The defection of another middle-class parent

I am tempted to move to Stoke Newington, just so I can vote against Diane Abbott at the next election

There has been a fairly dignified response, especially among her colleagues in the Labour Party, to the news that the left-wing Labour MP Diane Abbott is sending her son to a top independent school. In part, this may be because when Labour MPs were accused of hypocrisy in the past if they made elitist choices for their own children, Ms Abbott was one who could be relied upon to lead the voices of condemnation.

She has been critical of the Blairs for sending their children to high-performing state schools outside their own borough. "Education is debated around class," said Ms Abbott. "Equality and egalitarianism go to the heart of why people vote Labour." When Harriet Harman sent her own son to the same school, Ms Abbott said, "she made the Labour Party look as if we do one thing and say another." On the matter of her own "parental choice" though, she is saying nothing.

On this, at least, she is right. No doubt Ms Abbott could strike a few convincing postures around this issue. But her son didn't ask to be the child of a politician and she is right to keep him out of the debate if she can. How appalling it would be if Ms Abbott were to use her own child to score political points.

And as unlikely as this may sound, she could. In defence of her action, Ms Abbott could point out that she has been a vociferous opponent of the "privatisation" of the education system in her own constituency of Hackney, and feels she has no choice but to vote about what has gone on in her own borough with her feet. Hackney, famously condemned a few years ago by Chris Woodhead as "the worst education authority in Britain", was the first to have control over its schools removed and placed in the hands of an independent trust.

Ms Abbott complained that the removal of Hackney's education services into the hands of The Learning Trust, headed by Mike Tomlinson, a former chief inspector of schools, had not been agreed by the Labour Party, or by the people of Hackney, and was not even part of Labour Party policy. Therefore, she could argue that she is boycotting "privatised" Hackney on a matter of principle.

This, of course, is a stand that a great many of her constituents cannot follow her lead on, since the school which her son is attending costs £10,000 a year. Further, if those who can afford the fees decide that if she can do it then so can they, the exodus of potential pupils from more affluent backgrounds will do nothing but damage to educational standards in Hackney.

This well-known phenomenon, whereby the middle classes opt out of state education and leave behind schools full of children from poor backgrounds is commonly referred to as "white flight". In Ms Abbott's case the spotlight is placed on its lesser known sibling "black flight", whereby parents of children from ethnic minorities who can buy their way out of state education are willing to make more sacrifices to do so than their white counterparts.

Here again, we find what might be viewed as an extenuating circumstance for Ms Abbott's anti-egalitarian choice. Ms Abbott has been a long-standing campaigner against what she calls the "silent catastrophe" of black male under achievement in state schools. She has argued passionately that this under-achievement is down to institutionalised racism in British schools. Who in their right mind would sent their child to an institution that she is certain will discriminate against him?

Well, again, the answer is that it is the people who do not have the cash to make the choice. They will have to continue sending their children to schools that their MP says are structurally unfit to get the best out of their pupils, largely because "it would be remarkable if all white women teachers were free from the racial stereotypes that permeate this society about black men."

This is an interesting point because despite the preponderance of females at primary school level, where male teachers are as rare as hen's teeth, it is not until they are older that black boys, and especially those whose background is rooted in the Caribbean, start to fall behind.

Some people suggest that at least part of the problem may lie in the nihilistic values of the bling-bling culture many boys feel peer-group pressure to adhere to. Ms Abbott tends to shy away from this suggestion, even though it is clear that such a negative culture can be explained as a black male response to their stereotyping as aggressive underachievers. Understanding a vicious circle is at work is not the same as "blaming the victim".

Ms Abbott may avoid engaging with this argument but she does concede that the parents of black boys could do more to secure a better deal at school for their children. "We all have a role to play. A lot of parents, for whatever reason, feel inhibited," Ms Abbott has written. "My argument is that black parents need to engage with schools now. They need to ask questions, get involved, go to meetings, apply to be governors. There's a real shortage of black governors."

This is good advice. Research shows that parental involvement with their children's school life is more important in achieving positive educational outcomes than anything else - more important than race, more important than class, more important even than the quality of the school itself. It is advice that Ms Abbott is willing to follow - she does attend parents meetings at her son's school - but only with the devastating disclaimer that the school she is involved with is one in the private sector.

Even so, there are plenty of people who will support Ms Abbott in her choice. Trevor Phillips, who heads up the Commission for Racial Equality, sent his children to private school because he too believes in the institutional racism of the state sector. The late Bernie Grant, at the time when Harriet Harman was being excoriated for her own choice of school, was sympathetic. He said that he regretted sending his three children to state school in Tottenham, and felt that schools in London were so bad that they should be considered a special case.

I, though, have no sympathy with this view at all. The special case in London is that there is more middle-class flight from the state system than anywhere else in Britain. Not only does a much higher percentage of the population send their children to private schools. A huge percentage of the population also buys property at inflated prices so that they can buy their children a place at a good state school. I'm entirely against both ploys, although I'm tempted to move to Stoke Newington, just so I can vote against Ms Abbott in the next election.

If all of the middle classes followed Ms Abbott's lead, the state system in London would be a true ghetto, populated only by the disadvantaged, and taught only by those who failed to get work in the private sector. Thank God some of us do stick to our principles, and have the confidence in our own children to understand that without the purchase by their parents of all the advantages money can offer, they will grow up into more well-rounded citizens than those who are educated far away from the reality of the society in which they live.

Diane Abbott has let down herself, her son, her constituents and all the kids at the state school her family's presence might have positively influenced. How she can think that she can ever lecture "new" Labour about two-tier systems with any integrity again, I cannot imagine.

d.orr@independent.co.uk