UK coronavirus live: Gavin Williamson says he will remain in post 'over the coming year' despite exams fiasco

Education secretary tries to blame exams regulator Ofqual over fiasco while affected students face scramble for university placesCoronavirus – latest updatesSee all our coronavirus coverage 8.22am BST 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 Collyer 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. 8.16am BST 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. Continue reading... https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2020/aug/18/uk-coronavirus-live-gavin-williamson-criticised-over-exam-results-u-turn #uk_news #gavin_williamson #exams #politics