“It is time to stop pretending there is a bright future for Sunderland”

The episode of The Simpsons shown on Channel 4 last night involved the Mayor resorting to Springfield’s ‘Plan B’ and picking up the whole town and moving it by five miles, after the original site had been completely messed up through the dumping of rubbish. It seems someone from the Conservatives’ favourite think tank, the Policy Exchange, has also been viewing this particular episode and has come up with a ‘Plan B’ of their own for solving urban deprivation: move lots of people from cities like Liverpool, Hull and Sunderland to the untold wealth and possibilities of Oxford, Cambridge or London.

As someone who grew up in the North East but now lives in London, I am probably indicative of a brain drain that draws many away, either to London and the South East or to the more successfully established regional cities like Manchester, Leeds or Newcastle. However, the suggestion that simply moving people from areas characterised by low incomes to the areas where the highly skilled jobs of the information economy are concentrated is going to solve anything seems rather misplaced. Are these people going to absorb the wealth and skills of their new locations by osmosis, or are they just moving to fulfil the requirements for low paid service sector recruitment in more prosperous areas?

The suggestion in the report seems to be that government policy has done all it can to resurrect areas like this through generous regeneration budgets, but as earnings continue to rise at a lower pace here than in the South East, all such efforts must be judged as failures and in future resources should be directed elsewhere. What this misses is the fact that government policies have, in fact, been overwhelmingly skewed towards the interests of high finance and multinational capital for the past twenty five years. In other words, they have created the situation in which London and the South East overheat (spiraling house prices, strain on a crumbling infrastructure in the areas of roads, public transport, water supply) but the industrial or manufacturing base that sustained large areas of the country dwindles and dies. Therefore any complaint with regard to high levels of government spending in the North seems to ignore the fact that success in London was only made possible through the decimation of Northern industry. So the notion that prettifying of city centres and troubled housing estates or adding museums, art galleries or other assorted cultural facilities is too great a commitment seems really ridiculous.

If there is a complaint to be made about regeneration, it should rather be that it is largely just a superficial tinkering at the edges, which may improve the appearance of failing towns, or provide them with a Lottery-funded ’showpiece’ cultural attraction, but does little to improve their long-term economic viability. So, in the case of Sunderland, they have been provided with the National Glass Centre and a number of large edge of town business parks that, for the most part, have been filled by large call-centres. It’s hardly surprising that development such as this has yet to compensate for the loss of the once dominant shipbuilding and mining industries.

For the most part, the Policy Exchange report seems to hinge on the fact that certain cities are likely to fail economically due, for the most part, to problems with their particular location: eg being on the coast, so at the end of transport lines. Surely one of the major benefits of modern communications technology is that a central location is no longer the necessity that it once was. Is it really necessary for so much government administration to be located in London, or could much of it not be located to the regions? Or, if a good location or close links to Europe are still of such great importance, should the government not be investing more heavily in our transport infrastructure - high speed rail links between major centres, much greater use of light rail or tram systems within our large towns and cities? In the case of Sunderland, one of the major tragedies for the city was that it took more than 20 years for the ‘Tyne and Wear’ Metro to actually reach the banks of the Wear - and even then the extension to Sunderland was such a half-arsed job, for the most part just using existing rail lines, that it remains largely ineffective and underused.

David Cameron has been quick to distance himself from these proposals, dubbing them “rubbish from start to finish”, but inwardly he must be seething. It has taken a long time for the Conservatives to distance themselves from the perceived image of them as being a party for London and the home counties. But now, after years in which admitting to voting Conservative in parts of Northern England would make you more of an outcast than admitting to devil worship, just as progress was being made the publicity over these proposals will once again raise suspicions over where the true heart of the Tory party lies. Although, perhaps that is actually not such a bad thing…

Framing of the Russia/Georgia Conflict

I am by no means clued up on the intricacies of the post-Soviet political situation within the Caucasus, but one thing that has seemed clear is that Georgia is making a deliberate attempt to present what is going on in terms of plucky little democracy struggling to stand up against the imperial aggression of a superpower. Hence Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili coming out with quotes like, “this is not about South Ossetia, this is not even about Abkhazia. It’s all about independence and democracy in Georgia. Putin is personally commanding this operation. The purpose is to depose the democratically elected government of Georgia.”

