to the left. to the right
A year or two ago when the financial crisis and double-dip recession were shaping up nicely, it was oft predicted that this would be a ‘middle-class’ recession and one where squeezed middle-Englanders would be the ones under the cosh. And thus has it come to pass, principally because the most vulnerable are now so vulnerable they could hardly be more vulnerable. And less likely to organise a modicum of revolution in response. What our Maggie put in place in the early 80s let no government cast asunder.
But what’s this? Doctors striking? The police booing their own Home Secretary? Lecturers threatening a work to rule (lecturers and work in the same sentence? Some mistake me-thinks – ed.) The combination of neoliberalism and materialism may have dealt a near-fatal blow to the working class but militancy is alive and kicking somewhere in a manicured des-res-semi with access to good restaurants, fine golf courses and an Ofsted approved catchment area! For too long manufacturing, aka getting your hands dirty, has been out and middle-class values, in. A property-owning, shareholding, wine-sipping, well educated workforce, self-centred and all aspiring, has ably provided all the sophisticated finance, advertising and retail consulting services one could need, obviating the need anyone to do anything as crass as real-work.
The unions it was once said, were bringing Britain to its knees. Britain was once the sick man of Europe. Now, all of Europe is sick. Terminal. Perhaps we can now at least agree that the privileged, the wealthy and educated are no more wise and no more selfless in their wielding of power, and certainly no more competent.
