Unions and Labour

The Conservative Party have always had a dislike of the trade unionists interfering in the concerns of their betters. This dislike has now been taken up with enthusiasm by Miliband. It is not permitted for trade unionists to have a view on political matters. Politics is a rather dirty game for gentlemen and the working classes should know their place and keep out of it.

Of course the payments of large sums of money by private companies - i.e. companies which make a lot of money out of the public - that is quite OK.

Can I assume that next time I reach the checkout at Sainsbury's I will be asked to opt in or opt out of the hundreds of thousands they give to the Conservative Party? Mmm thought not.

However if the Labour Party wants to distance itself from the Trade Unions, the unions could do worse than stand anti-cuts candidates against New Labour in the next election. They offer us nothing, they deserve nothing.

http://derekmcmillan.com/

Euthanasia machine

In the Science Museum there is a lovely array of fascinating displays. However at one end of the gallery they laud Nazi scientist Werner Von Braun.

Older readers may remember Tom Lehrer's comment on this scientist.
"Some have harsh words for this man of renown
But some think our attitude
Should be one of gratitude.
Like the widows and cripples of Old London Town
Who owe their large pensions to Werner Von Braun.

"Don't say that he's hypocritical.
Say rather that he's apolitical.
'When the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?
 That's not my department!' says Werner Von Braun."

Continuing this theme, at the other end of the gallery they show a euthanasia machine to help useless old people out of this world. An example of the moral neutrality of science?

I agree with Richard Reiser. We need more emphasis on people who want to keep us alive!

http://derekmcmillan.com

Greedy MPs

As a means of setting a cat among the pigeons, the i newspaper published a tongue in cheek article by Chris Blackhurst suggesting MPs should be paid £200,000 a year as a way to make them less corrupt.

This led to an explosive response from readers as you can imagine. Suggestions included:

* This is no better than Danegeld - if you pay criminals fabulous sums, they will just come back for more.

* The bankers are a case in point. Allowing them to walk off with million pound bonuses has not decreased their appetite for more, more, more.

* a vicar pointed out that the stipend of a C of E vicar is around £24,000 plus a fully-funded house in the "constituency" however to get the money they have to do useful work.

* the market values espoused by all three parties suggest that where supply exceeds demand the price does not go up. Plenty of people want to become MPs. Three applicants for every job. A case for a wage cut for most employers.

* If MPs were on Performance Related Pay they would be paying us, not the other way round. The rate of absenteeism in the Commons chamber is appalling.

Well done, Chris Blackhurst :) MPs like Dave Nellist managed on a skilled worker's wage. It helps to keep them in touch with reality.

http://derekmcmillan.com/

Tory MP's sick doctrine of hatred

In blaring front page headline today the Daily Mail blames the problems of the NHS not on privatisation or cuts in funding. That would be naive. No it is all the fault of immigrants.

In an article from Chris Skidmore MP, who wants to don the mantle of Enoch Powell, the paper uses fake statistics to blame the problems in healthcare on immigrants.

"It cannot be a coincidence that 2004 — the year in which A&E attendance jumped so noticeably — was the year that Labour changed GPs' contracts to let them opt out of out-of-hours care, and also the year that East European countries such as Poland and the Czech Republic acceded to the EU, allowing their people free migration to the UK."

And the figure Skidmore ignores is that 50 percent of nurses and 25 percent of doctors were born overseas. Kick out the immigrants and the NHS would collapse.

The Daily Mail is no stranger to stirring up race hatred. It's "Hurrah for the Blackshirts" attitude in the 1930s is a template for Chris Skidmore's sick doctrine of hatred.

http://derekmcmillan.com/

MPs snouts in the trough

In Brighton the rubbish is piling up because the Greenies sought to impose cuts of up to £4000 on the dustbin workers. But it's not all doom and gloom. MPs are set for pay rises in excess of £4000 on top of their more than generous and imaginative expenses. Some reports suggest £10000 and a few red faces in Westminster.

