Oh dear...

was it something I said? 

Are some children more equal than others?

The home page of the Department for Education's website prominently displays the department's vision:

Our vision is for a highly educated society in which opportunity is more equal for children and young people no matter what their background or family circumstances.

I was surprised by the "more equal". Surely things are either equal or they are not. The vision is presumably supposed to mean that the department would like opportunity to be nearer to equal than it is now, but why not go all the way? Perhaps they think it cannot be achieved, which would be a shame. The Department for Education has not shied away from ambition recently, which is one of the reasons why it surprised me that its vision was qualified in such an odd way. I would have thought it would be better expressed as:

Our vision is for a highly educated society in which all children and young people have the same opportunities, no matter what their background or family circumstances.

They can use that, for a small fee.