The Thirty Years War: My Life Reporting on Education

Richard Garner has spent 36 years reporting on education, working for the Times Educational Supplement, The Mirror, and The Independent. In The Thirty Years War, he retraces the steps of his career, examining the policies, personalities, success stories and outright failures of the UK education scene from the 1980s to the present day. Richard gives his verdict on the 16 Education Secretaries he has seen come and go, and offers an insider's view of the major issues and events of his time in office, ranging from the fight to abolish corporal punishment to the rise of the academy movement, and now the Government's move to open new grammar schools. It is a story of power, policies and personalities, and how the events of the past three decades have shaped the education sector in the UK today.