Education in the UK, Lib Dems & the dictatorship of hedge-fund gangsters
bd | 13.11.2010 11:33 | Education | Public sector cuts | Social Struggles
Re-post/re-write (with additional information)
The Lib Dem's went into the last election on a ticket that they opposed any increase in student fees, which, as is now widely known, they have done a u-turn on in the new Con-Dem coalition. Now today, the Guardian newspaper reports on documents showing Clegg's public claim was at odds with secret decision before the election.
Back in March 2006, main Lib Dem thinktank - Centre Forum - funded and chaired by hedge fund speculator and founder of the Ark academy network Paul Marshall were then calling for an increase in student fees. Marshall is a special advisor to Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg. The chameleon-like nature of the Lib-Dems and what they supposedly stand for not only rings even more hollow but is further exposed as being as slippery as the lizard skin of their wealthy benefactors.
The Lib Dem's went into the last election on a ticket that they opposed any increase in student fees, which, as is now widely known, they have done a u-turn on in the new Con-Dem coalition. Now today, the Guardian newspaper reports on documents showing Clegg's public claim was at odds with secret decision before the election.
Back in March 2006, main Lib Dem thinktank - Centre Forum - funded and chaired by hedge fund speculator and founder of the Ark academy network Paul Marshall were then calling for an increase in student fees. Marshall is a special advisor to Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg. The chameleon-like nature of the Lib-Dems and what they supposedly stand for not only rings even more hollow but is further exposed as being as slippery as the lizard skin of their wealthy benefactors.
Paul Marshall, director of Hedge Fund Marshall Wace, is a major donator to the Libs Dems, is special advisor to Nick Clegg, and most significantly, donated £1 million to Centre Forum - the Lib Dem'a main policy thinktank and is chair of the Centre Forum Management Board. Marshall is also a founder of one of the largest academy networks in the UK - Ark.
He is a major player within the financial hegemony behind the new wave of academies ie. privatisation masquarading behind the thinly veiled conceit of the new philanthropic charitable trust business model. Marshall is co-founder of charity ARK which is running one of the biggest academy chains in Britain. They currently run 6 schools (including the controversial Wembley Park academy in Brent*) and aim to run 12 by 2012. The board of ARK are all hedge fund managers, such as Marshall, Ian Wace, and Stanley Fink - CEO of International Standard Asset Management (Fink donated £1 million to the Tories and is set to earn a peerage). Chair of ISAM is Lord Levy, accused of providing cash for peerages in 2007.
[* Ref to film about Wembley Park Academy by Jason Parkinson given below]
Hence, why Centre Forum has also led the calls for the school system to be opened up to new providers. From their website: "The practical benefits of supply side liberalisation were set out in an essay collection entitled Academies and the future of state education which brought together some of the most successful school leaders in the country, as well as Andrew Adonis, the minister responsible for the academy programme at the time."
Hedge Funds are the finance companies which tipped the world into economic crisis in 2008. Hedge Funds make huge profits by gambling on market prices. In 2008 they profited from driving down the value of bank shares. Marshall admitted to the House of Parliament Treasury Committee in Jan 2009 that Marshall-Wace earned record profits in 2008/9 shortselling shares on banks including HBOS - who had been bailed out with taxpayers money.
Centre Forum were arguing for an increase in student fees as far back as March 2006. Providing the ideological doublespeak justification for the Lib Dem's sanctioning of the increase in student fees, in the words of Centre Forum (from their website):
"Extending educational opportunities requires us to better direct public expenditure to those who most need it. Hence [their report] 'Open universities: a funding strategy for higher education' made the case for an increase in private payment, and a decrease in public subsidy, to free up scare resources to invest in early years education." The academy programme started under Tony Blair, whereby £25 million was given to the private sector to run schools whilst removing nearly all democratic controls from local parents and citizens. Academies are independent of local authority control, run by philanthropy, faith schools and a strong emphasis on Enterprise, and are free to set their own terms of conditions and independent pay levels to teachers.
