A partially ChatGPT-generated summary of this article is:
A-level results in England highlight widening educational inequalities between rich and poor, different regions, and private vs. state schools, with London outperforming areas like the East Midlands.
This can be attributed to structural issues such as fewer resources, opportunities, and lower ambition in disadvantaged areas.
To address this, the government could equalize educational investment across regions, adopt a regional industrial strategy, and shift focus from GDP growth to promoting equal opportunities and outcomes nationwide.
I noted the A-level results in England yesterday, and spent a part of the morning advising one friend on his choices when he did not get the grades he wanted due to illness during the exam period. I am pleased to say, he ended up with a good clearing offer at what I think to be a good university.
This summary of events byNadeine Asbali in the Guardian was, however, troubling:
In reality, the gap between the richest and poorest young people is bigger than it has ever been (apart from during the pandemic) and class divisions and regional disparities are growing.
In London, the nation's highest-performing area (and a place where schools have far more resources, and students more opportunities on their doorstep) 31.3% of all grades were marked A* or A.
However, in the East Midlands, the lowest-performing region, where my own experiences of teaching there opened my eyes to just how scarce opportunities and funding are, it was 22.5%.
Likewise, the gap between the private and state sector has widened. In fee-paying schools, nearly half of all grades were A or A* compared with around a quarter of those in academies or comprehensives.
I share her concern. This is troubling.
It is unsurprising that we have a divided country when opportunities for some and lower chances for others are baked in from the start.
I refuse to believe that people outside London and the south-east are any less intelligent than those in the capital.
I am quite certain that those in private schools are no brighter than average. You can argue otherwise, but good luck with presenting eugenic arguments and getting away with it in a world that has long moved on from accepting them, except when it comes to the royal family. You will find no support here.
Instead, I think that the differences in outcome arise from:
- Lower resource resource input
- Lower levels of opportunity near a person's home and family
- The messaging that these two issues provide
In other words, the problem is structural. Fewer jobs and lower educational resources result in reduced ambition, whether from the child themselves or for them from those around them. None of that is surprising when lived experience has dashed far too many hopes.
So the question is, can anything be done about this? The answer is that, of course, it could be. A government could:
- Equalise the input of educational resources around the country.
- Have a genuine regional industrial strategy.
- Equalise investment around the country, which would require a bias against the capital for some time to come.
Other options are also available.
What it could most certainly do is stop threatening the closure of universities, as Labour is now doing.
But that may not be enough. Suppose it was serious about this need for equal opportunity? Couldn't that become part of its goals?
Right now, the only goal the government has is to increase GDP. That is useless. Suppose a range of key performance indicators was chosen to replace GDP as the goal of government, and this levelling up of education was one of them. What might happen then?
This would really change things.
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I agree with your analysis. I went to a Secondary Modern in the late sixties. It was fine in some respects but obviously suffered in several ways.
1) Everyone had failed the 11 plus so were assumed not to be so bright as those that passed. That meant that the thresholds for success were lower than in a Grammar school.
2) Presumably fewer resources per pupil?
3) Underlying causes of poverty were not dealt with – not that that was the fault of the school.
4) There were some good hard working teachers, so I cannot fault them.
We now have comprehensives but most of the social issues persist.
“Everyone had failed the 11 plus”. You’ve highlighted a major flaw in our “education” system right there. A proportion of the students were labelled “failures” at age 11, regardless of the fact that children develop at different rates and there is a whole year difference in ages of the cohort. Comprehensive schools were a small step in the right direction but the basic problem still exists. The system is designed to grade people, not to lead them to their full potential. At every stage people are labelled successes or failures. Those who benefitted from the system often end up in positions of power and influence and have a vested interest in not changing it too much. Hence the reversion to pre-pandemic pass rates.
The eleven plus was what first drew me into being interested in politics
I am a twin. I ‘passed’. My twin ‘failed’. I learned about structural inequality at that moment and have never forgotten it.
Almost everyone failed the 11+.
I never took the exam but given the quality of the school I was sent to most of my early life-cheap private-I would not have passed.
The town-Christchurch Dorset- school was Sec Mod but the Grammar school was in the New Forest and necessitated a train journey and a posh uniform. Mum told me later that she couldn’t have afforded it anyway. Of course, there were grants but she had lived abroad and didn’t understand the system. She felt unable to ask. I realised at about 18, she was one of many who didn’t know how the system could be used.
