Don’t fail children again, parents warn Boris as they vent exams anger in poll
After Mail tracks down missing PM, the final insult: He pitched camp and made a fire on irate farmer’s land without asking... and his sheepish bodyguards are forced to apologise
PARENTS today have warned Boris Johnson he is on a knife-edge after his Government was accused of mishandling the exams fiasco.
Four in five parents south of the Border believe ministers made a mess of the ALevel and GCSE results, with growing pressure on Gavin Williamson to quit.
A majority want the Education Secretary to resign amid fears he will fail to get English pupils back to school in Sepof tember. It comes only weeks after Scotland’s Education Secretary John Swinney faced calls to quit after more than 124,000 grades were lowered based on the past performance of a pupil’s school.
The Scottish Government was forced into a U-turn after a backlash from pupils and parents, with grades now reverting to the estimates given initially by teachers after exams were cancelled.
The Prime Minister also faces criticism over his decision not to cut short his holiday to deal with the chaos that left thousands with days
uncertainty over their grades. The Daily Mail revealed yesterday how Mr Johnson – who still has not apologised to students and parents for the shambles – has been hiding out at a cottage in Applecross, Wester Ross.
A Daily Mail poll today reveals the strength of feeling among voters about the need to get pupils in England back into the classroom full-time, as they have in Scotland.
A massive 78 per cent believe it should be the Government’s top priority, with most willing to see pubs close, shops shut or even social gatherings banned if that is what is needed to get it done.
The clear message comes as the survey lays bare the scale of voter anger over the exams fiasco of the past week. The poll conducted in the wake of the Government’s reversal on Monday over the use of a controversial algorithm to adjust A-Level and GSCE results will make grim reading for the PM as he prepares to return to his desk in No10 next week.
In a sign that the exams saga has dented confidence in the Government, the Conservatives have slipped six points behind Labour on which party is trusted on education.
An overwhelming 79 per cent think ministers handled the exams situation badly, including 72 per cent of Tory voters.
Some 59 per cent believe Mr Johnson should have returned from his holiday to address the crisis, while two-thirds said they want him to be more visible as PM.
On Monday, the Government performed a turnabout on Alevel results just days after they were published, allowing students to receive their teacher-assessed grades, instead of those moderated by a controversial algorithm.
They also cancelled a plan to similarly adjust GCSE grades. The Prime Minister’s approval rating for his overall handling of coronavirus crisis has tumbled 12 percentage points to -15 in the past three months. But the biggest casualty in the standings is Mr Williamson who now has a net approval rating of -39.
According to the poll, 54 per cent believe he should resign compared to just 19 per cent who think he should stay, while 52 per cent think he is unfit to lead efforts to reopen classrooms with just 12 per cent in disagreement.
The poll revealed that most people are worried about the possibility of a spike in coronavirus infections in the coming months. Some 81 per cent expect a second wave in the UK this winter, but only 37 per cent are confident in the Government’s ability to handle it.
JL Partners interviewed 2,027 British adults online in the poll conducted on Wednesday and Thursday.
Sajid Javid, the former chancellor, warned that not enough had been done to make sure children kept learning through the coronavirus crisis.
In an interview with The Times, he revealed that he personally lobbied the Prime Minister to ditch the system that saw thousands of students have their A-Level marks downgraded.
He said: ‘I went to an FE (further education) college.
‘If I’d been awarded my A levels on the basis of an algorithm like that, I wouldn’t have been the first member of my family to go to university.’
Comment – Page 16
‘Lays bare scale of voter anger’
A FARMER last night accused Boris Johnson of failing to set a good example after the Prime Minister camped on his field without permission.
Kenny Cameron was left bewildered after discovering that Mr Johnson and his fiancée Carrie Symonds had pitched a tepee-style tent on his land during their stay in the Highlands.
The couple had been staying in a remote coastal cottage, but erected a makeshift campsite on Mr Cameron’s field next door – without asking him.
The sheep farmer said he became aware of this only yesterday – the day the Scottish Daily Mail published the first photographs of the Prime Minister’s cottage hideout, complete with the canvas bell-tent nearby.
Mr Cameron said he was particularly annoyed that the couple had lit a fire on the land after weeks of dry weather, leaving a pile of blackened wood at the site. He said it appeared they had climbed over a wire fence on to his land, without using a nearby gate.
He said he had been offered an apology by the Prime Minister’s Metropolitan Police security team, but added that the tent ‘wouldn’t have been an issue’ if Mr Johnson had asked first.
