This summer’s A-level and GCSE exam grading spun “out of control” after the education secretary called for a U-turn on a policy that his office had agreed to four hours previously, Ofqual claimed today.

Speaking to the Commons Education Select Committee this morning, Ofqual chair Roger Taylor said education secretary Gavin Williamson told the regulator to take down a statement on how students could use mock exams to appeal A-level grades, despite protests from both Mr Taylor and the then chief regulator, Sally Collier.

Mr Taylor said Mr Williamson’s office had agreed to the statement on mock appeals published at 3pm on 15 August, but by 8pm that evening he said the education secretary had demanded its retraction.

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Mr Williamson had announced that students would be able to use their mock grades as part of the appeals process earlier that week, less than two days before the publication of A-level results. Today Mr Taylor revealed that Ofqual had told the secretary of state that it would be difficult to ensure “valid and trustworthy” grades through this process.

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“We were very concerned that this idea of a valid mock exam had no real credible meaning, but we consulted very rapidly and developed an approach that we felt would be consistent with awarding valid qualifications,” Mr Taylor said.

“We then agreed that with the Department for Education and to our understanding with the secretary of state’s office. We then published this on the Saturday.”

Mr Taylor said Ofqual was then contacted by Mr Williamson at 7pm or 8pm, having published its statement on appeals at 3pm.

“We were subsequently contacted by the secretary of state later that evening and were informed that this was, in fact, not, to his mind, in line with government policy,” Mr Taylor said.

He told MPs that both he and Ms Collier, Ofqual’s chief regulator, had told Mr Williamson that the statement had been made based on “sound principles” and that they could not reverse the policy.

“Nonetheless, given the secretary of state’s view, it felt appropriate to call the board together very late that evening,” Mr Taylor continued, saying that Ofqual’s board had met at around 10pm.

“I think at this stage we realised we were in a situation which was rapidly getting out of control, that there were policies being recommended and strongly advocated by the secretary of state that we felt would not be consistent with our legal duties,” he said.

Mr Taylor said that using mocks as part of appeals would have meant 85 or 90 per cent of candidates receiving de facto centre-assessed grades, with a minority unable to receive these because they had been unable to sit mock exams. 

“There was an increasing risk about the deliverability of it, so for these reasons we felt we were now in a situation that was moving rapidly out of control and it was likely that the only way out of this was to move to centre-assessed grades,” he said.

Asked by Mr Halfon whether the statement on mock appeals had been put to Mr Williamson prior to publication, Mr Taylor said it had been agreed with his office. 

The Department for Education has been contacted for comment.