Amen to that. There's a NO2ID regional meeting in Birmingham this Saturday, details on my blog for all those interested.

I wish a few more on your side of the divide would unite with your sentiments on the ID card scheme.

And at the same time - nationalise Northern Rock.

Go back to pen and ink might also be worth looking at - cut the dole cue.

au contraire - I'd've thought this sorry saga reinforces the case for storing biometric data that, unless you also hold the body-part, is so much more tricky to forge. It also reminds us that government departments already hold data on all of us....

Mrs K, why do you assume the unemployed can read and write after just eleven years of education under Labour?

Snafu, they haven't had 11 years yet, and those starting school in 1997 when Labour came to power haven't left school yet. Your unemployed, if they are illiterate as you claim, were educated under the Conservatives... with oversized classrooms, buildings crumbling around them, staff facing redundancies... why are we surprised?

Foot, gun, take aim.... fire!

This mess will have enormous ramifications for any government project e.g. medical records, ID cards etc.

You would think that Labour would take note of these disasters and try to learn from past mistakes. Not a chance.

http://lettersfromatory.wordpress.com/2007/11/21/look-at-the-latest-mess-you-have-made-darling/

Thank you Bob, could not have put it better myself.

'Hole - digging' did spring to mind

Bob -“oversized classrooms” how do you work that one out? Can classrooms be oversized? We were promised a reduction in class sizes ten years ago-is that what you mean? Also “staff facing redundancies”???? how many staff have lost their jobs in just Sandwell by closing schools in the last few years? I will grant you the crumbling buildings - most still are.

You were not only promised smaller class sizes (your other point is pedantic) you got smaller class sizes. Staff redundancies from school closures where rolls are falling is a different issue to redundancies because the Conservative Government of the day would not fund education properly.

I don't know if there have been any compulsory redundancies in Sandwell, perhaps you know of some, but I certainly don't.

Bob & Mrs K, I could accept such criticism if right-wing educational policies had been in place prior to 1997. They weren't. Even Maggie herself refused to take on the National Union of Teachers!

Without discipline, proper teaching methods and selection and sacking failing teachers, no amount of money spent on schools will improve education for the masses.

Increasing numbers of people are sending their children to private schools due to such failings. It's just a shame that so many more children are condemned to a sub-standard education in the state sector!

Which is, of course, complete cobblers. Despite Snafu's stupid suggestion that the unemployed are illiterate and his even more stupid suggestion that this was the fault of the Labour Government (one which he now appears to have forgotten about having been shot down in flames) he actually has no more 'evidence' to support his latest ridiculous claims. No wonder no-one takes you right-wing nutters seriously these days.

You know, Bob, this is getting dangerous. I find myself agreeing with you more and more. I keep having to tell myself: "Bob's Labour, Bob's labour".

"In 1996 the government spent £27.2bn in the UK on education, by 2006 yearly spending had risen to £49.5bn, the ONS said."

"Business leaders feel educational standards have not improved since 1997"

"A government-commissioned report into skills, published by Lord Leitch in December, called for a radical overhaul in adult training - and warned that the UK's skill base was lower than many international competitors.

The report said that five million adults lacked functional literacy and more than 17 million had difficulties with numbers.

More than one in six youngsters left school unable to read, write or add up properly, said the report."

Yep, no evidence at all! Once again, I could accept your criticisms if the 'right' had been in charge of local education authorities but it has been dominated by left-wing ideologyu for years! Anyone rememeber the ILEA!?!

Flawed evidence snafu. Let's dismiss the opinion of business leaders for God's sake, their record on British industry makes them no judge.

5 million adults doesn't surprise me, as I said, Tory education standards were shocking and after 17 years of them being in charge we are lucky the figure is so low.

Yes the spending has increased, but you appear to have ignored the massive amounts that have had to be pumped into a crumbling infrastructure left them by.... errm... finish it yourself.

James... I must be getting soft.

Bob-pendantic? moi? pot and black spring to mind.Seriously where are these smaller classes?-I was talking to someone just last year who had 40 per class(to one qualified teacher) in his primary school. Classes in most state schools I know are bulging.