Schools are slipping away from local democratic control –but only slowly

Terry Edwards, left, and Carl Parsons

Covid-19 may have slowed the creeping privatisation of our schools but the forces operating to push this public service out of local democratic control are still operating and making ground in other ways. It remains worrying as services, which should be funded, organised, regulated and run by an elected government, are being off-loaded, outsourced and sold off. Fundamental concerns are about the goals and morality of the privatisers, even if dressed up as philanthropists and knighted for their generosity