The Tories have had the Human Rights Act in their sights for some time – but now they’ve got a chance to do take it out, they could end up living a nightmare.
Barely one month after the current government was elected in 2010, the secretary of state for education Michael Gove announced the abolition of the General Teaching Council for England. Now, only a few…
As the investigations continue into what happened at the schools implicated in the Trojan Horse extremism affair in Birmingham, the issue of who controls a school’s governing board has received unprecedented…
In many ways it’s incredible that in 2014 there is still a debate about whether teachers should be qualified or not. Imagine deliberating similar issues about your lawyer, your doctor or your surgeon…
The longest and most enthusiastic applause during Nicky Morgan’s first conference speech as secretary of state for education was for her predecessor Michael Gove. This seemed apt for a pre-election effort…
The latter days of Michael Gove’s time at the Department for Education were dominated by the Trojan Horse extremism plot in Birmingham. But in his four years as secretary of state, there were recurring…
There is a political consensus around putting children into sets according to their ability: that politicians believe they know what is best for schools. Michael Gove, when he was opposition spokesman…
In 2013 the former secretary of state for education, Michael Gove, and his minister of state for schools, David Laws, decided to change the A Level qualifications taken by English and Welsh students with…
In the hours after David Cameron unveiled the biggest cabinet reshuffle in a number of years, the Scottish first minister Alex Salmond took to the airwaves. Putting the eurosceptic Philip Hammond in charge…
David Cameron’s cabinet reshuffle has been substantial. Nowhere more so than in education, where both the secretary of state for education, Michael Gove, and the minister responsible for universities and…
David Cameron apparently doesn’t like reshuffles; “chillaxing” Dave prefers, so we are told, to leave people to get on with the job. So why such an apparently drastic overhaul of (the Conservative part…
In what must surely be seen as a significant demotion, secretary of state for education, Michael Gove, has been moved to become chief whip in David Cameron’s cabinet reshuffle. Given he is such a big fan…
As another teachers’ strike looms on July 10 it is worth setting out the reasons that teachers are unhappy with their profession. It’s not just because of conditions of service, pay, and pensions. Teaching…
Michael Gove’s recent proposal that English schools must “actively promote British values” caused a predictable storm of merriment on Twitter. He made his statement earlier this month ahead of the launch…
Eunice Goes, Richmond American International University
For the past four years or so, Theresa May has cultivated the reputation of being “The Quiet Woman” of Tory politics. She was seen as a pragmatic and unfussy politician who gets things done. But the recent…
Following recent allegations of Muslim extremism in some Birmingham schools and Ofsted putting five of them in special measures, Michael Gove, the secretary of state for education announced that schools…
The process of reform in any complex organisation is difficult, uneven and subject to being blown off course by events. In two recent articles in the Conversation I have drawn attention to the cultural…