Oh dear

oflife

Too much skunk at you know where on da Cowley Road, i'nit?

Rugbytory

Melanie, an intake of 41 students of black heritage out of a total of intake of 3000 is about 1%. Rather than focussing on precise numbers in a petty attempt to attack him why don't you listen to his point, which is correct. 1% is a disgracefully low figure.

David

He made an arse of himself in the US when he said America had been in the second world war from the start. He is neither an able Prime Minister or a decent man. Is he taking lessons from Michael Gove?

Veracity

And Gaddafi is in Venezuela don't you know. The left wing civil servants must be howling with laughter . it is so easy to dupe this coalition. it believes anything! How could anyone believe this story?

Dave s

Cameron is what he was always going to be. A PR man who says whatever he thinks will please his audience, Just not up to the job of PM and this will increasingly become obvious. He is no conservative.
Time to give up on the lot of them and tear up the ballot paper.

Brian Moshe

Is the photograph above of David Cameron while at Eton by any chance?

Mjolnir de Jersiais

Who cares about these statistics anyway? If we're all the same, it shouldn't matter whether any particular individual, at Oxford University, is black, white or indifferent. He is simply playing to the PC gallery.

John - An Australian

Oh my.
being down the other end of the world, it has been very saddening watch British society turn itself on its head. Many of us had hoped that with the demise of the labor Party, Britain might be able to pull itself out of the morally relativistic mire into which it has willingly jumped. Alas, it is becoming painfully obvious that the slide is going to continue. Sad, really, really sad. If I was Melanie Phillips, or any other decently thinking sort of person, I'd abandon the place. Like so many already are.
Soon, you wont even be able to field a cricketing team, because you will have forgotten the rules of the game, like you have forgotten the rules of living that once made Britain deserving of the word Great.

Nathan Cook

Applicants belonging to an ethnic minority are more likely to be accepted to Oxford than those who do not. Low numbers reflect low application rates. As such, Cameron could not have more perfectly harmed his cause by giving the misleading impression that black students might as well not apply!

nage

Nathan Cook 'Applicants belonging to an ethnic minority are more likely to be accepted to Oxford than those who do not.'
And with a lot more money than sense, I would think too.

Rip Van Winkle

You guys put him in; suffer!

Andrew Fletcher

Even if you are sympathetic to his argument, his basic basic with the numbers mean that his point is lost.
Inexcusable for a PM ( who is responsible for briefing him ??)
Adds to the general impression if incompetence

Vaselino

How long will it take the Brits to realise that, in Cameron, they have a PM who is totally unfit for purpose.

Rip Van Winkle

David @ 11:42am
Oh no! Not an arse?

Brian Moshe @ 12:49am
Was he an arse at Eton?

John An Australian @ 3:34am
Am with you there cobber.

Nathan Cook @ 4:06am
Quite a few white students would like to apply.

Rip Van Winkle

Melanie, Was that him! Hatted by the blackboard?

john east

Look at this from the lefts point of view. Just about every national institution has been destroyed by them in their efforts to destroy Western civilisation. Our elite universities, Oxford and Cambridge, are one of the last bastions of support for the old values of excellence and achievement which need to be taken down for the left to triumph. With the support of clueless Dave the left are almost there. Another few years, when Ed is in Downing St their victory will be complete.

To the misguided Rugbytory decrying the fact that the true figure of 1% is still "disgracefully low", have you learned nothing from the destruction of secondary education over the last four decades? Yes, it's disgraceful that blacks are disproportionately represented at university, but you should ask why this is the case before joining the left wing hue and cry to dumb down, add quotas, exclude those who achieve the grades but happen to be white, and as a result completely destroy these institutions.

We need to adopt measures to raise blacks to meet the exacting standards required, not pummell the universities to lower their standards.

Andy Gill

According to an Oxford University spokesman only 71 Black Caribbean students in the UK achieved the necessary 3 As at A level.

That is the real problem, and the real disgrace. If the schools don't ensure black children achieve good grades, of course they will be under-represented at university.

Robbo

He denigrates Britain's role in WWII whilst in America, he denigrates Britain's history whilst in Pakistan and now he denigrates one of Britain's finest universities. That's what we hear of his public utterances, what does he say behind closed doors? Is he employed by some foreign power? Is he a buffoon?

Roy

Before the days of ethnic minorities no one suggested there were not enough ginger haired or left handed people going to Oxford. Why should any other category than of a scholarly potential be acceptable today?
When are we going to forget about "race" differences and treat everybody alike? Which is indeed what the swallow dive into multiculturalism is supposed to represent. Yet if the resulting figures of this adventure don't match the factual reality, they must be adjusted to suit all the dreamers whims and fantasies becoming of this shared eldorado.

