I Kid You Not

Teacher - Making a difference (hopefully!) Live your best life.... love, laugh, sing and dance - even in the rain (especially in the rain!!)

[Dr Rachel Clarke @doctor_oxford]

In the scramble to respond to a global pandemic, I watched in awe as the vast majority of ordinary Britons came together with quiet decency, courage and altruism.

Not quite everyone though - as today’s damning report from the UK Covid-19 inquiry chair, Heather Hallett, lays bare.

Boris Johnson’s infamous ‘VIP’ lane for PPE procurement wasted an eye-watering £10bn of public money by favouring suppliers with connections to government, despite their abject lack of experience.

Cronies like Michelle Mone squandered hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money on useless, unfit-for-purpose PPE, all while lining their corrupt, bottomless coffers.

“The waste of public money was vast and could have been avoided, says Hallet. "Of approximately £14.9bn spent on PPE, nearly two thirds – almost £10bn – was wasted.”

Meanwhile, NHS doctors, nurses and care sector staff were forced to work with pitifully adequate PPE and lack of essential healthcare equipment such as ventilators. We couldn’t protect ourselves - or those in our care - from infection.

I will never forget those plastic pinnies so thin they tore apart in your hands, and the paper masks so flimsy the ear loops fell off as you unfolded them.

Hancock and Johnson will forever crow that they were heroes. But frontline staff in hospitals like mine will never forget the fear, the pressure, the staggering loss of life and our colleagues - who died of the deadly disease they caught while trying so valiantly to save others.

[The Rev. Anton Mittens 🌹👮🎓 @MittensOff]

Update issued from Count Binface's security team: 'We are pleased to report that our canvassers in Clacton are back on their wheels, after an unprovoked attack by far-right forces'. 'We will be stepping up security on Wednesday because it is Brown Bin day, and you know what they are like!'. #CountBinface #Clacton

[Ramblings @ramblingsloa]

May the stars carry your sadness away
May the flowers fill your heart with beauty
May hope forever wipe away your tears
And, above all, may silence make you strong.

Chief Dan George

[Tim Walker @ThatTimWalker]

Very cool, entertaining and with high production values: if I were @Nigel_Farage, I’d consider dipping into that £5 million to try to get out a video that can compare to it.

[I Kid You Not @MaryC1310]

@PMc276 @stuzi_pants You asked why she is on the media. That's why. I didn't say I supported her. Tbh I thought she was rude and aggressive - her interview on LBC was much funnier to watch. Just answering what I thought was a genuine question

[I Kid You Not @MaryC1310]

@EarlBrideshead @jeremycorbyn But lets look at the facts. We didn't have this problem until after the Brexit referendum when we lost our ability to return people to France. Who were the key drivers in that? I'm not sure I'd call the burglar in to fix my broken locks. Nigel is not a man of the people

[I Kid You Not @MaryC1310]

@BaronRodrigo2 @jeremycorbyn Links to Russia and convicted fraudsters. Let's not polish his halo just yet

[I Kid You Not @MaryC1310]

@EarlBrideshead @jeremycorbyn The problem for me is I don't think he does. He promotes division and the economic policies he wants to pursue will protect the wealthy not those who are less affluent eg an insurance based NHS. He'll be ok but those without means to pay won't. We don't want to end up like the US

[I Kid You Not @MaryC1310]

@PMc276 @stuzi_pants Isn't she supposed to be standing for reform in the London mayoral election 2028

[Martin Lewis @MartinSLewis]

STUDENT LOAN NEWS: The Treasury Committee of MPs has put out its report into student loans. Here's my view:-

I’ve long condemned the Chancellor’s planned freeze of the student loan repayment threshold next April as immoral and a breach of natural justice. So today is an important moment, as the cross-party Treasury Committee of MPs echoes this language in calling out a “moral obligation” for this to be reversed.

Changing terms for future students is a political choice, but that’s not what is planned next year. Freezing the threshold on existing Plan 2 loans effectively increases the amount those with those loans must repay each year. It is a retrospective, one-sided contractual change that would not be allowed in almost any other circumstance or sector. Worse, those hit often signed these contracts while just 18, with little or no explanation of what they were getting into.

This has to stop, and never be allowed again. That’s why one of the Committee’s most important proposals is that the Government should effectively be bound by the same Consumer Duty for student loans as a commercial lender, backed by proper fairness rules. Though it is only taking about student loan promotions, I think it should be for all student loan behaviour.

I have been pushing for this for over a decade. In 2016 we even got Wes Streeting, then a new MP, to propose FCA regulation of student loans and place restrictions on negative changes as a parliamentary amendment. It was rejected. Had that protection been in place, it could have stopped successive governments tinkering with the system, resulting in a horrific degradation of the original terms.

I hope this report, feeding into a new administration, means there is now a realistic chance of stopping the planned freeze and any future freezes.

Yet let’s be clear: that alone will not fix the Plan 2 student loan crisis - it’ll just stop it getting even worse. The report is titled "Student loans: broken and unfair?". There is no need for the question mark. The repayment threshold should be many thousands of pounds higher, interest should be reduced, maintenance thresholds need uprating, and the whole system, including the way it is communicated, needs a fundamental reset.

