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Starmer sees a net 17% approval gain compared with a year ago – politicalbetting.com
Starmer sees a net 17% approval gain compared with a year ago – politicalbetting.com
Keir Starmer's approval rating is +10% in the first poll of 2023, up from -7% in the first poll of 2022.Keir Starmer Approval Rating (2-3 January):Approve: 36% (-1)Disapprove: 26% (-1)Net: +10% (–)Changes +/- 11 Decemberhttps://t.co/AKVWIP5UGO pic.twitter.com/tyThJClcL9
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There is a major crisis underway in the NHS, and his response is to deny it, and make a major policy wonk speech.
I don't see how that improves his numbers.
That's like drawing against the Faroe Islands in football.
SKS doubters please explain.
Not sure the country is in the mood for it though.
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/rishi-sunak-maths-until-18_uk_63b4919ae4b0d6f0b9f64369
Tory source: "Going from zero maths to some maths cannot be ‘double.’ Double zero is … Zero.”
Labour source hits back: "Not a great look that the people overseeing our kids’ education aren’t familiar with ‘double maths’ I suppose you didn’t get that at Winchester College."
Families will be wondering whether they will ever feel better off under the Tories.
With the growing cost of the weekly shop just one factor in this, the answer will be no.
Britain deserves better than this.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/jan/04/record-133-uk-food-inflation-raises-fears-of-another-difficult-year
Although welcome to the world of being classed as a politically exposed person.
Rishi seems to have picked up at least one idea from his mathematically-minded predecessor.
They put a load of soldiers in a large building marked on every map. They put a load of ammunition next to them. They move them about in broad daylight.
And whose fault is it when the Ukrainians blow them up?
The soldiers', for using mobile phones.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/04/anger-and-grief-at-rare-public-commemoration-in-russia-after-makiivka-strike
Although I suppose the story may have the positive side effect (from the Putinista point of view) of making soldiers nervous about using mobile phones to tell people just how big a disaster Putin's penile compensation scheme is.
And, of course, it may have some truth in it, improbable though this would be for a Russian press release.
I'm told by no10 that the Maths announcement is "fully thought through".
Headteachers union @ASCL say it might exacerbate the already "chronic national shortage" of maths teachers & must be "based on solid research, not a pet project"
https://twitter.com/tamcohen/status/1610541249588563968
Instead, they should be asking why after a series of major curriculum and exam reforms dating back ten years, we are still not teaching maths sufficiently in twelve years that an extra two years are needed on top.
They said 'might' instead of 'would.'
This country has a zillion more important things on which to focus, not someone's pet subject. This just shows him up to be a student politician. Out of touch, ideological, aloof.
They are a bunch of fucking idiots.
It's entirely typical of the whole government's approach to education. 'We all did well in maths at post-16. We are talented and successful people. Therefore, the key to making people talented and successful is to make them do more maths.'
EXCL: Ministers have signed £200k contract with disaster response charity to help drivers stuck in lorry queues in Kent.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jan/04/disaster-response-charity-enlisted-to-aid-drivers-stuck-in-uk-queues-for-channel?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
It depends on how many hours a week this new maths teaching involves, but the Sunak plan is likely to need 5000 to 10000 extra maths teachers.
The government currently aims to recruit 2000 mathematicians into teacher training each year, and got 1800 last year.
This is why an awful lot of maths lessons aren't actually taught by actual maths teachers.
Would you talk about plebs with such disdain?
1 City quants are fabulously wealthy and have private healthcare.
2 If everyone in Britain was a city quant they would all have private healthcare and we wouldn't have to worry about the NHS any more.
3 Therefore, everyone needs to study maths.
No tory should be in charge of the NHS. Period.
And no private-educated tory should be anywhere near education. Period.
Crisis? What crisis? In the NHS.
Crisis? What crisis? in teacher training and retention.
Isn't Rishi supposed to be good at maths?
Then again, HY and that beinn guy - and possibly Big_G - will point out that I live north of the wall which is devolved which proves there is no crisis in England so THERE. Which is 1+1=11 territory...
So the solution to Britain falling apart at the seams in January 2023 is a commitment to legislate to have all students do maths to 19 at some point in the parliament to come.
In the paragraph afterwards he will announce the return of the cones hotline. In 2027.
Here’s some Anecdata. My wife is a maths tutor. She currently teaches mathematics to a kid who came to the U.K. from abroad. The kid has very little English and lived in a rural community. Basic arithmetic is new to this child. The child is bright, but at 14 years old it’s a struggle that relies on a lot of 1:1 time.
If you really want to achieve core standards at 18, will require significant investment.
And the answers could be:
1) Lack of specialist teachers - which is a long standing problem, made worse by this government;
2) A badly written curriculum - which is the responsibility of Nick Gibb, a member of this government;
3) A joke of an assessment system - ibid.
4) A broken inspection system - which has undoubtedly been caused by the decision to appoint a personal friend of Nicky Morgan as chief, instead of somebody with a functioning brain or even a limited knowledge of education;
5) Classes that are too large for the teaching methods demanded - see (1);
6) A complex system of management that seems designed to provide cushy numbers for bureaucrats rather than decent education for children - also see (1).
