Stalled

You really would think that in any country with aspirations to be a modern technical democracy would get a handle on the basics of education and push it as hard as they could. Then again, many of us suspect that this is the last thing the powers that be who rule the UK actually want, they want an ignorant proletariat to do their bidding, who through ignorance don't know enough to question their betters. They want propaganda, not education to form views, save only for their own offspring and the elite education system set aside for them.
BBC.

England is being overtaken by other leading nations because progress on literacy has stalled, says chief schools inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw.
Reading standards have not improved since 2005, he told BBC Two's Newsnight.
Speaking ahead of a speech on Thursday, in which he will call for targets for 11-year-olds to be raised, he said: "Our standards should be higher."
Teaching unions say big improvements have been made in the past two decades.
They have accused Ofsted and the government of "playing fast and loose with international data".
Sir Michael, who took over the chief inspector's role in January, told Newsnight: "Standards in literacy and reading went up between 1995 and 2005.

You'd almost have to laugh at the sheer gall of the teaching unions response to Ofsted's report if it weren't so serious to the future of the country. Not a day goes by without some report in the MSM bewailing the poorly educated young people applying for jobs in the private sector and it all boils down to an education system no longer fit for purpose because it has been the tinker toy of politicians for the last 50 years, it became worse once we joined the EU because under its rules education is one of the few areas in which they don't set policy and so is one of the few places where our politicians can actually go hands on. This is why our kids are learning about equality, climate change and alternative sexuality rather than reading, writing and arithmetic, all with the connivance of the teaching unions.
Unless or until we seize back the powers we've lost to the EU and remove the parasite class root and branch from the levers of power and relegate the teaching unions (amongst others) back to their proper roll in wage and other disputes rather than managerial decisions, the situation will only get worse.
It may well be though that we've gone too far and will not be able to repair the damage.
I hope not, because it will mean a return to the dark ages in this land we love.