In those days the school leaving age was 15. Fortunately my older brother made sure I did the extra year and got my O levels.
I then left school and , to my surprise, met a number of people who passed the 11+ but didn’t get their O levels.
Some of my SecMod friends went on to have good jobs, running a factory and working for the UN, officer in the forces, Chartered Engineer, etc but most came from Middle class families.
I guess the key factor was not accepting we had failed. But I did, at times, wonder if I was really up to a professional qualification. So in that I agree expectation -and encouragement-is key.
I remember shocking some of my colleagues at the London Borough of Harrow comprehensive I taught at between 1974 and 1979, when I said that the 11+ was an exercise in establishing the success of the few on the basis of the failure of the many! The “few” needed those “many” to validate their success.
Alas, the comprehensive ideal got swallowed up in the politics, because they were meant to be comprehensive NOT, as some people thought, because they took in – comprehended – both Gramnar and Secondary model pupils – but because they were meant to move beyond that point, to a place where each pupil’s needs could be comprehensively met by adapting method and content to that pupil’s needs.
Hopelessly idealistic, I suppose, especially as the underlying thinking “the failute of the many defines the success of the few” is actually deeply destructive of the aim of comprehensivisation.
But a properly funded comprehensive with a well-trained staff, could have moved towards that objective, which the majority of staff at my place of work were seeking to achieve, once the shock of comprehensivisation had been overcome – the year I started, 1974, was the first year a former Grammar School had been amalgamated with a former Secondary Modern School.
I so agree with your third para
I passed my 11 plus just as they ended grammar schools in my county.
I ended up going to a comprehensive and really it was not bad at all.
But I do wonder what might have happened if I had gone to a grammar school? The tales I’ve heard from those who attended them are mostly positive – a more relaxed attitude to learning, emphasising the building of confidence and problem solving – learning through discovery.
I know that this was not everyone’s experience BTW.
But when I reflect on my life, it is life that has taught me a lot (doing math for a reason; thinking about a problem that was real) and then my learning was turbo-charged by going to university at the ripe old age of 29. Sometimes, I think the university style of teaching and learning should start much earlier in our education system. It was the making of me and turned out to be what I had been looking for all my life.
🙂
I was educated under the 1944 Education Act-the Butler Act.
Nowhere did it legislate for the tripartite system which emerged Grammar, Secondary Modern and Technical schools.
The Technical schools were few and far between.
The Govt listened to Sir Cyril Burt who declared that 80% of intelligence was inherited. Indeed, I was taught this in the mid 1960s at my Teacher training College. The ‘proof’ was a series of studies with identical twins brought up separately. This seemed to fit in with popular ideas of the time-and could be used with racist ideas. But research was beginning to show that the brain (or mind for some) is more plastic -able to adapt-than had been thought. A stimulating environment increased what could be seen as more intelligent behaviour. The initial study was on rats but the primary schools of the 1960s were very different places than they had been before. There is no doubt it is true.
A lot us did benefit form the opportunities of the 1960s but many did not. The answers were not just in the schools but the wider society. Better housing, access to libraries, better nutrition and more employment opportunities such as sandwich courses. Some newspapers opposed changes like comprehensive school. The Express had a cartoon, about 1966, of bright boy (not a girl) in a class room with a ball and chain to illustrate bright kids being held back by not bright kids in comprehensives. There are still local authorities with the 11+
In the 1990s it was shown that Sir Cyril Burt had fudged his figures to fit his theory. His other writings, apparently, showed he thought few working class children were capable of appreciating the arts or ‘higher thought’.
The reaction came with ‘Black papers’ of the 1970s which showed the failings and ascribed them to ‘loony theories of education.’ Some had some substance. Many did not.
The 1988 Education Act was predicated on performance measures-OFSTED killed a lot of imaginative teaching IMO
But then the academies arrived which did promise a diversity of approaches. The course of education was often directed by people who did other jobs and got their ideas, it seems, from think tank publications. In practice things were still driven by OFSTED and hyped management -speak aims. ( I show my prejudices)
Gove and Cummings claimed to have ‘dragged teachers kicking and screaming’ into the modern world. Teachers almost en block, disagreed and he was replaced. The damage he did is still to be unwound.
