Cadbury

I wrote about the loss of Cadburys before hearing of the move to Poland. Sadly it shows the difference between the ethics of the Cadbury originators who built Bournville and Krafts who can only see the bottom line and forget about those who have spent a lifetime making the company and its reputation so that it was worth buying in the first place.

Cadburys

I am not enough of an economist to know whether selling Cadburys is good for the country or the employees. On a personal note being distantly related to the Cadburys through my grandmother, I am sad that a company which stood for more than a commercial enterprise and even if in paternalistic way tried to better the position of their employees has disappeared into an american company believing in free enterprise.

The Quaker companies are now basically a thing of the past but they tried to combine business with ethical behaviour. Perhaps we could do with some of their ideals in present circumstances. My own great grandfather was chairman of the board on the National Temperance Hospital and was involved with the The National Temperance Building Society. Perhaps if we still had the latter's approach we might have avoided the recent housing and banking crisis.

Progress?

To me the march against a liberal society started with the 1978 speech by Callaghan on education. Although he was not in power long enough after this to change the educational system, he instituted a fundamental change in the purpose of education. Education as opposed to teaching was to develop the person being educated. Instead education was changed to be a servant of the system and industry. Its measure was how well it equipped people to fulfil the needs of the workplace.

This change meant that school children were being trained to fit the needs as seen by government and industry rather than becoming critical thinking individuals who could adapt to new situations. Perhaps this is most seen in tertiary education. An undergraduate degree was in most cases designed to develop ways of researching and analytical thinking. Since the rush for Universities for all the move has been to train young people to fit particular jobs in society. If it fails in this its purpose is removed and tax payers doubt the need for it. However earlier forms of tertiary education although too limited in number created flexible, critical thinkers who could adapt to a changing world. Unfortunately they would also apply their critical thinking to government and society - far too uncomfortable.