To not want to provide my DC nationality and country of birth to school?!

[SoDownSoGone]

What will the government do with the Country of Birth and Nationality?! AIBU to not provide this info?!

Whilst comparing schools asking for the country of birth to armbands may seem overblown, as a small part of the overall picture it is not.

Those of you who know your history will know that the Nazis didn't start by gassing Jews in concentration camps. They started out by promising to make Germany great again, creating a nationalistic pride, and by a lot of propaganda designed to make the "other" seem dangerous, a threat to the German way to life, parasites etc

That is all happening at the moment in the UK, and it has so far led to a sustained rise in hate crime amongst other things.

Immigrants are being put in secure holding facilities.

Thousands of men women and children are drowning in the Mediterranean every year, but no one gives a shit because they are other, they should have stayed in their own country, they're immigrants not refugees, we have to look after our own first, we simply can't afford them, they steal our jobs, rape our wives....

The hatred being whipped up may not bother you now, but wait and see where it all ends up. It has already resulted in our probable exit from the EU which is going to pretty disastrous.

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I really do recommend this giraffe

Maeine le Pen references are a bit OTT themselves

Eh? Marine Le Pen made the same proposals as the Home Office. How is it OTT to bring that up? If your government is agreeing with the far right, then that tells you you need to look carefully at exactly what is being proposed, especially when it concerns immigration.

Some of the recently declassified policy proposals from the Thatcher government were completely crackers (and legally unachievable). Bad times lead to even worse kite flying. It's not good, but it's not the same as active policy or enacted legislation.

"Eh? Marine Le Pen made the same proposals as the Home Office. How is it OTT to bring that up? If your government is agreeing with the far right, then that tells you you need to look carefully at exactly what is being proposed, especially when it concerns immigration."

Yes, exactly that, Noble. With a Home Secretary who suggested making firms return the nationalities of their employees as well - remember that lovely (sarcasm, in case any one doesn't get that) speech at the Tory conference.

it's not the same as active policy or enacted legislation.

What is the answer to the question "Why are schools across England collecting country of birth data?'

Nothing to do with concentration camps or deportation.

I doubt it has anything to do with concentration camps. I'm sure the data would be used.for deportation though - I can't see our current government having the slightest qualms about that.

That's rather dodging the question isn't it?

It's simply to keep an eye on statistics & numbers in the country.

Nothing more....

Incorrect, Quark

How is it dodging the question?

I already said upthread I suspect there's a rush on to get figures for Brexit planning/negotiation.

But what it's clearly NOT for also seems quite important when there are so many people queuing up to defend the 'armband' stupidity.

It's dodging the question, because the answer to 'Why are schools across England collecting country of birth data' is 'because the Home Office wants to create a hostile environment for illegal immigrants'.

I already said upthread I suspect there's a rush on to get figures for Brexit planning/negotiation.

This has fuck-all to do with Brexit. Have you not read the news links?

It won't happen.

It'll be like non-cash benefits on plastic cards and a dozen other 'nasty party' 'think the unthinkable' bits of viciousness in recent years.

Agree with OP. The question about your race and sexual orientation is on every government form these days. I just cross through and put N/A (not applicable), and have never had a form returned or refused. My choice on whether I feel it's relevant or not.

Of COURSE multiple data sources are being used to guesstimate various things for various purposes ATM.

It was one of the big issues that UKIP made such great play of that nobody has been keeping accurate figures for various migration-related measures.

It's all very well saying 'it won't happen' BUT that doesn't change the fact that this data is being collected because the Home Office strong-armed the DfE into collecting it.

It's not for education purposes.

Thankfully because people were suspicious of the intentions and spent many hours digging into this, we now know this and the Home Office have been banned from accessing the data. Well done them. Not well done to those (including myself) who blithely assumed it was all fine. We were wrong.

Giraffe I do not understand why you are so hung up on that one nasty little plan someone floated as though it is THE single grand plan.

There'll be dozens of 'nasty party' draft policies doing the rounds, seeing if any stick.

it just doesn't sit right with me. I don't see it as relevant to my child's education

Do you see the fact that education in Britain is free as being relevant to your child's education? If you have nothing to hide fill in the details requested - like everyone else

And then the law should be changed, the British welfare state was created and funded by British people for British people.

It is not a charity and it was never intended to be that. For every illegal immigrant's child prioritised in school application a British person who has worked and paid taxes or is legally exempt from doing so by disability etc child is de-prioritised.

Working class schools are already jammed with immigrant kids, it is classist and disgraceful that people expect the worst of kids to put up with the consequences of their political ideology simply so they can feel good about themselves tucked up in bed at night while their kids go to middle class schools with the token migrant child also from a middle class family.

All government services should require proof of eligibility before use, and if you refuse well tough. It's how it goes in many many other countries including quite a few in the EU.

We have a collection of nasty bastards in government, some of them really nasty, some merely a bit unpleasant. There's nothing surprising about this.This is what these people do. BUT; The very worst suggestions generally don't become policy, though, thank god.

What ISN'T the case is that the recent minor local success of UKIP, have some magical strengthening effect on the policy process.

Why would some peole not want to give out information about things like ethnicity or country of birth?

Maybe they've lived places where that could get you singled out for attack or prejudice. Some folk automatically dislike certain nationalities/religions etc. Some folk might just not want to broadcast their background.

Thank you for providing some timely evidence rale124.

I do not understand why you are so hung up on that one nasty little plan someone floated as though it is THE single grand plan.

Because it was the plan of the current government in power, of a department led by someone who is now Prime Minister, and it has had the actual outcome of every school in England, including the one I work in, doing the dirty work. This data has been collected.

It is only due to vigilance of more suspicious people than me that this plan has been thwarted. This data cannot now be accessed by anyone outside the DfE, and given the campaigns to stop people providing it, will be pretty useless. It would be better, given its shady history, if the whole thing were dropped from the census.