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mattiroberts.bsky.social
@mattiroberts.bsky.social
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colinelves.bsky.social
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Smajo Beso • Follow 3d • © I started school in Newcastle in Year 5 without knowing a word of English. I was nine years old and had arrived as a refugee from Bosnia just a couple of months earlier. I was one of those strangers our politicians often speak about. I missed my grandparents and friends. I was having awful nightmares, and I would wake up screaming every single night. I hated going to school. I would sit in my chair, look out of the window, and spend my day daydreaming about ways to run back to Bosnia. I didn't want to be here. After a couple of weeks at school, my teacher, Miss Webster, and my classmates did something special to help me settle, something that made me feel less of a stranger. That was the first day I went home with a smile on my face. I have shared this story before, but as tomorrow is start of the new school year, I thought I would share it again. ** Miss Webster was amazing, but I couldn't understand a word she was saying. She had this ritual where, at the end of each day, we would all sit on the floor around her, she would play the guitar, and we would all sing a song together. I couldn't understand what they were singing, but I could see she would sing one part of the song, then she would say someone's name or point to them. The next part of the song would be sung with that person's name in it, and they would get to go home first. My classmates loved this, but I hated it. It annoyed me because I couldn't understand what they were singing, but if I am honest, l hated it mainly because of how happy they all were. I definitely wasn't happy. I cried myself to sleep nearly every night. I eventually started having separate English lessons, which I enjoyed more because it took me out of the classroom. It was always daunting coming to school because I felt everyone was looking at me or speaking about me. For months, my dad would stand with me outside the school gates in the morning until it was time to go in. One day I came back into the classroom from my English lesson. We sat down, and everyone was extra-excited, looking at me more than usual for some reason. Of course, I thought it was because I was a refugee, because I couldn't speak English, or because they couldn't pronounce my name. I was bracing myself for another afternoon of my classmates encouraging me to sing. This was probably the closest I came to running out. So we were all sitting on the floor around Miss Webster. She was holding her guitar, ready to sing. I remember the sun shining through the tall, narrow windows as I slowly drifted into a daydream of being back in Bosnia. She began playing the guitar, my classmates joined in, but this time, everything was different. I froze. I understood what they were signing. Not because I had miraculously learned English in one afternoon, but because they were singing in Bosnian for me. I looked around in shock, and they were all smiling at me, and for a moment I thought I was daydreaming. While I was having separate English lessons, Miss Webster had taught our entire class to sing this song for me in Bosnian. They sang it terribly, but it was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard. I skipped home that day with a huge smile on my face. For the first time, I looked forward to going back to school the next day. I have often imagined Miss Webster and my classmates rehearsing, struggling with the strange Bosnian words and laughing at themselves. For me, that effort was the ultimate recognition, an act of peace that felt like the opposite of everything I had known during the war. It was special. I do not know if they realised it then, but that moment helped to give me back my dignity, my belonging, and, for the first time in a long time, I didn't feel like I was just a refugee or an outsider. I was home.
September 3, 2025 at 8:59 PM
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johnharris1969.bsky.social
Starmer's concessions, then. Imagine 2 disabled ppl with similar PIP scores. One receives PIP, the other is about to apply. The first is now spared the worst to save the PM's skin. The other will still be immiserated. And note: there are more of the latter (430,000 by 2030) than the former (370,000)
June 27, 2025 at 7:37 AM
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martinbarrow.bsky.social
A record 4.5 million children are living in poverty in the UK, according to official statistics.

www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
Record 4.5m children living in poverty, UK data shows
Government urged to scrap two-child benefit cap after chancellor announces welfare cuts in spring statement
www.theguardian.com
March 27, 2025 at 3:38 PM
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joshhalliday.bsky.social
Twenty years ago, Peter Lodge wrote to the Guardian to complain about the state’s treatment of family carers.

In 2022, he died suddenly at the home he shared with his severely disabled son, David, who had no way to call for help.

1/5
March 24, 2025 at 6:48 AM
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riverlorien.bsky.social
Would you be happy if you - or your 25 year old - could only leave the house a couple of times a week? What if you (or they) had to go to bed at 7pm every day when a carer arrives? That's normal life for many disabled people because of poor social care, benefit cuts and years of political failure.
johnharris1969.bsky.social John Harris @johnharris1969.bsky.social · Jan 19
Might be one of the most important, urgent things I've ever written: 50% of social care spending is on disabled people, but that part of the mounting care crisis is completely ignored www.theguardian.com/uk/commentis...
Opinion | The Guardian
Latest opinion, analysis and discussion from the Guardian. CP Scott: "Comment is free, but facts are sacred"
www.theguardian.com
January 19, 2025 at 6:06 PM
Reposted
beckymontacute.bsky.social
💷 Happy budget day 💷

Before we find out more on the new govt's plans this afternoon, and following on from the new Sutton Trust report (by @samfr.bsky.social) out earlier this week - where is education at right now, and what has changed over time?

A thread of LOTS of graphs 📈 📊
October 30, 2024 at 9:25 AM
Reposted
freewheeling.info
Outcomes are cataclysmic.

Allow my autistic daughter to put it in her own words, which she did with eloquence:

howtobeme59.wordpress.com/2024/06/08/t...

It costs more to do the wrong thing in the wrong way
The System is Broken…and it almost broke me
Photo by Joshua Hoehne on Unsplash Ever since I started this blog, I knew I would write this article at some point. And I haven’t yet because it was too personal, too close to home. But now I…
howtobeme59.wordpress.com
October 22, 2024 at 7:29 PM