I have been contacted by many constituents about the A-level results.

First of all, can I say how sorry I am to hear about what has happened to so many students who have been affected by the exams fiasco, including losing their university place. It must be very hard for all those involved.

It is now clear that the algorithm used to assess students’ results was seriously flawed, and that is why it produced such unfair outcomes for so many students.

When the Government finally realised this, they made some hasty last-minute changes which have now been thrown into chaos by OFQUAL’s decision to withdraw the guidance on appeals that it had only just issued.

I think the only way forward now is for the Education Secretary to adopt the system that was finally implemented in Scotland after a similar uproar there – namely to allow students, if they wish, to be given grades based the predictions of their teachers. After all, these teachers know their students best and certainly much better than a computer programme.

We are pressing ministers to take this step, and the sooner they do so the better, not least because we are about to go through the whole thing again with the publication of GCSE ‘results’.

Hilary Benn MP