±«Óãtv

Nick,

I think you have been had. Do you not remember the slashing of the schools building programme a few short weeks ago? I strongly suspect that every minister will make the same claim in the days to come. I also suspect that when the sum are added up there will have been no cuts.

However the fear of cuts has and will continue to create such a devastating dip in economic output that the damage has already been done. What will then happen is a desperate Bank of England will generate cash from thin air and spend this money of good works which will be a vain attempt to re-start the economy which has already been destroyed by this bunch of amateurs since May. The damage that all the talk of cut has done is already visible and will grow even though there will be no cuts!!!!

I base this view on what has actually happened every time there has been talk of cuts in the past! I hope I am wrong.

Securing a small real terms increase in the schools budget does not mean that education has been treated like the health service. It is highly likely that the £7Bn (£2.5Bn in year 4 but how much in year 1?)) is largely funded by additional cuts in other areas. Furthermore is this 'new' money going to be ring fenced or thrown in the coffers of education authorities who will be facing their own financial crisis.
It is very doubtful that many schools will benefit from this 'good news' for many years but it may be presented to an increasingly anxious Lib Dem apparatchiks as a well fought concession.

You have to admire the coalition, previous Governments have tried to pick winners (with varying success), the coalition consistently backs losers. Any review of performance indicator data would suggest Universities and Police have done well, schools and the NHS much less well, so the relative failures are to be ring-fenced and the successes stuffed. When did Tories start to believe in rewarding relative failure? My prediction would be that in the next few months a boatload of the most talented Profs in key areas for our future prosperity will announce that they and their research teams are buggering off to countries that recognise the significance of higher education and scientific research for 21st century economic performance. How long before, facing much higher fees, the best students follow them? Hey coalition, you really get where growth in the 21st century comes from!

" Nick Clegg announced....."

How reassuring!

If Nick Clegg promised fine weather, I'd definitely take my brolly.

So we now have the utterly ridiulcous prospect of ring fenced money spent on pupils in poorly equipped schools and classrooms. Join up the thinking, join the dots, make two and equal, er 4.

@4 DistantTraveller

No need to bother with a brolly - just take a pinch of salt.

.
Good news for schools but disaster for UK universities:

"Universities in England face funding cuts of £4.2bn in the coming Spending Review, an e-mail leaked to the ±«Óãtv News website suggests.
Universities UK head Professor Steve Smith wrote to vice-chancellors saying this week's Browne Review set out figures that "confirm our worst fears".
He says they signal a £3.2bn or 79% cut from teaching and £1bn from research in next week's Spending Review."
(±«Óãtv online, 15 Oct 2010)

79% cut in the Teaching budget of universities means, in practice, that over half the universities in the land will be in receivership once their 'rainy day' savings account is used up - typically 2-3 months.

How many students are currently on course? And over half of these (500,000+)are in universities that are not 'research rich' - in other words they can not cross-subsidise from research into teaching.
This would seem to be an ideal case for a Class Action legal judgement for financial recompense, not only for immediate monetary loss (L) on fees paid and maintenance but also against actuarial lifetime earning potential (Government public domain figure 100,000 gbp per student).
(L+100,000) x 500,000 = more money than the annual University budget? ... and that's before the costs of staff redundancy and asset decommissioning is factored-in.
Presumably the sale of university buildings could raise money to pay off these liabilities;..... and the buildings would make perfect private school 'Academies'.

"I just don't believe it!"

What the government is doing is making the few 'good news' announcements before the bad news of the spending review. They were worried that these good news items would get lost in the horror of the spending review.

Schools budgets protected sounds good, but heavier cuts in other areas of education - what does it mean? Cuts in pre-school? - hardly family friendly or helping getting people into work. Cuts in FE colleges? - poorer skills for those who do not go to university. Cuts in Universities? - more people needing FE college courses, more research going abroad, poorer supply of researchers in the first place.

The extra money to the Equitable Life claimants. I don't know enough to make a serious comment, but I do know that the higher than expected repayments will cause some satisfaction in Conservative Clubs up and down the land. (Even if the reality is too little too late)

The MoD budget change is another one which will go down well with the public. Many believe (rightly or wrongly) that being a strong military power is part of our national identity. This coupled with the apparent maturity of many soldiers in contrast with the selective portrayal of the younger generation as violent, rude and self obsessed makes support of the military higher than it has been for many years.

I have a friend who is a social worker. When they have to give someone some really bad news they give them a '**** sandwich'. They say something positive, then comes the really bad news and they end up with something positive. We are in that process now. We are getting the good news, on Wednesday we will get the really bad news and then in the following weeks there will be some little rays of sunshine which will be dug up from the depths of the review at poltically opportune moments.