The red faces may be the result of shame or the result of expense-account lunches paid for by people like the Brighton dustmen. When they cut the pay of dustmen you can see the results. If the MPs were getting the average wage of a skilled worker (as Dave Nellist did when he was an MP for Coventy) we would probably see an improvement in productivity.

If one of the little piggies asks you for your vote, ask them how much it is going to cost you this time.

http://derekmcmillan.com

Updated website

I have updated the website derekmcmillan.com and about time too.

The happy benefit scrounger

It is not all doom and gloom. One benefit scrounger ought to be smiling  and for once the Bishop of London won't be baying for her blood and pontificating about her greed as he has every other pensioner in the land.

The Sovereign Grant, which funds the Queen's spending as Head of State, will rise in 2014 from £36m to £38m. So no benefit cap or cuts for her then. And she wont have to take a trip to Wonga.com to tide her over.

We all know what it's like living in a draughty old palace - or several draughty old palaces - and desperately trying to make ends meet. So as we watch the winter fuel allowance dwindle into insignificance. As we prepare to join the 2500 pensioners who will die from the cold in the run up to Christmas, we can rest easy in our beds knowing that one greedy pensioner at least is getting a nice warm glow from our money.

http://derekmcmillan.com/

Songs of Catullus - Concordia Singers

Join Concordia on Facebook

Join Concordia on Facebook

Pensioners mugged by The Independent

Pensioners are under attack again. Today the mugger is "The Independent" newspaper. They conducted a survey asking whether pensioners should be immune from cuts and got a "No" from a majority of the public and of pensioners.

Asking whether pensioners should bear their share of the cuts is a weasel of a question. How about "should the government attack the poor to give tax cuts to the rich?" How many over 65's would say "yes" to that?

Ask a GCSE Foundation statistics student what is wrong with the question and the word "bias" would appear in their answer! There are "lies, damned lies and statistics" it would seem. A good old Victorian evaluation from Disraeli.

http://derekmcmillan.com/

People's Assembly. Some dates for your diary

The People’s Assembly will support every genuine movement and action taken against any and all of the cuts. We support all current industrial actions by the unions. We encourage and will help to organise the maximum solidarity action with the PCS and teaching union members taking protest and strike action the week after the People’s Assembly, as well as with other action by unions planned for the autumn.

Peoples Assemblies against the cuts should be organised in towns and cities across our nations, bringing all those fighting the cuts together into a broad democratic alliance on a local basis. 
The national and the local Assemblies, in partnership with Trades Unions, Trades Councils, campaigning and community groups, can unite our movement and strengthen our campaigns. Local Assemblies will help us to organise a recalled National Assembly to review our work in the early spring of 2014.

We will work together with leading experts and campaigners both here and abroad, and friendly think tanks, to develop rapidly key policies and an alternative programme for a new anti-austerity government. We will continue to welcome support from all who fight the cuts.
We will call a national day of civil disobedience and direct action against austerity on November 5^th and a national demonstration in Spring 2014.
We will support the call for local demonstrations on 5^th July, the 65^th Birthday of our NHS and specifically, at Trafford Hospital, Manchester, the birthplace of the NHS.
We will work with the trade unions, campaign groups and others to organise and mobilise for a national demonstration at Conservative Party Conference in Manchester in support of our NHS on 29^th September 2013.


http://derekmcmillan.com

Changes to blog

I have changed the layout of the blog yet again. This time I include a form to contact me. If enough people contact me saying "Put it back the way it was!" I will do so.

A gratifying 414 people took an interest in my post on The People's Assembly against Austerity.

Mes lecteurs en France

Mon ancien professeur de français serait fier et étonné! Mes lecteurs ont plus de patience que mon professeur.

Merci beaucoup pour les lecteurs en France (et au Canada et en Amérique) du Miroir de l'éternité. Vous traiterez mes efforts pour écrire en français avec humour et sympathie. Je fais de mon mieux!

People's Assembly

The People's Assembly met in Westminster Central Hall on Saturday 22nd June with delegates from Trades Unions, Trades Councils, Leftist organisations and pressure groups such as the National Pensioners Convention and the Black Triangle organisation (which opposes the victimisation of disabled people) as well as individuals.