Now if Sunak were, instead of just coming up with dense ideas on post-16, to come up with at least questions to why these happened, and then try to find answers, we might get somewhere.
But lifelong learning is another area where this government is appallingly weak.
Not a huge fan, but Angela Rayner did have some interesting ideas on it that Labour, at least, should be exploring further.
https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1610548517722030080
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64158179
I'm not defending the entire record of Tory government 2010-2023.
It's just Casino's post made me realise I was a little bit harsh in my criticism of this specific proposal and the associated report. It might form the basis of something worthwhile that the future Starmer government can implement.
"Ah but what about Labour-run Wales" has been a deflection for a long time. And apparently SNP-run Scotland which as someone who literally stood for office against the SNP I find amusing when it is thrown at me.
What is the purpose of these deflections? To muddy the water, to whatabout away from the hell that is the NHS. The idea that Scotland and Wales can somehow completely avoid the structural and financial crisis in England is for the birds. Having just seen NHS Scotland in action in rural Aberdeenshire and then into Aberdeen with my dad, whilst they are struggling through the winter it doesn't appear to be remotely as dire as reports from England.
The country is in the grip of multiple co-morbid social and economic crises so let's make the slines do more maths at school.
His Christian characters, amiably discussing the Trinity as the Empire imploded around them, are an example of it. The problems are so intractable that they decide to focus on irrelevancies instead.
There's so much pi you can only have a little bit.
https://twitter.com/AlastairMeeks/status/1610550405301239808
There is a reason why I did much better at physics and economics than maths, even though there's so much maths in them.
It strikes me as exceedingly unlikely that someone who has not progressed their maths to exceed that of a primary school child by the age of 16 will benefit from an additional two years of mathematics.
https://twitter.com/LeonaONeill1/status/1610554683663450114
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64158179
https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1610555115722645504
But here we come back to another problem with the government and indeed our education system more widely. It's far too prone to assuming everyone is the same, deep down - good at academic subjects taught in particular ways. Because that's what our leaders were good at and they want us all to be as good as them.
It is, in fact, perfectly well-intentioned but it breaks down when you realise even among very able people like you, I and indeed pretty much everyone else on this highly-educated and will-informed forum there are significant differences in approach and outcome which cannot be accommodated in a rigid structure. How much more complex when you add in those who have dyslexia or dyscalculia and literally cannot access the exams they are told they must do if they're not to be a failure?
Sunak's maths approach is not inherently bad, but it is irrelevant to the primary concerns of the electorate and sounds... odd. Not Truss' energy wibbling when asked about borrowing/inflation/mortgage costs weird, but still out of kilter with the general public discourse of the minute. And that's not exactly a subtle or hidden conversation people are having (economic, and, lately, A&E).
It is inherently bad because it is based on a damaging misunderstanding.
And if ever implemented (it won't be) it would be a disaster for that reason.
It would be nice, just for once, to have leaders who bothered to actually understand matters in education before coming up with policies.
One thing it definitely won't do is fix innumeracy for the lowest centiles going forward.
But of course, I never went into banking...
It doesn't seem controversial to suggest that Britain's Maths education could do with improving. This could be the sort of thing that will help to make Britain a better country in 10-20 years time, if you imagine a possible future where Maths education noticeably improves.
And how are they planning to pay the teachers required because it won't be cheap.
Well, it is for the Dems anyway.
The natural outcome of this sort of bigotry is that you'll confine rigorous education to the private sector and only the private sector.
A horrible thought is starting to cross my mind - is Sunak actually a worse PM than Johnson?
If the announcement was extensive maths tutoring for all ages you might have a point.
But it isn't...
Ironically, of course, if this was implemented it would only be private schools that could refuse to teach everyone maths...
I don't have a problem with improving the quality of maths in British schools, indeed strongly for it. I don't see how extending maths teaching to 18 helps though.
Maths should be embedded into subjects that youngsters want to learn, with practical examples such as book keeping and accounts as part of vocational courses in beauty or plumbing. My experience of boys not interested in maths is that they have a deep understanding of goal difference and the probability of Arsenal winning the League.
The key to all good teaching seems to me not to be down to this style or that technique, though training in all these are useful, but rather down to motivation. A teacher needs the motivation to engage the students, and the student needs the motivation to learn. For both parties there also needs to be an absence of distractions to give space for the motivation to grow. A teacher being constantly battered by demands or a pupil being hungry or bullied do not have that space.
I did an analysis the other day of about 80 regular PB posters and a very clear majority of those posting at the moment are of a centre-left/left persuasion whilst centre-right posters (which narrowly outweight both combined) have gone back to lurking. The inverse of how it was here in 2008-2009.
It's a morale thing, like seeing 9 Lib Dem boards up in Hyacinth Avenue, interpolating, and thinking everyone is going to vote Lib Dem - but it's not representative.
I despair.