Here is the report: https://t.co/MPIOFE7mjy
Here is the MSE submission to the report: https://t.co/RIUPRO2svQ

[Jayce McMeeken @LiftingHumanity]

Outcome is the result of what is practiced

[𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐬 🎸🏴‍☠️🧩🤖🚀 @Principal_H]

Success isn't just about what you accomplish in your life.

It’s about what you inspire others to do.

[TeacherGoals @teachergoals]

Powerful. 🧡

[I Kid You Not @MaryC1310]

@quotesdaily100 I was surprised, speaking to Americans I met on holiday, at the way education in the US was funded. A system which gives the poorest least money, perpetuates inequality & reduces opportunities for social mobility is not only profoundly wrong but also economically unsound.

[I Kid You Not @MaryC1310]

@quotesdaily100 I'm assuming you're talking about the American system as a number of your points don't apply to the British system

[Jake Olson @JakeOlson61]

A staple truth of having a child is this: it’s inconvenient. A baby doesn’t care about your sleep, your schedule, your plans, or the life you had arranged before they arrived. And strangely enough, that’s the point.

Parenting is the moment you step into something bigger than yourself. You bring a life into the world that immediately asks more of you than you ever asked of yourself. It pulls you out of comfort and into calling.

Jesus said the way we lead is the way He led — through serving. And raising a child is one of the few places in life where you can’t fake that. You can’t hide behind convenience. You can’t negotiate your way out of sacrifice. You are forced, in the most beautiful way, to put someone else ahead of yourself.

That’s why it breaks my heart when our culture treats children as disposable the moment they become inconvenient. Because inconvenience isn’t a flaw of parenting. It’s the furnace where love is formed. It’s the place where selfishness dies and something holy is born.

To choose a child, even when it costs you, is one of the most honorable, shaping, pride‑worthy things a human being can ever do. It’s not easy. It’s not tidy. But it is sacred.

And maybe that’s the real issue:
We’ve forgotten that the greatest things in life are rarely convenient, but they are always worth it.

[TheTattooedHeadteacher Deputy CEO 🏳️‍🌈✊🏾she/her @KyrstieStubbs]

Good morning-
So beautiful when you find those people who just light up your life x ❤️

[TheTattooedHeadteacher Deputy CEO 🏳️‍🌈✊🏾she/her @KyrstieStubbs]

🩷🩷🩷

[Brad Weinstein @WeinsteinEdu]

Growth mindset. 🐢

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

SHE REPORTED RAPE AT WORK

Jan Cruickshank (@LittleJanhere) came to me this week with her story and a file of evidence she has spent years building. What she went through is one of the most shocking workplace cover-ups I have come across.

Jan worked as an apprenticeships officer at the Construction Industry Training Board @CITB_UK. Shortly after she started, a male colleague began subjecting her to sexual harassment that lasted over three years.

Explicit texts. Exposing himself to her at a hotel. Sending her an indecent photograph. A phone call during which he committed a sexual act while she was on the line.

In March 2015, at a conference in a Highland hotel, he came to her room and raped her.

Jan reported him. CITB believed his version instead. He claimed they had been having a consensual affair for three years and that Jan was hitting back because he had ended it. He was put on gardening leave for one week. Then he came back. He was also allowed to continue visiting schools while the investigation was ongoing.

CITB then launched a campaign to remove Jan from the business entirely. Two separate internal whistleblowers later confirmed this was deliberate. CITB's own legal team had calculated that a trial would cost them seriously.

So they chose to destroy her credibility instead. An HR investigation was initiated with the outcome already decided before it concluded. Jan was eventually sacked. The stated reason was misuse of company time by having an affair.

Her criminal case was dropped after @PoliceScotland were told by CITB that the relationship had been consensual. That lie closed the case.

The Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority looked at the evidence independently and reached a completely different conclusion. They awarded Jan compensation as a victim of serious sexual assault.

Jan took CITB to an employment tribunal. They offered her 15k pounds. She refused. She eventually settled for 60k pounds and refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement.

She said there was never any way she was going to agree to be gagged.

In November 2024, SNP MP Seamus Logan @SeamusLoganMP raised her case in the @HouseofCommons. He told Parliament that Jan had been pressured into a settlement far below what she was owed and that the man she accused was never held to account.

CITB responded with one line saying the matter was settled and they had nothing further to add..

A tribunal ruling recently reported as thrown out with no prospect of success has since been overturned. That decision has not yet reached the press.

Jan is now represented by well know to some of us John Robertson, the same investigator who stood beside Glenn Cottingham Smith before his death and who is currently fighting for my friend John Galajsza in his case against Barclays.

Jan asked herself one question:

"How did a woman who reported sexual misconduct at work end up spending the next decade fighting to defend her own reputation and reclaim a life that was stolen from her."

She was not broken. She documented everything. She refused the gag. She is still standing.

If this story made your stomach turn, share it. Jan has been fighting this alone for ten years.

The least we can do is make sure the right people see it. If you believe cover-ups like this should have consequences, put this in front of your network.

One share might reach the person who finally makes the difference.

Let's help her to be heard!

Sources: @Daily_Record Dec 2018 | @CNplus Nov 2024 | @BylineTimes Aug 2024