With Mike Mackay, the YJB IT manager, on £336,000 per annum and many IT staff on over £100,000, the returns from this taxpayer-funded quango, for IT staff at least, are very lucrative indeed.
But the YJB has yet to explain why it is worth so much, and whether it delivers value for money. Mackay earns more than the vast majority of quango chiefs, including the head of the YJB, and more than the Prime Minister. On this basis he is worth 10 times what a frontline worker is in the secure estate. Perhaps the YJB could explain why this is the case - to us taxpayers and these workers.
- Patrick Watson, managing director, Montrose Public Affairs Consultants
CHILDMINDING NOT A LAST RESORT
Adam Nichols recently blogged about a campaign in parts of London to recruit people to train as childminders (www.cypnow.co.uk/adamnichols).
While I have not seen the adverts, I was appalled to hear that they implied that a career as a childminder was for people who had failed their exams or considered themselves to be at a loose end.
Registered childminders deliver the Early Years Foundation Stage and undertake ongoing professional development to continuously improve the quality of their services.
This campaign will upset many committed and professional childminders, who chose the profession as their career and really want to make a difference.
- Catherine Farrell, joint chief executive, National Childminding Association
EYFS IS A THREAT TO DIVERSITY
It is good to see one Steiner school granted exemption from the iron fist of the Early Years Foundation Stage (CYP Now, 27 August-2 September), but why only Steiner? Why should not every setting with a different philosophical approach have the freedom to apply it? And why should parents not have the right to choose from a variety of options the style of education that they believe most appropriate? Nature thrives only on diversity, and to eliminate all freedom of choice is to compromise our human evolution.
- Grethe Hooper Hansen, retired teacher, Bath
The editor, Children & Young People Now, 174 Hammersmith Road, London W6 7JP
Letters should include an address and phone number. All letters may be edited for publication - cypnow@haymarket.com, 020 8267 4706.
