Certainly agree that there's no point in planning for 'light and variable' winds! But on a 50 mile navex at 90 KIAS which would take (at 90 KTAS) 33.3 minutes, I expect a student on a PPL Skill Test to be able to plan as accurately as reasonably possible - certainly to within 1 minute. Ignoring a 10 kt headwind component on such a leg will give a 4.2 minute error, ignoring a 10kt tailwind component will give a 3.3 minute error. Both of which are outside the in-flight accuracy expected, so anyone doing such lazy still-air planning could fail the navigation section of the PPL Skill Test before even getting airborne........
Yes, there are various standalone planning tools available, but in the future we should have a generally available on-line system as I described. Internet access at clubs should cost the club a mere £15 per month, easily recoverable. And it should be easy enough to prevent all but the most determined geeks from fiddling with the desktop settings.