The Times headline above is based, of course, on Professor of Bean-counting and Agricultural output, Lindsay Paterson’s selective reading of the data.
The actual news is:
Primary school literacy and numeracy improvement reaches new high.
The poverty-related attainment gaps in literacy and numeracy levels across primary schools have seen the biggest decreases since records began, official statistics show.
The gap between the proportion of primary pupils from the most and least-deprived areas achieving expected levels has narrowed by 3.4 percentage points in literacy and 3.7 percentage points in numeracy, according to the Achievement of Curriculum for Excellence Levels (ACEL) 2021/22. This marks the largest narrowing of the gap in a year since consistent records began in 2016/17.
There has also been a record increase in the proportion of primary school pupils achieving the expected levels of literacy (up 3.7 percentage points to 70.5%) and numeracy (up 3.3 percentage points to 77.9%).
https://www.gov.scot/news/record-narrowing-of-the-attainment-gap/
Some of Prof Paterson’s earlier work in talking Scottish schools down:
Talking-up Scotland 
Strange – ”Sturgeon” has averted strikes in our Health Service by talking to the union reps BUT the headlines are about doubtful Education ”failures”.
Almost as if the British media didn’t want to give the Scottish FM any credit for doing something that the UK PM couldn’t accomplish . Surely not !
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I did find it amusing at the bottom of that page to read Leerie Lindsay quoted as saying “Even without that, the goal flew in the face of decades of experience…” – Note DECADES – Translated as “Well, neither Labour nor the Tories could do it….”
Thank god the wheel had already been invented and the world was no longer believed flat before this pompous arse was born…
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O/T
https://news.stv.tv/scotland/scottish-drug-death-numbers-continue-to-fall-after-highest-level-on-record
Caught this on STV last night, though if you’d blinked you would have missed it.
21% reduction in drug deaths this year.
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The Anglo-British State has entered a full-on Imperialist mania, and has ordered all its “useful idiot” media and flunkies, to join the party.
Scotland’s colonial mejah have a tame “House-Jock” for every situation and circumstance.
Proffs Paterson, Michael et al.
They have even yolk’it that old war-donkey Baron Ffoulksakia, to the Herod opinion page to ramble on about Labours bogus “enhanced devolution”. Ffoulksakia agrees with every word Lord (by purchase) Offord writes. Blue and Red Tories in tandem, as always!
Labours bogus deal makes no sense to Georgio, but then nothing much does these days.
“Make mine a double, Alphonso, and be quick about it”!
“That’ll be a BIG double”!
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