Double standards from Ofsted?

Ofsted – the government agency responsible for inspecting and maintaining standards in schools – has been caught out employing a paedophile.

Ofsted Inspector Adam Higgins, 48, of Maypole Close, Saffron Walden in Essex was jailed for two years last week at Chelmsford Crown Court. He had pleaded guilty to two charges of making indecent images of children and one charge of inciting a boy aged 13 to 15 to engage in sexual activity, having been grooming him online. As well as the prison sentence, Higgins will also be put on the sex offenders register indefinitely and was made the subject of a sexual harm prevention order.

There are discussions on social media which allege that Higgins was a member of the Ofsted team which inspected schools in Birmingham during the “Trojan Horse” investigation into whether Muslims had been plotting to take over the city’s schools and introduce more pro-Islamic features. Parts of the investigation are reported to have involved Ofsted inspectors asking primary school aged children sexually explicit questions, in an apparent attempt to establish whether the children’s understanding of homosexuality and transgender issues had been affected by Muslim values. Ofsted has, however, stated that Higgins was not a member of any of the inspection teams which inspected and reported on any of the schools involved in the allegations.

Mr Higgins had been arrested late last year. He was immediately suspended and later resigned. On behalf of Ofsted, HM Chief Inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw indicated his revulsion at the news of the conviction and then tried to reassure the public, saying, “While the police have confirmed that there is no reason to believe any pupils at the schools he inspected were at risk during his inspection visits, we have liaised closely with the schools and local authority areas in which Mr Higgins worked and will continue to do so over any concerns they may have.”

The question now is how Ofsted came to employ someone who was committing these offences while also going into schools on behalf of the government – assessing children and their teachers. Mr Wilshaw commented, “While this is a deeply shocking case and a matter of profound regret, we believe we did everything we could to check his background. It serves as a reminder of the need for continual vigilance when it comes to safeguarding children.”

It is the case that continual vigilance is necessary: someone who passes checks prior to being employed can go on to offend later – particularly if those initial checks are restricted to checking whether the employee has any prior criminal convictions. Mr Wilshaw’s words are defensive, on an occasion when it would have been more reassuring if he had made Ofsted’s processes more transparent.

The public needs to know what procedures Ofsted has for checking on its prospective employees? If Mr Higgins passed those procedures, can they be improved?  What procedures does it have for “continual vigilance”? And has this conviction prompted any review of those procedures?

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