Sir – Many of your readers will share councillor Tilley’s dismay (Report, December 26) that six small Oxfordshire primary schools may be forced by Ofsted to become academies — even though all but one of them were previously rated ‘good” or “satisfactory.”

It is a matter of public concern that a school may be forced out of local control and into the hands of the Government merely on the whim of an unelected organisation whose decisions are absolute.

Many teachers might agree that Ofsted — with the powers now given it by an authoritarian Minister of Education — behaves increasingly like a terrorist organisation.

It can swoop on a school with little notice and in effect destroy a teacher’s career on the basis of brief judgements and dubious test results. There is growing unease in schools, where teachers’ time is largely monopolised by Ofsted-led paperwork. Those Oxford schools that have so misguidedly converted to academy status should take note that they are now in the hands of a DfE that is committed to the privatisation of education by profit-making companies.

Of particular significance is the perfunctory reply of the DfE spokesman to councillor Tilley: that sponsorship offered “the best chance of a first-class education”. There is currently no evidence to support this assertion, and much to suggest that it is simply not true.

This Ofsted intervention is a particular tragedy for Oxfordshire, which for many years could boast an enlightened county education department providing a caring and innovative environment for its teachers and their schools.

It must also be a personal setback for Mrs Tilley, herself a Conservative, and whose commitment to her county brief is very evident. I hope she will keep a close eye on these six schools, and not hesitate to make her views known to senior members of her party.

Maurice Holt, Oxford