You could tut-tut about the way we are being manipulated into thinking that the cuts are not as bad as they seem. Or you could say that part of the strategy of dealing with our financial problems is to ensure that the public morale is kept as high as possible and such manipulation is justified. A demoralised country isn't going to go on spending or work harder.

In some respects I don't mind being manipulated in the short term, because I know that jugements will start being made by way of local and by elections in the medium term. Then we will decide if we were conned or not. No one knows how well the economy will recover so in the mean time all we can do is leave those who think they know to exchange blows.

More smoke and mirrors from the Government I think. The point about poor school buildings is well made by an earlier contributor. The main reasons for net cutbacks in Education are concerned with the USA and Nato, our children's education is devalued in order to protect the USA. After all an aircraft carrier is not going to be much good in Afghanistan.

The reduction in research at Universities will hit the economy as hard as the errors of the bankers.

One day a Government will learn that until you pay the Engineers more that the Accountants and Lawyers there will be very little wealth creation in this country. Oh but the cost to a university of a degree in Law/Accountancy is far less than the cost of a degree in Engineering. This is also true for post graduate research in these subjects.

Still no news of where job creation is coming from. Just a smiling face at the door...offering comforting words of we are all in this together..and dont worry. All the while the smilling faces mate has just nicked a score out of your back pocket. I am strugling to think of a politician who has u-turned on so many pre-election promises. Even under a guise of coalition compromise, nick cleggs actions are so far from what he apparently stood for at the election its appalling. how he believes he can be taken seriously is amazing. of course when you see him on the front bench all cocky and self assured, its clear to see how ambition overtook principle. Unfortunately the cost of this ambition will be the devestation of his party.

It will soon become clear how the pupil premiums benefits will be drowned by other cuts elsewhere. All rather pointless really.
Brhyers warned many months ago that clegg was a tory. i wish and im sure many others wish they had listened.

A picture paints a thousand words...........

There are worry signs that The Coalition are, despite good advice, making a real bodge of the Comprehensive Spending Review and will end up, as in the 1980's and '90's, spending more not less.

They have broken their own rules for the CSR. They have disregarded the Canadian advice. If they cannot maintain clear thinking and discipline on this, what hope is there for a five year Parliament and the voter who wants good, successful Government?

Anyone know what 'the ±«Óãtv has learned..' means?

It would help put what follows in better context as a report.

If it is just retyping a press release, it is as much unnecessary as it is puff.

If it is negative, and/or from a source, it could be of journalistic value, but only if the source is credible.

"Vince Cable and Nick Clegg are clueless. It's like Leyton Orient being in the Champions League."

Lord Sugar, quoted in 'The Daily Telegraph' 6th October.

They should be replaced by David Davis and John Redwood.

Nick Clegg said the pupil premium was "a victory" for the LDs...why? Its in the Tory manifesto.

Also youth services will be all but wiped out to pay for it...Oh and by the way the LD manifesto said they would protect youth services and "make them statutory"...another promise conveniently dropped.

On R4 the other morning he said that the PP would reduce class disturbance by giving poor kids "the help they deserve"...thereby implying that it is only poor kids that play up, the nice wealthier ones do not...that just about sums the man up.

If the libdems had any integrity they would leave the Government and let matters take their course.

If the libdems had any sense (even of self-preservation) they would leave the Government .....

The questions posed by the budgetary crisis and being answered by these cuts is "what sort of society do you want to live in?"

I have always imagined that LibDems were somewhere in the middle ground, middle class and supporters of the post-war consensus on the welfare state. I believed, at the election, that in genuine three-party politics the LibDems should be prepared to work with either of the other parties, and that they could moderate the excesses of either.

I was clearly wrong. I don't buy the "there's no alternative" and "its the mess labour left behind". We're going to hear a lot of that, but the fact is they're complicit in an ideologically driven dismantling of the welfare/tax-based system in favour of a debt-base one.

I may soon have to concede that they have sold their birthright for a seat at the top table.

It's an absolute disgrace that the bbc can publish material which describes this announcement as "good news". This is spin rather than journalism. This blog is turning into the ministry of truth.

Not going to Heaven, Nick Clegg, I'm afraid.

This story on education and the story on defence in my view suggests that the coalition have been pushing higher figures of cuts in these areas so we don't mind as much when prime minister Wavey Davey steps in and forcefully reduces them to reduce them to levels they'd always intended to make. So they seem less bad than if they'd started at the lower level. Turning what should be bad news into good news.

10#

Oh god, the grim reaper returns....


