Last week, the shadow education secretary, Michael Gove, issued a statement declaring that ‘progressive’ teaching methods have caused great damage to the British education system. He was quoted in The Guardian as saying: "This misplaced ideology has let down generations of children…it privileges temporary relevance over a permanent body of knowledge which should be passed on from generation to generation. We need to tackle [it] wherever it occurs."

Making the announcement at Brighton College, he pledged that a Conservative government would reintroduce ‘traditional’, fact-based lessons; ending what they seem to view as the liberal rot that has set in since degenerative ideas began to influence the running of schools in the 1960s.

I’m sure Gove’s thoughts on education have caused a wide variety of reactions among teachers across British secondary schools: some sympathetic, some a little hostile. But in reality, Gove’s policy offensive is nothing new to the world of education; merely the latest incarnation of the various parties of Westminster attempting to impose their own favourite analysis of how to affect education.

Although a full spectrum of contradictory opinions on educational philosophy can lay just claim to be inspired by wanting the best for British children’s education, such ideas are rarely formed outside an existing, political ideology about what’s best for society. As a result, they seem unlikely to be settled any time soon. Such beliefs – and the dramatic changes in policy that they inspire – fluctuate wildly within single cabinets, let alone between political parties.

Such parties – and factions within them – employ a plethora of think tanks and experts to invent or justify ever-new proposals for governmental intervention into how teachers do their jobs. And whether based on age-old sociological principles or the latest fad in educational thinking, the constant oscillation between the expectations of how schools and lessons are run is a hugely damaging factor in itself.

Of the thousands of teachers we have been in touch with over the last 12 months, far too many have told us that the ever increasing pile of government initiatives has prevented them from teaching to the full extent of their abilities.

Such pressures are felt throughout schools. Constant changes in policy are felt directly by those working in the classroom but amongst schools leaders too. As our recent survey into the bullying of teachers showed, the unmanageable anxieties placed on head teachers by the authorities to bend to the will of new directives ensures that their staff can all too often be subjected to harrowing treatment in turn.

The relationship between institutional change and stress is recognised by the Health and Safety Executive itself. In its list of seven Standards for Work-related stress, the NDPB emphasises the importance of engaging employees when undergoing organisational change and ensuring “systems are in place to respond to any individual concerns.” Schools should not operate outside of these guidelines.

No one working in education resents the authorities’ attempts to improve the system to benefit those who are being taught. But the government, whether in Labour or Conservative incarnation, must realise that too often the constant introduction of new initiatives to schools, based on their individual ideologies – ephemeral or permanent – causes a terrible strain on staff members and damages the education of the very children in whose interests they claim to speak.

Whether it’s influencing policy that will affect what happens in class rooms across the country or, in other situations, letting teachers decide what is the best approach for a particular class or pupil, politicians would do well to remember that a cadre of educational experts exists in every institution of learning in the UK, working in inimitable proximity to children themselves, with sometimes decades of experience and an enthusiasm for the improvement of society through education that is second to none. They’re called teachers!