I don't think £80 a week will go far towards buying nappies and milk for four babies, never mind a boy of Joseph's age. Chesney will be on minimum wage, so they will be bumping along on very little money. I think the point of the storyline is to show that the pressures on children to have things like iPads and 'acceptable' trainers makes life very difficult for parents without spare cash.
I agree about the daftness of the Faye and Emma story, and I'm pleased that they showed Craig getting into trouble for running fingerprint checks to settle a bet - IRL he'd probably have been sacked.
How realistic is the Daniel story? The headmistress seems spectacularly inept, but I suppose the upskirting story shows how it is so often women and girls who are expected to make changes to accommodate badly behaved boys and men. They have a few younger generation cast members now, and if they are to be relevant they are going to have to cover stories like this, and the sexting one involving Asha a while ago. I wonder if Summer will get to go to Oxford, and whether Amy will go to university. When Ken was a young man he was portrayed as growing apart from his family because of his education, and I wonder if the scriptwriters will nod to that with Amy.
As for Tim and Sally
. I knew that Sally's widdling would come back to bite her on the bum (pun intended), and I am in awe of Tim's doctors for all the reasons already mentioned. I do think that S&T make a good couple though. Tim's down to earth attitude is the perfect foil to Sally's pretentious behaviour.