Chart shows the percentage of pupils at each school who achieved 5 GCSEs at A*-C including English and maths.

LIVERPOOL was today celebrating a GCSE hat-trick with official performance tables showing pupils have beaten the national average for the third time.

But while education officials celebrated the "incredible" achievements they joined in the condemnation of retrospective government changes to the way GCSE results are measured – branded by one city headteacher as a "cheap shot".

Official government performance tables show the proportion of Liverpool pupils managing five Cs in any subject has increased from 73.6% to 81.8% – meaning the city is beating the national average – which went up from 70 to 75.4% – for the third consecutive year.

Liverpool pupils have also outshone their Wirral counterparts at this level.

Figures also show that the percentage of GCSe students in Liverpool achieving five Cs or above including English and maths has shot up from 44.3% to 53% – less than a percentage short of the national average which rose from 49-53.4%.

Delighted cabinet member for education Cllr Jane Corbett said the city "was on a roll" and defied the fact it was home to the "highest level of deprivation in the country."

But she accused the coalition of "moving the goal posts" after the government decided to include a new English baccalaureate measure in today’s tables.

The measure reveals the proportion of a school’s pupils who got at least a C in English, maths, science, a language and either geography or history at GCSE – with Education Secretary Michael Gove stressing it will show which schools give pupils a core academic knowledge.

Only 12.8% of Liverpool pupils hit this level – compared to 15.6% nationally.

But the move to introduce the measure retrospectively has angered Merseyside headteachers who say schools are suddenly being measured against criteria they have not prepared for.

They also point out it is unreflective of subjects taken at GCSE in recent years by pupils and the measure will only be meaningful when schools’ curriculums are adjusted to meet the new subject expectations.

The previous Labour government put the emphasis on pupils achieving English and maths.

See a full table of Liverpool's results>>>>>