See how when Henman was in with a chance there were Flags of St George being waved, but now it's Murray there are Union Jacks waved, and people taking offence over Saltires waved
Re Gove's view that 5yrs olds should know fractions - maybe its just me but I knew that half an orange was 1/2 an orange when I was five.
I knew 5 Smarties were a 1/4 of the Smarties on the table too.
And knew my times tables up to 12x before I left State primary school in 1977.
Perhaps my Mum helped me to know these things when others didn't - I can't remember, but surely its not *too hard* to know such things by rote then? There are few things more essential to general life than knowing how to do simple adds/subtractions/percentages and times tables in your head?
Even if its just to have a general idea of how much a tank of petrol will cost?
My brother and I knew all we needed to know about fractions. One cuts, the other chooses. Simple, and such precision. Barely a crumb of difference.
That's game theory, not fractions.
It took a brialliant mathematician to translate real life into theory
See how when Henman was in with a chance there were Flags of St George being waved, but now it's Murray there are Union Jacks waved, and people taking offence over Saltires waved
Would Tony Blair have whipped out a St G cross in the Royal box (they are banned in Centre court) - nope - far too classy.
"We have withdrawn an article today relating to Unite and Mr Len McCluskey that contained allegations concerning Unite’s role in nominating Labour MPs with particular reference to Paisley. This withdrawal follows correspondence form Unite’s solicitors to the effect that information contained in the article was false. Pending further enquiries, we have withdrawn the article and request that media outlets do not report further the information contained in it."
Against this backdrop, a group of angry hayseeds crassly damaged something that wasn’t theirs, and one at least thought all the above less interesting than Scottish independence. WTF?
And yet the politics of these 'hayseeds' have got us to the point where the break up of the UK is a real possibility, while your (I assume) politics obsessively examines itself for symptoms of identity, picks over its past for reassurance and tries desperately to differentiate between virtually indistinguishable political brands. I guess a username based on an American financed caricature of a long-lost British global significance should have been a clue.
Kevin may be playing to the gallery - but he clearly doesn't think EdM is being smart here. I notice that The Mirror can't spell *Agreee* either in their invitation to comment on this article...
"Ed Miliband is a Kamikaze Kid after triggering a Labour civil war instead of fighting the ConDems.
He's a leader carelessly splitting his own party by foolishly treating Unite's Len McCluskey as an enemy within.
Miliband forgetting that his opponent is called David William Donald Cameron and leads the Conservative Party, not a trade union, suggests he needs a long holiday. He divided Labour's top team with his ill-judged decision to escalate the Falkirk parliamentary selection row by calling the police.
I'm reliably informed that Iain McNicol, Labour's general secretary, was among those against dialling 999. And if Miliband is genuinely concerned about how wannabe MPs are picked, he could start by cutting out the promises of safe Labour seats in return for favours.
Parachuting a chosen elite into Westminster is the big Labour fixing scandal of the past 20 years, northern England's working-class communities abused as a landing site for too many ambitious politicians with no love for the region. Miliband has blundered into a conflict he'll never win because those egging him on, inside and outside Labour, will never declare his victory.
The cheerleaders, describing his stand against Unite as brave, aren't Miliband's supporters. They mainly want him to be the Julia Gillard of British politics, to follow the ousted leader of Oz Labor into the wilderness.
How to lose friends and alienate people isn't a winning strategy.
See how when Henman was in with a chance there were Flags of St George being waved, but now it's Murray there are Union Jacks waved, and people taking offence over Saltires waved
Ah, sorry, a bit slow there. No real issue in it for me, to be honest. A Scots FM waving a Saltire when a Scot wins something should be a no brainer.
"The idea that people who grew up in the sixties are suddenly going to morph into Tory bigots seems a little patronising."
That's not what I said, and you know it.
They morph gradually and society changes slowly too. So they are moving against a background. In 2050, Laurie Penny may well be a "Tory bigot" , but the Tory party of then won't be the Tory party of today - like the Tory party of 2013 isn't the party of MacMillan. They may, of course, be even more right wing.
You're fighting a losing battle, tim. Embrace your inner senescence you'll feel happier for it.
It's a lot more complex than that. I've been pointing out for a long time that among over 75's Miliband has much better ratings than Cameron (14% lead last month) why that is who knows, living through the war and recognising personality types like Dave in the nylons trade maybe.
Some 1st generation university-goers just after WWII from traditional Lab households; some "my enemy's enemy (ie USSR) is my friend"-ers; some (early) immigrants; "Intellectuals", where that word has tended to signify "left wing". Plus most of these are in urban areas.
Cam "only" has the shires which, as you say, are diminishing in number.
"We have withdrawn an article today relating to Unite and Mr Len McCluskey that contained allegations concerning Unite’s role in nominating Labour MPs with particular reference to Paisley. This withdrawal follows correspondence form Unite’s solicitors to the effect that information contained in the article was false. Pending further enquiries, we have withdrawn the article and request that media outlets do not report further the information contained in it."
The comments under this Oborne piece might be worth a look later.
The reason is that tennis is not a national sport. It is a middle-class game which is played by, in statistical terms, a small minority of relatively affluent people. In addition it is to a large extent an elite sport, dominated by private clubs, or by people with expensive courts in back gardens. Just look at yesterday's crowd, where the tone was set by the home counties: a rich, glamorous, private sector world of hedge fund managers, PR executives and marketing experts, with more than a sprinkling of the offshore set. In this respect tennis resembles golf, which is not really a sport at all: more a form of outdoor relief for post-menopausal males, sponsored by adidas and greatly favoured by overweight corporate executives. These types, by the way, very much in evidence at Wimbledon yesterday.
Golfers are similar to pet owners and illegally parked/speeding motorists when it comes to self awareness.
Golf has changed a lot in the last twenty years. The middle-class golfing elite are being put at bay because golf clubs need money.
The club* I used to play at allows a lot more ruffians on that it used to.
I regularly got pulled over by wankerish middle-aged tossers for having non-tailored shorts on, or for having my shirt hanging out. I had a four-week ban for wearing the wrong shorts after being repeatedly told off. Stupid, pompous stuff like that; things that really played into the hands of rebels like me. I haven't played golf in this country for a couple of years but I know a lot of my rugby-boy friends are now members and years back none of them would've passed the 'interview'. I remember my father being asked loads of little-Hitler questions in our 'interview' to become members. I was only a kid and quite intimidated. When I got older I just regarded them as the bunch of schoolboy bullies and arrogant no-marks that they actually were. The stares stopped when I got older.
*The irony is that the club is not even particularly salubrious. I bet in the home-counties I'd get taken out by a heat-seeking missile on the driveway if I dared get near the course.
(ps i don't think we particularly need to teach creativity. kids are fairly anarchic by nature, in my experience )
Spot-on. That is the key point, and the one I was trying to illustrate earlier. It is a logical nonsense to think that teaching someone about the dates of battles, or the rules of grammar, or mental arithmetic, makes them less creative. On the other hand, thinking you can make them creative by letting them take the easy way out and just fool around with no-one criticising or evaluating their output, no matter how lazy, is a blind alley.
