The 2025 Celebrity Traitors programme has attracted circa 13 million viewers per episode, and I have no doubt that by the numbers are all added up, the programme will end up challenging the final of the Women’s Euro 2025 for most-watched programme this year. Despite the very honourable intentions of all the celebrities involved in the game, with the final prize fund of over £80,000 being available for the winning celebrity’s chosen charity, a huge % of the UK population have been watching an amazingly successful TV programme which tacitly approves of’ Lying’ to win the prize that could benefit so many deserving cases.

The phrase “Life imitates art far more than art imitates life” was said by Oscar Wilde in his 1889 essay, The Decay of Lying. The quote suggests that life often mimics the forms, ideas, and emotions presented in art rather than the other way around. Wilde was not the first to identify the importance of lying in public life, that honour probably belonging to the Greek philosopher, Plato, wh introduced the concept of the “noble lie” (gennaion pseudos), which are myths or falsehoods in words that the rulers of his ideal city are permitted to tell citizens for the purpose of maintaining social order and promoting the common good. This was an explicit departure from the stricter moral views of his teacher Socrates, who seems to have opposed all lies.

This week (4 November 2025), I’ve been listening to the current Secretary of State for Education highlighting that the new curriculum that her government are to introduce next year will put right the deficiencies arising from the old ‘new’ curriculum celebrated by Michael Gove 11 years ago, in his time in the same role. I remember specifically when Gove supported his changes in the Computing curriculum, supported by the then Executive Chairman of Google, Eric Schmidt, requiring a focus on the teaching of the fundamentals of Computer Science, coding and programming skills within our schools. The fundamental ‘truths’ of the last decade, spouted by Government and the DfE no doubt will be replaced by the brave new world hopes that iterate that we need computing to go back to providing broader insights and knowledge about the applications and outcomes. Inevitably, we will end up examining ‘up to the hilt’ the syllabus followed by its students; another folly erected in the pursuit of education, which has already moved on because of AI, LLM and the explosion of computing power now with us, previously never perceived ever to be available.

In terms of Education across the world, and all due praise to those very Gove reforms, English education has done really well, in Reading, Writing, Spelling, Maths and Science assessments in comparison to most other developed economies. Our sector gives Mr Gove every credit he deserves for those reforms, but has to hold back in its peon of praise, because Gove chose not to see all of the reforms we needed to truly create the outcomes that benefited all children. Forcing the EBacc on the country has seen the almost complete destruction of state school Arts education in the round, and his unwillingness to recognise those industries that bring such success to the UK through Film, Music and TV. Moreover, whilst we still lead the world in food technology, our state school Sixth Formers are unable to follow Food Studies at A level.

I do feel I can speak for the Independent school sector in England to say that neither set of reforms is likely to trouble our schools, as we have always been able to see the value in a myriad of subjects and approaches. We’ve been completely loyal to the children and young people we serve, offering all the range and breadth needed for our individual communities. Some schools have chosen (as we have at Claires Court) to make use of internationally recognised qualifications, and to offer breadth and range for subjects that are better assessed through practical assessments of vocational skills rather than terminal written exams. In short, there are many ways of ‘skinning the cat’, and we can celebrate them all.

Where national government is failing now and has been for years is in failing to adopt the duty of candour needed to run the country effectively. Despite the obvious failings of all the great departments of government, be those Care, Education, Health, Judiciary, the Police and Prison services, and perhaps above all, the Treasury, all their ministers (and their departmental spokesmen) can do is state that ‘we are spending more in real terms than previously’ and that it will take time ‘to put right the mess that we inherited from the last government’.

I quote from August 2024 “During the recent state opening of parliament, the new Labour Government confirmed their intention to enact primary legislation imposing a statutory duty of candour on all public servants and authorities. Although public authorities are currently subject to guidance on candour when taking part in inquest proceedings, they are not bound by any statutory duties to tell the truth. According to the Government, the new ‘Hillsborough Law’ intends to ‘change the culture of defensiveness in the public sector that has denied families the justice they deserve and contributed to their suffering’. The inclusion of this law in the 2024 King’s Speech is the direct result of a manifesto promise made by the Labour Party to support the long-standing ‘Hillsborough Law Now’ campaign to oblige state bodies to tell the truth and proactively cooperate with official investigations and inquiries. It is also, in part, a response to the outcome of the recent Infected Blood Inquiry and other high-profile miscarriages of justice such as the Post Office Scandal.”

Of course, no such legislation will ever work when we have such an oppositional approach to running our country. Those who win elections declare that they have the mandate to empower the changes they see the country needs, but never engage with the experts who actually know what needs to be done, in part because ‘expertise’ is now so easily acquired simply by inferring ‘I’ve done the job before’. I am one of many professionals now who feel that we are badly served by our government. It appears they are indeed ‘the traitors within’. Unlike the victor(s) from the TV series, where the successful could indeed have lied their way to the top, no one wins when the government of the day acts so treacherously, both to win power and then to retain it. This is no diatribe focused on the present; our country simply has outsourced so much, so many and for so long the services needed to run what we needed as a civilised society that we find ourselves in the perilous position today. Plato observed that ‘the noble lies’ are required to serve the purpose of persuading people to accept their role and be motivated to act for the country’s stability.

Sadly, government assertions today are no longer believed, because the half-truths and worse have come too thick and fast, with evidence of their failures filling the TV screens and news bulletins to the hilt. Sadly, I suspect the viewing public has already switched over from the reality of the news to the illusions conjured by ‘Traitors’, the ‘Great Bake Off’ and all. If nothing else, at least these shows actually have some winners!