Friday, March 18, 2005

Stand Down Margaret

Never done complaining about the government. Yet another minister joins the never ending list of new Labourites upon whom I wish very bad things. This time, as foretold by Father Bell in a comment, the target of my bile is children's minister and former peace loving lefty Margaret (C.N.D.) Hodge.

The bastards have only gone and deprived the good old Woodcraft Folk of DfEE funding of over � 50,000 a year. For a small voluntary organisation that's the sort of kick in the bollocks that could land you in deep shit. Even the Thatcher government wasn't so bitter and vindictive as to deprive them of funding, but here we have a supposed Labour government A Labour Government (Kinnockesqe repeat re Liverpool's Militant Council), many of whose party members were probably brought up in the Woodies landing the potentially killer blow.

Why? Not good value for money they claim. Bollocks its practically fucking free, gratis, provided by volunteers! The educational provision is exceptionally good and much of the citizenship agenda being introduced now by the statutory youth sector has been carried out by the Woodcraft Folk for decades. The materials the organisation has developed over the years have been used and welcomed throughout the youth sector.

The DfEE apparently have suggested that the organisation did not have"sufficiently robust outcome indicators" I would suggest that any fuckwit that put those words together in a sentence in English and claimed to part of a Government Education Department deserves a good kicking in the playground. And me anti-war too. Perhaps that's the problem then, the Woodies have never shied away from being an anti-war organisation and have been very visible in the Anti War movement.

A further suggestion has been that the Woodcraft Folk has largely become a middle class, organisation, run by professional parents. A bit of that is true and its my current beef too, however where I come from its not, our kids are from areas of spectacular social deprivation. I used to work for the Woodies, developing new groups in areas of multiple social deprivation in the former Strathclyde Region, (which had a lot of multiple social deprivation). We were good at it as well, but it took money, and that's what the government are taking away! Bastards!!!!!!

You can read more here, here, here and here!
posted by timesnewroman at 7:39 PM  

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