The state of the UK

[Scot Dutchy]

Holidays? No one trusts the Brits.

Europe’s distrust of the traffic light system threatens UK holidays

Tour operators are calling on the government for clarity or risk further damage to the travel sector

Uncertainty surrounding outbound travel from the UK is causing an atmosphere of distrust among hoteliers and travel suppliers in Europe, according to tour operators and industry bodies.

Prior to the government announcements on the latest changes to the traffic light system this week, tour operators have called for clarity to stem further damage to the travel sector and relationships overseas.

Noel Josephides, director of Aito, the Specialist Travel Association, and chairman of tour operator Sunvil, said that the continued chaos and speculation was not only destroying consumer confidence, but having a knock-on effect on suppliers.

“Hoteliers are turning away bookings from the UK in August because they don’t trust us – and European travellers are taking our beds and availability. There is no confidence; why should people trust us when we have the sword of Damocles constantly hanging over us and things could change and result in cancellations at any moment?” he said.

Chumocracy does not work outside the UK.

[Brian Peacock]

It failed from the start. 19th. Century methods did not work then or now.

19th Century judicial and carceral methods work very well indeed at communicating and enforcing particular social class and power relationships.

[Brian Peacock]

Call for action as UK driver shortage hits supermarket shelves

Gaps on supermarket shelves are likely to continue for several months unless the government does more to tackle the labour crisis hitting haulage firms, suppliers have warned.

Logistics and hauliers’ organisations said August would be a pinch point in the shortage as workers take summer breaks, while firms offering bonuses and sign-on fees to recruit drivers were not helping matters.

The shortage of qualified HGV drivers, worsened by Brexit and Covid, has left wholesalers unable to get goods to shops, with major dairy producer Arla on Friday admitting it could not get milk to about a quarter of supermarkets last week....

https://www.theguardian.com/business/20 ... et-shelves

[pErvinalia]

Yebutt you've got blue passports back.

[Brian Peacock]

Yay!

[Hermit]

Yebutt you've got blue passports back.

Designed by the French/Dutch company, Gemalto and made in Tczew, Poland. But being once again blue rather than the official EU standard maroon, it is, as home secretary Priti Patel put it, "once again entwined with our national identity."

De La Rue, the British company that had previously manufactured the passport, lost the contract, which led to a reported loss of up to 170 jobs in the UK. Gemalto has it for the next ten years.

[Scot Dutchy]

Poor disillusioned buggers.

[Scot Dutchy]

Three in four Britons back assisted dying for terminally ill – poll

Strong public support for change in law not shared by MPs, with only 35% agreeing, YouGov survey finds

Three-quarters of Britons support doctor-assisted dying for people who are terminally ill, compared with one in three MPs, according to a poll.

The fresh evidence of overwhelming public backing for a change in the law comes as a private member’s bill on assisted dying is awaiting its second reading in the House of Lords.

Lady Meacher, who introduced the bill for its first reading in May, said her proposal was “an insurance policy against intolerable suffering”.

YouGov, which has conducted the opinion survey, found that 73% of respondents think the law should be changed to allow doctors to assist in the suicide of someone suffering from a terminal illness, including 74% of Conservative voters and 76% of Labour voters. But only 35% of MPs agreed.

There was also support for a change in the law to allow doctors to assist in the death of someone suffering from a painful and incurable but not terminal illness. Among the general public, 50% backed such a move with 23% opposed. Among MPs, only 16% were in favour, and 51% opposed.

Previous polls have shown support for assisted dying to be even higher. A survey of almost 5,700 Britons in 2019 found 84% backed a change in the law.

[Scot Dutchy]

Chumocracy in action.

Private schools in England give pupils top grades in 70% of A-level entries

Teacher-assessed grades in lieu of exams benefit those at independent schools as gap with state education widens

The gap between private and state school A-level grades has grown to its widest in the modern era as part of a record-breaking set of results in which black pupils and male pupils also received lower grades than their peers.

After a year of disruption and school closures during the pandemic, nearly 45% of A-level entries across England, Wales and Northern Ireland were awarded top grades of A or A*, up from 38% in 2020 and 25% in 2019.

But teacher-assessed grades, which replaced exams across the UK, disproportionately benefited those at independent schools, where the proportion of top grades rose nine percentage points to 70%, compared with six percentage points elsewhere.

The gender gap also reached its highest level in 10 years, with the rate of A* and As standing at 46.4% for girls versus 41.7% for boys – a further reversal of the trend seen in 2017 and 2018, when boys last outperformed girls in exams.

In maths, female pupils overtook their male peers for the first time in the proportion of A*s as the gap overall widened across all subjects other than Spanish and German.

[Brian Peacock]

Well done kids.

[Scot Dutchy]

Well done Chumocracy.

[Brian Peacock]

Well, not strictly speaking. The private schools have always cheated - too much inbreeding among their cohort to succeed on merit alone, the poor dears.

But overall state school teachers have assessed their pupils as being more able than the traditional norm-referenced bell-curve distribution method that's been applied to exam results since 2011 has otherwise shown. Excepting the last 2 years, the UK exam system has been designed to produce winners and losers rather than to assess the abilities and educational achievement of students. The Right hate this of course.

A-level grade inflation hits record high

It feels like commentators have been complaining about grade inflation in A-levels since your humble writer was in nappies.

Yet these charts and graphs pulled together by the Telegraph's data team prove that, over the last two years, the naysayers appear to have a point.

Nearly half of A-levels have been awarded an A or A* this year, with almost double the proportion of top marks compared to before the pandemic as results reached a record high.

Of course the last two years have seen school-leavers given their grades based on teachers’ predictions after exams were cancelled owing to the pandemic.

This year 19.1pc of students in the UK were awarded an A*, up from 14.3pc last year and more than double the 7.8pc in 2019. The first graph in this story illustrates the steep jump.

The Education Secretary has defended this year's A-level results saying that students "deserve to be rewarded" after a year of disruption.

Scottish exams chiefs have insisted that employers and universities can have "full confidence" in this year's results despite a huge increase in top grades.

Yet these charts show how for each subject, grade inflation is rampant compared to before teacher grades...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/0 ... telegraph/

"Inflation" refers to the value of a qualification here - the message being that as more students receive higher grades in their final exams the lower the value of that qualification becomes. It's the commodification of exam results. For the last two years schools have assessed their pupil's level of learning and achievement in relation to the curriculum - which is why I posted "Well done kids."

[Scot Dutchy]

Yep when I was in school you only needed two "Highers" and a couple of "Lowers" to apply for university but these days you need a fistful plus a cart load of "Lowers". It was discovered a few years ago in Scotland that old Lower exam papers were being used for Higher exams.

The British School in the Netherlands (very English) has dropped its A level exams and replaced it with the Baccalaureate which is considered more stable at keeping its worth.

[Brian Peacock]

When you were at school you had to scratch your tables on a slate.

[JimC]

On a slate? He were lucky!

It was scribble in the mud when I were a lad...