Gove is driving teachers mad and the NHS reorganisation is wasting huge amounts of time and money in the health service.
Gove's attacks on teachers are all part of his bid to in the 2015 CON leadership contest and nothing to do with education.
His slagging off of an entire profession is costing the Tories dear. Tom Montgomerie has been right to raise his conerns. It's not just those in the state sector who are furious at his constant denigration of them but private sector ones as well. They are a big voting blog and many will use their votes on May 7 2015 to get rid of Gove.
There are about 900-1000 teachers in each constituency.
Mike
We need to see the evidence of Gove's "attacks on teachers" and "slagging off of an entire profession".
Some direct quotes might help advance the argument beyond partisan prejudice.
It is one thing to disagree both with a policy and its impact on teachers and quite another to conclude that it is a pre-meditated attempt to attack and demean.
Just about everything he does is seen as a denigration of teachers who loathe him. If you don't see that you are a fool.
is seen as
That's the point, Mike.
A perceived slight is not the same as an intended slight.
It may even be a easy means of opposing a policy when mounting a rational argument against it is difficult.
I remember being in London for a Mansfield match (Wembley freight rover final 1987!!) as a excited youth of 17 and during a sightseeing trip to Buck Palace started waving my stags scarf in front of a horseguards parade - The sergeant on a horse come up to me and told me not to be so f---n stupid. I moaned a bit to my mates afterwards but wouldn't have dreamed of reporting it to anybody (and I did not take photos of dead people either) We have become too wet in this country
If Labour are upset by an occasional Channel Four documentary on benefit claimants, they ought to watch the Jeremy Kyle Show which is on daily on ITV. That would do their blood pressure no good at all.
FWIW I found the public sector and the private sector roughly as efficient as each other; roughly speaking, my public sector job wasted more time on meetings, while my private sector jobs have wasted more time swinging between the latest half-baked ideas of management.
From what I've seen, the public sector has well caught up on the last of those in the last few years.
You may well be right, but in education, at least, that's largely due to Michael Gove's "continuous revolution". I don't like to throw "-ist"s around, but the early descriptions of the Coalition Government as "Maoist" have some truth in them.
@Sean_F: I can't remember a SoS of Education of any stripe who wasn't disliked by teachers, with the possible exception of Estelle Morris. But I have never known (coming from a family of teachers, though not one myself) one as disliked as Gove.
"This new “department for Milibandism” would take on responsibility for jobcentres from DWP, training from Education, cities and regional growth from CLG and financial services from the Treasury. The poor old Treasury would be left as a much diminished office of the budget."
Gove makes little secret of his disdain. Labour's mistake in the 1980s was to show similar disdain for private sector business people who wanted to get on. This is similar.
I can't see how alienating such huge voting blocs is helpful to ones electoral chances.
Two thoughts on public sector workers. First, they don't feel the effect of income tax in the way that the self-employed in particular do - it is this latter group which promoted the "taxation is theft" meme in the 1970s and 1980s and which may well resent not only the tax they pay but the accountants' fees they have to pay in order to avoid paying more tax.
Not sure I agree with that, the self-employed tax regime is generally much more generous than the employed one. The self-employed can generally get all their travel costs offset against tax, for example. And if you are just trying to claim legitimate expenses against tax, there really shouldn't be any need to employ an accountant, unless of course you just prefer to spend your time earning money and outsource the non-core tasks
I remember being in London for a Mansfield match (Wembley freight rover final 1987!!) as a excited youth of 17 and during a sightseeing trip to Buck Palace started waving my stags scarf in front of a horseguards parade - The sergeant on a horse come up to me and told me not to be so f---n stupid. I moaned a bit to my mates afterwards but wouldn't have dreamed of reporting it to anybody (and I did not take photos of dead people either) We have become too wet in this country
No, we've wised up to the more unseemly practises of those members of the police who don't play by the rules,.
I remember being in London for a Mansfield match (Wembley freight rover final 1987!!) as a excited youth of 17 and during a sightseeing trip to Buck Palace started waving my stags scarf in front of a horseguards parade - The sergeant on a horse come up to me and told me not to be so f---n stupid. I moaned a bit to my mates afterwards but wouldn't have dreamed of reporting it to anybody (and I did not take photos of dead people either) We have become too wet in this country
Did he confiscate your scarf and let you know how lucky you still were to have your front teeth though ?
He stayed on the right side of the thin blue line, plod in question in the telegraph article appears not to have.
I have never grasped why the Conservatives have gone out of their way to annoy public sector workers,many of whom have solid Tory values but seem to have deserted the coalition because they think they are not out there batting for them. Around 2 in 5 of all workers are in the public sector, so it's unwise to irritate them.
Can you give us an example of what you mean by the Conservatives going "out of their way to annoy public sector workers"?
I realise times are tough and political perceptions will be influenced by current conditions, but we really need evidence here to sort out myth from facts.
Constant denigration of the public sector and those who work in it is a constant theme of too many PB Conservatives on this site. Countless threads could serve as your example.
We are mostly a bunch of bloggers with a penchant for provocation.
What I am looking for is direct evidence that Gove (or for that matter any official member of the government) is deliberately seeking to denigrate workers in the public sector.
Do you have any quotes you can share with us?
You'll look for that in vain, because no such member of the government with such views would be unwise enough to express them directly. So it's a spurious question, as you of course know.
Instead I'll judge their attitudes to the public sector and its employees by the attitudes and prejudices displayed by their supporters on this site. I'm making a reasonable assumption that elected Conservatives think in much the same way as unelected Conservative supporters. I think that they're thinking what you're thinking (and blogging).
Gove makes little secret of his disdain. Labour's mistake in the 1980s was to show similar disdain for private sector business people who wanted to get on. This is similar.
I can't see how alienating such huge voting blocs is helpful to ones electoral chances.
DYB DYB DYB
DOB DOB DOB
Richard Nabavi has done his best to give an example of Gove's attitude to teachers. The speech was clear, unambiguous and revelatory.
Now it is time for you to do your best by providing a counter-example, TLBS.
Sorry going to call bollocks on this. Given how much footage we are subjected to by camera crews following emergency services around with the full cooperation of those emergency services. Scenes which often show injured people or even CPR then the emergency services really have no leg to stand on in claiming this is a "decency issue"
He could, and should have done that, but incidents like that are emotional, and the emergency services, professional as they are, do get affected by events. We're all guilty of shouting at gawpers and rubber neckers, I expect. The cameraman should ask himself "Would I be happy having my mum/dad/son/daughter filmed in such a situation?" They probably wouldn't.
Call it what you want, I don't have to accept it. I agree that the abundance of programmes about the emergency services have blurred the lines on this issue. I still wouldn't want any relation of mine, filmed by a bloke on a mobile, breathing their last. The copper was out of order, didn't handle it well, but his heart was in the right place.
Gove is driving teachers mad and the NHS reorganisation is wasting huge amounts of time and money in the health service.
Gove's attacks on teachers are all part of his bid to in the 2015 CON leadership contest and nothing to do with education.
