A BOLTON headteacher today condemned the "constant carping and condemnation" of the teaching profession.

Jack Hatch, headteacher of St Bede's in Morris Green, criticised the Government's Chief Inspector of Schools, Chris Woodhead, for "repeatedly hitting the profession in the gut."

Mr Hatch, the North-west regional representative of the National Association of Head Teachers, was speaking on the day Mr Woodhead was due to release key findings of school inspections carried out last year by OFSTED.

Mr Hatch, a headteacher for 16 years, said: "Instead of highlighting all that's being done in our schools to improve standards and the hard work being done by the vast majority of teachers, we are again subjected to criticism. "Rather than highlighting the strengths of teachers and the strong leadership in 90 per cent of secondary schools and 86 per cent of primary schools, we are told about the one in seven primary heads and one in 10 secondary heads who are poor.

"Parents have to remember that each class and intake is different.

"The achievements of one class in one year will be different than the same class the next year and therefore OFSTED findings will always be skewed."

He added: "Morale among teachers and headteachers is deteriorating all the time and this constant criticism does nothing to improve the situation.

"Careful analysis of inspectors' reports on 5,000 English schools risks being upstaged by the publication of one figure." Schools chief inspector Chris Woodhead was today expected to say that 15,000 teachers are so incompetent they deserve the sack.

But teachers say that is thrown into question by figures from his own office, which show that in little more than a year, the proportion of lessons judged to be poor has halved.

Liberal Democrat education spokesman Don Foster has challenged Mr Woodhead either to confirm that teachers are now less "incompetent" - or withdraw the 15,000 figure.

And the chief inspector has picked up the gauntlet, letting it be known that he aims today to settle the row once and for all.

He stands by his previous claim - based on the evidence at the time.

But he has acknowledged that the evidence has changed - showing now that "at the bottom end of the scale, the number of teachers judged to be poor has decreased."

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