Ross Clark

The whole purpose of changing the grading structure for GCSE exams was supposed to be to guard against the curse of grade inflation – whereby, over time, it becomes easier and easier to gain a good grade. How unfortunate, then, that the government has inflated the grades before the first exam results using the new system are published in August. The new scheme replaces the existing A – G grades. In future, candidates will be awarded a grade from 1 to 9, with 1 being the highest level of attainment and 9 being the lowest. The bottom of grade 1 is to be aligned with the bottom of old grade G, and the bottom of grade 4 with the bottom of old grade C.

Predictably enough it didn’t take long for the rearguard Remain lobby, and other opponents of the government, to jump on the latest inflation figures, which show the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) for February rising from 1.8 per cent to 2.3 per cent. Frances O’ Grady of the TUC, for example, said that Britain risked ‘sleepwalking into another living standards crisis’. A little historical perspective might be in order, especially on the part of the TUC. Inflation of 2.3 per cent would have been a dream back in the late 1970s when its members were pushing the rate beyond 20 per cent through their endless wage demands.

Last Wednesday, Philip Hammond made a joke at Norman Lamont’s expense by reminding the world of how John Major’s first chancellor was sacked after a negative public reaction to his budget in 1993. Hammond, one suspects, is already beginning to regret his gag as Lamont today became the latest Conservative to damn his plans to raise National Insurance contributions on the self-employed. What has been so damaging is not so much the staged 2 per cent rise in contributions as the strong hint that he is considering going far further and equalising, as he sees it, the NI contributions of employed and the self-employed in the name of ‘fairness’.

If you want to know why we never seem to be able to develop a sensible and proportionate policy towards prosecuting sex offences look no further than the comment threads beneath this morning’s story about Chief Constable Simon Bailey. Bailey, speaking on the Today programme, suggested that men who view child porn should not automatically be jailed but should instead be cautioned, put on the sex offenders’ register and made to attend courses on offending. This, he says, has become necessary in order to concentrate police resources on the most dangerous offenders – those who are a physical risk to children – and to prevent the Crown Prosecution Service becoming clogged up with cases.

When you hear of universities rewarding their vice-chancellors fat salaries – they averaged £277,000 last year, up 5 per cent on the previous year – it would be easy to think that they have evolved into businesses, driven by a great spirit of enterprise. When universities minister Jo Johnson made the proposal for two year degrees, however, it didn’t take long for the nation’s academics to retreat beneath the comfort blanket of wanting universities to be a monolithic state provider of education. 'Accelerated degrees risk undermining the well-rounded education upon which our universities’ reputation is based', complained Sally Hunt, general secretary of the Universities and College Union.

Just when you were minded to think that Supreme Court judges were a bunch of diehard liberals whose fundamentalist belief in the application of human rights overrides common sense, they deliver a judgement which makes them look like the pathetic toadies of an authoritarian government. This morning the court upheld a rule that forbids British citizens bringing a foreign spouse into the country unless they (the British citizen, not the foreign spouse) is earning at least £18,600 a year (or £22,400 if they have one or more children). I am in favour of controls on immigration, but this is a rule which stinks of discrimination and injustice.

Many farmers, asserted the Earl of Sandwich in a Lords debate last July, were now experiencing ‘regrexit’ – having voted to leave the EU they were now realising that the £3.2 billion worth of subsidies they had received from the EU in 2013 were now under threat. Or were they? Whether any farmers really did suffer from pangs of regret last July, they will since have grasped that whatever happens to agricultural subsidies post-Brexit they might actually do rather well – not from collecting handouts but by growing food and selling it. Today, the Food and Drink Federation published its latest statistics on food exports. In common with so many economic figures published since last June they have defied predictions of doom.

Another week, and more good economic news which has not been awarded the attention it deserves. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has released economic growth figures for December, which show a much stronger-than-expected economy. Construction output in December was up 1.8 per cent on November, and 0.6 per cent up on December 2015. Manufacturing output in December was up 2.1 per cent on November and 4.0 per cent up on December 2015. There is encouragement in the export figures, too – which show just how strong a shot in the arm has been provided by the lower pound. In December British firms exported £31.4 billion worth of goods and services, 8.4 per cent up on November and 16 per cent higher than in December 2015.

In contrast to the many stranglers and IRA terrorists who have become cause célèbres for justice campaigners over the years, there has been no audible campaign claiming that Rolf Harris, jailed in 2014 for 12 historic sex offences, is a victim of a miscarriage of justice. Nevertheless, the failure yesterday of an attempt to convict him on further charges ought to raise the question: should we really be spending vast amounts of time and money prosecuting offences which are pretty low down the scale and which happened decades ago but were never reported until recently? Of course it is an offence to put your hand up the skirt of a 14-year-old girl – one of the charges against Harris on which the jury failed to reach a verdict.