How I failed the citizen test

Most of the questions betray a weird obsession with immigration, multiculturalism and the intimate workings of the welfare system. It beggars belief, for example, that to become a British citizen, I would need to know exactly how many refugees from South East Asia have settled here since 1979 - but not the name of a single Shakespeare play or Dickens novel.

Weirdly, I would also need to know by heart the percentage of practising Muslims in the UK, the number of seats we hold in the European Parliament, the proportion of people who have ever taken drugs, and the ages at which children take SATS, as well as details of the Government's New Deal. As it happens, I got all of those questions wrong. I also made a mess of the statutory paternity leave, the maximum hours that a 15-year-old can work during the school week, and the exact minimum wage for 21-year-olds - though I did at least know where Scousers come from. What the examiners want is merely the regurgitation of their welfare and immigration-obsessed textbook - even though most of their cherished facts can be found on the internet in seconds.

But the truth is that citizenship, as the Romans understood, should be earned, not taught. Membership of a community is not something that can be tested by multiple-choice questions... It should be a reward for months of service, not for hours revising the world's dullest textbook. Citizenship should be the ultimate prize, recognising a newcomer's commitment to his adopted homeland.

Apart from anything else at least one question is completely wrong: "Children must go to school between the ages of? ...
Fact: There is no compulsion for children to go to school. There is a legal requirement for them to receive an education 'at school or otherwise'.