The English Examining Boards: Their route from independence to government outsourcing agencies

185

runs a high risk of disrupting the examination system at a time when major
changes to A, AS and GNVQ courses are being introduced.

(Tattersall and Townsend 1997)

Their views were perhaps dismissed as predictable objections. With hindsight, one
might suggest that had more effort been made to accommodate these points,
particularly the last, later problems might have been avoided.

Despite the intervening election of May 1997 in which a Labour Government ended
18 years of Conservative control - in June the results of the consultation were
published under the name of the new Junior Minister, Baroness Blackstone. The
impulse for increased central control crossed party lines - or perhaps originated from
the civil servants within the DfEE. The outcome meant that examining boards had to
offer both academic and GNVQ qualifications if they were to continue to be
accredited as English qualifications providers.

In the space of 13 years, the examining boards had worked with SEC, SEAC, SCAA
and QCA as the education department mutated from the DES to the DfEE to the
DfES. With each change the central control tightened and the Boards were
experiencing - but not openly acknowledging - a change from autonomy to
dependency. They were perhaps preoccupied by the changes they were undergoing
within their own organisational structures. In two of the three eventual organisations,
the process of unification was underway before Guaranteeing Standards made it
obligatory. In each of the three cases the motivation and process was very particular:
there was no typical pattern.

BTEC takes over the London Board

The decade’s first overt move towards unification among the examining boards
resulted from the recognition of potential mutual benefit. It was initiated by two

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