EDUCATION:FROM THE time he arrived as Northern Ireland's education minister in 1976, Lord (Peter) Melchett, an Old Etonian, had as his principal objective the introduction of comprehensive education. It soon became clear, after he had issued a consultative document, that this would be much more difficult to achieve than elsewhere in the United Kingdom.
Arthur Brooke, his permanent secretary, reported in March 1977, that “on the face of it, there is not much support for wholesale reorganisation”.
He added: “One of the purposes of the consultative document was to gain more support for reorganisation by showing how it would work out in practice. This has not happened.
“Another oddity is that, if there is solid ‘working-class’ support for reorganisation, it has failed to emerge. I do not believe this could have happened in England – there would be some expression of the view of the ordinary working man. We need to think about this.”
Brooke pointed out that the grammar-school lobby opposing change was strong, representing “an extensive middle class . . . It is these people that have contributed to the bulk of submissions, either opposing reorganisation, or expressing grave apprehension about it . . . A third of the population go the grammar schools and this is a very large proportion of any society. It is also the articulate third of society. It would be politically dangerous to fail to appreciate this situation”.
“Militant action by the grammar schools” he regarded as “a serious threat – serious, because it is almost impossible to conceive a comprehensive secondary school system in Northern Ireland of which the present grammar schools do not form a part. We require them to come in to make it work”.
In another confidential memorandum to the head of the civil service in April 1978, Brooke observed that the Parents’ Union, representing grammar schools, “is now making the running against ‘comprehensivisation’. They are properly getting into their stride”.
Melchett was not to be deterred, though in November 1978 he was forced to warn secretary of state Roy Mason about “attacks on the government’s policy by the grammar school lobby”.
He explained: “We are now once again in the period of school prize distributions, when head teachers of grammar schools have their annual opportunities to speak to captive audiences, and to obtain considerable coverage in the press.”
Melchett nevertheless forged ahead and replaced the “eleven-plus” qualifying test with a revised procedure. “The revised transfer procedure adopted this year has come under predictable though not necessarily unrideable pressure”, the department of education reported confidentially in February 1979. “There has been little tangible sign of progress towards reorganisation in recent months.”
A fortnight later Melchett declared defiantly: “My answer is clear. ‘I would like to be further down the road towards reorganisation in Northern Ireland than we are now; but I am satisfied with progress since June 1977’.”
Two months later Labour was out of office and the Conservatives showed no appetite for the reorganisation of Northern Ireland schools.
Some 30 years later Catríona Ruane, Sinn Féin’s education minister in the devolved administration, has done away with the “revised transfer procedure”, but the grammar schools have substituted their own tests and their lobby appears to be as powerful as it was in 1979 in resisting change.