THE PAREKH REPORT [4]

‘Several fundamental beliefs ... in our view are, or deserve to be, shared by most people in Britain.

First, all individuals have equal worth irrespective of their colour, gender, ethnicity, religion, age or sexual orientation, and have equal claims to the opportunities they need to realise their potential and contribute to collective wellbeing. The principle of equal moral worth cannot take root and flourish within a structure of deep economic or social inequalities.

Second, citizens are not only individuals but also members of particular religious, ethnic, cultural and religious communities, which are comparatively stable as well as open and fluid. Britain is both a community of citizens and a community of communities, both a liberal and a multicultural society, and needs to reconcile their sometimes conflicting requirements.

Third, since citizens have differing needs, equal treatment requires full account to be taken of their differences. When equality ignores relevant differences and insists on uniformity of treatment, it leads to injustice and inequality; when differences ignore the demands of equality, they result in discrimination. Equality must be defined in a culturally sensitive way and applied in a discriminating but not discriminatory manner.

Fourth, every society needs to be cohesive as well as respectful of diversity, and must find ways of nurturing diversity while fostering a common sense of belonging and a shared identity among its members.

Fifth, although every society needs a broadly shared body of values, of which human rights are an important part, there is a risk of defining the values so narrowly that their further development is ruled out or legitimate ways of life are suppressed. While affirming such essential procedural values as tolerance, mutual respect, dialogue and peaceful resolution of differences, and such basic ethical norms as respect for human dignity, equal worth of all, equal opportunity for self-development and equal life chances, society must also respect deep moral differences and find ways of resolving inescapable conflicts. Human rights principles provide a valuable framework for handling differences, but they are never by themselves enough.

Lastly, racism, understood either as division of humankind into fixed, closed and unalterable groups or as systematic domination of some groups by others, is an empirically false, logically incoherent and morally unacceptable doctrine. Racism is a subtle and complex phenomenon. It may be based on colour and physical features or on culture, nationality or way of life; it may affirm equality of human worth but implicitly deny this by insisting on the absolute superiority of a particular culture; it may admit equality up to a point but impose a glass ceiling higher up. Whatever its subtle disguises and forms, it is deeply divisive, intolerant of differences, a source of much human suffering and inimical to the common sense of belonging lying at the basis of every stable political community. It can have no place in a decent society.’

The above is from the Preface of the Parekh Report.

Much of it sounds very innocuous and nice. But it has been written by the politically correct and out-and-out communists, and therefore needs close examination - especially as we can see how it has worked out since.

The above 6 points will be dealt with in turn:

1. Talking of ‘equal worth’ is all very well, although it depends upon what is meant by ‘equal worth’. The term is flannel and designed to engender uncritical agreement.

The sentence that ‘the principle of equal moral worth cannot take root and flourish within a structure of deep economic or social inequalities’ is disingenuous and plain wrong. Someone’s ‘moral worth’ is not determined by the amount of money they have. Morality is not determined by money.

The concept is unworkable. Immigrants from the Third World are bound to be poorer, in general, than the indigenous population as they are coming from poorer countries. That is an inescapable fact. The government cannot wave a magic wand and financially enrich Third World immigrants - nor should it try to do so. The most effective way to help those living in the poorer countries of the Third World is through effective foreign aid and support for refugees in their own or neighbouring countries. Not by transporting them over here. The fact that there has been substantial immigration means that economic inequalities are inevitable.

2. This point shows that Vince Cable’s recent outburst against English nationalists is part of an ideological creed and is not based on any recent objective analysis. The report specifically does not refer to citizens as belonging to a country - either British or English [the report advocates the replacement of the British nation with a ‘community of communities’]. It asserts that Britain is a ‘multicultural society’ and makes no mention of the need for immigrants to assimilate into the host society [the report condemns the idea of assimilation as do the politically correct to this day].

3. This point deals with equality. Its definition of equality is that of the politically correct and multiculturalists. It rejects the notion that people should all be treated the same, which it dismisses as a cause of ‘injustice and inequality’. Instead it alleges that equality should be defined in a ‘culturally sensitive way’ and applied in a ‘discriminating’ manner. In effect this is a call for political correctness, a favourable treatment for ethnic minorities, and positive discrimination, which in turn is discrimination against, in the main, the English. It is a call for the English to be treated as second class citizens in their own country.

4. This point is an attempt to reconcile diversity with the need for cohesion. It makes no mention of the need for patriotism or the need for assimilation [or integration for those who object to that term] or the need to assess the ability of immigrants to assimilate into the host nation. Within 12 months of this report, which was published in October 2000, there was 9/11 and the accompanying open hostility among Asians towards Britain [see English Rights Campaign entries dated the 19 and 20 June 2005] More recently there has been the 7/7 bombings and the subsequent failed terrorist attacks. More recently still, there have been the interracial rioting and murders in Birmingham. The report makes no prediction of this, or identify the looming problems which we now face.

This failure shows how useless the report is. It was too busy peddling political correctness and allegations of racism that it ignored/failed to see the looming catastrophe which is now upon us.

It is patriotism which needs to be nurtured and not diversity. People should be allowed to get on with their own lives without a bunch of anti-British politically correct zealots, in pursuit of their own ideological ends, trying to interfere in order to exploit differences as a means of creating division and hatred.

5. Despite listing a number of values and ethics, the report makes no mention of freedom. No recognition of even the concept of the freedom of the individual. Of course such concepts are completely alien to the politically correct, who believe that only opinions and statements that they approve of are allowed.

Freedom of the individual and the willingness to live and let live, which is intrinsic to a free society, are the means by which traditional British tolerance reconciles differences.

Democracy is also a means of reconciling differences. This too needs to be respected and not ignored as it is in the report. Democracy is more important than so-called human rights, which have simply been interpreted as a means of implementing political correctness. Democracy is a vital ingredient of a free and tolerant society, and should not be dismissed as ‘majoritarian politics’ [to quote Cherie Blair].

Nor is there any mention of the need for, and the merits of, patriotism.

6. Last and not least, needless to say, the report could not resist wallowing in the issue of racism in lurid terms. The report’s definition of racism is important. The dictionary definition is:

‘(1) The belief that races have distinctive cultural characteristics determined by hereditary factors and that this endows some races with an intrinsic superiority over others (2) abusive or aggressive behaviour towards members of another race on the basis of such belief.’

[Collins English Dictionary]

Yet the report inserts its own definition. That definition is capable of wide interpretation, and is widely interpreted in the report. It is so wide as to include almost anything and is to the exclusion of common sense. It draws in ‘culture, nationality and way of life’, and does not confine itself to the common sense understanding held by most people. It does not confine itself to hatred, race or hereditary factors.

The recognition of foreigners as being so, is not racism. Nor is the recognition of difference the same as intolerance of difference, and certainly not the same as racism. The lack of a quota of ethnic minorities is not racism.

A particular culture might be superior to another. The political culture of the UK, despite all its flaws, is more advanced and superior than that of, say, either Zimbabwe or The Sudan. But to say that, or to recognise that, is not racism.

To speak of the racism of the domination of some groups by others leads to the ridiculous situation of Christmas Lights being banned as being offensive to other faiths. Or of the systematic removal of Christianity, or of British history, from the school curriculum.

Multiculturalism condemns any concept of a national culture, which by its nature will be treated differently to the culture held by those who have only recently set foot in Britain. A national culture will be the dominant culture. That is not racism

Being English is not racist.