They couldn't organise a p*** *p in a brewery

This is a constant refrain about this inefficient government which has wasted billions of our money on fruitless schemes and proposals and managed to mess up every IT project they have been involved in.

The most recent debacle is serious not so much because of a waste of money but because of the lives who will be involved. I refer to the on-off expansion of state money for sixth form expansion.

In January the Learning & Schools Council the government's quango, hatchet man and fixer, encouraged schools and colleges to plan for larger sixth forms, and recorded numbers expected in each school and college. Money was promised, - £100 million or £200 million?

In March schools received long letters, with the bad news included tucked away on very last pages.

The bad news was that student numbers were cut mysteriously by the L&S Council and money consequently reduced.

There may have been a problem, that many more wanted to stop on into the sixth form because of poor job prospects. This "problem" should have been evident by January.

Now we have the prospect of thousands of young people unable to find a sixth form place, having been promised one by a school or college.

The Government department which has been planning for all students to stop at school until they are 18 from 2011, is incapable of doing the sums for 2009.

I still think that the budget in a week or two will find the extra millions, - small beer with billions being borrowed. I expect McCavity B (that's Balls this time, not Brown) to pass the buck for the mismanagement. If I was the chairman or prominent senior official in the L & S C, I might start to look for another job, however