Whilst it may emerge that this whole episode was planned by Moscow to provoke Georgian action as the pretext for reasserting its authority in the region, and it is undeniably true that Russia has exploited the situation for all it is worth, it seems there is a danger that coverage of the conflict, coloured by fear of a resurgent Russian bear, may fall a little too neatly into line with the Georgian point of view. In such a situation, it should be remembered that it was Georgia who made the first move, militarily, and that ultimately it seems both sides have been reckless with regard to the welfare of the civilian population of the region in allowing the situation to develop as it has.

Things I’ve learned this week

Recent adverts on behalf of the Learning and Skills Council (one of them can be seen here) have taken a basic tautology (we are all capable of learning things) and put it to good neo-liberal use in claiming that ‘learning new skills is actually part of our DNA’, thus seeking to naturalise the attempt to get us all to turn ourselves into more attractive resources for the market.

As a response to this, I’m going to implement a new (semi-)regular feature here in which I will list things I have recently learned - interesting yet trivial facts, revealing statistics, skills that wouldn’t really fit in on my CV - that are unlikely to make me more appealing as an employment prospect.

So, this week I have learned…

1) …that Stockton, California is the sub-prime capital of the US (interesting as I am a previous resident of Stockton-on-Tees);

2) …that by the rules of cricket the maximum length a bat is allowed to be is 38 inches (I know this due to the second place tie-break question from the pub quiz at a local pub. I had said 32, the other team said 36, so we didn’t win the prize of a case of beer);

3) …how to make a delicious bacon and bean risotto:

Ingredients: stock (chicken or vegetable), garlic, cubes of bacon, risotto rice, white wine (you could probably leave the wine out - but where’s the fun in that…), beans (I used a tin of butter beans - I may experiment with other types of bean in future), Parmesan cheese. You can figure out the quantities for yourself.

Method: Heat the stock in a saucepan. Meanwhile, fry the garlic in a little oil in another pan. Increase the heat, add the bacon and fry until it begins to crisp. Reduce the heat again and stir in the rice, ensuring all the grains get coated in oil. Add a good slug of white wine. Once the wine has been absorbed add a ladel-full of stock. Add another once this is absorbed. Move the rice around with a spatula to prevent sticking, but don’t stir too vigourously. After about 15 minutes of cooking, add the beans and some grated Parmesan cheese. Cook for another 5-10 minutes, keeping adding stock as required. It’s cooked once the rice loses any chalkiness, but it should retain some firmness to the bite. Season with black pepper to taste. Wolf it down with the rest of the white wine as an accompanyment.

The Ongoing Collapse of New Labour

“New Labour won three elections by offering real change, not just in policy but in the way we do politics. We must do so again.”

David Miliband’s ‘vision’ for saving New Labour from impending electoral devastation seems really to be much of the same. Plenty of talk about ‘modernisation’, ‘reform’ of public services and the need for citizens to act ‘responsibly’, along with many a proud boast of the government’s achievements of the past 10 years. The problem is that, throughout the rest of the piece, poor David seems to suffering from a rather delusional attitude with regard to the guiding principles of Labour. Just because the party’s mission is outlined on their membership cards does not give Miliband the right to be quite so self-satisfied in his claim that Labour policy always aims at putting “power, wealth and opportunity in the hands of the many, not the few.” Particularly given the OECD’s suggestion that social mobility is lower in Britain than in any other developed nation.

In fact, Miliband’s condemnation of Westminster’s other Dave-on-the-up for lacking principles or a clear guiding vision comes to seem like pure and simple projection. Also, given the way Labour under Blair ditched many of the principles that had guided the party for nearly a century, his line of attack seems utterly hypocritical. For, despite the occasional progressive policy moment and all the rhetoric that has animated the New Labour project, the actual outcomes have favoured one group - the rich and super-rich - above all others. And now the large sections of the electorate who may traditionally have been strong supporters of Labour have begun to send out the message that they are no longer prepared to go on making excuses for the failure of a Labour government to improve their lot.

