Date published: 2007/05/26
The BBC says:
Private schools could be required to lend teachers to state schools and share other facilities under proposals by Education Secretary Alan Johnson.
Mr Johnson, a Labour deputy leadership candidate, says independent schools in England and Wales should do more to justify their charitable status.
Private schools claim many of them would close if not for the annual £100m in tax breaks from being a charity.
Conservatives accused Mr Johnson of making "clumsy threats" over the issue.
New charity rules mean private schools now have to pass a public benefit test showing how they add to communities.
Some teachers told the BBC that they found it patronising of Mr Johnson to imply that state school teachers needed the help of private school teachers.
And a spokeswoman for the National Union of Teachers said it was not "a one-way street".
"Private schools have a massive amount to learn from state schools.
"Teaching 30-35 pupils is very different from teaching 15 and requires a totally different set of skills and is much more demanding. That's the big problem that private school teachers will have," she said.
She might have said "teaching 30-35 working class pupils is very different from teaching 15 middle class pupils". It seems like Johnson is just trying to play the Old Labour class card to win the deputy leadership election.
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