"I am strugling to think of a politician who has u-turned on so many pre-election promises."

Hah. Your selective memory means you've already forgotten Blair and Brown?

I totally agree with Leglehid. Stop giving the Tories a free ride and let's have some unbiased journalism.

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

The Coalition Government has done itself proud.
The government has found £7bn outside the education budget for helping some of the poorest children. The money will help those "from the age of 2 to 20 – from a child's first shoes to a young adult's first suit". (Hmmmm, I take a little exception to the word "suit", but otherwise this decision seems great.)
Talking in rather more convoluted terms than necessary, the Deputy PM Nick Clegg said that two-year-olds from poor backgrounds will be entitled to 15 hours of free pre-school education every week. This is in addition to the existing 15 hours that three and four year olds receive.
Clegg said that after four years the pupil premium would go up to £2.5bn a year, with around £300m going towards two-year-olds from poor backgrounds and £150m going towards children "who otherwise wouldn't be going to university".
Of course the primary words here are: funded from outside the schools budget, as in "addition to".
Personally, I think it’s a wonderful idea, an investment in the future.
It's like "no child left behind" but in real terms.

Nick

At what point do you actually offer a critque of the policies of your chums? Are there any appearances on strictly-come-dancing in the pipeline?

Bluesberry

Are you sure...?

"Given the scale of the cuts in departmental spending to be announced next Wednesday, it seems likely that overall school funding will be cut in real terms.If such cuts are shared equally across schools, then the pupil premium could (depending on its final size, and on the cuts to the overall budget) lead to a net result where schools in affluent areas see their funding go up on average, while schools in deprived areas experience cuts in funding."

IFS

Do not confuse the schools budget with that of the wider education budget...Youth services are due to be cut severely...I wonder who uses those the most...

Plus,it looks like Clegg's been at it again, he said in his speech:

"Children from poor homes hear 616 words spoken an hour, on average, compared to 2,153 words an hour in richer homes. By the age of three, that amounts to a cumulative gap of 30 million words."

Er, that was based on a study carried out in the 1980s in the USA...no UK people took part.

People often seem to use these blogs to complain but I think this is indeed good news. This government has been left with quite a funding mess to sort out and they seem to be making excellent choices as they progrss with that task.

20. fubar/jr
yep. i can imagine you polishing the merc. whistling away. david essex cd playing in the background.
completely ignorant and apathetic to reality and the devestation of these cuts.
oh well.
rolls eyes. huge huge yawn.

Taking it at face value it seems a generally positive step and to be welcomed, education is the most important thing the nation does for its children.

Depending of course where the money is coming from - in addition to the extra spending committed to defense and welfare we have been told about.
No many areas left for it to come from.

Just a general comment. I am fed up to the back teeth of every Con/Lib response to every question being about the mess the previous government left us in. It's time for the Government to stop this drivel and to start to take responsibility for what they are doing. Looking to the past will solve none of the problems we have at the moment.

I'm self employed and things have got worse in the last six months - what is the government going to do about this? My son graduated in July from a top university with a top flight degree but with little chance of finding a decent job. Just tell us what the CSR is all about next week - in real terms not just top level numbers and let us all work out how to deal with it. You've been in power now for five months so let's get on with things instead of simply playing the blame game.

By the way. thought that the boy Ed Miliband did good at PMQ on Wednesday - more of the same please!

What, where and by how much would New or 'Same Old Labour' now be proposing to cut had a true and further cataclysmic political and economic disaster occurred at the last general election?

Oh, I'm forgetting ... they just could not be trusted to make any 'cuts'... never mind criticise anyone else's

"18. At 1:53pm on 16 Oct 2010, sagamix wrote:
Not going to Heaven, Nick Clegg, I'm afraid."


I thought you leftie's didn't believe in heaven?

What next? "Saga 'hearts' The pope"?

"238. At 5:06pm on 15 Oct 2010, IPGABP1 wrote:
No230 Andy,

240. At 5:35pm on 15 Oct 2010, IPGABP1 wrote:
No 236 Andy,"

It's odd. You never advance any views of your own, never say anything about yourself, just snipe at me.

You remind me of one of those little dogs who barks at every noise heard on the other side of the door. No idea what or who it is or what it means but just "yap yap yap". I often wonder if it's the dog having had the 'snip' that causes all the problems. is it? Is that what happened to you?

Do us all a favour, change your name on here to "YAPYAPYAP1".

Be more honest of you.

"11. At 08:52am on 16 Oct 2010, lefty10 wrote:
A picture paints a thousand words..........."