I left teaching in 2005 though I did GCSE marking until 2011 and invigilation until 2019. Today’s teachers do a good job considering. Actual exam results have improved but a lot that it valuable has been lost, in sport, drama, music even the humanities. IMHO if we let professionals run the system, we would have a better system.
Much to agree with
My father – from a really poor area of Nottingham – went to a technical school so he must have been lucky. It was the making of him he said – that – and national service believe it or not.
During national service, because he’d had polio as a boy (he had the thinnest legs ever, but could out walk us all), he was not fit enough to fight in Korea, but he ended up at Army Chilwell as a stores man to rank of Corporal. Asking if he was going with his unit to Korea, David (his name) was told by his commanding officer ‘If you go over there, I won’t know where anything is in this place and how much it of the army has – so you’re staying here Corporal’.
He also credited union membership with helping him to ‘learn and earn’. He had actually bought and sold his first house by 1970 just working hard.
Then all of that came to a halt in in the early 70’s when his firm was asset stripped by American carpet baggers under the nose of the Tory Harold Heath (no surprise) and we became working class for ever. He was not in a position to re-learn for another job, do what I did in the 1990’s and go to university. He would have made a decent accountant in my view reflecting on the way he managed limited funds to pay bills, and had little side lines to earn extra cash to stop us losing the home.
This is why today I get so angry with any born with the spoon in their mouth politician (hello Priti – how are you?) telling us how lazy and indolent the British people are when there must have been and still are millions of hard working people like Dad in this country working in a system that is prejudiced against their best interests but being blamed by shitty politicians as if its their fault.
Education should be open to all and easy to access for all age groups throughout your lifetime.
That would solve a lot of economic problems.
Your penultimate para is spot on
Might these results demonstrate the power of cumulative advantage?
According to « Slack +», its key characteristics are:
1) Initial advantage – the better your early life and education, the better the later academic performance
2) Positive feedback loop -early success leads to recognition, encouragement, more resources etc.
3) Ever widening disparities – the advantaged gain more resources, advantages and confidence.
4) Visibility and recognition – attention, recognition, praise etc increase confidence and drive as well as more resource benefits
The average pupil-teacher ratio in private schools is 8.6
The average pupil-teacher ratio in state schools is 17.9
(Private Education Policy Forum)
Might this, and other differentials between private and state raise questions about the validity of our democracy?
Leave private schooling aside – Labour is at least / last doing something there
It’s the state differential that worries me
And we do need to tackle the negative feedback loops
Richard,
One point that has been made is that people tend to chose partners with a similar level of education.
The argument is that some cities, London in particular tend to benefit from a concentration of educated people that makes them attractive to teachers/doctors etc in a way that a former Yorkshire pit town can never be – (other stereotypes are available)
Which of course makes your suggestions all the more pertinent, because if we want the best teachers to come to what are currently the most disadvantaged towns they need to be made more attractive.
This feels a bit eugenicy….
“…a bit eugenicy…”
Oh, I don’t think so, Richard. I’m sure that parental input into children’s upbringing is a lot more than just genes.
Educated parents are much more likely to have books in the house for example. Go to interesting and stimulating places on holidays and be able (since their education is likely to have helped them into better paid employment) to pay for extra curricular activities like musical instrument tuition, horse riding, etc etc. Stimulating activities. All nurture not nature.
And of course aspiration to be ‘successful’. It is one of the principal functions of ‘education’ to save children from their parents. That’s almost flippant, but not quite.
I accept that point
But I think the original comment was not framed that way
I’m still pondering on this topic, but my immediate thought is ‘class size’. Private schools have smaller classes. This means each pupil gets more time. For any pupil struggling with a topic, the extra attention can be vital. – A well known and obvious point.
True
But the bias is clear in state schooling as well
“For any pupil struggling with a topic, the extra attention can be vital.”
@Rich,
If the teacher is good or excellent your statement is true. It all begins with a good teacher. I should know as mother was the stereotypical “excellent” teacher that all schools want.
I’d think nutrition’s a big factor in developing intellectual achievement. Garbage in, garbage out, as they say.
All school meals, breakfast and lunch, should be free to ALL students.
This also removes the economic stigma of “free lunch” from disadvantaged children.
93% of our young people are educated in the state system.
You would like to think that central government would be keen to ensure that the state education system is properly funded and so on. After all the young are our future.
Yet 30% of our young people leave primary school without being able to read and write at the level expected of their age group. This in turn impacts on the secondary school system.
