STUDENTS at Bacup and Rawtenstall Grammar School have been urged by the headmaster to 'get a life' when they leave school.

Martyn Morris told them at the speech day: "Here's what I want to tell you tonight: get a life, a real life, not a panic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger pay cheque, the larger house.

"Do you think you would care very much about these things if you blew an aneurysm one afternoon? Or found a lump in your breast?

"Get a life in which you notice things, a life in which you stop, a life in which you watch what happens, a life in which you look at the way a baby scowls with concentration when she tries to pick up something with her thumb and first finger."

Mr Morris urged the youngsters: "Get a life in which you are not alone; find people you love and who love you and remember that love is not leisure, it is work.

"Each time you look at your certificates or your degrees, remember that you are still a student, still learning how best to treasure your connection to things. Pick up a phone, send an e-mail, write a letter, kiss your mum, hug your dad. get a life in which you are generous. "Care so deeply about what is goodness that you want to spread it around."

Mr Morris said it was easy to waste our lives and so easy to exist instead of live.

Mr Morris slated the unsurpassed level of government intervention in education. Since 1997, the Department for Education and Employment had sent councils 437 pieces of guidance, 387 sets of regulations, 315 consultation papers, 143 requests for date and nine ministerial letters.

"I ask myself where is all this leading and why all this bureaucracy and red tape. I believe it is my duty to make sure we are not strangled."

Mr Morris reported a 99 per cent pass rate at GCSE grade C and above and exceptional A level results, with an almost unbelievable 96.9 per cent pass rate.