Hooray, missing Scottish politician found safe and...err...well. JoLa's experience as a teacher of having to read loads of snide excuse notes from skiving pupils seems to have come in useful in today's Daily Record.
'That is why I discussed the issue with my friend and colleague Ed Miliband and said we needed an investigation.'
(ps i don't think we particularly need to teach creativity. kids are fairly anarchic by nature, in my experience )
Spot-on. That is the key point, and the one I was trying to illustrate earlier. It is a logical nonsense to think that teaching someone about the dates of battles, or the rules of grammar, or mental arithmetic, makes them less creative. On the other hand, thinking you can make them creative by letting them take the easy way out and just fool around with no-one criticising or evaluating their output, no matter how lazy, is a blind alley.
That hits the nail on the head for me - I can't think of how many times I've been at a conference when the presenters announce its *break out* time when 8 strangers get to make posters or come up with fag packet ideas or whatever.
I really am not interested in wasting 2hrs doing this or presenting someone's appalling handwritten A3 scribble as something worth remembering 5 mins later.
It's all *very creative* if using the lowest commonest denominator, but I've never taken anything back from such stuff. If you do it in a work group who will see each other the next day and rely on each other for results - it has merit, otherwise its nonsense.
Using it regularly in the classroom strikes me as very lazy teaching.
@BBCNews: Experts say homes insulated under flagship Green Deal scheme may overheat in hot summers http://t.co/LxgloyCYmq
I'm assuming that's part of Daves plan to reduce the UKIP vote
TBF it has to make sense to optimize British houses for cold weather not hot weather.
But maybe there's some quick, cheap stuff the British could be doing, like adopting this Japanese-engineered sudare technology: http://twitpic.com/5f1p6c
Dominic Laurie @dominic_laurie In 2008 Russian energy giant Gazprom was worth $367bn. Now it's worth $78bn. One of the reasons? US shale gas. @TheEconomist
(ps i don't think we particularly need to teach creativity. kids are fairly anarchic by nature, in my experience )
Spot-on. That is the key point, and the one I was trying to illustrate earlier. It is a logical nonsense to think that teaching someone about the dates of battles, or the rules of grammar, or mental arithmetic, makes them less creative. On the other hand, thinking you can make them creative by letting them take the easy way out and just fool around with no-one criticising or evaluating their output, no matter how lazy, is a blind alley.
I guess it's a good thing, then, that no mainstream teacher or politician, ever, has suggested the second option.
And as for the first option: it's a logical nonsense to suggest that some element of teaching facts makes the pupil less creative. Equally, it would be a logical nonsense to suggest that insisting every waking hour should be spent on learning facts and regurgitating them in tests could fail to have a negative impact on creativity. Nobody is arguing for either extreme: Gove is consistently misleading about what currently goes on in schools so that he can argue that there is a crisis which needs urgent solutions; this perception of crisis makes it easier to argue that his prescription is the solution to the perceived crisis.
In particular there are two London constituencies of particular concern: Ilford North and Lewisham Deptford.’
‘Given that this constituency appears on a Unite target list along with Falkirk, I believe that the circumstances of this membership recruitment merit investigation’, Mr Neill added.
The letter also points to claims from a London Labour activist Mandy Richards that Unite is ‘bankrolling’ a number of ‘orchestrated’ campaigns.
She singles out Lewisham Deptford for 'special attention'.
Austerity doesn't work. Krugman was right; Balls was right. Frau Merkel forgot to wonder who would buy German exports once she'd imposed austerity on the PIGS.
Really, that is also the essence of objections to the whole Euro project -- a currency union needs transfer payments, so the right should be up to speed on this.
Osborne made a similar mistake -- relying on a Eurozone boom to make up for his cutting domestic demand.
@Polruan - If you don't think there's a crisis which needs addressing, then you really haven't been paying attention. Or maybe you think it doesn't matter that a quarter of a million children leave primary school without being able to read and write properly, that we are falling in the international league tables (and would fall a lot further if it wasn't for the independent schools boosting part of the sample), that only one state school pupil in 20 is entered for one of the three main science subjects [2009 figures], or, worst of all, as Michael Gove pointed out in 2009:
Of the 75,000 children on free school meals each year (about 1 in 8 of all pupils), four out of ten fail to get even a single ‘C’ grade GCSE. Only 189 of these 75,000 go on to get three As at A Level – compared with the 175 three A’s pupils produced by just one school, Eton.
Independent schools, which educate just 7% of pupils, produce more pupils who get three A's at A Level than every comprehensive school put together.
No, no crisis at all. Everything is perfect in state education, if only Michael Gove would let them continue in their dogged pursuit of mediocrity it would all be fine. After all, who cares if only 189 out of 75,000 children get top A levels?
Not really, I'm afraid. I taught English in the state education system 15 years ago, but since then it's gone through a big reform aimed at "yutori" (something like "leeway" or "breathing space") that was supposed to stop trying to cram facts into the kids' heads and keeping them intensively occupied for every waking hour, and instead make them more creative.
A lot of older people complain that the "yutori" generation can't work properly because they're used to too much freedom, or something like that. This isn't my experience - the few young people I work are sharp, hard-working and creative, but I doubt I have a representative sample.
Edmund, I know a lot of our top brass in Japan agree with that view, we've had to send over key staff from the US and London to get our Japanese game studios back on an even keel. After about 5 years of "yutori" graduates coming into the company output fell through the floor along with productivity, there was no structure at the company and many of the executives didn't know how to deal with that, and the ones that did had already been promoted to global roles within SCEWWS.
The way I see it is that the "yutori" grads are not compatible with the way a lot of Japanese companies do business, and it is up to them to rise up and take control, now with the right direction and management from our US and UK executives that generation of graduates are making some of the best and most interesting games because they are incredibly creative.
The blame lies on Japanese management as much as it does on the graduates themselves. Management are incredibly inflexible in Japan and we had to take the incredibly unorthodox step of bringing western managers into our flagship development studio, I think most other Japanese companies probably wouldn't do that so will have a much harder time of adjusting to the new education system and it's emphasis on creativity above fact learning.
Amazingly we seem to be going in the other direction right now in the UK after years of trying to "teach" creativity (which as SO points out is impossible) I think Gove has gone too far in the other direction and school will become too structured and rigid. Interesting times...
Kevin Rudd's apology to the families of those killed in the home insulation scandal is not enough, according to the Coalition, who say they will keep pushing the Prime Minister to disclose the warnings he received about the scheme.
On Thursday, the Queensland Coroner handed down damning findings into the electrocution of three young Queenslanders in 2009 and 2010, criticising the federal and Queensland governments over the deaths.
"Everything is perfect in state education, if only Michael Gove would let them continue in their dogged pursuit of mediocrity it would all be fine. After all, who cares if only 189 out of 75,000 children get top A levels?"
(ps i don't think we particularly need to teach creativity. kids are fairly anarchic by nature, in my experience )
Spot-on. That is the key point, and the one I was trying to illustrate earlier. It is a logical nonsense to think that teaching someone about the dates of battles, or the rules of grammar, or mental arithmetic, makes them less creative. On the other hand, thinking you can make them creative by letting them take the easy way out and just fool around with no-one criticising or evaluating their output, no matter how lazy, is a blind alley.
