Failure is the Key to Success

From the spring term to the summer term, following the fee rise, 40% of those taking musical instrument tuition with Bedfordshire Music Service have cancelled their lessons.

This isn’t as high a number as I was expecting, however many people may be doing the same as us, seeing it through to the end of the summer term. It will be interesting to see the figures again in the autumn term.

From the council’s Agenda for the Executive meeting on 7th December 2010, fees, charges and other activities provided funding of £1,105,000. If we said 3,000 people having tuition at £100 a term, that raises £900,000 leaving the ‘charges and other activites’ with the remaining £205,000.

The fees went up 69% and the numbers dropped 40%, so that would be 1,800 people paying £169, raising £912,000, not a massive change from the original amount raised. Does this mean the fees have to go up again to cover the shortfall. I guess not, as the number of staff hours needed to teach would have dropped by 40% in line with the cancellations. Maybe the 40% staffing costs is enough to provide a cost neutral service, but at what cost.

Intentional or otherwise, the impact of these reductions in numbers of users of the service cannot be good for the future of music in Bedfordshire schools.

Tags:Bedfordshire Music Service,Dunstable Music Centre,music centre

I was reading the minutes of the CHILDREN’S SERVICES OVERVIEW & SCRUTINY COMMITTEE that took place on Tuesday, 29 March 2011 10.00 a.m. and was interested to read about the stakeholder meeting that took place on 22nd March at Dunstable Fire Station.

From the minutes:

The Portfolio Holder for Children’s Services provided the Committee with the following information:-

…

A meeting had been held on Tuesday 22 March 2001 at Dunstable Fire Station, to which all stakeholders associated with the music service were invited.  It was reported that only 18 people attended which was very disappointing.  In response to this, several Members of the Committee raised concern that they did now know that the meeting had taken place and that they did not receive an invite and therefore questioned the method of communication taken to inform stakeholders of the meeting.  Following a detailed conversation about these concerns, Councillor Mrs A M Lewis clarified that a letter had been issued to all stakeholders and that schools had been asked to cascade the invite to all parents.

…

Now either Councillor Mrs A M Lewis is wrong about the date of the meeting, the one that Jo and attended was held on Tuesday 15th March, or even worse another meeting was held a week later. Continue reading » Stakeholder meeting regarding music service

Tags:Bedfordshire Music Service,Central Bedfordshire Council,Dunstable Music Centre

Just over a month ago, we signed up to npower’s ‘hometeam 50 boiler care flexi’ boiler and central heating cover for £15 a month.

Within a few days, they contacted me to arrange the initial inspection and today was the day agreed.

The engineer turned up and I showed him into the living room. He looked at the fire and said, ‘there’s the fire, where’s the boiler?’. I told him it was a back boiler. ‘Oh’ he says, ‘we don’t service back boilers with that type of fire’ indicating the gas fire on the front.

So, that had to be the shortest boiler service in history. He check the air vent wasn’t blocked and the chimney and that was it.

He filled in on their system to have my contract cancelled and my money refunded.

I’ve just been looking again at the T&C for the contract and and section 7.3 under the elegibilty section is a gem:

• 7.3 We may not accept on to a Product some Boiler makes and models. We will notify You of this either when You request the Product or when We are required to carry out Work under this Agreement.

So basically I took a day off work for absolutely nothing! If they had asked me for the boiler model, surely they could have told me up front they cannot service it.

For anyone wondering if they would be in the same situation, I have a Potterton Housewarmer 55 gas fired back boiler and a Potterton Presence 2 Inset Decorative Gas Fire.

Tags:boiler service,npower

Imagine you take over a company making widgets. The typical market price for widgets is £50. You have many customers who buy a widget every few months at your selling price of £40. The problem is it is costing you £65 to make your widgets. After a business review, you decide to increase your selling price to £65, you give your customer base a couple of weeks to cancel their regular purchase or accept the price rise.

The obvious outcome, is that your customers will take their business elsewhere, rather than paying over the market price for your goods.

Continue reading » Update on the future of Central Bedfordshire Music Service

Tags:Bedfordshire Music Service,Dunstable Music School,music centre,music school

Back in November, Central Bedfordshire Council announced plans to cut funding to the Bedfordshire Music Service. Bedfordshire Music is the principal provider of instrumental education and musical enrichment opportunities in the county of Bedfordshire.

Their Overview and Scrutiny Committee met on 23rd November 2010 and recommended that any decision about the service should be deferred until after the Henley Review had published its report – due in February 2011.

On 7th December 2010, the Executive Committee met and it was reported at the time that the committee had accepted the the recommendations of the Scrutiny Committee. The main recommendations were:
• to await the report of the Henley Review, which was expected in early January, before making any decisions about funding for the Music Service, and
• to disaggregate the Service – i.e. to split it up between Bedford Borough (which is currently not proposing any cuts) and Central Bedfordshire.

After looking at the minutes of that meeting, http://www.centralbedfordshire.gov.uk/modgov/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=3370&T=1, there is no mention of waiting for the Henley Review, only the disaggregation.

Continue reading » The destruction of Bedfordshire Music Service

Tags:Bedfordshire Music Service,Dunstable Music School,music centre,music school

Yesterday, 21st May, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith made the announcement to the House of Commons that the Gurkha Justice Campaign have been fighting for for years. All ex-Gurkhas who have served more than 4 years in the British Army will have the right to settle in the UK if they wish.

For the first time I had contacted my MP Andrew Selous, via www.theyworkforyou.com, at the end of April and asked if he could support the vote in Parliament calling for a fair deal for Gurkhas and had an email back that evening to say that he would be voting in support of the Gurkhas. Following the government’s defeat in the Commons over the issue, it was only a matter of time before they had to bow to public opinion.

Tags:Gurhka,Gurhka Justice Campaign