What the weeklies are saying

Courtesy Steve O,Brien-Economist
In this week's New Statesman,Martin Bright looks at the controversy over the speaker and thinks that it shows the class war between the two parties is far from over

anyone who believes this row isn't about class should spend some time in the tearooms and bars of the Palace of Westminster talking to Labour MPs. "Speaker Martin is a lightning rod for all of us," said one close ally of the Prime Minister. "I have never known such an open and vicious example of class snobbery in all my time in parliament."

A similar theme in the Economist where Bagehot says Contrary to conventional wisdom, the mother of parliaments is working better than ever

Parliament isn't only less woeful than it used to be: in some ways it is even actively good. MPs spend more time than ever helping their constituents. That helps to explain why—as with attitudes to, say, the NHS—general and particular perceptions are contradictory: people respect their own MPs while believing that as a pack they are villains

At the Spectator,Frazer Nelson looks at the New Tory education revolution and sets the scene

This summer, at least 25,000 children will drop out of English schools without a single qualification to show for their years of compulsory education. Some 240,000 will graduate from primary school unable to read or write properly. By autumn, some 250 schools judged to be failing will welcome an intake of new pupils. Youth unemployment will probably hit an 11-year high. It will, tragically, be just another year in one of the world’s highest-funded education systems.

Fraser believes that David Cameron will bring in the Swedish system inviting anyone to set up an independent school and recieve £6000 per pupil from the government.

And education in the economist which asks the cost of private schools soars, we look at what parents get for their money and tells us that

Those who left private schools in the 1980s and early 1990s can expect to earn 35% more in life than the average product of a state school, they found, around half of which can be attributed to education, not background. That, they calculated, means parents achieved an average 7% return on their investment in fees.