Although there were many continuities in education policy between the Coalition Government of 2010-15 and the Labour administration that preceded it, the commitment to establishing a 'school-led' system of teacher education in England, announced in 2011 (DFE, 2011) and relentlessly pursued thereafter, represented a radical departure from previous kinds of initial teacher education partnership. While it is entirely consistent with a neo-liberal agenda, with its strong regulatory framework and appeal to market mechanisms, it is also underpinned by a particular conception of teaching as a craft - 'best learnt as an apprentice observing a master craftsman or woman' (Gove, 2010). This conception appears to exclude any need for research or theoretical grounding, and, unsurprisingly, prompted a staunch defence of the role of research in teacher education, led by the British Education Research Association, in collaboration with the Royal Society of Arts (BERA-RSA 2014). Yet even as the Coalition seemed to deny a role for research in the professional preparation of teachers, it simultaneously began to promote schools' use of research evidence - albeit research, rather narrowly construed as identifying and validating 'what works' for universal application. These contradictions and the tensions between them are made explicit in one of the final education policy documents published by the Coalition: its response to the Carter Review of Initial Teacher Training (DFE 2015), commissioned by Michael Gove shortly before he left office. This review, which drew on a range of evidence from competing stakeholders, was explicitly tasked with defining and exemplifying' effective ITT practice' - and so provides an illuminating insight into current conceptions of 'quality' teacher education. Drawing on discourse analysis of the review's findings and recommendations and of the government's response, this paper exposes the contradictions inherent in the Coalition Government policies as its administration comes to an end.

BERA/RSA (2014) Research and the teaching profession: building the capacity for a self-improving education system, London: BERA/RSA Department for Education (2011) Training our next generation of outstanding teachers Implementation plan available at https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/181154/DFE-00083-2011.pdf Department for Education (2015) Government Response to the Carter Review of Initial Teacher Training (ITT) available at https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/396461/Carter_Review_Government_response_20150119.pdf Gove, M. (2010) Speech to the Annual Conference of the National College for Leadership of Schools and Children's Services, Birmingham, 25 November.