New figures reveal that in the five months since it opened the school has expelled 19 troublesome pupils. In the whole of the previous year, Peterborough's 13 secondary schools only expelled 39 pupils between them.

But hang on a second, there's another of way of looking at this. Are we sure the academy is just not putting all its bad eggs in somebody else's basket?

Compare it with the Voyager – another new school – where only three pupils were expelled in the same period.

Yet both schools obviously have, and are dealing with, discipline issues.

The Voyager temporarily excluded 112 pupils for an average of almost five days each in those five months. The Academy temporarily excluded just 10 pupils for an average of less than four days in the same period.

The key difference is that children who are suspended go back to their school. But youngsters who are expelled become somebody else's problem.

City council education chief Mel Collins admits the high number of expulsions from the Academy is putting "great pressure'' on other schools, which are attempting to deal with their problem kids in-house and not just passing the problem on.

There is another key difference between these two new schools. The Voyager is a traditional local authority-controlled secondary school. The Academy is controlled by central Government.

Yet, the difficult children the Academy can't deal with become the problem of the local authority – and the other city schools. Those children who have been expelled are unlikely to have a positive impact on a school's performance.

So this might be good for the Academy, but if all the other schools suffer it is bad for the city as a whole.

If all the schools in the city expelled at the rate of the Academy the number of pupils expelled each year would run into hundreds. That would spell chaos for education in the city.

This is one playing field that is far from level.

Gunning for Harry
We really are a nation of peasants. Prince Harry takes a few weeks' break from staggering out of nightclubs and all of a sudden he's the greatest thing since sliced bread.

He wanted to go to Afghanistan for goodness sake. Good for him, but please spare us this sycophantic adoration.

Thousands of other young men and women have done the same, and much more.

The media has not covered itself in glory either by, first, agreeing to a news blackout and, then, by giving the army a recruitment ad campaign that money couldn't and didn't buy.

Some of the coverage of Harry's tour made Afghanistan look like an adventure playground not what it is – the world's most dangerous killing field.

The country's editors have done us all a huge disservice by colluding with the authorities to delude the nation.

In these days of the sprawling all-knowing presence that is the internet, it is amazing the secret didn't leak out immediately.