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State Schools (Independence)

I am a governor of a secondary school in Taunton. We recently had to appoint a new head teacher, and I was amazed by how little discretion the governors had in deciding the salary. Drawing on the point that the hon. Gentleman was making about allowing head teachers and governing bodies more budgetary discretion, should they have more freedom to, for example, pay or reward a distinguished teacher of French who has made the school admired throughout the area? A straitjacket seems to have been imposed on head teachers, which makes it difficult for them to reward excellence—and, for that matter, to allow greater advances in other parts of the school.