His slagging off of an entire profession is costing the Tories dear. Tom Montgomerie has been right to raise his conerns. It's not just those in the state sector who are furious at his constant denigration of them but private sector ones as well. They are a big voting blog and many will use their votes on May 7 2015 to get rid of Gove.
There are about 900-1000 teachers in each constituency.
Mike
We need to see the evidence of Gove's "attacks on teachers" and "slagging off of an entire profession".
Some direct quotes might help advance the argument beyond partisan prejudice.
It is one thing to disagree both with a policy and its impact on teachers and quite another to conclude that it is a pre-meditated attempt to attack and demean.
Just about everything he does is seen as a denigration of teachers who loathe him. If you don't see that you are a fool.
Hmmmm. Faced with argument at that level there's little more to be said!
@Sean_F: I can't remember a SoS of Education of any stripe who wasn't disliked by teachers, with the possible exception of Estelle Morris. But I have never known (coming from a family of teachers, though not one myself) one as disliked as Gove.
This is very much my experience. Public sector workers nearly always have a beef with the Government of the day (remember Mark Serwotka declaring the last Labour Government to be "the worst in history"?) but I have quite apolitical friends posting quite nasty things about Gove on my facebook timeline, it's beyond anything I've noticed before.
@Sean_F: I can't remember a SoS of Education of any stripe who wasn't disliked by teachers, with the possible exception of Estelle Morris. But I have never known (coming from a family of teachers, though not one myself) one as disliked as Gove.
This is very much my experience. Public sector workers nearly always have a beef with the Government of the day (remember Mark Serwotka declaring the last Labour Government to be "the worst in history"?) but I have quite apolitical friends posting quite nasty things about Gove on my facebook timeline, it's beyond anything I've noticed before.
It is because he is a clever and combative politician of conviction, Neil.
It is the Thatcher factor.
We really didn't lay her to rest in 2013. She is all around us,
@Sean_F: I can't remember a SoS of Education of any stripe who wasn't disliked by teachers, with the possible exception of Estelle Morris. But I have never known (coming from a family of teachers, though not one myself) one as disliked as Gove.
Perhaps the teachers are feeling the strain like never before for having overseen such a calamitous slide in the international rankings of the UK's kids?
Maybe they should look to themselves, instead of going on strike and looking to blame a SoS who has at least acknowledged there is a huge problem that needs to be addressed. Hanging their heads in shame and admitting they have failed many millions in their charge for several decades would be a start. Asking how they could actively work with the SoS to make sure this never happens again would be a positive step forward.
@Sean_F: I can't remember a SoS of Education of any stripe who wasn't disliked by teachers, with the possible exception of Estelle Morris. But I have never known (coming from a family of teachers, though not one myself) one as disliked as Gove.
This is very much my experience. Public sector workers nearly always have a beef with the Government of the day (remember Mark Serwotka declaring the last Labour Government to be "the worst in history"?) but I have quite apolitical friends posting quite nasty things about Gove on my facebook timeline, it's beyond anything I've noticed before.
Yes but is Gove the first Education Minister for a long while to stop pretending that educational standards are soaring higher and higher and actually facing up to the fact?
Call it what you want, I don't have to accept it. I agree that the abundance of programmes about the emergency services have blurred the lines on this issue. I still wouldn't want any relation of mine, filmed by a bloke on a mobile, breathing their last. The copper was out of order, didn't handle it well, but his heart was in the right place.
While I am not saying your sentiment is in anyway wrong, indeed I would probably tend to agree, there remains an important point to me which needs to be made.
That point is what can or cannot be done in this line needs to be defined by law not individual whim of the policeman on the ground. That law needs to apply equally across the board from citizen journalist to veteran press photographer.
Increasingly even our main stream press footage is coming from citizen journalists and they have produced some superb footage that we may otherwise not have seen from terror incidents to natural disasters we must be careful not to bar the good they do while trying to curb their excessive zeal
Public sector workers nearly always have a beef with the Government of the day (remember Mark Serwotka declaring the last Labour Government to be "the worse in history"?) but I have quite apolitical friends posting quite nasty things about Gove on my facebook timeline, it's beyond anything I've noticed before.
Gove is certainly unpopular because he's shaking up the cosy, complacent, and disastrously ineffective education establishment, but I'd be wary of judging by Facebook or any other internet comments; people are much less restrained online than they would be in other media.
I mean, if you judged by the Telegraph or Guardian comments, you'd think we were a country of certifiably angry loons. (Maybe we are, but if so it used to be better hidden).
@Sean_F: I can't remember a SoS of Education of any stripe who wasn't disliked by teachers, with the possible exception of Estelle Morris. But I have never known (coming from a family of teachers, though not one myself) one as disliked as Gove.
This is very much my experience. Public sector workers nearly always have a beef with the Government of the day (remember Mark Serwotka declaring the last Labour Government to be "the worst in history"?) but I have quite apolitical friends posting quite nasty things about Gove on my facebook timeline, it's beyond anything I've noticed before.
Perhaps you should consider that Facebook, Twitter, etc are of recent origin and may not entirely reflect the real world as much as people think.
@RichardNabavi His attack on formal teaching qualifications undermines every single teacher who has worked hard to get them.
If the qualifications means something (and they do), schools will still take them seriously when recruiting. If anything, the ability for schools to ignore them is the best incentive for those who set the standards for the teaching qualifications to ensure that they remain high and so retain that value.
That said, assurance of standards now is far more important than proof of standards 20+ years ago, and good heads will ensure that regular monitoring goes on to that end. Likewise, placing articificial barriers in the way of recruitment is silly. If someone is believed to be good enough but doesn't have the qualifications (they may have worked in the private sector, another country, or have significant other relevant experience), they shouldn't be prevented from applying or being appointed simply because of the lack of a piece of paper.
Public sector workers nearly always have a beef with the Government of the day (remember Mark Serwotka declaring the last Labour Government to be "the worse in history"?) but I have quite apolitical friends posting quite nasty things about Gove on my facebook timeline, it's beyond anything I've noticed before.
Gove is certainly unpopular because he's shaking up the cosy, complacent, and disastrously ineffective education establishment, but I'd be wary of judging by Facebook or any other internet comments; people are much less restrained online than they would be in other media.
I mean, if you judged the country by the Telegraph or Guardian comments, you'd think we were a country of certifiably angry loons. (Maybe we are, but if so it used to be better hidden).
It used to be said that the reason the Telegraph had such an anaemic letters page compared with the Times and Guardian is not that its readers did not write, but that 90 per cent of letters were unprintable.
I remember being in London for a Mansfield match (Wembley freight rover final 1987!!) as a excited youth of 17 and during a sightseeing trip to Buck Palace started waving my stags scarf in front of a horseguards parade - The sergeant on a horse come up to me and told me not to be so f---n stupid. I moaned a bit to my mates afterwards but wouldn't have dreamed of reporting it to anybody (and I did not take photos of dead people either) We have become too wet in this country
Did he confiscate your scarf and let you know how lucky you still were to have your front teeth though ?