I agree
Think how many songs or books were written in the face of hardship be it professional, love, family, whatever, compared with the dross that gets made when people have found happiness and fame and have time to dwell on their self indulgent arses
[Primaries] cost about £20k a pop from memory - so are a very expensive route to find a candidate.
Is that mostly postage? It might cost you that for a single party doing it on its own the first time, but nationally the obvious thing to do would be: a) You'd have a single mailing for all participating parties. b) Do the thing online, using credentials you gave out when you registered the voter, so all you need is a single national online voting system, which you could also use for other elections and/or referendums.
(2) would be wildly expensive and broken if the government did it, but you could just announce a prize and let a bunch of different teams build systems, then have some people who understand security pick the best one.
Also even with the single-party postal option, people are presumably going to be much keener to open those envelopes than your average direct mail, so if you were prepared to stick an advertising leaflet in there too you could probably cover some or all of the cost.
Tell the Jocks. And, please, if you - say - open a phrase with a hyphen then please enclose similarly; the use of a comma, any comma, it better spent....
TBF it has to make sense to optimize British houses for cold weather not hot weather.
But maybe there's some quick, cheap stuff the British could be doing, like adopting this Japanese-engineered sudare technology: http://twitpic.com/5f1p6c
On an entirely off topic note, are there enough members in Japan to organise a meet up? I'm going to be in Tokyo in September I think we can get a PB group together for an overseas meet up!
@Polruan - If you don't think there's a crisis which needs addressing, then you really haven't been paying attention. Or maybe you think it doesn't matter that a quarter of a million children leave primary school without being able to read and write properly, that we are falling in the international league tables (and would fall a lot further if it wasn't for the independent schools boosting part of the sample), that only one state school pupil in 20 is entered for one of the three main science subjects [2009 figures], or, worst of all, as Michael Gove pointed out in 2009:
Of the 75,000 children on free school meals each year (about 1 in 8 of all pupils), four out of ten fail to get even a single ‘C’ grade GCSE. Only 189 of these 75,000 go on to get three As at A Level – compared with the 175 three A’s pupils produced by just one school, Eton.
Independent schools, which educate just 7% of pupils, produce more pupils who get three A's at A Level than every comprehensive school put together.
No, no crisis at all. Everything is perfect in state education, if only Michael Gove would let them continue in their dogged pursuit of mediocrity it would all be fine. After all, who cares if only 189 out of 75,000 children get top A levels?
I didn't say there was or wasn't a crisis. There are major social exclusion issues, for example, many of which are likely to be worsened by a shortage of places in areas of high demand (which tend to correlate to poorer or inner city areas where there's a higher prevalence of free school meals) - yet the main new school places policy is creating places in areas other than those with the most acute shortage.
My point was that Gove pretends that there is a crisis in things like fact learning or evaluation of work. This morning you've characterised the choice as being between a status quo where pupils drift around being taught no facts and having their output uncriticized and unassessed, or Gove-world where some dates and techniques are taught. Plato's suggested that learning times tables at primary school is a long-abandoned tradition that should be restored. Both of these are in line with Gove's misleading denigration of the current state of educational methods.
Identifying some (genuine) problems in outcomes, then making false claims about existing teaching in order to make some changes to teaching methods, not particularly backed up by either evidential or conceptual links to improvements in the "crisis" outcomes is not addressing a crisis, whether said crisis exists or not.
Kevin Rudd's apology to the families of those killed in the home insulation scandal is not enough, according to the Coalition, who say they will keep pushing the Prime Minister to disclose the warnings he received about the scheme.
On Thursday, the Queensland Coroner handed down damning findings into the electrocution of three young Queenslanders in 2009 and 2010, criticising the federal and Queensland governments over the deaths.
Edited-to-add: Australian web-sites are suggesting that legal-action is about to be taken.
PROVIDE THE LINKS FROM AT LEAST ONE OF THESE SITES PLEASE.
From link:
The directors and supervisors of ceiling insulation businesses that employed the young men could also face Workplace Safety charges....
Mr Rudd said he accepted the criticisms of the government by the Queensland Coroner, saying: ''Let's not beat around the bush - this was a government program.''
Hmm..good bets, bad bets. Al Kazeem at 3/1 from Ladbrokes on Saturday morning got me out of bed and down the High Street pretty sharp. I now regret not taking the 7/2 on offer about Mr Murray a fortnight back but like so many I couldn't see him beating Nadal, Federer AND Djokovic at that time (as it turns out, he didn't have to).
On-topic, we can see why the Prime Minister wants UKIP down to 5% - the Con/UKIP bloc is around 43-45% so that offers a Conservative vote of 38-40% which would be enough. As I recall, around 2/5 of UKIP supporters would prefer a majority Conservative Government so that bloc is within reach.
I don't espect the Labour/UNITE business to be of much interest beyond places like this at the moment. As others have said, it doesn't do any Labour leader any harm to be seen to be standing up to the Unions and a shrewder Len McCluskey might consider that his contribution toward the next Labour Government might be to play the role of the pantomime villain.
Economic matters (as someone said earlier) and I'm disappointed Carney has decided not to return to normal monetary policy thus condemning savers to another three years of abysmal or non-existant returns. I appreciate the politics but at some point interest rates will have to rise and it may be the longer such a rise is deferred (until after a 2015 GE) the sharper and more aggressive it will be and it's an elephant trap awaiting the next Government (of whichever stripe) and the consequences of a rapid return to "normal" rates on households used to nearly a decade of historically low rates (not to mention zombie firms) could be considerable.
TBF it has to make sense to optimize British houses for cold weather not hot weather.
But maybe there's some quick, cheap stuff the British could be doing, like adopting this Japanese-engineered sudare technology: http://twitpic.com/5f1p6c
On an entirely off topic note, are there enough members in Japan to organise a meet up? I'm going to be in Tokyo in September I think we can get a PB group together for an overseas meet up!
I'm not sure who else is in/near Tokyo, but I'd be up for a beer when you're here, even if it just turns out to be the two of us... The hitch is that I might be in Berlin in September, but let's talk nearer the time.
(ps i don't think we particularly need to teach creativity. kids are fairly anarchic by nature, in my experience )
Spot-on. That is the key point, and the one I was trying to illustrate earlier. It is a logical nonsense to think that teaching someone about the dates of battles, or the rules of grammar, or mental arithmetic, makes them less creative. On the other hand, thinking you can make them creative by letting them take the easy way out and just fool around with no-one criticising or evaluating their output, no matter how lazy, is a blind alley.
I agree
Think how many songs or books were written in the face of hardship be it professional, love, family, whatever, compared with the dross that gets made when people have found happiness and fame and have time to dwell on their self indulgent arses
From my experience - self indulgent arses are born that way and are narcissists. They'd be *artistes* whatever their education.
The idea that how you're taught to spell or historical facts or grammar will impact on your creativity is just pants - without the basics, you can't form an opinion or much else or indeed communicate it.
Monkeys and typewriters creating Hamlet are the benchmark here.
