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Good evening. You're lucky to be alive.

That particular sperm at your conception was a 250 million to one shot.

Multipied back through the generations, the chances against you existing at all far exceed the number of atoms in the universe.

So it's a bit much to expect such unlikely

life to be fair. It isn't. Politicians invade against inherited advantage, but cannot legislate

for genetics. Your intelligence, to some extent your health, to a debatable degree your character,

are predetermined by your parents. They organise your education.

More, a caring home, a house full of books, the options and wide horizons of prosperity,

all influence, even if they don't entirely define your path through life.

We pay lip service to the idea of a quality of opportunity, but regard doing the best for our own children

as an unqualified virtue. Inheritance tax is deeply unpopular, even among those unlikely ever to

pay it, because it runs counter to our idea of family and the hierarchy of concern that it demands.

How far should we try to eradicate or compensate for inherited inequality?

That's our moral maze tonight.

The panel, Ash Sarka, from the Novara Media Group,

Mona Siddiqui, Professor of Islamic and Inter-Religious Studies

at Edinburgh University,

James Orr, Associate Professor of the Philosophy of Religion

at Cambridge University, and the historian Tim Stanley.

Ash, did you inherit privilege?

Yeah, my mother's winning smile.

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