Conservative Manifesto Launch

I must say they are very good with words and constructing promising, dreamy compositions! At the end of the day you don't get much substance I agree. A lot of family appealing dreamy images that sounds oh ever so perfect but hardly so in these ever so imperfect times. I felt the Tories are playing a very fine tune that does not fit in the reality of what we are going through. I am even more suspiscious of what they stand for now ! I want to hear real life waking up plans and not what i would like to dream about at night.

I want to believe them, agree with the headlines, would like to see change but at this point they need to add some substance to the fluff.

MP - By successful model do you mean has it worked elsewhere or that if it happens here it should start small- like Surestart did?

Another third way - good spot.

Hmm there seems to be a lot of "BIG SOCIETY" talk which seems to mean "Getting everyone to do stuff for free"

It talks about 5,000 "Community Organisers" being put into place, but says that their TRAINING will be funded - so these will be volunteers I assume, who coordinate local action projects. So the BIG SOCIETY is again about getting people to do work for free.

I'd like to see a successful model for this sort of enterprise that has been rolled out nationwide that has demonstrated ACTUAL OUTCOMES rather than people arguing all the time ...

It's sort of like the New Labour idea of moving everything from the public sector to the third sector, except this time it's moving to the voluntary sector, so we all provide the services for free...

Or am I mis-reading it?!

I can answer the schools thing.

If you have made your money in the city/advertising/whatever (or dh/dw is busy making it for you!) you can devote yourself to good works.
What better flavour of the month than to 'start your own school' imagine the dinner party chit chat.

There is one on the boil near here I hesitate to link because I don't want to give them publicity (and I can't do links )

The motivating factor seems to be keeping little Tarquin away from all the kids from the neighbouring LA (it's complicated-not enough schools there either) the admissions criteria seem to be based on attending certain feeder primary schools.

All well and good only thing is you need close to a million pounds to buy a house that will get you into one of these primaries.
Or you can do the renting and moving thing not that I said that.

They are very very quiet about what would happen to those that have moved away.
The site used to go on about the need to keep children from these small schools together and how like a family they were so they shouldn't be split up blah blah.

I think one of them is now one of the biggest schools in the area!

not a lot in there for the step families or single parents, a bit about nrp and grandparents but nothing about child support, there are a few thousand families like it.

Nothing on the tax credits cut of point either....just re admistration??

Agree Greatfires - there's an awful lot of soundbiting going on on both sides. I want to shout at them 'But what are you actually going to do?????' (and I usually do).

Parents running schools is a Labour policy too and it's happened twice already. The Tories, who believe an increase in good schools is a good thing, want to make it easier for any parents mad keen enough to go ahead. This article about Toby Young's plans to open a school in West London covers it well. here

The idea for companies etc to be involved in delivering education is pretty similar to what labour have brought in for the NHS - in terms of alternative providers of medical services (ie boots/virgin etc rather than NHS GPs). The idea being the money follows the pupil/patient if they chose to move from a failing school/gp surgery to somewhere else.

I just see more money being taken from failing schools, leading to them doing an even worse job. Not support to overcome the difficulties and improve standards. Certainly in healthcare, money saved from improving efficiency etc is being pocketed by private companies, rather than invested back into the NHS.

I would run a mile from this. (Not that I have any clue who I would run to - they are all bandying around lovely soundbites but little substance!)

It does seem very wishy washy

Everyone is avoiding the key issues i.e. WHAT ARE WE GOING TO LOSE?

Parents running schools in their spare time... snort... have these people ever tried to coordinate a summer fete?!!?!!

Oh for heavens sake what a load of happy clappy claptrap. When we need strong government we get this!. I really don't have the time, inclination and energy to set up a school and help run it. I also don't think lots of parental involvement in the running of schools is a great thing either as demonstrated by how parental choice has polarised the fortunes of so many schools in the UK. It makes me angry reading this as they obviously don't think we can stomach the reality of the cuts needed to get the economy back on its feet so they give us this soft focus stuff instead, at least labour's manifesto had some substance.

They won't talk about cuts until after the election singlemum

Alicatte Tis the extension of 'pupil centred' learning I think. Ironically 'very progressive'. I can see it working for self motivated children and it produces independent learners - where it works. It's already happening under Labour (a couple are just about to open).

can anyone tell me what it says about working tax credit/childcare tax credit? Will it be going? Thanks.

right I am downloading the whole thing

I can't make head or tail of any of it so far

How will this work - children setting their own targets? I'm not entirely against the idea but too much differentiation causes as many problems as it solves. Will it just be a kind of choice within a defined area do you think? Its interesting but do they have to make a profit - couldn't we just adopt the independent sector ideas within the state sector?

