At 8pm tonight, I’m presenting a Channel 4 Dispatches documentary on inequality, entitled How The Rich Get Richer. In 27 fact-filled minutes, I go through a lot of things – arguing that inequality is about more than tax receipts, and tackling it means more than complaining about rich people. In fact, I’d argue that the chief sponsor of inequality in Britain is state education.
Everyone knows that, in general, state schools are better in leafier areas. That’s why wealthy parents pay so much for houses in a good catchment areas: make no mistake, they’re buying their school place as surely as someone who sends their child to Eton.
Ch4 Dispatches commissioned the Centre for Social Justice to look at five years worth of exam results, and then map it against deprivation. In theory, there should be no link: if schools serve rich and poor equally – giving extra support to deprived communities if needed – then the results should be the same.
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