Boris Johnson has risked accusations of sexism after he told a City Hall audience that rising numbers of women are attending university in order to find a husband.
Johnson’s remark was made at last week’s launch of the World Islamic Economic Forum, where he appeared alongside the Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak.
Asked about the role of women in Islamic societies, Razak told the Evening Standard’s Pippa Crerar:
“Before coming here my officials have told me that the latest university intake in Malaysia, a Muslim country, 68% will be women entering our universities.” After which Boris interrupted with the suggestion that:
tim, he's not wrong. The role of women in Islam is an issue that warrants further discussion, for sure, but of those 68% how many of them are Chinese and Indian descended Malays and how many are Muslim...
'Keith Vaz, chairman of Parliament's Home Affairs Select Committee, questioned why the government had not started work on a treaty with Jordan at an earlier stage in the process.
"The home secretary's legal advisers will have questions to answer as to why they didn't conceive of this scheme earlier which would have prevented a cost to the taxpayer of £1.7m."
Maybe the idiot Vaz should be asking questions on how five Labour Home Secretaries failed so miserably to get rid of the scumbag.
TBF it has to make sense to optimize British houses for cold weather not hot weather.
But maybe there's some quick, cheap stuff the British could be doing, like adopting this Japanese-engineered sudare technology: http://twitpic.com/5f1p6c
On an entirely off topic note, are there enough members in Japan to organise a meet up? I'm going to be in Tokyo in September I think we can get a PB group together for an overseas meet up!
I'm not sure who else is in/near Tokyo, but I'd be up for a beer when you're here, even if it just turns out to be the two of us... The hitch is that I might be in Berlin in September, but let's talk nearer the time.
Definitely up for it. I'll probably be in the Grand Hyatt in Minato-ku so even if it's just a Suntory in the bar that's cool...
Strange but true: UKIP actually have a councillor in NI, on Newry & Mourne (this council is split between Newry & Armagh and South Down Westminster/Stormont seats).
(ps i don't think we particularly need to teach creativity. kids are fairly anarchic by nature, in my experience )
Spot-on. That is the key point, and the one I was trying to illustrate earlier. It is a logical nonsense to think that teaching someone about the dates of battles, or the rules of grammar, or mental arithmetic, makes them less creative. On the other hand, thinking you can make them creative by letting them take the easy way out and just fool around with no-one criticising or evaluating their output, no matter how lazy, is a blind alley.
I agree
Think how many songs or books were written in the face of hardship be it professional, love, family, whatever, compared with the dross that gets made when people have found happiness and fame and have time to dwell on their self indulgent arses
From my experience - self indulgent arses are born that way and are narcissists. They'd be *artistes* whatever their education.
The idea that how you're taught to spell or historical facts or grammar will impact on your creativity is just pants - without the basics, you can't form an opinion or much else or indeed communicate it.
Monkeys and typewriters creating Hamlet are the benchmark here.
How many self indulgent arses and narcissists have you known since birth??!!
No-one is claiming learning facts or timetables will stifle creativity. What does, though, is not nurturing and directing it. There needs to be a balance.
Should be worth something to the Tories in the polls.
According to the Standard there's now a nasty petition going round to deport his wife and children too, even though nobody's accused them of anything and they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).
Should be worth something to the Tories in the polls.
According to the Standard there's now a nasty petition going round to deport his wife and children too, even though nobody's accused them of anything and they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).
I didn't realise the blessed St Margaret was still PM in 1994, or were they granted asylum prior to that and took it up in 1994?
According to the Standard there's now a nasty petition going round to deport his wife and children too, even though nobody's accused them of anything and they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).
Come on now - 1994 Thatcher was long gone... (Labourites blaming Thatcher for everything...)
I believe I pointed towards this a day or two ago?
Mike Smithson@MSmithsonPB5m Hung parliament now running neck and neck with LAB at Betfair GE2015 based on actual trades expressed as %ages pic.twitter.com/GV6MSm21R8
No-one is claiming learning facts or timetables will stifle creativity. What does, though, is not nurturing and directing it. There needs to be a balance.
There does need to be a balance, I fear that Gove is moving education too far towards a rigid and dry system that apes the worst of German education without any of the job security that comes from their apprenticeship system.
Should be worth something to the Tories in the polls.
According to the Standard there's now a nasty petition going round to deport his wife and children too, even though nobody's accused them of anything and they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).
I know Gove passed his history test on LBC this morning, but NPxMP has just flunked modern politics, 1994 - Thatcher??? Or am I missing something.....
[Primaries] cost about £20k a pop from memory - so are a very expensive route to find a candidate.
Is that mostly postage? It might cost you that for a single party doing it on its own the first time, but nationally the obvious thing to do would be: a) You'd have a single mailing for all participating parties. b) Do the thing online, using credentials you gave out when you registered the voter, so all you need is a single national online voting system, which you could also use for other elections and/or referendums.
(2) would be wildly expensive and broken if the government did it, but you could just announce a prize and let a bunch of different teams build systems, then have some people who understand security pick the best one.
Also even with the single-party postal option, people are presumably going to be much keener to open those envelopes than your average direct mail, so if you were prepared to stick an advertising leaflet in there too you could probably cover some or all of the cost.
Labour routinely does a fund-raiser with its ballots, and I suspect all parties do. We'd worry about exclusion of the undigitised in an all-email ballot, though what is now common is letters that mainly go by email except to the handful of members without an email address. A snag about that is that people forget to tell us when they change email addresses (whereas most people remember to report a house move).
I believe I pointed towards this a day or two ago?
Mike Smithson@MSmithsonPB5m Hung parliament now running neck and neck with LAB at Betfair GE2015 based on actual trades expressed as %ages pic.twitter.com/GV6MSm21R8
According to the Standard there's now a nasty petition going round to deport his wife and children too, even though nobody's accused them of anything and they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).
Thatcher ceased to be Prime Minister in 1990... In any event, never has so much money been spent to deport such a harmless man for the benefit of so few.
What you keep saying is that Tories and UKIP members tend to be older (on average) than "progressives", as if that means extinction for the parties involved.
There are two factors you like to ignore. Young lefties often grow into older righties, but not the other way round - it's a natural progression, get over it. And old gits vote more regularly. If the average age of the Labour voters was higher, they'd be unbeatable at election time.
The future is old gittery, the future is on the right.
I've not made the transition yet, but when I reach 75, who knows?
I doubt very much that the results in that poll on gay marriage will be duplicated either among over 60's of other parties or right wingers who get older, you're believing myths I think. There's already a gender split for instance in that poll as older blokes tend to be more anti and have this is reflected in UKIP gender polling.
The idea that people who grew up in the sixties are suddenly going to morph into Tory bigots seems a little patronising.
People who grew up in the Sixties are much more likely to support right wing parties now than when they first voted. In the same way that US 18-29 year olds voted for McGovern in 1972, and Romney last year.
It seems the slightest hint of inaccuracy regarding the Blessed Margaret has a handbag of her devotees (or indeed acolytes) descending upon one.
The key point here is that Abu Qatada's family was granted asylum by a previous Conservative administration and, to my knowledge, no charges have been brought against any of them. If they choose to remain and live within the law, I cannot see why anyone would have any objection to them remaining in the UK.