He stayed on the right side of the thin blue line, plod in question in the telegraph article appears not to have.
He grabbed it and looked upon it with disdain (that's crime against Mansfield that is!!)
I have never grasped why the Conservatives have gone out of their way to annoy public sector workers,many of whom have solid Tory values but seem to have deserted the coalition because they think they are not out there batting for them. Around 2 in 5 of all workers are in the public sector, so it's unwise to irritate them.
Can you give us an example of what you mean by the Conservatives going "out of their way to annoy public sector workers"?
I realise times are tough and political perceptions will be influenced by current conditions, but we really need evidence here to sort out myth from facts.
Constant denigration of the public sector and those who work in it is a constant theme of too many PB Conservatives on this site. Countless threads could serve as your example.
We are mostly a bunch of bloggers with a penchant for provocation.
What I am looking for is direct evidence that Gove (or for that matter any official member of the government) is deliberately seeking to denigrate workers in the public sector.
Do you have any quotes you can share with us?
You'll look for that in vain, because no such member of the government with such views would be unwise enough to express them directly. So it's a spurious question, as you of course know.
Instead I'll judge their attitudes to the public sector and its employees by the attitudes and prejudices displayed by their supporters on this site. I'm making a reasonable assumption that elected Conservatives think in much the same way as unelected Conservative supporters. I think that they're thinking what you're thinking (and blogging).
It is not a reasonable assumption that the Secretary of State for Education's views on teachers are the same as those which you claim (without evidence) to have been expressed on a blog by unelected Conservative supporters.
Comments on facebook from otherwise apolitical people are just one example of the phenomenon of more-than-usual dissatisfaction of teaching friends with Gove. My main point was that my experience was very similar to El_Capitano's.
All Gove has done is fail to make excuses for an education system that, despite being amongst the best funded in the world, is way down the global league table at a time when education has never been more important.
Call it what you want, I don't have to accept it. I agree that the abundance of programmes about the emergency services have blurred the lines on this issue. I still wouldn't want any relation of mine, filmed by a bloke on a mobile, breathing their last. The copper was out of order, didn't handle it well, but his heart was in the right place.
While I am not saying your sentiment is in anyway wrong, indeed I would probably tend to agree, there remains an important point to me which needs to be made.
That point is what can or cannot be done in this line needs to be defined by law not individual whim of the policeman on the ground. That law needs to apply equally across the board from citizen journalist to veteran press photographer.
Increasingly even our main stream press footage is coming from citizen journalists and they have produced some superb footage that we may otherwise not have seen from terror incidents to natural disasters we must be careful not to bar the good they do while trying to curb their excessive zeal
I can't argue with that, it just needs onlookers to have a little self restraint. Capturing pictures of crashes, floods, fires, even capturing an actual rescue is perfectly acceptable. Filming someone dying on a pavement is pushing it a little too far, in my opinion. I'm not suggesting laws to restrict it, and as I say, the copper handled it badly, its just that being in that situation, from experience, is very emotionally hard, for all involved.
Seems to me that Teachers and their unions are prime examples of inflexible attitudes...
If Mitchell Johnson was a mate of the headmaster and offered to teach the cricket teams bowlers for a lesson or two, that would be worse than a supply teacher covering PE I suppose?
Maybe they should look to themselves, instead of going on strike and looking to blame a SoS who has at least acknowledged there is a huge problem that needs to be addressed. Hanging their heads in shame and admitting they have failed many millions in their charge for several decades would be a start.
This is quite an illuminating post, though I suspect not in the way you intended it.
Mrs Capitano would not be cheered to be told to "hang her head in shame" nor would she be willing to "admit she has failed [those] in her charge". Nor should she, given that her school sits in the top five for her city, despite being in a low-income area.
Elder Mrs Capitano (mother) would not be cheered to be told to "hang her head in shame", either, nor "admit she has failed [those] in her charge". Nor should she, given that her former school provides for some of the most seriously handicapped in our society - children who would be seriously disruptive in any other school, hampering others' achievement.
Should either of them "look to themselves"? No. No, I don't think so.
But; this is the message that they hear from Gove, and from Gove's supporters. Much though I admire the tenacity of the speech-ferreters here, it doesn't really matter whether particular words can be attributed to him, or to Dominic Cummings, or to PB commenters who support him. Mass politics is rarely about that. It's about broad-brush impressions, and the broad-brush impression you've conveyed is pretty much what they get from Gove.
This is why, to return to the post topic, the LibDems have seen their public sector support implode. Those who voted LibDem last time are very aware that they have helped put Gove (and Lansley/Hunt too) in power directly over them. They are unlikely to give the LibDems an opportunity to do this again.
All Gove has done is fail to make excuses for an education system that, despite being amongst the best funded in the world, is way down the global league table at a time when education has never been more important.
Rubbish, Gove has zero interest in education - his one concern is to be well placed to take over from Dave in 2015 when he steps down a CON leader after failing at the election.
That's the smart play. Dont say much about it at all, let public sector workers convince themselves that things cant be any worse under Labour. Lots of potential gain for very little electoral pain.
Maybe they should look to themselves, instead of going on strike and looking to blame a SoS who has at least acknowledged there is a huge problem that needs to be addressed. Hanging their heads in shame and admitting they have failed many millions in their charge for several decades would be a start.
This is quite an illuminating post, though I suspect not in the way you intended it.
Mrs Capitano would not be cheered to be told to "hang her head in shame" nor would she be willing to "admit she has failed [those] in her charge". Nor should she, given that her school sits in the top five for her city, despite being in a low-income area.
Has Mrs Capitano a) voted in the recent strike ballots and b) Voted for a strike ?
Maybe they should look to themselves, instead of going on strike and looking to blame a SoS who has at least acknowledged there is a huge problem that needs to be addressed. Hanging their heads in shame and admitting they have failed many millions in their charge for several decades would be a start.
This is quite an illuminating post, though I suspect not in the way you intended it.
Mrs Capitano would not be cheered to be told to "hang her head in shame" nor would she be willing to "admit she has failed [those] in her charge". Nor should she, given that her school sits in the top five for her city, despite being in a low-income area.
Elder Mrs Capitano (mother) would not be cheered to be told to "hang her head in shame", either, nor "admit she has failed [those] in her charge". Nor should she, given that her former school provides for some of the most seriously handicapped in our society - children who would be seriously disruptive in any other school, hampering others' achievement.
Should either of them "look to themselves"? No. No, I don't think so.
But; this is the message that they hear from Gove, and from Gove's supporters. Much though I admire the tenacity of the speech-ferreters here, it doesn't really matter whether particular words can be attributed to him, or to Dominic Cummings, or to PB commenters who support him. Mass politics is rarely about that. It's about broad-brush impressions, and the broad-brush impression you've conveyed is pretty much what they get from Gove.
