The people of Barnet voted to elect a Conservative Council and three Conservative MP's. What did you expect from them all? Did you expect a massive extension of the schools building program under a Conservative government? Did you expect the poorest children in Barnet, who attend the worst schools to get cash thrown at them? Well if you voted Tory and are suddenly shocked to find our new government has cancelled the rebuilding of all the delapidated schools in Barnet, I'm afraid to say you only have yourself to blame.
The local paper reports that our local Tory MP's Theresa Villiers (a member of the Government), Mike Freer and Matthew Offord are meeting education secretary Micahel Gove to see what can be done. They should save their efforts. It is quite simple what will happen. Gove will say "Blame it all on Labour" then say "tell them it has to be done or the country will go broke".
Sadly though that is a porkie. There is always an alternative. Sure things have to be cut, but not necessarily this budget. There are other things. Trident could be scrapped. Taxes on the very rich could be raised (people like Moir Lockhead who gets paid £800,000 to run First Capital Connect). Allowances for councillors (such as Brian Coleman who gets £113,000 from the public purse for a string of non jobs) could be slashed. Consultants writing "blue sky reports" for £1,500 a day consultancies could be sacked. The culture of layer upon layer of managers in public bodies could be ended. One of the "sacred cows" of the Governments spending cuts is the NHS. I wonder how many bureaucrats simply generating paperwork could be sacked with no effect on anyone. As for the Police, how much time do officers waste doing pointless paperwork.
I don't believe that we need to cancel any of these. We just need our local MP's to get off their backsides and start working. They need to start identifying waste in their own constituencies. If Matthew Offord said "We can save these schools if we can find the cash by cutting elsewhere and being really ruthless" I may have some respect for him. He won't because he's too lazy. He's the man who told me that 5-15% of Barnet Councils budget was wasted. This is enough to save the school rebuilding program. He did nothing about it as deputy leader and he's doing nothing about it as MP.
Sadly they are all hypocrites shedding crocodile tears for people they don't care about at all.
Very disappointing news for the Children of Barnet.
ReplyDeleteI hope that the new Government re-considers this plan.
Lets close down the £1 million a year Police operation at the Dome in Mill Hill - that would pay for Copthall and Ravenscroft to have their rebuilding programme.
The Coalition must cut from things outside the NHS and Schools. These two things should come first. If they dont the public will get tired of them very quickly which would be a shame.
What seems not to have been appreciated in this disgraceful development is not only are Bishop Douglas and Ravenscroft schools that have been struggling for years to make improvements, and cater for many pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds, but that Oak Lodge and The Pavilion are even more in need of support. Oak Lodge is an excellent specialist school for children with needs such as autism: The pavilion I believe is a referral centre for children excluded from mainstream school. So our most vulnerable children are being punished in these Tory cuts,whilst elsewhere our already priviliged selective schools and schools in affluent areas are being encouraged to demand academy status and gain their own autonomy and freedom from 'interference' by outside restrictions. In other words, as predicted, the gulf between haves and have nots in Broken Barnet is being pulled even wider apart by our Tory MPs chums in government. They knew perfectly well that this was party policy, and have no defence whatsoever from being associated with these decisions. Utterly shameful.
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