Tags
Adam Swift, Adams Grammar School, Andre Gide, Clapham College Grammar School, disadvantaged pupils, Education Select Committee, Guy Fawkes, Hypocrisy, Jeremy Corbyn, LBC, Neil Carmichael MP, Nick Ferrari, Ofsted, Polly Toynbee, Radio Four Westminster Hour, Sir Michael Wilshaw, social mobility, St Peter's school York, The Guardian, Theresa May
While the mainstream media offer endless analysis and political party talking heads pontificate on the issue of grammar schools and social mobility, the explanation for any reduction of social mobility is made clear by actions of these Members of Parliament
It is not the grammar schools which are responsible for restricting social mobility but those influential people who had the benefit of receiving private, independent schooling or attended a grammar school and then denying to others something that improved their own social mobility.
All those illustrated in this post would benefit from reading a copy of Adam Swift’s book, How not to be a hypocrite.
Stroud MP Neil Carmichael Conservative chairman of the Education Select Committee told Radio Four’s Westminster Hour:
We have serious issues about social mobility, in particular white working-class young people, and I don’t think that having more grammar schools is going to help them
Neil Carmichael boarded at St Peter’s, an independent school in York that dates back to AD627 and includes among its alumni Guy Fawkes, cricketer Jonny Bairstow and actor Greg Wise. Today to send your son to board would cost £27,375 a year.
Neil Carmichael’s Wikipedia page makes reference to him being a hypocrite.
John Pugh, Liberal Democrat education spokesperson condemns grammars. Pugh attended Prescot and Maidstone grammars, and taught in the independent sector at Merchant Taylors’ Boys’ School
Jeremy Corbyn MP, leader of the Labour Party was educated at Castle House Independent Preparatory School and Adams Grammar School.
In 1999, the MP split from his first wife over a conflict over their son’s education. His wife, Claudia Bracchita, explained:
We had to make the right decision in the interests of our child. We would have been less than human if we had done anything else.
Sir Michael Wilshaw attended Clapham College Grammar School.
The Ofsted Chief recently made a plea to Theresa May, the Prime Minister, to stop grammar schools He told Nick Ferrari on LBC, Leading Britain’s Conversation,
We need more than the top 10 or 20% of youngsters to do well in our economy and in our society.
Sir Michael Wilshaw has conveniently ignored the Northern Ireland education system which is entirely selective. Northern Ireland leads the UK in performance in GCSE and A-level examinations and has only one private post-primary school.
Update 13th September via Guido Fawkes
Polly Toynbee today attacks Theresa May’s grammar school plans, arguing that segregation by social class is “irrational” and claiming grammars add to “splits and divisions” in society. She has some front. Polly herself failed her 11-plus and attended the independent Badminton School. Earning £110,000-a-year at theGuardian meant she was able to send two of her children to private school as well. Today Toynbee writes that “inequality is monstrously unfair… it means birth is almost always social destiny”. Some children are evidently more equal than others.Is there a bigger hypocrite in the grammar schools debate?