Would it be all right for a new Children’s Laureate to complain that there were too many blacks on book covers?

Britain’s new Children’s Laureate is the black writer, Malorie Blackman, who tells us: "There have only been seven previous winners so it's not like we are breaking a pattern of hundreds of years but it's a reflection of being bold and not being afraid of new ideas. This is the 21st century, after all. It should not be a big deal to have a black Children's Laureate in 2013. I'm just thrilled that they think I am up to the task. I hope my colour was incidental to the choice."

If your race is coincidental to the appointment then why would you describe it as “a reflection of being bold and not being afraid of new ideas”? Sounds as if you think the colour of your skin is the main issue here. Why? There are lots of successful black authors and Britain is one of the most ethnically diverse and racially tolerant countries on earth.

In the manner beloved of compassionate liberals, Blackman then proceeds to criticise white Britons for being racist. White parents won’t buy books with black children on the cover. We need more “ethnically diverse” literature in this country (i.e. more black heroes and heroines). Michael Gove’s history curriculum is “dangerous” because it focuses on Britain  and therefore risks turning ethnic children against education (huh?). And, of course, she intends to “bang the drum” for diversity. Wow - talk about "new ideas"!

So there you have it – a card-carrying left-wing member of the race industry who thinks us white folk are racist, doesn’t think British kids should learn their own country’s history, and wants to use literature as a means of inculcating children with a set of stereotypical liberal attitudes of the “we are all guilty in a very real sense” variety.

Welcome to left-liberal la-la land.

First, diversity. What does this actually mean? I suspect it’s a synonym for “white British guilt”. It’s not enough to accept and be friendly to foreigners: being white means having to feel really, really guilty about your own history and culture (apart from the Holy Trinity of the NHS, the Welfare State and Mass Immigration, of course) and to feel deeply ashamed of even thinking of applying the same behavioural and cultural standards to foreigners as you do to your own kind. (Odd that, given that the countries from which most of our immigrants and their offspring hail rarely impose this sort of guilt-drenched multiculturalism on those who choose to stay at home. Hmm.)

Apart from denying indigenous Britons the right to their own racial identity, what diversity means in practice is making excuses for everything from predatory Asian sex gangs, forced marriages and honour killings, to black educational failure, Muslim unemployment rates and domestic Islamist atrocities. Mind you, if we had an Asian Prime Minister, blacks were over-represented at Oxbridge and the Muslim “community” had silenced hate speech within its own ranks, we’d still have a host of Malorie Blackmans assuring white Britons that they were intrinsically racist and that more needed to be done to make minorities feel at home here.

Just imagine the furore if a newly-appointed Children’s Laureate had announced that he intended using the role to encourage white working-class Britons to resist diversity and to celebrate their own history and culture. Or if a black or Asian appointee had assured us that she would spend her two-year tenure convincing ethnic minority children to feel thankful for having been afforded the opportunity to grow up in such a racially diverse and tolerant society. Of course, both scenarios are well beyond the bounds of possibility – proof (if any were needed) that the Liberal-Left has a Vulcan death-grip on our culture.

By the way, Malorie Blackman is married to a Scotsman called Neil and lives with him and their daughter, Elizabeth, in Kent.