CHRIS Woodhead wishes for a return to traditional education. Unfortunately, he is a poor advertisement for such teaching methods. His articles this week for the Daily Telegraph are poorly written, badly argued and nave. If they had been submitted as part of a sixth form project, they may well have been returned covered in red ink.

Most of Mr Woodhead's accusations are wild and unsubstantiated. All are undermined by his abdication of any responsibility for the "educational claptrap" he believes is endemic in our schools.

Even if we were to accept his charge that a generation of children have been "betrayed", who is most to blame? A Labour Government that has been in power for four years, or a former chief inspector of schools who was in the post for six?

Mr Woodhead has always courted controversy and during his time as chief inspector managed to alienate many teachers. Thousands of them were so poor they should be sacked, he claimed. We learn today that he even suggested cutting some teachers' pay.

Mr Woodhead's relentless attack on the profession ground down morale. Is it any coincidence that a recruitment crisis has now left England and Wales short of as many as 10,000 teachers?

We should not be taken in by Mr Woodhead's warped vision. Our children today enjoy an exciting and stimulating curriculum. Their lessons cover more subjects in greater depth than their parents could have dreamed of in their own school days. Meanwhile, GCSE and A level results continue to improve.

One suspects that Mr Woodhead is motivated as much by a hunger to see his name in print as by a desire to improve children's education. Tony Blair is right to treat the former chief inspector's abuse with the sort of disdain a teacher would reserve for a playground troublemaker. We should be grateful that Mr Woodhead's politically-motivated mischief can no longer do any direct harm to Britain's schools.

Updated: 12:01 Friday, March 02, 2001