The Politics Thread

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

I feel that's surprisingly shallow. But 'in part' you may well be right. I suspect that there will - in the near future - be more failures of marketing. It's a feature of Tory rule.

I don't think it's 'shallow' to say that the dissemination of information about this new policy was handled badly at the start, thus leading to a build up of angry momentum that quickly became unstoppable and self-feeding.

I suspect that there are many and various reasons for the angry momentum. It is noticeable how many LibDems in particular have been peddling this "they just haven't read the policy properly" line over the last few days...

I don't really think that is the key to the anger. I think people understand it all too well, in the main we are not stupid, though politicians like to imagine we are.

The Labour party introduced tuition fees - and there was no rioting in the streets... this makes me wonder if this is about something else other than "policy" and whether it is understood or not, and I think it might be two things..

1. anger at the LibDems so easily and blatantly selling out a clear and unambiguous pledge - a party commitment - and a succession of individual signed promises... "I pledge..." (yes - the labour party had a manifesto commitment - but NOT with the personal pledge emphasis that the LibDems had...)

Firstly, I'm not going defend the Lib Dems here. Their policy on this was always childish and unrealistic, compounded even more by the crass nonsense involving signing pledges etc.

But anyway, my impression was certainly that the proposals were not widely understood in their early days and that this contributed to the first rolling of a bandwagon that lots of groups have only been too willing to jump on since, for a variety of reasons. (It would be interesting to get a percentage at every demo for people who had actually cast a vote for the Lib Dems at the election.

Just the other day my grandmother, who abhors my politics and probably wouldn't cast her vote for me if I ever ran for office, sent me this in an email: "I was wondering if you have seen the Students Rally around Westminster. They seem very angry but well organised. Don't really know how I feel about the situation but I feel a bit sorry for the poorer families." What's the point in telling her that the fees don't affect people until they are, by definition, no longer poor anymore... it would be like banging my head against a brick wall.

[Worthy4England]

Just the other day my grandmother, who abhors my politics and probably wouldn't cast her vote for me if I ever ran for office.

She's probably not on her own there PB.

[William the White]

Just the other day my grandmother, who abhors my politics and probably wouldn't cast her vote for me if I ever ran for office.

She's probably not on her own there PB.

His grannie sounds really nice. And politically astute.

[Worthy4England]

Just the other day my grandmother, who abhors my politics and probably wouldn't cast her vote for me if I ever ran for office.

She's probably not on her own there PB.

His grannie sounds really nice. And politically astute.

I've heard that occasionally good stuff skips a generation or two...

[Harry Genshaw]

Don't really know how I feel about the situation but I feel a bit sorry for the poorer families." What's the point in telling her that the fees don't affect people until they are, by definition, no longer poor anymore... it would be like banging my head against a brick wall.

Isn't the argument though that this bill will effect poorer families because they're stopping the EMA?

I've no idea like - just asking...

[Bruce Rioja]

Just the other day my grandmother, who abhors my politics and probably wouldn't cast her vote for me if I ever ran for office.

She's probably not on her own there PB.

His grannie sounds really nice. And politically astute.

Yes, we'll have to ask her whether or not she'd still have men working a mile underground, smacking at coal with pickaxes?

[Gravedigger]

A friend of mine from a Royal Navy website sent me the following I hope you find it as interesting as I do:


If you are a young university educated Britain and unemployed or distinctly underemployed (i.e. working at a job that does not utilise your specific degree, or more likely any degree) then you are far from alone. Over half of all UK graduates are in the same sorry boat. Take a measure of comfort you personally did nothing "wrong"- the British labour market just hasn't been able to generate enough good jobs to match the rampant inflation in higher education over the last 20 years. The Institute for Employment Studies' report “What Do Graduates Really Do” studied three groups of graduates from one university. It revealed an astonishing level of 'underemployment'. 3 in 10 were in a job which they knew had previously been held by a humble 16-year-old school leaver. The 1990 government report, Highly Qualified People: Supply and Demand, for example, showed that 'Britain already has considerably more in the way of higher qualified labour than it can absorb in any capacity' - and that was before the current massive upsurge in higher education recruitment!