David H

Has the British PM nothing better to do than analyse the student population of universities? Has it come to the point where our rulers in Brussels have left the British Govt. with nothing more important to do?

mc

Why did he and his lapdog Warsi not comment on the fact that Muslim women are more likely to be graduates than other groups, yet also the most likely to face discrimination in employment?

Derek Pasquill

It is amusing sometimes to observe British politics - first you have the Labour leader filching the party away from the left and the trade unions, closely followed by his acolyte who has stolen the Tory Party from under the noses of its supporters - and whoever they are must remain an eternal mystery perhaps.

Joshua

"1% is a disgracefully low figure."

Given the enormous social problems in the black community and the fact that black people make up around 2% of the population (government statistics according to Wikipedia), it is not disgraceful at all.

Tiberius

The truth is that statistics can be interpreted to suit one's preconceived ideas or personal agendas. There seems to be just a bit of that going here (except for the Aussie guy sore at losing the Ashes).

Cameron is a politician - what is everyone else's excuse?

Bickers

Rugbytory: Why is 1% such a disgracefully low figure? Compared to what?

The only questions that need answering are:

1. why is the UK slipping down the international league tables across mainstream subjects?
2. why do Asian kids do so well at school/University?
3. why are employers appalled at the literacy of so called qualified students.

Realise that the answers lie in our discredited, politicised State School system and you'll know that attacking Universities is the wrong target.

C.d.G.

So now, since Cameron and the Tories are such, if someone intends to give his vote to the right, who is he supposed to go to? Bismark, Bormann, Botha?

Clear Memories

Perhaps you might like to comment on the fact that, using Oxford's own numbers, 22% of the intake are from ethnic minorities.

As the 2001 census claims 'only' 7.9% of the population are non-white ethnic, surely this means they are over-represented not under-represented as CMD seeks to infer?

Positive discrimination anyone?

Rip Van Winkle

Robbo @ 8:59am.
"Is he a buffoon?" Yes, plus David @ 11:42am says he made himself an "arse".

I prefer "incompetant arsehole"
but thats only for starters.

David

If black students dont get the grades to enter any Uni [whether its Oxford or any other]then they dont get in...simple as that...when I was at school I wanted to get into Edinburgh to study music composition but failed to get the A's I needed...so no entry. I went back to school for another year and got the A's I needed and re-applied and they still said no because the course was already over subscribed. It was a real dissapointment but thats life. My skin is white but I never went to John Major [PM at the time] to bleat about the fact that there was Chinese or other non White students 'taking' my place. If you dont meet the standards set out by the Uni of your choice by in failing an entrance exam or doing badly in the interview to attain a place then you re-apply the following year or choose another Uni. Black students dont deserve any kind of affirmative action to balance numbers against 'hideously white' institutions.

Augustus

Surely, there must be a Tory alternative to David Cameron, because, quite frankly, Mr Cameron just isn't all that good. He says daft things, and his media coverage is risible. It is hard to see him winning any electoral success ever again. Mr Cameron was the dog that did not bark in the night.

veryneat

Who could have imagined what an idiot Cameron would turn out to be? Whatever little of British institutions is left that still functions, he wants to destroy with the crudest social engineering. The taxpaying public is discriminated against and privileges handed out to those who haven't earned them and to newcomers who have never contributed anything to society. How long will the British people endure this before there is massive rioting?
The ignorance of Cameron and Clegg is such that it suggests that Britain's presumed excellent universities have also suffered from the lowering of standards in just about everything in the UK.

Arnold Levan

Statistics,statistics and even more statistics.They will soon be monitoring eye colour.I bet there are not many Jehovah's Winesses at Oxbridge--who cares. Leave it to the Admissions Tutors. Not a boy or girl at my school got into Oxbridge mind you I lived in Bow in the rwenties and thirties of the last century.

Dai of Edinburgh

Aren't we just glad that our heart surgeons who passed through university did so because of their academic excellence rather than skin colour? And that the pilot flying the passenger jet qualified for the profession on the basis that he had the skill and not the 'politically correct' skin colour? Lie down, Mr Cameron, and have a word with yourself. On second thoughts, don't, you'll only hear yourself spouting the same PC trash.

Derek Pasquill

C.d.G. - anything to the right of Atilla the Hen is fine by me.

Gordon Square

But UCL and Imperial have 30 or so per cent ethnic minority students and are academically in the same class as Oxford or Cambridge.

