The End is Nigh...

As we near the end of new Labour, a handy new initiative hoves into view to sum their 12 years up; the Learning Transformation Revolution is, apparently, upon us. Launched by Secretary of State John Denham, and contrary to the generally accepted usage of the word 'revolution' - which might normally relate to the Bolsheviks in 1917 or the French at the Bastille - this one is going to offer 'opportunities to signpost and connect different experiences' and 'opportunities to learn in a much wider variety of ways'. It is a new strategy, following a White Paper, which is supposed to encourage funding applications from organisations who offer adult education courses and training.

The application document sums up, in so many ways, what new Labour is about; over-bureaucratic - think of all those thousands of laws (see earlier post) which gum up police time and fill up the prisons - fussy, excruciatingly overbearing, and prone to linguistic complexity in order to a) create a language that only a political and administrative class can understand and respond to and b) hide the banality of what they are (not) achieving.

Bear in mind as you read this document that the organisations that need this funding are already overstretched, and that the vast majority are delivering very effective training, in difficult financial and social circumstances; and, crucially, that they are generally staffed by people of far greater capability than the politicians and civil servants that invent this garbage.

The Introduction by Mr Denham himself is almost worth the read alone, but the full horror only reveals itself as one scrolls down and sees the ridiculous hoops that the poor applicant has to jump through, right down to 'signposting', 'overarching principles' and 'The Pledge'.

Go on, treat yourself, then weep, and don't forget to vote... http://www.dius.gov.uk/~/media/publications/L/learningrev_prospectus

Just go here...

http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2009/01/23/coroners-and-justice-bill-data-protection/comment-page-1/#comment-32090 ...read the comments, and post an e-mail to your MP on www.writetothem.com urging them to stop the passage of the Bill.

More Power to their Elbow!

Since I last posted - disappointed that the death of new Labour wasn't imminent, I lost energy and motivation - we've had an apparent Brown Bounce on the back of the credit crunch (which of course was none of his fault...), but now thankfully the polls are showing him plummeting again. And, just in case we feel bad about sticking the boot in, the Government has come forward with a timely reminder as to why we have to get them out, as soon as possible and by any means...

The Coroners and Justice Bill, going through parliament at the moment, is surely enough to rouse any sane person into disgust and hatred for this Government. It has two chief impacts which we should be concerned about here:

* It provides for inquests to be held in secret, for 'security reasons'. This is in the light of the Oxford Coroner criticising the Government's lack of provision for the soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, which led directly to a number of deaths, and were the subject of obfuscation and delay by the Ministers responsible (hello Geoff 'Buff' Hoon!). They now want the option to disqualify the public attending, and press reporting of specific inquests, at the Justice Secretary's (hello Jack 'Last' Straw!) or other Minister's discretion.
* 'to amend the Data Protection Act 1998'; the 'Protection' here is to be summarily turned on its head. The state will be able to share any and unlimited data with anyone - from minor public official to private company - in any country, 'in furtherance of any Government policy'; your health records, tax returns, DNA, internet visits, family status and relatives...it also allows the few restrictions on data sharing in the ID Card Bill - no, they haven't dropped it yet - to be summarily overridden.

If you're not terrified at what this incompetent, unprincipled, devious bunch of charlatans could do with the powers in this bill, then think what would happen if somebody even less savoury was in power...

Wishful Thinking?

In a blog I posted in January I predicted - wished? - that Gordon Brown would implode, and that there would be a General Election by May.

I was wrong. Things didn't move as fast as I'd have liked. He looks beat, but he's going to hang on for a while. Instead, May will see the Crewe and Nantwich bye-election, which is in turn seen as a test of his viability to continue. Tens of ministers and Labour MPs are being bussed in to get their vote out, which is a sign that Labour is going to lose. And - as if the party hasn't sunk far enough this past few years - the local Labour Party literature says that 'the Tories want to stop foreign nationals being given Identity Cards'; so here we have Labour finally, desperately and despicably, playing the race card, exploiting base fears - as they well know, the Tories want to stop everybody having an ID card - in a bid to retain power.

I can't understand how anybody with an ounce of decency would vote for a party that endorses this sort of low politics, especially as many Labour voters have, over the years, rightly hated the Tories for pulling similar stunts. But some have said to me 'Labour is all we can vote for - you don't want the Tories in, do you?'. And it's a fair point. I hate the Tories.

