“The concrete collapse is the result of Britain’s arrogant disregard for children in state education”

As our schools dissipate, Brian Reade says no other rich country would show such arrogant disregard for the education and safety of 93% of its schoolchildren

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Has anyone noticed a distinct avoidance of the elephant in the ruined classroom?

How did we spend a week bemoaning and debating the shocking neglect of our education system without getting to the heart of the problem? Here's a little test: how many of these schools, which couldn't open because they were equipped with cheap concrete that hadn't been replaced, were private schools?

How many of these perilous classrooms, which the Prime Minister has known about for years, were in fee-paying schools of the type he once attended, as his daughters do today? How many members of Sunak's cabinet, two-thirds of whom were trained in the private sector, were aware of the problem and refused to "sit on their butts" because it affected them?

If you answered "none" to all of the questions above, then come to the front of the class (unless you are worried that the metal poles will give way and you will be crushed by the ceiling) because you are doing a very good job. work. Some may say that I am offering a straw man argument, because independent schools are businesses that must remain in tip-top shape to satisfy paying customers. But that misses the larger point.

There has always been an educational apartheid in Britain aimed at perpetuating the rigid class system, but since the Conservatives came to power in 2010, cutting public sector spending to the breaking point, it became more obvious. A whistleblower, who recently worked with the education secretary, claims the Tory cabinet has been regularly warned about the RAAC but has been "dangerously complacent" on the issue.< /p>

In what other rich country would there be such arrogant disregard for the education and safety of 93% of its school children? In what other rich country would a Prime Minister appoint a post-Covid education recovery tsar, only to review the £15bn state schools catch-up plan he produced and slash it with contempt by 90% to £1.4 billion, as Boris Johnson did? ?

This equates to £50 per pupil in the UK, compared to £1,600 per pupil spent in America and £2,500 per pupil in the Netherlands, and has led to a gap in exam results between state schools and private companies (which had the means to better negotiate Covid) expanding even further.

Keir Starmer claimed in PMQs that Britain was run by cowboys. But that’s too basic an analogy. It is run by a wealthy mafia whose main interest is to preserve the status quo. The current Conservative government and its wealthy backers simply don't care about public education because, in most cases, they are buying a better one for their own offspring.

This is why there have been 10 education secretaries in 13 years, whose main objectives were to stand up to the teaching unions (nicknamed "The Blob" by Michael Gove), to push secondary schools to satisfy ambitious voters who cannot afford it. costs and reduce budgets. Compare this with the last Labor government which had a plan to rebuild or renovate all public schools because it believed that raising education standards was the key to unlocking the country's potential. A plan that the conservatives rejected.

The elephant in Britain's crumbling room is the rarely told truth that it lags behind comparative economies in social mobility, regional equality and production.