And the medical students from Barts &the Royal London I come across at work seem to be fifty per cent black or Asian, and they're no academic slouches either.

So is it an Oxbridge thing?

Jonathon

Entry into Oxford is a bit of a hit and miss affair and, if a candidate is called for interview, he might perform badly or suffer from nerves and not get a place. There has also been pressure to admit state school candidates who could be given a place over one that is privately educated. I am speaking from the experience of my daughter who had 12 GCSE's all As and A*s and three A levels with marks all above 90 and she still fell at the interview... Ah well, Oxford's loss....

Jerry Owen

You are either good enough or not good enough to get into Oxford.
What has colour got to do with it?
Cameron like the rest of our political elite class are obsessed to the point of serious mental disorder about colour, race, sexuality of any sort (except heterosexuality).
If you want to increase racial tensions in Britain then this is the way to do it, highlight colour at every possible opportunity.
I am sick to death of it, and so are many others I suspect.

Stephen Rothbart

I am sorry, but isn't Clegg Prime Minister?

Cameron is a bit like Obama and Gordon Brown. Whenever there is a difficult situation to sort out, it's poor Cleggie that has to face the media and fellow MPs.

Then when the great man finally appears, he puts his big foot in his mouth.

Cameron wittering on about the American war effort, now this; Obama on the fact that Austrians speak Austrian and getting his entire foreign policy backwards, and Brown...well practically on anything, but "saving the world's economy" was a pretty good one.

It's sad, that nowadays we only have centrist politicians. They all have to be PC to survive the media spotlight.

I had hoped the Tories would bring us back to sense. Away from the doomed EU experiment, Human Rights and PC and Climate Change rhetoric.

But sadly, all we have is a better looking Prime Minister than the last one, but with more or less the same politics.

daniel maris

So no problem there then...

I can't believe you are so complacent.

This is the country that doesn't have anyone of Jamaican descent over the rank of private...compare and contrast with the USA - remember Colin Powell.

David

For daniel maris -
Colin Powell was good enough as an individual to attain the office he did. But in America they also have affirmative action where black people are given the opportunity to apply for jobs where whites are excluded...even though a white person may be the better candidate. This is reverse racsim....the US thinks that to part from its racist past then the only way to do this is by practising racism.

It also happens in this country. White people are being discriminated against by the Metropolitan Police due to employment policies that favour ethnic minorities and do not allow whites to apply for certain posts.

White students have been banned from applying for internships with the Metropolitan Police and Whitehall.The temporary jobs are advertised as internships ‘that could change your life’, but the organisation’s racist policies exclude whites from applying.

The Metropolitan Police publicly offers only one work experience programme. The twelve-week Diversity Internship will pay six interns more than £3,000 to work in a field of different departments.

The application form states that only students from specific ethnic groups, including black African, black Asian or Chinese, can apply. NO WHITES. Applicants are also questioned about their religious beliefs and sexuality.

The only white candidates eligible to apply for the Fast Stream Summer Diversity Internship are those whose families are from ‘under-represented socio-economic backgrounds’.

Cameron bassicaly said that Oxford is too white. Can you imagine the Japanese Prime Minister complaining about Japanese Uni's being too Japanese? This kind of garbage is only found in the west.

daniel maris

David -

Don't you find it odd that in the USA people of Jamaican descent are "good enough" to command the whole of their armed forces, whereas we struggle to get one beyond the rank of private?

Isn't there a message there for you - and for Melanie?

Ben

I don't see why the low number of black students at Oxford qualifies the university as 'disgraceful'. More and more I feel like we are living in the old Soviet Union with it's endless schemes for social engineering.

If it had had only one black student, that would be surprising, but even then Cameron's figure was wrong. But the implication is that, if the university has a small number of black students, then the university MUST be racist. There is no other explanation - the low number of blacks at Oxford could never be explained by any other factor (not least perhaps the low number of suitable black candidates for Oxford) but racism. In the PC mind, somebody MUST be holding them back. Never can it be the fault of blacks themselves.

We live in a free society. It should NOT be the university's job to fill quotas in order to achieve the mythical blessings of 'diversity'. They should choose the most able candidates regardless of race and gender, and not seek to exalt ethnic minorities to positions beyond what they deserve. This is just reverse-discrimination and its own ugly form of racism.

If 'not enough' blacks have qualified for Oxford, why don't we question why not enough have them have achieved it? Cameron says to Oxford 'we can do better than that!' What exactly does he mean? Shouldn't he be saying to blacks, not the university, 'you can do better than that'?

logdon

And here's what happens when voters disgust at abandonment by the main parties turns to action.

