now, with the upgrade, has forced the government she told me she should be ok, into a u—turn on a—level and gcse but it's been a horrible few days. grading ? after education secretary what's the last week gavin williamson declared been like for you? there would be no really upset on thursday, change and no u—turn. the daily express says like inconsolable upset. the prime minister told the education secretary to scrap but then i've just been stressed the algorithm for this summer s exams results — and i've been trying to get my head following the outcry. around different plans the daily mirror describes it for the future cos all along i've as another government been planning to go to uni "screeching" u—turn, and then i had to think, but note that education secretary reamins in his job. "well, maybe i'm going to have to retake the year, or have a forced gap year". according to the daily so are you happy tonight, telegraph, gavin williamson are you relieved? is blaming the exam regulator mostly. it's a bit of a shambles, really. for the exam results chaos. who do you rely on? the ‘i' describes how some students, parents and teachers these students say theyjust don't are breathing a sigh of relief understand why the politicians and regulators didn't act sooner. after days of confusion. while the daily mail suggests the story is worthy of laurel and hardy — like hannah, happy to be going to lancaster uni, but frustrated by the way a—level calling it ‘another fine mess.‘ results have been handled. i suppose the government would say, "look, we've been dealing with a pandemic, we've never had is blaming the exam regulator for the exam results chaos. the ‘i' describes how some students, to do with anything parents and teachers are breathing a sigh of relief to deal with anything after days of confusion. while the daily mail like this before, we have suggests the story is worthy listened, we have acted". of laurel and hardy — they've made it really confusing and they've made people even more stressed at a time that they're already stressed. calling it ‘another fine mess.‘ obviously, it's good for a lot of people that they will get to go to uni now, but ijust think they should have planned it much more beforehand and made sure the people weren't disappointed in the first place. so, let‘s begin. even though dylan now has the grades to get to uni, she still doesn't know if they'll take her, or when. the fact that they've done a u—turn now, i'm really glad. shall we start with the express? it shows that they're listening to us. but i wonder if that's more because they want a good reputation obviously, for the british papers, and want to be re—elected, it is all about the u—turn on the or whether they actually care about us and our futures and everything else. results. victory for common sense just four stories from four students and exams fiasco. the express, there who've had four days they'd rather forget. is nothing good for the government in any of these headlines, is there? jon kay, bbc news, bristol. no, there really isn‘t you might that's it. 00:02:39,564 --> 2147483051:38:04,497 now on bbc one, time 2147483051:38:04,497 --> 4294966103:13:29,430 for the news where you are. argue that the express headline acknowledges some common sense is finally made itself clear but the u—turn is very much the right move but it was far too long coming. it is not as of the government enough plenty of warning that this fiasco would be heading their way. but instead, they chose only after the event to reverse on this policy when he could‘ve announced the change in the rationale or we could go in the could‘ve spared students and absolutely hellish week and universities a lot of the logistical nightmare that will be coming their way as they attempt to get the stu d e nts way as they attempt to get the students that, it‘s not very good report for the government today. went to the common sense penny drop? it seems to have dropped at the very la st it seems to have dropped at the very last minute. because there have been warnings about this algorithm and the problems that it was going to create and even if it is common sense, i think if it was common sense, i think if it was common sense, it was forced on gavin williamson, the education secretary and borisjohnson williamson, the education secretary and boris johnson the williamson, the education secretary and borisjohnson the prime minister that we believe is on holiday in scotland, rather than them coming to it unforced. it built up of the weekend andl it unforced. it built up of the weekend and i think coming from the conservative back benches during the day today, it's pretty obvious that they were going to have to make the change in the very fact that there was no minister, nobody else willing to go and defend the policy this morning, i think toward his other this change was coming. shall we go to the metro. the exams u—turn with the striking exam a—level students, stop playing postcode politics because really, at its heart, that is what it came down to, didn‘t it? with this algorithm. in reading a bit more detail about today, i was struck by how skewed it really was, especially for private schools. if you are lucky enough to be in the school with three or four of the pupils, you are judged school with three or four of the pupils, you arejudged accordingly and sometimes are taken out of actually being marked down purely because you‘re in the smaller class size. absolutely. ithink because you‘re in the smaller class size. absolutely. i think lance is absolutely right that over the weekend, ministers, mps were hurt hearing from their constituents the outrage from all this in the sense that this injustice has succeeded in uniting the right and left against the proposals because notjust as it a terrible betrayal of the students, isa a terrible betrayal of the students, is a terrible betrayal of what conservatives would consider to be the core values. the idea of things like aspiration, that