Responding to Ofsted's announcement of its proposals for reform, which are now going out to consultation, Paul Whiteman, general secretary of school leaders’ union, NAHT said: “The proposals set out today for consultation suggest an inspectorate determined to hold on to a model of inspection that is long past its sell-by date.

“The plan to retain numbered sub-judgements risks replicating the worst aspects of the current system and will do little to reduce the enormous pressure school leaders are under.

“Given that Ofsted previously struggled to provide reliable judgements using a 4-point scale, it is very hard to see how they will be able to do against a 5-point one. As other inspectorates have shown, there is another way – a way to provide clearer information for parents and schools without resorting to grades.

“Avoiding the harm to education professionals caused by an outdated approach is not going soft on standards. The opposite is true, the current system is at the root of the teacher and leader retention crisis which in itself is a threat to the education we can deliver to children.  

“The decision to remove overarching judgements was absolutely the right one and we welcome the confirmation these will not be returning, but as school leaders made clear at the time, that must be a first step towards fundamental reform of a broken system. School leaders do not want to see evolution of a system that has caused so much harm over many years.

“We are very concerned about the design of the consultation. By using open-ended, free-text questions, Ofsted will be able to avoid gathering data accurately to gauge whether there is genuine support for the model it appears to have already chosen. Picking out what parents and professionals really think will be virtually impossible and the design risks losing sight of the wood for the trees. Ofsted is refusing to ask simple and straightforward questions about the extent to which stakeholders support these proposals.

“As a public body, Ofsted must do better than this – parents and professionals should be presented with a set of genuine options. Arbitrary deadlines must not be used to push reforms through if the support is not there.”