As we move from a world where university was the preserve of the bright or privileged few to one where it is viewed as a universal right of passage, one of the key benefits of a degree - namely the extent to which it marks you exceptional –... vanishes. Where is the competitive advantage if every Tom, Dick and Henrietta has a similar qualification? Over the last 20 years University students have fulfilled their part of the bargain with government by stacking up ever-increasing debt with an ever-diminishing prospect of good quality employment opportunities within which to pay it back. According to the 2010 Higher Education Policy Institute, study - Broke and Broken the average student leaves owing around £25,000, rising to £37,000 for those borrowing the most, including those studying in London. With annual interest alone calculated at almost £1,000-a-year, researchers said many students would only see marginal benefit from a university education. Those taking arts courses at university - including fine art, drama, dance and music - are only predicted to earn an extra £35,000 over their lifetime compared to those dropping out of education at 18. "Consider an example where an arts student took up a place at an institution in London, paying fees consistent with the average of the market, but also taking up the maximum loan entitlement," said the study. "It is obvious that they could expect to receive a negative premium - in other words, they would obtain no financial benefit from higher education whatsoever." Are we seriously suggesting that the next generation of student should hock themselves to the eyeballs in under-funded universities with no guarantee of a return on their investment? Randall Collins in “The Dirty Secret of Credential Inflation”, describes a higher education system locked in a cycle of expanding access to degrees, which dilutes the value of those degrees in the employment market, which, in turn, drives a portion of those degree-holders back to campus for still more advanced degrees. “In principle,” he wrote, “credential inflation could go on endlessly, until caretakers need Ph.D.’s and babysitters are required to hold advanced degrees in child care. People could stay in college up through their 30s and 40s.”

Again the biggest problem has been the decline of manufacturing jobs. This has meant the loss of tens of millions of mid-level management, professional or technical jobs that should have gone to university graduates didn't materialise. The ...plan in the 60's was for British industry to modernise and automate (and train workers to become technocrats in a high skill economy forged “in the white heat of technology”) to overcome low-wage foreign competition. However, most manufacturers simply moved their manufacturing off shore to utilise the cheaper labour and facilities. In economic terms this was far cheaper and easier than developing efficient high-tech facilities in the U.K. Yet again British governments and their bureaucratic cronies refuse to see the decline of the productive sector as their principal concern and cling to the hope that more education is the magic formula to get the country out of its dystopia. A report by Professor Peter Saunders “What are low ability workers to do when unskilled jobs disappear?” showed conclusively that simply pumping more and more government spending into education and training (there is very little genuine vocational training taking place in the UK) will not solve this problem.

As the government presses ahead with its drive to get 50% of under-30s into higher education by 2010, we are entering a period where everyone on paper seems better educated, but as employers point out no-one seems any brighter. Already, much of the supposed improvement in secondary school and university graduation rates has come by asking less of graduates. What the statistics don't show and employers embarrassingly point out frequently, is that thousands of those students exciting our education system cannot construct a proper sentence; they cannot sit for an hour in a lecture theatre, and some can't even tell you who fought, let alone won, the Second World War! Richard F. Gombrich in his book British Higher Education Policy in the last Twenty Years: clearly illustrates that higher education policy over the last couple of decades has been an unmitigated catastrophe in terms of maintaining a semblance of quality. We have undermined what were at one time widely regarded as some of the world's best universities. In 1961, 5% of young people in Britain received higher education; in 1997 the percentage was 34,12 and the government's declared policy is to raise it to 50 In 1992 John Major's government passed a Further and Higher Education Act which brought dramatic change to higher education., Since 1965, British higher education had been organized on what was called the ``binary system'', binary because divided between universities and other institutions, mainly polytechnics and teachers' training colleges they had a strong bias towards vocational and applied subjects. Many of the polytechnics were centres of excellence in their particular fields. Unfortunately as manufacturing declined so did the relevance and the links with the Poly's. In 1992 the binary system was abolished and the former polytechnics etc mostly became 2nd rate universities aping the mannerisms of the older universities.

