GCSEs will be axed and replaced by an English Baccalaureate Certificate after the Liberal Democrats dropped their opposition to the biggest exam overhaul in two decades.

Ministers said the change would deliver more rigorous testing at 16, by scrapping retakes and drastically cutting back on assessing coursework in favour of tougher, end-ofyear exams.

Crucially, earlier plans for a rigid two-tier system – bringing back CSE-style exams, for less able pupils – have been dropped after Lib Dem protests.

Education experts had warned of “CSE towns” in areas with poorer results, including across the North-East in parts of County Durham, Hartlepool , Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland, Stockton and Sunderland.

Mike McDonald, northern secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said while there was a need for a serious debate on the exam system as the Government’s argument for change appeared to be based on the “rather spurious reason” that too many pupils are succeeding.

“What is being proposed here is blatantly a two-tier system. Pupils who do not gain EBacc certificates will receive a record of achievement, which will most certainly be seen to be of far less worth by employers and colleges.”

Placing a cap on those who can gain top grades means many students will miss out on opportunities, he added.

Exams expert Professor Robert Coe, from Durham University’s Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring(CEMs) said: “Coursework and modular exams have been getting a bad name recently but there are good educational reasons for including both in assessments.

“The problems come when you combine them with a highpressure accountability system that includes league tables.”

“We need to have some discussion about how we create accountability systems that are not completely dysfunctional for learning.

“There are certainly problems with the current GCSE, and it is right to make it more challenging for the highest attainers.

Exam questions have relied too much on recall of facts, requiring regurgitation of formulaic and predictable responses rather than understanding or hard thinking.”

In a joint article Education Secretary Michael Gove and Nick Clegg, the Lib Dem leader, warned “urgent reform” was badly needed to stop English schools falling behind those abroad.

They argued GCSEs had led to a “race to the bottom” of softer courses and easier questions – leading to “grade inflation” and “teaching to the test”.

The pair wrote: “We have failed to stretch the highest achievers and left lower achievers – still overwhelmingly those from the poorest backgrounds – floundering with grades that many employers consider meaningless.

“We need new exams for students at the age of 16, qualifications that are more rigorous and more stretching for the able, but which will ensure the majority of children can flourish and achieve their full potential.”

Mr Gove revealed the new EBacc would:

  • Be introduced first for English, maths and the sciences, from September 2015 – and, probably a year later, for history, geography and foreign languages – with the first exams sat in summer 2017;
  • Require success in English, maths, science, a humanities subject and a language to pass “the full English Baccalaureate”;
  • Get rid of “bite-sized” modules, which encouraged “spoon-feeding, teaching to the test and gaming of the system”, once and for all;
  • Be sat by less able pupils at 17 or even 18, rather than 16 – after unexplained “enhanced provision”;
  • Be set by a single examination board for each subject – the winners to be decided by a ‘railway-style’ tendering competition.

Stephen Twigg, for Labour, said the shake-up would bring back a “two-tier system which left thousands of children on the scrapheap at the age of 16.

“Schools do need to change, as all children stay on in education to 18. We won’t achieve that with a return to the 1980s.”

However, Labour stepped back from a firm commitment to stop the introduction of the EBacc, if it wins the 2015 general election.

Sir Mike Tomlinson, the former chief inspector of schools, said he was generally “positive”, but questioned how subjects that could not be tested in a three-hour exam – art, dance and music – would be catered for.

Beccy Earnshaw, director of Schools North-East, which represents more than 1,300 schools in the region, said: “We call on the Government to listen fully to the views of the education profession, employers, parents and students to aim to gain cross party and cross-sector consensus on a system for the future that is recognised, trusted, and respected by all.”