GRAMMAR school education will not be making a return in the Royal Borough, council leader Simon Dudley acknowledged this week.

It is only a few months since the council’s ruling Conservative members were openly discussing the possibility of some sort of selection being reintroduced into Windsor and Maidenhead, in the wake of Prime Minister Theresa May’s enthusiasm for a return to some form of grammar school system.

Grammars are extremely popular in neighbouring Slough and South Bucks with some of the best results in the country going to their students.

But on Thursday Cllr Dudley put on a brave face on the absence of any change on grammar school policy in the Queen’s speech.

He said: “It does not surprise me at all considering the mathematics of the House of Commons now.

“We are disappointed because we wanted to offer that choice in the Royal Borough to residents. But we have fantastic primary and secondary schools which are improving all the time and we are investing significantly in them.

“I don’t think anyone wants another general election soon.

“So it is a ‘no’ to grammar schools but we will carry on supporting our successful comprehensives.”

The reintroduction of selection had been fiercely opposed by the headteachers of Windsor’s two comprehensive schools - The Windsor Boys School’s Gavin Henderson and Windsor Girls School’s Gill Labrum.

News that bringing back grammar schools is now off the agenda has also delighted Canon Doctor Jeremy Hurst, a former headteacher at Desborough School in Mrs May’s Maidenhead constituency, who became the Rector of Langley.

Doctor Hurst, who lives in Bolton Avenue, Windsor, this week expressed doubts as to whether a change of policy over grammar schools would have been achievable - even if Mrs May has kept her parliamentary majority.

He said: “It would have been a very unpopular policy.

“I would have been surprised if she stuck with it anyway. Many of her colleagues did not like it.

“The academy schools here did not want any part of it.”