Why teachers need flexibility

Without these checks, it would be far more difficult to identify those schools that are failing their pupils and for appropriate action to be taken to ensure that the life chances of young people is not compromised by poor teaching or leadership.

That said, there is a growing belief that the entire academic year now revolves around the Ofsted inspection and that too much emphasis is being placed on targets – some more pertinent than others – rather than teachers being able to show the flair which will inspire pupils, even in the drier subjects.

Even though Mr Gove’s “free school” agenda is supposed to underpin the coalition’s localism agenda, he must not hide from the fact that he is one of the most centrist education secretaries of recent times.

This assertion is further highlighted by the Institute for Public Policy Research’s own critique of vocational education which has also been published today.

These are the non-traditional subjects that have been marginalised by Mr Gove because of his desire, an understandable one, for schools to concentrate GCSE teaching on core subjects – English, maths, science, history, a foreign language and so on.

Mr Gove has done so in response to those universities and business leaders who said there was no correlation between standards and annual increase in the GCSE pass-rate.

Yet the Education Secretary needs to remember that his preferred academic journey, from primary school to GCSE exams, A-levels and then university, is only open to a minority of pupils. It is irrelevant to those who struggle, for whatever reason, to aspire to his own high standards. It comes back to this key point – schools need the freedom to do what is best for their pupils and a vocational subject may offer a young person the best chance of gaining a qualification, and pursuing a trade. With one million youngsters out of work, and little evidence of this number declining, such a pragmatic approach takes on even greater economic significance.