Twelve years ago, when I was head of the Commission for Racial Equality, I argued that the fate we were predicting for many young, working-class black males — to become the very definition of failure; under-educated and unemployed — could engulf other groups too.

And I pointed to the rapidly emerging problem of poor white boys doing badly at school.

A change in the way government collected education statistics — distinguishing between various ethnic groups — had highlighted the differences in academic attainment.

White working-class pupils are falling behind their ethnic minority counterparts throughout their education, an official audit shows (file photo)

Children from Asian and Chinese backgrounds were forging ahead, while those from disadvantaged African-Caribbean and white families — especially the boys — were struggling.

Victims

The response back then was a distinct lack of interest in their plight. Blacks were good victims; nobody cared much about the so-called white underclass, those who came to be demonised as ‘chavs’.

Yesterday, we learned the depressing result of the unwillingness to address that issue. The Government’s welcome flood of data from the Race Disparity Audit confirms the dismal performance of less well-off white boys.

When it comes to education and employment they — along with the African-Caribbean, gipsy and traveller boys who have carpeted society’s ground floor for decades — are taking a hell of a beating.

The data, which covers 130 areas of life across health, education, employment and criminal justice is rich in detail. It confirms what we have long known: while some groups have thrived in Britain, some have failed to progress and remain at serious disadvantage.

However, the data on the indigenous, white working-class youth is devastating.

On the basis of these statistics, there seems every chance that while the Sikh teenager will one day turn into a highly skilled doctor, the grime-music obsessed African sixth-former will become a pin-striped lawyer, and that mathematics-nut Chinese GCSE student will end up a tech entrepreneur, the best that your average working-class white boy can hope for is a part-time job in an Amazon warehouse.

Hats off to Theresa May for commissioning the Cabinet Office to embark on the racial audit database, the first of its kind in the world

Well, hats off to Theresa May for holding to her promise to lift the lid on this festering sore by commissioning the Cabinet Office to embark on the racial audit database, the first of its kind in the world.

Based on my own experience, the Prime Minister will have had little encouragement from fellow MPs and many in the senior Civil Service, for whom the evidence should serve only to reinforce their prejudices.

In liberal minds every black person is a victim and every white person an oppressor. This new data shatters those prejudices. And yet the evidence has been telling us this for years.

A 2015 study by the Institute for Fiscal Studies reported that just under a third — 32.6 per cent — of those who class themselves as ‘white British’ go to university. The problem is gender-skewed — with just 29 per cent of white boys making it to tertiary education.

Black Caribbean youngsters have a 37.4 per cent chance of higher education, compared to just 29 per cent of white boys (file photo)

By contrast, Black Caribbean youngsters have a 37.4 per cent chance of higher education, Pakistani pupils a 44.7 per cent chance, and the figure for Bangladeshis is 48.8 per cent.

Indian youngsters have more than double the chance of going to university (67.4 per cent) than white Britons, while more than three-quarters (75.7 per cent) of Chinese pupils make it.

Given that a degree can add between £170-250,000 to the average career earnings of the British worker, the future looks increasingly grim for the group that once upon a time always seemed to end up on top: white males.

Legislation that outlawed discrimination in the workplace has made it worthwhile for women and minorities to aspire to top jobs and careers, while the rise of knowledge-based service industries, and new technology has eroded men’s physical advantage.

The equality warrior in me says that this is exactly the moment when, in a just society, someone should be speaking up for them.

Admittedly it’s hard to have sympathy for those who didn’t display much compassion for others when they were on top. But we should be — we are — better than that.

Success

The enemy was never white men; it was injustice and unfairness. And this is not an insoluble problem, if we can bring ourselves to face some uncomfortable realities.

Certainly, there’s little evidence that gender makes you smarter — among Chinese and Asian students the gap between girls’ and boys’ performance is greatly diminished.

Likewise, the success of black African boys compared with their under-performing African-Caribbean cousins proves that genetics play little part in this problem.

In truth, we know that much of the disadvantage for those left behind in the global competition is cultural, related to habit and behaviour. It’s not a coincidence that the most successful ethnic groups — the Chinese and some South Asians, who have strong family structures — do more homework than whites.

If Theresa May is looking for a legacy by which she will be remembered, this audit surely has to be her most significant achievement so far, writes Trevor Phillips

Nor should it come as a surprise that the least educationally successful households in the U.S. — African-Americans — watch almost two hours more television a week on average than the rest of the U.S. population. I suspect the figures would be similar here.

We can fix all this. It just needs leadership. But, as I have found over the years, it isn’t easy to get it on the agenda.

For a start there’s a problem with teachers, some of whom seem to want disadvantage to be blamed solely on lack of resources and government investment.

Challenge

For their part, too many politicians want it to be all about social class. They flaunt their liberal credentials by insisting that the poor will always under-perform unless given much more aid. Those high-flying Chinese and Indian pupils confound that view.

Two years ago, the Chief Inspector of Schools, Sir Michael Wilshaw, acknowledged this challenge of the ‘lost boys’ of the white working class left behind.

He called for better schools and school leaders — and for teachers to get tough with ‘feckless’ parents. He received just as lukewarm a hearing as I did all those years ago.

Oddly enough, the white men who currently dominate the Labour Party would probably cut off their right arms before they acknowledged that the Race Disparity Audit has uncovered a serious race-related problem — because the ‘victims’ are white.

If Labour had not been so totally captured by its sub-Marxist militant fringe, this should surely have been a major cause for the Left.

It may be ironic that it has taken a Tory Prime Minister, whose days, according to some, are numbered, to summon up the courage to tackle the single most important challenge facing young white men in our society.

If Theresa May is looking for a legacy by which she will be remembered, this audit surely has to be her most significant achievement so far.