Mr Cameron said: ‘Mr Johnson is meant to be leading the country and yet he is not setting a great example. Usually if people want to go inside a fenced area, they ask for permission first, but I was not asked at all. It is only polite to ask.
‘He could have put up his tent in the garden of the cottage and there would have been no problem – but he didn’t do that.’
The Prime Minister has been accused of being ‘invisible’ during the A-level results fiasco by refusing to interrupt his Scottish holiday to offer sympathy to pupils.
Despite using social media to congratulate GCSE pupils and to comment on the sentencing of the Manchester Arena bomber’s brother, Mr Johnson has refused to apologise for the embarrassing U-turn that saw a controversial marking algorithm scrapped.
The Prime Minister travelled 645 miles from Downing Street to the three-bedroom property on the isolated Applecross peninsula with Miss Symonds, their son Wilfred and dog Dilyn last weekend.
Just hours after Mr Johnson left the bolthole yesterday, Mr Cameron arrived to find the tent still there. The crofter, who has leased the 20-acre plot for two decades, said he had been tipped off about the tent, and feared it would be left to ‘blow away in the wind’.
As he arrived at the property, he had no idea about the identity of the guests who had been using it. However, the situation quickly became apparent when two of Mr Johnson’s bodyguards arrived and started to take down the tent.
The specialist officers apologised to Mr Cameron, saying that they and the Prime Minister had believed the field was part of the cottage. One said: ‘We are going to take the tent down and clear away any rubbish.’
The farmer questioned why Mr Johnson appeared to have crossed on to his land over a 3ft fence rather using a gate just 20 yards away, although he admitted the couple caused no damage during their stay. Mr Cameron told the
Mail: ‘When people ask if they can camp, it’s no bother at all as long as they leave the place the way they find it and do no damage.
‘It wouldn’t have been an issue if he had asked permission, used the gate and didn’t have a fire in those conditions.’
Asked if Mr Johnson was a welcome guest on the peninsula, Mr Cameron, a supporter of independence, said: ‘I’m just not keen on people coming to the area at the moment with this Covid-19.
‘We’ve avoided it so far but the number of people coming to this area is now ridiculous.’
The tent was pitched just 50 yards from the cottage, a renovated 19th-century school house on the banks of the Inner Sound, a strait with sweeping sea views of the Inner Hebrides.
Downing Street last night refused to comments on the claims that Mr Johnson had camped on the land without permission.
Holidaymakers in Scotland told how Mr Johnson was seen enjoying hikes with his family as the row over exams raged.
The Prime Minister is expected back at work next week, though his whereabouts last night remained unclear.
Mr Johnson last month said he would be working ‘flat out’ through the summer but revealed plans to escape for a mini-break at some point.
Opposition leaders and Tory MPs have questioned why the Prime Minister refused to intervene in the school exams fiasco that threw university admissions into chaos. The furore prompted widespread calls for Education Secretary Gavin Williamson to resign.
Earlier this year, Mr Johnson was called a ‘part-time prime minister’ by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn for refusing to cut short a break to respond to flooding in the UK.
‘Usually, people ask permission first’
‘Leave the place the way they find it’
THE term ‘ghost town’ conjures images of dust-swept pioneer settlements in the American Old West.
However, in this country and in short order, we may see high streets left for dead by the slow climb out of lockdown.
The continued closure of offices is driving this decline because businesses in the hospitality and service sectors count office workers among their biggest clients.
When offices lie empty, so do the coffee bars and sandwich delis that surround them; there are no Friday evening drinks after work and no taxis home. When printers stand unused and stationery cupboards fully stocked, suppliers of ink, paper and other workplace essentials see their profits dwindle. During a pandemic, the economy can work like a Heath Robinson contraption, with each business closure spurring a chain reaction that shutters another business and another after that.
Imagine your local shopping thoroughfare without the familiar pubs or tea rooms or family-owned butchers.
Businesses such as these do not have to imagine such an eventuality: they are staring it in the face.
When it emerges that civil servants may not return to their desks until next March, it confirms the fears of thousands of business owners that the Covid chain reaction will reach them soon.
That chain can only be broken by getting as many people back to work as soon and as safely as possible.
This is not an ideological choice of economic growth versus good health.
Without either, the other is impossible. Growth funds the NHS which keeps us healthy, but if we imperil our health by letting the virus run rampant, the economy will groan under the strain of absences and further lockdowns.
Therefore, a balance must be struck that keeps office workers safe and keeps businesses from death’s door.
If the Scottish Government fails to do so, high streets risk being hollowed out, turned into ghost towns where the queues for local shops and restaurants have been replaced by one long line outside the Jobcentre.