A commission into the future of Haringey’s education set up by the council will include a vocal critic of the borough’s schools, it has been revealed.

The Haringey Independent understands that the four leaders of the Outstanding for All commission, announced by Haringey Council leader Claire Kober last week, include the editor of the Times Educational Supplement, Gerard Kelly, who has labelled the borough’s education record “abysmal”.

Mr Kelly, who is also a governor at Woodside High School in White Hart Lane, wrote an editorial in January where he wrote that “too many of [Haringey’s] primaries are substandard” and backed Education Secretary Michael Gove’s move to forcibly convert four of them into academies.

He wrote: “If school leadership is weak, and has been over several years, and if the local authority refuses to hold those schools to account, the Government is right to step in and demand improvement. Labour did it to secondary schools – the coalition should do the same for primaries.”

The other three commissioners are Sir Jim Rose, former director of inspections at Ofsted, Dame Anna Hassan, former headteacher of Millfields Community School in Hackney, and Graham Badman, chair of Haringey’s Local Safeguarding Children Board.

The body, which is charged with coming up with a list of recommendations to improve the borough’s schools by the end of the year, was criticised last week by anti-academy campaigners, who said the council had intervened “too late” in the saga.

Cllr Kober said that the independent panel of experts would speak to teachers, parents and pupils to gather views, but the appointment of Mr Kelly has already been criticised by one of her own councillors.

Tottenham councillor Alan Stanton (Lab) said that parents and headteachers would be fearful of speaking “frankly and openly” with someone who has already made their views clear.

He added: “There's a huge difference between an open-minded critic who can offer a warts-and-all judgement, and someone who gives every indication of being a closed-minded ideologue who sees something because they believe it.”

Yesterday’s removal of the board of governors at Downhills Primary School means all four of the schools in the borough threatened with forced conversion are moving ahead with the Department for Education’s plan.

Last month, Coleraine Park Primary School in Glendish Road reluctantly agreed to become an academy, following the same move by Noel Park a week earlier. Governors at Nightingale Primary School in Bounds Green Road were removed by the DfE and replaced with a Government-approved board after they refused to comply.