2009-06-02

Who Gets Education in the Cabinet Reshuffle?

With the Labour Party likely to get massacred in Thursday's European and county elections, the Prime Minister is expected to radically overhaul his cabinet.

The good news seems to be that the Ministry for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) will be rid of Ed Balls, who as Secretary of State has presided over the college funding debacle and its 2.5 billion pound black hole. The bad news is that it sounds like this financial genius is heading for the Treasury as Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Another worry is that we will get our seventh Labour minister in charge of education in twelve years (test yourself, can you name them all?) It could be argued that Balls, and the others failed to get to grips with such a large department's activities, not just because he was only ever interested in promotion, but because no-one stays in post for long enough to understand the job.

And looking around at the Parliamentary Labour Party, it is hard to see who could do the job, hasn't done it already before moving quickly on and has avoided making injudicious expenses claims.

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