to be very heartened by the student riots!

[Heathcliffscathy]

apathy be damned...I predict more riots...looks like the youth have found their teeth.

Why are people getting upset about the destruction of a bit of Tory/Millionaire owened property? Throwing fire extinguishers - idotic - wrecking Tory HQ? They should've burned it to the ground.

Right on Pottonista 10.21.
I hadn't even considered that but I think you are right.

I agree with all your posts pottonista and think that Germany and Switzerland have it right. I can't understand why crafts and trades are second class when lots of academic people couldn't do them!

I am still smarting from the comment I got this morning when I said that we needed more apprenticeships and I got:

''And to be frank calling for vocational courses and apprenticeships to replace degrees not only smacks of finding something for working class boys to do so we don't have to concern ourselves with educating them, it also ignores the very real fact that we don't have any call for these kinds of jobs anymore. '

With attitudes like that no wonder the country is in a mess! Unless I missed it, the person who wrote it never came back to say how she was going to manage without plumbers, electricians, car mechanics, carpenters, hair dressers etc etc etc that apparently we have no call for!

there aren't degree course in those subjects anyway... hairdressers have the option of doing a foundation degree but that's in partnership with an employer.

and unqualified plumbers/electricians find it very difficult to find apprenticeships and gain their NVQ as it is.

@ stuckinthemiddle: Not all Tory voters are millionaires. I'm not a higher-rate taxpayer, and I voted Tory in the last election - for the first time in my life, and after some soul searching - because I was so apalled at what New Labour had done.

Blair and Brown basked in the '90s and early '00s boom in tax receipts - which came about through deregulating financial services (with the consequences we've seen now) and encouraging house price inflation, which in turn encouraged more spending, more lending, etc etc. But instead of using the tsunami of incoming tax dosh to fix the roof while the sun shone, they squandered it to buy votes through a vast and unsustainable expansion in public spending. Non-jobs in the public sector; bureaucratic handout schemes; pointless quangos (believe me, I've seen enough of them in operation, most quangos are incompetent and pointless); and now, 500,000 people whose livelihoods are fucked, because they were employed on public sector salaries the post-boom tax receipts can't pay for. What New Labour did is equivalent to the way Thatcher blew the North Sea oil revenues on breaking the unions, rather than building for the future: a massive betrayal of the country's long-term needs.

I'm sorry, but 'Tory millionaires, they can afford it, let's smash them' is just puerile.

I didn't even think stuckinthemiddle worth replying too!

I'm not sure if you understood my point blinks-we need more apprenticeships- they certainly don't want degrees in hairdressing and plumbing!

i understood, i'm saying that there are barely enough apprenticeships to go round as it stands now.

often it's easier with some college qualifications first.

@ pisces: too true. Don't feed them, etc. I guess I've just seen a lot of simplistic 'them and us' posturing recently. The political situation in this country at the moment is really ugly, and our current government is a long way from perfect; it just gets on my tits when people try and reduce discussion to a sort of Spurs v Arsenal 'My team versus yours' thing.

@ blinks That's exactly the problem! Can we please have fewer degrees in Vampire Literature Studies and a bit more funding and opportunity for plumbing and hairdressing and so on.

FWIW, if anyone cares about where I'm coming from in all this: I did an arts degree at a 'good' university, which I will never regret for a second, because I believe that culture and thought has intrinsic value. But it's done bugger all for me career-wise, so aged 31 I'm self-funding through a part-time vocational qualification.

I wasn't refering to Tory voters, so much as the Tory elite. I know plenty of people who voted Tory - a few even poorer than I am!

Peacful protest gets ignored - anybody remember the Iraq demo?

I totally agree with pottonista- there needs to be more apprecticeships, because we seem to now have more new graduates than we know what to do with. I know a fair few who have retreated back into academia to do further degrees (and rack up more debt) because their original degree didn't get them a job. Meanwhile we do seem to need more plumbers/ mechanics/ electricians/ joiners- ever tried getting hold of one of those guys??

I'm also averse to the rising cost of university education, however. I agree that not everyone needs a degree. A degree seems to have become pretty devalued. I went to uni because the job I wanted neede a degree (vet). Vets still have high employment. I have never been out of work, and have paid my taxes happily and consistently since I qualified 15 years ago. I'm now looking to open my own practice, where I will be employing people as well as paying taxes/ business rates etc, so I feel that the tuition fees paid for me at the time have been repaid.

My going to university, however, was very much a product of my parents having gone to university and having come out when degrees were pretty valued. Both my parents came from relatively poor families and were both the first (and only) of their families to go on to further education. this was only possible for them because there were no tuition fees and they got a grant (which was handed straight over to their parents, for digs etc). Had they not had that opportunity I may well not have had that opportunity, and so it goes on. Education used to be the way out of the poverty trap, but sadly it doesn't seem to be any more. The way things are, unless my children have a vocation that requires a degree, I would be reluctant to recommend that they go on to further education, given the lack of employment for graduates and the huge debt they would be amassing for themselves.

as was said earlier the 'mickey mouse' degree course are utterly over stated...

you think this government is going to pile money into helping fund more apprenticeships? really?

i also have an arts degree (painting) which i turned into a career. i'm on a career break while i look after my wee ones and work part time for NHS but will start working full time again next year... my old student friends have gone on to teach, run art galleries and be self employed artists/designers. none of them are languishing on the dole or work in marks and spencers, as was implied earlier on by someone.

where is this contempt, theshriekingharpy?

