Reading the White Paper, with its numerous proposals and initiatives, brought back memories of the Ed Balls and Michael Gove eras. Back then, we thought that it would be impossible for any future government to make as many changes. Unfortunately, most governments suffer from Hyperactivity Regulatory Disorder (HRD), a condition that I named in 2009 and for which there appears to be no known cure.

There is, however, a possible remedy. I was once told by an Aviva insurance employee that the company gets its executives to crash a car and then go through the process of making a claim. This way of undergoing the customer experience could be applied to education ministers. Before taking office, they could spend a month as a teacher and a month as a head, meeting all deadlines and preferably experiencing an Ofsted inspection at the end of week three.

Stop, collaborate and listen

In the face of the maelstrom of initiatives in 2008-9, I wrote that a new alignment needed to be forged between the government and schools. Strong, autonomous schools needed to be empowered to collaborate, and held to account intelligently within a framework in which autonomy, collaboration and accountability are in a new, more productive balance - top-down empowerment with bottom-up development. An enabling government working with an innovative profession.

Instead, empowerment to take on the autonomy of academy status has become compulsion to convert, with autonomy severely constrained by a bewildering mass of government measures on curriculum, assessment and accountability.

The key to successful government of education is the link between policy and implementation. The government has a democratic mandate to introduce policies, and school leaders and teachers are the professional experts who hold the key to implementation. The policies cannot succeed unless the implementation is good - and for that, ministers and civil servants need to talk to the experts before introducing the legislation.

‘If only you had asked us...’

The late Steve Marshall, an Australian who was head of education in the government in Cardiff, wrote: “You often find in education systems that, when policy is determined, implementation is not always considered to the degree it could be and principals will say ‘If only you had asked us …’”

Perhaps the sheer volume of legislation and regulation prevents ministers from consulting adequately on every proposal before they find their way into a White Paper.

Looking back to 2009, I recall what a good press Ed Balls received when he abolished the superfluous key stage 3 tests. As I said to him at the time, and perhaps we should now say to the present secretary of state: “Since you receive so many more plaudits for abolishing things than for introducing them, perhaps you should introduce less and abolish more.” It may be the only cure for HRD.

John Dunford is chair of Whole Education, a former secondary head, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders and national pupil premium champion. He tweets as @johndunford

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