IT was always going to be an emotional occasion, and as Nigel de Gruchy stood down as general secretary of the second biggest teaching union he warned delegates that lifebelts and tissues were under their seats.
“It’s been great work,” he told the union’s annual conference in Scarborough last week. “Sometimes exhilarating, sometimes exhausting.
“Sometimes there was pleasure, sometimes there was pain. Sometimes there were setbacks but to have played a part in this has always been a tremendous privilege.”
It brought delegates to their feet for a rousing standing ovation in the second of at least three big leaving parties for Mr de Gruchy last week.
“Never forget that trade unionism is about standing up and being prepared to fight over injustice. It is about solidarity and courage,” he said.
Courage is something he has never been short of, taking on successive governments and speaking out even when being ridiculed, against violent and disruptive pupils. And the master of the soundbite bowed out with his own fireworks. In a blistering attack on politicians, Mr de Gruchy accused Tony Blair of destroying the country in an increasingly presidential system.
He said that in the past 30 years politicians had done more than anyone else to damage children’s education. And he said, Estelle Morris excepted:
“I would describe them as a bunch of self-seeking, self-opinionated rogues. They spend one decade pulling us in one direction and the next pulling us back the opposite way.
“The only common theme is the inadequate resources.”
Policy was decided by “the president - sorry prime minister - with a few chosen special advisers and motley millionaires”.
You are only as good as your last soundbite. And his was good.
Diary, 21