On more substantive issues, the key to the next election is in the 100 or so seats gained by the Conservatives from other parties (mainly Labour) in 2010. In lieu of any serious polling in the marginals (and not to overstate local election contests on a 25-30% turnout), we are left to consider how these might develop.
Yes, incumbent first-term MPs may have an advantage of sorts but it's hard to see Labour plumbing the historical depths of 2010 in 2015. The question is whether the Conservative vote of 2010 in these marginals can be held and whether that will offset the combination of three things - a) a recovery in the Labour vote, b) the likely collapse of the LD vote and c) the effect of UKIP in these seats.
I suspect that with a few exceptions, UKIP will poll best where it matters least in terms of winning seats. The LDs will fight a defensive campaign which will allow them to hold a greater number of seats than their vote share would suggest.
We are then back to the battleground marginals and the question as to whether the 20 seats the Conservatives need for an overall majority is an easier ask than the 70 or so Labour needs. Those who argue that neither will achieve their goal may yet have a fair point.
Should be worth something to the Tories in the polls.
According to the Standard there's now a nasty petition going round to deport his wife and children too, even though nobody's accused them of anything and they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).
It wasn't Thatcher, it was Michael Howard, and David Cameron as his home office SpAd. richard dodd was pushing this line yesterday.
The key point here is that Abu Qatada's family was granted asylum by a previous Conservative administration and, to my knowledge, no charges have been brought against any of them. If they choose to remain and live within the law, I cannot see why anyone would have any objection to them remaining in the UK.
That logic applied mutatis mutandis to Mr Othman before his deportation.
' they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).'
Based on forged documents.
'In 1991, after the Gulf War, Abu Qatada was expelled from Kuwait along with many other Palestinians. He returned to Jordan, but in September 1993 he fled with his wife and five children to the UK, using a forged UAE passport. He requested asylum on grounds of religious persecution, claiming he had been tortured in Jordan, and asylum was granted in June 1994.[13][14]'
As we keep being repeatedly told of the importance of family life by the ECHR,surely they would want to be in Jordan,can't be the lure of benefits that's keeping them here surely?
Tim you are lying again I did not push that line.. Have you sorted out your Abu from your Abu yet, a clue..one has a hook and was sent to the States, the other one was deported to Jordan at the weekend, he does not have a hook..His defence for staying was that he would be deprived of a family life if deported,, nothing to stop him getting one, it entails his family going to where he is.Forcible deportation was never mentioned by me..but a nice smear on your part.
Yes, lots of BNP & EDL types have been loudly proclaiming and linking to it on Twitter over the weekend.
O/T There is a gypsy band that plays to entertain the tourists by the 3 bridges in Ljubljana. It was a pleasent surprise when they played Knees up mother Brown and Roll out the barrel
Should be worth something to the Tories in the polls.
According to the Standard there's now a nasty petition going round to deport his wife and children too, even though nobody's accused them of anything and they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).
Should be worth something to the Tories in the polls.
According to the Standard there's now a nasty petition going round to deport his wife and children too, even though nobody's accused them of anything and they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).
I didn't realise the blessed St Margaret was still PM in 1994, or were they granted asylum prior to that and took it up in 1994?
Ed Miliband has today appointed former Labour MP Nick Palmer as special educational adviser for school history teaching. Mr Palmer said :
"I thank David Miliband for this opportunity. For too long since this Conservative government came to power in 2008 there has been a lack of rigour in the subject.
We need a return to teaching of subjects such as the Normal Invasion of 1166, the War of the Tulips, Henry VI and his eight wives, the Industrial Devolution and the 35-49 Second World War.
I look forward to serving in the next Labour administration after the 2014 general election."
"I'm a very strong supporter of open primaries - we had one and it was hugely successful (albeit the decision was taken at a meeting attended by several hundred residents rather than postal ballot)"
@JohnO I couldn't understand the need for a postal ballot in these Labour plans if they were going to go ahead with Open Primaries. Seems a bit daft not to just get folk to vote while they are there rather than go down a postal vote route.
I hope Alex hasn't been missed off the invite list, if not hope he remembers to pack his handbag again? Ed M can then tell the PLP all about it too at his meeting with them?
it's hard to see Labour plumbing the historical depths of 2010 in 2015.I would agree that the special factor of the "betrayed" left-wing Lib Dems make that less likely, but it's not impossible to see how it might happen.
In 2010, Labour were the incumbent government, and consequently enjoyed a certain credibility* that Miliband and the shadow cabinet will struggle to attain, simply by virtue of being the Government.
If we suppose that some of Labour's 29% in 2010 were from waverers who voted for "better the devil you know", then there is potential for the Labour vote to decline in 2015.
Good move by Labour getting Prezza out to quell the Falkirk sole 'hotspot'. Whats not a good spot!
Benedict Brogan@benedictbrogan1m 'Where the hell is Falkirk?' John 'not right, not hon' Prescott's gift to the #SNP #WATO
Tim Shipman (Mail)@ShippersUnbound3m John Prescott taking Labour's problems with the seriousness they deserve: 'Some people will say: "Where the hell is Falkirk?"'
norman smith@BBCNormanS3m John Prescott on Labour/Unite row ....."Some might say where the hell is Falkirk ?" #wato
I thought knighthoods used only to be handed out to great sportsmen on their retirement. I'd find it embarrassing to be saddled with one while still competing and no doubt motivating your opponents to try even harder. Andy should decline if offered.
Isn't just the name 'Lynton Crosby' likely to be enough to put off idealistic Lib Dems who thought their party were getting into bed with a changed Tory Party-only to discover they were riddled with an Australian STD-from putting any trust in their leadership again?
Good move by Dave to invite Ed as well. Makes him appear statesman like and not wanting to take advantage of the situation to push any agenda. Salmond can invite him to his own soiree in Scotland and invite the Scots leaders from Lab, Con and LD.
OSM It is quite reasonable to expect desperate refugees to travel on false documents to exit the area of persecution but when a country of sanctuary is reached the principle is that you admit the truth and then ask for Asylum, this appears not to be the case and is possibly regarded as fraud,
Unite accuse the Cons of "wasting police time" by reporting other potential seats to Met.
I have to agree. Apart from anything else it makes Ed's behaviour vis a vis Falkirk look marginally less ridiculous and why on earth would the tories want to do that?
Chris Hoy was still competing wasn't he? Agree that they shouldn't be handed out until sporting career is over. It would be most embarrassing if a knighted sports person got done for doping or something.
I thought knighthoods were only handed out to great sportsmen on their retirement. I'd find it embarrassing to be saddled with one while still competing and no doubt motivating your opponents to try even harder. Andy should decline if offered.
I thought knighthoods used only to be handed out to great sportsmen on their retirement. I'd find it embarrassing to be saddled with one while still competing and no doubt motivating your opponents to try even harder. Andy should decline if offered.
Not so. Even recently Sir Wiggo, Sir Hoyo and Sir Ainslo all competed or will compete whilst dubbed.
it's hard to see Labour plumbing the historical depths of 2010 in 2015.
