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He criticised the Government for failing to provide the £15bn of additional education funding recommended by “catch-up tsar” Sir Kevan Collins, who resigned in 2021 after saying the money being offered by ministers was insufficient. The Department for Education says it has provided £5bn to fund education recovery.

Reverend Chalke told i: “I think this year’s A-level, and indeed GCSE, students have indeed been desperately unlucky. But ‘unlucky’ is an interesting word because much of this situation has been deliberately inflicted.

“What we are seeing feeding through into next week’s results is the effects of the pandemic, in which kids from the poorest families were at a disadvantage because they were less likely to have their own bedroom, their own electronic device and parents able to work from home, and the catastrophe which was the failure to provide adequate catch-up funding after the pandemic.

“And the consequences are huge. I am sure next week’s results will show a growing disparity in attainment levels for those kids who were able to access resources and those who weren’t. The dice are loaded against a young person from a challenging background and we are absolutely going backwards in terms of closing that attainment gap.”

School leaders said teachers continue to stretch every sinew to help pupils, pointing out that many schools ensured they stayed open for exam students during recent strikes. But experts said teacher shortages are also fueling pre-Covid disparities which have been dramatically exacerbated by the pandemic. Russell Hobby, chief executive of Teach First, the charity which recruits graduates to teach in deprived areas, told i: “We’re in the midst of a serious shortage of teachers, especially in low-income communities. The tragedy is that for too many of the young people who won’t get the grades they want next week, that was predictable long before the pandemic, but Covid-19 raised the hurdles higher.”

Several experts pointed to the corrosive effects of rising levels of persistent absence – defined as missing 10 per cent or more of school days – in schools since the pandemic, reaching just under 30 per cent in English secondary schools for the last academic year and nearly 40 per cent in special schools.

Rev Chalke said such figures are symptomatic of a wider post-pandemic crisis in mental health and behaviour, both for pupils and parents. He cited the case of a student whose attendance and concentration had plummeted after their mother developed a paranoia that the internet was being used by public bodies to monitor her activities and banned her child from access to any electronic advice, discouraging the youngster from going to school.

The Oasis founder said youth workers attached to some of its schools had seen an exponential increase in incidents of children needing intervention with behavioural issues, rising in some instances from two instances per week to up to five per day.

Lee Elliot Major, professor of social mobility at Exeter University, said this year’s A-level students were facing a “perfect storm” of challenges in reaching university following the loss of learning during the pandemic – put at nearly 35 per cent of classroom time for the poorest pupils – and the subsequent cost of living crisis.

Ucas figures show that some 320,000 students have applied to university this year – slightly behind last year’s all-time record of 326,000, but significantly ahead of the pre-pandemic figure of 275,000. The admissions service said pupils from the most disadvantaged backgrounds were receiving more offers than in 2022, with 76.5 per cent receiving a place offer – compared to 76.2 per cent across all socio-economic groups.

But Professor Major said there was no escaping the conclusion that social mobility had been thrown into reverse by the pandemic and its aftermath.

He said: “We will see stark education gaps in the next few years – on these measures of life prospects, society has gone backwards. This year’s [exam] cohorts are particularly unlucky – facing a perfect storm of greater numbers applying to university, tougher grades, amid a tightening of some degree places at leading universities. The long-term damage from the pandemic is likely to be a huge backward step for educational prospects and social mobility.”

Gavin Williamson said teachers looking for ‘excuse’ not to work during pandemic
Further messages released by the investigation claim Sir Gavin complained to Mr Hancock that teachers “really do just hate work” amid ongoing rows over school closures.

The exchange took place in October 2020, by which point schools had begun gradually reopening after being shut during the first lockdown.
Exams had been cancelled at the end of summer 2020, and Sir Gavin had been forced to abandon a controversial algorithm which had been used to determine grades.
Following reports that exams would be delayed by several weeks in 2021, Mr Hancock sent a message to Sir Gavin which said: “Cracking announcement today. What a bunch of absolute arses the teaching unions are.”
Sir Gavin responded: “I know they really really do just hate work”
Mr Hancock responded to the message with two laughing emojis and a bullseye emoji.
Responding to the publication of these messages, Sir Gavin said his comments had been “about some unions and not teachers”.

“I have the utmost respect for teachers who work tirelessly to support students,” he said.

"Another good reason why they are now both out of a job" Kharma? NGW 2023