The promotion of Freddie Evans to Commissioner of Education won high marks from Mike Charles, general secretary of the Bermuda Union of Teachers.

“He has demonstrated, despite all the negatives, that he can do the job,” Mr Charles told The Royal Gazette, saying he was “happy” at the long-anticipated appointment, in which Dr Evans has pledged to apply his extensive experience of the island’s public schools to at least a decade’s service.

“Hopefully, now he will be allowed to do the job, and run the department as a commissioner should,” added Mr Charles, who said that past commissioners had been undermined by “micromanagement” from elsewhere in the ministry.

Dr Evans has held the post of acting commissioner, along with Lou Matthews and Llewellyn Simmons, over the course of nearly three years. Mr Charles, who has long criticised the island’s public school system as lacking in vision.

“It’s horrendous what teachers have to put up with. How can we prepare students for the world of work as we see it in Bermuda with the kind of system and supplies that we see in our schools?”

Mr Charles conceded that the ministry’s budget had been awarded a 2 per cent boost for 2017-18, saying also that Cole Simons, the new Minister of Education, had “a good head”.

“However, until we have a government that is committed to education, we are marking time.

“We will be setting our students up to fail.”