OPINION: Dolly’s childhood in poverty inspired scheme that helped millions of our children

She was an incredibly unifying figure. There were the quotes. Responding to references to her being a “dumb blonde”, she quipped: “Most definitely not dumb and not blonde either”. Indeed, when asked how long it took to do her hair, she replied, “I’ve no idea, I’m never there”.

The fact that Dolly the cloned sheep was named after her? Look up the quote she made when told about it. It’s hilarious.

However, beyond all the wigs and showbiz, the grinding poverty of her childhood, with an illiterate but loving father, inspired her decision to create the Imagination Library. This wonderful charity gifts books to young children, a charity created by Dolly herself to inspire a love of reading. Millions of books have passed into our children’s hands through her generosity.

It is providing a much-needed stimulus for young children learning to read and write English. Quite rightly, local news media showed the GCSE celebrations in our schools a short time ago. There is no doubt that across the area, we have a fantastic choice of schools, both primary and secondary. The results bear witness to that.

However, this year behind the scenes, there were some puzzling outcomes, most notably with GCSE English. Schools reported across the country that students, who were confidently predicted to achieve at least a Grade 4 (the lowest pass grade) opened their envelopes to discover they had been given a 3.

Classified as a failure, it precluded them from going on to A Level courses. It is estimated that the number across the country was 200,000. In maths far less disquiet was expressed, the equivalent number being 3,000. Given the increasing domination of maths entries at A Level, is it legitimate to ask if numeracy now has a marked precedence over literacy? When once it was the other way round. And does it matter?

Meanwhile some good news for schools and parents from the USA, where at least 28 states, importantly both Democrat and Republican, have taken the big tech companies like Meta to court. Thousands of parents, who have seen their children damaged, even to the point of losing their lives, have accused the companies of deliberately setting out to create addictive algorithms. And the parents show every sign of winning, although it is still clearly early days.

As this strange summer has proceeded with one terrifying climate disaster after another, at least we still have cricket. Last month I reported on the “clicky” crisis at Saltburn cricket club where a slip fielder was deceiving the umpire by clicking his fingers as the ball passed the edge of the bat.

True to form, up comes an even more ingenious form of cheating. A captain exploited the fact that he had identical twins in his team. He sent the better batsman to the crease twice and deployed the superior bowler from both ends. Great story but can’t be true, surely? But then apparently Jolene wasn’t either. Great song, mind you.