Meeting of the Parliament 09 May 2017
I am not sure how much attention Mr Thomson has been paying in the past few months, but if he had read the letter of guidance from the chief inspector of education that was issued to every schoolteacher in August last year, he would have seen the chief inspector say to every teacher in the country that, out of the eight curricular areas, all teachers, no matter their discipline, have to be focused on ensuring that they make their contribution to the delivery of the primary elements of the curricular areas of literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing.
When Mr Thomson comes here and says that I have not confronted the issues, I do not know what he is talking about, because I have done that. He talks about curriculum guidance. The curriculum guidance has been sharpened in the fashion that I have said. He talks about standards. The benchmarks have been issued. The literacy and numeracy benchmarks were issued to the members of the teaching profession in August last year—to some welcome endorsement by the teaching profession, I have to say—and the other benchmarks were issued in March.
I invite Mr Thomson, when he is going to come here and scrutinise the Government, to at least catch up with the work that we have undertaken to ensure that we strengthen the delivery of Scottish education and that we respond to the challenges that are faced the length and breadth of the country.