Theresa May’s Cabinet reshuffle has left her with a higher proportion of Oxbridge and privately educated top ministers than when she first became prime minister, analysis shows.

Despite suggestions that Ms May could seek to boost the diversity of her top team to better reflect the demographics of the country, a higher proportion (34 per cent) of her senior ministers received a private education than in her first Cabinet in 2016 (30 per cent).

Overall, Cabinet ministers were more than five times more likely to have gone to a fee-paying school than the general population, the Sutton Trust analysis shows.

Nearly half (48 per cent) of the Cabinet attended Oxbridge. This is a higher proportion than in 2016 (44 per cent), but is lower than that for her predecessor David Cameron’s 2015 team (50 per cent).

Products of selective state education

Ms May has sought to make a clean break from Mr Cameron’s premiership, and has a far higher proportion of Cabinet ministers from state schools (66 per cent ) than the former PM did in 2015 (50 per cent).

And although she had to ditch plans for new grammar schools after a disastrous general election result, the make-up of her Cabinet points to the value that the PM places on selective state education, with 24 per cent of top ministers coming from these schools, compared with 7 per cent of Mr Cameron’s 2015 team.

Overall, fewer than half (41 per cent) of Ms May’s January 2018 Cabinet attended comprehensive state schools, compared with 44 per cent of her Cabinet on becoming PM, and 43 per cent in Mr Cameron’s team.

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