Tuesday 11 October 2016

Of Housing and Schooling

Blather from the usual suspects about Shami Chakrabarti's "£2.5 million house". But that is purely an estate agent's estimate for if she were to try and sell it now, which she isn't.

Two doors down from my 1960s semidetached is that of an elderly couple who have lived there since it was built.

If they sold their house today, then they would make an awful lot more than they paid for it. But so what?

And still the point is lost on an astonishing number of people that private schools and grammar schools are nothing to do with each other.

The former have produced many of the leading figures of the Left, and they continue to do so.

The latter used to, but that role is now filled by the comprehensives. That, despite the fact that grammar schools still exist.

Jeremy Corbyn, say, or John McDonnell, or Diane Abbott, or Owen Jones, or George Galloway, or indeed Shami Chakrabarti, would be wildly unlikely to be invited to speak at a school that was run by Buckinghamshire County Council, or by Kent County Council, or by Trafford Metropolitan Borough Council.

If anything, any of those figures would be even less likely to be invited to speak at any school that was run by right-wing Labour councillors and their sidekicks.

But the invitation of any of them to speak at a private school would surprise no one.

Galloway, I happen to know, does receive and accept several such invitations every year. Perhaps so do the others.

In the present frenzy, the recent meeting between Vladimir Putin and some boys from Eton was a highly positive development.

The main political organising force for the greater part of their generation is in support of Corbyn, especially through Momentum.

All in all, the kids are all right.

But there is a strong Corbynite organisational base among those attending a state school in this vicinity that could almost pass for a private school, and which is attended by many people whose parents would otherwise send them to such an institution, although by many others besides.

Can I get them to have Galloway's landmark film, The Killing$ of Tony Blair, shown there, with a Q&A featuring the man himself? Not a chance.

Yet I bet that we could get it shown at a private school, complete with that Q&A. If all else fails, then watch that space.

1 comment:

  1. The point about house prices is well made. So is the point that the Left's leaders used to be public school and grammar school but are now public school and comp, even though grammars still exist. The remaining grammars are just factories for unthinking lower middle class Tories, no wonder the Tory grass roots want 1500 more of them. You're right, Left voices have no trouble getting into private schools, no chance getting into schools run by Tory and Right Labour councils.

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