Since the Labour Party came to power in 1997 proclaiming education its priority, one grand policy after another has foundered. Schools were told to run themselves — but forbidden to do the things that matter most, such as paying good teachers more. Parents were encouraged to choose schools — but with too few attractive ones to choose from, many were rejected by the schools they selected. They were urged to lobby local governments for new schools — but were largely ignored when they did so. A total of two ‘parent-promoted’ schools actually opened.

The opposition Conservatives, who are on course to form the next government, have made much of their own grand plans for schools at their party conference which concluded on October 6. Citing Sweden’s ‘free-school’ reforms of the 1990s as their model, they say they will smash the state’s monopoly by funding new schools to be run by charities or groups of parents, as generously as state ones. Michael Gove, their schools spokesman, reckons that 220,000 new places — as many as 500 schools — might be made available during their first term in office. The policy could see new suppliers responding to demand, innovating and competing to drive up standards. It could be a revolution.

Or it could be another almighty flop. Among the pessimists is Anders Hultin, an architect of Sweden’s reforms and co-founder of Kunskapsskolan, the country’s largest chain of free schools. He now works for GEMS, a Dubai-based chain  (promoted by India-born edupreneur Sunny Varkey) of commercial schools operating in nine countries, including Britain. Of Sweden’s 1,000-odd free schools, three-quarters are run for profit, he points out — but the Tories, afraid of the charge that they plan to hand little children over to big business, would ban schools from making profits. “I think it is a tactical decision,” says Hultin. “But it will surely mean fewer schools opening.”

Allowing those who promote new schools to make profits would certainly turbo-charge the Tories’ plans, but other sorts of suppliers are likely to come forward. Gove thinks he can nudge exclusive private schools, which are fighting to retain their charitable status, into opening free-school relatives as a way of looking socially responsible. KIPP, America’s largest chain of charter schools, shows that non-profit organisations can grow and succeed in poor areas. And operators of ‘academies’ — independent state-funded schools that work rather like the planned free schools but are centrally managed rather than demand-driven — are likely to get into the game too.

The biggest skirmish may be with teachers, or, more precisely, with their unions. State funding would follow children into free schools, meaning that if lots of new ones open, some state schools will have to close. “The good teachers will find new jobs,” says one Tory aide, blithely — but unions have never been concerned primarily with their more able members. The unions also oppose Tory plans to end central pay bargaining for teachers and to allow schools to pay according to merit.

Here, though, the lessons from Sweden are more optimistic. Swedish teaching unions initially hated the whole idea of free schools — but once they saw that their members liked working in them, says Hultin, they changed their tune. Britain’s teachers too might prefer better-run, less chaotic schools, more freedom over how to teach — and to be rewarded for success. If the Tories stand firm, free schools could be in Britain to stay.

(Excerpted and adapted from The Economist)