Oh Dear. You don't know the difference between a picture and a
cartoon do you? Did Gordon Brown once show you a 'picture' of his magic money tree? Is that why you believed in him?

Here's a picture of your beloved leader Tony Blair



If the ±«Óãtv cut the link, you know the one. Public school. boater. typical Labour leader really.

there's a cartoon in today's Times that draws a striking resemblence between Ed Milliband and Wallace (of wallace and Gromit fame).

I wondered who Labour's Gromit might be but then remembered that Gromit was smart, practical and got things done.

33. andrew
catoon pitures andrew. splitting hairs really, arent you. if i called you a muppet and then said no...actually you are a moron. that would be silly as they represent the same thing and both descriptions would apply.
anyway. still waiting for your policy for buliding camps for unemployed people. i asked before and i find it strange as you said i was wrong for not discussing it...then when i ask you for detail you go all quiet.
come on andy. how would it work. imagine you are pm. roll out the policy in detail?

35 lefty10

I'm not sure about building camps for the unemployed, but they should certainly be working for their benefit.

There are plenty of things that need doing in my area that my council can not afford to do, a short list below:

Clearing up dog excrement
Clearing drains
Picking up litter
Repairing vandalism

At the same time, we have several thousand unemployed people in the area who could be doing it.

Of course, if they didn't fancy the thought of the jobs listed above, they could always find alternative voluntary or paid employment.

Do you think this would be a good idea or is it better to let them claim benefits for doing nothing?

35

*sigh*

It isn't easy dropping down to your chubby crayon level but I will.

What was it about hostels for the unemployed you didn't understand? I wasn't saying break up families, i was talking about an acknowledged lack of social housing in the UK and that a low cost solution would be hostels along the lines of University accomodation as enjoyed by many tens of thousands of students without any complaint.

If the bread winner in a family lost his job the siuation would be ver differen from a single person leaving home and screeching that a nice new flat paid fro by you was his 'right' as told to him by a chubby pub bore.

The strange thing is that at the moment the alternative is paying inflated rents to the private buy-to-let landlords you are supposed to hate.

But, I guess that sums you up. No actual answers to the real world siuation just slogans and mantra.

hey, why not just ignore what I have just said and chant "jobs not bombs".

Or, as a alleged businessman, how can you defend employing someone when you are paying them less than they earn for the business?

"36. AS71"

You're wasting your breath.

Lefty10 lives in a different world from th rest of us.

it's one full of evil pit owners driving horse and carriage and poor orphans saying "gawd bless you" to Lefty types who (oddly) are self employed and run their own business. Supposedley.

36. AS71.
I know it bothers you because of the previous story you gave. when you were delivering post. and all those curtains still drawn. and then as you said..it suddenly got busy, the curtains opened.... when the off liscence opened. after reading this i was uncertain what camp you were in. tory fox news daily mail moron..or just having a bit of fun and exagerating with a bit of tongue in cheek. so giving you the botd....i want you to know that i believe hard work is good for the soul and expect anyone that can...does. of course i have a massive problem with low wages and employer exploitation...but thats a whole other topic.

"if i called you a muppet and then said no...actually you are a moron."

Oh Dear,

Still the slightly drunk, heavily overweight pub bore, aren't you?

Easy on the other side of the internet.

Any idea of how big a berk you are?

38. andrew.
loud voice. primary school shorts.
and v v v low social inteligence.

36 "Clearing up dog excrement
Clearing drains
Picking up litter
Repairing vandalism"

I'm sure Lefty10 would be a suitable applicant.

Probably with his teeth, except myabe the last one.

39 - i have a massive problem with low wages and employer exploitation."

have you any experience of this in your alleged running of your own business?

41 - "loud voice. primary school shorts.
and v v v low social inteligence."

Thank you for a pen portrait of yourself.

Why do you persist in turning up for a battle of wits having left your weapon at home?

44. a battle? lmao.
i pity you. and also in a very twisted sort of way....find you quite amusing. i couldnt possibly do more damage to your credibility than facilitating more of your posts... get it?.....lol

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

AS71 @ 36

Why don't you do something about it? Always wanting other people to fix things, it's lazy ... and it gets us precisely nowhere.

Let's take charge of our lives.

Gee, a veritable blitz of posts from you, Andy. Saturday night - shouldn't you be in the Den, watching Top Gear or something?

" sagamix wrote:


Why don't you do something about it? Always wanting other people to fix things, it's lazy"


Sweet Jezus.

Sagamix criticisng someone for talk not action.

My sides really are hurting, that really is so funny.

#29 gilliebollie wrote:
"I am fed up to the back teeth of every Con/Lib response to every question being about the mess the previous government left us in."

