Business leaders condemn exam system as GCSE pass rate falls

Britain's business leaders today launch a devastating attack on the country's "deficient" exam system, days before publication of this year's GCSE results which are likely to show a further fall in the pass rate.

The Confederation of British Industry reveals in a survey that one in three companies are so dissatisifed with school leavers' literacy and numeracy skills that they are having to give them "remedial training".

The findings come as pupils, parents and politicians are being warned to expect a slight dip in the GCSE pass rate on Thursday. By contrast, the A-level pass rate rose this year to 96% in the 22nd consecutive annual rise.

Overall, GCSE results across the board at A* to G are likely to fall if the trend of recent years continued, although there could be a small increase in performance at the top grades of A* to C, says education expert Alan Smithers of Buckingham University.

Last year the GCSE pass rate fell 0.3% to 97.6% while the proportion of A* to Cs rose 0.2% to 58.1%.

The overall pass rate was down 1% on the 1992 level and Professor Smithers said pressure on schools to enter all their pupils, regardless of whether they stood a chance of passing or not, was to blame.

The CBI says today that British industry is forced to spend billions of pounds a year to improve maths and English skills. Extracts from a survey of 500 companies reveal that 37% of firms said they were not satisfied with the basic literacy and numeracy of school leavers and show concerns that government plans to radically reform the education system will distract attention from what corporate Britain sees as the key task of improving skills.

The employers' organisation said that British business spends £23bn a year on training but warned that it is concerned "that a significant proportion of this is being spent ironing out basic problems which should have been resolved by state education".

At the same time, Prof Smithers predicted the proportion of GCSE entries awarded a minimum of a C would rise again this year, by 0.3% or 0.4%, while there would also be a slight increase in A*s and As. But the lower grades would decline again and politicians only had them selves to blame. He added: "Getting everyone to take part is something that politicians value. It tends to lose sight of how important qualifications are to people and what part that they play in their lives."

A spokesperson for the Department for Education said: "We want the same as the CBI - pupils to come out of school with the basics. And the fact is that there are more pupils now doing just that, with far more getting good GCSEs than in 1997.

We are turning round years of low performance in secondary schools, with more pupils now getting the chance to do well. But we need to go further and that's why we set up the Tomlinson inquiry. A major part of that work will be to ensure every pupil has the tools to do well at work."