Anyone remember the 'eighties when it was almost universally believed on the left that the Labour Party was failing because it wasn't left wing enough?

It's bizarre that Oborne seems to see Farage as 'the kind of man who would have served loyally in the post-war Conservative Party' considering the main thrust of Oborne's argument seems to be dependent on a belief that UKIP could prove successful at the current time as he thinks the three main parties are ideologically so similar. Surely the late-40s and 50s, a time when apparently Farage would have 'served loyally' for the Tories, are defined politically by the long-term consensus and economic butskellism which existed between Labour and the Conservatives. This was a time at which due to the post-war re-building of Britain low unemployment and the provision of greater social welfare took priority over free-market economic theory meaning a situation of harmony between the two major parties existed which has otherwise not been the case, and not a consensus I could imagine Farage supporting.
The reality is that Farage is only really happy when acting like a petulant child throwing silly insults at others from his self-perceived standing as an outsider, and surely the last thing Britain needed in the immediate post-war period was an ardent nationalist who believed himself to be inherently superior to those of differing racial backgrounds.

I've learned from the comments that Cameron isn't rightwing. Much have dreamt all those privatised jails, NHS, free schools and all that.

That is indeed bizarre of Oborne.

MacMillan was proud of building council houses. Farage would have been a (very) poor man's Powell. And unlike Powell, he wouldn't have worked hard on behalf of the mentally ill. Fargo would have been all "the nutters have taken over the department of health".

I can report similar and sorry to say but in my home town, staunchly Labour to the bone, the BNP are frighteningly popular.

Depressing. I think a small but significant tranche of Labour voters come from a 'they're not Tories' view, as opposed to being for Labour policies explicitly. Give them an alternative that claims to offer them something whilst being able to oppose the Tories and that'll do.

The relatives of mine got the council house on the cheap and have moved right ever since. I do wonder about that really, my parents bought before that in 1979 and have told me about the rise in interest rates soon after, they were lefties at that point and remain so yet the relatives I talk about got sweet on the council house deal and voted Thatcher and as said have moved right ever since (Though this wasn't the case for all as one Uncle who did came back to Labour and is now a member). All my family of that era come from the working class Labour areas of Leigh & Wigan.

When I do talk to them however it is mostly fear. I won't doubt some Labour people do vote BNP but I wonder how many were directly from the Blair era and how many were lost at a much earlier part in history. And the fear I talk about is the fear of not particulary anything but everything.

I think the papers we criticise on here along with the news media have a lot to answer for. The news should be the news it should be bland to be honest it shouldn't be sensationalised because by doing that you blur the message and you hype the tension in people and by doing so create a fear.

What amazes me is when people like Oborne pretend to speak for people of that class, they have no idea absolutely no idea.

Ah the "bought council house at massive discount, but hate people who get something for nothing" vote.

The father in law of my niece is BNP. He told me black people get higher unemployment benefits.

He is the thickest person I ever met.

Apart from some Telegraph posters, of course. Couple of hours down the drain that was.

They've lined up the BBC as the fall guy if some people see more of UKIP and don't fancy them.

Because of course you have to be a lefty-liberal to oppose a party who want to abolish the minimum wage, or want to crank up the defence budget by 40% now.

There's no money left!

Ha, ha.



So referendum on hanging!

Really articulated the principle for a referendum on that issue and not other of their faves like the minimum wage, haven't they?

Why not just vow to reintroduce hanging?

And WTF?



"On own merits"? No merit to a s106?



Because no-one ever talked about "the northeast" or "East Anglia" before the EU came along. First step to abolishing England!

Hate to say it, having worked in social housing for longer than I ever wanted to, but the blending of social housing into new developments is very problematic. Principles don't translate into practicalities. Until we have a government that invest in addressing the glaring root causes of stunningly dysfunctional families then this will remain the case. The human brain remains plastic until death but we have to stop taking the piss. It is plastic within narrow, biologically defined, paramaters. We expect the impossible then cry foul when it doesn't materialise. We blame people who are very, very damaged for not doing what they are not capable of because it is easier than looking at ourselves and rethinking our expectations and our spending. By the time people with chronically chaotic lives reach adulthood much of the damge is literally hardwired in place on a synaptic level and destined to be repeated through their kids. There is fucking tons of cold, hard, repeated empirical evidence from neuroscience for this, has been for decades now, yet the solution is always to move problem families around in the vain hope that somehow it will all come out in the wash. All that happens is that neighbourhoods that were ticking along have mini crime waves that last until the dysfunctional families get shifted to the next address. Being around sorted people does not rub off if you can't even function. They're not evil (thanks for that ugly word theism), they are simply doing their best and it is not sufficient to enable them to prevent themselves from harming and harrassing innocent people who encounter them. Such people are a minority within a minority but the consequences are astronomical.