All that governments do is tinker, think academies, testing, and so on.
Why not re think the UK approach to primary school?
Instead of one teacher per class covering every subject why not have a class teacher and specialists, with teaching assistants, teaching each subject?
Plus train the teaching staff to believe in promoting that every child can exceed the teachers expectations.
Pay primary staff really decent money. They are the key to sparking all young peoples life time interest in learning.
But of course our Chancellor will say that there is no money.
Much to agree with.
English and maths reaching require differing skills.
And, by the way, in my experience many young people get to university unable to write a proper sentence, and lacking any real understanding of punctuation, capitalisation of words, or grammar.
That problem is not confined to young people.
While there is a lot of justified criticism of OFSTED I was born in Bristol which had a high percentage of children in what were then Direct Grant schools, as a result politicians took there eye of the ball in terms of state education as a local councillor admitted to me.
A former neighbour of mine who moved over from TEFL to Secondary Teaching again in Bristol realised that the school she was at had previously been little more than a child minding operation keeping the kids amused until 3 with quality education not being a priority.
So what I suggest OFSTED did that was good was to impose some accountability for Education Authorities and School Managers and make them do their jobs.
Did it do it the right way or help to lead improving education? Probably not
I too went to a Direct Grant school and mourn their abolition. With a third of the pupils coming from the state sector they allowed a big chunk of the children in the area who were suited to a highly academic education to get it. And excluded parents buying a place for a child who would struggle in that environment.
I always resented these schools
I felt they never solved an identifiable problem
I refused to apply for a place at one and my parents, for once, wisely acquiesced
Is a UK “Direct Grant” the same thing as a USA “Voucher”?
I don’t know
The elephant in the room is …. poverty.
With some 4.4m children in relative poverty across the UK, so three in ten, with their life opportunities already heavily circumscribed, then their levels of educational achievement are always going to present a further disadvantage.
The official figure for absolute poverty is now 18% of the population*
No technocratic prescriptions, or ersatz levelling up, within the education system can ever compensate for the whole basket of disadvantages that come with poverty.
No tales of individual triumph and personal success over deprivation are ever going to alter that.
Successive governments pretend to be concerned, but basically the educational gap cannot be abolished, and a level playing field created by compensatory funding alone. That is just another con trick.
Until and unless poverty is reduced and preferably abolished, as a priority of government, then educational disadvantage will persist.
Mitigation, though admirable, is a temporary and partial fix, and cannot solve the challenge of every child being able to pursue and attain their personal optimum.
In the UK, poverty levels are not reducing, and the 2024-25 and then the 2025-26 figures will be yet another national disgrace.
No minor tweaking of exam results, or messing with bell shaped curves, can compensate for the obvious truth that educational achievement does not reflect individual ability, and especially for those with the millstone of poverty around their necks.
*and 22% by the JRF figures
I do not know what has happened to the paragraphing for this comment.
It was okay in preview.
Apologies
A WordPress issue….
The elephant in the room is …. poverty.
With some 4.4m children in relative poverty across the UK, so three in ten, with their life opportunities already heavily circumscribed, then their levels of educational achievement are always going to present a further disadvantage.
The official figure for absolute poverty is now 18% of the population*
No technocratic prescriptions, or ersatz levelling up, within the education system can ever compensate for the whole basket of disadvantages that come with poverty.
No individual triumphs of personal success over deprivation are ever going to alter that.
Successive governments are pretending to be concerned, but basically the educational gap cannot be abolished, and a level playing field created by compensatory funding alone. That is just another con trick.
Until and unless poverty is reduced and preferably abolished, as a priority of government, then educational disadvantage will persist.
Mitigation, though admirable, is a temporary and partial fix, and cannot solve the challenge of every child being able to pursue and attain their personal optimum.
In the UK, poverty levels are not reducing, and the 2024-25 and then the 2025-26 figures will be yet another national disgrace.
No minor tweaking of exam results, or messing with bell shaped curves, can compensate for the obvious truth that educational achievement does not reflect individual ability, and especially for those with the millstone of poverty around their necks.
*and 22% by the JRF figures
Spot on….
Agreed Richard.
I believe that every young person in the state primary school system should be taught the building blocks for English grammar, maths, science, history, foreign languages, the confidence to speak aloud to their classmates and adults and so on.
Hopefully this in turn feeds into secondary schools and then higher education/apprenticeships.
