The Bucks Free Press ran an article last week about the new 11+ test which was introduced in Bucks in 2013.

It stated that the Observer had acknowledged there were no figures to back up the contension by the Chairman of the Bucks Grammar Schools Association, which it reported previously, that the new test reduced the effect of coaching.

What the BFP article did not mention, and the Observer did, was that Wycombe Labour managed to obtain provisional data from Bucks County Council about the new 11+. The data shows that: - Under the new 11+ test, a child from a state primary school in Bucks had a 20 per cent chance of getting a grammar school place, while a child from a private school had a 50 per cent chance. The probability of a child from a state primary school in Bucks gaining a grammar school place decreased by nearly 4 percentage points with the introduction of the new test.

- Between 2013 and 2014, the proportion of Bucks grammar school places going to children from local state primary schools decreased from 44 per cent to 38 per cent. Despite the number of applicants from Bucks state primary schools increasing by nearly 300 in 2014, 110 fewer children from these schools won a grammar school place.

- The proportion of Bucks grammar school places going to children from out of the county increased by a massive 12 per cent, from 35 per cent to 47 per cent, between 2013 and 2014.

Wycombe Labour does not believe that children in private schools are more than twice as clever as children in state schools, or have more than twice the potential. But this is what the new Bucks 11+ exam suggests.

Wycombe Labour wants to know on what basis the grammar schools decided to bring in this new exam which favours the private schools even more.

And why has the Government put these critical educational decisions into the hands of the private sector which is not accountable to local interests – and has a vested interest in getting the better-off into their schools?

It appears corrupted and infected with failure. — Riaz Ahmed, Chairman, Wycombe Labour Party