IT'S a source of pride that this column has often been able to suggest that community leaders and police trying to combat racial tension in Britain could do worse than look to Worcester for inspiration.

The last occasion was in the wake of September 11, when agitators daubed graffiti on a wall in Wyld's Lane, hoping to drive a wedge between the ethnic groups who live side by side in the Faithful City.

Before that, as Oldham, Bradford and Burnley counted the cost of racial violence, it was as an echo to Home Secretary Jack Straw's plea that we all accept the challenge to ensure our communities are harmonious, contented places to be.

At the time, we repeated a cherished view that, from a child's first day at school, we shouldn't just teach them to tolerate differences, we must show how they can be celebrated.

That's why we must all heed the warning that the Government's plan to establish more single faith schools could increase ethnic tensions.

It has come in a Home Office-sponsored investigation of the troubles in Bradford, Oldham and Burnley which exposed a "polarisation" in Britain that has led to races leading parallel but separate lives.

It proposed that single faith schools give a quarter of places to children of other cultures, to improve understanding between white and ethnic minority groups.

If it doesn't happen - and our concern that it won't is cemented by the fact that Prime Minister Tony Blair and Education Secretary Estelle Morris are both committed to more single faith schools - we may live to rue the day society took a wrong turning.