The ideological commitment to the unfettered development of 'free markets', now central to the globalised economy, whether in China and the Asian economies, the developing African countries or the traditional Western capitalist countries, goes hand in hand with the systematic dismantling of traditional worker protections. The neutering of Trade Unions and any kind of collective representation (high fees have recently been introduced here for the last defence of the employee, employment tribunals), the consequent lowering of wages, the dismantling of hard-won workplace protections and the growth of short term and zero hours contracts is the result of this successful neo-liberal assault on the framework of employer - employee relations. This has placed a firm brake on wages and spurred on the aggressive accumulation of capital by those who benefit from these changes and, in turn, fund the political class who engineer them.
Globally, this economic orthodoxy is sustained and policed by the managers of international capital through organisations such as the IMF, the World Trade Organisation, the World Bank, the European Central bank, and, most worryingly, secretly negotiated trade agreements like the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. This latter is about to bring in an agreement between the USA and the European Union allowing multi-national companies to over-ride democratic procedures and allow them to sue governments that have policies that might harm company profits - e.g. environmental issues, public health concerns, employment law etc. It will also force public services - the NHS, for example, to be opened up for privatisation. The legal actions will be heard before undemocratic and unaccountable tribunals overseen by corporate lawyers.
These changes have occurred almost entirely in the last thirty years. They have been successful in achieving their goals in this country thanks largely to the lack of any organised opposition as the Labour Party allowed itself to be hijacked by 'New Labour' with its wholehearted embrace of neo-liberal ideology. But their success is also due to a wholly quiescent media, which, being largely controlled by multi-national conglomerates, have cheered on changes that clearly benefit them, or have displayed a total inability to see beyond the propaganda of the powerful and are a source of continual despair.
Can we be really surprised that 63 people now own the equivalent of half the world's wealth? Do we feel a righteous anger, or simply a weary acceptance of something we feel powerless to affect?
When I grew up on my council estate, I was only occasionally aware that I was one of the poor in our society. Children simply accept the life that has been granted them and since it's normality for them, it probably won't feel strange or in any way unjust. Even though my paternal grandparents lived in a large, detached comfortably furnished house, it never struck me as odd that I returned to a cold, sparsely furnished flat with barely enough to eat, let alone enjoy any luxuries. This was simply how things were.
There was one occasion, in my fourth year at Primary School, when I returned after the summer break with a new pair of trousers and a new sleeveless pullover my grandmother had knitted for me. I'm pretty sure these were the first brand new trousers I had owned. I had been taken to the co-op in Bromley, where they still had a pre-war system of delivering payment and change by an elaborate network of wires across the ceiling of the store. These would whoosh around, high above the heads of customers, to be delivered down to the cashiers above the tills. You paid for your purchase, the cash was tucked into a metal container which was then hoisted upwards and sped along a wire to a central accounting office. It would return a short time later with any change owing to the customer. It was an entertainment in itself just to watch these little treasure chests whirring around the store, way out of reach of customers, of course. In such a manner, my new trousers were purchased together with some of the magic of the high wire payment system.
At school, a couple of kids in my class commented on my new attire. "You look smart today ", one said, "Not the usual scruffbag." This came as quite a shock to me. I realised that I must usually have looked, well, a scruffbag. I looked across at my best friend, Colin. "Do I usually look scruffy, Col?" I asked. There was a short silence, and then, "well....yes". I was crestfallen. I couldn't say anything. I just saw myself as others must always have seen me, teachers and classmates, and it hurt.
There were three Colins in my class, two of whom lived on my estate and so entered the school from the front entrance with the rest of us from the working-class side of the social divide, and the third from a more affluent home who arrived at school from the rear entrance that led in the direction of the private homes on the new estates being built nearby. This third Colin I only got to know well in my last year at school, but he became a good friend until secondary school split us up. He was quite reserved, spoke very politely with something approaching Received Pronunciation and was always well dressed. In other words, he was a middle class child from a 'respectable' home. Unlike most of my other friends. Nonetheless, we somehow got on. He was bright, but self-deprecating. His interests were quite different from mine - he had more of a scientific sensibility - but he knew a lot without flaunting it, and I enjoyed talking to him. I found I could actually learn quite a lot from him about things that hadn't previously interested me. He knew about space, the planets and was good at maths, a subject where I consistently performed dismally.
