Labour launches petition opposing grammar schools

The Labour Party has launched a petition to oppose the government’s proposals to lift the ban on opening new grammar schools.

The petition was launched following Shadow Education Secretary Angela Rayner’s speech at the the Labour Party Conference 2016, in which she condemned Prime Minister Theresa May for her education proposals.

Rayner vowed to ‘fight with every breath’ in her body against the plans and stressed that May had ‘produced no evidence that grammar schools help social mobility’.

She told the conference: “Selection - or segregation as it should be called - entrenches division and increases inequality.

“And it’s not just me who says this. The Institute for Fiscal Studies, the Chief Inspector of Schools for Ofsted, the National Association of Head Teachers, and even those well-known socialists at The Times and The Spectator all agree. Even David Cameron called it ‘completely delusional’.”

Rayner added: “Theresa May is telling fairy tales about social mobility and opportunity. Selection is toxic. It tells a clever child they are stupid, strips a child of self-esteem and embeds inequality. Every child has potential. Every child can succeed. No child should be left out or left behind.”

The Labour Party has now officially launched its campaign against more grammar schools, inviting opponents of the plans to sign the petition, which has already received over 35,000 signatures at the time of writing