The start of the new academic year at public schools was marked by major problems. Briefly, these were the insecure future of the Commissioner of Education, the mould at a middle school, and the general state of cleanliness and disrepair.

Such problems are a common feature at the start of each academic year. The question is why?

After all, such things are rare in private business. Perhaps the answer lies in doing a thought experiment and sending a sniffer dog into the rubble of public education to see if there is anything worth saving.

To start, let’s think about the way another essential service is provided to the public. The distribution of food is probably even more necessary than education, yet I do not recall that there was ever a period when plentiful and reliable supplies of food were in jeopardy.

When I go to any supermarket I am constantly amazed by the dazzling array of products available from all over the world: French cheese, Belgian chocolate, Scottish salmon, American steaks, Argentine wine, and so on it goes.

I am told that the number of products in an average supermarket is greater than 60,000 and in the big hypermarkets common in the United States the number of items far exceeds 100,000.

Why is it that we have thousands of choices from all over the world in the average grocery store, while — in choosing a school for their children — young parents are left with a Hobson’s choice of take it or leave it?

Under the Registration Regulations of the Ministry of Education, children who wish to attend government schools must go to a school in the area in which they live.

It may well be that parents are happy with this arrangement. But is it likelier that parents would want greater choice with respect to the goals, methods, curriculum and ethos of the place their child is going to spend the next six or seven years of their formative life?

The regulations, which resemble in format what one would find in a military camp, give little discretion to the parents. One would have thought that parents, as customers, would have as much choice in selecting a school for their children as they have in selecting a breakfast cereal. But the MoE experts know best — parents cannot be trusted with the responsibility to educate their own children.

The more I read the “2016-17 Registration for the Bermuda Public School System” notice, the more I think how nonsensical the management of our education system is compared with that of our supermarkets.

It is all the more amazing when one takes into consideration that no one is compelled to buy from a grocery store. You have to be persuaded by things such as price, location, cleanliness and convenience.

But parents are compelled under pain of prison to send their children to a government school of which they may disapprove, and which may be some distance from where they work.

If public schools were a dazzling success, it might be possible to demonstrate that personnel in the MoE are much better qualified than parents to select a school.

But the public school system in Bermuda has been a tragic failure for many years. If one wishes evidence of this failure, an hour spent by a parent reading the Hopkins Report of 2009 would find a compelling and depressing story of incompetence at almost every level of public education.

2009? Eight long years ago. Surely things must have improved since then? I very much doubt it. There have been about 20 ministers of education in 20 years, or is it 50 ministers in 15 years?

The MoE has overseen a repeated change in personnel but nothing has changed from dismal circumstances as outlined in the Hopkins Report. The ministry has a long and unimpressive record of failing to equip our children for the future.

It is even more puzzling to me — as a former schoolteacher — as to why the people who work in the government Department of Education produce an inferior product when they are better-educated, and paid more, than those who are employed in our grocery stores.

Part of the answer must be that parents are considered to be too incompetent to be responsible for their children, and that educational decisions for their children must be delegated to experts. But the elitist experts have done a terrible job for many years. Education is the only business that blames its customers — parents and children — when things go wrong.

So bad a job has been done that 40 per cent of parents — those better informed than me put the figure at about 50 per cent — opt out of the government system and pay about $25,000 per year for their children to be educated privately. Many public schoolteachers are included in those who decide on private education.

But back to grocery stores. Imagine how it would be if a government “Ministry of Food” undertook to manage some grocery stores, or other stores, in the same manner as government schools, and customers were entitled to free food in the same way as they get free government education.

1, The Ministry of Food would build and operate supermarkets

2, Customers who wanted to shop at private stores would then have to pay a fee to be exempt from shopping at government stores. Just like parents who educate their children privately

3, Each family would be assigned a specific store in which to shop, according to their home address — pretty much in the same way as parents are instructed, or ordered, to send their children to specific schools. For example, if you lived in Smith’s Parish, you would be forbidden to shop at Lindo’s on Brighton Hill Road and would have to shop at, say, Shelly Bay MarketPlace or Harrington Sound Grocery.

4, Good government stores would attract wealthy customers who would buy expensive homes next to the good supermarkets. Bad government supermarkets would result in poor housing

5, Because public supermarkets did not have to worry about customers, they would be likely to provide an inferior inventory of food

6, Government unions would oppose private supermarkets on the spurious grounds that they offered chocolate and soda, and would likely picket them on the grounds that they had the temerity to offer choices to parents when as, everyone knows, only the staff of the government food commissioner possesses the expertise to determine what is best for children

7, Certain products such as vegetables would not be available on Mondays but only on Wednesdays, while products available on Monday may not be sold on Thursday. Other goods would be restricted to citizens, not customers, who always have the correct change

8, Staff unions would determine hours of work, which would mean closing early on Fridays and weekends. Staying open until 10pm would be regarded as exploitation

Many of these points are a method of masking the strong distaste unions and government bureaucrats have for parents who have the audacity to think that they know best as to what sort of food is best for their children. But back to education.

It is utter folly to expect good educational results from a system dominated by the producers and unions rather than the consumers of educational services, namely parents on behalf of their children. Public education should be a ticket out of poverty. For too many young people, it is more like a life sentence to financial misery.

Is it not time to end the misguided reign of the MoE and make it possible for all parents, not just the wealthy, to have the opportunity to choose what they think is the best school for their children?

There is some evidence and hope of public support for parental rights. Charles Jeffers, in a Letter to the Editor published on February 25 of this year, urged that politics be taken out of education. Craig Simmons suggested that incompetent teachers be fired — teachers are not the real cause of our educational malaise; it is the administration and political interference. Even Zane DeSilva linked poor education with low incomes.

The big question is this: why should poor children be foisted off with a diminished quality of education? Without an educational upgrade that provides a road map to skills that match the requirements of modern jobs, disadvantaged children will be shut out from the high-paying jobs of tomorrow.

The MoE is not up to this job. When there is strong evidence that something is a catastrophic failure, it should be abandoned or radically reformed. Fix the schools and many of our social problems would be solvable.

No child deserves the Ministry of Education.

All children should have access to a first-class education. Run our educational system as efficiently as our grocery stores.

• Robert Stewart is the author of A Guide to the Economy of Bermuda — and a former schoolteacher