Knowing your place
Contradictions inherent in New Labour’s policy of increased diversity and “choice” in school-provision have surfaced again over admissions to state secondary schools. Media attention has once again focused on Brighton and Hove, the first Local Authority to make “random allocation” of schoo places, rather than proximity to the school, the criterion to resolve conflict where schools in the same catchment-area are over-subscribed. (A handful of individual schools in other areas already use the system.) Some Tories have objected, noting that Brighton’s “ballot” or “lottery” prevents wealthier...