This is why, to return to the post topic, the LibDems have seen their public sector support implode. Those who voted LibDem last time are very aware that they have helped put Gove (and Lansley/Hunt too) in power directly over them. They are unlikely to give the LibDems an opportunity to do this again.
What about if they are in a Lib/Con marginal though ?
The left hate Gove (and target him) because he is the most effective (not least effective) Tory. He also seems to care about his brief and not just his personal career. Thatcher was attacked and hated in the same way and because of the same thing.
I dunno, I abandon my really important (1) work with really immediate deadline (2) to watch our hero on a webinar, and he only turns up for five minutes!
All Gove has done is fail to make excuses for an education system that, despite being amongst the best funded in the world, is way down the global league table at a time when education has never been more important.
Rubbish, Gove has zero interest in education - his one concern is to be well placed to take over from Dave in 2015 when he steps down a CON leader after failing at the election.
Rubbish, Gove has zero interest in education - his one concern is to be well placed to take over from Dave in 2015 when he steps down a CON leade after failing at the election.
Mike, really, that is an extraordinary thing to say. Gove is absolutely passionate about education - he's been banging on about it, and the scandal of low attainment especially amongst the bottom 25% by income, for years, in speech after speech.
Maybe he's got the wrong solutions - time will tell, with a bit of luck - but it is ludicrous to suggest that he doesn't care about the issue.
All Gove has done is fail to make excuses for an education system that, despite being amongst the best funded in the world, is way down the global league table at a time when education has never been more important.
Rubbish, Gove has zero interest in education - his one concern is to be well placed to take over from Dave in 2015 when he steps down a CON leader after failing at the election.
Seems to me that Teachers and their unions are prime examples of inflexible attitudes...
If Mitchell Johnson was a mate of the headmaster and offered to teach the cricket teams bowlers for a lesson or two, that would be worse than a supply teacher covering PE I suppose?
All Gove has done is fail to make excuses for an education system that, despite being amongst the best funded in the world, is way down the global league table at a time when education has never been more important.
Rubbish, Gove has zero interest in education - his one concern is to be well placed to take over from Dave in 2015 when he steps down a CON leader after failing at the election.
Mike, just because tim's still lurking, doesn't mean you have to act like a irrational tribal moron like him..
Has Mrs Capitano a) voted in the recent strike ballots and b) Voted for a strike ?
If so why ?
She voted no. She thinks (and I would tend to agree) that whatever the merits of the strike action, it won't change Gove's mind, simply entrenches the situation further, and makes it easy to (wrongly) characterise teachers as a militant force concerned mostly about their own jobs.
That said, when the strike was called, she did reluctantly stay at home that day, principally because if her class were the only one to be in school, it would make her pupils very resentful towards her, and that's not good for their learning through the rest of the year!
Seems to me that Teachers and their unions are prime examples of inflexible attitudes...
If Mitchell Johnson was a mate of the headmaster and offered to teach the cricket teams bowlers for a lesson or two, that would be worse than a supply teacher covering PE I suppose?
I've worked in the public sector and have friends who still do. To describe public sector workers as a group as "left wing" is absurd. Indeed, some of my friends would fit in very well with the majority sentiment of this forum being strongly anti-Labour though that's not to say they are not critical of the Coalition.
There is still a sense of an instrusive centralisation - that central Government are trying to do much directing and regulating rather than allowing local authorities to get on and manage their own affairs. In those Authorities where the share of Government rant as a percentage of income has fallen sharply over the years, the ongoing interventionist ethos is all the more annoying.
I don't know if it's the same with Education but on the one hand there is clear encouragement for Schools to break away from local authority management (though that's not as simple and obvious as is generally imagined) but on the other an ever more regulated curriculum and standardisation.
The centralisation of successive Conservative and Labour Governments was ruinous and it still seems there is a micro-managerial interventionist mindset still very much around in Whitehall and Westminster.
That's the smart play. Dont say much about it at all, let public sector workers convince themselves that things cant be any worse under Labour. Lots of potential gain for very little electoral pain.
My impression of the Labour Party is that they will say as little as possible about anything until they have to. While that may not be sporting it's not necessarily a bad strategy.
Do you still live in/around Mansfield or have you headed to the big smoke ?
Whats your thoughts on the 60 limit proposed for the M1 ?!
I did live in London for a number of years - the memory of that scarf incident makes me emotional whenever I ventured to Buck Palace (not really!) . I now live back in Notts and work occasionally in Mansfield-- As for speed limits , just keep it at 70 mph -why do we complicate things ?
Has Mrs Capitano a) voted in the recent strike ballots and b) Voted for a strike ?
If so why ?
because if her class were the only one to be in school, it would make her pupils very resentful towards her, and that's not good for their learning through the rest of the year!
Illuminating - can I tell you that she would however be very popular with parents. Some might say they are the customers.
Do you still live in/around Mansfield or have you headed to the big smoke ?
Whats your thoughts on the 60 limit proposed for the M1 ?!
I did live in London for a number of years - the memory of that scarf incident makes me emotional whenever I ventured to Buck Palace (not really!) . I now live back in Notts and work occasionally in Mansfield-- As for speed limits , just keep it at 70 mph -why do we complicate things ?
Do you still live in/around Mansfield or have you headed to the big smoke ?
Whats your thoughts on the 60 limit proposed for the M1 ?!
I did live in London for a number of years - the memory of that scarf incident makes me emotional whenever I ventured to Buck Palace (not really!) . I now live back in Notts and work occasionally in Mansfield-- As for speed limits , just keep it at 70 mph -why do we complicate things ?
Exactly. Lowering it to 60 will do buggerall for the environment, realistically. It might prove a good revenue generator, though.
"This new “department for Milibandism” would take on responsibility for jobcentres from DWP, training from Education, cities and regional growth from CLG and financial services from the Treasury. The poor old Treasury would be left as a much diminished office of the budget."
How on earth does Miliband's plan for wealth creation fit in with his views on profit?
Illuminating - can I tell you that she would however be very popular with parents. Some might say they are the customers.
She'd be popular with the half of parents who only have one kid at the school, I'll grant you that. Probably less so with those who have 2+ kids in different classes!
right whose going to bat then kids? (loads of hands go up) (some Gove hating teacher picks two who look pleased getting padded up' 'right we have a treat for you today kids - Mitchell Johnson is here and he is going to do a bit of bowling' (all but two kids laugh)
Constituencies with highest % of public workers out of the total working population. Source: ONS Annual Population Survey. It is a self collocation question. So public employment reported is usually higher than official accounts as some people reply "public employment" even if in reality their contract is with a private contractor having a deal with a public body.
