Young people who do not pass GCSE English and maths face ‘blockage’, Powell says

The proportion of GCSE entries awarded top grades rose on last year, figures show.

Young people who fail to score a decent pass in GCSE English and maths face a “blockage” to further study and work, the Education Secretary has said amid calls for reforms to compulsory resits in the subjects.

Hundreds of thousands of pupils across England, Wales and Northern Ireland received their GCSE grades and technical awards on Thursday – with students able to view their results in an app following a successful trial last year.

The proportion of GCSE entries awarded top grades rose on last year but the rate scoring a decent pass returned to pre-pandemic levels, according to the figures from the Joint Council for Qualifications.

The gap in results between boys and girls shrunk again to its narrowest point this century while the gap in top grades between London – the best-performing region – and the North East – the worst-performing – widened to the largest since current records began.

Concerns have flooded in about the Government’s policy of making students in England resit maths and English GCSEs after the latest data showed more students aged 17 and above took the subjects this year but got worse results.

The increase in post-16 entries is likely driven by pupils retaking the core GCSEs if they do not secure at least a grade 4 – broadly equivalent to a C grade and considered a “standard pass”.

Lucy Powell told the Press Association: “There’s got to be a better way to give young people the skills and confidence that they need to succeed, not just branding them a failure, and also allowing them to gain other qualifications that show they have a strong foundation in English and maths.

“So that’s why I want to bring in a new level one qualification so they’ve got a strong foundation in English and maths that gives them that passport to go on for further study or an apprenticeship or a training place, which at the moment they’re often finding there’s a blockage because they haven’t got the 4 in English and maths.”

She said the review into the Neets (not in education, employment or training) crisis has found pupils struggling to pass those subjects is contributing to the more than one million young people aged 16 to 24 neither working nor learning.

Ms Powell said introducing new preparatory qualifications for students before they retake English and maths will help end the cycle of demoralising resits and tackle the Neets crisis.

She said the Government is also boosting technical and vocational education so that young people have more choices.

“We’re constantly giving them a pathway and options for the future and we’re not having an education system that brands too many a failure and chucks them on the scrap heap too young,” she told PA.

PA analysis of figures by Ofqual, England’s exam regulator, suggests more than 350,000 current 16-year-olds will need to take resits next year.

The analysis indicates 178,270 16-year-olds in England did not achieve a grade 4 or above in maths this year, 2,720 more than in 2025.

In English language, it is likely that 180,570 did not achieve a grade 4 or above, 2,900 fewer than last year.

The proportion of post-16 UK entries for English this summer rose by 6.5% on last year, but the rate of scoring a decent pass decreased by 1.4 percentage points.

For maths, the proportion of entries increased by 5.8% but the rate of achieving a 4 was down 1.7 percentage points on 2025.

Sir Ian Bauckham, head of Ofqual, told PA: “If we can get more people to gain good qualifications, and we’re talking here particularly about that grade 4 threshold that is so widely recognised, then there will be more opportunities for the young people that have those qualifications.

“That will open more doors to them when they go out into the workplace.”

Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “This year’s post-16 resit results reinforce the fact that the Government policy of then force-feeding them a relentless diet of GCSE English and maths in post-16 education is simply not working.

“Tinkering at the edges of the qualification system will not solve this problem. As long as we continue to grade students in this way in these gateway subjects of English and maths we will continue to damage their future prospects.

“If the Government is serious about tackling the Neet crisis it must grasp this nettle and rethink how we assess English and maths.”

More than a fifth (22.0%) of UK entries were awarded the top grades – at least a 7 or an A grade – this year, up by 0.1 percentage points on last year, when 21.9% achieved the top grades.

This was higher than in 2019, the last year before the pandemic, when 20.8% of entries achieved the top grades.

The proportion of entries getting at least a 4 or a C grade has fallen from 67.4% in 2025 to 67.3% this year – a drop of 0.1 percentage points, and the same as in 2019.

While traditional A*-G grades are used in Northern Ireland and Wales, in England these have been replaced with a 9-1 system, where 9 is the highest.

A 4 is broadly equivalent to a C grade and a 7 is broadly equivalent to an A.

Overall entries for GCSEs have risen slightly – up 0.6% on 2025 – after dropping last year.

The overall rate for grades 1/G or above is 97.9%, which is the same as 2025 but is down on 98.3% in 2019.