Daily roundup: Outstanding schools, Teather quits, and foster carers

Ofsted’s chief inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw has hailed an “unprecedented rate of national improvement” in school performance across England, after latest figures showed that 78 per cent of schools are now judged good or outstanding. Ofsted said the improvement since last year, when the figure was 69 per cent, means more than 600,000 more children are now receiving a good or better education.

Former children’s minister Sarah Teather has announced she will stand down as an MP at the 2015 general election, claiming she no longer feels that her Lib Dem party fights sufficiently for social justice and liberal values on immigration. The Guardian reports that Teather felt "desolate" and "catastrophically depressed" as a result of party leader Nick Clegg’s tougher approach to immigration, including a plan for some immigrants to pay a £1,000 deposit when applying for visas.

Myths around foster caring threaten to cause a crisis, a charity has warned. A survey of more than 2,000 people by Action for Children found that one in three people believe you cannot foster if you live in rented accommodation or are gay. More than half (54 per cent) think that if you are over 55 you will not be approved as a foster carer, and 16 per cent of people believe that if you are a man you can’t foster. Action for Children said the UK is facing a shortage of 9,000 foster carers this year and myths preventing people coming forward risk creating a “crisis”.

Numbers of care applications last month were down on the previous year, latest figures from Cafcass have shown. In August 2013, Cafcass received a total of 822 applications, a 17 per cent decrease compared to August 2012 when 987 applications were received. Between April and August this year, Cafcass received a total of 4,441 applications, two per cent lower than the same period last year, when 4,531 applications were received.

A midwife has been struck off after her failings were found to have led to the death of an unborn child. The Birmingham Mail reports that a disciplinary panel found that Patience Ajumobi, who worked at Heartlands and Good Hope hospitals in the city, lacked “even the basic level of competency for midwifery”. A Nursing and Midwifery Council hearing was told she failed to ask senior colleagues for help with a woman in labour, despite noting there had been a “prolonged” deceleration of the unborn child’s heartbeat.

Calls about youngsters suspected to have been exploited by sex offenders have risen by a third in Lancashire in the wake of the Jimmy Savile inquiry. The Lancashire Evening Post reports that there was a 30 per cent rise in calls to Lancashire Constabulary between April and August this year.