Moving House

Well, we're moving house in the next fortnight. We have to, the landlord is selling the house we're in currently. Luckily the new house is £50 a month cheaper in rent.

We've come to a decision about my Autistic son too. We're not taking him with us to the new place. Time to make a stand and say enough is enough, no more prevaricating: they MUST house him. We have to be tough, because while he is in the house (even though technically he's homeless as we don't have a room for him here), because he gets ESA benefit in his own right, its that that means we don't qualify for housing and council tax benefits. The bailiffs letters are mounting up because we can't afford to pay the bills, so its a purely economic decision. We need to do it in order to get help with council tax and the rent. Well, thats what I keep telling myself, although it kills me that we have to take such drastic action, after years of fighting for his needs and supporting him. It does feel like I've failed.

But, its time to start playing the system and be hard-nosed about it. He needs to be in supported housing before I drop dead, otherwise his social issues will mean he'll end up homeless. He needs to be in supported housing for the rest of his life and if this is the only way to get it, so be it. So, short-term pain for long-term-gain is the way I see it.

We're actually moving about a mile across the border from Havant to Portsmouth. The social worker tasked with trying to house my son upon hearing the news had a moment of elation: "Aha!" He said, "As your son will be moving to Portsmouth, you need to get in contact with their social services to house him." (In a quite obvious attempt to move the problem to another department/local authority: a move which we've seen happen many times before). At which point we deflated his elation by pointing out that our son will NOT be moving with us.

They've got two weeks. Will he be left on the doorstep? Most probably. Will I be contacting local papers if that happens? Most definately.

Teachers: Licenced to Indoctrinate?

Old Holborn Has a thought on the scheme proposed by the government this week that teachers should have regular reviews and be issued a licence to teach. He thinks that its a mechanism to standardise indoctrination across our schools.

He might have a point, but let me take it further.

So far the government has only been able to ruin state schools. Schools outside the state sector have largely been untouched by the grim hand of government. Thats why children attending public schools fare so much better than those in the state sector.

Enter licences for teachers. Every teacher will be required to have a licence and I assume will be assessed in part on their adherence to the national curriculum. They would probably be marked down for any deviations from the curriculum. This will severely curtain the public schools, who excel in no-expense-spared wide-ranging education that doesn't necessarily adhere to dogmatic PC doctrine and a fixed, narrow curriculum.

Again, its all about control. Its a way to finally control public schools and limit the advantage they give over the state sector.

I should know, I'm a product of one of the crappiest schools in my area. It was so underfunded it was a joke. Metalwork class was hysterical: one lathe between 30 kids. I never actually got to have a go on it, because the term ran out before I had my chance in the queue! We had to buy our own textbooks or share between 2-3 kids because the school couldn't fund a book for every one of us. So I know how important education is. I fought tooth and nail to get my son specialist help. When he was consigned to a mainstream school thanks to Oxfordshire LEA's dogmatic "mainstream or nothing" approach, I fought again to get him statemented and supported in-class. In the end he got GCSE B and C grades, a testament to my initial support (which cost me my career) and the ongoing support of his LSA, who stuck by him all the way through school and only left once he'd finished his GCSE's. Thats the sort of commitment we need in every school in order to improve education. Not dragging the best down to make the lowest look better.

What galls me is that Labour are intent on dragging everyone down to the lowest level; the politics of jealousy, rather than looking at the top percentile and trying to emulate the processes and procedures that go into educating those kids. Nope: in Labours world, if the state can't fund a decent education, then those able to step away and pay for it should be penalised and consigned to banality too.

They are determined to ruin this country.

I just thought I'd add this:

I've since moved from Oxfordshire to Hampshire. I can quite honestly say that my daughter has come on leaps and bounds at her new school, not only educationally, but as a person. To me a convincing case that dogma loses out over a proper, rounded education.

This Country is Fucked

I've been saying it for 18 months or so now, I could see it back then, so why couldn't all the "experts"? This country is already fucked, and is going to be even more fucked during the next 12 months. There will be no "green shoots", there will be no recovery.

Look at this report from the BBC: The economy shrank by the greatest margin for 51 years. That one sentence tells you all you need to know about how monumental a fuck-up this crisis and the government's response to it is. Look at the graph at the bottom of the page. Look closely at the cliff-like drop in growth. Does the trend look like it's slowing, or does it look like it's gaining momentum? Looks like the latter to me.

Now add on top of that drop in growth, the rise in national debt. Thats a huge burden on and already overburdened economy. But there's more. Add on top of that overburdened economy the cost of welfare: paying people not in work. Thats a huge unproductive cost. In fact the cost of welfare has just outstripped the amount of money raised by tax revenue. Might as well slap on top of that the cost of PFI and Public Sector pensions. Not to mention the cost of interest on top of the whole fetid pile.

Things can't go on as they are. Gordon Brown continues to borrow money like a crack addict, with no investment in wealth-creating projects. Instead its dead money: used to pay people to sit idle. Its used to fund pet projects that have no chance of creating wealth, only increasing regulatory burdens. Its used to fund public sector jobs that don't generate wealth.

The one-eyed twat can't see farther than his nose. Neither can his self-interested chums in finance, that spout a rosy picture in order to keep mugs investing money in a dead horse economy. All to fund their bonuses.

All the while the Bank of England, despite warnings from Mervyn King, authorises the creation of billions of pounds of funny money, created to prop up the economy and buy the next election. Zimbabwe politics in action. Why not have done with it and buy everyone a fucking toaster, or whatever the equivalent is over here eh Gordon?

Experts are predicting the Pound will be worth less than 1 Euro by the end of the year. I wonder if that will signify a rush by Politicians for us to join the Euro Zone? Will the EU let us join?

I said it last December: This country is spiralling into the abbyss. No-one at the top seems to care.

Its about time people stopped whinging and grew some.

I'm prepared to. Mainly because I have no choice. My council tax is going unpaid as we speak and the baliffs letters arrived last week. Can I materialise 1500 fucking quid out of thin air when I don't get benefits? No I fucking can't. So, looks like I'll be doing time for non-payment then. Far better than actually finance the spendthrift fuckers in government.

Mervyn King should stop whining and grow some too. If he thinks that quantative easing is bad for the country and is steering us on a dangerous course, he should stop authorising it. Its not a political decision, its economic. If we're bankrupt, fucking say it how it is.

Her Majesty the Queen needs to drag Gordo in and have a stern word about his mad plan too. I know shes got a set of solid-gold baubles. Its about time to say protocol be fucked, these are unprecedented historic times: its time something was said.

The 646 self-serving fuckers in the house of commons need to grow some, although I have no faith given they've proved only to be in Parliament to line their fucking pockets and pay for their property portfolios. Start taking the monotonous, monosylabic one-eyed moron to task about his plans. Where are his figures? Do they add up? Just how is a nation that produces fuck-all supposed to pay it all back?

The ermine-robed nobs in the Lords need to grow some too. Why hasn't Weaseley Mandleson been given a hard time there. Instead the smug fucker wafts shit and destruction all about the place. Will no-one sort the fucker out?

We all need to start to get organised to protest against the madness too. Start locally and then once you get a critical mass, link up nationally.

Its time we all channelled our anger towards the twats in government, where it rightly belongs.