It is infuriating how the media are misreporting 'predicted grades', and now that exam results are 'reverting back to teacher predictions' it is more important than ever that students/parents/public understand what this means. What many media outlets (and a lot of the 'hard-luck story' pupils you have seen) are referring to as 'predicted grades' are in fact 'UCAS predicted grades' that get send off with University applications. These are always inflated/optimistic and are well known to be by schools and universities (a whole different debate for another time) What is actually being used are Centre Assessed Grades, of which the teachers had some input (we did the rankings within our classes that lead to the rankings for the cohort within the school), but then the school attributed grades to this ranking. If the school did it 'properly', this would be in line with the school's usual performance. If the school did it improperly these will be anywhere from slightly to wildly optimistic. But most importantly, at this stage the pupils would now know their Centre Assessed Grade (nor would many of their subject teachers). A student who is most likely to get a B in their subject but might on a good day have scraped an A will have an A as their UCAS predicted grade (if not it would prevent them from applying to any university that requires an A grade). Their Centre Assessed Grade would be most likely a B, and if the school had predicted too optimistically for the cohort it may have been moderated to a C. (Hence the headlines of 'my grades were dropped from A to C). Any time you hear 'my predicted grades were......' keep in mind this might not actually be what the school/teachers predicted they'd get, depending on how their school shares predictions with the students. The government's system is a complete mess, but the media's reporting of it has not helped and has contributed hugely to the students' sense of injustice here.
You think so ? I would wait until the effects of Brexit kick in next year. The supposed boost to the economy will have been wiped out by the impact of the Coronavirus even if it were to happen at all. This government has not really succeeded in doing satisfactory and seems to be being forced in to U-turn after U-turn. Given the size of the parliamentary majority, I find this incredible. The Right wing printed media have been pretty critical since March with television and radio coverage seemingly offering little in the way of positivity since Boris came to power. It is a fascinating situation to watch if you are not a Tory. I don't think that any of the party members can be satisfied and the supposed "Boris- bounce" has actually mutated into a situation where he is becoming a toxic brand within his own party. I have said this before but Boris will end up being kicked out by his own party. There is no way that he will contest the next election as leader. The next by-election will be fascinating and I think will reveal just how wide the cracks really are, both amongst party members / MPs and those who elected them in the first place. Public faith in this government is practically at zero. I will be interested to see how quickly some of the Tories start to break ranks. I would not bet against the formation of a coalition government at this point as no one will accept a country being managed in such a chaotic and disastrous manner. We have had weak and ineffectual Prime Minister's before, but never one as incompetent as this one. Those people who rejected Jeremy in December should hang their heads in shame.
I think if Corbyn had come out as Pro-Remain, The Lib-Dems would have been more likely to have agreed to a voter pact, as it was he didn't so how could they in good conscience considering they were running with the promise to stop Brexit. But by then I think Labour had adopted a siege mentality.
My own view is that it was the size of the majority that has caused this. Pfeffel just assumed that he was bombproof - King of the World! In actual fact he won because the alternative didn't appeal to enough people. They assumed that if Corbyn was elected the country would be plunged into chaos, much like we have been in fact. I think you are absolutely correct in assuming that Brexit is going to pan out into a grade one disaster. If you want a blue passport and a fancy ten bob coin you might be satisfied with the outcome, but if you were expecting any positive benefits think again.
