Tony Blair, Britain’s outgoing prime minister, would like the “city academy” programme to be one of the great achievements of his self-declared crusade to improve school standards. But the bold idea – tackle the perpetual failure of many inner city schools by rebuilding them and handing their management to private organisations – has been contaminated by the strange requirement that anyone wishing to run a school must do so on a charitable basis and pay a princely sum of £2m to prove their bona fides.

This has done the scheme no favours. It has helped to exclude many educational charities that have expertise in running schools but lack resources, or forced them into sometimes uneasy collaborations with wealthy partners.