Free schools may be costly to our children’s futures

Published: 19 August, 2010
EDITOR'S COMMENT

THE drums beating for new powers to allow parents to start their own schools were first heard in Toby Young’s column in the Spectator –a magazine that broadly supports the Tories – more than a year ago.

The idea took flight, mainly among Tory intellectuals, and was taken up by the Education Secretary Michael Gove.

From the start it was opposed by Labour and many educationists  who saw it as a threat to state education. They feared that the government-funded “free schools” would be taken out of the control of local authorities who, in particular, would lose powers over the admissions policy and the curriculum that have formed the bedrock of education in Britain for a century.

It could also cogently be argued that parents who had the expertise and networking influence to bring about the creation of a new school would, by the nature of things, be middle class and that such a driving force would – however unconsciously – create social divisions.

At first, matters seemed to move along straight political lines when St Luke’s Church in Hampstead mooted the idea that a free school could be set up, initially, in its hall. The Tories supported the idea.

But the fact remains that there is a shortage of primary schools in north Camden and that, in the past year or so, parents in the Belsize Park area have been frantically worried about where they can send their children.

An unpredictable baby boom has been blamed by some, poor population forecasts by others.

Whatever the cause, parents in some parts of the borough are left facing real problems, and the idea of a new school – free or not – can be very attractive.

Sectarian political arguments that sometimes amount to sheer rhetoric won’t add much to the debate.

Meanwhile, parents in south Camden, who have been campaigning for years for a secondary school in the King’s Cross area may feel that the idea of a “free school” could be explored.

Where could a new secondary be sited? On the land now occupied by  workshops in Wren Street which are owned by the council. Their leases have only four more years to go. If the leaseholders were bought out, a new school could become a possibility. The Labour government promised funds for such a school.  

The Con-Lib Dem coalition will only part with funds if it became a “free school”. The debate about a new school – whatever its nature – will not go away if the coalition survives.