Last Call for Democracy

Do you want to light a candle for democracy in your western window next Halloween? Harriet Harman snubbed Graham Stuart's request for a parliamentary debate on home education. The Special Minister of Elective Home Education calls upon the 5000+ people who responded to the consultation, to add their annotation (CLICK HERE and hide video) and demand their democratic right to be heard.

Invasion of the Voice Snatchers

The Special Minister of Elective Home Education recommends that all children beware of the Voice Snatcher after worrying rumours that Maggie Atkinson wants to be the voice for children. As she has already shown her reluctance to be held accountable the Special Minister is concerned that the newly appointed Children's Commissioner will change the children's voices to please Mr Balls' ears.

Play Balls or Play your Trump Card

The Special Minister of Elective Home Education calls on all bubble blowers, mass lobbyists, not-back-to-school picnickers, respondants to reviews and consultations, extremely domestics, elective home educators and other people who feel the need to uphold democracy, to gather at Scotland Yard and demand to have our picture taken for the police spotter cards. And, to be non-discriminatory, we can then take theirs for our own Top Trumps pack.

The Show Goes On

The Special Minister of Elective Home Education announces the arrival of a new star in Ed Balls' puppet theatre: Maggie Atkinson.
Maggie's ability to repeat spin and spout lies has secured her the post of England's Commissioner for (a select number of) Children and given Ed Balls the opportunity to once again show his contempt for democracy.

Can you believe it?

The Special Minister of Elective Home Education would like to know why Peter Travis is concerned about people home educating for religious reasons, when Graham Badman himself in his Report declared his beliefs no less than 16 times, and his Recommendations are clearly an attempt to inculcate home educated children with his religiously held views.

The truth behind Truancy

In response to the highest truancy level ever the Special Minister of Elective Home Education states that "missing school for a good reason - lack of suitable education - is totally acceptable" and "the best education to succeed in life takes place outside the classroom, in real life".

Ed Balls and Democracy

It took the Special Minister of Elective Home Education ages to think of a - grammatically - positive statement with the words "Ed Balls" and "democracy" in it, and this is it.

24 hours and adding up...

With the Consultation deadline in 24 hours (Monday 19 October 23.45hrs) the Special Minister of Elective Home Education sits back to reflect on the more than 3750 responses that have already gone in and wonders what more it will take...

Health and safety checks on DCSF personnel

The Special Minister of Elective Home Education is now commissioning a team of health specialists to do eye and ear checks on Ed Balls and other DCSF functionaries, after rumours - substantiated by careful observation and analysis - about their selective loss of hearing and (in)sight. We recommend the specialists are given the authority to examine the subjects on their own, and simultaneously make sure their heart is still in the correct place.

Compensation

The Special Minister of Elective Home Education recommends that the budget for the proposed 2010 consultations about full-time and suitable education will instead be used to compensate a fraction of the time and efforts Elective Home Educators put into educating government, local authorities and the national press.

Exemption

The Special Minister of Elective Home Education recommends that, to compensate the wrongful and damaging assaults on their reputation and integrity, Elective Home Educators will from now on be exempt from consultations, reviews and other sneaky threats to their freedom.

Count us in, Graham!

"The Special Minister for Elective Home Education is pleased to hear that former science teacher Graham Badman has stated that he can count. Now for higher maths, Graham. Multiplying and percentages. Starting from the 2000 vociferous objectors to your proposals..."

Do we need a Special Commissioner for children in EHE?

The Special Minister of Elective Home Education is utterly horrified to learn that, like Vijay Patel of NSPCC, the proposed Children's Commissioner for England, one Maggie Atkinson, has no qualms to rob an innocent child's grave by falsely suggesting that her tragic death was due to elective home education. We look forward to Maggie undertaking further research, and apologising for her uninformed opinion.

Need to know

"Research by the Special Minister of Elective Home Education has shown that it took a 14yo home educated child less time to find out what carbon sequestration was, than it took Graham Badman to not understand what autonomous education is."

EHE children at risk from lying newspapers

"Study of today's (13-10-2009) Guardian  shows that home educated children are being severely disadvantaged by biased and/or uninformed newspaper articles with discriminatory and sensationalist headlines," says the Special Minister of Elective Home Education.

Every child a voice and a choice

"The Special Minister for Elective Home Education agrees with Mr Badman that every child should have a voice and a choice, and therefore strongly recommends that all children of school age will be given the right to visit their LA at least once a year - accompanied by whoever they feel is appropriate accompaniment - to state their preferred form of education."

Suitability of LA staff

"The Special Minister for Elective Home Education is announcing a review into the level of education of LA staff, after worrying rumours that over eighty-five (85!!) percent of them haven't done their homework for, and were truanting during the training regarding legislation and regulation on home education."

Suitable education

"The Special Minister for Elective Home Education is announcing a review of school education, after worrying rumours that an estimated 3-6 million children are not receiving education suitable to their age, aptitude and ability and any special needs they may have."

It is time...

for home educators to step out of the shadows, says Mr Badman.
So here we are.
To ministrate and to serve.
As a ministry should.