UK: Unions march for alternative economic choices and growth

EI’s British member organisations are backing their national Trades Union Congress (TUC) call for action and will join a March for the Alternative on 26 March.

The National Union of Teachers, the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers, and the University and College Union, will join other public and private sector unions in a national day of action.

They have supported calls from the TUC General Secretary, Brendan Barber, who said “the brutal austerity measures being implemented in Britain, on the back of a series of myths, half-truths and distortions have poisoned our public debate.”

Like Barber, EI’s affiliates in the UK believe that “the government's answer – to slash public spending with reckless speed – is based not on a sound reading of the evidence, but on an ideological zeal to shrink the size of the state,” and that “the so-called reforms in the National Health Service and education threaten the fundamental character of our public realm.”

Teacher unionists consider the Conservative Government’s decision to “spend more on servicing debt interest than on educating our children is just plain wrong” and wish to break down “the myths used by the government to justify its deep, rapid and unfair cuts and set out the case for an alternative based on jobs, investment and growth.”

According to the TUC, four myths exist: that the deficit was caused by out-of-control public spending; without drastic cuts, Britain would become the next Greece; Britain is like a household that has ‘maxed out’ on its credit card, and though it is a great sound bite, and one that the public can easily understand, that there is no alternative.

Barber noted that there is a “need to make jobs and growth the priority, keeping people in work, keeping tax revenues flowing, limiting the huge social costs of unemployment. And rather than swingeing cuts, we need a much more prominent role for progressive taxes - not least on the City and the bankers who caused this mess.”

EI supports the British TUC’s campaign, and calls on all teachers to join the major demonstration planned to take place on 26 March, with a message that pushes for a “genuine alternative with fair tax, growth and jobs at its heart, resonating with the public.”

source:http://www.ei-ie.org/news/news_details/1716

Pakistan schools campaign hopes to avert 'education emergency'

British-backed initiative aims to help overhaul a system that has left seven million children without primary education

Schoolchildren in Karachi. Pakistan has admitted it is failing to reach its UN education commitments

With millions of children out of school and one-fifth of teachers playing truant, Pakistan faces an "education emergency" that costs the economic equivalent of its flood disaster every year, a new campaign has warned.

The March for Education campaign, launched with British government backing, deploys stark statistics to draw a picture of a chronically ill system.

One in 10 of the world's out-of-school children live in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state that last year spent just 2% of GDP on education.

The number of children absent from primary school – seven million – is roughly equivalent to the population of its second largest city, Lahore.

Half of the population is illiterate and progress is painfully slow – at present rates the government will not deliver universal education in Balochistan, the largest province, until 2100.

"It's a challenge of global dimensions," said campaign spokesman Fasi Zaka.

The campaign calls on Pakistanis to petition the prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, to double education spending. Oddly, the campaign comes from within government itself – a sign, officials say, of how serious the problem has become.

"When half your population has no skills or education, it's a serious issue of state security," said Shahnaz Wazir Ali, co-chair of the government taskforce behind the campaign. "That's why we're going public with this. It's not just a government issue, it's a society issue."

Campaigners want to raise awareness in a country that is becoming dangerously polarised. Pakistan's elite educates its offspring at expensive schools in Pakistan or abroad, and so education has slipped off the political agenda.

The taskforce estimates an extra £725m a year is needed to gets the school system into shape. But money is not the main issue. At least 26 poorer countries send more children to school, but Pakistan's system has been eviscerated by decades of cronyism and mismanagement.

Politicians use schools as patronage, and although public teachers are relatively well-paid, 15%-20% are absent from class on any given day.

"There's very little accountability," said Wazir Ali, whose co-chair is Sir Michael Barber, a former education adviser to Tony Blair.

Critics said the campaign fails to focus on the outdated curriculum in Pakistani schools that promotes a narrow view of Islam, hatred of Hindus and other bigotry.

"The emergency is not that there's too little education but that there's an excess of miseducation," said Pervez Hoodbhoy, an academic and campaigner. "Decades ago there was less literacy and fewer students in schools. But children were not fed their daily diet of hate, and open minds were more welcome than today."

Under constitutional changes introduced last April, education became a right for all Pakistanis under 16. But the country is lagging far behind its south Asian neighbours. India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka say they are on track to meet their education commitments under the UN's millennium development goals programme by 2015; Pakistan has already admitted failure.

Last week UK development secretary Andrew Mitchell announced a huge aid injection to provide Pakistan with an extra four million school places and 90,000 new teachers by 2015. But a large proportion of the money will go into the booming private education sector, especially in Punjab province, in the hope of bypassing the creaking public school sector.

The campaign hopes to invigorate debate by publishing British-style education league tables, broken down by constituency. But it has stoked controversy over its claim to debunk myths about the country's controversial madrasa sector.

Just 6% of Pakistani children attend such religious schools, the campaign says – a figure critics say is too high.

"It's a staggering number," said Hoodbhoy, calling for an education system that "demands questioning, teaches skills and downplays indoctrination in favour of knowledge and enlightenment".

source:http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/mar/08/pakistan-faces-education-emergency

Obama to discuss Libya sanctions with France,Britian

Washington: President Barack Obama will Thursday discuss punitive measures against Libya, including sanctions, with British Prime Minister David Cameron and French President Nicolas Sarkozy, the White House said.

“They will be discussing Libya and they will be discussing different options that we can take,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said, saying the calls were due to take place later in the day.

“I am sure, broadly speaking, our options will be discussed,” he said, though he declined to detail exact steps Washington wanted to see taken, amid calls for sanctions and the establishment of a “no fly” zone over Libya.

“I am not ruling anything out,” Carney said, though acknowledged “sanctions are something we are looking at.”

“Exploring the options means just that,” Carney said, when asked whether the Pentagon was laying plans to enforce a “no fly zone” to protect civilians in Libya.

source:http://www.livemint.com/2011/02/25003205/Obama-to-discuss-Libya-sanctio.html