Leicestershire’s acting director of education, Mike Daubney, said he was “disappointed that the Commission thought education was not a major issue in their assessments”.

“I find it difficult to see how the present level of services in Rutland could continue to be provided under the new arrangement,” he added.

This fear was echoed by headteachers whose schools will be part of the new authority, made up of 24 primary schools, two secondary community colleges and a grant-maintained secondary.

They are worried that, as a small authority, Rutland will have to contract out most if not all of its services. Neighbouring authorities would be able to charge differential rates, costing Rutland more, and leading to bigger council tax bills.

Leicestershire fears it may lose up to a third of its services through reorganisation. Resour-ces that Rutland may wish to buy in from this larger authority may not be on offer as Leicestershire is forced to cut back its provision in line with its reduced constituency.

Peter Green, head of Rutland’s Vale of Catmose College, said: “Leicestershire is a good, strong, forward-looking LEA. There is a lot to lose by these changes. But there are advantages. The centre of management will be down the street and not 24 miles away, and it can concentrate on the rural issues that concern our schools.”

In Derby, a group of heads and college principals has been preparing the way for the transfer of educational responsibility to the city by speaking to the city council.

Michael York, headteacher of Derby Moor Community School and co-ordinator of the group, said he was not anxious to escape from the county council and that he had some worries about the change.

But he and his fellow heads were trying to make sure that the students and pupils of Derby benefited from the experience of what had gone wrong and what had gone right with the county council. “We’re getting a little bit hardened to change these days,” he said stoically. “Our attitude is: ‘We’ll make the best of it’.”

Mr York said he would now be pushing for a sixth form for his school, where he had had “not much joy with the county council”.

One head who has not waited for the change is Howell Thomas, headteacher of Chellaston School in Derby.

His school opted out two years ago - and is about to acquire a sixth form.

The local government change will now make little direct difference to Mr Thomas but he welcomes it nonetheless. As a head of some years’ standing, he remembers what life was like when the old borough of Derby ran the city’s education service, “very effectively and very efficiently”, before 1974, when the education offices were just four miles up the road and he knew all the local councillors “We were promised specialist services and back-up services when the county council took over but I don’t think that turned out to be the case,” he says.