North East Fife Cardiff North Newcastle upon Tyne East Manchester, Withington Cardiff West Liverpool, Wavertree Neath Na h-Eileanan An Iar Wirral West Beverley and Holderness Pontypridd Birmingham, Edgbaston Gower Gosport Exeter Taunton Deane Chesterfield Newcastle-under-Lyme Sedgefield Leeds North West
On the other side
Poplar and Limehouse Amber Valley Chelsea and Fulham Somerton and Frome Cities of London and Westminster Waveney East Surrey South West Bedfordshire Boston and Skegness South Norfolk Gravesham Hemel Hempstead Sevenoaks Stratford-on-Avon East Hampshire North East Hampshire Runnymede and Weybridge Worthing West South Holland and The Deepings Tamworth
I was prompted to look at Benefits street because of the comments here. I wish I hadn't,extremely depressing. They were all virtually unemployable,and bringing up the next generation of unemployed. All the stereotypes were there,large TVs,strong lager,smart phones,smoking,dogs etc.All blaming the Effing Government for cutting their bedroom subsidy,spare rooms were being used to grow cannabis.
I hope this is an extreme example,but fear it may not be. I would not know how to start to correct this situation.
Very silly Kay Burley attack on Boris Johnson's use of the word "prophylactic" to describe "Cleggers" role in government.
Boris is a Greats Scholar and will know that prophylactic has a wider meaning than its modern use to denote a condom.
The word derives from the Ancient Greek for standing guard before or in front of something or someone. This meaning fits the context of Boris's description of Clegg's role as a shield in front of Cameron.
Prophylactic later acquired a secondary meaning of preventing disease and from there it became associated with a means of preventing sexual disease (or unwanted insemination).
It's a strange old ideology though. Smaller State at all costs, public bad private good, anti-poor, pro big business corporatist, an authoritarian streak.
It's not that strange an ideology - it's held unbroken power in the UK for decades now.
"Just about everything he does is seen as a denigration of teachers who loathe him."
Seen by who, Mr. S.? By the teachers? But they loathe him you say, so no surprise. By the educational establishment, whose comfy boat he seems to be rocking? No surprise there either. What about parents?
In my experience as a parent (son left school in 2011) and as a qualified, though no longer practising, teacher (couldn't stand the concentration on process and side-lining of outcomes) the education system in this country desperately needs reform and the clearance of an awful lot of dead wood.
Gove is, I think, trying to move the system in the right direction and in doing so is bound to upset the vested interests of the producers. We can argue about what sort of reform would be best (if I had a complaint it would be that he is not being radical enough), but your comment is, perhaps, intemperate and may I say unjustified.
I was prompted to look at Benefits street because of the comments here. I wish I hadn't,extremely depressing. They were all virtually unemployable,and bringing up the next generation of unemployed. All the stereotypes were there,large TVs,strong lager,smart phones,smoking,dogs etc.All blaming the Effing Government for cutting their bedroom subsidy,spare rooms were being used to grow cannabis.
I hope this is an extreme example,but fear it may not be. I would not know how to start to correct this situation.
The subjects of the doccy are claiming it the producers have edited it to show them in the worst possible light.
The valid votes in the final round were 132. I don't know how many members the Con Association has but 132 voters don't seem to suggest a high interest among the general public (assuming Con members have the standard turnout)
A commentator on ConHome offers some details:
"When the first count started, much to my surprise, I noted that none of the candidates had a scrutineer present. Evidently, this was a ruling from Gareth Fox, who was at the meeting at that time. A classic Central Office cock-up ruling! There is nothing in the rules which says that you cannot have a scrutineer, and had the candidates had one each, we would not now be in this ridiculous position.
Secondly, at no time following any of the counts (of which there were three) were the candidates shown the result and asked if they would like a recount. That must happen, and is quite clearly stated in the rule book. Another classic cock-up! "
Illuminating - can I tell you that she would however be very popular with parents. Some might say they are the customers.
She'd be popular with the half of parents who only have one kid at the school, I'll grant you that. Probably less so with those who have 2+ kids in different classes!
I dunno - they would be pleased they one less little darling at home.
Parents loathe strikes - especially on top of the lengthy holidays and "inset" days.
I was prompted to look at Benefits street because of the comments here. I wish I hadn't,extremely depressing. They were all virtually unemployable,and bringing up the next generation of unemployed. All the stereotypes were there,large TVs,strong lager,smart phones,smoking,dogs etc.All blaming the Effing Government for cutting their bedroom subsidy,spare rooms were being used to grow cannabis.
I hope this is an extreme example,but fear it may not be. I would not know how to start to correct this situation.
The subjects of the doccy are claiming it the producers have edited it to show them in the worst possible light.
I have some sympathy with that: it is in the TV company's interest to get as many viewers as possible, and that can be done by making it as sensationalist as they possibly can.
However it might have downsides as a defence: it might be that the unedited footage shows some of them in a worse light.
At the end of he day, if you do a deal with the devil then you pay the consequences ...
Has Austin Mitchell ever ruled his own quasi-Fascist statelet where people copulate in graveyards? Has Boris Johnson ever bombed Trieste in a biplane while singing his own war cry? Does Dennis Skinner have an enormous collection of cravats? Clearly not.
@HurstLlama Gove is costing you the election. Period
Costing ME the election? I don't think so. I am not a member or a supporter of any political party, so he can't, can he?. I don't believe he will cost the Conservative party the election either (there are far too many other factors ahead of him in the queue).
Has Austin Mitchell ever ruled his own quasi-Fascist statelet where people copulate in graveyards? Has Boris Johnson ever bombed Trieste in a biplane while singing his own war cry? Does Dennis Skinner have an enormous collection of cravats? Clearly not.
In the long term, D'Annunzio was a failure, the port of Fiume soon became Rijeka in Yugoslavia, and it's now in Croatia.
Failure???? He was a world famous poet, he was a genuine war hero, he was adored by millions, he had his own private army, he slept with thousands of women (among the most beautiful of the day), he did cocaine into his 70s (during orgies) and he ended his life in a massive villa in Lake Garda with half a battleship in the garden.
Failure???? He was a world famous poet, he was a genuine war hero, he was adored by millions, he had his own private army, he slept with thousands of women (among the most beautiful of the day), he did cocaine into his 70s (during orgies) and he ended his life in a massive villa by Lake Garda with half a battleship in the garden.
Constituencies with highest % of public workers out of the total working population. Source: ONS Annual Population Survey. It is a self collocation question. So public employment reported is usually higher than official accounts as some people reply "public employment" even if in reality their contract is with a private contractor having a deal with a public body.
North East Fife Cardiff North Newcastle upon Tyne East Manchester, Withington Cardiff West Liverpool, Wavertree Neath Na h-Eileanan An Iar Wirral West Beverley and Holderness Pontypridd Birmingham, Edgbaston Gower Gosport Exeter Taunton Deane Chesterfield Newcastle-under-Lyme Sedgefield Leeds North West
On the other side
Poplar and Limehouse Amber Valley Chelsea and Fulham Somerton and Frome Cities of London and Westminster Waveney East Surrey South West Bedfordshire Boston and Skegness South Norfolk Gravesham Hemel Hempstead Sevenoaks Stratford-on-Avon East Hampshire North East Hampshire Runnymede and Weybridge Worthing West South Holland and The Deepings Tamworth
Sounds like bollocks given the amount of government jobs in London, I presume they just don't class themselves as public sector.
