GCSE exams will be scrapped and replaced with a revamped English Baccalaureate qualification from 2017.

Education Secretary Michael Gove annoucned the plans yesterday. It will be the biggest upheaval to the secondary school examination system since the introduction of GCSEs in 1986.

Gove said the new qualification would be more rigorous than GCSEs and concentrate on traditional academic subjects.

Under the proposals, the vast majority of pupils will be expected to work towards an English Baccalaureate certificate - which will be given to those who obtain top grade passes in English, maths, the sciences, foreign languages and the humanities - history or geography.

From the autumn of 2015, pupils will be taught for the new EBacc in English, maths and science.

The new exam will be sat for the first time in these subjects in the summer of 2017. There will be no coursework in English and maths but some coursework in science to take account of the importance of laboratory work.

From 2016, pupils will be taught for the new EBacc in history, geography and languages. Pupils will sit the exams in the summer of 2018. There will be no coursework for history. Field trips will still count in geography and there will be flexibility on oral exams for languages.

Gove told MPs: "Today marks the next stage in radical exam reform, to equip children for the 21st century and to allow us to compete with the best performing education nations.

"We want to ensure that modules - which encourage bite-size learning and spoon-feeding, teaching to the test and gaming of the system - go, once and for all."

There will be some pupils who will not sit the new exams. Gove said schools will be required to produce a detailed record of these pupil’s achievements in each curriculum.

He added: "We anticipate some will secure EBacc Certificates at the age of 17 or 18."

Gove’s Labour shadow has criticised the proposals.

He has claimed the changes could create a return to a two-tier system which "left thousands of children on the scrap heap at the age of 16."