Trojan Horse: politicians from both sides to blame for mismanaging extremism in schools

The row between Michael Gove and Theresa May has – in Westminster, at least – somewhat overshadowed the immeasurably more important news that extremists are operating in our schools. A report out today is expected to put six schools into special measures. 

With a weary predictability, an idiot writer for – guess who? – the Guardian tried yesterday to pretend it was all a “witch-hunt”. It is so clearly not a witch-hunt that one honestly wonders where they find these people.

The most frustrating thing is that the potential for this has been obvious for some time and yet both Labour and Tory politicians have not only ignored it; they have actively encouraged it.

It is true that these are not faith schools (thanks to Greg Pope for making this point). But the faith schools agenda has legitimised and encouraged a relaxed attitude to cultural segregation. And many of our universities have had the same relaxed attitude to on-campus extremism. Extremism in schools has therefore really been only a matter of time.

Gove himself was responsible, as the Centre Left warned three years ago, for leaving schools vulnerable to extremism by allowing them to recruit all teachers from a particular faith, so that there could be no question of balance across a range of worldviews and religions, in the event that a head teacher wanted it so.

But the politician who may well, I’m afraid to say, bear the most responsibility is Tony Blair (yes, you heard me correctly), as I said in that piece. There are very good reasons not to “do God” in politics and, on one of the few occasions when he did, the heavy encouragement of faith schools was the result. It was then, frankly, exacerbated by a more general tolerance towards extremism under Brown.

We can now see where this has all led. It is not a good place.