Gavin Williamson refuses to say whether he has offered to resign over A-levels fiasco

Comments follow government U-turn on algorithm to standardise results

Embattled education secretary Gavin Williamson has refused to say whether he offered his resignation to Boris Johnson after the government was forced to abandon a contentious A Level and GCSE algorithm.

Following days of disarray over the publication of A Level results and anger from students who were downgraded by the standardising system, Mr Williamson again apologised for the “distress” caused to thousands.

Despite Mr Williamson being adamant just 48 hours ago he would stick with the system, the government unveiled a U-turn on Monday, as No 10 effectively admitted this year’s results were unfair and reverted to using teacher assessed grades.

Pressed three times on BBC Breakfast on Tuesday whether he had discussed departing the Department for Education (DfE) with Mr Johnson due to the fiasco, the cabinet minister refused to directly answer the question.

Mr Williamson said he had explained to the prime minister the need to move to centre assessed grades as it “was the fair system and the right system”, adding his focus was on the full return of all children back to school next month.

Quizzed again, he said: “We are focusing on delivering the grades for those children, making sure that all schools are returned and I’m absolutely determined over the coming year that I’m going to be delivering the world’s best education system.

“The improvements and reforms we’ve made over the last ten years, they need to be built on. That’s what our focus is, that’s what my focus is on and that’s what the prime minister’s focus is on”.

Ministers hope the U-turn will draw a line under the row, but a new YouGov poll found 40 per cent of the public believe Mr Williamson should resign, compared to just 21 per cent who think he should stay in post.

Conservative MP and chair of the Commons Education Select Committee Robert Halfon said the problems with the exam system should be a “massive wake-up call” for the government, adding: "I want our government to be a government of social justice, of the land of opportunity, of the workers, as the Prime Minister promised it to be.

"This has been a mega-mess and should not have happened and [Education Secretary Gavin Williamson’s] got to, I think, learn from this and just make sure these kind of things do not happen in the future."

Mr Williamson also reiterated his apology to young people for the distress caused to them by the downgrading of results. "I'm incredibly sorry for the fact that this has caused distress," he told Sky News.

"But the right thing to do was when it was clear that the system wasn't delivering what we believed, and been assured that it would do, and the fairness that we all expect it to deliver and we all had confidence and belief that it would deliver, then further action had to be taken."