As someone educated in the 1970s, when ‘creativity’ and self-expression were allowed to trump disciplined and structured learning, I noticed as a young journalist in the 1980s that older colleagues had been considerably better educated than I was.

UK employers in a competitive global market are bearing the brunt of the 1960’s carnival approach to education. With many indigenous British school leavers lacking necessary skills in reading, writing, and arithmetic, even though they may have acquired a little knowledge about the suffragettes, employers could be forgiven for longing for the days when rigorous learning and creativity were not seen as mutually exclusive.

After all, what is so creative about losing out to the Chinese?

It was Britain’s Protestant Christian heritage that allowed children educated the pre-1960s way to acquire the necessary knowledge for gainful employment within generally benevolent moral norms that gave room for constructive creativity and considerate self-expression. Christian Britain certainly produced some very great writers, artists and musicians.

Despite her opposition to same-sex marriage, unless Mrs Morgan takes action to balance the Stonewall appointment with a politically incorrect one – such as an adviser who will help her address the lamentable ignorance about the Lord Jesus Christ in many British schools - she is unlikely to be much of a force for good in education.

.Julian Mann is vicar of the Parish Church of the Ascension, Oughtibridge, South Yorkshire - www.oughtibridgechurch.org.uk