What interest would Marshall have in influencing policy towards increasing student fees? Centre Forum themselves state that "fees are unlikely to restrict access to higher education because cost is not what is keeping the majority of bright but poor children out of the system". This is partly true, hence their argument to increase investment in early years education which has become Lib Dem and now Con-Dem policy (the Con-Dem govt have sold the policy of increasing student fees on the proviso of increasing funds for schools with kids from disadvantaged backgrounds, though on closer inspection, the figures show that the govt are not providing any additional money for their £2.5bn "pupil premium policy; this money is just being reallocated from existing budgets). However, using this argument to justify the increase in student fees that will lead to students conceivably ammassing debts of up to £30,000 after graduation is a deceitful oversimplication. The rational appears to be to fufill the twin objectives of reducing public spending and to rationalise the university sector and make university achievement more exclusive again, which will no doubt have the knock-on effect of further consolidating the class divide in UK society by reducing opportunities for the poorest to advanced education. This is also in part justified by the argument that university degrees have been devalued over the past 2 decades, and more immediately, the policy is justified having been formulated on the back on increasing overall educational attainment across the board. It is justified by Centre Forum who say that increasing fees will bring us up into parity with Australia, New Zealand and the United States, each of which charges significantly more for higher education than the UK. In ideological terms, the neoliberal argument is that this social welfare subsidy is not justified in the long-term development of a market economy like the UK. In practical terms, educational streaming, which is likely to become more advanced in academies as opposed to LEA controlled schools, is quite possibly a tool which will create a social learning environment more conducive to separating students for university from students going down a more vocational route. Stephen Ball, a Professor of Sociology at the Institute, was quoted as saying at the antiacademies alliance conference in 2006 that academies are a return to a "Victorian Education system".
Additionally, the rational to shift resources from higher education to early education, which of course is more pronounced with the meltdown in public finances, seems also to be one which is compatible with the academy programme in that public subsidy funds are guaranteed for academy schools as with the whole primary education sector, which is of help with their immediate business model.
Returning to Ark, it's main sponsors include:
- John Paulson. His company Paulson and Company paid £50,000 for a table at an ARK fundraiser. John Paulson has been described as “the world's biggest winner” from the Credit Crunch. He is also described as one of the 25 people at the heart of the economic meltdown.
- Aspect Capital. Their website boasts "Aspect Funds are organised as exempted companies incorporated with limited liability in the Cayman Islands, the investment activities of the Funds are not regulated or otherwise overseen by the Caymans Islands’
government or any other financial regulator".
- 2008 Fundraising meal
£25.8 million was raised at their fundraising meal in June. Blue Crest Capital
Management, Bloomberg, Merrill Lynch and UBS were the sponsors. Tony Blair was
the guest speaker.
Source:
http://www.antiacademies.org.uk/Home/literature/briefings-2/arkbriefing
* For more info about the ARK academy in Wembley Park and the financial hegemony behind the new wave of academies ie. privatisation masquarding behind the thinly veiled conceit of the new philanthropic charitable trust business model, see this excellent video about the campaign against Wembley Park Academy by Jason Parkinson:
http://vimeo.com/14634627
He is a major player within the financial hegemony behind the new wave of academies ie. privatisation masquarading behind the thinly veiled conceit of the new philanthropic charitable trust business model. Marshall is co-founder of charity ARK which is running one of the biggest academy chains in Britain. They currently run 6 schools (including the controversial Wembley Park academy in Brent*) and aim to run 12 by 2012. The board of ARK are all hedge fund managers, such as Marshall, Ian Wace, and Stanley Fink - CEO of International Standard Asset Management (Fink donated £1 million to the Tories and is set to earn a peerage). Chair of ISAM is Lord Levy, accused of providing cash for peerages in 2007.
[* Ref to film about Wembley Park Academy by Jason Parkinson given below]
Hence, why Centre Forum has also led the calls for the school system to be opened up to new providers. From their website: "The practical benefits of supply side liberalisation were set out in an essay collection entitled Academies and the future of state education which brought together some of the most successful school leaders in the country, as well as Andrew Adonis, the minister responsible for the academy programme at the time."
