Too many industries have been allowed to die while this government swells the ranks of public sector workers who do not create wealth. Manufacturing, farming and fishing should have greater respect.

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1) ‘Cigar bars’ like they have in New York, why shouldn’t like minded individuals have the freedom of association to smoke tobacco and drink whisky or whatever their tipple over a nice conversation in the warmth.

2) Those sheesha cafe’s the Arabs used to have that have been criminalised, smoking ‘sheeshas’ or ‘hookers’ in the Arab world is prevelent, why shouldn’t Brits of Arabic origin, Arab visitors and other people who want to try something different and smoke sheeshas over a cup of tea and some ethnic food not be allowed to fo so whilst enjoying shelter from the elements and hospitality?

3) A promise to maitain our freedom to fish with rod and line in the sea without a licence. Beach/rock fishing with rod and line does not reduce stocks, nets do. We are an island nation and any man who stands on our shores should be allowed to hunt in our seas with a single rod and line with governmnt intrusion. Sea fishermen already pay 17.5 VAT on the equipement they buy.

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Sir Roger (Dr.)Bannister (who in his seventies probably still runs faster than most of us can cycle) recently pointed out to me that one of the advantages of cycling is that it restricts the flow of blood to the testicles, thus reducing fertility. Given the degree of

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(also trying to see if I can fool these italics…)

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Of course it isn’t. Just more tinkering with a fundamentally flawed system. You will note from the Ed Balls interview that his answer to most things is to “deliver a strategy within a framework of policies”… blah blah.

That accursed phrase always tells me they have nothing to offer but strategies. But we want to know what they’re actually going to DO about the broken education system. Ah yes, deliver strategies…

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Conservatives are looking much, much more promising after detailing some of their policies I think. Its all common sense stuff but this is absolutely what Britain needs after a decade of failed leftopia from the Labor party.

I listened to the Ed Balls interview posted here and feel motivated to comment once more on education.

Ed Balls was asked about why more people are attempting to opt out of the state system. He didn’t have an answer but his answer to improving education in the state system seemed to be to ‘personalise’ it.

Can I just say right now ‘personalising’ education is no solution. It isn’t achievable, its a waste of resources and teacher energy and furthermore will not make a blind bit of difference to educational standards. Its a line and a smokescreen to conceal the fact that despite all the money pumped into education the Labor party hasn’t a clue how to make things better.

The reality is that education has to be simple to carry out for teachers and it has to fit with the way people operate rather than the way you wish they would operate.

1) You need a seriously brilliant national curriculum with detailed lesson plans that can be simply rolled out by teachers.
2) You need to stream kids into vocational courses if they are not academic.
3) you need to stream kids generally so that simple whole class teaching is possible.
4) You need to expel children who cause problems in class and stop others learning. Teachers waste so much class time on behaviour management that everyone is missing out. Better to be tough on a few to make sure the majority gets the education they are entitled to. I think it would be just as easy to bring back the cane but that will never happen.
5) Parents only feel comfortable putting their kids in schools where most of the kids are ‘like them’. Some parents are aspirational and want their children to be with others they consider are more upwardly mobile but no-one feels comfortable leaving their kids in a place where they don’t fit in.

Most evidence about they way human beings operate shows that high levels of trust and reciprocity are linked to conformity rather than to diversity.

Rather than pretending that this is a problem to be fixed and having parents opt out of the system as a consequence schools should focus seriously on ensuring that pupils are a good fit.

There should be more schools available in both the public and private sector that have an interview policy to determine whether there is a good match between the school and the child.

There is quite a lot of selection that goes on by borough with parents moving to areas that are known to have a good school system and similarly motivated students/parents which tends to be self reinforcing but this isn’t enough and is too linked to purely financial resources.
6)I’m not sure about this but I think teaching is now largely a ‘second salary’ job done by women. If parents in different areas could compete for the best teachers by paying more for them you would see some private sector competition, improvement and attrition and that would almost certainly raise standard across the board. Schools with richer parents would be at an advantage but lets face it they always are–that’s capitalism.

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There was a surprising lack of global warming humbug in the speeches I watched. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised; after Dave’s glacier-hugging phase, the Tories may at last have realised that the wheels are coming off the GW bandwagon. People are beginning to see it for what it is – the biggest scam since the South Sea Bubble, only bigger.

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As Idlex said, it was good to hear Cameron talking like a Tory, and the public has responded. Hopefully he will have learned from this and there’ll be much less wishy washy centrism coming from the Opposition front bench in the future!

(Climate change hasn’t gone away but since none of the parties are saying they’re in favour of making it worse, there’s little point banging on about it too much.)

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