In the turmoil that has been set in motion by the impending electoral slaughter suggested by recent polls and performance, one point seems to have been lost on all of the Labour figures having a say on the way forward: that is, for all Tony Blair’s missionary zeal, New Labour’s appeal to the centre was always a pragmatic electoral move designed to make the party electable after many years in the wilderness. The degree of success the party achieved in 1997 and 2001 was due far more to an intense dislike of the Tories than the radical pretensions of the New Labour project. But there is only so long you can go on saying ‘vote for us - at least we’re better than the other lot’, without tempting people to call your bluff and give the other lot another try.

So, sorry Stephen Byers, but there’s no way for you to “re-establish the coalition of support that has won Labour three elections”, as there is no way for a party that has been in power for eleven years to seem fresh, or to be able to blame the other lot for the problems faced within society, the economy, etc.

The situation at present is coming increasingly to resemble the last days of the Conservative government under Major, when those loyal to the previous leader consistently undermined the figure at the helm of their party - a character transformed into a figure of ridicule for much of the country - all the while harking back to a supposed magic formula that had led them to previous successes. Which goes to suggest that over a decade after the new dawn that broke (did it not) in 1997, we are now watching the sunset for New Labour.

“Put a Donk on it…”

You’ve got to love a bit of smug, metropolitan sneering, haven’t you? Nice to see someone in the comments advocating sterilisation for people based upon their music taste, as well.

Personally, I found this brought a big grin to my face with its irrepressible, dumb charm.

Snakes and ladders

This post on ads without products got me thinking about the moral undertone that has always been present in media coverage of the housing market: the notion that there are some people who deserve to make a mint out of ever-escalating house prices and others who should just know their place and leave well alone. When the market was spiraling upwards, the news was full of stories showing the fresh faces of young middle-class people in full employment staring wistfully into estate agents’ windows and bemoaning the fact they were still unable to get ‘on the property ladder’. And so these hardworking, deserving people were being denied access to the untold riches on offer if only they were able to grab that bottom rung.

But now, as the sloppy stuff hits the Fan(nie Mae), the focus turns to the shortcomings of those who bought not only a house, but the whole schtick that they could have it all and the rising price of their investment would cover the cost. So the supposed moral failings of the individual become the symbol for the woes that we are all going through: it is because of people who got into debt they can’t repay that the value of everyone else’s house is melting away, that the whole economic climate becomes one of total gloom, that the banks are running out of money. So a news story about one such person features a picture of her talking on the phone with a cigarette in hand, not just as an easy signifier of the stress she is under, but also as a note of instruction as to how we are supposed to react to the story: she SMOKES, so therefore it follows that she must be utterly irresponsible and incapable of fulfilling her responsibilities as a good economic citizen. Here you go America - here’s the reason you are worse off, feel free to point and make snidey remarks…

All of which goes to hide the real culprits of the piece. Firstly, the banks who kept coming up with innovative measures to meet the circumstances of the rising market: 120% mortgages, lending to a multiplier of 4 or 5 times a buyer’s salary, self-certification mortgages. Which were of course helpful measures for first time buyers from the wonderfully altruistic banks, and not just strategies to try to prevent stagnation by allowing some new buyers into the market, hence ensuring prices would keep rising, allowing larger amounts to be lent, with bigger potential profits from interest on the repayments.

