Gainsborough: MP blasts Ofsted after it denied a school the highest rating because it was not multicultural

The 104-pupil Middle Rasen Primary, in the town of Market Rasen on the edge of the Lincolnshire wolds, was inspected last month.

Sir Edward Leigh has spoken out after Ofsted would not give Middle Rasen Primary School the highest rating following its latest inspected.

Sir Edward said: “This is political correctness gone mad.”

“Middle Rasen Primary School is an outstanding school by any standards, and Melonie Brunton is a brilliant headteacher .”

“I back the school and its head 100 per cent.”

“Just last week I wrote to Nicky Morgan, the Education Secretary, objecting strenuously to the new so-called ‘equality’ regulations she is implementing in schools.”

“Conservatives have always stood for freeing our schools from the deadening hand of state-enforced orthodoxy”

“Why there has been such a massive U-turn under Nicky Morgan is inexplicable to me.”

Sir Edward, who is one of the most vocal MPs and with more than 30 years’ experience in the Commons, added that the demographics of the area don’t justify Ofsted’s criticism.

He said: “Multiculturalism is an irrelevance in Lincolnshire with its low number of ethnic minorities, who are already welcomed and well-integrated into our local communities, as they should be.”

Ofsted refused it an ‘outstanding’ rating and graded it ‘good’ instead.

It said the school was failing to do enough to ensure pupils understand the ‘cultural diversity of modern British society’ and experience ‘first-hand interaction with counterparts from different backgrounds’.