On Tue, 16 Feb 2021 13:08:54 +0000
williamwright wrote:

Off topic, but a bit of light relief

FIFTY YEARS AGO

Can you remember what you were doing exactly fifty years ago
yesterday? (That's assuming you were born.)

On the morning of February 16th 1972 I was attempting to collect
dinner money from a class of 35 assorted malcontents and
troublemakers. The new coins had only appeared that morning, and a
few kids had been to the shops and got them in change. Otherwise, we
were using €˜old money.

As an aside, for months before D Day the government had been
distributing large quantities of the €˜new money in the form of
(worthless) plastic coins. These were for children and adults to
practice with. Lots of these coins went into the schools, and most
were stolen and taken home, in the belief that come D Day they would
be legal tender.

The central problem with Dinner Money was that the price was 1/9d per
day, and there was no exact decimal equivalent. Most kids paid
weekly: 1/9d times five = 8/9d (eight shillings and nine pence). In
New Money they now paid the nearest equivalent to 8/9d, which was
44p. But some parents couldnt afford either 8/9d or 44p on a Monday,
so they sent 9p dinner money on each day of the week when they had it
to send. This meant that if they managed to send 9p every day from
Monday to Friday they had sent a total of 45p. But the €˜rich kids
had only paid 44p! In the Proletarian Peoples Republic of South
Yorkshire that was a political scandal just waiting to happen. So it
was decreed, in a hastily distributed instruction from the West
Riding County Council Education Dept that a separate Decimal Dinner
Money register had to be kept, in which it was to be recorded which
kids had paid five consecutive lots of 9p in the week. On Friday
afternoon the main educational task was the distribution to these
children of their one New Penny change. If a child had only bought
four dinners that week there was no penny, and this was perceived as
being grossly unfair. Letters soon started to come from parents,
along the lines of, €œHe missed the Wednesday before last but then he
had Thursday and Friday dinners, then last week he had Monday,
Tuesday, and Wednesday. I made sure he had the Wednesday so there was
five in a row. So could you send the penny please?€� and €œHe was off
on Tuesday for the dentist but he had all the other days so could you
send the penny please? Its not my fault his teeth are bad.€� These
matters had to go to arbitration. Luckily the Head had little
sympathy with these claimants and never paid up.

I wonder if anyone else who was teaching at the time remembers this
fiasco?

Bill

Not teaching, I was a university student, but I remember that then
first thing I bought with the new money was 6 faggots from our local
butcher, in Quorn, Leicestershire, for me and my two housemates.

--
Davey.