Anyone still unconvinced of the rightness of Labour’s policy on private school funding needs only to read last week’s front-page article (“Teachers axed as schools in debt hits record”), which painted a hugely depressing picture of the state of England’s maintained schools. A rapidly growing proportion is facing increased numbers of children in need of special educational and mental health support, while simultaneously being forced by budget cuts to make teachers and support staff redundant. Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the National Education Union, reported primary class sizes now to be the highest in Europe and secondary ones the highest in almost 50 years.
When Finland, many decades ago, effectively abolished private education, it made the clearly correct assumption that, if the rich and powerful knew their own children were likely to attend state-maintained schools, they would be keen to ensure that such schools were well funded. Finland is among Europe’s most educationally successful countries.
Labour is not, to the regret of many, proposing anything as radical as this. It simply intends to treat private schools as the private businesses they are, and expect their customers to pay the appropriate rate of VAT. The increased taxes raised will be redirected to provide limited extra help for the most needy schools and their pupils. Anyone reading Anna Fazackerley’s article and still quibbling about Labour’s proposal has plainly lost any semblance of a moral compass.
Chris Dunne
London E2
When I began teaching in 1965, I had a class of 42 eight- and nine-year-olds. There were no teaching assistants and no provision for children with learning difficulties. But the children were, and felt, safe. Would I want a return to those days? Emphatically not. Educational provision has improved beyond recognition but, due to the financial pressures schools are facing, some of these gains are at risk. They do need protecting, but claims that schools “will soon be unsafe” are scaremongering drawing on rhetoric and concerns over safeguarding. The vast majority of schools are very safe places. As they have always done, teachers will do all they can to ensure that remains the case.
Prof Colin Richards
Spark Bridge, Cumbria
A time and a place for drag
Drag is a fabulous, funny and fascinating art form that’s been around for over 100 years (“Drag stars are racing to the rescue”, Magazine). It’s also highly sexualised adult entertainment, which many people feel is pretty misogynistic. Nobody was protesting against drag when it was restricted to late-night pubs and nightclubs. In the last few years, it has moved into schools and libraries and many people find that concerning. Eva Wiseman writes that protests against this “often include anti-vaxxers, white nationalists and conspiracy theorists”. They also include men and women of all ages, sexualities and backgrounds who are concerned about the erosion of sexual boundaries and the impact that could have on issues of consent.
Katharine Rogers
Bristol
Beautiful plumage
Laughing out loud while reading the Observer is not something I ever have expected to do – until I read Andrew Rawnsley’s “dead pledge” sketch in the first paragraph of his piece on Sir Keir Starmer’s latest change in policy (“Scuttling his green flagship policy, Sir Keir Starmer has imperilled his credibility”, Comment). After a seemingly constant stream of doom and gloom in the news, such a ray of humour is most welcome. All I can say is: “Bravo! Encore!”
Melvin Hurst
Ventnor, Isle of Wight
Not all SUVs are bad
SUVs, as a category, are no more harmful than other big, heavy cars that pollute more than others (“Pity SUV drivers, fast being priced out of their badges of contempt for the planet”, Comment). The article focuses largely on the Range Rover, which is certainly right up there in terms of being heavy and polluting, but others are much lighter and a good deal less polluting than many saloon cars and hatchbacks – the Suzuki Vitara, for example. Please don’t tar all SUVs with the same brush. Maligning them all on weight and pollution grounds is plain wrong.
Richard Bell
Keszthely, Hungary
Save our soles
Removing one’s shoes at the door is an excellent policy (“Shoes on or off indoors? Fear of germs settles the long-running debate”). But who wants to wear socks on freezing tiles or pet-polluted carpets, or risk whatever’s been spilt on the kitchen floor? In my childhood, we automatically changed from our outdoor to our indoor shoes whenever we came in, and these days I frequently take a pair of ballet flats with me when I visit friends. Remember the draw-string shoe-bag?
Katy Jennison
Witney, Oxfordshire
Abandoned by the banks
You report that musicians at the London Chamber Orchestra have not been paid for five months (“Musicians walk out after London orchestra leaves them unpaid for months”). The headline and subheading pointed towards the orchestra being at fault but, as the story revealed, it was the orchestra’s bank, Barclays, which had without warning frozen the ensemble’s account and made it impossible to pay the musicians. The LCO is in a very similar situation to hundreds of other charities whose banks have abandoned their previously supportive approach to charity accounts, which have either been frozen – as in this case – or suddenly subjected to drastically escalated banking fees.
Charities are not profit-making enterprises, even when their immediate function is to raise money for charitable purposes. They are an important element in the modern economy, and they need support from the other economic institutions, not punitive interventions. Clearly, the musicians at the LCO deserve our sympathy – but let the blame be put where it belongs: with the banks, not the orchestra’s management.
Keith Battarbee
Stevenage, Hertfordshire
One in a million
With regard to your “best love songs” feature (“12 love songs chosen by novelists”, New Review), your contributors forgot to mention what is clearly the greatest of all time, and that is Take That’s A Million Love Songs, written by Gary Barlow.
Melanie White
Marazion, Cornwall
