Government inspectors said progress had been rapid in recent months and there was now strong leadership in place but many other areas remained unsatisfactory or poor.

Today's report says that increased efforts should be made to improve educational standards among ethnic minority pupils and more support should be provided for pupils with behavioural problems as well as those in council care.

However, the Ofsted inspectors say: "It is to the credit of the (Local Education) Authority and Education Bradford that the progress to date has been managed with considerable success. These changes have led to improvements in the culture and relationships with the educational service as a whole.

"The partnership with schools is now a more appropriate one in which greater trust and confidence are developing between headteachers, officers and (council) members. Education priorities feature strongly within corporate plans and the essential contribution to the social and economic regeneration of the district is fully recognised."

The Ofsted inspection which resulted in today's report was conducted between April and September 2002 followed an earlier inspection in 2000 in which Bradford Local Education Authority's performance was ranked as "very poor."

Councillor Margaret Eaton, Bradford Council Leader, says: "The Council accepts the findings of this report and while it is encouraging that we have improved since the previous Ofsted, we need to do much better. As the inspectors have commented, we are all determined to bring about positive changes in our schools. I can assure parents that education remains our greatest priority and we are working alongside teachers and parents to continue to improve education standards among our young people."

Mark Pattison, Managing Director of Education Bradford, the company brought in after the report in 2000 to run education-support services in the district, says: "There have been significant improvements in the last 12 months - and these have continued since the Ofsted team left us in September."

An Action Plan is now being drawn up by Bradford Council and Education Bradford showing how they plan to tackle the 25 recommendations made in the report.