That ambition is undeniably radical. In fact, it's the realisation of a long-cherished but never yet fulfilled liberal dream.

For most of human history most individuals have had their futures determined by forces beyond their control. Most men and women were hewers of wood and drawers of water-condemned to manual jobs dictated by where they grew up and who their parents were. They had no effective control over their economic lives, and thus very little control over their destinies. They never had the chance to fulfil themselves, or shape the world. They were the village Hampdens, the mute inglorious Miltons, the 99 out of 100 children who left that Merseyside school at 16 without five good GCSEs.

But education can change that. There is nothing fixed about any child's future. Deprivation need not be destiny. If the right professionals — under the right leadership, with the right level of ambition — are given the freedom to teach the subjects they love in a disciplined environment, then any child can succeed.

Over the last three years the coalition government has been setting out to prove that every child can succeed. We've been recruiting more highly qualified teachers. We've made it easier to pay good teachers more. By granting 3,000 state schools academy status we've given their headteachers the freedom that independent school heads have long enjoyed. We've given teachers the chance to build ambitious new academic institutions from scratch through our Free Schools programme. We've restored rigour and honesty to our exams by getting rid of the dumbed-down syllabuses and rigged assessment techniques that produced grade inflation. We've rewarded schools that teach the traditional subjects which help all students get into university. We've given heads and teachers new powers to keep order in the classroom. We've toughened up inspection. And we've transformed vocational qualifications so at last they're as rigorous as academic courses.

The aim has been to encourage every school to match the best. And the best state schools in this country are wonderful proof that every child — from no matter what background — can succeed.

I've stood in classrooms where half the children come from homes where English isn't spoken, where half the children are so poor they're eligible for free school meals, where their family memories are of ethnic cleansing in Kosovo or terror in Somalia, and heard those children discuss tyranny and legitimacy in Julius Caesar and Macbeth. And those children were only ten.