Londoners Magazine

Boris Johnson, the elected official responsible for leading the fight against knife crime and gang-related murders in London, recently stated that teaching Latin in schools could have a major impact on youth violence. Oh, and ancient Greek too.

In a speech that seems like another example of how breathtakingly out of touch he is with London’s young people, our blonde bombshell of a Mayor (who studied Classics at Oxford) said: “I think there’s a huge amount we can do in London by promoting the learning of languages including Latin… I would like to see not only that but I would like to see ancient Greek. Latin can help with all languages.”

Although Latin is unarguably a cracking keystone in the unlocking all the romance languages, Mr. Johnson failed to make clear how learning Latin helps if you’re stuck in a systemically disadvantaged situation and feeling pressurised to join a violent gang. If anything, being forced to learn a language that has no modern application is likely to increase the risk of violence. Especially when teachers start talking about declensions and personal pronouns.

While Londoners applauds any serious effort to increase facilities for the capital’s young population (Boris also discussed the importance of boxing academies and university admissions), our Mayor needs to quickly learn that there’s little synchronicity between his experience at Eton and the needs of inner city kids.