But here's a thought. Those of us vague lefties, who like to think we support progressive, enlightened politics, supported New Labour because we thought 'they' were vaguely on 'our' side. In turn, they have managed to

* prosecute an illegal, unjust war, and kill hundreds of thousands of people.
* finance NHS, education and housing services by enabling private companies to run them, thus piling up crippling public debt for the future.
* brought in ID cards, and are now using subterfuge and disgraceful underhand means to implement it (see the No2ID link on the left for the full story).
* Legislate to bring in extended incarceration for 'suspected terrorists', a move that takes our legal system back to the Dark Ages.
* Garnered the cheapest of tabloid headlines by reclassifying cannabis - against all of the expert advice, and regardless of the criminal, social and financial costs of doing so.
* Brought in a punitive legal structure - , hundreds more laws, ASBOs, 'tougher sentencing' and the like - which means we lock up more of our population than any other European nation.
* And now, as I mention, are whipping up scare stories about foreigners.

So my question is: would us 'progressives' - indeed, would the UK population - have allowed the Tories to have achieved the above, were they in power? Could they have got away with this litany of horrors? Or, more pertinently, could they get away with it if returned to power?

My tentative answer is 'no', and this is based on the fact they they never achieved any of them when in power; Thatcher mooted ID cards, but couldn't even get it past her own backbenchers; Major started PFI, but faced too much opposition from the unions and the general public to push it through to the extent that Labour has done; Thatcher did, yes, prosecute a war, but it was arguably justified, and she would certainly never have had the backing to invade a country and attempt to impose democracy on it; Michael Howard proclaimed 'prison works', and was widely derided for it, but was not in actualite as 'tough' as he claimed to be; they tried playing the race card, and all right-thinking people moved away from them in their droves, to the point where they have now moved 'to the left' on this issue.

And so on; my point is that, if the Tories are in power, the wilder elements of their thinking are reined in, and a great coalition of interest bodies, unions, think tanks, and a majority of the population are able to check, and to an extent manage, their policies. When Labour are in, the closeness to power of some of these bodies, alongside the split in the 'progressives' as to whether we should focus on the 'bigger picture' - 'at least it's not the Tories' - and not split over individual policies, means that ever more right wing policies are followed.

So, am I saying that, if we want a more 'left' society, that we should hope that the Tories get in; indeed, that we should vote for them, knowing that if they get in there are enough of us - on the 'progressive side' - to ensure that they can't move too far right; or at least not as far right as new Labour is? Maybe, I am. Sticks in my craw to say it though...

The Smoking Gun?

As I mention in a previous blog, I distrust the type of people who want to ban smoking in any 'public place', but have never really examined the claims about the dangers posed by 'passive smoking'. Luckily, someone has; the musician Joe Jackson spent years looking into the claims made against tobacco - the supposed harm that derives from smoking (active and passive), the role of the pharmaceutical companies and governments, and the zealotry of anti-smoking campaigners - and has published his findings on his website (see the link on the left).

Suffice to say, I can't make the case better than he can. Please read his findings; I find them unarguable, but feel free to start an argument with me about them. But please read them, it's important - socially, politically, economically, and for our own health - that we know the risks (or lack of them) of the drive to ban smoking.

The poor get poorer...

I have to get something for my blood pressure...

The Institute for Fiscal studies has produced a report that shows child poverty and inequality are rising (in spite of the Government's commitment to halving child poverty by 2010). It's also estimated that Gordon Brown's decision last year to abolish the 10p lower rate of income tax will hit 5.3 million low paid families the hardest. Gordon says that 'no one' will be worse off.

The Office of National Statistics has also produced a report demonstrating that, despite all new Labour's intentions, the gap between the top 10 per cent of earners and the bottom 10 per cent has not closed. The same organisation also publishes the yearly national poverty statistics, normally in March; however this year the Department of Work and Pensions is delaying the publication of the statistics until the 2nd May, the day after the local and mayoral elections, citing a need for 'additional validation and quality assurance'.

Now, one would hate to accuse them of wanting to 'bury bad news' - the very phrase conjures up the crudest political machination of our time, Jo Moore's e-mail the day after 9/11 - but it does seem suspicious that they will be released on a Friday, when all of the news coverage will be on the elections. I may be a tad cynical but I cannot believe, were the figures positive, that the Government wouldn't publish them in time for the elections; or that - if there is a genuine delay, and the news was good - they're not holding the publication until the following Monday; surely they'd want all of us to know of their success?. No, they know what's coming all right; Friday 2nd May it is, and another nail in the coffin for those who hope for a semblance of open, honest government.

