Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Children's tsar probes PPP impact on pupils

Because contrary to popular belief, the involvement of the private sector in the refurbishment and maintenance of school buildings doesn't seem to have improved the quality - nor has it reduced bureaucracy:
"The Scottish Executive's £2.3 billion flagship school-building programme will result in 300 schools being rebuilt or refurbished by 2009, with most of it funded through PPP.

But in recent months, parents, teachers and construction experts have cast doubt on whether PPP is providing top-quality facilities for pupils.
[...]
A survey of teachers in 2004 found that only 30 per cent believed PPP was value for money. It also found many projects were beset with problems - including overheating classrooms, leaking roofs and lack of storage space."
Yep - classrooms are too damn hot; had a leaking roof in my last place; and the lack of any storage that can be locked has resulted in all my stationery being pinched. The last I don't blame on the pupils - I think the RE department are conducting raids into our corridor and stealing our pens. Bastards.

So it's time to call in the 'tsar'. We have a tsar for everything in Scotland. There's a mountain bike tsar. There's even a squirrel tsar. The tsars will sort it out. Any suggestion to the contrary is just cynicism. After all, in the unlikely event that the tsar should prove less than excellent in the execution of their duties, we even have a tsar's tsar. This is what makes us - as our Leader Jack McConnell says - the 'best small country in the world'.

Update: Apparently there was also a 'spam tsar' who gave up 'the war on spam' with the admission that he was unable to even stop his own computer being spammed. We know a song about that, don't we?

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