Written by Margaret Simpson. Tx 18th January 1980

It’s time for the school council elections.  Penny Lewis is the current rep but some people, like Trisha and Doyle, aren’t happy with her.  Trisha and Penny are totally opposite characters – which brings a healthy dose of conflict into their relationship.

Trisha and Cathy are irritated about having nowhere to go during the lunch-breaks, so that’s one of the reasons why Trisha decides to stand as a council rep.  If elected, she’ll request that the third-formers have access to common rooms, like the fifth-formers.

Doyle later makes the reasonable point to Miss Peterson that since there’s more girls than boys, any boy rep doesn’t stand much of a chance of getting elected.  Miss Peterson counters that surely sex wouldn’t be the first consideration, whilst Trisha mutters that it’s all the boys ever think about!

But Doyle’s in the right place at the right time, as it’s been decided that having both male and female reps in each year would be fair.  Doyle is elected third year boy rep (much to the disgust of Penny) whilst both Penny and Trisha are beaten by an unknown outsider.  All of Doyle’s policies are good – they should be, since they were pilfered from both Penny and Trisha.

Before the results come in, there’s an epic fight between Penny and Trisha (Penny calls Trisha “a nasty two-faced bitch” which kicks off proceedings).  Tucker has nothing to do whilst the argument between Penny and Trisha is bubbling away – but Todd Carty’s facial expressions are a delight and he goes a long way to stealing the scene.

Doyle’s victory will continue to rankle with Penny for the rest of series three, which makes it a fruitful source of conflict between the pair of them.

Elsewhere, Miss Mooney appears to be the worst possible science teacher.  She finds herself distracted by the loss of her glasses (which were on her head all the time).  Whilst she’s fretting about her glasses, there’s a small fire, which Tucker manages to put out.  He’s later berated for this – yes he did put the fire out, but he started it in the first place!  This seems a little unfair, as it was an accident, and if the pupils aren’t adequately supervised surely some of the blame should rest with the teacher.