英学者呼吁改革公民入籍测试

Emperor Claudius on a bronze sestertius. The man who invaded Britain in AD 43 features in the Life in the UK test.

A test taken by around 150,000 would-be British citizens each year is just a "bad pub quiz" with too much focus on culture and history at the expense of practical knowledge, an academic has said.

The Life in the UK test, which must be passed to qualify for indefinite leave to remain in Britain, does not require practical necessities in everyday life, Durham University's Dr Thom Brooks said.

But it is required that new citizens know "trivial" facts such as the year Emperor Claudius invaded Britain, the year that Sake Dean Mahomet launched the first curry house in the country and the age of Big Ben.

Brooks, a US immigrant who sat and passed the test in Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 2009, becoming a British citizen in 2011, said the test is a key part of immigration policy but is unfit for purpose in its current form.

"The Life In The UK test has become a bad pub quiz. It has gone from testing practical trivia to the purely trivial and is a major opportunity lost," he said.

"The biggest surprise is the lack of attention successive governments have paid to ensuring the test is fair and not out of date, a surprise even bigger than the sometimes-shocking questions that can be found on the test," said Brooks, a reader in law at Durham Law School.

"Many citizens that were born and bred in the UK would struggle to know the answers to many of these questions.

"Britain will not be more cohesive because more have heard about the Battle of Trafalgar, but rather if future citizens understand better how to participate in daily British life and make a contribution."

The latest edition of the test took effect from 25 March and was based on the third edition of the handbook Life in the United Kingdom.

Brooks argues that the test is inconsistent in what it requires new citizens to know. They are not required to know the number of MPs in Westminster but are required to know the number of representatives in the Welsh Assembly, Scottish Parliament and Northern Ireland Assembly.

Lord Roberts of Llandudno, vice-chairman of the all party parliamentary group on migration, welcomed Brooks's report, launched at a lecture at Durham University on Thursday evening.

"I am delighted to echo his call that the test, which is both impractical and irrelevant as it stands, be reformed," he said.

"Surely future Britons should better understand how to participate in daily life, instead of knowing by rote which emperor invaded Britain in AD 43?"

Brooks stops short of recommending that the test is ditched, but instead said it should be reformed so that it is no longer "impractical, inconsistent, trivial, gender imbalanced, outdated and ineffective".

The test requires new citizens to know the date of birth and death of nearly 30 men in British history but only four women. No women artists, musicians or poets are mentioned.

Much of the information in the accompanying official handbook does not appear to be part of the test, Brooks said.

The handbook contains about 3,000 facts including five telephone numbers, 34 websites, 278 historical dates and several brief excerpts of British poetry.

Of the 400 official practice questions and answers in one of three official test handbooks, no telephone numbers, no websites, no poetry and only a few dates are mentioned.

A Home Office spokesman said: "We've stripped out mundane information about water meters, train timetables, and using the internet. The new test rightly focuses on values and principles at the heart of being British. Instead of telling people how to claim benefits it encourages participation in British life.

"This is just part of our work to help ensure migrants are ready and able to integrate into British society and forms part of our changes which have broken the automatic link between temporary and permanent migration.

"We have made radical changes to the immigration system and are determined to reduce net migration from the hundred of thousands into the tens of thousands by the end of this parliament. The latest figures show these reforms are working, with net migration falling by more than a third since 2010."

A Conservative party spokesman said: "Dr Brooks is a self-confessed 'active member' of the Labour party, so it's no surprise that he prefers Labour's flawed old test which told people how to claim benefits rather than encourage participation in British life."

据英国《卫报》6月14日报道——一名学者表示，每年约15万人参加的英国公民入籍考试仅仅是一个“拙劣的酒吧测验游戏”，它太过专注文化及历史，而非实用知识。

英国杜伦大学

但是，它需要新公民知道一些“琐碎”的事实，例如克劳狄一世入侵英国的年代、Sake Dean Mahomet开设英国第一家咖喱餐馆的年代以及大本钟

布鲁克斯是一名美国移民，他于2009年在泰茵河上的纽卡斯尔

他说：“‘英国生活’测试已变成了一个拙劣的酒吧测试游戏。它从测验实用琐事变成了测试真正琐碎无趣的事实，这是一次重大机会的错失。”

“最让人吃惊的是，历届政府都缺乏对保持测试公正及测试与时俱进的注意力。这比测试中那有时让人震惊的问题还要更让人震惊。”

“许多土生土长的英国公民面对很多问题时也要绞尽脑汁。

“英国不会变得更加团结紧密，因为会有越来越多的人知道特拉法加大海战

《英国生活》测试书的最新版从3月25日起开始生效，基于《英国生活》

布鲁克斯争论到，测试对新公民的要求是前后矛盾的。受试者不需要知道威斯敏斯特

兰迪德诺

他说：“我很高兴能在改革测试的问题上和他拥有相同的看法，此测试既不切实际又不相干。”

“未来的公民应该更好地理解如何参与英国的日常生活，而不是去死记硬背哪个皇帝在公元43年入侵了英国，这一点肯定的。”

布鲁克斯不认为该废弃此测试，而是认为应该改革此测试，这样，它就不会再是“不切实际、前后矛盾、琐碎繁杂、性别失调、老旧过时和无效无用的了”。

该测试要求新公民知晓英国历史上近30位男性的生卒年月，但女性只要求掌握4位。也没有提到任何的女性艺术家、音乐家或诗人。

布鲁克斯说，官方出版的《英国生活》手册里的许多内容在测试中都没有出现。

一名英国内政部的发言人说：“我们删去了关于水表、火车时刻表以及网络使用的无聊信息。新测试关注的是英国人的核心价值观和原则。它没有告诉人们如何获得利益，而是鼓励人们参与到英国人的生活中来。”

“这只是我们工作的一部分，帮助确保移民都已准备好，并且有能力融入英国社会，组成英国变化的一部分，这变化打断了临时移民和永久移民之间的自动链接。

“我们在移民体系上做出了很重大的变革，并且决定在这次议会结束时减少净移民人数，从几十万减少到几万。最新数据显示这些改革正在起作用，净移民人数从2010年来减少了三分之一多。”

一名保守派的发言人说：“布鲁克斯博士是公开承认的工党‘活跃分子’，所以他更喜欢工党满是诟病的老式测试也就不足为奇了，老测试告诉告诉人们如何获得利益，而非鼓励人们参与到英国人的生活中来。”