RISING A-Level pass rates mean the bar for access to a good career has been raised to a C-grade at least, headteachers have warned.

As expected, passes in England, Wales and Northern Ireland rose for the 22nd consecutive year - with an even greater increase in A-grades - amid the annual chorus of criticism that the gold standard exam has been dumbed down.

After years of losing ground to girls, boys fought back in 2004 but their achievement was overshadowed by further falls in entries to some so-called "hard" subjects including physics, French and German, although maths showed an increase.

There was another rise in popularity of subjects that are often dismissed as "soft" including media, film and TV studies, sociology and psychology.

And religious studies saw a surge in entries. It has become increasingly popular at GCSE level too in recent years, and the National Association of Head Teachers indicated it could be down to the clash between the West and Islamist terrorists.

Provisional statistics from the Joint Council for General Qualifications, representing all the main exam boards in the three nations, showed the A to E-grade pass rate rose 0.6% to 96%.

The proportion of entries awarded grade A climbed 0.8% to stand at 22.4%, after a 0.9% rise in 2003.

The growth rates slowed in comparison with 2003, when the A-E pass rate increased by 1.1% over the previous year.

Trend

But if the upward trends were to continue, the figures indicated that one in four entries would gain the top grade by the end of the decade.

On Tuesday, School Standards Minister David Miliband acknowledged that major reform was needed to enable universities and employers to identify the best candidates.

It would be for the Government's working party on reform of 14 to 19 education headed by former chief schools inspector Mike Tomlinson to put forward the options for change, he added.

NAHT general secretary David Hart insisted that A-Levels were not easier than they were a generation ago - schools now achieved higher standards.

But he added that A-Levels were going the way of GCSEs in the sense that universities and companies were increasingly unlikely to look at candidates with less than a C, now that 24 out of 25 entries were nodded through.

"Ds and Es are a perfectly good recognition of good teaching and hard work," he said.

"But I think that, inevitably, we are moving to a situation where As, Bs and Cs are going to be regarded as the benchmark.

"I think employers will increasingly look to As, Bs and Cs as the important benchmark and that is unfortunate because I think the work students do who get Ds and Es also needs recognition.

"It seems to be moving towards the situation of GCSEs."