Jackie Ashley talks to Gordon Brown's right-hand man, Ed Balls | Special Reports | Guardian Unlimited Politics

I recall the sociologist, Basil Bernstein arguing that eduction cannot compensate for society. Whether the Durham research is an accurate evaluation of the impact of New Labour's policies for children education without wealth and income redistribution is unlikely to achieve the goals set by New Labour. Ball's recognition that what happens outside school is important is redolent of the English nursery school campaigner, Margaret McMillan's complaint that the behaviour of the children in her nursery school deteriorated over the holidays and she concluded that the solution was to extend the hours in the day that the children were in the nursery and the days in the year they were there too. This opens the way for the state to take the role of over parent which, even if desirable, is too expensive for taxpayers to accept - outside Scandanavia that is. Jackie Ashley talks to Gordon Brown's right-hand man, Ed Balls | Special Reports | Guardian Unlimited Politics