Oct 31 2007
The loadsofmoney fallacy again
Today we hear there are two government initiatives briefed to the media - and of course no Parliament once again to press and probe government Ministers on what they are up to.
The first is Hazel Blears offering ??70 million of our money to tackle extremism in Islamic communities. It will be interesting to see how she spends this and what she thinks she is buying with it. As so often with this government the story is the money, not the good they think it can do as that is difficult to define. They usually work out the sum they can "afford" before deciding in detail how to spend it, leading to waste and fruitless spending.
The second is the Prime Minister, saying he is going to spend more on teachers and teacher training so he can tackle all the schools which fail to achieve 30% of their pupils passing 5 GCSEs or more at A-C grade. He does not tell us why the additional money he is proposing will make all the difference, when all the money committed so far has not worked. He does not tell us how he wishes teachers to reform or improve these schools, although he does threaten them with "special measures" if they do not achieve the standard. I trust 30% is not his ambition but his minimum standard, as it is a low one.
Getting more young people to pass 5 GCSEs requires changes of attitude. First and foremost it needs the young people themselves to decide that passing these GCSEs is important. Ultimately it is down to the students. Doubtless many more could pass these exams if they wanted to. The problem is one of motivaiton. The lack of motivation is related to the benefit system, attitudes to work and the negative response some schooling generates in the pupils.
Secondly it needs the adults who have some contact with these young people - parents, other relatives, community leaders - to create an atmosphere which stresses that pasing these exams is a necessary part of growing up which can lead them to better jobs and lives thereafter.
Thirdly, it needs the school leaders to believe that their children can achieve, as young people in other places achieve.
The government has a far more difficult problem than the Prime Minister implies. If throwing money at public servcies worked we would now have cracked this. No-one can deny that this government has spent record sums of money, nor do I doubt they would like this money to buy success for more pupils.
It is high time the Prime Minister used his fabled intelligence to ask the obvious questions - where has all the money gone, and why isn’t it working?
If he started to ask himself that he might then discover something about leadership. Leadership is not a question of just setting targets and sending cheques. It is a question of mobilising professional opinion, carrying teachers and lecturers with him, making them believe improvements can be made, and setting out to society as a whole why education matters.
Mr Brown’s educational system has become a rather mean and narrow concentration on too many exams and too many targets. Teachers and schools feel they are on a treadmill which many of the students do not like. Boys in particualr are disaffected with the current styles of teaching and examining and the nature of the curriculum. As a boy who was critical of his own education it is a pity Mr Brown does not give this some more thought before another generation leave school disaffected with the educational world and underqualified for the modern competitive world.
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John Redwood has been the Member of Parliament for Wokingham since 1987. First attending Kent College, Canterbury, he graduated from Magdalen College...
Well put.
I sincerely hope the
Education is the answer to both of the main thrusts of your piece.
Education and integration will cut down the dangerous rise in fundamentalism seen in some mosques. I am not sure that just throwing money at the problem will make it go away.
Better quality and targeted education will help the young. Many are not engaged by teachers, too many tests and a lack of discipline in the classroom seem to be at the heart of the problem.
Many of these tests seem pointless, a good teacher knows how well their pupils are doing, what their strengths and weakness’ are. The government need to let the professionals do their jobs, the government need to trust these professionals. This applies to many other areas as well as education.
There needs to be access to education at all ages. If someone was forty for example, and fancied a career change they should be able to train for the new role, perhaps using distance learning. This education should be free or at least tax deductible.
The future is bleak for less able students. A life of depressing unskilled work for little pay with competition for that work from incomers that will work for little money is the reality of many less able people.
I often hear it said that British workers are lazy and don’t want the jobs on offer. Let’s look at that.
No one in the southeast can afford to live on the national minimum wage. However, our national minimum wage for say a pole is likely to be four or five times the wage they could earn at home. Now imagine if someone in this country working in a low paid unskilled job was suddenly offered four or five times the national minimum wage for the same work, I am sure they would suddenly be keen and have a good work ethic.
Again the poor suffer.
If we as a country allow a company to pay someone the national minimum wage to a British worker in say London, it is likely that that person would have his money made up by income support and housing benefit etc. We in effect are then subsidising that company out of taxpayer’s money. Is this a stealth increase in those dependant on the public sector?
I am a great believer in the market, if there is a shortage of workers then those that work can be more choosey about the terms and conditions they will accept. Wages will find a natural level that relates to the area.
We have flooded this country with cheap labour from abroad to the detriment of our own unskilled workers. Again the poor suffer.
Our industry needs to invest money in training for our own people. We steal skilled workers from abroad, which wrecks their economy. It is morally wrong. If Labour is truthful in their desire to help Africa, then we as a country need to stop poaching their skilled nurses and workers now and concentrate on training our own people to do these jobs.
One final thought: It is one thing to be poor on benefits but it is another thing to be working forty hours a week in a dead end job for the national minimum wage and still be poor.
We as a nation that once worked to live, are becoming a nation of drones where we live to work as a result of Labour’s policies.
We have too little time off and one of the worse work/life balances of any country in the EU.
Brown has one modus operandi - tax and spend/waste. I am tired of reading about his amazing intellect as I fail to recognise any sign of one. Miliband and Balls are others who have been so described but fail to show any sign of remotely deserving such an accolade. These people operate at the lowest level of party politics which accounts for Labour’s massive failures in every area of public life.
If academically disinclined boys could be taught car mechanics by strong male role models, my guess would be wild horses couldn’t keep them from school. Instead they leave school with few qualifications for a lifetime on benefits and a low feeling of self-worth. This all to pander to an obsession with academic qualifications held by a well educated and well paid liberal elite.
No-one ever seems to ask whether we’re educating young people solely to produce exam results, for careerist politicians to trumpet, or to allow them to grow up and find a fulfilling place in society.