James

David - in response to your query, absolutely, I wouldn't want anyone 'locked into' the same stream for long periods of time. They should be able to move up and down as necessary. Dave R - in response to your point about parents having the right to choose private or faith schools or whatever. This is absolutely right in principle. I suppose the problem is the mistaken belief that market forces and that magic word "choice" are the answer to everything. It is a complete illusion. We're not selling baked beans or broadband internet, where market forces work to drive up standards. When it comes to education, the raw material is people, who cannot be re-engineered. Meaning that any attempt to create a market will simply result in a kind of social apartheid where the most able are creamed off to excel while the least advantaged are left to rot. I was forced to choose private for my son, as the state school he was offered is terrible. So I am contributing to the whole situation. But who can blame me, or the many others that do? We have to work within the system that exists - a system riddled with unfairness and inequality. And when it comes down to it, I have to do what's best for my son. As I see it, the only solution is what I described in my earlier post - proper and total comprehensivization. Don't hold your breath waiting for that to happen...

I think it's rubbish, totally overrated. We have loads of decent Indian places in ED but the Chinese & Thai offerings are pretty substandard...

Ok, here's my proposal for the British education system. Scrap all private, selective schools and faith schools. They have no place in a fair, meritocratic education system. Reinstate the eleven plus - compulsory for everyone - but instead of using it to separate by ability, use it to ensure that every school has a comprehensive intake with kids of all abilities. Each child is assigned the nearest possible school to satisfy this criteria. Each school then uses streaming in all subjects from day one to ensure differentiation. Parents are not given a choice of schools. This is the only way to ensure fairness. To ensure consistency and teaching excellence, the lowest and highest abilities receive extra lessons from a team of specialist teachers who travel the entire LEA. Speacialist 'units' within a school can be set up for the brightest and most struggling kids. Result = no more sink schools. Every school is able to cater for all abilities, so standards should be broadly the same everywhere. No more heartache and huge waste of taxpayers' money on bureaucracy arising from the appeals procedure. When it boils down to it, parents don't want "choice." They want decent schools for their kids. So why should some get brilliant schools at the expense of others?

I know the service in the co-op is a bit shoddy sometimes but that's a bit disproportionate

Surely the parents could have had the decency to provide some alcopops for their children?

If more people went vegetarian it would help. But that's another thread.

Yes, yes and yes!

Oooh, controversial.. (us agreeing again I mean!) Yes, totally agree with what you're saying about electability. Funnily enough now that Blair's spin machine has been unplugged we now see how badly poor Gordon needs one! The thing I find most depressing is the lack of true conviction in politics. Labour has got themselves in knots inventing academies and PPP and trying to appear tough on crime while Cameron has been babbling on about the environment and anything remotely touchy-feely. Will they really do/say ANYTHING the focus groups tell them to? Is there no integrity left whatsoever? Whatever anyone says about Ken, he was a man of principles. If he believed in something he stuck it.

PS on the subject of Bromley, I grew up there so I know a bit about the mentality. More people voted NF than green there, which tells you something. The average Bromley person (I am going to sound really snobby and David will tell me off now) is totally uncultured and has no interest in London's wonderful museums, theatres and cultural diversity. Instead they want to live a kind of santised Truman-show existence, wandering around the Glades shopping centre drooling over consumer goods. Bromley council famously complained about having to subsidise London's transport network in the 70s and tussled repeatedly with the GLA; more recently it tried to resist attempts to allow civil partnerships to be conducted in the borough. It doesn't really see itself as part of London at all. I say good riddance to places like Bromley. We don't want you anyway. Declare yourself part of Kent, have Boris the homophobic, racist buffoon as your mayor and let us keep Ken!

Oh my God, David is agreeing with me... will have to try to think of something reactionary to say! Would you also agree with me about how outrageously partisan the press are? The Evening Standard and similar gutter publications have been ripping Ken to shreds for years. How are we supposed to have a fair election when people are being brainwashed into voting for someone because he has been totally misrepresented in the media? That's aside from the fact that many people faled to see the distinction between Ken and the Labour party (there is obviously a HUGE diference) - voting against him to punish Gordon Brown for being dour and Scottish and failing to prevent the US having a recession. The whole thing is a farce.

I am amazed that some people have such short memories! Look at Tate Modern, the envy of the world. Look at our once-crumbling bus system - now revived. Look at the money that's gone into schools and hospitals. Yes, Labour has been a disappointment. They have made mistakes. But it's nothing compared with the sheer self-interest and sleaze of the 'nasty party' of the 80s. The fact is Cameron's ilk haven't changed their spots, just their image. How can people be so naive!? I think the fact that Boris concentrated on outer suburbia (places like Bromley) says it all. These people aren't real Londoners anyway. All they want is the lowest possible taxation. More money in their pocket to spend in the Glades and to hell with everything else.

Surely the main advantage of bendy buses is sheer speed of boarding/disembarking? Oyster has also speeded things up, as have the extra bus lanes and congestion charge. All of which were Ken's doing. I fear we'll go backwards with Boris. Like all Tories he doesn't care about investing in things. Averting the ?25 4x4 congestion charge and west London extension are greater priorities (his mates live there and like their big, polluting cars). I think all this reminiscing about Routemasters is ridiculous. London is a 21st Century city, not a museum piece. If you want routemasters back why stop there - why not trolleybuses and gas lamps?