I am afraid to say but the current education system fails them badly.
It is a struggle trying to persuade young colleagues to think critically, try to work the answer out yourself, have you considered, what would you do ? Rather than rely on me to give you the answer immediately.
Much to agree with
The deleterious effect the Tories had in education cannot be denied..
After 2010, school spending per pupil fell across all four nations of the UK. Between 2009–10 and 2018–19, school spending per pupil fell by 8% in real terms in England and by 5% in real terms in Wales. In Northern Ireland, there was a fall of 8% in the shorter period between 2011–12 and 2018–19. In Scotland, there was a fall of 6½% between 2009–10 and 2014–15.
Since then, spending per pupil has mostly recovered back to 2010 levels across England, Wales and Northern Ireland, with increases of about 8% in real terms in England and Wales between 2018–19 and 2022–23, and of 11% in Northern Ireland. This leaves school spending at about £7,200 per pupil across England, Wales and Northern Ireland in 2022–23. This may end up a little higher in Wales once extra funding has been agreed for a higher teacher pay settlement. In Northern Ireland, there is more uncertainty, with no agreement reached on teacher pay levels stretching back to 2021 and signals of budget cuts for next year
In Scotland, large increases in school spending since 2014 have more than reversed past cuts. There was a 13% real-terms increase between 2014–15 and 2019–20, reflecting growth in specific grants over time and a large increase in teacher pay of 7% in 2019. There was then further growth in spending per pupil of 6½% between 2019–20 and 2022–23, reflecting expansion in early years funding and further increases in teacher pay. This makes for a total rise of 21% between 2014–15 and 2022–23 and leaves spending per pupil in Scotland at over £8,500 in 2022–23, over 18% or £1,300 higher than in England, Wales and Northern Ireland1. In 2022–23, average private school fees across the UK were £15,200 in today’s prices (net of bursaries and scholarships). This is £7,200 or nearly 90% higher than state school spending per pupil, which was £8,000 in 2022–23 (including day-to-day and capital spending). The gap between private school fees and state school spending per pupil has more than doubled since 2010, when the gap was about 40% or £3,500.
Furthermore the gap between ammount spent per pupil in state education vs the amount spent in private is increasing.
https://ifs.org.uk/sites/default/files/styles/wysiwyg_full_width_mobile/public/uploads/Comparing-state-school-spending-per-pupil-and-average-private-school-fees-over-time.png.webp?itok=_IRRkxf2
https://ifs.org.uk/articles/growing-gap-between-state-school-and-private-school-spending
Thanks
Useful
[…] done a couple of summaries this morning in the two blogs I have published so far today, here and here. The first was almost wholly ChatGPT generated in 50 words. The second required 70 words to be […]
Don’t many private schools have an entrance exam and/or minimum educational requirements? Which would quite reasonably lead to pupils attending those schools being more intelligent than the average?
That’s very sweet of you to believe that.
The test is your parent’s ability to pay large sums of money, often.
The private, fee paying, schools that also require pupils to pass an entrance exam are called ‘Public Schools’. Â These are certainly the most elite schools in the UK, but there are possibilities for the less well off to obtain grant payment of fees, if they manage to pass the ‘Common Entrance’ exam. Â Rather than taxing school fees I think the government should require private schools to offer a lot more scholarship places to less well off children. Â I don’t believe that private schools should be abolished as they offer education in our country to many young people from overseas who later become students at our universities. Â
As a single parent my mother worked all hours, in several jobs, to send my brother and I to private schools, but at times of hardship I attended state schools in the UK. Â The cold, damp, poorly insulated maisonette where we lived and a meagre breakfast made my blood sugar plummet in school which exacerbated my severe dyslexia. Â That mandatory little bottle of milk made a big difference; it was like someone turned on the lights in my head! Â Of course ‘Thatcher, THatcher, bottle snatcher, had to take that away from school children in the UK. Â I have no doubt that a substantial number of poor children are trying to learn with very low blood sugar caused by poor housing and inadequate nutrition.
The only teachers who really stand out in my memory of private education were those that bullied and hit me when I scrambled numbers and struggled to read. Â Although the teachers were all degree qualified, the intense pressure to force all pupils to do well was predicated by parents’ expectations: they paid for impressive results. Â I appreciated the extensive grounds but, my most positive memories of private school were down to meeting children from all over the world at a time when the UK was very white British. Â I actually wanted to be a boarder; instead I was a smuggler!
