I blame Lady Thatcher myself an honest woman financially even if she has become
I blame Lady Thatcher myself, an honest woman financially, even if she has become a little too fond of fat fees in her old age for her own good. For anyone who could accept or even hanker after such sordid arrangements would by definition be outside the professional classes.The distinguishing characteristic of the Conservative Party today is its absence of shame. It is humbug to maintain, as defenders of the party's practices have done, that the continuing existence of the "professional classes" somehow depends on members being able to accept unsavoury consultancies of one kind or another The argument is itself a contradiction in terms. It was, in short, ever thus, but in the last year or so it has been even thusser. Certainly the chief characteristic of the past session of Parliament has been the decline in reputation of the House of Commons. Measured by the personal behaviour of many Conservatives, including some ministers, this popular estimate is perfectly fair. Crossman "mentioned that [Hugh] Gaitskell had said he would be able, just but only just, to select a cabinet".
Boothby then proceeded to quote his mistress, Lady Dorothy Macmillan, who was herself quoting her husband Harold, the prime minister: "You have no idea how the quality of the Conservative Party will decline in the next Parliament, whatever happens. I shall only just be able to put a cabinet together if we win." One way of looking at this is to say that there is nothing new under the sun; another, to acknowledge that there has indeed been a parliamentary decline since 1959, but that recently it has become more precipitate. If there are any heads, schools or groups of teachers for whom "it is just far too tall an order to cope with and cater for the whole gamut of requirements presenting itself in an average secondary intake of 11-year-olds", may I suggest that it is they who cannot cope and not the intake or philosophy that is at fault. Incidentally, we have appointed seven new teachers to the school over the last three years They are all excellent.
This gives me far more cause for optimism than N Gillott's letter. Peter ShawFradley, Staffordshire. RE-READING Richard Crossman's Backbench Diaries the other day, I came on an entry for 25 August 1959 in which he and Bob Boothby "agreed about the decline in the quality of the Commons". I have found teaching pupils of all abilities to be interesting, challenging and rewarding. I have taught for 21 years in comprehensive schools in Scotland, the North-east and the West Midlands. Comprehensive schools have clearly been a great success story.