Significantly "non-political" organisations like the NUT were represented alongside the usual suspects. 

This movement against austerity has high hopes of confronting the government and overturning its policies. This is going to be an uphill struggle because none of the political elite are remotely interested in fighting austerity. On the contrary it is Labour Councils (and one Green council) in the forefront of pushing through the Tory cuts and Ed Balls has made it clear that there will be no change if Labour are elected.


Most significantly Owen Jones ended his keynote speech by evoking the memory of the anti-poll tax movement. It will certainly take something as inspirational and well-organised as that movement to confront this government. The Anti Poll Tax movement was viciously opposed by the Labour leadership and yet it succeeded in humiliating Margaret Thatcher. So much so that the meltdown of the iron lady began when her flagship policy was sunk.

If the People's Assembly can give an impetus to persuading the TUC to get off its knees and organise that general strike they keep promising it will be excellent. If they can support anti-cuts candidates against what are popularly called the Labour traitors that would be even better.

Short Fiction Results

Bad Romance , in category; Romance. Views: 698,
It is a pleasure to meet the man who shot my brother , in category; Adult Theme. Views: 669,
What's on the television? , in category; Scifi. Views: 246,
When I think about you , in category; Adult Theme. Views: 4494

My comment on that is simply telling people a story has an "adult theme" seems to get a lot of readers. Sci Fi does not seem to be nearly as popular.

So should I stick with the Sci Fi? Probably because I write best what I like best. That's my opinion, you can have it for what it's worth!

http://derekmcmillan.com

Horsham Hospital's Compelling Vision

Our local minor injuries unit is faced with closure. Management consultants, who know all about these things, have tried to paint this as a good thing "going forward"

George Orwell used to cite an example of what happens when people lose track of what their words actually mean. “The fascist octopus has sung its swansong. The Jackboot has been cast into the melting-pot.” This sounds ridiculous. No more ridiculous, however, than the pathetic excuses for closing Horsham Hospital's minor injuries unit.

“When you are looking at minor injuries in any health economy you have to look at what changes you are making. What we have is a compelling vision about how care can be different.” is reasonably difficult to understand because it does not use words to convey information but to obscure it.

Likewise “improving services for the future” by cutting them in the present flies in the face of reason. As for Mr Williams “awaiting utilisation data” and the frankly disingenuous remark that “The central pillar of our existence is public engagement.” we are entitled to ask which planet these wiseacres were addressing.

The NHS, which is supposed to be a National Health Service, is being taken over by very well-paid suits spouting gobbledegook. A single doctor, nurse or cleaner is worth a thousand “mission statements” and “compelling visions”.

May God forgive the Bishop of London

 

The notoriously well-fed Bishop of London has launched an unprovoked attack on pensioners. We are all greedy and overprivileged and a burden on the state.We are not like Lady Thatcher whom he eulogised to such an extent that the sales of sick bags went up all over the country.

Government spending on 'baby boomers'  – those born in the 20 years after the Second World War – the Bishop pontificates ‘raises questions of intergenerational equity’. The fact of the matter is that pensioners are at the sharp end of cuts in benefits and public spending and many look to the church for some kind of support.

I am beginning to sound like Victor Meldrew but "I don't believe it!" When Bishops and politicians start talking about pensioners as a burden on the state how far away are we from some kind of "final solution" for the lot of us? No more pensions for you guys and here's a bottle of cyanide?

I forgive the Bishop of London. I am thinking of taking him off my Christmas Card list though

The National Pensioners Convention are doing their bit to oppose the Bishop's ungodly rhetoric. 

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Galloway against transvestites

George Galloway does not seem to have consulted anyone before announcing he will stand for London Mayor. Galloway says, “Labour, I understand, is contemplating selecting a transvestite comedian, Eddie Izzard, which would also be an interesting contest. Real Labour versus a transvestite.”

George Galloway implies that transvestites cannot be socialists. I don't know where he is getting that from but such a use of backward prejudice is at variance with all the principles of Socialism.