A cultural High Five

'The second-rate mind is in command of the ponderously spoken platitude. In the liberal rhetoric, vagueness...is raised to principle' (C. Wright Mills, 'The Power Elite')

A couple of weeks ago the Government announced the 'Cultural Offer', which aims to 'give young people the chance to discover and develop their talents with the intention, ultimately, to offer children five hours of arts and culture a week, in and outside of the school day. This will include the chance to:
* perform on stage and attend top quality performances, exhibitions at museums and galleries, and heritage sites;
* get hands-on experience of the creative industries including film making, radio and TV;
* learn a musical instrument, and take part in a musical performance in front of an audience;
* produce creative writing and appreciate authors and how they work;
* learn about - and practise – new media and digital art; and
* develop art and craft skills.'

Having worked in the arts for nearly 20 years I think I understand the a) apparent scale of the ambition, b) absolutely zero chance it has of being effected in reality and c) the flimsiness of the supposed benefits - and the fallacy of the 'creative learning agenda'. Let's have a look at them one by one...

a) Look at the bullet points again. They all seem very laudable. But wait! Should there be an 'and' or an 'or' between each of them?; do they really mean that every child has to take part in all of these activities, totalling five hours per week - in which case, those young people who have no artistic inclination are going to have a really rotten time, considering for one that they're going to have to 'take part in a musical performance in front of an audience' - or is it actually that some young people might take part in some of the activities; a much more prosaic aim. So, one young person's English lesson will go towards the 'produce creative writing' element, whilst their attendance in art will enable them to 'develop art and craft skills'. And those that are in a band outside school, and/or go to a gig, that will count towards their 'five hours' (and you can bet your bottom dollar that when the reality behind the linguistic soft-soaping is exposed, this is eventually how it will be counted, and justified).

And what is meant by, and who defines, 'top quality performances'? I'll wager my judgement is different from yours. Is every young person in the country going to be taken to the opera (and where's everybody else going to sit)? Or the X-Factor? Can they go local to am-dram, or is the Royal National Theatre the one that 'counts'? Does one two hour average play 'count' more than one one hour very good one?

And then there's the five hours of sport that is already part of the Government's 'commitment to young people'? Presumably that stays, so we now have ten hours of directed time per week - with the implication that a large part of this total should take place in addition to the school day (after all, if it took place within, the school day would be about 15 hours long).

Many people I know that work in the arts see the 'Cultural Offer' as a vaguely good thing, if a little cumbersome; after years of the Tories - when the 'fight' for arts education was at its most strident - the New Labour approach to the arts enabled everybody to jump on board. Once those in power started to talk about the Creative Learning Agenda, and ploughing money into Creative Partnerships, the arts community rolled over and had its belly tickled. The claims were grandiose; a whole new approach to the curriculum - with creativity at the core - was going to transform young peoples' learning, develop their self-esteem (although developing self respect would have been much more useful, and might have resulted in a few less youngsters shouting, showing their knickers and throwing up on a Saturday night) and offer a whole sector of new career opportunities.

Now, I've looked through the Government and Creative Partnership's website - you can too, on the left - and I can't find, after six years or so, one concrete example of any wide-ranging positive impact on the lives of young people. And I look around, and at other statistics, and see (as I mention below) that literacy and numeracy standards - the basic building blocks of a child's 'opportunity' - have plummeted disastrously, and violence among young people is on the increase, with catastrophic results (maybe somebody should be commissioned to establish a causal link between engagement in the arts and subsequent propensity to violence?).

So (phew), we get to the nub of it; New Labour knew that, to get the liberals onside, they had to adopt the language - 'empowerment', 'opportunity', 'creativity', 'cultural offer'- used by the arts community; as Hywel Williams argues very persuasively ('Britain's Power Elites - The Rebirth of a Ruling Class'), all elites need to construct their own 'meaning', to the exclusion of others, and can then retain and exploit power for its own sake. Those of us who have worked with young people know the positive effect that arts activity can have on some of them (and, indeed, that access to the arts is a complex but genuine concern); but we should also know the limits of that impact, and that it is certainly not appropriate for all (I hated biology, metalwork and chemistry at school, and if forced to do five hours a week in and outside of school, no matter how it was taught, I would've run a mile; others didn't, and that's called a diverse, pluralist, multi-skilled society).

But the arts community will jump at the money - the closeness to power and the 'validity of purpose' such closeness engenders will ensure that they do - the language will become more feelgood but opaque, the benefits even more so, and the kids will wonder if they'll ever have time to just fucking relax.