The Govenment report on Race and Ethnic Disparities is being called into question on a daily (or more) basis.

Good post EllanVannin. What he says will be uncomfortable and not sit well with some people:
We appear to have lost interest in the broad and unifying stories that used to hold the British people together, such as our shared citizenship, pride in our history and strong feelings of national identity.
In the world of the woke, all of these are 'taboo' — to be deconstructed and dismantled.
And into this vacuum has stepped an incredibly simplistic, divisive and 'binary' view of the world.
There are now only two groups in society — the virtuous 'good' groups like women, non-whites, immigrants and people who are LGBT+, and the 'bad' groups, like straight men and the white working class.

Only those who have lived through the 50's and 60's have any understanding of how things were if you wanted to get on in life back then.
Well said by Matt Goodwin. I was thoroughly disgusted reading what he had to say because it's the truth whether you like it or not.

John Lennon sings about a " Working Class Hero ". They are/ were and always will be !!

Speaking of disparities, let's just leave the ethnic groups for a minute and think about our white working classes such as Professor Matt Goodwin has written about in the DM today.
How refreshing to read the grass-roots truth on these particular classes of people since the general public have all but forgotten about them.

It is the children from these backgrounds who suffer some of the worst outcomes in society. The Professor goes on to say that he was brought up by his single mum on the outskirts of London where stress was part of their everyday life.

Like many others from a working class background, he never felt as though he fitted in with society and was even worse when he went on to pass exams at school to end up at a uni on the outskirts of Manchester---for the " non-elite ". He said it was a miracle that he and his other " sort " were there at all.

22% of working class were more likely to reach the stage of further education compared to 45% of their peers, who were black and 56% Asian kids.
White working class kids were bottom of the pile.

The long forgotten and ignored white working class doesn't figure in this land of new ideology.

growstuff

Chestnut It's obvious you don't like me, but please refrain from making personal comments and assuming you know what I think.

Surely this post is assuming what I think? It's obvious you don't like me is an assumption. Don't we all get an idea of what people think from their posts? You have indicated you do not accept what Matt Goodwin says because he is 'right wing and not unbiassed' as if that is a reason for dismissing his article.

Smileless2012

Perhaps you could practice what you preach growstuff the next time you want to refer to a post of mine as "meaningless and sycophantic".

But it was.

Perhaps you could practice what you preach growstuff the next time you want to refer to a post of mine as "meaningless and sycophantic".

Chestnut It's obvious you don't like me, but please refrain from making personal comments and assuming you know what I think.

His comment is very much a reflection of focus group mentality. The Conservatives want to retain their red wall seats. The predominant socio-economic make up of people in red wall seats is white working class with low educational attainment. It doesn't take a genius to work out what Conservative policy makers are doing.

Chestnut

growstuff

Chestnut Professor Matt Goodwin is known for being right wing and not unbiassed.

There is nothing wrong with being right wing or left wing, it's the extreme right or left wing who are dangerous.

Presumably he does not meet with your approval, just like some of the panel on the race report. It seems just because people's views do not agree with yours then they are biased and must be wrong.

Not a question of meeting with my approval (what a strange thing to write ). I was just stating that Matt Goodwin is not unbiassed.

growstuff

Katie59 Are you implying that those with an Afro-Caribbean background are likely to be involved in drugs and crime - in other words, stereotypical blacks - but those with African heritage aren't?

I'm confused.

I’m not implying anything, my response was to African students achieving better results at school, trying to explain why I think that is.
It’s just my opinion, from what I have seen in the UK and overseas

growstuff

Chestnut Professor Matt Goodwin is known for being right wing and not unbiassed.

There is nothing wrong with being right wing or left wing, it's the extreme right or left wing who are dangerous.

Presumably he does not meet with your approval, just like some of the panel on the race report. It seems just because people's views do not agree with yours then they are biased and must be wrong.

Katie59 Are you implying that those with an Afro-Caribbean background are likely to be involved in drugs and crime - in other words, stereotypical blacks - but those with African heritage aren't?

I'm confused.

I'm afraid I'm still unclear too.

I was aware of the different backgrounds of those with West African and Caribbean heritage, but I'm still unclear what your point is. By the way, not all Africans come from the same kind of background either. The back story of those from Somalia or Eritrea, for example, is often very different.

I'm still unclear what point you're making, Katie59.

Whenever we've been to the Caribbean the plane has been chockablock with afrocaribbeans maintaining links with their homeland.

