Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has fiercely defended proposals for a new Ofsted ‘report card’ grading system after a huge backlash from teachers’ unions
The Education Secretary came out fighting on Monday amid a backlash over her plans to revamp the schools inspection system.
Bridget Phillipson faced down her critics as she hailed a “new era” of standards as she set out Ofsted’s new “report card” grades. At a speech in central London, the Cabinet minister shared a personal story about growing up in Washington, Sunderland, where her house was repeatedly burgled.
She said she is proof that a “great education can be a transformational force” as she praised her wonderful teachers and celebrated that a child’s “background doesn’t have to be destiny”. She said memories of “injustices” – including her friends being held back because of their upbringings – spur her on every morning to improve school standards across the country.
But Ms Phillipson is facing fury from teaching unions who say the new proposed grading system will continue to focus on “blaming and shaming” schools instead of working with them. In a fierce response, she told teachers and headteachers that she expects their “first priority” to be “children and their life chances”. She added that the negative response from unions proves she is not “in hock” with them as critics have claimed.
Under Ofsted’s new proposals, schools will no longer receive one-word ratings but will instead get one of five coloured ratings from dark green to red across 11 areas, from behaviour to achievement. The changes are subject to a 12-week consultation. Concerns have been raised that Ofsted officials will struggle to offer “fair, reliable and consistent” ratings across a short two-day inspection as the system is so complicated.
The changes come after headteacher Ruth Perry took her own life in 2023 after an Ofsted report downgraded the rating of her Caversham Primary School in Reading. Her sister Julia Waters was highly critical of Ofsted’s new proposals. She said they have “re-traumatised” her family and urged for “more humane, fair, reliable, consistent” inspections to replace them.
Speaking to reporters at the Centre for Social Justice, Ms Phillipson paid tribute to Ms Perry and said there is an “important need to strike a balance” to ensure teachers’ wellbeing plays a part. She said she will “always seek to engage in dialogue” with unions but she added that she “won’t let anything get in the way” of her responsibility to families and children.
“My first priority is children and their life chances, and that’s what I’d expect their first priority to be as well,” she said. The Cabinet minister added that the negative response from unions proves she is not “in hock” with them as critics have claimed.
Elsewhere Ms Phillipson said that tackling pupil absences from school is not something the Government can do alone. She said parents “all have responsibilities” to make sure their children are going to school and said there has been a “casual kind of attitude increasingly emerging” on attendance.
Ms Phillipson said: “It’s not OK to say ‘it’s only a Friday, you don’t need to go to school today’. Every day at school does matter and parents have responsibilities too.”
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School absence rates have spiralled since the pandemic. Official data showed that 2.7% of kids were off school without authorisation at the start of January – up on last year’s 2.5%.
Responding to Ofsted’s proposals, Paul Whiteman, general secretary at school leaders’ union NAHT, said: “It’s important this government makes a clean break from the past and avoid using the same old tired tropes from previous administrations which focused on blaming and shaming, rather than working with schools.
“The current accountability system unfairly penalises schools working in the most difficult circumstances. We desperately need a new approach where everyone works together to ensure those schools have the resources and support they need to succeed.”
Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the National Education Union, said: “There is an elephant in the room here. The Secretary of State is talking today about urging the education system to achieve more. At the same time, this Government is gearing up to make cuts to education, and to the other services which students need to remove barriers to their learning.”
Dr Patrick Roach, General Secretary of NASUWT teachers’ union, said the development of new regional improvement teams, known as RISE teams, “will be key to providing struggling schools with the additional support they need”. He added: “However, this must only be the start of delivering a more ambitious programme of investment to secure an effective support and improvement infrastructure available for every school.”
