With a lifetime in education, first as a teacher and then as a schools inspector, Mike Tomlinson is seen in government circles as a safe pair of hands with a good record for dealing with tricky situations.

Born in 1942, and educated in Rotherham and Bournemouth, he studied chemistry at Durham University and taught in schools in Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire for 12 years. He also spent a year as a liaison officer between schools and the petrochemical industry.

He joined Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Schools in 1978. In 1996, the year after he was appointed director of inspection, he headed the team that went in to run the troubled Ridings School in Halifax for a year, when it was named the worst school in England.

He also helped to restore the education system in Kuwait after the 1990 Gulf War, and to develop a schools inspection regime for China.

He was awarded a CBE in 1997, and in 2000 was made chief inspector after the sudden resignation of his boss, Chris Woodhead. After the bitter antagonism that had existed between schools and Mr Woodhead at the renamed Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted), Mr Tomlinson was seen as the right man to pour oil on troubled waters.

He was not a caretaker leader however, criticising the Government over damaging teacher shortages.

He retired in April 2002, but rather than opt for the quiet life he became chairman of the trust running schools in Hackney, one of England's most problematic education services.

He had been there rather less than six months when Estelle Morris, the Education Secretary, called him in to sort out the mess over A-level grading and standards.

Miss Morris resigned not long afterwards, and it was her successor, Charles Clarke, who asked Mr Tomlinson to take charge of the review of 14-19 education, a much bigger political hot potato.

He was careful to build a broad consensus on his committee, which included representatives from schools, further education colleges, independent schools, employers, vocational trainers, universities, but it remains to be seen whether the far-reaching reforms he proposes will be acceptable to the public.

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