Corbyn made himself unelectable by aligning himself to the anti-EU and ultra left wing forces instead of appealing to the more centrist socialist voters. To KG's point, if he had come out as anti-Brexit instead of anti-EU, he could have agreed something with the Lib-Dems and maybe have done something. As it was, both he and Jo Swinson fell straight into Pfeffel's trap of agreeing to an election when there was virtually no chance of them winning anything because the media were still trumpeting the sunlit uplands of Brexit, the nasty little **** Farage was being given all the time he needed on TV, radio and the papers to peddle his fascist, racist filth and there was no working opposition who could actively say "we are going to make things better". Corbyn left himself wide open to attack by the right wing media (and, as we know, if you get the punters who read these kind of rags, you get Westminster) and it was only going to end in tears. When I heard that they'd agreed to have an election I said to my friends that the Tories would increase their majority, but everyone thought I was mad. They should never have agreed and worked on the then small majority the Tories had in order to try and get a decent government. As soon as the fat Pfeffel got his 80+ majority, they were always going to ram through a no deal Brexit and do whatever they wanted to enrich themselves. I must admit, however, that I never thought they would get as bad as they had been. I just hope the voter in this country doesn't forget, ignores the media and votes with their conscience next time. I wonder when the next by-election will be - that will be an interesting snapshot of public feeling.
Corbyn made himself unelectable by aligning himself to the anti-EU and ultra left wing forces instead of appealing to the more centrist socialist voters. To KG's point, if he had come out as anti-Brexit instead of anti-EU, he could have agreed something with the Lib-Dems and maybe have done something. As it was, both he and Jo Swinson fell straight into Pfeffel's trap of agreeing to an election when there was virtually no chance of them winning anything because the media were still trumpeting the sunlit uplands of Brexit, the nasty little **** Farage was being given all the time he needed on TV, radio and the papers to peddle his fascist, racist filth and there was no working opposition who could actively say "we are going to make things better". Corbyn left himself wide open to attack by the right wing media (and, as we know, if you get the punters who read these kind of rags, you get Westminster) and it was only going to end in tears. When I heard that they'd agreed to have an election I said to my friends that the Tories would increase their majority, but everyone thought I was mad. They should never have agreed and worked on the then small majority the Tories had in order to try and get a decent government. As soon as the fat Pfeffel got his 80+ majority, they were always going to ram through a no deal Brexit and do whatever they wanted to enrich themselves. I must admit, however, that I never thought they would get as bad as they had been. I just hope the voter in this country doesn't forget, ignores the media and votes with their conscience next time. I wonder when the next by-election will be - that will be an interesting snapshot of public feeling.
So how did it work out for the Lib Dems, setting out their stall as the unequivocally anti Brexit party?
The Lib Dems were never going to carry enough weight to swing it. From the coalition on they were a single digit polling party. Corbyn however had it in his hands, firstly to swing the Brexit vote in favour of Remain, and secondly to deprive Pfeffel of a majority by unequivocal support for staying in. He missed both opportunities and, if you recall ( you probably do because you called me a Cassandra at the time) I predicted Corbyn would struggle to get 200 seats. He ended up on 201.
The Lib-Dems problems are that they still have the stench of coalition on them, Someone had to stand for those of us who wanted to remain, that can be argued it should have been the opposition to HM Govt.
I have tried staying clear of this thread for a while because the state of politics in this country has left me feeling depressed and bewildered. I had a feeling this bunch of clowns would be bad for the country but I honestly never imagined just how dreadful they would be. Blatant corruption, endless lies, incompetence far beyond anything we have ever seen from a government in this country and a total disregard for the general population. The complete disaster of their utter mismanagement of the Covid-19 pandemic not only turned us into a shambles of a country, it killed thousands of the finest people we have. People who deserved so much more from a government. I don't just blame the useless Tories, I also blame the stupid, selfish and greedy people who allowed these imbeciles into power. There is going to be 4 more years of suffering, real suffering, under this vile government and no matter who replaces the fat idiot in charge, it will just be more of the same. We had our chance in this country to elect a socially responsible and caring government led by Jeremy Corbyn but threw that chance away and chose to believe the lies and false promises of a lazy overweight slob. My sanity has been saved by focussing on what has been happening once the football season restarted and seeing how Saints took on the challenge of the remaining matches. Saints are slowly but surely creating something special under the leadership of Ralph and the willingness for the team to dig in, work hard and really perform when they had to. I feel encouraged and excited at what might happen next season. Pity this government can't do similar. Useless tossers.
