British National Party Public Services News Bulletin w/c July 23rd, 2007
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1. TRENDY LESSONS DEPRIVING OUR CHILDREN OF THEIR HERITAGE

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=466515&in_page_id=1770

Children are missing out because schools no longer teach classic historical tales and Bible stories, a Cambridge don has warned. Dr Kate Pretty said many youngsters were not being taught time-honoured stories such as the tale of King Alfred the Great burning the cakes. Britain was in ‘grave’ danger of losing its sense of shared culture and heritage as a result, she said. Dr Pretty, head of the teaching college Homerton, revealed that only one student in a class of 20 trainee teachers knew about Christopher Columbus's landing in America. Most did not learn about him at school because subject content was being watered down in favour of trendy themed lessons, she warned. Dr Pretty spoke out at a meeting of teachers and academics convened by Prince Charles, who is concerned that ‘modish’ teaching theories are failing children. A senior Ofsted inspector told the same conference the schools watchdog will release a report this month warning history is becoming ‘marginalised’. Only a third of youngsters are studying the subject after the age of 14. Dr Pretty said Cambridge students were increasingly arriving at the university with gaps in their basic knowledge of key events and people that shaped history.

This was partly down to an overcrowded primary school curriculum which was increasingly dominated by the three Rs, she said. ‘It is worse than it used to be and some of it is about the erosion of history as a defined topic at primary level,’ she added. ‘It is not the secondary schools that instil that deficit but primaries. The little, tiny stories that make up the common thread which you can pull on, we are expecting students to somehow implicitly know. There are the great stories of the past like Alfred burning the cakes, the Magna Carta, Columbus sailing the ocean blue - all that sort of stuff we learned. ‘It is not about A-level knowledge of a particular subject, it is a more general sense of the web of understanding that binds us to a common understanding of the past.’ She said it was harder to teach students who were unable to pick up on references such as the Biblical story of the Israelites destroying the walls of Jericho. She said students of all faiths should be taught such stories since they were part of general knowledge. She added: ‘It is very difficult to teach students who don't know the stories of the Bible.’ Horrified at her students' ignorance of Columbus and other swathes of history, she sent them off to read a light-hearted take on British history - 1066 And All That by WC Sellar and RJ Yeatman. Her criticism came as it emerged Ofsted is about to deliver a critical assessment of history teaching. Paul Armitage, Ofsted's specialist adviser for history, said a report would warn the subject was being ‘marginalised’. Schools Secretary Ed Balls has pledged £13.7million to teach children how to handle their emotions. They will be taught how to deal with feelings such as anger and frustration without resorting to swearing and fighting - and how to be good losers in PE.

2. SCHOOLS TO GIVE LESSONS IN FEELINGS

http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/12473/Schools-to-give-lessons-in-feelings

All children will receive lessons in how to manage their feelings under a multi-million pound scheme to improve classroom behaviour, Schools Secretary Ed Balls said. Pupils will be taught about resolving conflict without fighting through citizenship lessons and how to be good losers in PE. Mr Balls announced that £13.7 million would be spent over the next four years to fund the national roll-out of the social and emotional aspects of learning (Seal) programme to secondary schools. The initiative, which has already been successful in primary schools, comes amid continuing concern over poor standards of behaviour. Mr Balls said: ‘Many schools that have implemented this programme have seen a marked improvement in the way their pupils interact with each other both inside and outside the classroom. ‘The programme will make sure that all children understand the importance of being confident and interacting with other children in a respectful and positive manner.’ Officials said the programme aims to help pupils ‘manage strong feelings such as frustration, anger and anxiety’ and ‘recover from setbacks’. It also sets out to teach pupils the value of competing fairly, losing with dignity and having respect for their competitors. The Seal scheme is already running in 10,000 primary schools - about 60% of the primaries in England. The secondary school Seal programme will be rolled out from this September. The announcement follows the introduction of new powers for teachers to discipline unruly pupils and use ‘reasonable force’.

