Yesterday the Liberal Democrats held what seems to have become our almost annual one-day January policy conference, this year on the theme of a progressive future for Britain.

Perhaps the most constant theme across the day, or at least the sessions I was in, was a consensus about the importance for that goal of investing in education, at every phase from early years right through schooling and up to further and higher education (actually further education didn’t get much of a mention, though it should have done). There was a strong consensus that education must be at the heart of achieving the liberal idea of empowering individuals to - as the preamble to the party’s constitution puts it - not be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity. And indeed our spring party conference in six weeks’ time will have a whole raft of proposals in each of these three phases, including significant plans for additional investment in each.

But the point that got me thinking most was one made in the final session, about the importance of parenting skills.

We all agree now, it seems, that investing in the education of children, the younger the better, is the most effective way of helping them to develop, so that in due course they are in the best position to make their own choices about their lives and indeed their world.

But what about the far greater part of their lives that young people don’t spend in school, nursery or any other kind of formal setting - but at home? Surely that must also have a huge impact on how they develop (and indeed there is evidence to support this)?

I always think this is a fascinating dilemma for liberals.

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A few weeks ago, Ed Balls, Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, and Captain of the Praetorian Guard of Brownism, launched a stinging attack on low educational attainment in 638 secondary schools across the country. These schools failed to get even 30% of their pupils to achieve 5 decent GCSEs (ie at grades A*-C) including English and Maths – a basic standard in being able to participate in the modern world. The tone of the DCSF press release is all very constructive and moderate, but the way in which it was presented to the media, which they duly followed, was of ‘failing schools’ being presented with an ‘ultimatum’ to improve, or ‘be closed down’ (here, here and here, for example)

His attack caused fury (and not just metaphorically, but literally) from teachers who felt they were being unfairly attacked by someone who hadn’t really understood the problem. Even if Balls’ take on this situation is “right”, then in the short-term at least he significantly demotivated the very people he needs to taker action to address it. A week after the initial attack, the TES published figures giving some of the greater complexity of the position, and specifically pointing out that of the 638 schools, a quarter had actually been graded as “good schools” by the schools regulator, Ofsted, and a few even “excellent”, the very top grade.

So who is right here?

Well firstly let’s take a look at the raw figures. If you look at the statistics and see only 20-odd percent of pupils get 5 A*-Cs including Maths and English, it does indeed seem that there is be a difficult group of schools who stubbornly fail to provide a good basic GCSE-level education to even a third of their students. It’s very easy to say that This Simply Isn’t Good Enough and so Something Must Be Done. I find it very difficult not to have some sympathy initially with this position. This is the life prospects of our young people that we are talking about here (as well as the economic future of the nation, if that kind of language gets your juices flowing more) and we need to get it right, not fail large numbers of them, as these figures imply.

Balls, a very political Minister who really wants to be able to show that he has made a transformational difference in this job, wants to do something to tackle this. In the thinktank and economics world in which he spends a lot of time, shifting the actual numbers and results is what it’s all about, and much of what follows in the next paragraph just sounds like whinging and making excuses.

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Last night the governing body of Highbury Grove secondary school (of which I am a member) gave its formal agreement to the building of completely new premises for the school, under the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme. The school’s existing 1960s buildings are very much in need of replacement, and this means that by 2010 Highbury Grove’s pupils will have some amazing new facilities.

The school has made a huge amount of progress academically in recent years (earlier this year being judged ‘good’ by Ofsted, a remarkable turnaround) - and it’s great that its facilities will be catching up and giving pupils the best opportunities in future.

Getting governing body agreement is hardly the end of this process - with a huge construction programme to come over the next two years. But it’s great to know that it will now definitely be happening!

Last night was a good night for Highbury Grove school!

In the first part of the evening we had a very useful meeting about the latest plans for the school to be replaced under the Building Schools for the Future programme. At the end of this month we have an important meeting to make the final decision as the governing body to proceed with the project, so it’s good to see that so much work on all the details is going in, by the people at the school, CEA and the Council.

And then later in the evening the relevant Council planning sub-committee agreed to give planning permission for the new buildings. The new school will be completely new buildings, built on the same site but around the existing ones (which will then be demolished). It is a huge building project so this was a crucial step.

Roll on the new school!

I was delighted to discover that the good work of Highbury Grove Secondary School (where I’m a governor) is highlighted in today’s Independent. Highbury Grove has faced a lot of challenges over the years, but earlier this year was judged by Ofsted to be a ‘good’ school, which is a great turnaround.

About four years ago, Emma sat on a Lib Dem party policy working group on early years. One of the issues they identified was the need to raise the quality of training for early years staff, which has a big impact on the benefit to young children. As a way of doing of this they proposed introducing a national register and status for leaders in early years, equivalent to Qualified Teacher Status (QTS) for teaching primary and secondary-aged children.

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I knew that the old days of teachers having to spend months preparing for an Ofsted inspection were gone, to be replaced by a ‘light touch’ inspection at short notice. That seemed very sensible - the effort required just to prepare for the inspection did seem to be rather disproportional to actually teaching.

I got a taste of this in January, when at the governors meeting at Highbury Grove Secondary School, I asked when we were expecting Ofsted again and were told it could be any time now. Within 36 hours they had rung up to say they were coming now, they came two days later, and within a week of me asking the question it was all over. (The school was graded ‘good’ - an amazing success for a school that has made huge strides forward over the last few years.)

But that was nothing to Ofsted Early Years (a different set up to Ofsted, though with the same basic purpose in life), who turned up on the doorstep at Emma’s school and nursery this morning, announcing they were going to conduct an inspection at that very minute. They seem to have spent the day looking around there, but by the early afternoon they had gone again, off to write their report. Apparently they actually get training in how to respond to nurseries’ reaction to them (ie shock!).

Since one of the major complaints of the previous system was that teachers had to spend many months worrying about and preparing for the inspection, I can see some sense in this - but which of the rest of us face a knock on the door at any minute and the announcement of an instant inspection by outsiders - leading to a report which will be taken as the judgement on us by the rest of the world for the next three years?