This morning on Radio 4 an NUT spokesman said that one reason for today’s teachers’ strike was the increased imposition of bureaucracy. This, he claimed, reduces the time which teachers can devote to teaching children.
Fine, if these things do detract from education, we should ask why teachers undertake them in the first place.
Rather than slavishly follow the directions of politicians, teachers should do the best for their charges, persuade parents that this is the right course and develop the professional confidence to put politicians in their place. If, as I would doubt, politicians then took on teachers, there would be grounds for a fight.
However, I don’t think politicians would want to be seen to be turning off the national child-minding service.
Who knows – carry the parents and the public and teachers might have to worry less about salaries and pensions.