A candidate to represent all Londoners would reject any marginalisation of any part of the community. People may vote for Galloway out of despair at the failure of all the mainstream parties but our old friend "none of the above" may win this election if there is no credible working class alternative.

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Conspiracy Theories

Politicians like to sneer about “Conspirary Theories.” Question the frankly incredible official version of the Kennedy assassination? Conspiracy Theorist! Wonder aloud if Mr Blair was telling the whole truth about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction? Conspiracy Theorist!

And as for those people who think Computer moguls like Google, Facebook and Microsoft are collecting data about your internet and computer usage. Conspiracy...oh just a minute, that's not a theory. That is a fact. They even boast about it. They are collecting all this data to “improve the product” or to “provide you with better advertisements” (as if you were asking them to send you adverts!) or to “make your experience more satisfactory. “

Harmless? Even benign?

Or are you concerned that this information is being sold to the US government and indirectly to the UK government?

Do you think the UK government is being economical with the truth when it boasts that its intelligence gathering is only targeted on terrorists and criminals and if you disagree you must be a terrorist or a criminal yourself. “Only the guilty have anything to fear.” to quote Willie Hague

Do you get the sneaking feeling that you can only trust this ConDem government as far as you could comfortably spit a rat?

You're one of those Conspiracy Theorists aren't you?

Socialist Reviews Death Agony of Capitalism

Big Sister Teresa May

Home Secretary "Big Sister" Teresa May revealed on Sunday that since 2010, nearly 5700 separate articles and websites have been taken off the internet by the UK government. The excuse for this is the war on terror. So any website thought to be encouraging terrorism (defined by the government of course) can be taken down by the government.

At the same time the government have utilised the revulsion following the Woolwich killing to sneak in legislation which will seek to read all your emails and mine. This is partly nonsense because the
government already has the ability to read anyone's emails and they are not subject to any public scrutiny of the reasons for so doing.

Privacy campaign group Big Brother Watch says police already have the ability under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (Ripa) code to demand communications data – "who sent what to whom from where and when" – from internet and phone companies on terror and serious crime suspects. The powers are already widely used: 494,078 such requests were made by police and security services in 2011 alone. We are expected to believe there are half a million terrorists in the UK? And
I am the Queen of Sheba.

Experts have pointed out that increased draconian powers will actually make it harder to combat terrorism because the police will have to wade through oceans of information to find what they actually need to know.

This suggests that the "war on terror" is more of a smokescreen.

The government seems to want to use the backlash against Islam to gather more authoritarian powers. These could be used to clamp down on all opposition to the cuts. They could also keep a close eye on those opposing government policy of pursuing endless colonial wars. They will seek to argue that peace campaigns like CND are "encouraging terrorism" by opposing war!

You can bet the trade union movement and the left will be the targets of any clampdown. The government know who their real enemies are.

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Socialist Reviews free on 1st June

I write reviews of books and films for The Socialist and Socialism Today. The book will be free on 1st June and very reasonably priced thereafter (99 cents in America and the equivalent in the UK and elsewhere) Click here

During the banking crisis, the BBC broadcaster, Sarah Kennedy, joked that “The TUC have a demonstration against capitalism this weekend. They are bringing it forward because capitalism may not last that long.” Yet capitalism did survive the banking crisis and every family in the land knows how it survived. It survived at our expense. Bankers still get million pound bonuses (I always think six months in prison would do them more good) and we get cuts in wages, pensions and social services.

Perhaps it is those who believe in capitalism who are living in cloud cuckoo land. They assert that Socialism is impractical but what could be more impractical then a society which robs the poor to give to the rich?

I have collected some of my reviews here. The most recent is a review of Parliamentary Socialism entitled Miliband on Miliband. The earliest is a review of Life on the Screen by Sherry Turkle which is simply the most fascinating insight into the strange world of cyberspace that I have ever come across.

I review things which move or interest me.That is the advantage of freelance writing.

