Vox Polis

A couple of days ago I covered the plan to set up a stricter code of conduct for school selection. In light of that it’s was interesting to see an article in the The Independent on a study which revelealed that church schools are taking in fewer children from low income families than secular schools in the same areas. Of course it is possible that a lower percentage of religious families have low income which would skew the statistics. If it is found that church schools are attempting to select on academic ability in addition to their already debatable selection practices then the education authorities should certainly take action.

The same study also showed that the new academies (which I’m not fond of) established as part of recent controversial education reforms are taking in more than their share of pupils who are eligible for free school meals (the indicator used for low income) which will probably be used as an argument in favour of increasing the number of academies.

Iain Dale’s got the new Tory logo on his site, which (unsurprisingly) is a tree - i think! It looks like a 4 year olds scribble…it just doesnt fit the new slick Tory campaign.

The government are to release for consultation a new code that will create tighter controls on the ways that state schools select pupils. Guidelines already exist for the selection of candidates but adherence is not compulsory. The new code contains wording that makes it clear to schools that they are to follow the rules.

Included in the new code are rules to prevent selection of candidates based on: their parent’s social and financial background; the child’s past behaviour; relationships to school staff or governors; relationship to existing pupils.

So all in all pretty good news, we live in times where children are ferried to and from school in blacked out 4×4s and congregate outside for fear of attracting on the spot ASBOs. This climate of fear leaves comprehensive schools as pretty much the only place where kids can meet other people from different social backgrounds. Personally I’m extremely glad of the understanding of other people I received from going to a school with a broad intake (I don’t believe it had a detrimental effect on my education either). On a broader note allowing children to mix as widely as possible between social, racial and religious groups is the best way to foster a climate free of the sort of isolationism that leads on to hate crime and home grown terrorism.

Via the BBC.

Tony’s going to lecture us all tomorrow about social exclusion, and we can all gather and watch it “live” on the Downing Street website- what fun!

Tony said last week that there are “people that have multiple problems, who we need to identify far earlier.” - In Tony’s case there’s his announcement that he’s leaving, coupled with the failure to agree on a leaving date, which has resulted in growing opposition in the media, from the Tories, resentment from the public and even his own party. Would have been easier if he’d identified this problem far earlier, and resigned.

Clearly Tony’s is being excluded. Social exclusion is defined as:

“This is a term to describe marginalisation from employment (very soon), income (well compared to a director of a multinational), social networks such as family, neighbourhood (he lives next door to Gordon) and community (hmm..labour party, trade unions etc etc), decision making and from an adequate quality of life (who’d want to work his hours?- 5 hours sleep a night).”

Poor Tony! The Labour party certainly needs to tackle social exclusion. And it must start by tackling it within its own party.

So the Government has decided to agree with the Tories and introduce permits for Bulgarians and Romanians.  This is likely to fail to achieve any of its goals, because people will come to the UK anyway and work here illegally or move to a member state where there are no restrictions.  We’re also likely to lose out on the best workers.

And I thought there was going to be a proper debate about immigration.  Yet again the Government is making policy based on misguided tabloid pressure.

It seems that Romania is preparing to place its own restrictions on worker migration when it joins the EU next year in retaliation to those planned by Britain and other member states. Although you might think that no one in their right mind would want to work in Romania where the average wage is $7,700 - Romania does face a shortage in construction workers - so all those Polish builders could end up there (the average Polish wage is $6,948) unless Poland places restrictions too.

London has the best transport system in the world- apparently. Clearly the respondents of the survey havent been caught up in strikes, delays, hot weather, or terrorist attacks.

The Mail on Sunday had an interesting article showing that local councils are “bugging” our wheelie bins to determine how much non-recycled waste we are producing. To be fair the information they are collecting is minimal - it calculates how full the bin is, and is the equivalent of someone with a pen and paper marking how full/empty it is (but much more efficient).

The real ‘concern’ is how this information is going to be used. Clearly it is a precursor to a “pay as you throw” scheme where households are charged for not recycling. Although I believe this is inevitable, I’m not convinced it will work (people will just dump their waste elsewhere) and should only be implemented with an equal policy to get producers to reduce packaging - perhaps the “one layer” scheme I blogged here.

Councils’ first policy should be to introduce the fortnightly pick up that Canterbury City Council has implemented - discussed here. The stench of 2 week old rubbish is enough to convince anyone to recycle.

Oh and finally if the Tories are going to criticise the scheme can they come up with something better than:

“Conservative MP Andrew Pelling said burglars could hack into the computer system to see if sudden reductions in waste at individual households meant the owners were on holiday and the property empty.”

Don’t people have to put the bin out to be collected? Isn’t that be a pretty clear sign that they’re away on holiday?!

David Hencke at the Guardian has an interesting piece on the state of funding for the 3 major parties.  The sources are largely what you’d expect - state funding, business, wealthy individuals and for Labour the unions.  But the bit that really had me nodding my head was Hencke’s final point about the moral, democratic solution to the funding question - return policy making power to ordinary party members.  The sad thing is that political decisions being made for the true benefit of the majority seems like an almost impossible dream in the current climate.

Anyways, read the article here.

Have the Tories learnt nothing from their last two election defeats?? They’re back onto the immigration debate, calling for restrictions on immigrants from Bulgaria and Romania when they join the EU next year. This is a bad idea because:

• As I have pointed out here and here, we’re unlikely to swamped with new arrivals.

• Restrictions and quotas will not stop them coming to the UK. It will only stop them working here legally (the black market will be very welcoming). This is because of the Free Movement directive, which even allows them to claim health care and benefits.

• Think how they feel. Does no one else think it’s hypocritical to allow Western Europeans to visit, work, buy up all the nice land/houses in Eastern/Central Europe, but not allow them to do the same??