Steiner Schools have always offered a form of education that has been defiantly outside the mainstream.

That is why they have not received state aid despite all the good work they have achieved for many youngsters.

But now, for the first time, the Brighton Steiner School is teaching GCSEs to its pupils alongside its own curriculum in a bid to make it easier to go on to higher education.

The compromise enables the school to carry on teaching children in a way that stimulates their imagination.

It could also mean that the Government may offer help, opening this form of education to many more children.

Provided the Steiner School pupils prove successful in a pilot scheme, as seems likely, the movement should flourish.