Table of Contents

Miliband on Miliband
Les Miserables 2012
The Apprentice final
Fahrenheit 9/11
Remember me Rescue me
The Exception to the Rulers
The Media in Question
A Child called 'It'
The Root of All Evil
Battleship Potemkin
Lady Chatterley’s Lover
The Chatterley Affair
V for Vendetta
Forget you had a daughter
Two lives
Life on the Screen
Borgen
Ideological dimensions of Taxi Driver
The Iron Lady in meltdown
Various Pets Alive and Dead
Why I became a Socialist

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You've heard of Oxfam. Well this is Oxcred

Oxcred is a scheme in Oxford (hence the name) for a mutual credit scheme. I googled it and they thought I wanted OFSTED! Does any teacher really want OFSTED?

•    The idea is to create a social economy, one freed from the control of the banks, the speculators and the megacorporations.
•    Oxcred will seek to encourage community, co-operation and mutualism.
•    It will seek to encourage local trade, production and consumption of locally produced goods.
•    This social economy will be aided by the creation of a new currency in Oxford called the oxcred.
•    This currency will be issued by and under under the democratic control of its members.

It is an indication of the extent to which people distrust the banks that a scheme like Oxcred is being proposed. In the absence of a mass party representing working people it makes sense to take measures of self-defence like mutual credit even if the banks will do all in their power to subvert it if it becomes a threat to them. Remember how the building societies were hijacked by profiteers with only Nationwide surviving the onslaught.

Click here to find out more

War profiteer 1919 could be 2013

Requires no comment really 

Thatcherism is alive

This happened to me today. It has probably happened to you so many times it seems commonplace. It was a hot day and I tried to buy some water. There was no price on the water displayed outside the shop but I soon found out it was five Euros for 3 litres!

I declined. To be exact I told the shopkeeper what I thought of him and declined.

I then bought 3 litres of water for 50 cents at another shop.

If I were to try to steal 4 euros 50 from somebody I would wind up in prison. Lock up the profiteers!

Word game resource

If you like word games you will find this useful. It was created while playing "Bookworm" but the information is also useful for Scrabble, bananas, Lexicon and other wordgames.

Click here and see what you think

 

Left Challenge in NUT VP election

Socialist Party member Martin Powell-Davies will be standing for Vice President of the NUT. He has already received the backing of the Local Associations National Action Campaign (LANAC) and is now seeking nominations from NUT branches.

There is more information here

http://electmartin1.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/martin-powell-davies-to-stand-for-nut.html

Gmail account hacked

My gmail account has been hacked. I apologise to anyone who has received dodgy emails ostensibly from my account. I have had a go at tightening up security on the account and keeping my fingers crossed.

I had this problem some time ago with yahoo and deleted all my yahoo contacts. This was a bit drastic so I hope I don't have to do the same for gmail.

British Heart Foundation gaffe

I have a lot of time for the British Heart Foundation for the obvious reason that I have heart disease. I was concerned that the latest Heart Matters magazine features Vinnie Jones. I threw it away.

Jones was the presenter of the infamous Soccer's Hard Men video, which featured archived footage of himself and many other "hard men" of the game, and included advice for budding "hard men". After the release of the video, Jones was fined £20,000 and given a six-month ban (suspended for three years) for "bringing the game into disrepute". Jones boasted that " I've taken violence off the terraces and onto the pitch".
He has subsequently had a career as a thug in films.

One wonders whether this is the best possible image for the British Heart Foundation.

A verbal contract? Is it worth the paper it's written on?

A nasty piece of work this morning. I am still running the West Sussex NUT Helpline pro tem. A member has agreed to work two days a week as this fits in with childcare arrangments. The head insists that the member agreed to three days a week. Three days a week would be impossible for them. Head charmingly hinted they seek work elsewhere.

The head is taking advantage of the Goldwyn adage that "a verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on" (It should of course have been an oral contract but Goldwyn was Goldwyn)

I suggested the member should set out their objections in writing and request a meeting with the head.
Members are entitled to be accompanied at meetings:
Ideally by the NUT rep
Failing that an NUT member
Failing that another member of staff.
They should certainly take a record of the discussion since this seems to be a shortcoming of previous negotiations.
It is most important to have clear objectives for the meeting. It is most often the person with a clear agenda who gets their own way.

