… if you want her to be a journalist. (Assuming of course such species will continue to exist by the time she enters the workforce.)

It will come as no surprise at all to anyone who has worked in the London media to learn that it is dominated by the products of fee-paying schools.

The survey showed that 54% of the top 100 newspaper editors, columnists, broadcasters and executives were educated privately, despite fee-paying schools catering for 7% of the school population. That figure has increased from 49% in 1986, when the research was last carried out.

And that figure would be pretty well reflected throughout the rest of the industry – indeed if you were to count the reporters (who do the flashy stuff and get the bylines) I’d suspect the figure would be rather higher, while among the sub-editors and production people (no glory) it would be perhaps a bit lower.

Why? Partly it is the fact that to get into the industry you have to do lots of unpaid work experience, or for mummy or daddy to know the right person; partly is that it requires a level of confidence, or the ability to blag your way through any situation, that fee-paying schools seem to be very good at inculcating in their pupils.

(Declaration of my place: I went to the Australian equivalent of what in British terms would be a “minor public school”. Not that it helps much, since I doubt there are many MLC School graduates in the London media.)