NASUWT: Local authorities should retain control

Tuesday, 20, Nov 2007 12:00

Conservative plans to hand parents, charities and businesses the right to set-up and run secondary schools are a 'recipe for social segregation', the country's largest teachers' union has said.

David Cameron announced the Conservative's prospective education agenda in a speech today.

He proposed extending Labour's academies programme to make it easier for local people to use public taxes to set up independent schools free from council control.

But the plans have been condemned by NASUWT, who insist that the core principle of 'freeing schools' is misguided.

Chris Keates, general secretary of the NASUWT, argued: "Plans to basically allow anyone who wants to, to run a school, are a recipe for social segregation and chaos.

"State education is a public service which should be democratically accountable at local and national level not handed over to anyone who has a passing interest in education."

A more appropriate way for parents to engage with the education system, Ms Keates advised, would be to serve on governing bodies.

Other cornerstones of the Conservatives education policy propoposed reintroducing teaching by ability, extending synthetic phonics as a method of increasing literacy rates and improving the discipline within schools by empowering headteachers to administer tougher punishments for repeated offenders.

In an effort to dispel the idea they would be extending Labour's policy, the Conservatives cited similar programmes in the United States and Sweden as influencing blueprints.

But Ms Keates maintained that emulating practice in other countries would not necessarily be applicable to the UK education system which is founded on different principles.