The new chief

Wednesday, May 15, 2002

The new chief inspector of schools in England has committed himself to visiting schools each week to see how they are getting on. David Bell, who succeeded Mike Tomlinson as head of Ofsted on 1 April, revealed his intention during a lengthy question and answer session in front of the Education and Skills Select Committee in Westminster last week. Mr Bell, a former primary school teacher from Glasgow who most recently was chief executive of Bedfordshire County Council, told the committee he knew what it was like 'to be on the receiving end' of Ofsted inspections. The Ofsted inspection regime, he said, was there 'to support a school and not be a bureaucratic exercise from outside'. When asked if he had seen differences in standards between schools in Scotland and England, he said that when he came to work in England in the mid-1980s he 'didn't notice the dramatic differences I had been led to believe'.