Just out of interest, blinks, how long ago did you graduate? Just that most of the recent grads I know are having real trouble getting work. I suppose it could also depend where in the country you are.

i graduated in 2000 and worked freelance from 2002 to present (not worked much past 2 years though since having second child, hence the part time job until next year).

as an arts graduate you mostly have to make your own opportunities unless you go into arts administration or teaching.

"Blair and Brown basked in the '90s and early '00s boom in tax receipts - which came about through deregulating financial services (with the consequences we've seen now) and encouraging house price inflation, which in turn encouraged more spending, more lending, etc etc."

Hate to point this out Pottonista, but the Tories were right on board with all the banking deregulation thru the 90 's.
They were not exactly throwing up their hands in horror at what was going on.They had all the same kinds of policies!

And they INVENTED quangos!

Also, people go on and on about the "squandering" of money by New Labour. I am no New Labourite, but the fact is that the country's infastructure had been left to utterly decay during the Thatcher/Major years.

I remember how much things went to shit then, in all areas of public services, expecially here in the North. Also, many public sector jobs were moved to the regions which massively revitalised local economies.

There HAD to be money spent, simply to get things to a reasnable level, and more on par with a supposedly rich nation like ours.

The problem was, New Labour wanted to rebuild the public sector, but at the same time they wanted to keep big business on side, by cutting their taxes, deregulation etc.
Therefore nobody was paying.

The thing is though, I think even though New Labour got a lot wrong, a lot of the intentions (tax credits for working families etc) were right. Cameron's government have no altruistic intentions for us. Quite the opposite.

Also, I am getting heartily sick of people blaming the last government for what has been a WORLDWIDE banking and credit crash.

Did America have massive overspending in the public sector? Er..no.

Ah- most of the folk I know are business type graduates. The problem with a degree in Business Management is that you have no experience, so few places want to hire you as a manager and you are overqualified for other jobs that might one day lead to a management position!

but as to the tuition fees- lots of people here thinking it is a good thing that fewer people will go to university if they are worried about paying their way. the rich kids will be fine. The rest? What will we do with them? Because there are just so many jobs out there for them..

So we'd rather pay for them to be unemployed, than pay for them to do something which, in future years, could lead to them contributing back into the system, creating jobs etc? That sounds daft to me.

What is the message to children/ young adults today- leave school at 16 with no prospects, do nothing and the State will look after you and however many children you choose to have; work hard at school, try to do something with your life that could be valuable to society and, sorry, but you're on your own- best hope mum and dad are rich

How about this solution to student funding:

The better your marks at university, the bigger a rebate you get on your fees (or you pay a lower interest rate on your loans - whichever is easiest). Leeway for genuine hardship cases such as students who have been ill or suffered a bereavement.

This would get rid of the time-wasters, reward the truly motivated, and remove any incentives for academics to be overly generous in their marking.

I am half serious.

i've never met anyone who has expressed contempt towards blue collar workers/manual workers so i'm curious where you have, TSH?

Or alternativly, Matsikula, limit the number of places available and select only the most relevant/ best qualified students for those places. It seems to work in vet/medicine/law. There is a fairly rigourous selection process (for vet anyway) where candidates are interviewed for their suitability, much like a job interview. The selection process not only covers exam results, but also necessary practical experience, character assessment etc. There are 5 (6?) vet schools in the UK, taking in about 100 students each. Lots of people want to do it, but there are limited places. This means that we have a fairly good employment rate. Could this type of process not be applied to many other degree courses to ensure good prospects for future graduates and lower tuition costs to the government?

Personally I think that the university education thing has got out of hand. Everybody has to go to uni and get a degree to the extent that the whole degree setup has been devalued. It's like driving licences, not everybody is capable of getting a worthwhile degree or driving a vehicle so why should it be considered a right rather than a privilege? The fees thing has been cooked up to deter people from poorer backgrounds going to uni but nobody will admit that because that means admitting to cocking up the whole further education thing.

I say go back to Polys and day release degree courses so that students can start degree courses when they're a bit more mature and an employer can help subsidise the costs.

As for the protests, they're ridiculous and self serving. Why didn't they smash the place up before the Iraq invasion?

V.

I also absolutely agree with Potton. Bloated is exactly the word I Would use to describe tertiary academic education in Britain now. It makes me so angry with Labour -- this situation is their creating, and it can't be fixed by going back to the way it was. All this debt, and for very little.

According to the Standard, one of the riot planners was a 27 year old lecturer in international relations. All his life in education, the public sector, public money.

To the response about people who couldn't, or couldn't do well at school -- of course it is possible to go to university without doing well or working hard. Of course it is. Every student is income for the universities. It's like a private school with empty places. Of course you can get away with not doing much and goiung to uni. Why should I fund that?