Is this harsh ?

He will keep using red ink. I keep asking him to write in black, or blue - apart from the hassle of my having to change to another colour when marking, if he does this in the exam he risks being disqualified or not marked, because these days all the answers are scanned and sent electronically to markers who may only tackle one question.

I'm not sure how I'd feel marking 700 scripts of question 4 (b) (iii).

I used to do A level ICT papers and rather relished the change of pace through the whole paper - question one was usually a warm-up - it was often "What is ICT ?", and the last question was always an essay, worth 16 marks for content and four for quality of written communication. One for a sentence, any sentence, even "I think this paper is silly". Four for writing in more perfect and better structured English than most teachers.