Click here for Classroom Teacher Manual - the book of the helpline

Levellers

Levellers' Day is a fortnight away on 18 May.


The Levellers were predecessors of today's socialists. Their demands were not socialist but they went far beyond anything Cromwell was likely to countenance.

One summary of their demands is here

Link to Levellers' Day

Blog update

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Ark update

Ark is a local charity in Horsham helping people who are homeless or addicted or just plain poor. It also helps people like me. There isn't really a client/volunteer atmosphere at Ark. We are all in the same boat so to speak. 

On of the things I do is provide advice on ICT, numeracy and literacy. As part of the literacy work of Ark, one of our members has been writing a story. It is available here Over 400 people have looked at it so far. You could be the next :)

Site for short fiction Mayday update

There is no money in this but it is probably good publicity The site is http://www.short-fiction.co.uk

The story as of Mayday 2013 is as follows:

 

Bad Romance 628 readers

What's on the Television 192 readers

When I think about you 4187 readers - that is a lot of readers!

Mayday Socialist Reviews Thanks

Thanks to everyone who downloaded on Mayday. If you liked Socialist Reviews of Xavier's Recipe Book please feel free to make a comment on Amazon - doubly so if your surname is not McMillan! If you didn't like it, never mind :)

Socialist Reviews

Xavier's Cookbook

Pensioners of the world unite

Ian Duncan Smith has proposed that pensioners should hand back their bus passes and the meagre winter fuel allowance. Ian Duncan Smith is best remembered as the glutton who claimed £39 on expenses for his breakfast. We want it back – not the breakfast Ian, the money.


MPs – millionaire MPs – like Vince Cable have insisted that all “pensioners perks” should be taxed out of existence. Cable – a rich pensioner if ever there was one – does not need a bus pass. We pay for his travel – first class all the way.

They are giving hypocrisy a bad name! They are attacking pensioners while saying they cannot do anything about bankers' bonuses or (God forbid!) MPs expenses. They believe pensioners are weak. They are wrong. They believe pensioners have no allies. They are wrong.

When the sleeping giant (occasionally comatose giant!) of the TUC wakes up to its responsibilities and calls a general strike these wiseacres will have to learn to walk again. It will do them good to stand on their own two feet and learn to live in the real world.

Pensioners of the world unite – you have nothing to lose but Vince Cable!

  Click here to preview Socialist Reviews http://www.amazon.co.uk/Socialist-Reviews-ebook/dp/B00C9G7682/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1367232839&sr=8-2&keywords=socialist+reviews

Can I help you?

I run a helpline for stressed teachers. When I tell people this they frequently say “you must get a lot of calls” and add “it must be a real strain for them dealing with the little b******s”.

The second part is wrong. Curiously it is the big b******s who cause the most headaches for my callers. It is true that there are people who have been driven out of teaching by the behaviour of some pupils. The teacher is the first person who has ever said “no” to some pupils and the pupils do not like it. The potential for disruption in a school is considerable. One teacher quit in her first year because the classroom displays she lavished time and love on were continually vandalised. You realise this could have been the work of just one pupil.

However, teachers expect and can cope with most of the “challenging behaviour” of pupils. There is always the support and above all the knowledge of other teachers to fall back on. Other teachers will have knowledge of dealing with pupils and knowledge about the particular “challenging” individual in question.

No. The calls I get are about the overgrown playground bullies who have positions of power in education. Bullies in chief are Michael Gove and his henchman Michael Wilshaw. Wilshaw's first piece of advice to heads was “if morale is at an all-time low, you will know you are doing something right.” What a charmer.

If teachers are having problems (and that would be all of us at one time or another) then the Wilshaw style head does not offer support and advice. They just tell you what you already know. “Your results are not good enough.” Teach for a few years and you will realise that nothing is good enough for people like them.

I have even had one head who wants the staff to wear uniform. He will be getting them to salute him next. Since this was a unilateral change of contract we were able to dispute it. I had one caller who had been given a target of “driving” not the school bus as you might think but the English department. This is in Sussex and “we won't be druv!” is the county motto.

