Saturday, December 22, 2012

Cobblers to the Council!













East Riding Council is threatening the imminent removal of the historic setts (cobblestones) in the market place....so...the message today was Save Our Setts and ....Cobblers to the Council! This was just the first of a list of other important issues to be dealt with.

I spoke with MP Graham Stuart at the end and asked him what the Tory Government does about errant Tory councils like this one... 'surely you're not proud of the way they carry on?' I asked.  He replied that it's democracy - people vote for them....!

Friday, December 21, 2012

School cancels Christmas



Bah Humbug!

The cancellation of Christmas by the Oasis Academy at Nunsthorpe, near Grimsby (in N-E Yorks according to today's Metro!)  says it all about the madness of the current approach to education.   The primary school says  they have to 'raise standards'  before reintroducing music and drama productions because they came bottom of a league table for  English and Maths.  An angry parent renamed the school  'the Scrooge Academy' .

A head teacher who had turned round a London school through music and the arts was outraged. The fact that schools have now reached the stage of  bizarre decisions like this is an indication of the depth of the crisis in education. School governors and heads have bought in to the myths of Gradgrind methods because they are lacking wise leadership from government.  Dickens' ‘Hard Times’ has morphed from being a satire to becoming a text book.  Talking of Dickens, the  UK government should be put through Scrooge’s nightmare experience in ‘A Christmas Carol’…..they need a dose of those ghosts warning against a preoccupation with cash boxes, ledgers and exploiting the workers.  Then they might – just possibly – realise the error of their ways.

The North East Lincs 'academy' may be an oasis from Christmas, but the UK government's approach to education (and society) is now an oasis from humanity and good sense.
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