Former chief inspector of schools Chris Woodhead has revealed he would rather kill himself than die in agony from motor neurone disease.

The 62-year-old, who was the top schools watchdog for six years until 2000, was diagnosed with the disease in 2006.

He was formerly the second deputy county education officer for Shropshire and a teacher in Shrewsbury, who began his career at the Priory Boys’ School, now the Shrewsbury Sixth Form College.

Mr Woodhead, who lives with his wife Christine in Snowdonia, Wales, said that as a former keen hiker who now walks with a stick and has trouble dressing himself, “the quality of one’s life is more important than its quantity”.

He said: “I am clear in my own mind that it is better to end it than continue a life that is extremely frustrating for me and onerous to others who are living with me.”

“I find it humiliating that Christine has to do everything, even take the rubbish out, so the prospect of being completely incapable, of relying on computer-assisted breathing, or assisted speech, is not one I would ever want to tolerate.”

The former schools boss said he had ruled out travelling to an assisted suicide clinic like Dignitas in Switzerland. “The truth is I would be more likely to drive myself in a wheelchair off a cliff in Cornwall than go to Dignitas and speak to a bearded social worker,” he said.

“I have no immediate plans to kill myself. I hope that I have several years of reasonable life left.”