you don‘t judge people for their background and that individual attainment matters. in this algorithm must take into account things like previous performance by that school, so very little room for the possibility that some student might exceeded expectations. it is essentially a system that put politics above people and it was treating people like statistics and they think that when they had the absolute brush complaints of the weekend, there was a sense that pretty much at the time of great division, they succeeded in uniting the entire country against it. you would've done things differently when you are advising the labour party because these crazies blow up and sometimes governments want to dig in deep because it just governments want to dig in deep because itjust seems like a sign of wea kness because itjust seems like a sign of weakness and looking at the other u—turn, the last was the free school meals for disadvantaged children and a lot of people outside politics, it seems like a no—brainer. the status of the thinking of why they would not of move quickly on this after the scottish fiasco last week. they did have plenty of warning about it and one of the worrying signs about it is the fact that gavin williamson seems to be trying the education secretary seems to be trying to shift the blame to the regulator, rather than taking it on the chin because the public don't mind governments having to perform u—turns and the government that i worked for certainly performed u—turns and there been many other in the history of british politics and what i'm not prepared to accept and why this is much more damaging for the conservatives in previous u—turns is the impression of incompetence and this simply smacks of incompetence. and if you recognise he made a mistake you need to make a change, if it looks as if you simply do not have a grip on the issue and common sense, the first have we are talking about when it comes to common sense, it is staring you in the face, but this is a mistake. whatever they might've voted in a general election will be looking at this and ask if these guys really know what they're doing. here is the person holding a mug, that was turned into, and social media, on that shifting the blame to the watchdog, it really raises the question of who is answerable to him andi question of who is answerable to him and i would‘ve thought you could help us that eventually comes down to the secretary of state, doesn‘t it? he would be instructing them even though they are an independent body and not actually set up to look at predictions, they have been the outfit for the results themselves, having the? it's one of many examples during this pandemic where independent bodies have been given rather too much bodies, public health england is an example of this that have failed and i have many things to say about how the government is handled schools and exams the repeatable on tv. and i don‘t think the name which should be shifting the blame. that will make your, make your own headlines, there will be great. i think the government has behaved appallingly in so many ways and particularly, according exams in person we are finding that there is no substitute for learning and testing in person. they also do bears some responsibility in this because the algorithm was of their making and they had to perform some of their own embarrassing u—turns as well and they had to produce their guidance on how they did this and then they rejected it again. and there is some questions to ask of the exam regulator and the overriding feeling is the government has lost control of these bodies and the account, the lack of accountability is really obvious it is not quite clear who was meant to be doing what and who was meant to be doing what and who was responsible. do we have confidence in off court and indeed a level and gcse systems? or are we just living in this terribly different year in our history because of the pandemic that perhaps this would‘ve never materialised again. we must all hope and pray that this time next year, the health situation has changed and students are able to take exams in the normal way. it will be an absolute catastrophe on a scale that is hard to imagine. there is a real worry that the whole class of 2020, if you like to use that american term, will have been damaged in the reputation of the been damaged by this. but there was clearly a balance that to be struck between the risk of what is called grade inflation, predicting higher grades then perhaps some of the pupils are likely to achieve in the risk of that against the risk of the manifest unfairness and what is happened. and next week, we are talking about the gcse, which is the younger kids and how their exams are coming out next thursday. there's no point even publishing those because we know that it is the predicted grades that have already been given to pupils that count. i think the system, the exam system can recover from this in a normal year and hopefully, the kids have gone through it this year, won't have this around their necks for the rest of their careers. they do not deserve that. and going onto the mirror, this is no way to run a country, they have picked up on the photo caption there as he holds his mug of tea. it is a good prop, anyway. the next question is, the universities and how they‘re going to sort this out because they have given a lot of places to people who did get the grades and others of deferred and gone to their second choice and not of the greats have been upgraded, what happens and they wa nt to been upgraded, what happens and they want to go back to the first choice? if yes, many of these places are full and there‘s the double complication in regards to the social distancing requirement of the universities and there will probably be able to house more students and they would‘ve done and so there‘s this double bind that they have been in and some this could have been mitigated by this u—turn being sensible but some