Second generation still suffering bias

RACE DISCRIMINATION

Minority groups are continuing to pay an "ethnic penalty", enduring worse employment and housing prospects than their white counterparts.

According to the Office for National Statistics, there is little evidence that less discrimination is suffered by second-generation groups than their parents. Among the second generation, the relative chances of black Caribbean men in competition for places in the two topmost social classes were only 75 per cent of British-born whites of the same age and qualifications. In the competition to avoid unemployment their relative chances were down to 43 per cent. And analysing figures from the 1991 census, the ONS concludes more than 200,000 households would have to move home if the distribution of housing was to be equal, with ethnic groups less likely to own their own homes and more likely to have the worst living conditions.

Ethnicity in the 1991 Census: Volume Four from the Stationery Office pounds 29.95 and The Tables Are Bare, report available from the MSF, 50 SouthwarkStreet, London, SE1 1UN; pounds 5.