If Rishi Sunak was leading a freshly elected government brimming with energy and enjoying popular support, his plan for a radical overhaul of post-16 qualifications might stand a chance of becoming reality.

Instead, he is leading the fag-end of a Conservative government that long ago exhausted the electorate’s patience and seems highly likely to be voted out of office next year.

The chances, then, of his Advanced British Standard ever seeing the light of day - given that it would take a decade or more to come to fruition - are remote.

But let’s suppose that it does, somehow, happen. Is it a good thing or not?

Misgivings and snobbery

Many educators will have misgivings about a plan that proposes to replace qualifications as well-established and recognised as A levels.

They may also wonder why on earth the government has spent a fortune on introducing T levels only to announce plans to replace them before they have even been fully rolled out.

It may seem as though the government is making it up as it goes along.

Then there is the matter of whether this all ignores the need for much more focus at the other end of the age range - on early years education, where attainment gaps first begin and then become ever wider. Would this not be the most effective way of levelling up?

Yet there is a good principle at the heart of the ABS (yes, we have a new acronym). There has always been a snobbery about vocational qualifications.

It is the ingrained perception that academic qualifications are somehow better - even though our country needs the skills that vocational education provides.

The ABS proposes a single qualification that would embrace academic and vocational subjects and give students the freedom to take a mixture of these subjects. That would potentially provide the parity of esteem that has been so elusive.

Shamefully neglected

The greater curriculum breadth proposed by the ABS is also positive. In a 2021 report, the Education Policy Institute concluded that England “has one of the narrowest curricula in the developed world, with few other rich countries forcing learners to specialise in a small set of subjects from the age of 16”. (Ironically, the post-16 curriculum became narrower as a result of a previous government reform that devalued AS levels.)

Also welcome is the promise of more investment in post-16 education - a sector that has been shamefully neglected. As the Institute for Fiscal Studies’ Luke Sibieta says, “There is more than a bit of catching up to do”.

He continues: “Despite recent increases, spending per student aged 16-18 in colleges is still expected to be 5 per cent lower in real-terms in 2024 than in 2010, and spending per student in sixth forms is expected to be 22 per cent lower.”

Workable plan

The arguments for and against the idea of the ABS are finely balanced, then. You’ll have your own views.

But there is probably the kernel of a good idea in the proposals and if - to quote Marvell - had we but world enough and time, we might ultimately arrive at a workable plan.

But with a general election fast approaching, the government does not have that time. And most importantly of all, it does not have enough teachers either. This is the rock upon which the ABS proposal - whatever its merits - founders.

There aren’t, in fact, enough teachers for existing requirements let alone the extension to teaching envisaged by the ABS. The government’s answer is a tax-free bonus of up to £30,000 over the first five years of their career for teachers in key shortage subjects

But this is the sort of piecemeal initiative that has been a hallmark of the government’s failure to get to grips with the recruitment and retention crisis.

Inadequate solution

It is a wholly inadequate solution to a problem that requires a comprehensive strategy and investment in teaching in general - in pay, conditions and education funding.

And in the final analysis, this is where the prime minister’s announcement yesterday fails so badly. Rishi Sunak obviously does not have time to introduce the ABS. But he does have a real and immediate crisis on his watch that demands attention.

Yesterday, he had the opportunity in his conference speech to make a commitment to tackle teacher shortages - something that would benefit children and young people in the immediate future rather than in 10 years’ time.

But he blew that opportunity, deciding instead to set out a plan that, in the current circumstances, is nothing more than a pipe dream.

Geoff Barton is general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders