The Nth Columnist

So, farewell, Barack Obama: As many have already said, we're all going to miss your cool, unruffled presidency. Your farewell speech was gracious, calm and generous. It struck the tone that a President should: inclusive, hopeful, helpful and slightly detached. OK folks, I hope you've got your safety belts on now, as it looks as if we're in for one hell of a ride.... I watched Mr Trump's Press conference today. If I'm being generous, it is best described as being markedly different in tone from Mr Obama's valediction. If I'm being honest, it was the most jaw-dropping, godawful, car crash of a press briefing I have ever seen. You don't want to hear what my opinion would be if I were to be negative. I really don't know where to begin with it. You may have noticed that this post is beginning to read like a theatre review, and that is because it is, in a way. This was Trumpian Theatricality at its darkest and most brutal. It started with an ...

The principle of schools and colleges collaborating in a learning network is a good one - but forcing schools to become academies is not the way to do it. Today, Chancellor George Osborne is due to announce that all schools within England and Wales will become academies, whether they like it or not, by 2020. Quite why the Chancellor and not the Secretary of State for Education is announcing this seems a puzzle - until you realise that, once again, education is the thematic football of choice for those players vying to big up their political game. As an educator, I personally find it deeply frustrating when politicians with no knowledge of pedagogy or educational theory make broad announcements that will have a profound effect on the lives of everyone for years to come. the image the government projects.... The last truly effective changes were, in my opinion, the Education Reform Act of 1988 under Kenneth Clarke - this lead to, among other things, the expansion of Higher Educa...

We're in the middle of a serious housing crisis. Here are two ways we could fix it. It's long been a maxim that the best place to invest your money is in bricks and mortar. That's probably never been truer than in the housing market in the UK for the last thirty years or so. Have a guess how much market prices have increased since 1970. Go on. 10%? OK, 25%? Hmm.. let's try a bit more....100% Nope. In fact, average house prices, in real terms, have gone up an eye-watering 346% since then. And that's the national average - it doesn't take into account regional variations. For example, in my home town the average home has gone up in monetary value by 6% in the last six months alone, and it is estimated that house prices may go up by 43% once the new Crossrail scheme becomes active in 2017. To put that in context, a property 'worth' £200,000 (just about a two-bed place) would be 'worth'  £288,000 within the space of a few months. For...