Concerns over impartiality of school abuse review

Concerns have been raised about the impartiality of an Ofsted review into claims of sex abuse in schools.

The government ordered the review after thousands of anonymous allegations of abuse in schools were posted on the Everyone’s Invited website.

But the head of the largest teaching union says education watchdog Ofsted is unable to conduct an impartial review.

However, the Department for Education said Ofsted would ensure a wide range of expertise informed its work.

The mostly anonymous testimonies of abuse and misogyny started emerging mainly from within private schools but thousands of allegations have since been attributed to pupils from state schools and colleges as well.

Ofsted was asked to conduct a review into safeguarding policies and practices on sexual abuse in both state and independent schools in England.

But National Education Union (NEU) joint general secretary Dr Mary Bousted says the watchdog is not best placed to conduct the review.

“The Department for Education wants an inquiry that it can control, so it overuses Ofsted for a whole manner of inquiries because it has a close relationship with Ofsted and can control the results of that inquiry and the recommendations,” she said.

Read more on BBC News

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