No Surprise..........Oxbridge elite still dominates UK public life

[Cidersomerset]

How a narrow Oxbridge elite still dominates UK public life: More than 75% of senior judges and half the cabinet attended university

Thursday 28 August 2014
By david-icke




http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...niversity.html






How a narrow Oxbridge elite still dominates UK public life: More than 75% of senior
judges and half the cabinet attended university More than a third of David Cameron's
cabinet attended a fee paying school A pressure group has urged the fast-tracking of
disadvantaged students Britain's elite still goes to Eton before attending Oxbridge,
claims report Only seven percent of the population has been privately educated

By Sarah Harris for The Daily Mail

Published: 00:01, 28 August 2014 | Updated: 00:08, 28 August 2014

Britain is still ‘deeply elitist’, with privately-educated pupils and Oxbridge graduates
continuing to dominate the top roles in society, a new report warns.

Many of the nation’s judges, politicians, armed forces chiefs, journalists, TV executives
and public officials attended fee-paying schools before studying at Oxford and Cambridge.

The Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission is calling for disadvantaged students
from less prestigious universities to be fast-tracked into leading professions to correct
the bias.It wants leading employers to ignore the university background of applicants
during recruitment rounds and publish data on the social background of all their
members of staff.

The commission – an advisory body of the Department for Education – believes the
move is necessary as its research shows the UK’s top jobs ‘remain disproportionately
held by people from a narrow range of backgrounds’.

But critics fear that the recommendations for employers amount to discriminating
against privately-educated pupils and warn against quotas.

The commission analysed the education of more than 4,000 individuals holding the most
prestigious jobs in British society and concluded that the country’s elite is still ‘formed
on the playing fields of independent schools’ and ‘finished in Oxbridge’s dreaming
spires’.



George Osborne, pictured, also went to Oxford and was a member of the Bullingdon Club with Boris Johnson

No less than 71 per cent of senior judges, almost two thirds of senior armed forces
officers, more than half of senior diplomats, and over a third of the Cabinet attended a
fee-paying school. David Cameron attended Eton and Oxford.

Nationally, around seven per cent of the UK population attended a private school.

The proportions were similar when the researchers examined who went to Oxford or
Cambridge among the leading professions, even though 62 per cent of UK adults did not
even attend university.

The commission says the ‘sheer scale of the dominance of certain backgrounds’ raises
questions about whether getting a top job is about ability or knowing the right people.


It has called for a national effort to ‘break open’ Britain’s elite. It wants employers to
use ‘contextual evaluation of academic achievements’ and ‘university-blind applications’
during recruitment drives.

This would involve bosses taking into account the family or school background of an
applicant.

The commission also wants leading employers to publish data on the proportion of staff
who have claimed free school meals, attended private schools and whose parents went to university.

Alan Milburn, its chairman, said yesterday: ‘Firms risk missing out on the best if they
arbitrarily restrict recruitment rounds to certain institutions or cherry-pick applicants on
the basis of university alone.’

The end of the grammar school system is believed to have helped widen class divisions.
It meant that bright pupils from poor backgrounds no longer had the 11-plus exam as a
means of getting ahead in education.

Former grammar school Prime Ministers include Harold Wilson, John Major and Margaret Thatcher.

Ruth Lea, economic adviser at Arbuthnot Banking Group, said the recommendation for
companies to introduce ‘university-blind’ applications was ‘completely impractical’ and
ignored the fact that a number of universities are known to excel at certain types of subjects.

[aheb]

I've known a few oxbridge people who didn't come from the right side of the tracks. The people that you are talking about went to Eton or Harrow before oxbridge, and that is really the secret. Also if I am correct you can pay to go to oxbridge without having the inconvenience of passing exams, I know prince charles went to oxford after Llandudno university and he had the a level results of a 12 year old.
I think it's more than that , I watched a programm comparing the rich and the poor which was rather amusing, it tried to make out they were all the same lol.but there was some young twonk who'd been a smackhead and was now working as a stockbroker.............that is really the key, it isn't what university you went to it's more who you know.
Some of the upper classes are really thick.look at princess diana i think she had 2 gec o level passes .