I would agree that the special factor of the "betrayed" left-wing Lib Dems make that less likely, but it's not impossible to see how it might happen.
In 2010, Labour were the incumbent government, and consequently enjoyed a certain credibility* that Miliband and the shadow cabinet will struggle to attain, simply by virtue of being the Government.
If we suppose that some of Labour's 29% in 2010 were from waverers who voted for "better the devil you know", then there is potential for the Labour vote to decline in 2015.
* Whether they merited this is another matter.
It's an interesting analysis with which I almost completely disagree.
I think we will come to see the 2010 GE as a "one-off" in terms of historical analysis of elections. Labour had never been in power for so long and nor had the Conservatives been out of power for so long since 1918.
Previously, the Conservatives had won elections on the back of a fall in the third-party vote which was steeper than the equivalent decline in the Labour vote and 1951, 1970 and 1979 all demonstrated that - indeed, Labour outpolled the Tories in 1951.
It wasn't until the following election that Labour really suffered so in 1955, Feb 1974 and 1983, Labour fell back sharply as the third party recovered and the Conservative vote remained fairly strong (although Feb 74 stands as an exception to that).
What "should" have happened in 2010 was a significant fall in the LD vote benefitting the Conservatives directly and the pre-debate polls showing the Conservatives at 38-40%, Labour at 32-34% and the LDs at 15-17% suggested that.
Had the Conservatives won a majority in 2010, I suspect we'd be seeing polls of Labour 35%, Lib Dems 30%, Conservatives 25%, UKIP 5% or something of that nature but that's not what happened with the coming of the Coalition.
We know a significant part (perhaps as much as a half, certainly a third) of the 2010 LD vote has gone to Labour. It's also not unreasonable to suppose that some of those who wouldn't vote for Labour in 2010 might be far more motivated (after five years of Con-LD Government) to go back to Labour. Either way, Labour cannot, in my view, poll their 2010 number. As to whether they have enough votes to win a majority, that remains to be seen.
Chris Hoy was still competing wasn't he? Agree that they shouldn't be handed out until sporting career is over. It would be most embarrassing if a knighted sports person got done for doping or something.
I thought knighthoods were only handed out to great sportsmen on their retirement. I'd find it embarrassing to be saddled with one while still competing and no doubt motivating your opponents to try even harder. Andy should decline if offered.
They could always remove the knighthood. We have a precedent in 'services to banking'
Comments
See how when Henman was in with a chance there were Flags of St George being waved, but now it's Murray there are Union Jacks waved, and people taking offence over Saltires waved
It took a brialliant mathematician to translate real life into theory
http://www.hulu.com/watch/105846
Euro-trash-version:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-6CaUKC7tM
:no-further-comment...:
Hee-he-hah!
"Ed Miliband is a Kamikaze Kid after triggering a Labour civil war instead of fighting the ConDems.
He's a leader carelessly splitting his own party by foolishly treating Unite's Len McCluskey as an enemy within.
Miliband forgetting that his opponent is called David William Donald Cameron and leads the Conservative Party, not a trade union, suggests he needs a long holiday. He divided Labour's top team with his ill-judged decision to escalate the Falkirk parliamentary selection row by calling the police.
I'm reliably informed that Iain McNicol, Labour's general secretary, was among those against dialling 999. And if Miliband is genuinely concerned about how wannabe MPs are picked, he could start by cutting out the promises of safe Labour seats in return for favours.
Parachuting a chosen elite into Westminster is the big Labour fixing scandal of the past 20 years, northern England's working-class communities abused as a landing site for too many ambitious politicians with no love for the region. Miliband has blundered into a conflict he'll never win because those egging him on, inside and outside Labour, will never declare his victory.
The cheerleaders, describing his stand against Unite as brave, aren't Miliband's supporters. They mainly want him to be the Julia Gillard of British politics, to follow the ousted leader of Oz Labor into the wilderness.
How to lose friends and alienate people isn't a winning strategy.
Check out all the latest News, Sport & Celeb gossip at Mirror.co.uk http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/ed-miliband-needs-fight-real-2037789#ixzz2YRsy1wlN
Follow us: @DailyMirror on Twitter | DailyMirror on Facebook
Cam "only" has the shires which, as you say, are diminishing in number.
Link please (and pictures) :-)
PoliticsHome @politicshome
.@StephenTwigg: The freedom Free Schools have to dictate curriculum should be "extended to all maintained schools".
The club* I used to play at allows a lot more ruffians on that it used to.
I regularly got pulled over by wankerish middle-aged tossers for having non-tailored shorts on, or for having my shirt hanging out. I had a four-week ban for wearing the wrong shorts after being repeatedly told off. Stupid, pompous stuff like that; things that really played into the hands of rebels like me. I haven't played golf in this country for a couple of years but I know a lot of my rugby-boy friends are now members and years back none of them would've passed the 'interview'. I remember my father being asked loads of little-Hitler questions in our 'interview' to become members. I was only a kid and quite intimidated. When I got older I just regarded them as the bunch of schoolboy bullies and arrogant no-marks that they actually were. The stares stopped when I got older.
*The irony is that the club is not even particularly salubrious. I bet in the home-counties I'd get taken out by a heat-seeking missile on the driveway if I dared get near the course.
JoLa's experience as a teacher of having to read loads of snide excuse notes from skiving pupils seems to have come in useful in today's Daily Record.
'That is why I discussed the issue with my friend and colleague Ed Miliband and said we needed an investigation.'
http://tinyurl.com/lottbuw
I really am not interested in wasting 2hrs doing this or presenting someone's appalling handwritten A3 scribble as something worth remembering 5 mins later.
It's all *very creative* if using the lowest commonest denominator, but I've never taken anything back from such stuff. If you do it in a work group who will see each other the next day and rely on each other for results - it has merit, otherwise its nonsense.
Using it regularly in the classroom strikes me as very lazy teaching.
But maybe there's some quick, cheap stuff the British could be doing, like adopting this Japanese-engineered sudare technology:
http://twitpic.com/5f1p6c
Dominic Laurie @dominic_laurie
In 2008 Russian energy giant Gazprom was worth $367bn. Now it's worth $78bn. One of the reasons? US shale gas. @TheEconomist
And as for the first option: it's a logical nonsense to suggest that some element of teaching facts makes the pupil less creative. Equally, it would be a logical nonsense to suggest that insisting every waking hour should be spent on learning facts and regurgitating them in tests could fail to have a negative impact on creativity. Nobody is arguing for either extreme: Gove is consistently misleading about what currently goes on in schools so that he can argue that there is a crisis which needs urgent solutions; this perception of crisis makes it easier to argue that his prescription is the solution to the perceived crisis.
In particular there are two London constituencies of particular concern: Ilford North and Lewisham Deptford.’
‘Given that this constituency appears on a Unite target list along with Falkirk, I believe that the circumstances of this membership recruitment merit investigation’, Mr Neill added.
The letter also points to claims from a London Labour activist Mandy Richards that Unite is ‘bankrolling’ a number of ‘orchestrated’ campaigns.
