I’ve just done a posting on my education blog about an organisation called Connexions Direct, which, together with its website ending in .gov.uk, I’ve just seen advertised on TV. It strikes me as just a tad creepy, at any rate potentially.
Finding someone to talk to.
Connexions Direct Advisers are here to listen to your relationship problems and can also help you to find support in your area. You can contact us via email, text, phone or webchat or pop into your local office. Look in the Connexions Service section for details of where your local office is.
Should an organisation with .gov.uk at the end of its website address be offering relationship advice?
I can see it developing into a sort of database of the unhappy. It of course swears that it won’t abuse all the information it will nevertheless be hoovering up, but then it would, wouldn’t it?
And since doing that posting at my blog, I’ve also noticed this. Guess what? Yes, it’s the Connections Card:
The Connexions Card is a secure smartcard, designed specially for you, which allows you to collect reward points for learning, work-based training and voluntary activities. These can be exchanged for discounted and free goods and services and other rewards, including some exclusive ‘money can’t buy’ experiences. The Card can also be used for on-the-spot discounts and special offers from outlets and business displaying the Connexions Card window sticker.
I’d be interested to hear what anyone else thinks about all this.
There’s a body in Australia that gets taxpayer funding, called “Relationships Australia” that recently got into a bit of a snit because it advocated that older single women should embrace lesbianism to overcome the ‘man’ shortage.
Needless to say, anyone that goes to the state for support in relationships is in a very sad state indeed.
Brian, I am unfortunate to have had first hand experience dealing with “Connexions” because my school (a combined secondary school and sixth form college of around 1,400 students aged between 11 and 18) handed over my personal details to this organisation without my consent: They passed on my name, date of birth, home address, telephone number and goodness knows what other information they held on me to Connexions in exchange for £1. (Connexions have subsequently sent me a vast amount of junk mail including a small booklet which explained that, “Connexions are here to offer you advice on important life-changing decisions – like starting an apprenticeship, getting a job or having a makeover” and I also received a phonecall from an idiotic bureaucrat who insisted that I hand over my personal information for the sake of allowing them to “monitor the quality of service” or some such rubbish.)
Connexions had promised my school £1 for each set of details that were handed over – and it was enough incentive for my school to hand over not only the personal details of its 1,400 students but also the details of, by my best estimate, a couple of thousand ex-pupils and ex-students whose details they still held on record. Connexions is billed as a service for “young people aged 13-19” but that didn’t seem to deter my school from handing over the personal information of ex-students who are now university graduates (i.e. aged 21, 22, 23). I know because I have graduate friends who all of a sudden received thank you letters from Connexions at their parents’ home addresses, along with, in some cases, Connexions identity cards. I too received a thank you letter and an identity card from Connexions (which I promptly destroyed but in hindsight perhaps should have taken issue with) and what I found most concerning was that, according to the letter I received, I’d apparently signed a contract with Connexions and a privacy statement – neither of which I have ever seen, leaving me to conclude that either Connexions were lying or an unscrupulous money-hungry member of staff from my school had forged my signature on these documents.
This website is an excellent source of information on how Connexions operates and how the organisation collects and distributes the personal information of many thousands of UK citizens who have been in contact with the state education system.
According to the site:
A lot more must be done to raise awareness about “Connexions” – this a highly dangerous and quite probably corrupt organisation (judging by my personal experience) which deliberately targets children who its operatives presumably believe make easier targets than the adult population. The “Connexions Card” is a blatant attempt to introduce the concept of a compulsory national identity card to school children. If Connexions weren’t associated with the “have all the free taxpayer-purchased condoms you like, young children”-government they’d really suit the name “Junior Anti-Sex League”. As things stand I think it’s fair to call them the “Junior Anti-Sense League” or “Junior Anti-Privacy League”.
I think White Rose has an important role to play in helping to keep an eye on Connexions as closely as Connexions tries to keep an eye on the UK’s school-aged citizens.
But the cards are being supplied by Capita though, which means it’ll all run smoothly!