One Sunday morning, he turned up at our flat. He had cycled over on his gleaming, obviously new bike and had somehow worked out which flat I lived in. What he made of our rather bleak living quarters, I don't know, but he suggested that we cycle over to his house where we could play with his games and his mum would give us tea. That clinched it for me, so off we set. I had trouble keeping up with him on my unsafe, self-assembled machine with it's dodgy crank-shaft and no brakes, but eventually we turned into a newly formed road and arrived at a long tarmac laid drive leading up to a large detached house with a garage, opened to reveal the rear of a gleaming blue car. The house was surrounded by shrubs, and a neatly trimmed lawn edged with well tended flower beds. I felt like William Brown, my favourite fictional character, staring at Bott Hall (if you know the stories).
We entered the house and I was greeted warmly by Colin's mother and even by his elder brother, something hitherto unknown to me (older brothers of my acquaintance either ignored or threatened, never offered a friendly greeting). We went upstairs to Colin's room. Yes, he had a large bedroom entirely to himself. It turned out to be an Aladdin's cave of delights and surprises. There were shelves of books, both fiction and reference books. A neat pile of comics stacked against a wall which all turned out to be copies of The Eagle. This was something of an 'improving' comic. It was the only comic that certain middle-class parents would allow their children to read, since it contained a lot of factual information - drawings of complex bits of machinery etc. - alongside the strips. The cover always featured Dan Dare, a granite-jawed British hero straight from WW2 stereotypes, but here plunged into space forever thwarting his nemesis, The Mekon, an egg headed creature who travelled everywhere on a kind of flying tea tray. Inside, I also remember PC49, the adventures of a stalwart British bobby, thwarting crime and keeping us safe. It was a comic I never read because I could sense that it had a rather dull, clearly 'educational' remit, where I wanted something subversive and challenging of authority.
The Bash Street Kids were more my cup of tea, though I can now see how well drawn a strip like PC 49 was. It was definitely a comic for kids like Colin.
In his room, Colin also had a telescope and a microscope. Piles of board games, a bow and arrow and - what really grabbed my attention - a large air rifle, complete with a box of pellets and a target. Wow! This was my idea of heaven. I persuaded Colin to take the gun into the garden for some practice. We went downstairs and through the lounge to some French Windows. The garden, with a long, immaculate lawn, stretched ahead of us. We walked to the end of the lawn, only to find an archway into the second half of the garden, where, already prepared, was a laid out archery lane, complete with target, and a gun practice lane next to it. And this was here all the time! This was how Colin lived. I was overawed, but happily spent the rest of the afternoon shooting both pellets and arrows at the appropriate targets, in a state of self-absorbed enchantment until we were summoned in to tea.
Tea was what is known as 'high tea', something I'd never heard of. There were different courses of sandwiches, buns, biscuits and cakes, together with a choice of fruit juices. I'd never had anything like it in another kid's house before. The only problem was that my nose started to run, and I, of course, had no handkerchief. I had to keep sniffing hard, surreptitiously wiping the snot away with my hand, hoping no-one would notice. Finally I had to resort to taking an inordinate interest in a fish tank filled with tropical fish on the side-board, thus keeping my face determinedly away from the table and its occupants and praying they would not see the slimy trail emanating from my nose and my attempts to lick it away whilst still cramming as much cake as I could into my mouth.
I had never experienced anything quite like Colin's home life. I reflected on my way home on how our desultory little flat must have seemed to him. Of how little I obviously had compared to him, but how generously he - and his family - had shared. I was finally aware of the gulf in resources between his middle-class upbringing and my own and I felt, for the first time, a sense of shame in my home circumstances. Colin never commented on my very obvious lack of material resources. We remained friends until the 11+ split us apart. I never had the nerve to invite him back for tea. But as I limped back home on my bike, with its crank-shaft slipping more and more as I peddled, I was aware as I had never been before in the gulf between the lives of people like me and the fortunate ones like Colin. I felt absolutely no resentment. That's just how life was.
This divide is now more pronounced, more corrosive of the human capacity to develop its potential, than when I was eleven. And its getting worse.
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