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wanted, how they should be organised, whensuch provision should be state-funded and/orwhen it should be self-directed and privatelyfunded. Such debates are beyond the scope ofthis chapter, though they are discussed elsewherein this volume. But we need to have those debateswith renewed confidence about the value of adulteducation. We live in an imperfect society,whose defining features at present are an ageingpopulation and the slow-motion collapse of ourdominant economic model. Adult educationintrinsically acknowledges imperfections andis a means by which people and communitiescan change direction, at however late a stage;it is both a practical and a utopian endeavour.If we are to build something closer to the GoodSociety, adult education will need to be at itsheart.Education for the good society | 43
1 The Learning Age: A Renaissancefor a New Britain, Cm 3790, TheStationery Office, 1998.2 Tom Schuller and DavidWatson, Learning Through Life:Inquiry into the Future for LifelongLearning, NIACE, 2009.9. Lifelong learning:chimera, head-nodderor awkward customer?Tom SchullerLibrarians are rumoured, entirely unfairly, to befond of saying ‘which part of “no” is it that youdon’t understand?’. Sometimes I feel the sameway when I’m asked about lifelong learning.After all, the words which make up the term areall part of day-to-day discourse. But that is beingunfair to the questioner, since it remains truethat lifelong learning is still a concept which is farfrom clearly defined and understood.An alternative, equally common, response,is a sympathetic but slightly impatient nod: yesyes, of course we all agree lifelong learning is aGood Thing, but let’s get on to the issues thatreally have a grip on the political imagination:school selection, or higher education funding.Again, this is an understandable reaction, as theseare indeed the items that are foremost in manyfamilies’ minds, and therefore in the ruminationsof politicians.These are just two of the reasons why it isso hard to get a solid debate going on lifelonglearning. Another is the perennial difficulty oftackling an issue that spans sectoral boundaries:not just several educational sectors, not justeducation and training, but these plus health,social care, community development and so on.I’m not going here to do the job of definitiveclarification, nor offer the compelling rationalefor lifelong learning. The acknowledged sourcefor this is David Blunkett’s foreword to the 1998green paper The Learning Age, a (sadly typical)example of the unfulfilled promise held out byearly New Labour. 1 Instead I want to address thepolitics of lifelong learning in quite a pragmaticway but raising, I hope, some awkward questions,which political rhetoric on its own will not beenough to deal with.However, just to be clear about the scope oflifelong learning as I understand it, I’m stickingwith the approach we used in Learning ThroughLife, the main report of the Inquiry into theFuture of Lifelong Learning:Lifelong learning includes people of all ageslearning in a variety of contexts – in educationalinstitutions, at work, at home and through leisureactivities. It focuses mainly on adults returningto organised learning rather than on the initialperiod of education or on incidental learning. 2Some of the awkward issues for me about thepolitics of the issue are:• What is the nature of the educational contractbetween generations?• What is the desired balance between marketand non-market provision?• How do we reconcile personal aspirationsand preferences with education’s role as apromoter of social cohesion?By ‘awkward’ I mean politically challengingissues on which people who share similar valuesmay well disagree.Intergenerational justice andeducational effectivenessIn Learning Through Life we show the grossimbalance in the way public and private expenditureon education is weighted towards theyoungest adult age group. We defined this as18–25, the other three groups being 25–50, 50–75and 75+ (for the social and epidemiologicalrationale for these divisions, see www.niace.org.uk/lifelonglearninginquiry). We estimated thetotal to be of the order of £55 billion annually; 86per cent of this goes to the first age group, 12 percent to the second, with trivial amounts to theThird Age and virtually nothing to the FourthAge. There is now a window of opportunity,with the demographic decline in the numbersof young people, to achieve a rebalancing acrossage groups without this resulting in per capitareduction in expenditure on young people. Thatproposition, of course, looks implausible in thelight of the furore over student finance. Reducingstill further the public investment in youngpeople would not immediately recommend itselfto anyone just now. Yet the argument remains.What we need is a serious debate on educationas part of the intergenerational contract. Thebooks by Ed Howker and Shiv Malik (Jilted44 | www.compassonline.org.uk
Page 1 and 2: Educationfor theGoodSocietyThe valu
Page 3 and 4: Acknowledgements:Compass would like
Page 5 and 6: ContributorsLisa Nandy is Labour MP
Page 7 and 8: IntroductionEducation for the Good
Page 9 and 10: 1 This article has been developedou
Page 11 and 12: 8 See Ann Hodgson, Ken Spoursand Ma
Page 13 and 14: 13 The most comprehensiverecent res
Page 15 and 16: 1 See for example B. Simon, ‘Cane
Page 17 and 18: 10 J. Martin, Making Socialists: Ma
Page 19 and 20: the poorest homes (as measured by e
Page 21 and 22: 1 In 2008, 15 per cent ofacademies
Page 23 and 24: 1 Angela McRobbie, The Aftermathof
Page 25 and 26: 8 Christine Skelton, Schooling theB
Page 27 and 28: 1 See www.education.gov.uk/b0065507
Page 29 and 30: 13 Barbara Fredrickson, ‘Therole
Page 31 and 32: 6. Education forsustainabilityTeres
Page 33 and 34: well as cognitively. Real understan
Page 35 and 36: 7. Schools fordemocracyMichael Fiel
Page 37 and 38: and joyful relations between person
Page 39 and 40: 8 Wilfred Carr and AnthonyHartnett,
Page 41 and 42: 1 Winston Churchill, quoted inNIACE
Page 43: 9 See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/ed
Page 47 and 48: nities, and not have the public-pri
Page 49 and 50: 4 Engineering flexibility: a system
Page 51 and 52: other countries to require their re
Page 53 and 54: 6. Remember that many of the outcom
Page 55 and 56: 2 Adrian Elliott, State SchoolsSinc
Page 57 and 58: 4 Peter Hyman, ‘Fear on the front
Page 59 and 60: 12. Rethinking thecomprehensive ide
Page 61 and 62: training, be part of a local system
Page 64: About CompassCompass is the democra

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