After Greenpeace’s stunt at the Prime Minister’s house, the Government quickly announced it would no longer meet with them. A sensible enough move, you might think – but the most surprising thing is that Greenpeace ever occupied ministers’ time in the first place. After all the group’s website proudly lists the range of law suits […]
The Bank of England’s pronouncements on the ability of any gender to become pregnant are just the latest example of how our financial and economic regulators are no longer fit for purpose. When they were first established their remit was clear – to protect customers from being exploited by monopoly or unscrupulous providers. Now most […]
Strikes used to be weapon of the poorly paid and the role of trade unions was to defend downtrodden workers being exploited by their greedy bosses. These days, however, we have junior doctors standing on picket lines demanding a 35% pay increase which would take their starting salary to £40,000. Headteachers are also considering strike […]
It is accepted wisdom that the NHS is desperately short of staff. We regularly hear reports of the record number of vacancies and the need to use expensive agency cover. Yet the NHS in England employs the full time equivalent of 1.2 million people, nearly 200,000 more than they did in 2012. The increases in […]
It seems that the mystery of what ‘levelling up’ means is about to be revealed – and it turns out that it will amount to more government, more public spending and, that perennial local government favourite, regenerating town centres. This week’s white paper looks set to ignore the decades of evidence that throwing government money […]
When children went back to school on March 8 it was possible to believe it was a return to normality. There was a glimmer of hope that a relentless focus over the summer term might begin to undo some of the damage of lockdown. Gradually, it has become clear that was a false dawn. Beset […]
When I was the councillor in charge of children’s services on Barnet council, every six months the director of education and I had to appear before the council leader to be cross examined on every line of our budget. We were questioned on everything from the subscription to the Times Educational Supplement to the taxi […]
The devastation of the past year makes it hard to talk about schools without feeling utter despair. The extent of the learning that has been lost and the futures blighted will sadly become ever more apparent in the months to come. The Government’s education recovery plan is a start in addressing those difficulties, but it […]
Britain’s lack of engineers, technicians and health professionals is holding the economy back. If we can train up the next generation with the right skills we can have a prosperous future with a highly productive workforce toiling away on good things like wind turbines or computer coding. At least that’s the vision set out in […]
So here we are again, arguing about whether schools should be closed. Just as they did in March, June, September and November, the teaching unions are showing how little value they place on children’s education. It’s not surprising that Amanda Spielman, Ofsted’s Chief Inspector, should be so passionate about the need for schools to stay […]
Last week I went to a meeting at the primary school where I am chairman of governors. It was the first time I had crossed the threshold since March and, suitably sanitised and gloved, I examined the work the children had done this term, stories written, spellings corrected, sums completed. The children are delighted to […]
There are clear political justifications for the Government’s recent announcement of extra school funding. A highly effective union campaign has made education funding a toxic issue and some schools are struggling to make ends meet. What is less is clear is why the cost of running English schools has increased so much over the past […]
The only certainty about Theresa May’s announcement of more money for the NHS is that it won’t be enough and it won’t be spent wisely. That is because the structure, management and organisation of the NHS make it impossible to drive through the changes that are needed to make it run more efficiently, a problem […]