She singles out Lewisham Deptford for 'special attention'.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2358174/Scotland-Yard-asked-investigate-union-influence-TWO-London-seats-Labour-crisis-deepens-Miliband.html#ixzz2YS0Y4f1Z
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"This morning Falkirk has become the Labour Left’s Roswell. Not a place, but a giant and glorious conspiracy theory that will both reaffirm their political world view and shield them from the harsh realities of the world as it actually is." http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/danhodges/100225322/falkirk-has-become-labours-roswell-the-truth-is-out-there-but-the-left-refuse-to-see-it/
Having been to Roswell and seen the gift shops - they're a lot more entertaining than I suspect Falkirk or even Paisley are for tourists.
:new-balls-please:
Austerity doesn't work. Krugman was right; Balls was right. Frau Merkel forgot to wonder who would buy German exports once she'd imposed austerity on the PIGS.
Really, that is also the essence of objections to the whole Euro project -- a currency union needs transfer payments, so the right should be up to speed on this.
Osborne made a similar mistake -- relying on a Eurozone boom to make up for his cutting domestic demand.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BOpac6WCIAA3O-g.jpg:large
Of the 75,000 children on free school meals each year (about 1 in 8 of all pupils), four out of ten fail to get even a single ‘C’ grade GCSE. Only 189 of these 75,000 go on to get three As at A Level – compared with the 175 three A’s pupils produced by just one school, Eton.
Independent schools, which educate just 7% of pupils, produce more pupils who get three A's at A Level than every comprehensive school put together.
http://www.thersa.org/__data/assets/pdf_file/0009/213021/Gove-speech-to-RSA.pdf
No, no crisis at all. Everything is perfect in state education, if only Michael Gove would let them continue in their dogged pursuit of mediocrity it would all be fine. After all, who cares if only 189 out of 75,000 children get top A levels?
The way I see it is that the "yutori" grads are not compatible with the way a lot of Japanese companies do business, and it is up to them to rise up and take control, now with the right direction and management from our US and UK executives that generation of graduates are making some of the best and most interesting games because they are incredibly creative.
The blame lies on Japanese management as much as it does on the graduates themselves. Management are incredibly inflexible in Japan and we had to take the incredibly unorthodox step of bringing western managers into our flagship development studio, I think most other Japanese companies probably wouldn't do that so will have a much harder time of adjusting to the new education system and it's emphasis on creativity above fact learning.
Amazingly we seem to be going in the other direction right now in the UK after years of trying to "teach" creativity (which as SO points out is impossible) I think Gove has gone too far in the other direction and school will become too structured and rigid. Interesting times...
"Everything is perfect in state education, if only Michael Gove would let them continue in their dogged pursuit of mediocrity it would all be fine. After all, who cares if only 189 out of 75,000 children get top A levels?"
But think of the childreeeennnnnn!
Think how many songs or books were written in the face of hardship be it professional, love, family, whatever, compared with the dross that gets made when people have found happiness and fame and have time to dwell on their self indulgent arses
a) You'd have a single mailing for all participating parties.
b) Do the thing online, using credentials you gave out when you registered the voter, so all you need is a single national online voting system, which you could also use for other elections and/or referendums.
(2) would be wildly expensive and broken if the government did it, but you could just announce a prize and let a bunch of different teams build systems, then have some people who understand security pick the best one.
Also even with the single-party postal option, people are presumably going to be much keener to open those envelopes than your average direct mail, so if you were prepared to stick an advertising leaflet in there too you could probably cover some or all of the cost.
My point was that Gove pretends that there is a crisis in things like fact learning or evaluation of work. This morning you've characterised the choice as being between a status quo where pupils drift around being taught no facts and having their output uncriticized and unassessed, or Gove-world where some dates and techniques are taught. Plato's suggested that learning times tables at primary school is a long-abandoned tradition that should be restored. Both of these are in line with Gove's misleading denigration of the current state of educational methods.
Identifying some (genuine) problems in outcomes, then making false claims about existing teaching in order to make some changes to teaching methods, not particularly backed up by either evidential or conceptual links to improvements in the "crisis" outcomes is not addressing a crisis, whether said crisis exists or not.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/seanthomas/100225278/revealed-how-i-posed-as-a-left-wing-nutjob-on-the-guardians-comment-is-free-and-got-away-with-it/
I suspect BenM and MickPork also of this parish are regulars over at CiF.
PROVIDE THE LINKS FROM AT LEAST ONE OF THESE SITES PLEASE.
From link: Need more from link provided? D.Y.O.R....
http://www.theherald.com.au/story/1617155/rudds-apology-on-insulation-program-deaths-not-enough-abbott/?cs=12
http://www.watoday.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/rudds-apology-on-insulation-program-deaths-not-enough-abbott-20130704-2peal.html
http://www.dailylife.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/rudds-apology-on-insulation-program-deaths-not-enough-abbott-20130704-2peal.html
Hmm..good bets, bad bets. Al Kazeem at 3/1 from Ladbrokes on Saturday morning got me out of bed and down the High Street pretty sharp. I now regret not taking the 7/2 on offer about Mr Murray a fortnight back but like so many I couldn't see him beating Nadal, Federer AND Djokovic at that time (as it turns out, he didn't have to).
On-topic, we can see why the Prime Minister wants UKIP down to 5% - the Con/UKIP bloc is around 43-45% so that offers a Conservative vote of 38-40% which would be enough. As I recall, around 2/5 of UKIP supporters would prefer a majority Conservative Government so that bloc is within reach.
I don't espect the Labour/UNITE business to be of much interest beyond places like this at the moment. As others have said, it doesn't do any Labour leader any harm to be seen to be standing up to the Unions and a shrewder Len McCluskey might consider that his contribution toward the next Labour Government might be to play the role of the pantomime villain.
Economic matters (as someone said earlier) and I'm disappointed Carney has decided not to return to normal monetary policy thus condemning savers to another three years of abysmal or non-existant returns. I appreciate the politics but at some point interest rates will have to rise and it may be the longer such a rise is deferred (until after a 2015 GE) the sharper and more aggressive it will be and it's an elephant trap awaiting the next Government (of whichever stripe) and the consequences of a rapid return to "normal" rates on households used to nearly a decade of historically low rates (not to mention zombie firms) could be considerable.
Scumbag terrorist is GONE !
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23213740
Should be worth something to the Tories in the polls.
The idea that how you're taught to spell or historical facts or grammar will impact on your creativity is just pants - without the basics, you can't form an opinion or much else or indeed communicate it.
Monkeys and typewriters creating Hamlet are the benchmark here.
I gather Mr Farage is about to head out there.
'Keith Vaz, chairman of Parliament's Home Affairs Select Committee, questioned why the government had not started work on a treaty with Jordan at an earlier stage in the process.
"The home secretary's legal advisers will have questions to answer as to why they didn't conceive of this scheme earlier which would have prevented a cost to the taxpayer of £1.7m."
Maybe the idiot Vaz should be asking questions on how five Labour Home Secretaries failed so miserably to get rid of the scumbag.
It had been 77 years since a native son had won the title at the All England Club. Thanks to a splendid Scot, Britain's wait is over"
Read more: http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2013/07/08/a-brit-at-last-how-andy-murray-captured-wimbledon/#ixzz2YSA1Zf4m
No-one is claiming learning facts or timetables will stifle creativity. What does, though, is not nurturing and directing it. There needs to be a balance.
