In London, nearly a third of A-level candidates gained As and As. In the East Midlands and north-east, the figure was less than a quarter. Photograph: Peter Lopeman/Alamy View image in fullscreen In London, nearly a third of A-level candidates gained As and As. In the East Midlands and north-east, the figure was less than a quarter. Photograph: Peter Lopeman/Alamy A-levels Analysis Behind England’s bumper A-level results lie record levels of regional disparities Sally Weale Education correspondent Need for Burnham to tackle regional inequality could not be clearer as London becomes ‘educational outlier’
Andy Burnham has put regional inequality at the top of his agenda as prime minister, and nowhere is the need for doing so clearer than in education.
As England’s A-level results were published on Thursday morning, students across the country were pictured celebrating a bumper crop of results, with record rates of As and A*s .
Drill down into the detail, however, and the regional disparities are shocking, with the gap between London and the lowest performing areas of the country also at record levels.
Nearly a third of A-level candidates in the capital (32.7%) gained A*s and As, up six percentage points on last year.
In the East Midlands, however, less than a quarter (23.1%) secured top grades, down from 23.8% in 2025, putting it level with the north-east, which increased its share of top grades marginally from 22.9% last year.
The results reveal the gap in A and A* grades between London and the north-east has grown to an alarming 9.6 percentage points, the largest since the pandemic and significantly higher than the 2019 pre-pandemic disparity of 3.9 points.
The gap in A* grades is up from two percentage points in 2019 to 5.1 points in 2026. Experts are hoping the prime minister’s devolution plans to give regional areas the independence to adapt their approach to local conditions will help learners outside London.
Lee Elliot Major, a professor of social mobility at Exeter University, said: “Our capital has become an educational outlier while too many young people in the north-east, East Midlands and other parts of the country are growing up in very different worlds of opportunity.
“England is no longer defined by a simple north-south divide. It is increasingly a story of London pulling away from much of the country. Talent is spread evenly across the country; opportunity is not.”
The reasons for London’s runaway success are many. Tony Blair’s London Challenge started the process of transformation in the capital’s schools in 2003. Since then higher pay and cultural attractiveness have incentivised more teachers to join the capital’s schools, while ambitious migrant families have helped raise standards.
The Department for Education says its Rise teams (regional improvement for standards and excellence) are putting “a laser focus” on areas and schools where performance is weakest.
A proposal in the schools white paper to use household income to vary funding rates according to the level of disadvantage so that children with more entrenched disadvantage attract more funding has also been welcomed.
But the scale and persistence of the disparities laid bare in Thursday’s results clearly require significant intervention.
Chris Zarraga, the director of Schools North East, which represents 1,150 schools in the region, said schools in different parts of England were not operating on a level playing field.
“In the north-east, school…