Teaching with the left foot

Here's an interesting letter from a teacher who objects to having to reveal his religion when applying for jobs:

Asking me if I am a Catholic or not when applying for a job is religious discrimination, sectarian and bigoted, but you never pursue this. Why not?

Why is the First Minister, Jack McConnell, shy of this issue? One thing is for sure; if Rangers issued an application form with such an anti-Catholic question, he would be all over your front pages for weeks condemning their sectarian employment policy.

The writer is correct in stating that the First Minister would fly into a rage if Rangers were to act as described.

But L McDowell misses the real point: Rangers and Celtic are private organisations. In my view they should be free to discriminate in favour or against anyone for any reason whatsoever. Equally of course, we, the public, should take any such discrimination into account when deciding whether or not to support such a team.

It's quite a different matter when we come to the writer's job applications because the schools in question aren't privately owned but are paid for by the taxpayer. Government schools shouldn't discriminate on grounds of religion and it's a nonsense that Scotland has two separate state education systems. One would be bad enough!