Nicholas William Peter Clegg had an excellent education, studying at Caldicott School and Westminster School followed by Cambridge University and numerous other educational institutions. He now works in a position where he is surrounded by a phalanx of advisers and has access to numerous Civil Servants. He is not short of wisdom in his working environment and is not obliged to agree to interviews by national newspapers. However it is clear that any interviews he does agree to are bound to carried out by journalists who are not necessarily sympathetic to his message. Assuming that the Times Educational Supplement has not mis-quoted the deputy Prime Minister in their article published today his statements below are simply incredible. He is speaking about the relationship between the teaching profession and the Government now that Michael Gove is no longer Minister for education:

“I think it’s an opportunity to turn a page on the somewhat acrimonious relationship that existed between the government, and the Department for Education in particular, and a number of teachers,” …… “I think we now need to reset the relationship. Not, I should stress, by summarily abandoning all government policy or reforms, but first and foremost by ensuring that, where there is debate and discussion between the teaching profession and government, it is conducted in a spirit and tone of mutual respect. And that we seek out every opportunity to celebrate, and not always seek to denigrate, the fantastic work that teachers do.”

Occasionally its not easy to keep a straight face, even when the comments are based on a complete failure to understand the impact on the audience. The teachers who felt relief at the end of term when the news of the reshuffle was announced will simply find this interview a matter of pure opportunism and incredible naivety. Although these comments are so far from what is needed, I suspect that this weeks TES will bring a bit of laughter into the homes of many teachers. Nick Clegg is clearly not a stupid man, but he cannot possibly believe that an interview like this 9 months before the General Election and 4 years after Michael Gove began to denigrate the fantastic work that most teachers do will persuade any of them that he is sincere. The part of the article where he states:

“I’ve met too many teachers now who feel somewhat beleaguered by the amount of administrative form filling, some of which they don’t feel makes much sense, or is repetitive or is somehow seeking to second-guess their professional judgement,”

Is equally bizarre. This sense of being under siege which many public professions have been experiencing for many years is something that a decent and emotionally intelligent man would have spoken up about 2-3 years ago. Even as late as last month when the Government passed its Data Retention and Investigatory Powers (DRIP) bill without any public consultation and a mere 9 hours of Parliamentary scrutiny, if that is what one could call it, some of us hoped that the Liberal Democratic MPs would do an honourable thing and oppose the Government. These comments by Nick Clegg have all the integrity of a man who has taken part in a street fight and after the violence has ended explains to the weaker side that he would have liked to stop them getting so bruised and he now understands how painful the fight must have been and regrets hitting them so hard.