Fifty years after the production of Circular 10/65, which confirmed comprehensive education as the national policy for secondary education in England and Wales, it i possible to trace the idea of comprehensive education from the 1940s to the 1960s, to understand the posiiton of the Labour Party in its development, and to assess the nature of the contribution of Circular 10/65 itself to comprehensive education in Britain. Gary McCulloch is the inaugural Brian Simon Professor of the History of Education at the founding director of the International Centre for Historical research in Education at UCL Institute of Education. Publication