Thread by @tamcohen

We saw him on Thursday promising no U-turn...

The education secretary is back on with @skynewsniall at 7:10 to talk about yesterday's decision - do tune in.

https://twitter.com/KayBurley/status/1293808581578563586

Williamson tells @SkyNews his department held an extensive consultation on the grading system in April with unions etc - and there was consensus on it and "we had every confidence that what had been developed by Ofqual would withstand scrutiny".

When did he become aware of the problems with the algorithm? Given @CommonsEd report in July and reporting of 40% downgrades over a month ago...

GW says "at every stage the DfE and Ofqual put the issue of children from disadvantaged backgrounds at the heart of what it does"

Williamson repeatedly says the system was "more robust" than in Scotland where disadvantage gap in moderated Highers results was greater - and lack of appeals.

But this is argument his team were making last week pre U-turn...

Williamson says going into results day he had "every confidence & reassurance" it was a robust system, supported by unions and the opposition.

"When it became clear there were anomalies" that no appeals system could remedy, they had to take decision in interests of "fairness".

Why should he stay in post?

GW said his concern along the way was disadvantaged pupils... and then blames the standardisation process which "threw up too many anomalies"

Analysis of the interview -

This is the report published by the Commons Education Committee on July 11 and and section on standardisation

Data suggesting 40% of results might be downgraded was reported on weeks ago by @tes

tes.com/news/exclusive…