THE Scottish Greens have apologised after sparking fury online over taking credit for pupils having their SQA grades withdrawn and replaced with teachers' estimates.

In a speech to Parliament today, Deputy First Minister John Swinney confirmed that he would use powers available to him under the Education Scotland Act to withdraw all downgraded results and would direct the SQA to “reissue those awards based solely on teacher, or lecturer judgement.”

With the coronavirus crisis forcing the cancellation of Scotland’s exams for the first time in 130 years, pupils’ marks were instead based on the judgments of their teachers.

However, all of those predicted marks had to be vetted by the SQA’s national system of “moderation”.

The body said this process – the detail of which was kept under wraps until results day – was put in place to maintain “standards and credibility”.

Controversially, the exams body did this in part by looking at each school’s previous history of results.

READ MORE: John Swinney withdraws all grades marked down by SQA moderation process

Before the speech Scottish Greens education spokesman Ross Greer said he welcomed Swinney’s “admission that the Scottish Government got this badly wrong”.

Swinney told MSPs: “We set out to ensure that the system was fair, we set out to ensure that it was credible, but we did not get it right for all young people. 

“Before I go any further, I want to apologise for that. And speaking directly to the young people affected by the downgrading of awards, the 75,000 pupils whose teacher estimates were higher than their final award, I want to say this, I am sorry. 

“But as sorry as I am, I know that an apology is not enough.”

The Scottish Greens took responsibility for this decison, crediting Greer.

In a now-deleted tweet, they said: "Breaking @RossGreer has secured the restoration of 124,565 grades that were unfairly downgraded by the SQA!"

The National:

The party also issues a press release to journalists with the title "Scottish Greens fix SQA grades fiasco".

After Swinney's speech, Greer said: “I warned for four months that this would happen, and that it would be unacceptable. Unfortunately, the Education Secretary and SQA refused to listen then, but I am glad that they are listening now. “The Scottish Government has agreed to implement the solutions demanded by the Greens, starting with the restoration of 124,565 grades which were lowered by the SQA’s discriminatory ‘moderation’ system. In this extraordinary year pupils’ grades should always have been based on the professional judgement of those who know them best, their teachers.

“With UCAS and other admissions bodies being informed of these changes imminently, young people whose hopes of moving on to university and college were shattered last week will now be able to move forward with the places they worked so hard to secure for themselves.

“The Priestly review also announced today is of vital importance. The unacceptable situation that arose this year can never be allowed to happen again. Listening to pupils and teachers is essential in ensuring that. Of course, if they had been listened to in the first place, as we had called for, much of this fiasco could have been avoided.

“The Scottish Greens have long made the case that high stakes exams at the end of the school year are a poor way of judging a young person’s attainment and may be a particularly bad way of judging pupils from the most disadvantaged communities. We look forward to the results of the OECD review and the opportunity to replace Scotland’s outdated assessment system with one fit for the 21st century.

“Scottish Greens were clear throughout this process that our priority was securing a solution for the tens of thousands of pupils, teachers and parents affected. We are glad to have achieved that today.”

The Scottish Greens later apologised for the tweet, saying: "Apologies for the previous wording. To clarify, the Greens presented the Government with a set of proposals to restore 124,000 grades. Our proposals were adopted in full. None of this would have been possible without the young people & teachers who fought back against the SQA."

Twitter users expressed frustration at the tweet, with Fraser Matheson calling it "bizarre" and John McLean saying the move was "spineless".

Others said the victory belongs to Scotland's young people.

Labour councillor Eva Murray said the party failed to recognise "the young people, parents and teachers who fought for [the change]."