Over the last sixteen years I have had an insight into the dark side of education. People do not ring me up to say they are having a good time. I have also seen how the union can help people who are having problems and occasionally cut some of the worst heads and line managers down to size.

Excuse me, that's the phone.

Click here for Classroom Teacher Manual - the book of the helpline

E-petitions against Goveism

Gove wants to unilaterally worsen conditions for teachers and pupils. His implicit assumption is that teachers do not work hard enough. This will play well with the Tory blowhards he is appealing to but anyone who knows about education will query whether "more" invariably means "better". Otherwise why not have schools open 24 hours a day?

If schools want to lengthen the school day or cut holidays they have to consult and negotiate. Gove is just a bully. Teachers are good at dealing with bullies.

Do writing to your MP or e-petitions change the mind of a government which responds to criticism by literally going "yadda yadda yadda"? Probably not but as Tesco say, every little helps. The government assume everybody agrees with its policies just as they assume everybody loves Margaret Thatcher and was happy to pay millions for her funeral. 

One particularly useless Tory MP proclaimed to the local newspaper "nobody is against school x becoming an academy" because nobody had bothered to write to him.

Provide some evidence that they are lying.

 

There is a suggested petition to insist Gove has a go at teaching although that could be child abuse.

 There is also one against his proposed changes

 

 

 

 

 

Click here

Rallies for education organised by NASUWT and NUT

This is for those people who think the unions should be working together - which would be most teachers. I hope ATL members will take part too. Parents and governors will also be invited. Gove's attack on teachers and his philistine "yadda yadda yadda" attitude to criticism pose a threat to education.

Association	Venue	Date	Time & Speakers
Liverpool	Holiday Inn Liverpool City Centre Lime Street Liverpool L1 1NQ click for directions and map	Saturday 27 April 2013 click for parking	11am - 12.30pm Christine Blower General Secretary NUT, Patrick Roach Deputy General Secretary NASUWT
Manchester	Midland Hotel Peter Street Manchester M60 2DS click for directions and map	Saturday 27 April 2013 click for parking	11am - 12.30pm Chris Keates General Secretary NASUWT, Kevin Courtney Deputy General Secretary NUT
Birmingham	ICC Broad Street Birmingham B1 2EA click for directions and map	Saturday 11 May 2013 click for parking	11am - 12.30pm Chris Keates General Secretary NASUWT, Kevin Courtney Deputy General Secretary NUT
Leeds	The Hilton Leeds City Hotel Neville Street Leeds LS1 4BX click for directions and map	Saturday 11 May 2013	11am - 12.30pm Christine Blower General Secretary NUT, Patrick Roach Deputy General Secretary NASUWT
Cardiff	Motorpoint Arena Mary Ann Street Cardiff CF10 2EQ click for directions and map	Saturday 18 May 2013 click for parking	11am - 12.30pm Chris Keates General Secretary NASUWT, Kevin Courtney Deputy General Secretary NUT
Newcastle	Centre for Life Times Square Newcastle upon Tyne Tyne and Wear NE1 4EP click for directions and map http://classroomteacher.blogspot.com	Saturday 18 May 2013	11am - 12.30pm Christine Blower General Secretary NUT, Patrick Roach Deputy General Secretary NASUWT

Gove's pay cut for teachers

A new 2013 School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document (STPCD),
confirming Gove’s divisive performance-pay plans, has been released on
the Department for Education website, along with a ‘Toolkit’ of
dangerous advice encouraging schools to set teacher against teacher.



For a summary, look on the LANAC website:


http://www.nutlan.org.uk/?q=node/8985

Click here

Frankie goes to St Pauls

Francis Maude, first "bastard" to put the knife into Maggie Thatcher, is the unlikely choice for organiser of the pro-Tory rally we are all paying 10 million pounds for today. Maude knew that Thatcherism would live on. When Thatcher only stole milk from children, it is now proposed to rob them of free school meals too. It is what the blessed Margaret would have wanted.

