Scrapping one-word Ofsted judgements is the first sensible thing this Government has done - Sarah Todd

The education watchdog has traditionally awarded one of four marks to schools it inspects: outstanding, good, requires improvement and inadequate.

But the Department for Education (DfE) has announced that from this new academic year those blunt one-word findings will be binned. More detailed reports will be given.

The change follows engagement with the education sector and the family of headteacher Ruth Perry, who took her own life after an Ofsted report downgraded her Reading primary school from ‘outstanding’ to ‘inadequate’.

Last year, a coroner's inquest found the inspection process had contributed to her death.

As an aside, let’s hope other areas of the Government’s inspection arms are also put under the spotlight.

The farming press has reported how the widow of a farmer who took his own life following a farm inspection has also been calling on the Government to overhaul its approach to agricultural regulation and enforcement.

Rita Poulson said her husband Rocky was left feeling ‘incompetent' after a Rural Payments Agency (RPA) inspection on the East Midlands family farm in September 2023 found 18 sheep, bought to improve the flock's fertility, had been tagged with incorrect-coloured ear tags.

In a farming career which had spanned 50-plus years, it was Rocky Poulson's first and only offence and an accidental error, but he was told he could face a penalty and feared whole farm inspections were imminent.

Mrs Poulson told the Farmers Guardian the current system is ‘totally destructive and insensitive' and called for flexibility and change from the Government.

"He kept it to himself for 24 hours and then at supper told me he had made a mistake,” she recalled. "He said: ‘I do not think they are going to let me keep sheep again; it is a criminal offence…'.

"These worries were on his mind and they were escalating during this short period of time. He did not see how he could improve the situation. He just saw no way out."

Decisions that impact so heavily on people’s lives - and livelihoods - should be better dealt with.

Here, in rural areas, a good or bad Ofsted inspection can cause a mass exodus from one school to the extent that some smaller ones have ended up closing. This has done nobody any favours.

All Government inspectors, of whatever sector, would do well to watch former England cricketer Andrew ‘Freddie’ Flintoff and the story of the cricket team he put together from a group of likely lads in Preston.

Late to the party as ever, we have just watched the original series on the iPlayer and can’t wait to see the second part, which has just been aired, showing the team on a tour to India.

So far, it’s the best television documentary for years and, as mentioned, we haven’t even got to the second part where Freddie must push himself through anxiety caused by his life-altering injuries in a horrific crash while filming for the Top Gear programme.

Freddie and his mates who helped with the coaching proved that all the lads needed was a bit of time investing in them. To be listened to, and the structure of a regular place to meet up. Somewhere they felt they belonged and were welcome.

One of the standout heroes, for this viewer at least, was the steward at the run-down sports ground that Freddie secured funding for. She had no messing with the lads, getting them sweeping and painting, and they respected her for it.

Over the weeks they put their mobile phones and vapes down and stopped answering back. They went from not wanting to wear their cricketing whites to putting them on with pride and shaking hands with their opponents at the end of matches.

A star player or two may well have been found, which was the original aim of the programme, but Freddie reflected that it had been about so much more.

Most of these lads had been written off at some point in their young lives. One had been sleeping in a bus shelter, others given labels by schools such as being disruptive and having behavioural problems. Freddie proved that all they needed was somebody to look up to and to feel like they belonged. Plus some northern common sense.