Another uprating of the UK's GDP Q4 growth forecast. This time from the British Chambers of Commerce.
The economy is growing as a solid pace, and 2014 is off to a 'fantastic start', the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) said Tuesday.
In its quarterly survey of nearly 8,000 businesses, the BCC found that all the critical fourth quarter balances were stronger than their long-term averages, and many were above their pre-recession levels.
As a result, the BCC has predicted that the UK's GDP will have grown 0.9% in the final three months of the year.
Another uprating of the UK's GDP Q4 growth forecast. This time from the British Chambers of Commerce.
The economy is growing as a solid pace, and 2014 is off to a 'fantastic start', the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) said Tuesday.
In its quarterly survey of nearly 8,000 businesses, the BCC found that all the critical fourth quarter balances were stronger than their long-term averages, and many were above their pre-recession levels.
As a result, the BCC has predicted that the UK's GDP will have grown 0.9% in the final three months of the year.
Onwards and upwards.
Comrade Chancellor! You'll receive the Order of Lenin for this!!
Another uprating of the UK's GDP Q4 growth forecast. This time from the British Chambers of Commerce.
The economy is growing as a solid pace, and 2014 is off to a 'fantastic start', the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) said Tuesday.
In its quarterly survey of nearly 8,000 businesses, the BCC found that all the critical fourth quarter balances were stronger than their long-term averages, and many were above their pre-recession levels.
As a result, the BCC has predicted that the UK's GDP will have grown 0.9% in the final three months of the year.
Onwards and upwards.
Comrade Chancellor! You'll receive the Order of Lenin for this!!
It will sit next to my Герой Социалистического Труда close to my heart, Tovarich Sunilsky.
Someone touched on this earlier, but just to expand. I don't believe there has ever been a Labour supporting block in the public sector. Different departments may have had a tendency to a majority voting in one direction than another (e.g. Defence was a pretty much right of centre crowd, ditto the Home Office whereas DHSS (to use the old name) was much more to the left). In local government employees generally followed the split in their area, but perhaps leaning a little more to the right at least in the white collar jobs.
Cameron's policy of going out of his way to piss off as many groups of his "natural" supporters as possible (it has to have been deliberate, surely) will have affected public sector employees just as much as workers in the private sector.
Has Austin Mitchell ever ruled his own quasi-Fascist statelet where people copulate in graveyards? Has Boris Johnson ever bombed Trieste in a biplane while singing his own war cry? Does Dennis Skinner have an enormous collection of cravats? Clearly not.
In the long term, D'Annunzio was a failure, the port of Fiume soon became Rijeka in Yugoslovia, and now in Croatia.
Failure???? He was a world famous poet, he was a genuine war hero, he was adored by millions, he had his own private army, he slept with thousands of women (among the most beautiful of the day), he did cocaine into his 70s (during orgies) and he ended his life in a massive villa by Lake Garda with half a battleship in the garden.
If that is failure then what, pray, is *success*?
You really, really need to to edit his Wikipedia entry. It's ever so dull.
Why have the Lib Dems lost three times more support from public sector workers than Conservative?
Is it Labour Lite voters who saw Lib Dems as a soft option to Labour?
Can the Lib Dems re-position themselves as capitalists with a heart instead of soft Labour?
Lord Ashcroft's "What are the LDs for?" piece is interesting on the LD>Lab switchers:
"...as far as these voters are concerned, it is the Lib Dems’ fault that the Conservatives are in office at all. For this the party cannot be forgiven "
Are people on this site generally general public or are they politicians and those connected with politics?
Mostly people with an abnormally high interest in politics but not actually standing, with a smattering of professionals (sometimes including me) and general public.
On Gove, I always liked his Times column and have nothing against him personally. But he does turn up in doorstep conversations, always negatively. The problem is I think (leaving aside the rights and wrongs) that he's seen by teachers as anti-teacher but not really seen by parents as pro-parent, partly perhaps because teachers follow his comments closely while parents are pretty much the general public, who don't in general follow ANYTHING political closely. Indeed I suspect that more than 75% of parents would struggle to name him.
Has Austin Mitchell ever ruled his own quasi-Fascist statelet where people copulate in graveyards? Has Boris Johnson ever bombed Trieste in a biplane while singing his own war cry? Does Dennis Skinner have an enormous collection of cravats? Clearly not.
In the long term, D'Annunzio was a failure, the port of Fiume soon became Rijeka in Yugoslovia, and now in Croatia.
Failure???? He was a world famous poet, he was a genuine war hero, he was adored by millions, he had his own private army, he slept with thousands of women (among the most beautiful of the day), he did cocaine into his 70s (during orgies) and he ended his life in a massive villa by Lake Garda with half a battleship in the garden.
If that is failure then what, pray, is *success*?
You really, really need to to edit his Wikipedia entry. It's ever so dull.
Even Hitler ruled Fiume for a longer period than D'Annunzio
(that's September 1943 to May '45 versus Sep 1919 to Dec '20)
Have you met with Gove and discussed his policies with him?
Would you deny that in general the UK's education system has been failing for many years and that Gove is trying to bring it back to a reasonable standard that will allow the future UK employees to compete in a global market for talent?
As an employer it is very usual to find the candidate from overseas to be better educated, be more knowledgeable and have a better attitude to work than the corresponding UK candidate and have more aspiration to learn and improve.
Being part of the UK's leading technical companies, in order to survive and grow globally, we cannot afford to employ anyone but the best in qualifications, knowledge and work ethic - if not we will be overtaken and go bankrupt.
The UK's education system has been in a nigh bankrupt state for many years and Gove is trying to haul it out of that abyss which was accepted by Labour for their political purposes and by the educational establishment for their own pride.
Of course Gove is meeting opposition on all sides, but OGH would you prefer to have our children worse educated than much of the developing world and so face a prospect of perpetual unemployment.
Children are our future and it behoves us all to give them the best education possible and to develop their talents and give them the maximum encouragement and opportunities to utilise those talents.
Cameron's policy of going out of his way to piss off as many groups of his "natural" supporters as possible (it has to have been deliberate, surely) will have affected public sector employees just as much as workers in the private sector.
I think the master plan was: 1. Cameroons show they dislike conservatives. 2. Conservative-hating Guardian readers vote for Conservative Party.
Has Austin Mitchell ever ruled his own quasi-Fascist statelet where people copulate in graveyards? Has Boris Johnson ever bombed Trieste in a biplane while singing his own war cry? Does Dennis Skinner have an enormous collection of cravats? Clearly not.
In the long term, D'Annunzio was a failure, the port of Fiume soon became Rijeka in Yugoslovia, and now in Croatia.
Failure???? He was a world famous poet, he was a genuine war hero, he was adored by millions, he had his own private army, he slept with thousands of women (among the most beautiful of the day), he did cocaine into his 70s (during orgies) and he ended his life in a massive villa by Lake Garda with half a battleship in the garden.
If that is failure then what, pray, is *success*?