The old Tory lie about the royal family being "above politics" dies at this event. Although they reportedly despised Thatcher and her pretensions when she was alive, they are Thatcherites at heart. The views of the duke of Edinburgh who insists on referring to the Chinese as "slitty eyed" echo those of the Thatchers with their "golliwogs". More importantly a policy which puts the rich first is bound to appeal to the richest woman in Europe and her consort.

There will be protests at the funeral but if we are to bury Thatcherism it will require a concerted effort by the trade union movement. Labour lickspittles will be out in force today.  There is no hope that they will be of any use. A 24 hour general strike has been proposed - thanks to lobbying by the National Shop Stewards Network and others. It would be a good place to start.

The funeral of Thatcherism is coming. There will be no mourners by request :)

You know when you've been fraped

One of the irritating things about Facebook is the little tick box "keep me logged in". It frequently comes up with a tick already in it so if you do not have your wits about you - and I don't always have my wits about me! - then you are still logged in next time somebody uses the computer.

What happens then is what Angela's daughter Liz called "getting fraped". My experience of this has been harmless and salutary. One comment was posted ostensibly from me telling the world that I had just been fraped!

However, you might click "like" next to something on a website and suddenly find that you have just told all your 500 friends about it. That may not have been your intention.

The Teacher Support Network does issue advice on staying safe online. It is just a question of having your wits about you....come back wits, I need you now.

A fitting tribute to Thatcher

Where there was discord, Thatcher brought harmony as this photo illustrates.

Thatcher did not invent selfishness and greed. However, sane people have always shunned selfishness and greed as anti-social. Human solidarity predates Socialism by centuries. Our ancestors found out that they could achieve far more working together than they could by selfishness.

If, as Thatcher believed fervently, there was “no such thing as society” then it made no sense to talk about anything being “anti-social”. For the first time selfishness and greed were lauded as positive virtues. The virtues indeed of the hard working strivers.

Thatcher believed in hard work. She herself worked very hard. However the strivers who benefited most from Thatcherism were the spivs and speculators. They worked hard at making money. A pickpocket also works hard and an old fashioned Socialist might regard the pickpocket's activities as anti-social.

Indeed one simpering sycophant on the BBC gushed about how restricted the banks were before the blessed Margaret set them free from old-fashioned regulation. Then the commentator clearly realised what she had just said and started backtracking, “maybe that wasn't such a good thing!”

The other aspect of Thatcherism was described as “rolling back the state” as a means of setting free the hard-working strivers. Instead of subsidising the infrastructure for the public good, state money and assets found their way into private pockets. Far from demonstrating the power of capitalism, privatisation merely verified its rapacious nature. The resources of the public were plundered for the benefit of profiteers.

The state, in the form of Maggie's blue cavalry, rolled over the mining communities and the lives of thousands of people were devastated. For some strange reason a police truncheon on the head did not make them love Thatcher. How ungrateful.

So the first response to Thatcher's death was to push “Ding dong the witch is dead.” to the top of the Amazon charts and there were street celebrations.

This is not enough. We need a lasting memorial to Thatcher. For decades parents who saw selfish behaviour in their children would mutter “I blame Thatcher.”

Every time you do something Thatcher would hate; every time you help a neighbour, every time you express solidarity; every action you take which asserts that there is such a thing as society is a nail in the coffin of Thatcherism.

And the time is coming when it will be buried forever.

 Socialist Reviews now out on Kindle

A Tory political demonstration and we are paying for it

"The old saw that one shouldn’t speak ill of the recently dead cannot possibly apply to controversial figures in public life. It certainly didn’t apply to President Hugo Chavez who predeceased Margaret Thatcher amidst a blizzard of abuse." (George Galloway)

 It is nothing but hypocrisy when the same Tory blowhards who rubbished Chavez now start being pious.

I do not see eye to eye with George Galloway but no other member of parliament seems to want to speak up. Shame on the whole shower.

The government is intent on making Thatcher's funeral into a political demonstration and using the police to silence anyone who doesn't like it. She would have loved that.

When we bury Thatcherism it will not be a cause for grief but for celebration.

 Socialist Reviews now out on Kindle