ePolitix.com Stakeholders comment on the news that the Conservative shadow schools secretary Michael Gove has set out plans for up to 5,000 new independently run schools.
The schools would be funded by the taxpayer, run by parents, charities and private firms and free to attend. The party wants to make the pledge central to its campaign to become the next government.
Government response:
Andrew Adonis, Labour's schools minister, responding to Michael Gove's speech at Tory party conference, said: "Michael Gove calls for 'straight talk' but it's time the Tories came clean about the true cost of their Swedish model. He needs to tell us what he would cut to pay for these 5,000 schools.
"Until he can answer this question, their 'free' schools are just fantasy schools compared to our 1,200 real Academies and new or rebuilt schools nationwide.
"Labour has set up more than 130 new Academies, built or rebuilt more than 1,200 schools, and employed 40,000 extra teachers, raising standards nationwide.
"Nearly 300 extra Academies are also planned and funded, and we are supporting parents who want to set up their own schools, creating a new generation of co-operative trust schools.
"When the Tories first proposed a few hundred new 'Swedish style' schools, they conceded they would have to cut £4.5bn from our school building programme to pay for the capital costs. But the 5,000 schools the Tories are now talking about would cost many billions more.
"Where is this money going to come from and how are they going to deal with the impact on existing schools?"
Party response:
Responding to Michael Gove's speech to the Conservative Party conference today, Liberal Democrat schools spokesman David Laws said: "The Tories say that they are going to free schools and teachers from central government control, but the small print suggests that they simply want to impose a different set of centralised diktats.
"Michael Gove claims he wants to slim down the curriculum, but in the next breath he tells teachers which bits of history they should be teaching.
"Tory thinking is muddled between the rhetoric of giving back real freedoms and the reality of extra micromanagement."
Stakeholder response: NASUWT
Chris Keates, general secretary of the NASUWT, the largest UK-wide teachers' union, told ePolitix.com: "The speech was high on rhetoric and low on detail but it was tinged with chilling references to failed Conservative Education policies of the past.
"The picture Mr Gove painted of an education service in chaos and riddled with failure is not only grossly inaccurate but it is also a grave disservice to schools, teachers and headteachers who have done so much to raise standards of education.
"The absence of any acknowledgment or thanks to the school workforce for their hard-work, dedication and commitment was stark and will not go unnoticed.
"References to sweeping aside health and safety legislation may play well with the party faithful, but they will cause deep alarm to any right-minded person. It is nothing short of reckless to pledge to remove regulation which is fundamental to the health and welfare of young people and adults.
"The only positive note was struck by the reference to the continuing commitment to support teachers in maintaining high standards of discipline in schools and abolishing the independent appeals panels - a long held policy of the NASUWT.”
Stakeholder response: NUT
Christine Blower, acting general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, Europe's largest teaching union said: "Michael Gove's proposals spell potential chaos and planning gridlock for local schools, as well as threatening the existence of a local democratic voice in education.
"What is more, his proposals for creating hundreds of new academies will fuel the very social segregation he aspires to eliminate. Those parents with the necessary time and knowledge will be able to establish new schools, leaving those without that capacity to trail behind.
"It would have been better for Michael Gove to have concentrated far more on how to support teachers' professional freedom. He is right to highlight the importance of creating an autonomous teaching profession, and the need to tackle the exam burden. Yet even where this message appears, he should free himself from the contradiction of prescribing synthetic phonics, while at the same time championing the right to innovate."
Stakeholder response: ATL
Commenting on Michael Gove's speech at the Conservative Party conference, Dr Mary Bousted, general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL), said: "Michael Gove identifies the illness in our education system - too much red tape, too much testing and a lack of trust in teachers.
"However, his cures would kill the patient.
"A proliferation of new, state-funded, but privately-run schools would bypass the poor and disadvantaged who rely on the state to give them the support and opportunities they lack because of their background.
"Voluntarism would not be any more successful now than it has been in the past and would leave the vulnerable more exposed and left behind."
