A softer Labour line on free schools?

 

Stephen Twigg, whose name will always make Labour people grin in memory of Enfliend Southgate, seems to be very carefull softening the party's line on free schools.

Andy Burnham, his precdecessor as education spokesman, was accused of attacking free schools but making an exception for the one run by Labour's own Peter Hyman.

Twigg is another comprehensive school kid but in an interview with tonight's Evenign Standard was markedly less hostile.

"This is not the way we would have brought about improvements but some of these schools will do good things." he said.

Twigg recently went to Woodpecker Hall free school in Edmonton, run by a terrific head called Patsy Souter. He said: "The idea that I would close such a school is crazy."

Years ago, Twigg was a governor at a school she ran. He argues that top heads like her would be a success in any school structure. He thinks Michael Gove is being led by dogma and is giving unfair dollops of funding to free schools but also thinks that if good schools are created as a result they should not be clobbered.

Here's the rub.  When asked if he might change their status, Twigg said: "I would tread with care."  In other words, he is not ruling out putting them under council control, which backers of free schools will say is tantamount to abolishing them.

And here's another sentence that will alarm free school fans.  "Also, we must be guided by a set of principles, which are about fairness of funding, fairness of admissions and encouraging schools to collaborate."

That implies less funding for free schools, less control over admissions and new rules to integrate them with regular schools, which presumably would mean a role for local authorities.

A softer line on free schools?  Not necessarily, though it is certainly less hostile in tone.

A more flexible, pragmatic line? You betcha. As you'd expect of someone who learned the trade from Tony Blair.

 

Joe Murphy

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