Hedge Funds are the finance companies which tipped the world into economic crisis in 2008. Hedge Funds make huge profits by gambling on market prices. In 2008 they profited from driving down the value of bank shares. Marshall admitted to the House of Parliament Treasury Committee in Jan 2009 that Marshall-Wace earned record profits in 2008/9 shortselling shares on banks including HBOS - who had been bailed out with taxpayers money.
Centre Forum were arguing for an increase in student fees as far back as March 2006. Providing the ideological doublespeak justification for the Lib Dem's sanctioning of the increase in student fees, in the words of Centre Forum (from their website):
"Extending educational opportunities requires us to better direct public expenditure to those who most need it. Hence [their report] 'Open universities: a funding strategy for higher education' made the case for an increase in private payment, and a decrease in public subsidy, to free up scare resources to invest in early years education." The academy programme started under Tony Blair, whereby £25 million was given to the private sector to run schools whilst removing nearly all democratic controls from local parents and citizens. Academies are independent of local authority control, run by philanthropy, faith schools and a strong emphasis on Enterprise, and are free to set their own terms of conditions and independent pay levels to teachers.
What interest would Marshall have in influencing policy towards increasing student fees? Centre Forum themselves state that "fees are unlikely to restrict access to higher education because cost is not what is keeping the majority of bright but poor children out of the system". This is partly true, hence their argument to increase investment in early years education which has become Lib Dem and now Con-Dem policy (the Con-Dem govt have sold the policy of increasing student fees on the proviso of increasing funds for schools with kids from disadvantaged backgrounds, though on closer inspection, the figures show that the govt are not providing any additional money for their £2.5bn "pupil premium policy; this money is just being reallocated from existing budgets). However, using this argument to justify the increase in student fees that will lead to students conceivably ammassing debts of up to £30,000 after graduation is a deceitful oversimplication. The rational appears to be to fufill the twin objectives of reducing public spending and to rationalise the university sector and make university achievement more exclusive again, which will no doubt have the knock-on effect of further consolidating the class divide in UK society by reducing opportunities for the poorest to advanced education. This is also in part justified by the argument that university degrees have been devalued over the past 2 decades, and more immediately, the policy is justified having been formulated on the back on increasing overall educational attainment across the board. It is justified by Centre Forum who say that increasing fees will bring us up into parity with Australia, New Zealand and the United States, each of which charges significantly more for higher education than the UK. In ideological terms, the neoliberal argument is that this social welfare subsidy is not justified in the long-term development of a market economy like the UK. In practical terms, educational streaming, which is likely to become more advanced in academies as opposed to LEA controlled schools, is quite possibly a tool which will create a social learning environment more conducive to separating students for university from students going down a more vocational route. Stephen Ball, a Professor of Sociology at the Institute, was quoted as saying at the antiacademies alliance conference in 2006 that academies are a return to a "Victorian Education system".
Additionally, the rational to shift resources from higher education to early education, which of course is more pronounced with the meltdown in public finances, seems also to be one which is compatible with the academy programme in that public subsidy funds are guaranteed for academy schools as with the whole primary education sector, which is of help with their immediate business model.
Returning to Ark, it's main sponsors include:
- John Paulson. His company Paulson and Company paid £50,000 for a table at an ARK fundraiser. John Paulson has been described as “the world's biggest winner” from the Credit Crunch. He is also described as one of the 25 people at the heart of the economic meltdown.
- Aspect Capital. Their website boasts "Aspect Funds are organised as exempted companies incorporated with limited liability in the Cayman Islands, the investment activities of the Funds are not regulated or otherwise overseen by the Caymans Islands’
government or any other financial regulator".
- 2008 Fundraising meal
£25.8 million was raised at their fundraising meal in June. Blue Crest Capital
Management, Bloomberg, Merrill Lynch and UBS were the sponsors. Tony Blair was
the guest speaker.
Source:
http://www.antiacademies.org.uk/Home/literature/briefings-2/arkbriefing * For more info about the ARK academy in Wembley Park and the financial hegemony behind the new wave of academies ie. privatisation masquarding behind the thinly veiled conceit of the new philanthropic charitable trust business model, see this excellent video about the campaign against Wembley Park Academy by Jason Parkinson:
http://vimeo.com/14634627
bd