Education Minister Caitriona Ruane has rejected calls for her to join cross-party talks on school transfer tests, branding them an attempt to save academic selection.
The Sinn Fein minister faced questions in the Assembly on Monday from rival parties calling on her to take part in their discussions on finding an alternative to the minister's immediate scrapping of the 11-Plus test.
But Ms Ruane said removal of the exam was long overdue and she produced a 45-year-old newspaper clipping promising 11-Plus reform by the then unionist-dominated Stormont government.
The minister said she had put transfer arrangements in place and told the Assembly there was no future for an exam she said discriminated against large numbers of children.
"I had to take action. I am the Minister of Education for all children, not just a small minority," she said.
"I have to make sure that all our children are treated with equality and with respect.
"The 11-Plus is gone. The 11-Plus is not coming back, nor is any alternative in terms of examining children, putting children through the ordeal of two, one hour tests."
She added: "There is no need for the testing of children. It does not happen in the rest of Ireland at 10 years of age, it doesn't happen in England, Scotland or Wales and it doesn't happen throughout Europe and the United States."
Opposition
The minister faced questions from the UUP and the SDLP who asked her to engage in the round table talks on education that her party is boycotting.
But Ms Ruane said the Ulster Unionists were in an election pact with the Conservative Party which opposes re-introducing academic testing in England. And she said the SDLP had effectively dropped its 40-year opposition to academic selection by allying itself to parties who supported such exams.
The Alliance's Trevor Lunn also said she should enter the non-binding talks, but the minister noted that the cross-party Education Committee had already failed to secure agreement.
Ms Ruane also said the three parties, plus the DUP, had refused to discuss options for the future of education for two years and blocked her attempts to bring them to the Executive.
"People clambering to bring back the 11-Plus or a testing alternative to the 11-Plus should consider very carefully how it affects children in working class communities, be they nationalist or republican working class communities, loyalist or unionist working class communities or newcomer children," she said.
"I will tell you how it affects them. It discriminates against them. It is not possible to test children at ten years of age without discriminating against them.
"Thankfully now we have Transfer 2010. Thankfully now the vast majority of children will move to post primary on the basis of equality, on the basis of fairness and on the basis of good international practice."
© Press Association