Church Schools: The Real Class Bias

We all know that the real objection to "faith schools" is that Catholic ones have been so good at, according to the old Christian Brothers' maxim, "taking the sons of dockers and turning them into doctors".

The professions, and thus the places where professional people live, now contain any number of people originally from Scotland, the North, the Midlands and the less salubrious parts of the South, with working-class grandparents or even parents, and with Irish great-grandparents.

Where will it all end?

Meanwhile, the rubbish passed by the Bishops' Conferences as RE in Catholic schools would not be permitted, even now, in any other discipline. The likes of colouring in at 16 go on, but the curricula do not actually require or specify them, and they are certainly not universally practised.

We need someone in Parliament (especially as it is going to be hung next time) who will put down an amendment, such as would probably get through with only an angry Tablet and a quietly exultant Catholic Herald (and possibly Daily Telegraph) noticing, that all RE textbooks, resources and inspectors in state-funded Catholic schools (and I can't see where else the money is supposed to come from, nor is the separation of Church and State anything other than a direct disobedience to the Magisterium) must be approved directly by the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.