You cannot rewire built in developmental defecits, nor undo the neural impact of lifelong privation, through housing policy. These fall under the remit of social services and the health service primarily but there is also a societal dimension. It is obscene to expect people who literally are doing their level best to do more than is available of them to deliver. There are profoundly damaged people in society who literally lack the self-regulating capacities required to uphold their stake in the social contract, by dint of their start in life. This is tragic and ruins the lives of people who end up living adjacent to them. It is just too easy to gloss over it all and ramble on abou the underclass or chavs. The circumstances that allow this to be perpetuated are maintained because they benefit other people who don't have to be anywhere near the consequecnes, which are far reaching indeed.

Just at the end of my street is a brand new development of housing, a mixture of fully owned, half and half and social housing. From the week they were inhabited the entire area has changed beyond recognition, principally centred around the social housing segment. This is quite uncomfortable to admit but also so blatant as to be impossible to ignore. Where a police car was an unusual sight it has become something that is seen a few times a day. Sometimes the police are called out two or three times in an evening to the same address. There is a man who is going to kill his wife one of these days and seems to be having a good go at it pretty much most days. Not only is he a danger to his wife and kids but he is also aggressive to pretty much everyone. He needs considerable help but mostly he needs containment. He cannot contain himself and is harming people. By containment I do not mean prison. I mean a network of services and checks to hold his sprawling, damaging behaviour, be it health visitors, social workers, a mental health section, who knows. Damaged people damage people.

There is nothing to be gained financially by spending the money this would entail. So nothing is managed. His kids have not a chance. Not at school yet and there lives are a done deal. Where is the outrage? Just silence, to all intents and purposes, dressed up in rhetoric.

It is a sad fact but people can most certainly be so fundamentally damaged as to be beyond recovery. Compassion is one thing, naivety another. We still need to contain their destructive behaviour, not let it be perpetuated because non-economically viable people are worthy only of ignoring. Even from an entirely selfish point of view it makes sense.

Top post, Gourami. Thanks.

Absolutely. Mrs Armsteen, who taught in primaries, often points out that you can spot the educational and social disasters very young. In one case she knew, the fact that local people referred to the dad as 'Burglar Bill' was a clue...
In fact we knowingly throw away a proportion of our young people every year.

Gourami,

Weren't the rules about providing affordable housing, rather than social housing- ie teachers and the like?

For anyone (like me) who thinks they can't be bothered to read a post as long as Gourami's, try copying and pasting it into Word and changing the font to 12pt Times New Roman. It's a really interesting and thoughtful read and worth taking the time.

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"To the living we owe respect, but to the dead we owe only the truth."
Voltaire

Policies generally specify affordable housing, which includes social renting alongside things like sub-market rental and shared ownership. Within that, a certain proportion is social renting and a certain proportion is 'intermediate' housing. Agree that you do have to be careful about where the social rent element goes, and it won't be appropriate in all areas. In my area, for instance, there are policies to avoid social renting for single people being provided in the town centre, mainly because those people will often have particular issues that are triggered by a more high-pressure environment, higher noise levels, overcrowded public areas etc.

Developers do their very best to avoid groups coming into contact on a single site. It is not uncommon, for instance, for a block of flats to have two different entrances, one for the private residents and one for the unwashed proles.

_________________
"Winterval is the favourite myth of the lunatic right who base most of their weekly columns on angry Brie-based dreams rather than looking out of their window." (Robin Ince)

To be fair the last Labour government did recognise the issue, and attempted to address it. In education there was the Excellence in Cities programme (cut by Charles Clarke), Sure Start (now cut), Children's Centres, reforms of the Foundation Stage, addition of responsibility for families to the DfE, funding to address areas of disadvantage (now gone). The response started strongly but was watered down by successive SofS after Estelle Morris, who was the last Labour SoS to have a real grasp of the need for, and power of education in raising the disadvantaged.
I always reckoned that this (social inclusion) was about the only issue I would have trusted Tony Blair on, but in this as in so much else he fell under the religious sway of the Catholic church and Andrew 'Adonis' Adonis™. And, of course, the corrosive effects of the Mail, Express and Sun every time a reform was put forward.