Having being involved in Education all my working life, I would suggest to Mr Balls that his scheme is doomed to failure before it even gets off the ground. By far the vast majority of those who will fall foul of this scheme will be children who come from socially deprived backgrounds. Many of their parents will be feckless, unemployed and single parents. Those we all recognise, but are afraid to name publicly as “scroungers on the state”. Now in all honesty how many of these kind of parents are going to attend parenting classes?
I know from experience, having worked in a very deprived area, where a high proportion of children came from homes where parents had been long term unemployed that the important things in the lives of these parents were booze, betting and fags. Education had a very low rating in their lives. School was simply “a place you sent the kids to get them out from under your feet”. Much of the good attendance at the school had nothing to do with complying with the law, or valuing the education the children were getting, but more to do with the school being a free child minder!
Many of the parents had an openly hostile attitude to school. “What good is it for our kids when they won’t get a job at the end of it?” was a frequently asked question.
Now come on Mr Balls, how many of these parents are going to be worried with your pontificating and threats? Ok, you say, so fine them. What are they going to pay the fines with? Their Social Security money? You must be joking! That has to pay for the booze, betting and fags!
So let’s bring in the heavy persuasion – prison – but just a minute, aren’t our prisons already bursting at the seams?
Ed Balls has been economic adviser to the then shadow chancellor, Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP, 1994–97; secretary of the Labour Party Economic Policy Commission, 1994–97; economic adviser to the chancellor of the exchequer, 1997–99; chief economic adviser to HM Treasury, 1999–2004. With the present state of the economy it does little to encourage our beliefs that Ed Balls will do any better in Education than he did in his economic and Treasury posts.
Oh! Just as an interesting aside, this is the same Ed Balls who in September 2007, with his wife Yvette Cooper, was accused of "breaking the spirit of Commons rules" by using MPs' allowances to help pay for a £655,000 home in north London. It was alleged that they bought a four-bed house in Stoke Newington, north London, and registered this as their second home (rather than their home in Castleford, West Yorkshire) in order to qualify for up to £44,000 a year to subsidize a reported £438,000 mortgage under the Commons Additional Costs Allowance. This is despite both spouses working in London full-time and their children attending local London schools. Through a spokesman, Balls and Cooper countered the allegation by saying "The whole family travel between their Yorkshire home and London each week when Parliament is sitting. As they are all in London during the week, their children have always attended the nearest school to their London house."
Many of the parents had an openly hostile attitude to school. “What good is it for our kids when they won’t get a job at the end of it?” was a frequently asked question.
Now come on Mr Balls, how many of these parents are going to be worried with your pontificating and threats? Ok, you say, so fine them. What are they going to pay the fines with? Their Social Security money? You must be joking! That has to pay for the booze, betting and fags!
So let’s bring in the heavy persuasion – prison – but just a minute, aren’t our prisons already bursting at the seams?
Ed Balls has been economic adviser to the then shadow chancellor, Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP, 1994–97; secretary of the Labour Party Economic Policy Commission, 1994–97; economic adviser to the chancellor of the exchequer, 1997–99; chief economic adviser to HM Treasury, 1999–2004. With the present state of the economy it does little to encourage our beliefs that Ed Balls will do any better in Education than he did in his economic and Treasury posts.
Oh! Just as an interesting aside, this is the same Ed Balls who in September 2007, with his wife Yvette Cooper, was accused of "breaking the spirit of Commons rules" by using MPs' allowances to help pay for a £655,000 home in north London. It was alleged that they bought a four-bed house in Stoke Newington, north London, and registered this as their second home (rather than their home in Castleford, West Yorkshire) in order to qualify for up to £44,000 a year to subsidize a reported £438,000 mortgage under the Commons Additional Costs Allowance. This is despite both spouses working in London full-time and their children attending local London schools. Through a spokesman, Balls and Cooper countered the allegation by saying "The whole family travel between their Yorkshire home and London each week when Parliament is sitting. As they are all in London during the week, their children have always attended the nearest school to their London house."
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