O/T. The Government's handling of Covid

[Andy_Faber]

I’m not sure how you’ve reached that latter conclusion, AF, or what your evidence is.

There was a discussion on it on the BBC News channel early hours of Saturday (I checked the news out after a marathon watching of ‘the terror’ on BBC I player, I recommend it), there was a mixture of vox pops and studio/zoom non-party-affiliated ‘experts’ and the balance was 1% is better than other outcomes since Covid hit us. No stats which is why I said mood rather than banging out any numbers

[AdiSalisbury]

Not often I agree with you Swale but the 2.6m spend at Downing Street is a total waste, but in terms of cash it wouldn't change the 1% by very much if it were spent on NHS wages.

The current spend on NHS wages must be at least 50 billion (was almost 48 billion in 2016-17). Thus your inferred comparison is disingenuous: tossing another 2.6 million at the NHS wage budget would maybe give every staff member an extra £1 each after tax per annum.

The numbers are important here for context. If we take that £50 billion assumption, 1% equates to (back of envelope non accountant calcs):

£500,000,000 Salary
£69,000,000 (assumed 13.8%) ER NIC
£15,000,000 (assumed 3%) ER Pension Contributions
Total cost: £584,000,000

...and that's before the additional cost of increased rates for overtime and allowances.

No small change, and not a salary budget I'd want to be handling! Put it this way, every 0.175% is worth just over a million £s. It's staggering, especially as there's no (direct) income to offset it.

[Geoff Parkstone]

Don't disagree with those figures Adi but don't forget tgat:

The incremental ERNI comes back to the government in order to fund such things as the NHS!

There will be an increased tax take and eeni of (say) 29% of grosscoming back to the government

[Geoff Parkstone]

Another interesting suggestion I've seen today is that, in order to help students catch up with contact time and teaching/learning the school day could be extended and the school holidays cut. The objective seems eminently sensible and could solve an issue that teachers have been highlighting throughout the pandemic.

I'm not sure how practical the longer hours per day would be but I can only imagine the squawking that will emerge from the teaching fraternity at having to give up some of their annual 16+ weeks holiday!!

And another intriguing thing. For my sins I listen to radio 4/4X - I know it's an age thing! Anyway last week I heard a repeat of a words based quiz from maybe 20 years ago, in which the contestants had to define various obscure seldom used words. One such word was "pandemic" which the panel struggled with but finally worked the meaning out.

Say what you like about education today, but most of the country's crop of 9 year olds could have answered that one correctly.

[AdiSalisbury]

Ah yes, indeed. How much of that (say) 29% would go back to the NHS is another question I suppose, maybe we need another Olympics!

[MadAmster]

My wish for the day. That people who haven't worked as a teacher, actually bother to find out the facts about how much work a teacher does in the course of a year.

A teacher gets a salary. A fixed amount. If they take a day off in term time they get stopped (or used to at any rate) 1/260th of their salary. (5 days a week, 52 weeks a year). If they really got 16 weeks paid holiday a year and only worked 36, then a day off would cost them 1/180th of their salary (5 x 36).....

During term time, teachers (most of them in any case, there are a few who don't) work well in excess of 40 hours a week. They get no overtime payments for that extra work.

Take, for instance, the 6 week summer "holiday". It's not 6 weeks off for most teachers. After the last day of school there are still the odd things to be done. By the end of week 2 you've recovered from the rigours of the school year, some by the end of week 1. Then it's 2 or 3 weeks "proper" vacation and then you start the preparations for the new school year.

[ramAnag]

Another interesting suggestion I've seen today is that, in order to help students catch up with contact time and teaching/learning the school day could be extended and the school holidays cut. The objective seems eminently sensible and could solve an issue that teachers have been highlighting throughout the pandemic.

I'm not sure how practical the longer hours per day would be but I can only imagine the squawking that will emerge from the teaching fraternity at having to give up some of their annual 16+ weeks holiday.

‘16+ weeks holiday’ per year. Really? I’d love to know how you work that one out. Please do explain.

Also it might be an idea if, before you started banging on about extending the school day and cutting holidays, you took into account that most schools have remained open, albeit with a reduced ‘clientele’ in accordance with current legislation, throughout the lockdown.

I realise, of course, that you are ‘fishing’ and deflecting from the original issue but you might at least produce some semblance of fact.

[Geoff Parkstone]

I'm merely commenting on something I read today promulgated by your favourite minister, and indeed questioned the validity of extending the day myself. I believe the reduction in holidays might work in terms of giving the extra tuition most feel the children need: which indeed did produce the squawk that I had predicted

Re 16 weeks, 8 summer, 4 Xmas, 4 Easter, 2 half terms: or at least it was when my kids were at school maybe 5 to 10 years ago

[Geoff Parkstone]

My wish for the day. That people who haven't worked as a teacher, actually bother to find out the facts about how much work a teacher does in the course of a year.

A teacher gets a salary. A fixed amount. If they take a day off in term time they get stopped (or used to at any rate) 1/260th of their salary. (5 days a week, 52 weeks a year). If they really got 16 weeks paid holiday a year and only worked 36, then a day off would cost them 1/180th of their salary (5 x 36)....

Fatally flawed argument. If they get 16 weeks paid holiday then they would still be docked 1/260th because everyone else with 4 or 5 weeks paid holiday has 1/260th deducted for unpaid days off. A paid holiday day is just the same as working day for this purpose.

My wish for the day. People who haven't been school governors responsible for finance don't presume to know it all 😂😂

But at least rA didn't take the bait

[ramAnag]

You either can’t count (unlikely given your profession) or your kids went to unusual schools.
However, for the vast majority...it’s six weeks in summer, two weeks at Christmas, two weeks at Easter and three x 1 week half terms providing a total of 13 weeks and a far cry from your ‘16+’.

Teachers work ‘directed time’ of 1265 hours per year. As far as I remember, ‘directed time’ is what it suggests and includes contact time, staff meetings, parents’ evenings etc. It doesn’t usually take account of planning time, hours spent running games activities, lunchtime clubs, residential activities etc.
In each of my last twenty odd years of teaching for instance I ran at least one week, often 1.5, of residential activities which essentially meant working from 8.30 on Monday morning until 3.00 pm on Friday. I’m not claiming hero status...I enjoyed virtually every minute of it and it was immensely rewarding, but plenty of teachers do much the same and don’t get a penny extra for it.

P.S. I did also spend four years as a school governor.