Picking up the pieces

That there is a crisis within the NHS caused by years of underfunding and mismanagement is common knowledge, even among those who seem to believe that the Tories are the right party to clean up a mess they themselves caused. Less well documented is the fact that the education system is also at breaking point - and it doesn't have anything to do with teaching.

Liz Lightfoot's Guardian article on the bleak realities of life on the front line is essential if horrifying reading, detailing as it does the devastating consequences of austerity measures for the nation's children and the unbearable strains that schools and teachers are under as they find themselves forced to deal with the fall-out of Tory policies. It's just a shame that the piece wasn't published before the election.