Adieu, Commission for Racial Equality

A fond farewell to the Commission for Racial Equality

22 September 2007

It never grasped that ethnic disparities reflect cultural forces

A Chinese baby born today, for example, would be much, much more likely to grow up to be better paid than his or her white contemporary. And also likely to receive a better education and live in a nicer home. The latest figures available suggest that 77 per cent of Chinese girls and 72 per cent of Chinese boys receive five or more A-levels at C grade or above — way ahead of the figure for occidental boys and girls. They are also less likely (as you might expect) to end up doing manual work and have the highest proportion of any ethnic grouping for attendance at university. Except, I should add, for the smaller ‘East Asian’ community, whose performance outstrips not only the indigenous whites, but even their Chinese cousins. If I can use the word cousins in its colloquial sense.

That’s not all. A child born to an Indian family today can expect, on average, almost precisely the same educational achievements, housing, employment and good or bad health as his or her white counterparts. Meanwhile, Pakistani kids do slightly worse, on average, than their white counterparts but are more likely to end up self-employed and less likely to be found doing menial work. Black African girls are likely to do rather better out of the education system than white British boys; they are also slightly more likely to get a job requiring qualifications than either white boys or white girls. A child born to any one of the following ethnic minority groups is far more likely than a white British child to get a job in the top managerial and professional class: Indian, Chinese, East Asian, Irish. A boy born to a white British working-class family will do worse at school than every ethnic minority other than those from the Caribbean, Bangladeshi and travelling communities (static, or the more usual kind of traveller, those who like to move about every now and again).