Each of the 530 schools currently below the 2006 target will be "twinned" with a successful specialist or beacon school. A pilot group of 10 high-performing "super heads" will be recruited to work with existing head teachers to raise standards in some of the most difficult schools.Teachers' leaders attacked the targets as being based on a flawed measure of exam success without taking account of schools' catchment areas.But Mr Blunkett said the aim "will be to turn around schools that are struggling before they fail." He shrugged off criticism that the Government was demoralising teachers, and rounded on "cynics out there who say that school performance is all about socio-economics and the areas these schools are located in." He said: "No school is pre-ordained by their class or by their gender or by their ethnic group or by their home life to fail."He told a National Union of Teachers conference in London, that critics should "join us in coming up with solutions and not just come up with cynical laughter and grins at every new development".He said: "I challenge anybody in this room to say what they would do if their child went to a school where over 20 per cent of pupils do not get any qualifications at 16."I challenge you to send your children there. As a parent you would intervene and challenge the school to transform the life chances of the pupils."But teachers' leaders warned that threatening the future of schools could make their position worse.John Dunford, general secretary of the Secondary Heads Association, said many talented heads were losing their jobs after being drafted in to deal with near-impossible jobs.. To a casual observer, the Phoenix high school in the middle of a windswept estate in west London is just the sort of struggling school David Blunkett has in mind. To a casual observer, the Phoenix high school in the middle of a windswept estate in west London is just the sort of struggling school David Blunkett has in mind. Last year, only 5 per cent of pupils achieved five good grades at GCSE, a fall from 14 per cent and 16 per cent in the previous two years.The school's inspection report last year, however, painted a different picture.

Far from attacking the teachers and thehead, William Atkinson, it noted big improvements. While inspectors acknowledged that the school still had some serious weaknesses, they said the head's leadership was excellent, most of the teaching was good, governors were effective and discipline sound.Yesterday Mr Atkinson said the explanation for the school's poor exam performance was clear - even the best teaching could not compensate for pupils' difficulties.He urged ministers to stop generalising about schools with bad exam results and investigate the harsh realities of life in inner-city schools. Mr Atkinson, a government adviserwhose school inspired the"fresh start" policy, challenged the view that schools failed simply because of poor management, poor teachers, weak governors and low expectations of children "That is a myth. Of course, all these things must be right but you can have all of them in place and still have poor exam results."Seventy per cent of the Phoenix pupils who took GCSE last year were in the bottom two ability bands in national tests when they entered the school. All were recruited at a time when the school's fortunes were at its lowest, just before Mr Atkinson arrived. There was a significant proportion of refugees and disruptive pupils.Since 1995, the school has recruited a few more able pupils.

Among the younger ones, around 25 out of a year group of 180 are now of average ability. But 60 per cent are on free school meals - a poverty indicator - and 60 per cent have special educational needs. Because the pupils are so challenging, recruiting teachers is difficult."It is entirely reasonable for the Government to set national targets. But the brush they are using to characterise schools is too broad," Mr Atkinson said.

"They are saying that the schools at the bottom of the league tables are the worst. We are at the bottom of the league tables and in terms of practices we are at the top. They need to look at the underlying factors."He strongly supports the idea of closing bad schools but argues that even the best will not reach the targets unless ministers provide enough money for big changes.. British Nuclear Fuels appointed a new chief executive on Wednesday night on a pay package worth up to £490,000 and warned that other management changes would take place following the Sellafield safety scandal. British Nuclear Fuels appointed a new chief executive on Wednesday night on a pay package worth up to £490,000 and warned that other management changes would take place following the Sellafield safety scandal. Norman Askew, a former executive in the electricity industry, will join BNFL later this month following the ousting last week of John Taylor, who was forced to carry the can for the falsification of safety data on nuclear fuel.Mr Askew, a former chief executive of East Midlands Electricity who has spent much of the last three years in the US power industry, will earn a basic salary of £350,000 and is eligible for a performance bonus of up to 40 per cent.Hugh Collum, BNFL's chairman, invited Mr Askew to become a non-executive director last October, then offered him the chief executive's job a month later when it became clear that ministers were demanding Mr Taylor's head.Mr Collum said last night that other BNFL executives would go but he refused to say whether these would include more board members "I am sure there will be some other management change. The culture and style at Sellafield is due for change and there are too many layers of management.

We have got to shake off the past and look much more aggressively to the future."He said that Mr Askew's first task would be to win back customer confidence after the falsification of data on batches of uranium and plutonium mixed oxide (Mox) fuel.BNFL's biggest Mox customer, Kansai Electric Power in Japan, has insisted on the return of a Mox shipment which arrived there in December. The Nuclear Installations Inspectorate accused BNFL a fortnight ago of "systematic management failures" at Sellafield and gave it two months to overhaul its safety standards.. For Robbie Paul and the Bradford Bulls, this has to be the year. No longer a child prodigy, the younger of the gifted Paul brothers has been at Odsal longer than all but one of his team-mates.