Cameron’s Munich speech on multiculturalism predictably set the cat amongst the pigeons.

We are told the Prime Minister has identified segregation and separatism as key issues behind the threat of Islamic extremism and he calls for a “shared national identity” to replace “the doctrine of State multiculturalism”.

But what does he really mean by a “shared national identity”?

How has his own experience shaped his views?

I’d like to know.

It's too bad that Prime Ministers tend to come from mono cultural constituencies.

Cameron’s Witney is overwhelmingly white. Blair’s Sedgefield and Broon’s Kirkaldy are so white there aren’t enough ethic minorities to register even a blip on the official statistics.

Does this matter?

In today’s Britain perhaps it does.

Over the years I spent a lot of time thinking about Pakistan. My constituency surgeries offered no escape from that country or the travails of its people. 

So when Trevor Phillips tells Andrew Marr this morning that 25% of all British Pakistani men are taxi drivers it doesn’t seem at all strange to me.

In fact, I find myself thinking if I have ever seen a taxi driver in Pendle who isn’t a British Pakistani man.

No. I don’t think I have.

But, after drawing attention to the weirdness of that taxi driver statistic, Phillips goes on to say that integration happens most effectively at work and there is a problem when 75% of British Pakistani women of working age are at home, outside the labour market.

I agree.

Said so for years.

And if this continues as the norm, even with women born and brought up in Britain, then we can all say goodbye to a “shared national identity”.

So, what is being done to get more Muslim women out of the house and into work?

Discuss.

The big unmentionable is, of course, faith schools.

For the moment there are not many Muslim faith schools in Jack Straw’s backyard in East Lancashire. But, as sure as night follows day, this will change.

And if children grow up apart, separated from others by ethnicity and religion, then we really will have problems.

But let’s not get too apocalyptic. We are not alone in grappling with issues of shared national identity.

Every four years Canada accepts a million newcomers.

The welcome mat is out for arrivals from every corner of the globe. They are immigrating into a society that believes multiculturalism works.

Yet even here the question is asked of the New Canadians: “Why can’t they be more like us?”

Good question.

But what happens if they don’t want to be?

Attachments:

nomis_2011_02_06_124856.xls

[Constituencies by ethnicity]

144 Kb