A Century of Local Education Authorities: What has been lost?

For a century local education authorities have been an integral element in the formal education system in the United Kingdom. They were created by the 1902 Education Act and are currently in what seems close to terminal decline, many of their powers having been either taken away or emasculated during the most recent twenty years. This introductory article seeks to show the rationale for their existence, something of their achievements during the intervening century and, above all, to argue that they have proved to be both a civilising and a modernising influence within a system which has often been insensitive to local needs and which has shown clear signs of becoming increasingly centralised. They, or something very like them, are needed as much today as they were a hundred years ago.