I love Bellenden but am put off by the name cos it sounds like Bell End Road. I know it's childish and silly but I am!

I think King's is great and the staff are brilliant. My only criticism is the rip-off carpark, which is nothing to do with them anyway.

A 'dads only' meet-up? Outrageous! Are you a misogynist?

re. the whole Charter issue, is it not possible that instead of concentrating on kids of all abilities the focus is now on the kids hovering dangerously around the 5 A*-C benchmark? In other words, why bother with the kids who are sure to get/fail to get 5 A-C? Any school that has improved significantly may be playing the same trick the political parties do - focussing on the marginal seats as it were.

A decent comprehensive basically. It doesn't have to be amazing. I don't care if the kids are coming out with strings of A*s (I went to a grammar like this and hated it). The problem is in South East London it's completely polarized - the schools seem to be either exceptional (the selective/independent ones) or pretty poor. I think Haberdashers is great and it was my first choice for my son. But I think what annoys me about it is the way it purports to be a comprehensive, yet uses complicated, opaque means of selection. I've heard many stories of people who were refused entry literally harassing the school (one such person on this forum) until they were offered a place. Whilst I can't blame them - we might have done the same - this hardly seems fair. Neither does the music scholarship system. Or the bizarre banding system which seems to discriminate against the upper bands. If it really wants to be a comp, why not abolish the system and have a simple lottery? Otherwise, admit that you're selecting by stealth and become a grammar. They seem to be having their cake and eating it right now.

Just noticed this: >Joking and sneery side swipes aside, this refusal to get involved in local community schooling facilities and manipulating the rules to get the "best " school entry for your kids may serve you well in your narrow little world, but does nothing to assist the system and goes towards creating a cultural apartheid whereby bad schools get worse and need to be constantly pumped full of cash and assistance to get them going again - this costs the tax payer and the kids themselves I don't know who this was aimed at but personally I wish that all schools were banded so that every school had pretty much the same mix of abilities and there was no such thing as grammars or private schools. Unfortunately this will never happen. So peopler like me are faced with the choice of a dismal state school or a private scholarship. It's very easy for people without kids to tell us we should support the local comp but it's a different matter altogether when your child's future & happiness is at stake.

Oh for goodness sake, why do you two (Kel and David) get off on making me out to be a card-carrying bigoted fascist? Does it make you feel better? Does it make you feel 'right-on' or something? Do you hope it will help you make friends on this forum or something, going on your little witch hunts? First of all I'm told I am a racist and advocate of eugenics because I don't like chavs who own dangerous dogs. Now I'm told I am insulting children who do well at comprehensives because I don't want to send my son to a failing school with a dreadful reputation. I think it is my right to send him wherever I think is right for him, thanks very much!

Kel, you and David C have made lots of unfounded and ignorant assumptions about me so if you can't take it, don't dish it out. Also funny how you accuse me of banging on about class when you keep banging on about race - which has even less to do with it.

Has anyone told the lady who wanted to set up a Vietnamese on Lordship Lane but couldn't find premises!?

Yes, I am puzzled by the race thing too. I don't like chavs therefore I am a racist. How does that work? CWALD I would reassert that all the things you describe make you working class. If anyone discriminates against you because of this, shame on them. But I repeat, this is not the same as being a chav - in the same way that being black does not make you a gangster rapper - obviously. Perhaps it is you who are stereotyping. Nobody NEEDS to own a dangerous dog. I also believe that nobody should have the right to own a dangerous dog. Funny how the only people you CAN legitimately discriminate against are the middle classes. The amount of sneering jibes aimed at them on this forum is incredible. Kel and David's comments remind me of this - some kind of weird self-loathing going on here (as you are almost certainly middle class too).

Oh right. Yes, let's all pretend that the word chav means something else. KK you have an axe to grind because you and David were spouting misinformed rubbish about schools on another thread and I made you look stupid. Now you are both playing a silly, childish game involving labelling everyone a racist/Daily Mail reader/whatever because I have made some judgments based on my experience and you don't agree. You can carry on pretending that the people who own these dogs aren't chavs until the cows come home if it makes your bleeding hearts feel better. You'll still be wrong and deluded though. By the way, um, no I don't find "young tracksuited men threatening." But if one was coming at we with a Staffie I probably would.

Yeah, actually what a shame my child is very bright. I really should not bother to take an interest in his education at all. By wanting the best for him I am "living out my own truncated ambitions" through his life.

CWALD you just made the same mistake as David C - muddling up lifestyle choices with people's race. You can't choose your race but nobody is having a gun held to their head and forced to own a dangerous dog and wear a tracksuit and be routinely objectionable! I personally find it patronising and the level of a 6th form debate (if not lower) to be told that because I disapprove of the "chav" attitudes that makes me a racist. This is silly and childish. It's laughable that I'm being admonished for stereotyping by David while he stereotypes me atrociously just because I refuse to pander to his politically correct claptrap. You seem to be suggesting that everyone who's lower class is by definition a chav. How patronising and insulting to the majority of decent working-class people.