OK, I was wrong on the schools proposal - it looks as if they will be allowed to make a profit after all (according to this Times article.

Frankly, I struggled to get through that, and did skim through quite a bit.

The fox-hunting paragraph (tacked onto the end of 'civil liberties' simply made me laugh. I mean, come on, it's such an utterly petty thing to include in an election manifesto in which people are voting to try and salvage some sort of life out of the financial mess we're in right now.

As for the rest of it, there seemed to be an awful lot there that maybe seemed a good idea to some hiher up being idealistic, but linking the pay of Sure Start workers to their results seems a scary precedent to set. Results-based pay is a really great way to stress out your workforce and disillusion them. Combined with the threats to cut funding to bad hospitals, and the opportunity for any helicopter-parent with a big idea to start their own school if the fancy it, this just looks like step one of a descent into chaos.

I can just see endless quangos having to appear in a few years to try and monitor this mess, along with reams of management staff busily assessing medical professionals and social workers, reducing their effeciency even more. And as for the workhouse Work Programme idea... it took me six months just to get through all the flipping medicals for my ESA claim the first time (during which I was in benefits limbo, unable to work and unable to be confident my claim would properly go through); the thought of doing that all over again because they've decided to force sick people into work is just infuriating. I have to get back into a return-to-work programme '6 to 8 weeks' after giving birth as it is.

But on the plus side, it does look like quite a few graphic artists made a mint doing those pictures, so at least someone's benefited.

I haven't read it, but have been listening to radio 4 for the last hour or so, so have got a general overview. What I took away from it was that there is no appetite from parents to set up their own schools, so that's just nonsense.

Only four pages about the economy - I presume that's because they don't really know what their going to do OR they do, but don't want us to know.

More involvement from individuals in the local community - I remember care in the community, so no thanks.

Thanks for that Vesela,

Its a bit of mixed report though - I went down to the bottom line (bad habit of mine) and it said that the Swedish Education Minister thought that the education in Sweden was bad relative to the rest of Europe. He also seemed to be saying that it was 'selection' that made the free schools relatively better at the moment. Then the advisor said they needed to make a profit so they could subsidise the education of less well off children.

Couldn't we just pay up front?

The ones they have in Sweden are profit-making, but the Tories apparently decided they wouldn't be allowed to make a profit here (against the advice of this Swedish advisor.

Actually they're less widespread than I thought in Sweden - 10% of children are in them. I thought it was more.

I am responding to the BBC news report just after lunch today which featured Justine from Mumsnet. In this report it was explained that parents would be able not so much to start schools themselves as to be able to invite companies and charities to start schools for them - hence my concerns.

To be honest, I can't find much that is very clear in the manifesto - its why I'm finding it so difficult. It puts me in mind of a kind of 'doublespeak' I don't know what they mean so I am very grateful to the political interpreters on the BBC.

MissM has made me worry about shareholders now - how could such a conflict of interest be resolved?

Alicatte - I actually can't find any reference to profit making from schools in the manifesto. And recently the Tories have been denying that they will allow it.

I guess it all comes down to polical orthodoxy? Do you believe public services are inherently cost effective with tax payer's money is spent in the most effecient way? Or do you believe organisations respond best to incentives, such as profit?

jackstarbright,

I guess my point was that as we currently have the option, within actual education in the classroom, to spend ALL the government allocated money on the process - it seems a shame to spend less and add to the host of companies making a profit.

Not, of course, that there is anything intrinsically wrong with making a profit. It is just such a waste to let companies cream off profit when the current arrangement allows us not to.

So let's have a think. I am an education professional with over 16 years experience, now at a senior level. My DH is a class teacher with 15 years experience of inner-city schools as a literacy and SEN manager. Knowing what we know about the education system from the inside, there is no way on earth either of us would dream of starting our own school, or even presume that we could, and we are probably more qualified than many. I just can't understand how such a policy could possibly work even if the will and energy (and money) were there. If there aren't any decent schools in an area then the government should ask itself why and do something about it, not ask us to sort it out. Builde - your point about playgroups sums it up! Companies will end up running schools for a profit, and who would they be accountable to for driving up standards? Shareholders?