Who are the masters now?

While not disagreeing with the general thrust of the comments, I am puzzled by the statistics you quoted,*Greatnan*, particularly 20 Old Etonian cabinet members in 2010

According to The Guardian the 2010 Coalition Cabinet comprised 23 members, of whom 4 were women, and could not have gone to Eton. Eighteen of the men did not go to Eton, leaving David Cameron. Of the six other ministers who attended cabinet or were invited as necessary, two went to Eton.

Is this the Boris effect, which makes it seem that everyone went to Eton?

Interestingly, six of the 2010 team went to Magdalen College, Oxford, but that is another story, and one of them was Chris Huhne.....

I did not go to Eton!

Yep! Spot on, Ivanhoe.

Dresden , State education in Britain has been crassly underfunded since Thatcher.

The right wing Tory's do not not want an educated working class.

The Tory's want the class divide.

Should read 'out to discredit'

I know the Beeb doesn't always get it right (!!) but I sometimes get the feeling that other powerful factions (??) are actually of to discredit it or lessens its power and influence. I can think of two instances in recent years beside the present brouhaha when this thought has occurred to me.

I have just come across another epetition to sign.
Private providers of public services to be subject to Freedom of Information Act.
That definitely needs to happen. At the moment it is only by other people like the Green Benches author and Keep Our NHS Public that we can find out about what happens to the NHS.
It's wrong that Virgincare can own as much of the NHS as it does and we cannot find out about it through our local NHS because they are not subject to the Freedom of Information Act.

Hope you've signed my petition, Dresden, about the links between politicians and private healthcare companies. Find out about those with snouts in trough in Parliament. Has 547 signatures now. Needs over 100,000, so a few to go.

It is the unholy alliance of government, business and the press that disturbs me most.

And the press, absent.

I don't think politicians are the masters. Real power but without responsibility is in the hands of those who run the huge transnational companies.

bad luck, jeni - he's one of Scotland's less appealing exports.

Mines Liam Fox!
Need I say any more?

I agree with you, Greatnan, many voters are sleepwalking. Why don't we all become much more vocal about the shortcomings of our representatives, especially those with their snouts in the trough?

I suppose most of us are a bit lazy and although we know that it is our money that is being used to fund various politicians' shenanigans, there is a disconnect there. Or maybe we just feel that whatever we do, we won't be able to change the way things are done by our masters.

Now I've talked myself into feeling even more cynical

to jeni's dad who made jeni a good doctor. to you too jeni or maybe a vodka and tonic.

I'm with you Dresden re. George Orwell's observations in Animal Farm!

Well, that makes at least two cynics, Dresden. I suppose Prescott is a perfect example of somebody who climbs the greasy pole and revels in life at the top.
I think ruefully of the MPs I knew of in my childhood - Nye Bevan, Dr Edith Summerskill, Bessie Braddock - not necessarily from a deprived background themselves, but certainly able to empathise with the constituents they served.
Did the rot set in with Blair, or had the Labour Party already sold out? Kinnock certainly jumped on the gravy train and Glenys Kinnock landed a very cushy job in Brussels.
Sometimes I feel that millions of voters are just sleepwalking, kidding themselves that Britain is not just as corrupt as most other nations. Perhaps I should stop reading Private Eye - it only enrages me.

I think it is very hard for any politician, left or right wing, to really relate to ordinary folk. Most politicians inhabit a completely different world, with different values and moral codes. Look at the continuing scandals over expenses which involve MPs of all parties.

The only politician I ever had anything to do with personally, was left wing and had a working class upbringing. However he had gone on to join the ranks of the privileged, lived in a large and attractive house in a beautiful village and mixed almost exclusively with the rich, as far as I could see.

I think George Orwell hit the nail on the head with "Animal Farm", but maybe I'm too cynical?

But much more important was the education I got from being in GP with my father. He taught me to treat the person not the biochemistry or disease.
He also taught me compassion and patience and that we are no better than the receptionists or our patients.

I've got one as well.

Nothing wrong with a university education, Jane, I got one myself, albeit rather later than most students. What is wrong is that the levers of power are in the hands of a privileged group, many of whom have no experience outside politics and some of whom will only have had contact with 'other ranks' as employees. Does anybody seriously believe that Cameron et al can understand the difficulty of trying to bring up a family on the minimum wage?

Anyone else read School Wars by Melissa Benn? It's a brilliant book, and needless to say made me very angry.
Didn't Dave say he wanted everyone to benefit from an exclusive education?
Reducing class sizes to less than 20 might put state school pupils on a par with public schools, or at least even up the odds.

The only thing wrong with state education is that people can send their children to private schools and opt out.
Finland was supposed to have the best education in the world. That was after they got rid of their private schools.
I went to a private school myself. Got a scholarship there. My dad was a bus driver and my mother a nurse. They applied for a grant to buy my uniform and were given enough money to buy half a dozen pairs of school knickers.
I was the only girl in the class who didn't have diction lessons,as they were paid for, and probably the only one who needed them, on their terms.

Want to borrow a shovel jane?

I was privately educated, but I have spent all my working life in, and am a passionate advocate for, state education. I think the thing that upsets me most is the way the press and the politicians trash the state sector, when huge improvements have been made and there are some excellent schools out there. My GDs state primaries are exemplary and I was hugely impressed when I did a tour of state secondaries this year. I am very glad that Ed Miliband went to a comprehensive and hope this will be the last over-privileged, out of touch Etonian government.

I am not sure what is wrong with 90% having been to university, greatnan.
Surely we want our MPs to be intelligent and articulate and broadly educated?
I am not saying that someone who has not got a degree cannot be intelligent and articulate, just that a university education teaches people to think critically and have the aspirations that might lead them into politics, so it is perhaps more likely that graduates will be successful in being selected as candidates.