Educating Gordon Brown

One of the least explored defects of this government is what Rabbi Lionel Blue calls “moral short-sightedness” – the ability to see problems on another continent, but not on one’s own doorstep. I was reminded of this when Brown announced £106 million of our money to open schools in Nigeria. It’s the latest example of what I’ve described as his neo-colonialism: his desire to rewire Africa along New Labour lines. Yet its not as if it’s “mission accomplished” with English education – some 40,000 kids leave primary school in Britain unable to read or write properly, setting them up for a lifetime of poverty.
 
Brown’s blind faith in state-monopoly education bars him from recognising the poverty being created under his nose, from the failings of this appalling UK system which serves the posh neighbourhoods so much better than the deprived ones. Brown is focusing on Africa because his ideologically-programmed brain tells him all must be well in his leftist utopia of Britain. After all, isn’t Labour in charge?
 
There is more you can do than get angry about this situation. Civitas run a superb network of schools which seek to catch the kids who fall down the many gaps in government education system. It is one of the most inspiring projects in the country today, and offers superb return for any charitable donation.  It is appalling that with£75 billion spent on education, British kids are again relying on alms to be educated. But if no one else will look out for these kids then, as Robert Whelen says, civil society must strike back.