The National Curriculum was brought in as an ill-conceived blunt instrument of control over teachers by Thatcher. She couldn't stand us, and our exceptionally weak attempts at militancy in the mid-80s gave her the perfect excuse. It came with a lot more than just a content-stuffed bunch of syllabuses that, at a stroke, destroyed the concepts of imagination and flexibility that are the hallmarks of good teaching. It also brought in a system of inspection, run by unqualified people, that was designed to be one hundred percent judgemental and nil percent advisory. It also forced an authoritarian regime on teachers that ruined the concepts of democracy and professional collaboration in staffrooms. Well, we've had all this for thirty years now. We have had no improvement in standards, a whole load of inept fiddling with assessment systems that encourage cheating in order to keep your place in the league table and a situation in which head teachers are leaving in droves who can't be replaced. So well done Maggie for setting it off and well done Blair for conniving in it. And a thousand bloody curses on the teaching unions for being so damned weak and divided. And I'm still a member of one of 'em and will be until they carry me out in a box. Education? Best bloody political football going.