None other than Gordon Brown has weighed into the debate about the fact that the Apprentice’s eventual winner Lee fibbed about his career at TVU (Thames Valley University) stretching his academic career in catering there from 4 months to 2 years as reported here on a site that sounds like a hilarious title from Have I got News For You’s”Missing Words” round. Brown said “I think people should tell the truth”: well you can’t say fairer than that can you?
CV enhancement is pretty commonplace but people here at Digital Spy muse that the victorious Lee should have fibbed that he went somewhere “better”. Every profession has a pecking order. I dunno if TVU is such a bad place though. It happens to be my local university (walking distance) and when I was a postgrad I had a McJob in the library there stamping books rather than flipping burgers. Alumnae from its former incarnatoin as Ealing Art College include Emma from 90s indie shoegazers Lush, Who axeman Pete Townsend and even Freddie Mercury. It even has apparently even had an ex-student Apprentice winner before: Tim Campbell back in 2005.
What is the moral of the story? Tactics are everything? Every loser wins? Seems strange that I began writing this in draft yesterday and now the story of attention-seeking potentially ultra-loser David Davis has taken over. For my two-penny worth I don’t think Labour should play his games and stand. This toys-out-the-pram hissyfit disguised as martyrdom does nobody any favours and now that Kelvin McKenzie is threatening to stand it could seriously backfire – cancelling out the Tories Crewe and Nantwich by-election gain.
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June 14, 2008 at 8:08 am
Gege
It’s unfair to describe Mr Davis’s action as a ‘hissy fit’. He may be genuinely trying to make a point.
I know we are told that where you study doesn’t matter. But i hear that, employers look down on people from non redbrick universtities.
June 14, 2008 at 11:55 am
Chris Paul
The Guardian masthead trailed the winner alongside a bigger trail still about a guide to pond life.
June 14, 2008 at 10:25 pm
catherinebuca
Still, you know NuLab are in bad shape when they leave the field to an odious reactionary like MacKenzie to make the 42 days case for them.
But on to the big issue – should Lee have won? Was Claire robbed?
June 16, 2008 at 9:54 am
Tim
At the end of the day once you’ve been working for a few years it doesn’t actually matter what, where or if you studied – it’s what experience you have.
Personally I don’t think that lying on your CV to whatever extent can be excused – it’s the thin (or not so thin) end of the wedge and does call into question the honesty of the candidate.
Yes – Claire was robbed! Another Ruth Badger situation!