Scotland's Education Secretary, Mairi McAllan, has been accused of being "in denial" over falling school standards after she indicated she would not take up an offer from former Conservative Education Secretary Lord Michael Gove to help improve Scotland's education system, citing his views on Brexit and welfare reform. She also rejected concerns from a leading academic that school attendance has effectively become "optional" in Scotland, prompting sharp criticism from Scottish Labour, which said her comments would leave parents "deeply frustrated".

The row follows the 2025 Pisa results, which showed Scottish pupils more than a year behind their English counterparts in science and maths, with England ranking in the global top ten for science, maths and reading. Speaking on the BBC's The Sunday Show, McAllan said she was "pragmatic and open-minded" about learning from education systems worldwide, citing Canada and Ireland, but was dismissive of Gove personally, calling him one of the "principal architects" of austerity, welfare reform and Brexit. Scottish Labour's education spokesperson, Katherine Sangster, said the SNP showed "no ambition" and "no curiosity" about the causes of declining standards, while McAllan insisted school attendance remained a legal obligation, not an optional matter.