3. TEACHER FOUND GUILTY OVER FILMING PUPILS

Discipline in schools is a serious problem, and this teacher should be commended for exposing how this problem has gone out of control under Labour.

http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/12305/Teacher-guilty-over-filming-pupils

A teacher who secretly filmed unruly behaviour in the classroom for a television documentary has been found guilty of unacceptable professional conduct. Angela Mason, of Aberdare Gardens, London, went undercover at several schools in the capital and the north east of England for the Channel 5 programme Classroom Chaos. Using a camera hidden in her handbag, she recorded a number of incidents of pupils misbehaving and disrupting lessons she covered as a supply teacher in late 2004 and early 2005. Mrs Mason admitted carrying out the secret filming, but denied it amounted to unacceptable professional conduct, arguing that she was acting in the public interest. But at a hearing in Birmingham the General Teaching Council (GTC), the body which regulates the profession in England, ruled the public interest defence was not strong enough to justify the breach of trust implicit in the secret filming. Issuing the judgment, Andrew Baxter - the chair of the GTC committee - said that secretly filming students would constitute unacceptable professional conduct in all but the most exceptional circumstances. ‘We are not satisfied the public interest argument which Mrs Mason makes is sufficiently strong and exceptional to justify the secret filming of pupils which she undertook,’ he said. ‘She was employed and paid by these schools to teach pupils in her care. ‘In fact, her true motivation was to obtain secret film of the pupils for the purposes of a television programme. In that respect we find that her conduct abused the trust of the head teachers, staff and pupils at the schools.’ Mr Baxter said the committee decided that Mrs Mason had not deliberately mismanaged the pupils in her care to exacerbate classroom disruption for the purposes of the documentary, but she had failed to use up-to-date techniques to control their behaviour.

4. THOUSANDS OF NEW NURSES STILL JOB-HUNTING

Immigrationists claim the NHS would collapse without immigrants but, at the same time, qualified British nurses are unemployed!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/06/nnurses106.xml

Almost a third of nurses - some 4,000 - had not found jobs six months after qualifying last year, according to official statistics. More than half of physiotherapists and one in five midwives were also still unemployed half a year after completing their studies, the Department of Health admits. Professional bodies claimed taxpayers' money is being wasted on training staff who then cannot find work in the NHS, and blamed Government squeezes on funding which lead to local healthcare trusts cutting junior positions. At least 12,000 nurses qualified in May or September last year. But the Department of Health has admitted that only 69 per cent had found jobs by March this year. Among physiotherapists, only 48 per cent managed to find jobs after finishing their training. The Royal College of Midwives estimates 3,000 more midwives are needed but about 20 per cent of newly qualified midwives failed to find work last year. A Royal College of Nursing spokesman said: ‘It is a big problem. Entry-level jobs, for which newly qualified nurses apply, have been frozen because trusts have been told to reduce their deficits. ‘We think trusts need to be given more time and flexibility to manage their deficits as otherwise it's a waste of taxpayers' money.’ Last year a survey by the RCN found almost three quarters of newly qualified nurses were still searching for a permanent job months after qualifying. The Department of Health said: ‘The NHS is balancing its work force after job shortages in the past. We expect people like this would find jobs in the next few months as others leave or retire. It is a more competitive environment now and people have to be a bit more flexible in the jobs they take, especially when they've just graduated.’ However, the NHS has been spending £1 billion a year on agency nurses because of poor planning.

5. DEMENTIA VICTIMS ‘BEING FAILED BY NHS’ - REPORT

The NHS wastes a lot of money by offering free healthcare to immigrants and asylum seekers, but refuses to offer treatments to aged native Britons who paid taxes all their lives.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/04/nhs104.xml

