Michael Gove delivers speech to party conference

During this week’s Conservative Party Conference Michael Gove delivered a speech expressing his anger at the previous Labour Government for its record on education. The topic of academies was covered extensively by Gove who described them as a ‘Tory invention’ and highlighted how academic experts were helping to make schools in England the best in the world.  Gove continued to speak about the social divide within schools noting that the divide between the achievements of the rich and poor is bad for the individual but also an act of economic "self-harm", because of the loss of potential.

Teacher training was an area covered Gove and he stressed the need to support teachers in three areas:

1)    Back teachers on discipline

2)    Create a curriculum fit for purpose

3)    Ensure teachers have pride in profession.

The Education Secretary continued by explaining how "soft subjects", which he claimed were popular under the last government, had left some students unemployed and with poor prospects.   He ended his speech saying: "I am a parent, I know I would never accept second best for my child. I will never accept second best for this country."

In other conference news at a fringe event hosted by the Association of School and College leaders Gove spoke of bad behaviour in schools noting that a third of teaching time was lost due to a lack of discipline in the classroom. He also pointed to deregulation in the classroom pointing to the streamlining of guidance for teachers which used to be “six hundred pages of dos and don'ts, we've reduced that to fifty."