On Thursday 23 February, Camden (north London) branch of the National Union of Teachers drew over 100 people to a public meeting against the Education White Paper. A branch of CASE, the Campaign for the Advancement of State Education, was set up from the meeting as a vehicle for a united campaign by teachers and parents against the Government’s plans.
Disappointing in the meeting was the fact that none of the platform speakers — including Christine Blower, assistant general secretary of the NUT — went beyond denouncing the White Paper as “nonsense”, or said anything about how it could be defeated.
It was left to speakers from the floor to point out that the White Paper does make sense from a class — anti-working-class — point of view, and that it must be defeated by a strategy including industrial action and pressure on councils and school governors to pledge to defy its plan for “trust” schools.
