, as these young people become the workers of the future.

It was – or so we thought – a recognition of this challenge that saw Johnson appoint Sir Kevan Collins his “catch up tzar” at the start of 2021 and tell him, with his usual bombastic bravado, that “money would be no object”. At the time, No 10 could not get enough of telling people about the scale of their ambition in this area.

None of us should have been surprised that this was essentially a pack of lies. Johnson, of course, had no intention of following up with on this commitment. He probably didn’t even know what he was promising. He probably didn’t even care.

Sir Kevan took the prime minister at his word. He developed a costed and detailed catch up plan by late Spring 2021 and took it back to Downing Street. This extensive proposal, he explained, was the best way to help as many children get back up to speed as possible – but it would need money – the kind of money the PM had promised only a few months before.

Only when he arrived in Downing Street he was told that cash for catch up wasn’t, in fact, unlimited. Indeed, there was only a pitiful 10 per cent of the money that Sir Kevan had asked for– and that just one pillar of his plan would be funded: the proposals for a national tutoring service (which has since completely unraveled).

Sir Kevan did the right thing and resigned on the spot.

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There is now no imaginable way that this week’s horrifying decline in Sats results can be reversed – nor the same pattern that is being witnessed in secondaries. Teachers will do there best, but sometimes hard work and goodwill just aren’t enough.

This is a story – one of many – that speaks a truth about the Johnsonian administration.

It is a story about blather, bravado and weakness. And, just with those now on the breadline thanks to the cost of living crisis, it is the most vulnerable in our society who will suffer the consequences of having this shallow, vain and lazy man in charge of our country and its future.