Race relations not helped by pseudo-cultural political correctness

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/23/race-relations-not-helped-political-correctness

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Channel 4’s documentary presented by Trevor Phillips has some interesting reflections and needs to be taken seriously (Editorial, 17 March). But, having appointed him to head what was then the Commission for Racial Equality, I am somewhat surprised at the examples given and the rewriting of history. There is a danger that we are now setting up shibboleths, to make a point rather heavily and to make a programme interesting.

For instance, there is absolutely nothing new about the misuse of words.

As leader of Sheffield council 30 years ago, I had to slap down well-meaning equality officers who wanted the local authority and the schools (which were much closer to the local authority then) to avoid using words such as “blackboard”: this was so patently ridiculous that a stand needed to be taken, to make the opposite point that we did not help race relations by irritating the populace as a whole and by creating absurdities. It was 12 years ago that Tony Blair’s government wholeheartedly backed Ann Clwyd MP’s private member’s bill, which took a step towards tackling genital mutilation. At that time we were arguing vehemently that it was important to overcome pseudo-cultural political correctness.

But it was the suggestion that politicians and educationalists have not been prepared to acknowledge the great success of particular ethnic minorities that surprised and saddened me the most. For four years from 1997, when I was education secretary, we talked of little other than the enormous strides being made by Chinese and Indian students, and the sad fact that white working-class and African-Caribbean children were falling behind.

We published tables under the name of the head of the then Standards and Effectiveness Unit, Professor Michael Barber, showing just what the situation was in terms of different ethnic groupings. Let us by all means have a debate about whether we are too sensitive to deal with genuine issues, but can we please stop rewriting history.David Blunkett MPLab, Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough

• While I agree with much of Joseph Harker’s article (Opinion, 21 March), which hints at the complexities behind many of these statements about race and stereotypes, I must take issue with his comments about the deaths of Victoria Climbié and Baby Peter. Surely within the context of the article as a whole, the argument should have been that children are killed by adults who should be caring for them, regardless of race or background, rather than the lazy stereotyping of social services again being to blame.Hilary SparlingRochester, Kent