 As Secretary of State, Blunkett pursued conservative reforms, ready to take on the teaching unions and determined to ensure basic standards of literacy and numeracy.He was rewarded with extra funding to cut class sizes, and subsequently there has since 1997 been a massive increase in literacy and numeracy, and there are 42,000 more teachers than in 1997, with doubled spending per pupil in frontline schools (and over 100,000 teaching assistants) through to 2010.A key pillar of Blunkett's work as Education Secretary was the introduction of Sure Start, a government programme which provides services for pre-school children and their families.