Another point worth noting whilst discussing the ways in which banks benefit from rising house prices is that such growth is largely dead money if you are an owner-occupier. The only way for you to keep profit after selling up is to move to a smaller place (as larger or similarly sized properties are likely to have gained value at an equal rate), or to return to renting (which, so long as prices keep rising, will actually make it harder to return to ownership at a later date). Therefore, whilst a homeowner may feel much richer as their home’s value continues to multiply, the only way they can get access to this cash is to borrow more money against the increased price of their home. Unless, of course, favourable conditions exist for people to own more homes than they require for living in…

Step forward culprit number two: government policies. Once houses become viewed in terms of an investment rather than as somewhere to live, you are inevitably going to cause the market to step out of line with the actual need for the population to have a roof over its head. You are also going to increase the tendency within the market for boom and bust cycles: when capital is invested in property not due to a necessity as a home, but rather due to the potential high rate of return, once that high rate of return is no longer assured such money will seek to move elsewhere, thus exacerbating the effects of a decline in values. Those that are stung by price collapses are far more likely to be the small investors, lulled into thinking they can make fortunes by the endless stream of ‘property porn’ programmes, whilst those with more significant interests will be able to ride it out. A further distortion, in terms of the UK housing market, is the non-domecile tax rules, which allow people from overseas to live here without paying tax on their interests abroad - the effect of which is to turn the most attractive residential areas within London into a billionaires’ playground, the ripple effect in terms of property values being far more significant than the supposed trickle down of the benefits of overseas investment.

The depressing thing is that, even though prices may be tumbling at the moment, the structural flaws remain. Social housing stocks are still massively depleted from the effects of Right to Buy, yet social housing providers (either Councils or housing associations) are, for the most part, no longer able to invest in developing new stock for themselves, but must instead rely upon a percentage of private developments being made available as part of the planning process. But if private housebuilding hits a slump, such percentage targets will continue to fail to yield the required quantities of new dwellings. Coupled with a labyrinthine planning system and the potential gains that are possible through speculative land holding, the obstacles to development remain significant. So overall, the prospects that housing supply will be able to catch up with the rising numbers of households look highly unlikely, meaning the current dip is almost certainly a mere hiatus, and home ownership will continue to be pushed further out of reach of large portions of the population.

It all puts you in a rather unfamiliar position as someone inclined towards leftist political viewpoints, of wishing that Winston Churchill had had his way. In 1909, as Liberal President of the Board of Trade, Churchill had been a vociferous supporter of Chancellor David Lloyd George’s People’s Budget, which had included within it the introduction of a land tax, which would have levied a tax upon the increase in value of unimproved land. Since house price gains are essentially due to the increasing value of the land upon which the property stands, such a tax could have cooled the rampant property speculation that we have seen in recent years. But, what with the House of Lords being stuffed with landowning Conservatives, the proposals were dropped after the initial budget was vetoed. The rancour between the Lords and the Commons during this period led on to the passing of the Parliament Act of 1911 - which asserted the primacy of the Commons - most recently employed in banning fox-hunting. So you may have to pay ridiculous sums for a place to live, but at least the foxes are OK (or, at least they would be if the Act that banned hunting didn’t have more holes than the plot of a Dan Brown novel…)

A Man-Eating Machine

I have to mention the dazzling new Grace Jones video, in which visual effects are used to transform Grace into a savage, spectral, shape-shifting figuration of Capital itself:

All of which is described and detailed far better than I could hope to do by Steven Shaviro.

A salute

I’ve had today’s stage of the Tour de France on the TV for much of the afternoon. Whether the much trumpeted clampdown on drug use has been successful, or whether the riders continue to maintain their prowess by illicit means, you still have to admire the sheer crazed endurance required, having already covered a couple of thousand kilometres in two and a half weeks, to then face a 200km day of winding through the Alps, topping climbs up to 2645m and 2067m, and then after five hours in the saddle coming face to face with this:

and still having enough left to manage to power up it in less than an hour.

While I’m sure of it’s of no consolation at all those riders currently in agony as they plough up the Alp D’Huez, I’m sat here on my backside raising a mug of tea to them in admiration.

