Mad March Hares

I caught up with some of the news from the teaching union conferences in England the other week - the NUT and NASUWT - which are always held around Easter when the schools are closed for the holidays.

Now I can't remember where I read this or which union was involved - I think it was the NUT - but the gist of the story is that teachers are allegedly up in arms over school inspections.

And the unions are calling for a campaign of non-cooperation with the independent schools inspectorate - Ofsted.

For the life of me I can't really understand what the fuss is all about - all public services should be independently monitored and inspected now and again - preferably by inspectors making unannounced visits.

Can you imagine people working in the NHS refusing to cooperate with an inspection by the Care Quality Commission in England - or Health Improvement Scotland as the equivalent body is named north of the border?

I wonder what would happen if a restaurant suddenly announced that it was not going to allow a visit from the local enviromental health department?

But it's obvious what would happen of course - customers would quickly boycott the place and the restaurant owners would quickly see the sense - in not cutting off their nose to spite their face. 

So I look forward to hearing more of developments in England and Wales.

Surely the big two  teaching unions are not stupid enough to allow such a thing to happen?

Although you never know because these Easter break union conferences have the reputation of being madder than a Mad March Hare.