There was a sigh of relief in Brussels yesterday as the German Federal Constitutional Court ruled that the Lisbon Treaty does not contravene the country’s constitution, writes Nicola Di Luzio, though prior to its implementation, the German Parliament’s right to approve or reject matters decided in the Council of the European Union under Qualified Majority… [Read More]
“The requirement that, if a pupil is to qualify for admission his mother must be Jewish, whether by descent or by conversion, is a test of ethnicity which contravenes the Race Relations Act.” So three appeal court judges decided last week.
One of the latest changes amongst what appear to be last ditch attempts to win over the public on education policy is the introduction of ‘personality’ tests to ‘weed out’ weak teachers. Outlined in today’s Times Educational Supplement are proposals to use a diagnostic tool in teacher training institutions to work out who is and who isn’t suitable for teaching.
More ridiculousness from the powers that be. One year down the line the Department of Health has finally got round to fleshing out details of its ‘top leaders programme’; c. 1,000 ‘leaders’ (up, it seems, from the original 250 planned) drawn from 50 NHS-related organisations identified as ‘needing the most senior leaders’ to go on… [Read More]
This week saw the parties of the newly elected European Parliament (EP) scrambling to formalise alliances that will allow them to access EU-funds and other benefits afforded to official parties in the EP, writes Luke Clark.
Since 1999, the size of the NHS workforce has increased by 29 per cent. One in every 19 people in Britain now works for it. A chief architect of that increase is Ed Balls, between 1990 and 2004 chief economic adviser to Gordon Brown. Last week in a widely reported radio interview, Mr Balls said:… [Read More]
The European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies held a seminar last week presenting some recent work of a few of my former London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine professors. ‘Investing in Hospitals of the Future’, by Bernd Rechel, Martin McKee et al., presents and compares various case studies of the buildings, costs and… [Read More]
“Health and safety gone mad!” is a cry oft uttered by grumpy ranters; harking back to the good old days, they remember when children boldly scaled the lofty heights of the school oak tree, experimented with explosive chemicals in the lab, and roamed forests without any sign of parental permission slips and supplementary adult protection.
On the Daily Telegraph’s blog, Richard Preston writes about Civitas’ latest publication, Failing to Figure by Mervyn Stone, emeritus professor of statistics at UCL. Half-way through, Preston makes the wry observation: ‘His biggest case study is the immensely complicated, deceitful and deluded means by which the formula was arrived at that determines how much of… [Read More]
At tomorrow’s European Union summit, Heads of State and Government from the EU’s 27 member states are likely to back the incumbent EU Commission President José Manuel Barroso for another 5 year term, writes Luke Clark. Barroso will then need to be endorsed by the European Parliament (EP). This will be more problematic…