Coming soon on Nintendo DS…

Conversation Training - Want to wow the guests at your boss’s dinner party? Want to avoid embarrassing silences on your next first date? Or do you just want to be up with the latest water-cooler conversations? Conversation Training can help you deal with all of these social situations and more. Choose from thousands of conversation topics, jokes and anecdotes, each tailored precisely to your defined situation. Just 10 minutes of preparation can provide you with a whole evening of sparkling conversation. Keep in touch with latest events, and always have witty responses ready for whatever is in the news with the downloadable update feature. Quiz yourself on acceptable opinions and behaviour to avoid social embarrassment. Conversation Training is an invaluable tool for coping with busy modern lifestyles and hectic social lives.

My Career Coach - My Career Coach can help you to succeed in achieving your aspirations and getting the job that you have always dreamed of. Whether you are just setting out in the job market or are an established professional looking to advance, My Career Coach can help to steer you along your career path by giving you short, medium and long range targets alongside daily tips and challenges based upon your personal profile. Games, tests and challenges help you to develop the right skills and personality traits for success. An added incentive is that all your efforts and achievements are translated into your personal earning potential figure, ensuring that you get everything you deserve.

These games don’t actually exist, I’ve just made them up. However, given the appetite amongst the general public for allowing a computer to tell them how old their brain is, what to do to lose weight or what to eat, whilst also training their eyesight, arithmetic and word-power (in a range of languages), surely things like this are right this moment being brainstormed, or plucked from the sessions of blue-sky thought of some software developer out there.

Probably the biggest success so far in the genre of the aspirational, quasi-educational training game has been Dr Kawshima’s Brain Training, which still sits at the top of Amazon’s Nintendo DS bestseller chart two years after its release. It promises, through a series of games and puzzles, to calculate the age of your brain. Now, I’m no neuroscientist, but isn’t your brain going to be, well, the same age as the rest of you? And how exactly is 20 minutes of puzzles or fucking sudoku a day likely to make a major difference?

Surely, in fact, an older brain would actually be an advantage in that having had more experience and more opportunity for learning, it might have gathered a greater range and depth of knowledge. Which makes the whole thing readily apparent as just another factor in the whole biopower construct that so much of modern society seems to revolve around: health=youth=attractiveness, all of which are within your reach if you put in the requisite hours in the gym, fork out for the latest miracle skin cream/cosmetic surgical procedure. So, therefore, it is little surprise that the brain gets treated like just another muscle that, given regular workouts, will remain in shape. In itself, this attitude is not necessarily harmful, but surely reading a book would be just as effective a mental workout. However, knowledge is not so readily ranked as performance in puzzles, and our economic system seems to have incubated a love of targets, objectives, grades, scores and the easy psychic reward they offer in completion. Therefore, just as a significant proportion of our society prefer pounding a treadmill in a shiny chrome and glass gym to a long rambling walk in terms of physical exercise, so Brain Training will be preferred by many to the act of actually thinking about something.

All of which seems to fit the whole phenomenon into the same capacity-over-content way of thinking as Infinite Thought’s fantastically ominous portrait of ‘Studies Studies’ as the future of education, keeping brains ticking over without ever attempting to fill them.

Footnote - Honourable mention in terms of horrendousness for this:

&

“There are two versions of the game - one for boys and one for girls. The two versions have a different selection of minigames designed to appeal to sons and daughters alike, with the boy version featuring games like “toy train” or “drive the car,” and the girl version offering games like “colour the animals” or “little kitchen.” I Did It Mum offers simple but fun challenges for this age group, which they can enjoy completing with a parent. Additional feature allowing a voice recording option for Mum to encourage their child when completing the minigames.”

Win your Mum’s (because Dad is no doubt out earning a wage, or watching sport or something far more important than spending time with their child) approval by conforming to gender stereotypes. Fantastic.

Question Time Schools Edition

Being ever-interested in what young people make of the political process, I sat through the majority of the above programme the other night. Probably with the aim of getting the Yoof reconnected with politics, they produce one of these programmes each series: the usual QT format (audience members pose questions (screened in advance by the producers) to a panel typically comprised of one figure from each of the major parties plus a couple of other vaguely relevant figures) except the audience is made up of people 18 or under and the panel is tailored to the supposed concerns of the audience. In this case, this was done by including ‘businesswoman’ (although far more likely to remembered as a gobby also-ran on a previous series of The Apprentice) Saira Khan and 18 year old Michael Heaver, who won a competition to be a ‘people’s panelist’ on the show.