Betfair next GE
Lab Maj 2.5 - 2.76
NOM 2.46 - 2.62
Mike Smithson@MSmithsonPB5m
Hung parliament now running neck and neck with LAB at Betfair GE2015 based on actual trades expressed as %ages pic.twitter.com/GV6MSm21R8
FATCHAAAAAHH !
I know Gove passed his history test on LBC this morning, but NPxMP has just flunked modern politics, 1994 - Thatcher??? Or am I missing something.....
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/tennis/23225645
It is a shame Mr Cameron does not know anyone in the Establishment who might be able to arrange such an honour.
Quite astonishing error.
The key point here is that Abu Qatada's family was granted asylum by a previous Conservative administration and, to my knowledge, no charges have been brought against any of them. If they choose to remain and live within the law, I cannot see why anyone would have any objection to them remaining in the UK.
On more substantive issues, the key to the next election is in the 100 or so seats gained by the Conservatives from other parties (mainly Labour) in 2010. In lieu of any serious polling in the marginals (and not to overstate local election contests on a 25-30% turnout), we are left to consider how these might develop.
Yes, incumbent first-term MPs may have an advantage of sorts but it's hard to see Labour plumbing the historical depths of 2010 in 2015. The question is whether the Conservative vote of 2010 in these marginals can be held and whether that will offset the combination of three things - a) a recovery in the Labour vote, b) the likely collapse of the LD vote and c) the effect of UKIP in these seats.
I suspect that with a few exceptions, UKIP will poll best where it matters least in terms of winning seats. The LDs will fight a defensive campaign which will allow them to hold a greater number of seats than their vote share would suggest.
We are then back to the battleground marginals and the question as to whether the 20 seats the Conservatives need for an overall majority is an easier ask than the 70 or so Labour needs. Those who argue that neither will achieve their goal may yet have a fair point.
' they've been here since the family was given asylum in 1994 (under Thatcher, for those of partisan mind).'
Based on forged documents.
'In 1991, after the Gulf War, Abu Qatada was expelled from Kuwait along with many other Palestinians. He returned to Jordan, but in September 1993 he fled with his wife and five children to the UK, using a forged UAE passport. He requested asylum on grounds of religious persecution, claiming he had been tortured in Jordan, and asylum was granted in June 1994.[13][14]'
As we keep being repeatedly told of the importance of family life by the ECHR,surely they would want to be in Jordan,can't be the lure of benefits that's keeping them here surely?
Have you sorted out your Abu from your Abu yet, a clue..one has a hook and was sent to the States, the other one was deported to Jordan at the weekend, he does not have a hook..His defence for staying was that he would be deprived of a family life if deported,, nothing to stop him getting one, it entails his family going to where he is.Forcible deportation was never mentioned by me..but a nice smear on your part.
O/T There is a gypsy band that plays to entertain the tourists by the 3 bridges in Ljubljana. It was a pleasent surprise when they played Knees up mother Brown and Roll out the barrel
"I thank David Miliband for this opportunity. For too long since this Conservative government came to power in 2008 there has been a lack of rigour in the subject.
We need a return to teaching of subjects such as the Normal Invasion of 1166, the War of the Tulips, Henry VI and his eight wives, the Industrial Devolution and the 35-49 Second World War.
I look forward to serving in the next Labour administration after the 2014 general election."
@JohnO I couldn't understand the need for a postal ballot in these Labour plans if they were going to go ahead with Open Primaries. Seems a bit daft not to just get folk to vote while they are there rather than go down a postal vote route.
Andy Murray going to No10 for a celebration cup of tea at 4pm today - @David_Cameron has invited @nick_clegg and @Ed_Miliband too. Sweet.
Tom Newton Dunn@tnewtondunn1m
Andy Murray going to No10 for a celebration cup of tea at 4pm today - @David_Cameron has invited @nick_clegg and @Ed_Miliband too. Sweet.
In 2010, Labour were the incumbent government, and consequently enjoyed a certain credibility* that Miliband and the shadow cabinet will struggle to attain, simply by virtue of being the Government.
If we suppose that some of Labour's 29% in 2010 were from waverers who voted for "better the devil you know", then there is potential for the Labour vote to decline in 2015.
* Whether they merited this is another matter.
Cameron "Can't think of anyone who deserves a knighthood more than Andy Murray...."
Wouldn't it be wonderful if he turned it down. I thought yesterday when he didn't bow to the Royal that the signs were good....
But even those you expect better of can rarely say 'no' to a glittering trinket viz Sir Bradley
He entered the UK using forged documents,end of.
Benedict Brogan@benedictbrogan1m
'Where the hell is Falkirk?' John 'not right, not hon' Prescott's gift to the #SNP #WATO
Tim Shipman (Mail)@ShippersUnbound3m
John Prescott taking Labour's problems with the seriousness they deserve: 'Some people will say: "Where the hell is Falkirk?"'
norman smith@BBCNormanS3m
John Prescott on Labour/Unite row ....."Some might say where the hell is Falkirk ?" #wato
One Nation but where the hell is Falkirk?
It is the most stupid criticism that asylum seekers face, and possibly reaches the pantheon of the top ten most stupid criticisms ever.
Titters ....
In 2010, Labour were the incumbent government, and consequently enjoyed a certain credibility* that Miliband and the shadow cabinet will struggle to attain, simply by virtue of being the Government.
If we suppose that some of Labour's 29% in 2010 were from waverers who voted for "better the devil you know", then there is potential for the Labour vote to decline in 2015.
* Whether they merited this is another matter.
It's an interesting analysis with which I almost completely disagree.
I think we will come to see the 2010 GE as a "one-off" in terms of historical analysis of elections. Labour had never been in power for so long and nor had the Conservatives been out of power for so long since 1918.
Previously, the Conservatives had won elections on the back of a fall in the third-party vote which was steeper than the equivalent decline in the Labour vote and 1951, 1970 and 1979 all demonstrated that - indeed, Labour outpolled the Tories in 1951.
It wasn't until the following election that Labour really suffered so in 1955, Feb 1974 and 1983, Labour fell back sharply as the third party recovered and the Conservative vote remained fairly strong (although Feb 74 stands as an exception to that).
What "should" have happened in 2010 was a significant fall in the LD vote benefitting the Conservatives directly and the pre-debate polls showing the Conservatives at 38-40%, Labour at 32-34% and the LDs at 15-17% suggested that.
Had the Conservatives won a majority in 2010, I suspect we'd be seeing polls of Labour 35%, Lib Dems 30%, Conservatives 25%, UKIP 5% or something of that nature but that's not what happened with the coming of the Coalition.
We know a significant part (perhaps as much as a half, certainly a third) of the 2010 LD vote has gone to Labour. It's also not unreasonable to suppose that some of those who wouldn't vote for Labour in 2010 might be far more motivated (after five years of Con-LD Government) to go back to Labour. Either way, Labour cannot, in my view, poll their 2010 number. As to whether they have enough votes to win a majority, that remains to be seen.