FREE!
What a happy word
FREE is! On the grand scale there's the classic news photo of Nelson
Mandela striding into the sunshine with a smile; at the other end it
might be just a smile on a shopper's face on finding an extra 33% of
detergent in a bottle (“enough
for six more washes!”).
So free means happy-me, free is good. OK then, what about all those
free schools that David Cameron has promised us if we let him? (Did
I say promised
or threatened
to inflict upon
us just then?) Anyway, moving swiftly on… Free in this case means
free from some of those irksome little restrictions that Local
Authority schools have to abide by, such as insisting that teachers
have actual teaching qualifications, or following the National
Curriculum. They are not claiming to be free in the money sense:
they are to be paid for by the taxpaying public.
Perhaps inflicted
upon us
would be the right thing to say is going on. Let me explain: Why is
it that proposed schools quietly disappear? Oh yes they do. When a
planning application for 300 new houses near Gunvil Hall to the
South-west of Wymondham was first discussed, the idea was suggested
that part of the plan would include a new school. After the plans
have bounced between South Norfolk and the developers a couple of
times, when Wymondham Town Councillors saw the latest version with a
space where the school was, I asked “What has happened to the
proposed school?” I was told that the developers asked the County
Council for details and were told that a new school was not needed in
that area; it’s
within cycling distance of both Wymondham College and Wymondham High.
(No, I don’t know either how that squares with the need for
primary school places, but heigh-ho!) Instead
of building a school,
the developers’ PR told me they were advised, perhaps
they could either leave a space or build a community building that
potentially could be used for a free school.
That is a clear example of Tories preparing the ground for more cuts
in services, more movement towards their dogmatism. It's not exactly
privatisation, but it is less
local
control pretending to be more, less money for Local Authority
education where we need more. I am yet to be shown even one single
tiny benefit of free schools, other than to County Councils who want
to shed responsibility for excellence in education.
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