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October 6, 2009
It's always nice to know the British can be ignorant too, despite their nice accents.
In a savage attack, Andrew Grant, chairman of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference (HMC), compared the Government's crackdown on independent schools' charitable status to Henry VIII's seizure of land and property in the 1500s.. . .
He compared the move to Henry VIII's decision in the 1530s to shut down English monasteries and nunneries, confiscating all land and property for the crown. It was sold to pay for Government expenditure.
Addressing headmasters on Monday, Mr Grant said: "Let's be clear: the threat that currently underlies the Charity Commission's guidance is the well-tried mediaeval one of confiscation of land and property and it looks no less crude and ugly under the rose of Labour than it did under the rose of Tudor. Down in St Albans, we've been there before, of course, in 1539, when the monastery was dissolved."
By any stretch of the historiographical imagination, of course, Henry VIII is Renaissance or Early Modern. Keep your objurgations more current, Mr. Grant!
Then there's this interesting bit of academic class warfare:
The comments came as the University and College Union, which represents lecturers, said private schools' charitable status should be abolished. It claimed the £100m a year saving could pay for 20,000 extra university places.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at October 6, 2009 8:01 AM