Having visited 6 African countries the women there go to great lengths to educate their children, although usually primary schools are free, secondary education has to be paid for, and it is a pleasure to see legions of children walking to school in immaculately turned out uniforms, however humble their houses.
Only the middle classes can afford secondary school, shopkeepers, farmers, teachers, police and administrators of all sorts, some will have relatives in the west also sending money home. Church attendance is very high, even in cities, predominantly Christian, although Islamic areas are common. Work for educated children is very limited so many will migrate by whatever means, very often to join family contacts in their new country.
The society is much more matriarchal than we are, their values are instilled in their children wether they are first or second generation, also just like many Asians travel links are maintained with homeland

We saw with the Windrush issue most afrocarribbeans don’t maintain homeland links so never get a passport and have developed their own culture in the UK

Katie59

“Eh? What's that about? Most black children currently in the UK were born here ... in some cases they're second or third generation.”

I guess 90% plus are born in the UK, the families with direct African heritage have different cultural values, very often middle class in their homeland. The family connections within the UK and overseas is quite strong

I'm afraid I'm still unclear what point you're making.

So how about the government does something about poverty, whatever colour people's skin is?

It's a distraction from the real issues and distinct from racism.

Goodwin has a history of pandering to white people in "red wall" seats, where there is an agenda of division by blaming "others" for unemployment and deprivation.

Chestnut Professor Matt Goodwin is known for being right wing and not unbiassed.

Using sarcastic terms like "the woke brigade" doesn't, in my opinion, add anything useful to the discussion.

There is certainly plenty of evidence to show that poor white boys have the lowest achievement levels of all young people. The reasons for that need to be identified - though many of them are already known - and then an effort made to address them. But I am fairly confident the cause won't be because they are white. I have not heard any reports of young white MPs being challenged for using the MPs' lift because they are assumed to be cleaners, or of white banking professionals being mistaken for security guards, or of senior academics being questioned as to whether they are the guest speaker. Many black people report that, despite holding senior professional positions and dressing in a similar way to their white colleagues, they have experienced being mistaken for junior employees or manual workers.

Citing the issue of poor white boys is, in my view, an attempt to draw attention away from the fact that discriminatory practices and attitudes negatively affect the futures of significant numbers of non-white people, whatever their class, financial status or qualifications. Poverty and classism are known to be part of the problem of poor academic performance and employment outcomes, along with other less researched issues. But Conservative governments have increased poverty and deprivation and have reduced funding for initiatives to improve life outcomes, such as the Sure Start centres. So all this faux concern for working class white boys seems to me to be a rather cynical way of trying shift the focus by claiming some sort of white victimhood.

growstuff Thank you for posting the link to the report. I'm impressed that you have read it as it is quite long, but I'm going to have a go too so I know exactly what was said.

I think several people have already commented that several of the people appointed to participate in the compilation of the report had already stated their belief that there is no systemic/institutional racism in the UK.

Well this article won't go down well with the woke brigade.
Professor Matt Goodwin article
Should you want to succeed in modern Britain, don’t be a poor white boy.
That is what you might conclude after reading the controversial new report on race in Britain.
It is not a fashionable thing to say in a society that has lost interest in the white working class, but it is children — and especially boys — from these communities who are most likely to suffer a range of dreadful outcomes.
As the report by the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities makes clear, they perform worse than every other ethnic group at GCSE, are the least likely of all to make it into higher education, and are among the most likely to experience high rates of family breakdown. The deck is stacked against them from day one.

“Eh? What's that about? Most black children currently in the UK were born here ... in some cases they're second or third generation.”

I guess 90% plus are born in the UK, the families with direct African heritage have different cultural values, very often middle class in their homeland. The family connections within the UK and overseas is quite strong

Katie59

MerylStreep

growstuff we can’t put all black working class boys together.
There is lots of evidence that shows boys with an African background are achieving far higher than boys with a Caribbean background.

That is because they are not in the Afrocarribbean culture they are are the brightest and best from many places, they know real poverty. They have risked their life many times to get to the UK, they are living their dream, however menial that is, it’s far far better than their homeland.

Eh? What's that about? Most black children currently in the UK were born here ... in some cases they're second or third generation.

Smileless2012

I shall treat your post @ 18.56 growstuff with the contempt it deserves.

OK! Suits me!

foxie I would read it. I don't disagree with some of the recommendations, but it's really what it doesn't say which is important.

For the record, I don't like identity politics, and actually agree that the bigger problem is poverty, but what the report doesn't address is why so many people from certain groups are poor and have limited opportunities. In some cases that is a result of racism.

The underlying agenda of the report is to victim blame. Sewell is on record as claiming that the problems faced particularly by Afro-Caribbeans are the result of poor parenting, drug abuse, etc. and that message comes through in the report. That is a very "Conservative" attitude to poverty.