There is an inherent tolerance and kindness in the state school teenagers I know.

There is so much that is positive, wonderful even, about state schools. At a state school your kids will learn to live alongside and appreciate other kids from many diverse and different cultures.

Look, I want what's good for everybody. I want to promote good state education for all. I want to raise standards for all kids, irrespective of race and class but why can't they all just do what I say when I know I'm right?

I spent my entire childhood living abroad because of my father's occupation, so we were on long-haul flights all the time.

As I was growing up, it was made clear that the fat me wasn't welcome, that a thin person was expected and awaited, and impatiently so.

Why has everything got to be about feelings these days? In the old days, no one knew what anyone was feeling and, what's more, they weren't expected to.

With a diplomat father, for whom foreign postings were a fact of life, my siblings and I were expected to attend boarding schools in Britain.