Cameron is obviously living in belief that merely sticking a Tory label on to his green/socialist leanings will do the trick.

That having the open goal of mush mouth Miliband opposite him at the despatch box will deliver his next electoral triumph.

Not much of a triumph last time even with a despised Brown heading Labour. Didn't that send the alerts? Didn't he stop to think that this close run thing could have been a result of his metropolitan all things to all men leanings?

This latest gaffe piled hotly upon his display of propensity for self harm both to himself and his country in Pakistan is noted by a suspicious electorate and they thus decide to opt out of the three party circus.

The BNP in this case is the winner.

Remember every trick of spin and smear has been directed at Griffin and his party. They've survived spurious actions by Trevor Phillips and his gang of merry race baiters. They endure approbrium of the, rinse your mouth out after even uttering those three vile intitials, easily swayed. Then there's the BBC. As they say, don't get me started.

For them to pull this off must have depended upon a pretty powerful tailwind of thwarted grievance. We all know what that is.

However I have to give Cameron fair does. He's an equal opportunities insulter.

Not only does he malign the working classes dwelling within the British Islamic fiefdoms, he now adopts an upwardly mobile tack and has a pop at Oxford.

Would our new Peoples Prince have forfeited his own place within those dreaming spires in favour of a poor, yet aspirational black kid from Brixton?

I think the answer is as sure as ha, follows ha.

Here's the article....

The BNP mayor: Race fears erupt after council votes for UK's first mayor from party

By James Tozer
Last updated at 2:10 AM on 13th April 2011

A town is to become the first in the country to have a mayor from the far-right BNP, in a move branded divisive and worrying by campaigners.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1375997/Race-fears-arise-town-votes-overwhelmingly-Britains-BNP-mayor.html#ixzz1JOinMYRb

aelle

Yes, of course, Melanie,you are right to point out Cameron's slip of the tongue in omitting to make it clear that the one black English person admitted to Oxford in 2009 related only to those of Caribbean descent.

What escapes me is why this observation, which is intended as an indictment of the academic levels attained by the Anglo-Caribbean community in the UK, should be so widely misinterpreted as some sort of attack on Oxford University itself.

If, as I presume Cameron does, you assume Oxford - pace Cambridge - to be the intellectual summit of the British educational system, then I see no reason why it should not be a matter of concern if a particular substantial ethnic minority is able to produce only one solitary person capable of achieving the standard necessary for Oxford entry.

Cameron said " we have to do better " - I think he means that we - the British society at large -
should create an environment and an educational system that allows people, regardless of racial, religious or social background, to achieve the very best.

Unless, like some, you assume notions of inherent racial superiority, it would seem churlish to carp at Cameron's instinctive egalitarianism.

And an Oxford graduate, like Ms Phillips - or myself for that matter,- knows full well that our old University is not in the habit of dispensing 1st Class Degrees to those deficient in common sense.

Ian Hills

In view of the fact that there are so few blacks at Eton, surely it should lose its charitable status. I blame racist pupils for this - just look at the hideously white Old Etonian front bench. Pretending that black parents can't afford Eton's high fees is no argument, when the government could reinstate the assisted places scheme, as demanded by Eton's current head last year. I expect these colonialist throwbacks want us to reinstate the slave trade instead - after all, it made their ancestors rich!

Dave M

"When are we going to forget about "race" differences and treat everybody alike? Which is indeed what the swallow dive into multiculturalism is supposed to represent."

This is where the downfall of this country may be summed up. To my mind once you totally dismiss national identity you enventually wind up with a non state. Once you accept the idea nationality has no bearing at all what becomes of your state, your history and culture?
Recently I visited my old uni and found most of the students now are from overseas. English students were becoming a minority. This I thought was disastrous, not due to any racial prejudice as such but in light of the fact China and India are educating billions of their own graduates to degree level. I don't think the Chinese really worry how many other ethnic groups fill their classrooms. They just concentrate on providing quality education.
Of course this is not to say commonwealth countries here aren't a factor and it's important education is open to all those groups. However, this should be on the basis of hard work and academic results not some sort of social engineering.
I also think the core question is that English graduates are becoming a minority as many can't afford a degree. So the governments have been counting on educationg foreign born graduates instead where rich parents can afford the fees.
The result is simple to see: In 20 years or so the educational level of the so called indigenous Britons is going to fall behind all other countries. We'll become a mish mash of races competing for scarce jobs and no real national identity to hold it all together.

David, Thailand

Lots of noise over nothing, like anyone expects accuracy, or honesty, from Cameron.