Hundreds of thousands of elderly people suffering from dementia are being comprehensively failed by the Government and the health service, Whitehall's spending watchdog warns today. Far too few people are being diagnosed as suffering from dementia - or are being diagnosed much too late - and even then drugs and other treatments are not widely available. Britain languishes near the bottom of the European league table for the number of victims receiving anti-dementia drugs. Only five countries have a worse record. The National Audit Office (NAO) report says urgent action is needed to tackle shortcomings in services for a condition which costs the country £14.3 billion a year - more than £25,000 for every man, woman and child - including £1.2 billion spent by the NHS. In particular, there needs to be more support for the ‘selfless’ army of nearly half a million carers who look after relatives and friends with dementia. The report's publication comes as the Government's drugs rationing watchdog is facing a legal challenge over its decision to restrict the availability of drugs that can delay the onset of Alzheimer's. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) ruled that around 100,000 people in the early stages of the disease should not receive the drugs on the NHS. But drugs companies launched a High Court challenge last week to overturn the decision. While Nice had ruled out drugs for people in the early stages of Alzheimer's - which accounts for 62 per cent of all dementia cases -today's report says there is a consensus that early diagnosis and treatment is vital. In a highly critical report, the NAO says ministers and the NHS have not given enough priority to a condition which is suffered by around 560,000 people in Britain.

However, that figure is expected to soar by nearly 40 per cent to around 780,000 over the next 15 years as people live longer. By 2051, there will be 1.4 million sufferers. The report says that dementia is estimated to be a factor in almost 60,000 deaths each year, around 13 per cent of all deaths in Britain. In around 18,000 cases, dementia is the main cause of death, often because victims become so frail they lose the ability to swallow or eat. Despite its growing prevalence, the report says that only one in three sufferers ever receive a formal diagnosis. It takes twice as long to diagnose patients in Britain than many other European countries. The report was welcomed last night by campaigners and opposition politicians. Neil Hunt, the chief executive of the Alzheimer's Society, said: ‘The human and economic cost of dementia can't be ignored - one in three older people will end their lives with a form of dementia. ‘It is absolutely crucial that people with dementia get diagnosed as early as possible so that they and their families get the information and support they need.’ • The elderly are finding it increasingly difficult to access crucial care services, a survey reveals today. Older people are being confronted by a growing ‘care gap’, with low-level services which allow people to carry on living in their home - such as shopping or cleaning - being squeezed out as authorities focus scarce resources on intensive care for the most vulnerable. The survey by charity Counsel and Care showed that 70 per cent of local authorities only provide care for those with ‘critical or substantial needs’.

6. BRITAIN'S UNIVERSITIES COULD 'LOSE WORLD POSITION'

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/05/nuni105.xml

Britain's reputation as a world leader for university education could be lost within 10 years, the vice-chancellor of Cambridge warned yesterday. Standards will plummet unless universities resist the temptation to take on poor-quality students in an attempt to plug funding gaps, Professor Alison Richard told MPs. At present Cambridge and Oxford are second and third respectively in the world university league table rankings, beaten only by Harvard. Britain also has 29 universities in the top 200 and has achieved a worldwide reputation for academic excellence in higher education. Prof Richard told the education select committee that standards could be seriously compromised by the Government's drive to increase student numbers. In particular, the trend to recruit foreign students for their higher fees could lead to ‘a downward spiral’, she said. Ministers have set a target for 50 per cent of all 18- to 30-year-olds to have entered higher education by 2010. Prof Richard, previously Provost of Yale University, told MPs: ‘We have got maybe a decade to consolidate and position the system to retain its competitive edge. The risk I see to the UK system is that with the under-funding of our education activities historically, the temptation will be to go for volume rather than quality.’ She called for more investment in universities from both the Government and from private donors. It was also vital, she said, that undergraduates came from all class backgrounds. Cambridge must not become merely ‘a finishing school for the well-to-do’.

7. DEPARTMENT REORGANISATION COST TOPS £2.6M

Further evidence of how our government wastes money on paper shuffling and managerial schemes, rather than spending the money on front-line service providers such as teachers, nurses, and policemen.

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=1028742007

The government has spent at least £2.6 million rebranding and reorganising 11 departments since 1997, it was claimed yesterday. The Liberal Democrats say much of the spending is down to the division of the Home Office and the creation of the Ministry of Justice, which they say cost taxpayers £1.5 million.