You really, really need to to edit his Wikipedia entry. It's ever so dull.
Even Hitler ruled Fiume for a longer period than D'Annunzio
(that's September 1943 to May '45 versus Sep 1919 to Dec '20)
Comments
That's the point, Mike.
A perceived slight is not the same as an intended slight.
It may even be a easy means of opposing a policy when mounting a rational argument against it is difficult.
And who can forget Patricia Hewitt and the nurses?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4943596.stm
I moaned a bit to my mates afterwards but wouldn't have dreamed of reporting it to anybody (and I did not take photos of dead people either)
We have become too wet in this country
If Labour are upset by an occasional Channel Four documentary on benefit claimants, they ought to watch the Jeremy Kyle Show which is on daily on ITV. That would do their blood pressure no good at all.
@Sean_F: I can't remember a SoS of Education of any stripe who wasn't disliked by teachers, with the possible exception of Estelle Morris. But I have never known (coming from a family of teachers, though not one myself) one as disliked as Gove.
http://labour-uncut.co.uk/2014/01/07/toil-and-trouble-bubbling-in-the-shadow-cabinet-pot/
"This new “department for Milibandism” would take on responsibility for jobcentres from DWP, training from Education, cities and regional growth from CLG and financial services from the Treasury. The poor old Treasury would be left as a much diminished office of the budget."
Gove makes little secret of his disdain. Labour's mistake in the 1980s was to show similar disdain for private sector business people who wanted to get on. This is similar.
I can't see how alienating such huge voting blocs is helpful to ones electoral chances.
It's caught between hatred of the rich and hatred of benefit scroungers. In the end the two sides look rather similar despite being fiercely opposed.
He stayed on the right side of the thin blue line, plod in question in the telegraph article appears not to have.
Instead I'll judge their attitudes to the public sector and its employees by the attitudes and prejudices displayed by their supporters on this site. I'm making a reasonable assumption that elected Conservatives think in much the same way as unelected Conservative supporters. I think that they're thinking what you're thinking (and blogging).
DOB DOB DOB
Richard Nabavi has done his best to give an example of Gove's attitude to teachers. The speech was clear, unambiguous and revelatory.
Now it is time for you to do your best by providing a counter-example, TLBS.
Call it what you want, I don't have to accept it. I agree that the abundance of programmes about the emergency services have blurred the lines on this issue. I still wouldn't want any relation of mine, filmed by a bloke on a mobile, breathing their last.
The copper was out of order, didn't handle it well, but his heart was in the right place.
Gove has gone out of his way to defend teachers without formal qualifications from aggressive attacks from the unions of those who do.
I'm not sure that's the same as attacking formal qualifications.
Plus ça change: It is five years ago to the day that KP resigned the England captaincy after Peter Moores was sacked.
It is the Thatcher factor.
We really didn't lay her to rest in 2013. She is all around us,
Maybe they should look to themselves, instead of going on strike and looking to blame a SoS who has at least acknowledged there is a huge problem that needs to be addressed. Hanging their heads in shame and admitting they have failed many millions in their charge for several decades would be a start. Asking how they could actively work with the SoS to make sure this never happens again would be a positive step forward.
Yeah, right...
That point is what can or cannot be done in this line needs to be defined by law not individual whim of the policeman on the ground. That law needs to apply equally across the board from citizen journalist to veteran press photographer.
Increasingly even our main stream press footage is coming from citizen journalists and they have produced some superb footage that we may otherwise not have seen from terror incidents to natural disasters we must be careful not to bar the good they do while trying to curb their excessive zeal
I mean, if you judged by the Telegraph or Guardian comments, you'd think we were a country of certifiably angry loons. (Maybe we are, but if so it used to be better hidden).
Perhaps you should consider that Facebook, Twitter, etc are of recent origin and may not entirely reflect the real world as much as people think.
That said, assurance of standards now is far more important than proof of standards 20+ years ago, and good heads will ensure that regular monitoring goes on to that end. Likewise, placing articificial barriers in the way of recruitment is silly. If someone is believed to be good enough but doesn't have the qualifications (they may have worked in the private sector, another country, or have significant other relevant experience), they shouldn't be prevented from applying or being appointed simply because of the lack of a piece of paper.
It is simply unreasonable prejudice.
Comments on facebook from otherwise apolitical people are just one example of the phenomenon of more-than-usual dissatisfaction of teaching friends with Gove. My main point was that my experience was very similar to El_Capitano's.
I'm not suggesting laws to restrict it, and as I say, the copper handled it badly, its just that being in that situation, from experience, is very emotionally hard, for all involved.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/9014782/Ed-Balls-says-Labour-will-not-oppose-public-sector-pay-freeze.html
If Mitchell Johnson was a mate of the headmaster and offered to teach the cricket teams bowlers for a lesson or two, that would be worse than a supply teacher covering PE I suppose?
Not worse for the kids
Mrs Capitano would not be cheered to be told to "hang her head in shame" nor would she be willing to "admit she has failed [those] in her charge". Nor should she, given that her school sits in the top five for her city, despite being in a low-income area.
Elder Mrs Capitano (mother) would not be cheered to be told to "hang her head in shame", either, nor "admit she has failed [those] in her charge". Nor should she, given that her former school provides for some of the most seriously handicapped in our society - children who would be seriously disruptive in any other school, hampering others' achievement.
Should either of them "look to themselves"? No. No, I don't think so.
But; this is the message that they hear from Gove, and from Gove's supporters. Much though I admire the tenacity of the speech-ferreters here, it doesn't really matter whether particular words can be attributed to him, or to Dominic Cummings, or to PB commenters who support him. Mass politics is rarely about that. It's about broad-brush impressions, and the broad-brush impression you've conveyed is pretty much what they get from Gove.
This is why, to return to the post topic, the LibDems have seen their public sector support implode. Those who voted LibDem last time are very aware that they have helped put Gove (and Lansley/Hunt too) in power directly over them. They are unlikely to give the LibDems an opportunity to do this again.
If so why ?
Lik errm Eastleigh
I dunno, I abandon my really important (1) work with really immediate deadline (2) to watch our hero on a webinar, and he only turns up for five minutes!
(1) to me, at least.
(2) yes, really.
Maybe he's got the wrong solutions - time will tell, with a bit of luck - but it is ludicrous to suggest that he doesn't care about the issue.
Do you still live in/around Mansfield or have you headed to the big smoke ?
Whats your thoughts on the 60 limit proposed for the M1 ?!
Are people on this site generally general public or are they politicians and those connected with politics?
That said, when the strike was called, she did reluctantly stay at home that day, principally because if her class were the only one to be in school, it would make her pupils very resentful towards her, and that's not good for their learning through the rest of the year!
I've worked in the public sector and have friends who still do. To describe public sector workers as a group as "left wing" is absurd. Indeed, some of my friends would fit in very well with the majority sentiment of this forum being strongly anti-Labour though that's not to say they are not critical of the Coalition.
