I was glad to see the Prime Minister and the Education Secretary doing so recently – particularly now that Rayner is clear she will scrap the programme.
Ofsted has judged us “outstanding.” Six years ago it found us “inadequate”. One big achievement is that we are now relying much less on agency staff.
It is funded at a lower level than schools, and yet is expected to put right much that has gone wrong. Technical courses need higher esteem.
Despite our budget being cut, we have achieved bold reforms with libraries, children’s services, broadband roll out and business rates retention. We are open for business.
Where children are scared to go to school, their parents are being threatened with truancy action and given the option to home educate.
The perpetrators of school violence and disruption inflict more harm on the education of other pupils, and to the morale of teachers, than they do on themselves.
Conservative policies to date have done little to improve the situation, and have sometimes made it worse. These bureaucratic impositions must be lifted.
Previously the parks were neglected and the roads full of potholes. The Conservatives have started to turn the borough around.
Free schools and academies have found that setting improves standards. It’s time to stop giving huge public funds to academics who disregard this evidence.
As Labour councils around us abolish libraries, we’re building new ones. We are working flat out to win the local elections. Our message is: “Keep moving forward.”
Tougher exams are not to blame. Too often children’s time for the first three years of secondary school is wasted.
This latest scheme could drag sports clubs, the Scouts and Guides and even the TA, Royal Naval Reserves and cadets into its net.
A fairer funding formula, better behaviour, fluency in numeracy and literacy, a richer National Curriculum, better exams: these appeal to voters’ innate common sense.
Give trainee teachers much more experience of working with individual children, so that they learn to focus on the person in front of them, and not on what someone else tells them to do.
Pointless paperwork, excessively detailed planning, and over-marking need to be addressed by Justine Greening.