Former Education Secretary David Blunkett has suggested it will take another decade before the Government's reforms raise standards in secondary schools.
Mr Blunkett said the Government had started to change education with reforms to primary school, including the literacy and numeracy strategies which raised national test results sharply during the late 1990s.
But, despite nearly a decade in power, it will take another 10 years for secondary schools to see similar improvements, he told the Teachers' TV channel.
In an interview with his successor as Education Secretary, Baroness (Estelle) Morris, Mr Blunkett said: "In 1997 we adopted the phrase standards not structures. The first policy document of the Blair government was the white paper on education, including Sure Start, literacy and numeracy.
"I believe that we did start to change the world but that it will take another decade to achieve at secondary what we achieved at primary."
Mr Blunkett also acknowledged that his project to make citizenship lessons a key part of school life had not yet succeeded. He said: "I believe it is crucial to have citizenship on the menu to prepare youngsters for modern life. I don't think we have entirely got it right yet. We need to renew our commitment to ensure citizenship is not seen as a diversion or a burden."
The plan to introduce compulsory citizenship classes was one of Mr Blunkett's key policies during his time as Education Secretary.
Last week, Ofsted warned that a quarter of schools were failing to provide adequate lessons in citizenship, which became a compulsory part of the national curriculum in 2002. Many simply did not take the subject seriously enough, inspectors said.
Citizenship lessons aim to cover topics including the workings of British democracy, the media and pupils' rights and responsibilities as citizens. Ministers have suggested that high quality citizenship lessons could be crucial to countering extremism among young people and re-engaging youth with mainstream politics.
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A spokesman for the Department for Education and Skills said: "Thousands of secondary school pupils have already benefited from the reforms and investment that this Government has made in education - Key Stage, GCSE and A-level results, international comparisons, and Ofsted reports - make this clear. Year on year standards are rising - 64% of students now leave school with the five good GCSEs they need and we are already taking forward the reforms that will ensure this is the case for all."