In terms of maintaining standards Universities cannot possibly have preserved quality in any of those bodies, but it is virtually taboo to say so. The model for the university is now the factory. The factory mass-produces supposedly qualified students. Our education system used to be the envy of the world. Now, those who haven't yet succumbed to the lure of a management pay cheque, and promotion to the ethereal world of massaging figures and generating paper, are embarrassed at the paucity of knowledge a large body of students arrive at University with. They then wince at the illiteracy at University level. The British education system is immoral, and increasingly a farce. In effect these institutions are child-minding, filling the gap that entering the workplace used to have. Our higher education institutions are now not to be trusted. Academically ill-equipped students are lured into substantial debt to obtain a degree that gives them or no benefit in the job market. There is now a built-in incentive for institutions to expand remorselessly the provision of courses that are in effect Mickey Mouse degrees. The term was used by the then education minister Margaret Hodge, in a classic piece of British understatement, she defined a Mickey Mouse course as "one where the content is perhaps not as rigorous as one would expect and where the degree itself may not have huge relevance in the labour market"; Media Studies has fallen victim to the term, since there are 43 times as many Media Studies students in higher education as there are jobs available in the media annually. In 2000, Staffordshire University was rightly mocked as providing ' David Beckham Studies' as it provided a module on the sociological importance of football to students taking Sociology, Sports Science, or Media Studies. Other degrees deemed 'Mickey Mouse' include Golf Management, Surf Science, and Oenology. The most ridiculed course was "outdoor adventure with philosophy" offered by Marjon College in Plymouth, it features "journeys, environmental management, creative outdoor study and spirituality".


Over the last 40 or so years we have seen the fulfillment of the Futurists dream for a bright new world. Britain of 2010 has successfully achieved its goal of entering the leisure age. We have automated not only our factories but our offices and administration. Every aspect of the supply chain is now highly efficient with costs pared down to a minimum. We have introduced a raft of practices to reduce manning, goodbye to the bus conductor and the person who collects your trolley at the supermarket. We have outsourced or off shored just about anything that can be made cheaper or exported (regardless of quality, have you ever dealt with a call centre in Bombay?). We have flattened management structures and reformed, reorganised and rationalised the British workforce to within an inch of its life. We have systematically driven to exclude as many jobs and functions as we possibly can and now with mass unemployment staring us in the face we are surprised that the economy is like a wheezy nag only fit for the knackers yard . As a careers adviser I'm often asked what will be the growth areas in terms of employment in the future. The truth is apart from elderly care I have no idea. I suppose pet beautician, nail technician or some kind of spurious personal service! Prostitution probably, yes I can foresee prostitution becoming mainstream like pornography, after all it is the ultimate personal service. You think this unlikely? If you had told me 40 years ago that there would be pawn shops, tattoo and piercing parlours in abundance in our towns and cities I would have thought you mad. The demands for a more and more flexible labour force coupled with the leap forwards in automation and the sophistications of computer software has caused great reverberations of insecurity throughout the employment structure. Redundancy, short-term contracts, multiple desperate career jumps have become the order of the day, we now face huge structural unemployment with many facing the prospect of a lifetime idle or working for poverty wages. In short, what Will Hutton (1995) has characterized as "the 40:30:30 society".

The truth is that Britain along with the United States has undertaken yet another highly risky experiment in laissez-faire economics.

60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, present and how similar it all seems. Just a rehashing. Enjoy!!!!

[Hoboh]

Cool dude

Over to the scholars on here................... Strike back!!!!

(If CAPS gets past the first line even he may like it )

[thebish]

Cool dude

Over to the scholars on here................... Strike back!!!!

(If CAPS gets past the first line even he may like it )

I suspect his list of non-courses is lifted from the so-called "Non-Courses Report", produced by a group called the Taxpayers Alliance.

this is such a popular diatribe that I have, on occasion, followed up some of the claims made for "non-courses". It usually turns out that what they are describing is simply a unit of a bigger degree (or often - not a degree at all) - or even just an essay-title, and sometimes an essay title from a HE college that doesn't offer degree-level studies - but is then described as "a degree in XXXX"

granted - some bonkers courses do exist - but often - if you actually look at the course it is a perfectly reasonable and rigourously academic course - with an unusual title - and no more ludicrous a notion than what are considered to be conventionally acceptable degree courses.

(why - for instance is any literary degree with a 20th centiry science fiction angle deemed less worthy - more bonkers - than a literary degree focussing on 18th centiry romantic poetry or shakespearean plays?)

I may be wrong, though - he may have rigourously researched it himself rather than lifted it from a widely discredited report from a bunch of loonies.....

[Hoboh]

Cool dude

Over to the scholars on here................... Strike back!!!!