The most creative and inspirational teachers that I clearly remember to this day were all in state schools.  A good memory helped me, but dyslexia remained a problem with the three Rs and I failed 11+ miserably.  Inexplicably I fantasized about going to University  and my grandmother, who cared for us, led me to believe that I couldn’t take O levels unless I changed schools.  The private convent I went to had an abysmal scholastic record and the badgering of one obsessive nun failed to help me learn. I left at 14 to start work, hoping to gain independence as I really wanted to leave home.  In the 70s it was possible for a teenager to get a full-time low-paid job and live independently, sadly not anymore! Â
I was too young to enter the College of Further Education at 15, but I gave a convincing speech on ‘the importance of education’ to the head of the science dept and bluffed my way in, despite catastrophically failing the entrance exam. Â Back then, although I never qualified for them, there were grants to support students who did well scholastically and there were no tuition fees. Â I see this as an investment in the future potential of young people that should still be supported by our government. Â Those who succeed get higher paid jobs and will most likely pay higher taxes for life! Â
In the 70s all of the exams required lengthy written answers. After failing the first year, I realized I was never going to pass any UK exams or do well in conventional education. Â I have never resented not making the cut as I started into a life of travel and adventure. My overworked mother was heading out to Spain to live, so joining her offered a shame free excuse to drop out of college. She bought me a suitcase, a passport and a one way airline ticket to Spain saying I was on my own: after that! Â I found new opportunities that didn’t require qualifications were a possibility overseas. Â
When I first arrived in Spain the UK had not yet entered the EU, but I started working on yachts to get around border restrictions. Â I was really thrilled when we joined the EU as it offered interesting opportunities for travel at least within Europe. Â Leaving the EU and ditching the Erasmus program was just one more way the Tory Government obliterated the life chances of young people in the UK. Â As an older person who never had any kids, I still believe that we all share a collective responsibility towards children. Â I am horrified by the selfish way that my generation continues to deny the basic needs of children and has sabotaged the future of our young people.
I am moving to the point where I think we need to copy the Finnish example on private schools
Sadly one of the best products of Labour’s last term in office bit the dust when they left. I refer to Sure Start. The effect on a developing brain of the stimulation it receives from birth (and even earlier) can not be reproduced later so support systems for prospective and new parents are an excellent investment. Also the structure of early years education in this country is questionable. Formal education before 6 years old for children, especially those who have not experienced an enriching play environment, can do more harm than good. I feel that, while differences in funding for schools needs addressing, a renewed focus on early years’ development and support is vital.
I agree
But most especially, focussed play involving language interaction is so important at that age
Well done Richard!
This was very much in the spirit of FDR whose broad vision of economic rights would permit all children to achieve their potential growing up in families with living wage jobs, full educational and health opportunities and affordable housing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Bill_of_Rights
Much to agree with in this BTL discussion. It hits most of the problems, and shows that solutions without ÂŁÂŁÂŁÂŁ will not succeed. May I make some pertinent points as an A level part time teacher (ex Chief Examiner but never IMO a teacher to the exclusion of a life).
1) Student mental health is frankly bloody awful and there is literally no support where needed, in poorer areas.
2) Many students work, often long hours at the weekend, for pittance pay. This is often to keep up with their peers (driving lessons, the iPhone or the newest Android)
3) Student loans are now putting off the less well-off students. I used to have near 100% going to university or other tertiary destination. It’s now plummeting well below 50%.
4) GCSE/National Curriculum is a big negative, with improving schools (many academies) focusing hugely on STEM to the exclusion of all else. It is also a big growth area for corporate programmed learning.
Having said that, I got told off by an SLT staffer (and supported by another) for advising an undecided, very bright, student to work for six months then travel/volunteer abroad before committing to tertiary education.
The system is stacked against good teaching, it seems to me
The educational quality issue like many others in this country appears to boil down to one where a preference is given to money as a Private Utility rather than a Public Utility. If this is accepted then the issue is how do we ensure everyone gets sufficient income from the market so they can get adequate resources from it including being able to send their children to private schools. It would seem to me that in fact the market has a built-in pressure of competitiveness and greed that won’t allow this. Few appear to recognise this imperfection so the country goes round in circles! Same thing going on in regard to changing our consumption of things to mitigate global warming. The UK very much Siesta Land!