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An alternative agenda for Brown?
Unequal Britain. By Stuart Weir.
Politico’s Publishing £10.99 Order this book
’M at last convinced that history marches backward.
In the 1880s the future Conservative Prime Minister Disraeli wrote a novel of two nations: The Poor and The Affluent. It caused the Tories to talk of themselves as being a One Nation party.
In 1793 the French Revolution advocated liberty, equality and fraternity. Earlier, the fledgling United States of America published its Constitution and Bill of Rights, Which among other things said: “We hold these truths to be self evident ... all men ... have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
Noble words ringing down the centuries. The French radical Louis Blanc campaigned in the 1830s and 1840s around the slogan The Right to Work. Now 109 nations have signed up to that.
Unequal Britain by Stuart Weir takes a penetrating look at UK society in 2006. Weir, a former editor of the New Statesmen, and seven other academics offer damning evidence of growing inequality even though Labour has ploughed massive amounts of capital back into education and health after years of Tory deprivation.
Our membership of the EU binds us to its laws and directives, coupled with many UN resolutions on human rights. Of course, if you derive your opinions from the Sun or the Daily Mail or even David Blunkett you are entitled to foam at the mouth as you read of greedy asylum seekers and their abuse of rights all forced to the front of the debate by contorted arguments laced with urban myth. On the other hand, go over the facts and figures and responsible opinion as to what should be practised that is often not enforced.
Cynics among us will crow with George Orwell in Animal Farm that “All animals are equal but some are more equal than others”.
Ask around and any Labour apologist rushes to say how they brought in the minimum wage – well yes, and about time! It was our own local High Court judge Lord Hoffman who in a sharp, short paragraph within a 2003 judgement caught the essence: “Human Rights are the rights essential to the life and dignity of the individual in a democratic society. I think it is well arguable that human rights include the right to a minimum standard of living without which many other rights would be a mockery.”
That conclusion, written, I surmise, on the heights of Hampstead, is as clear as the tablets Moses brought down from Mount Zion after a long afternoon with God.
Sadly, only a third of us believe we can influence government. Unequal Britain is part of an alternative political agenda – and that might be a positive sign as Brown begins his premiership. |
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