(If CAPS gets past the first line even he may like it )

I suspect his list of non-courses is lifted from the so-called "Non-Courses Report", produced by a group called the Taxpayers Alliance.

this is such a popular diatribe that I have, on occasion, followed up some of the claims made for "non-courses". It usually turns out that what they are describing is simply a unit of a bigger degree (or often - not a degree at all) - or even just an essay-title, and sometimes an essay title from a HE college that doesn't offer degree-level studies - but is then described as "a degree in XXXX"

granted - some bonkers courses do exist - but often - if you actually look at the course it is a perfectly reasonable and rigourously academic course - with an unusual title - and no more ludicrous a notion than what are considered to be conventionally acceptable degree courses.

(why - for instance is any literary degree with a 20th centiry science fiction angle deemed less worthy - more bonkers - than a literary degree focussing on 18th centiry romantic poetry or shakespearean plays?)

I may be wrong, though - he may have rigourously researched it himself rather than lifted it from a widely discredited report from a bunch of loonies.....

You been on the "pop" before you posted that load of contridictions bish?
Makes me feel humble your down at our level now

[thebish]

you'll have to help me out Hoboh... contradictions??

(nowt wrong with your level, though, happy to be here!)

[Hoboh]

Cool dude

Over to the scholars on here................... Strike back!!!!

(If CAPS gets past the first line even he may like it )

I suspect his list of non-courses is lifted from the so-called "Non-Courses Report", produced by a group called the Taxpayers Alliance.

this is such a popular diatribe that I have, on occasion, followed up some of the claims made for "non-courses". It usually turns out that what they are describing is simply a unit of a bigger degree (or often - not a degree at all) - or even just an essay-title, and sometimes an essay title from a HE college that doesn't offer degree-level studies - but is then described as "a degree in XXXX"granted - some bonkers courses do exist - but often - if you actually look at the course it is a perfectly reasonable and rigourously academic course - with an unusual title - and no more ludicrous a notion than what are considered to be conventionally acceptable degree courses.

(why - for instance is any literary degree with a 20th centiry science fiction angle deemed less worthy - more bonkers - than a literary degree focussing on 18th centiry romantic poetry or shakespearean plays?)

I may be wrong, though - he may have rigourously researched it himself rather than lifted it from a widely discredited report from a bunch of loonies.....

You been on the "pop" before you posted that load of contridictions bish?
Makes me feel humble your down at our level now

Lol It don't read quite right, a bit like a hobohisum and I spotted the spelling too!!!

[hisroyalgingerness]

Then WTF are they protesting about?

Oh, fcuking keep up

The nasty Liberals lied to them

from what I understand Nick Clegg's pledge was that he would lobby the government against tuition fees rising and would vote against a government that did.

See, even he didn't expect to BE the government. So the pledges made were neither here nor there.

[Hoboh]

Then WTF are they protesting about?

Oh, fcuking keep up

The nasty Liberals lied to them

from what I understand Nick Clegg's pledge was that he would lobby the government against tuition fees rising and would vote against a government that did.

See, even he didn't expect to BE the government. So the pledges made were neither here nor there.

What was it once said?

Events dear boy, events (or something like that)

[thebish]

Lol It don't read quite right, a bit like a hobohisum and I spotted the spelling too!!!

A tortuous sentence littered with crashing clauses - maybe! - but I can't see any actual contradictions...

and...

let me get this right.. you're picking up a crazy spelling of century (no idea how it came out like that with an "i" - twice!! - oh the shame!!) - but in doing so, accusing me of contridictions??

anyway - the point remains...

it was a loooooooong post - maybe you're confusing length with erudition?

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

Just the other day my grandmother, who abhors my politics and probably wouldn't cast her vote for me if I ever ran for office.

She's probably not on her own there PB.

His grannie sounds really nice. And politically astute.

I feel I should point out at this point that Nanna Crayons carries a BNP card in her purse, before we get too carried away about her political credentials...

[Lord Kangana]

Perhaps William is veering to the right in his owd age?

[William the White]

Perhaps William is veering to the right in his owd age?

[Lord Kangana]

Well.

What was DSB's quote a good while back on this thread?

[Worthy4England]

Just the other day my grandmother, who abhors my politics and probably wouldn't cast her vote for me if I ever ran for office.

She's probably not on her own there PB.

His grannie sounds really nice. And politically astute.

I feel I should point out at this point that Nanna Crayons carries a BNP card in her purse, before we get too carried away about her political credentials...

But as long as her economics is sound.