GCSE candidates work hard for their grades, but hard work is not everything, and the fact is that English and English Literature are not the examinations they were. As I write, I have to hand the 1960 Cambridge GCE exams in both subjects - long-serving teachers will have sat them or similar - and the difference in standards is plain.

The first of the two language exams, the essay paper, lasts 90 minutes, and candidates choosing “composition” have to spend the whole of that time on a single topic such as “There is no virtue like necessity”, “The achievements of women in business and public life” or “Echoes”.

Alternatively, candidates may elect to write two authoritative 45-minute essays expl-aining, for example, the importance of an astronomer or geologist; telling someone from memory how to use a railway timetable; or saying how they would organise an orchestral society in their school.

The second language paper, also 90 minutes long, contains a passage of 344 words to be summarised in 125 words; putting indirect speech into direct speech and vice versa; clause analysis; a test of parts of speech; and two word-replacement exercises.

One of these asks for exact equivalents for words selected by the examiner from a passage given in full. The other asks for the rewriting of a set of sentences, with accurate substitutions made for words and phrases underlined, for example, “There is no reason why objects of utilitarian value should not also delight the eye” or “His taciturn disposition made him a wet blanket at all social functions”.

The closed-book literature examination (two hours 40 minutes) contains its own challenges, notably Chaucer’s The Nun’s Priest’s Tale in Middle English and G K Chesterton’s Essays. Chaucer has long since been removed to A-level, where “annotated” open-book examining has allowed candidates to use their line-by-line modern English translations; while essays, demanding because of their variety of interest and argument, seldom feature anywhere these days.

Now, change does not exclude overlaps, nor is it always for the worse. Nevertheless, an informative 90-minute essay on a single surprise topic is a major expectation in terms of vocabulary, phrasing, structuring and intellectual stamina; summary (as distinct from paraphrase or gist) is intrinsically more exacting than the directed writing which has replaced it; direct and indirect speech tests presume a thoroughness wholly lacking in today’s broad-brush SPAG (Spelling, Punctuation And Grammar) expectations; and clause analysis supposes an awareness of linguistic organisation well beyond sensitivity to language in use.

In short, compared with past expectations, the range of skills required at 16-plus has been reduced; those skills that remain are not exposed to the stringency of discrete testing; and memorising is no longer treated as a discipline.

Bear in mind, too, that exams express only part of the learning that precedes them. In 1960, for example, that meant five solid years of dedicated efficiency-raising, unrivalled as yet by the national curriculum and its ways.

That implies of course that in modern times a lot of eager minds have effectively been deprived of the best possible education in English. But the tide is turning. The drills-and-skills literacy strategy now reaching key stage 3 is reinstituting a policy of maximum competence in all the arts of English and ASA2 English includes closed-book exams.

So, conceivably, English at 16-plus will eventually return to past excellence. That will entail a drastic revision of tiering. But it will also make talk about standards meaningful again.

Dr Colin Butler is senior English master at Borden Grammar School, Sittingbourne, Kent