The Academies Bill or In which I agree with a paragraph in The Guardian

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Every now and then my colleague Huw draws my attention to writings within that evil rag, The Guardian. I am now strong enough to stomach short exposes to this kind of stuff so was quite delighted to read this today from Julian Glover:

This bill introduces no new brand of school; no extra cash; no anything, really, except the extension of what we already have, which was anyway the aim of the last government when Tony Blair promised "every school an independent school". That was before it became inconvenient for Labour to take the side of consumers over providers.

And there you have it – people like Fiona Millar are paid to argue the case for the producers of education services. For the people who produced a system where it’s a source of celebration when nearly half of Bradford’s kids get five good GCSEs.

So yes let’s have that school system run for the consumers of the service – children and their parents – rather than run for the continuation of producer interest. We surely can’t carry on with the sorry state we’ve got now.

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