For the most part, this proceeded in the manner of other QT shows: question; bland party-politicking answers from Tory, Labour and Lib Dem panelists; responses from the other panelists that, whilst more interesting due to not having to be ‘on message’, may lack intricate knowledge of the issues in question; contributions from the audience ranging from populist ranting to ultra-considered rambling from more studious types, keen to make the most of their moment in the spotlight to show how intelligent and knowledgeable they are (probably the type of people who blog on politics in their spare time…)

What caught my attention was the fact that two (of five or six in total) of the main questions, were explicitly premised upon the notion of a gulf between politicians and what is typically referred to as ‘the real world’. Firstly, whether it was acceptable for the G8 leaders to sit down to a “lavish” eight course banquet at a summit that had global food shortages at the top of its agenda. Secondly, on the topic of MP’s expenses and whether they have contributed to a loss of respect for politics. Without getting drawn into a debate on such issues, or denying that there are questions that have to be answered, what strikes me is the glee with which such points are seized upon, firstly in the media, and then in the electorate at large. We have an instinctive dislike of politicians, and regard them all as greedy, incompetent careerists keen only to line their own nests, while climbing greasy poles, riding on gravy trains and multiple other metaphorical accusations. The problem is that such sniping creates an attitude to politics as a whole whereby we prefer to rant from the sidelines rather than engage in any political issues. Therefore, in shifting the blame onto a few figures in government, we absolve ourselves completely of responsibility for the state we are in, whilst the structural factors that distort our politics go ignored: an electoral system that privileges votes in a few key swing seats; a need for politicians to cosy up to established interests in big business for party funding, and the media to try to ensure a good press.

In his answer to the question regarding MP’s expenses, Iain Duncan Smith, the Tory member of the panel, made a comparison of politicians to estate agents or journalists as the most disliked, and least trusted, professions within society. I think such a comparison is quite telling: yes, we (quite rightly) dislike and mistrust estate agents, but we don’t withdraw completely from an involvement in the housing market (far from it, in fact); similarly, for all we profess a distrust of journalists, we’re happy to keep reading and absorbing the opinions they churn out. Yet, our dislike of politicians becomes a ready-made excuse for us to abandon any sort of political involvement or engagement, creating a situation in which the self-righteous rant is one of the defining features of our political discourse, forever demanding, with a tone of wronged belligerence simmering constantly just below the surface. This was certainly the approach favoured by Saira Khan on the programme, with her high-volume input often warmly received by the assembled audience.

The problem is that once a tone of constant haranguing becomes the political norm, it makes it easier for policy to ignore legitimate concerns (of which there are many) and for the political classes to pick and choose which bits of mainstream public opinion they wish to listen to. Equally, the friction-free nature of political speech - spun so fine it can never be properly pinned down - is a direct attempt to avoid being an easy subject for attacks from press or public, as can be seen from some of the comments regarding Thursday night’s programme: the insipid pronouncements of IDS, Labour’s Douglas Alexander and Julia Goldsworthy of the Lib Dems receive nowhere near as much ire from viewers (even young viewers) as the contributions of Heaver and Khan. So it seems that, for all we dislike the slippery pronouncements of politicians and their attempts to talk without ever really saying anything, we still jump on anything that does not measure up to our expectations in terms of the manner and level of informed content within political speech.

All this is not to follow Tony Blair in suggesting the press are like feral beasts and that there is a need for us to be less demanding of politicians. We should, if anything, be more demanding of our representatives, but should refuse to accept the generalised, scattergun critique of our political figures peddled by many parts of the press. Breaking out of the viscious circle we have got ourselves into requires that we are always focussed and informed in our demands. Withdrawing from the political sphere, then moaning that it fails to meet our expectations is more likely to continue to deplete the standard of political debate.