Sorry your are fed up, but "men make history, but not in circumstances of their own chosing" (Marx)

The government are struggling with a deficit that they would not have wished to inherit. It is the basic fact of politics of this Parliament (unless there is a new development, such as war or pestilence, etc.). It is impossible to engage in political debate without it.

48 -

Docklnds bash.

Been an all day thing and now taking a break in my room from drinking before rejoining the throng

I'm sure you've read about such things in Sunday Supplements?

46.
andrew andrew andrew.
lets go back to the hostels for unemployed people. as a businessman i am happy to provide you with rope at cost price. what the hell...lets call it a freebee.
would the hostels be newbuild ? what would the cost of this be? how many single unemployed people in the uk? howe many hostels to be built? would they be fenced in? have electricity and water?
please give more detail. and please please dont worry about being over specific.

52 please dont worry about being over specific."


Ha ha.

Something that has never ever worried you.

A serial avoider of questions about yourself.

I know that a hostel built for 20 would be cheaper than paying for 20 individual houses.

Maybe with you, once you have your clown shoes on and big stick on red nose, numbers don't matter?

47 saga

AS71 @ 36

Why don't you do something about it? Always wanting other people to fix things, it's lazy ... and it gets us precisely nowhere.

Let's take charge of our lives.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Sounds very "Big Society" - didn't know you approved Saga!

I (and plenty of others) do sort some of these things out on an ad-hoc basis - can't dedicate 8 hours per day to it though.

My point is that we have large numbers of people who recieve unemployment benefit, can spare 8 hours per day to work and choose not to.

Do you think this would be a good idea or is it better to let them claim benefits for doing nothing?

On the previous blog by Nick,
2. At 10:18am on 14 Oct 2010, DeimosL posted:

Before the election all parties were keen to restore public confidence in MPs. Now they are elected they seem to not care less as their lack of morals, lack of accountability, etc. all emerge (yet again). Our political system is failing us because those who put themselves forward are totally unsuited to the role as they appear to despise the electorate as irrelevant - they regard the system as a 5 year dictatorship whilst we expect them to be acting on our behave and in our interest. We are the naive ones.

I agree but what Nick Clegg and the Lib Dems have done is far worse than the excessive expenses claims. It was individual MPs that made excessive expense claims but this is the leader of the Lib Dems and all of the Lib Dem party. And, it is not just a bit of money. It is about our democracy and the voting system itself. How can the promises of any candidate or any political party be trusted again if they can do exactly the opposite of their promises just by saying the things look different now that they are in power. If things are so different, they should publish the situation as it is now and call an election again. They should also pass a law that ensures that the main political parties are allowed to ‘see the books’ during the election period so that no one can do a Cleggy in the future. If the Lib Dem MPs don’t vote against the rises then, when we see someone in the future lying and cheating, we may say that they are LibDemming.

I presume that Nick Clegg believes that as the rest of the world comes out of recession and Britain follows, we will give them credit. I don’t think people will forget what he has done and he will be infamous in history like Chamberlain.

# 1 - The schools building programme was a capital expenditure programme so Nick has not be 'had'.

# 29 - I don't blame the Coalition government for reminding everyone about the economic backdrop; it's the worst situation any incoming UK government has ever had to deal with.

This is good news. It will put the Labour Party under more pressure with regard to their alternative solutions for dealing with the budgetary deficit. We're still waiting!

AS71,

It's an okay idea. Voluntary basis though, bit fascist otherwise.

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

"I'm sure you've read about such things in Sunday Supplements?" - andy @ 51

Very likely I have - but that doesn't make it alright.

"Universities in England face funding cuts of £4.2bn in the coming Spending Review, an e-mail leaked to the ±«Óãtv News website suggests.
Universities UK head Professor Steve Smith wrote to vice-chancellors saying this week's Browne Review set out figures that "confirm our worst fears".
He says they signal a £3.2bn or 79% cut from teaching and £1bn from research in next week's Spending Review."
(±«Óãtv online, 15 Oct 2010)


Am I the only one here that has picked up on the University bosses identifying that the Government are throwing a 79% cut to the universities Teaching budget allocation.

This will cripple most universities and do irredemable harm to the 1.14 million students currently in higher education

It will also cause the closing down of a significant number of universities.

Does this not disturb anybody?

"It is impossible to engage in political debate without it." - 66 @ 50

Bet you I can, John. Often do, in fact. When we get together with a few Chilean reds*, start kicking around ideas for a better and more egalitarian society, we don't mention the deficit much. Anyone who does bang on about it gets jeered and shown the door.

* no, not the vino, the people - we drink tea.