ABSTRACT
The 1997 General Election was a landslide for Labour. The new regime at the Department for
Education and Employment decided on a combination of carrot and stick (DfEE, 1997a) to push
forward its school improvement regime. The pressure would involve:
• setting challenging national and local targets;
• having ‘tough’ negotiations with local authorities on benchmarking categories, on the
mandatory targets for schools, and on the optional targets for schools.
