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| Diary: another attack by the Gove-ite poison tweet assassin. Who's next in the crosshairs? | Diary: another attack by the Gove-ite poison tweet assassin. Who's next in the crosshairs? |
| (1 day later) | |
| • A front-page exposé in the Observer might reasonably have prompted the dark demented tweeter to tone it down; to reflect on the use of insults against those who doubt the brilliance of the education secretary. But not a bit of it. Whoever it is, and many fear it could be one of the Gove-ite spads, has continued firing off sometimes abusive tweets. One stream at 3.30am on Sunday began by talking about having "returned from an evening of Bach and sushi". The juvenile tone isn't helped by the constant, irritating use of the hash tag #winning. There's obvious bad blood between @toryeducation and the Obs, but we shan't dwell on that, for our assassin has now turned on the author, former children's laureate, and writer of the Dear Mr Gove letters, Michael Rosen. "Just another unscientific SWP relic who longs for total state control of schools and = angry cos losin," tweeted the assassin. "Why are you repeating an untruth about me? Withdraw it please," replied Rosen (@MichaelRosenYes), who doesn't actually belong to any political party. "What 'untruth'? That you're a socialist who wants the state to control schools instead of academy freedom? That 'untruth'?" Rosen tried again: "I'll try one more time. Please withdraw this untruth about me." The tweeter countered by linking a Guardian obit of SWP bigwig Chris Harman, authored by Rosen, and audio of the writer speaking at a Marxism event last year posted on SWP Online. A trump card? No, says Rosen. "I speak at all sorts of meetings. They are accusing someone of something that is not true, and from a position of anonymity. Pure McCarthyism." He says he won't sue; he doesn't believe in it. But he has reported @toryeducation to Twitter. | • A front-page exposé in the Observer might reasonably have prompted the dark demented tweeter to tone it down; to reflect on the use of insults against those who doubt the brilliance of the education secretary. But not a bit of it. Whoever it is, and many fear it could be one of the Gove-ite spads, has continued firing off sometimes abusive tweets. One stream at 3.30am on Sunday began by talking about having "returned from an evening of Bach and sushi". The juvenile tone isn't helped by the constant, irritating use of the hash tag #winning. There's obvious bad blood between @toryeducation and the Obs, but we shan't dwell on that, for our assassin has now turned on the author, former children's laureate, and writer of the Dear Mr Gove letters, Michael Rosen. "Just another unscientific SWP relic who longs for total state control of schools and = angry cos losin," tweeted the assassin. "Why are you repeating an untruth about me? Withdraw it please," replied Rosen (@MichaelRosenYes), who doesn't actually belong to any political party. "What 'untruth'? That you're a socialist who wants the state to control schools instead of academy freedom? That 'untruth'?" Rosen tried again: "I'll try one more time. Please withdraw this untruth about me." The tweeter countered by linking a Guardian obit of SWP bigwig Chris Harman, authored by Rosen, and audio of the writer speaking at a Marxism event last year posted on SWP Online. A trump card? No, says Rosen. "I speak at all sorts of meetings. They are accusing someone of something that is not true, and from a position of anonymity. Pure McCarthyism." He says he won't sue; he doesn't believe in it. But he has reported @toryeducation to Twitter. |
| • And after Gove's abandonment of plans to foist the English baccalaureate on long-suffering schools, many are wondering: is he Mr Magoo in disguise, able to stumble from disaster to calamity without ever being aware of the wreckage? Worth looking at the chaos in his department, which has been failing to deal with correspondence and questions from parliament. Confronted by the procedure committee, there was nothing for our man to do but grovel. "You cannot be bottom of the league table in Whitehall by such a wide margin as we are and be anything other than deeply disappointed at the incredibly poor performance of the department when it comes to parliamentary questions," Gove told the chair, Charles Walker. "On behalf of the department I would like to apologise to you, to the committee and to the house." This really isn't good enough, harrumphed Walker. "I hope there really is a determination to sort this out and to get to a level where you can be proud of the performance of your department in delivering answers to parliamentary questions." Soundly thrashed, Gove was dismissed. | • And after Gove's abandonment of plans to foist the English baccalaureate on long-suffering schools, many are wondering: is he Mr Magoo in disguise, able to stumble from disaster to calamity without ever being aware of the wreckage? Worth looking at the chaos in his department, which has been failing to deal with correspondence and questions from parliament. Confronted by the procedure committee, there was nothing for our man to do but grovel. "You cannot be bottom of the league table in Whitehall by such a wide margin as we are and be anything other than deeply disappointed at the incredibly poor performance of the department when it comes to parliamentary questions," Gove told the chair, Charles Walker. "On behalf of the department I would like to apologise to you, to the committee and to the house." This really isn't good enough, harrumphed Walker. "I hope there really is a determination to sort this out and to get to a level where you can be proud of the performance of your department in delivering answers to parliamentary questions." Soundly thrashed, Gove was dismissed. |
| • But he has his work cut out, for the malaise runs deep. Dr Geraldine Boocock from Lancashire tells us she was one of those caught up in the Gove-ian shambles. "After the recent death of my longstanding civil partner Kathleen Tattersall, ex-chair of Ofqual, Mr Gove sent a handwritten, warm personal letter of condolence." That was nice. But he sent it "to one of her colleagues". But, says Boocock, the DfE is at least a responsive organisation. "After four telephone calls over a period of a week and an email to his private office I did receive an apology and an assurance that the distressing error would be corrected." A letter from Gove arrived yesterday. She's lucky. One MP asked Gove to list his recent meetings with media executives. That took six weeks. | • But he has his work cut out, for the malaise runs deep. Dr Geraldine Boocock from Lancashire tells us she was one of those caught up in the Gove-ian shambles. "After the recent death of my longstanding civil partner Kathleen Tattersall, ex-chair of Ofqual, Mr Gove sent a handwritten, warm personal letter of condolence." That was nice. But he sent it "to one of her colleagues". But, says Boocock, the DfE is at least a responsive organisation. "After four telephone calls over a period of a week and an email to his private office I did receive an apology and an assurance that the distressing error would be corrected." A letter from Gove arrived yesterday. She's lucky. One MP asked Gove to list his recent meetings with media executives. That took six weeks. |
| • It's cold and will only get colder, with forecasters predicting another month of Arctic conditions. Can we cope? Some have more confidence than others. Recently, blizzard conditions in Moscow meant a delayed departure for a British Airways flight – and arrival 15 minutes late at Heathrow. Apologies, said the pilot ruefully as he taxied towards Terminal 5. But, he continued, bear in mind that if the same conditions had been in London, we would not have left Heathrow until next week. Harsh but true, you might think. | • It's cold and will only get colder, with forecasters predicting another month of Arctic conditions. Can we cope? Some have more confidence than others. Recently, blizzard conditions in Moscow meant a delayed departure for a British Airways flight – and arrival 15 minutes late at Heathrow. Apologies, said the pilot ruefully as he taxied towards Terminal 5. But, he continued, bear in mind that if the same conditions had been in London, we would not have left Heathrow until next week. Harsh but true, you might think. |
| • Darn those cyber gremlins. For we clicked, eager to read the archived Lib Dem press release: "Better policing: more effective prisons – Huhne sets out route to cutting crime". And what appeared? Nothing. | • Darn those cyber gremlins. For we clicked, eager to read the archived Lib Dem press release: "Better policing: more effective prisons – Huhne sets out route to cutting crime". And what appeared? Nothing. |
| Diary@guardian.co.uk Twitter: @hugh_muir | Diary@guardian.co.uk Twitter: @hugh_muir |