Specialists critical of official policy claim secret files are being kept on them by the Department for Education

It was a Tuesday night in March, two days before Ruth Swailes, an expert on early years education, was due to travel to Manchester to speak at a conference. Nothing about the event – launching a government-funded hub to improve the education of children under five – had struck her as controversial. But that evening she opened a message from her co- presenter, Dr Aaron Bradbury, saying the government was blocking them both from attending.

Moreover, the multi-academy trust organising the event said because these two “unsuitable” experts were to be given a platform, the Department for Education (DfE) wanted to pull the plug on the whole conference.