There is still a sense of an instrusive centralisation - that central Government are trying to do much directing and regulating rather than allowing local authorities to get on and manage their own affairs. In those Authorities where the share of Government rant as a percentage of income has fallen sharply over the years, the ongoing interventionist ethos is all the more annoying.
I don't know if it's the same with Education but on the one hand there is clear encouragement for Schools to break away from local authority management (though that's not as simple and obvious as is generally imagined) but on the other an ever more regulated curriculum and standardisation.
The centralisation of successive Conservative and Labour Governments was ruinous and it still seems there is a micro-managerial interventionist mindset still very much around in Whitehall and Westminster.
(loads of hands go up) (some Gove hating teacher picks two who look pleased getting padded up'
'right we have a treat for you today kids - Mitchell Johnson is here and he is going to do a bit of bowling'
(all but two kids laugh)
North East Fife
Cardiff North
Newcastle upon Tyne East
Manchester, Withington
Cardiff West
Liverpool, Wavertree
Neath
Na h-Eileanan An Iar
Wirral West
Beverley and Holderness
Pontypridd
Birmingham, Edgbaston
Gower
Gosport
Exeter
Taunton Deane
Chesterfield
Newcastle-under-Lyme
Sedgefield
Leeds North West
On the other side
Poplar and Limehouse
Amber Valley
Chelsea and Fulham
Somerton and Frome
Cities of London and Westminster
Waveney
East Surrey
South West Bedfordshire
Boston and Skegness
South Norfolk
Gravesham
Hemel Hempstead
Sevenoaks
Stratford-on-Avon
East Hampshire
North East Hampshire
Runnymede and Weybridge
Worthing West
South Holland and The Deepings
Tamworth
I wish I hadn't,extremely depressing. They were all virtually unemployable,and bringing up the next generation of unemployed.
All the stereotypes were there,large TVs,strong lager,smart phones,smoking,dogs etc.All blaming the Effing Government for cutting their bedroom subsidy,spare rooms were being used to grow cannabis.
I hope this is an extreme example,but fear it may not be.
I would not know how to start to correct this situation.
Boris is a Greats Scholar and will know that prophylactic has a wider meaning than its modern use to denote a condom.
The word derives from the Ancient Greek for standing guard before or in front of something or someone. This meaning fits the context of Boris's description of Clegg's role as a shield in front of Cameron.
Prophylactic later acquired a secondary meaning of preventing disease and from there it became associated with a means of preventing sexual disease (or unwanted insemination).
Silly, silly Burley!
Seen by who, Mr. S.? By the teachers? But they loathe him you say, so no surprise. By the educational establishment, whose comfy boat he seems to be rocking? No surprise there either. What about parents?
In my experience as a parent (son left school in 2011) and as a qualified, though no longer practising, teacher (couldn't stand the concentration on process and side-lining of outcomes) the education system in this country desperately needs reform and the clearance of an awful lot of dead wood.
Gove is, I think, trying to move the system in the right direction and in doing so is bound to upset the vested interests of the producers. We can argue about what sort of reform would be best (if I had a complaint it would be that he is not being radical enough), but your comment is, perhaps, intemperate and may I say unjustified.
More money has been tried and failed. Not sure making benefits tougher to live on will be any more successful, to be honest.
"When the first count started, much to my surprise, I noted that none of the candidates had a scrutineer present. Evidently, this was a ruling from Gareth Fox, who was at the meeting at that time. A classic Central Office cock-up ruling! There is nothing in the rules which says that you cannot have a scrutineer, and had the candidates had one each, we would not now be in this ridiculous position.
Secondly, at no time following any of the counts (of which there were three) were the candidates shown the result and asked if they would like a recount. That must happen, and is quite clearly stated in the rule book. Another classic cock-up! "
http://www.conservativehome.com/parliament/2014/01/alleged-vote-counting-error-throws-south-east-cambridgeshire-open-primary-result-into-doubt.html#IDComment780720331
Parents loathe strikes - especially on top of the lengthy holidays and "inset" days.
However it might have downsides as a defence: it might be that the unedited footage shows some of them in a worse light.
At the end of he day, if you do a deal with the devil then you pay the consequences ...
In the long term, D'Annunzio was a failure, the port of Fiume soon became Rijeka in Yugoslavia, and it's now in Croatia.
Another uprating of the UK's GDP Q4 growth forecast. This time from the British Chambers of Commerce.
The economy is growing as a solid pace, and 2014 is off to a 'fantastic start', the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) said Tuesday.
In its quarterly survey of nearly 8,000 businesses, the BCC found that all the critical fourth quarter balances were stronger than their long-term averages, and many were above their pre-recession levels.
As a result, the BCC has predicted that the UK's GDP will have grown 0.9% in the final three months of the year.
Onwards and upwards.
Is it Labour Lite voters who saw Lib Dems as a soft option to Labour?
Can the Lib Dems re-position themselves as capitalists with a heart instead of soft Labour?
1.6m working in NHS, 1.5m in education, 1.1m in public administration
Cameron's policy of going out of his way to piss off as many groups of his "natural" supporters as possible (it has to have been deliberate, surely) will have affected public sector employees just as much as workers in the private sector.
"...as far as these voters are concerned, it is the Lib Dems’ fault that the Conservatives are in office at all. For this the party cannot be forgiven "
http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2013/03/what-are-the-liberal-democrats-for/
I am a Govean at heart and "workers" seems a step too far.
On Gove, I always liked his Times column and have nothing against him personally. But he does turn up in doorstep conversations, always negatively. The problem is I think (leaving aside the rights and wrongs) that he's seen by teachers as anti-teacher but not really seen by parents as pro-parent, partly perhaps because teachers follow his comments closely while parents are pretty much the general public, who don't in general follow ANYTHING political closely. Indeed I suspect that more than 75% of parents would struggle to name him.
(that's September 1943 to May '45 versus Sep 1919 to Dec '20)
Have you met with Gove and discussed his policies with him?
Would you deny that in general the UK's education system has been failing for many years and that Gove is trying to bring it back to a reasonable standard that will allow the future UK employees to compete in a global market for talent?
As an employer it is very usual to find the candidate from overseas to be better educated, be more knowledgeable and have a better attitude to work than the corresponding UK candidate and have more aspiration to learn and improve.
Being part of the UK's leading technical companies, in order to survive and grow globally, we cannot afford to employ anyone but the best in qualifications, knowledge and work ethic - if not we will be overtaken and go bankrupt.
The UK's education system has been in a nigh bankrupt state for many years and Gove is trying to haul it out of that abyss which was accepted by Labour for their political purposes and by the educational establishment for their own pride.
Of course Gove is meeting opposition on all sides, but OGH would you prefer to have our children worse educated than much of the developing world and so face a prospect of perpetual unemployment.
Children are our future and it behoves us all to give them the best education possible and to develop their talents and give them the maximum encouragement and opportunities to utilise those talents.
1. Cameroons show they dislike conservatives.
2. Conservative-hating Guardian readers vote for Conservative Party.
Was the opposition to Fiume Split?