Bring back Woodhead

The education service in England has had to endure some far out Chief Inspectors of Schools coupled with Secretaries of State who want to interfere with it. This is the first time I realised there was a new kid on the block from the first of January who appears to vie with Michael Gove by taking an outlandish approach. Schools, he says, will be inspected without prior warning.

Gove is attempting to force primary schools to become academies. Where it becomes known there have been large protest meetings. The problem is that any crank can apply directly to the Department for Education with a submission for Free Schools without even the local authority being aware. How planning for education will take place, or accountability can happen is a complete mystery. Since New Labour pushed Academies there is no opposition to the privatisation of education from any major party.

I have heard rumours that organisations like book publishers are planning on running a number of schools, where of course they will have a captive market for their publications. Money is the key. Education as a serious area of study has disappeared. The less anyone knows about it, how children learn, is all dead and buried in the ideological world of market forces.

Blogged by John Tyrrell at 9:54 PM, January 10, 2012 | Comments (0)

Dragging out the truth about our finances

Who can we trust to tell us the truth? It appears, as Margaret Hodge MP points out, that you have to resort to Private Eye or courageous whistleblowers. We know that big companies are not paying taxes, but HMRC are failing to tackle it and coming to cosy arrangements over billions of pounds. The rest of us lose our jobs, pensions, homes and essential services and are held to ransom over fuel and food bills by the same mighty corporations who have taken over everything, apart so far from fresh air. Even that has been highly polluted!

Pensions not affordable? That's what we've been told. When I started teaching in the nineteen sixties there were complaints that the pension pot was too fat and something had to be done about that! We're told we're living too long and that's not affordable. We're not told this. Yes the fat cats are taking the cream. Be sure in the festive season they are very merry and jolly as they plan bigger and better scams for 2012.

Politicians of all persuasions seem to be dazzled by the prospect of wealth, and when we had thought they were busy looking after our interests they were feathering their own nests and joining in the "tax avoidance industry" The former Prime Minister, leader of New Labour and Peace Envoy in the Muddle East spends his free time showing others to massage their greed upwards as their Christian duty.

Blogged by John Tyrrell at 10:47 AM, December 20, 2011 | Comments (0)

"Unfortunately" job losses will continue - at the bottom

"Unfortunately" job losses will continue in local councils says LGA chairman Sir Merrick Cockel. Unfortunately pay rises will continue at the top. Councils you see have to model their behaviour on the corporate board room and pay their useless top executives loads of money.

In Birmingham we have Stephen Hughes as Chief Executive who seems to have been instrumental in bringing in Capita to the City Council where they helped set up the "Business Transformation Partnership" I think it's called. I asked Mr Hughes at a recent meeting at the Council House about the 2012-2013 budget if Capita staff would be taking swingeing cuts as Council staff were. I thought that Capita didn't come cheaply, although its track record was not very good to say the least. Mr Hughes said that Capita had helped the Council save money by identifying which buildings to axe. Did he mean children's care homes, or community facilities housing local libraries and other services? While Council employees either have no job or a massive cut to their already low pay Mr Hughes and wife don't appear to have shared the pain. Mind you there appear to be crocodile tears aplenty when Mr Hughes apologised for the stress that had been caused to city council employees by loosing their income and livlihood. Capita seem to show their appreciation regularly to Mr Hughes by footing the bill for his entertainment and delight.

Blogged by John Tyrrell at 6:21 PM, December 8, 2011 | Comments (0)