The Liberal Democrat Schools Minister David Laws has warned in a BBC interview of the “corrosive impact” of self-interested political meddling in schools policy in England. He seems to be spot on in his analysis. He is  calling for an independent body to set the curriculum content and measure whether standards in schools are really improving or declining.

The “whims of here-today, gone-tomorrow politicians” should not decide which books pupils study, Mr Laws said. The schools minister is setting out Lib Dem ideas saying parents and teachers would have much greater confidence in an education system with less “political interference”. Such an independent Education Standards Authority would:

• Control curriculum content and prevent short-term political changes
• Provide an objective measure on standards to stop politicians “marking their own homework”

The schools minister also said the Lib Dems would keep the academy school system, and allow more free schools to open. Without free schools and the freedoms academies now have we wouldn’t be solving our local school place crisis. So thisi s good new for Dulwich, Lambeth and Southwark.

Clearly we would still have politicians setting the overall national strategy and financing of the education system but the curriculum detail should be left to subject specialists who have sometimes been ignoredunder the current system.

David Laws also pointed out “Ministers float in and out of the department, often for quite short periods of time” which created “too much turbulence”. The one thing all organisations is stability.

This is clearly a swipe at the controversial re-writing of the curriculum under the previous education secretary Michael Gove, saying parts of the new curriculum have been decided “on a whim”. Barmy things like dropping American modern literature such as Arthur Miller, F Scott Fitzgerald, John Steinbeck and Harper Lee.

Mr Laws called for “realistic comparisons with other countries, based on evidence rather than bogus claims about the latest performance data, which are based often on a partisan assessment”.

“We’ll have a better education system if the degree of political volatility is reduced and policy-making is based more on evidence and less on what suits the politicians in control,” he said.

Mr Laws said independent schools benefited from being at a “greater degree of distance” from the constant upheavals in the state sector.

David Laws said the Liberal Democrats were making a “cradle to college” spending promise to protect budgets from pre-school classes through to the 16- to 19-year-old-age group.

In contrast, he warned the spending plans of the Conservatives beyond the election would leave education services unprotected and at risk of being cut.

He said the Liberal Democrats in office had delivered the pupil premium to support disadvantaged pupils and free meals to infant pupils.

Mr Laws also said he wants to extend free meals to all pupils in primary school.

There is divergence with their coalition partners over allowing Ofsted to inspect academy chains.

“I think it’s inevitable – and most people in Parliament think it’s not defensible in the future to have a different system of accountability for academy chains and local authorities,” he said.

And there is no ruling out more free schools.

With the right sponsors and in the right areas, he said: “We’re certainly not saying that we couldn’t have any more free schools.”