Neighbourhoods

Creating citizenship communities

Civic involvement is an enduring ‘worthy-but-dull’ theme of social policy discourse. The school curriculum is currently a bit of a policy hot potato. What do you get if you bring the two together? Some schools struggle to deliver anything much beyond the core curriculum, while the fact that there are so many old Etonians in positions of power and influence is explained by an ‘ethos of public service.’

Here’s a report of research into Creating citizenship communities, published last week, which investigated the thinking and actions of young people and professionals in schools about ‘forms of citizenship that relate to strong communities’:

‘There appears to be a disconnect between school discourse around the importance of community and civic engagement, and what is taught in schools. Citizenship education is not always viewed as a subject that is taken seriously by schools. Young people in this study did not feel that teaching about community and citizenship fully prepared them to take an active part in their school or local communities.

‘Young people have strong opinions on what schools can do to recognise the contributions they already make to their communities, as well as to support young people in engaging in civic action. These include building positive links with other schools in their community; actively encouraging interaction between different groups of pupils within and outside of school; making sure that opportunities to get involved with in- and out-of-school projects are equally available to all students; and taking an interest in pupils’ lives beyond the school gates.’

 

Being honest about poverty statistics

So in Wales they have appointed a ‘Poverty Minister,’ the excellent Huw Lewis. His aim is to ensure that the government machine ‘turns to face the people caught up in the poverty statistics.’

Ah yes, when it comes to addressing poverty statistics, the rest of the UK gets this chap, known for his use of what Fry would call ‘terminological inexactitude’ regarding statistics.

Living in interesting times

England seems to be shifting from being a rather right-wing country to a frighteningly right-wing country. JRF research published the other day shows not just that ‘the public has become increasingly likely to say that individual characteristics rather than societal issues cause poverty;’ but also that this is largely accounted for by a shift in attitudes among voters on the left. In 1986 the proportion of Labour voters who cited social injustice as the main cause of poverty was 41 per cent: in 2011 it was just 27 per cent.

Never mind, let’s see what’s in the news to cheer us up. How about this? A brand new UK Independence Party councillor, Eric Kitson, has made racist ‘jokes’ and shared ‘a cartoon of Muslim people being burnt at the stake with copies of the Koran fuelling the flames’, on his Facebook page. The following sentence seems to be his explanation for why Ukip have not suspended him:

‘I'm not a politician - I'm a bit of a fool really.’

Meanwhile, Colin Brewer, the previously mentioned independent councillor in Cornwall who said that disabled children should be put down, apparently was re-elected in the same round of elections: according to the Indy, ‘with 335 votes – a winning margin of four votes.’ Brewer compared disabled children with deformed lambs that are dealt with at birth by ‘smashing them against a wall.’ His presence on the candidate list would certainly get me out to the polling station.

In both cases, I’m perversely curious about whether some voters put their cross against these names without at least some understanding of what they stood for. The logic of democracy means that you have to believe that a majority of those who voted for these people knew what they were doing. Something is very rotten in the state of England.

 

Don’t start blaming the neighbours

Now things have quietened down a bit, what can we say about the questioning of neighbourliness around 2207 Seymour Ave in Cleveland Ohio? Don’t blame the neighbours; avoid knee-jerk conjuring of halcyon historic community; and take mental health more seriously.

Exhibit A is the cliché of American ‘community’ life, half-heartedly examined by Rupert Cornwell in the Indy for instance:

‘Cleveland has somehow given the lie to all this. If communities are supposed to look after their own, this particular one failed.’

I think it must be a bewildering, deeply disturbing experience for the neighbours concerned and I don’t see that it helps to clobber them with a sense of having let the side down. As I wrote a year ago with reference to such contexts, the experience of local people may be complicated by a sense of guilt mixed with cruel deception:

‘Can we understand how it felt in retrospect to have been a neighbour of Josef Fritzl, and to have respected his privacy? I imagine people saying simply, We knew nothing, what should we have done? – and never really recovering. An anti-social or deranged individual determined to use privacy as a smokescreen will do so, unless as a society we were to dismantle the structures and culture of privacy…

‘How close could the best of good neighbourliness have got to an Anders Breivik or a Josef Fritzl? No closer than they’d let you, through a street rep scheme perhaps, and no closer. You cannot see what he brings home from the stores in boxes or the magazines going through the letterbox, or what he views online.’

So far I don’t see that the case of Ariel Castro is particularly different. And it doesn’t help to refer to more halcyon days or localities, mythical or not, unless we are also going to offer analyses which suggest how we can reduce the likelihood of deranged behaviour having brutal and lasting impact on the lives of others.

With that in mind, there’s one social imperative which seems to be missed every time: the need to create a culture in which the disorder of the individual in question is self-recognised as treatable by an available, confidential, caring system. Castro is said to have prepared a ‘suicide’ note in which he speaks of a sex addiction and said he needed help. What realistically were his chances of getting it, of taking it? Maybe we need to put more effort into pre-emptive services for all kinds of mental ill-health; and to normalise or de-stigmatise the idea of consulting them. Implementing the recommendations of the Independent Commission on Mental Health and Policing would be a start: ‘mental health is core business’ it says.

Today we tend to find the treatment of people with mental illness, in previous centuries, distasteful or even barbaric. Unless we learn how to learn from tragedies like Seymour Avenue, I think that future societies may reflect in the same way about our own primitive disinterest in mental health.

 

Education, segregation, and social damage

Here's Will Hutton in today's Observer, summarising the social damage wrought by elitist educational and economic policies:

"Societies are built on multiple interdependencies. Trust, the foundation of human relationships, is created around reciprocity. An elite that segregates itself is declaring it does not want to be part of reciprocal relationships of trust. All that matters is its own betterment. Entrepreneurship and innovation, as entrepreneurs and innovators know full well, happen best in a climate of openness, access and high trust, not in societies managed to deliver economic rent and advantage to a self-perpetuating oligarchy of the privately educated."

And at the local level, the gated community is an increasingly powerful symbol of all this comtemptible ideology promoted by this government and its largely conniving press.

Recovered possessions

I have recently finished a short booklet on a theme familiar to readers of this blog – lost possessions. It comprises a light-touch essay, illustrated with a range of photos, exploring the curious tradition whereby people pick up items that others have dropped in public places, and place them somewhere to optimise the chances of rediscovery by the owner. I’ve long been fascinated by these acts of anonymous consideration.

Co-editor Martin Dudley and I had an absorbing time selecting the images for the final cut: they include examples of sundry gloves, hats and scarves, but also a necktie, a vehicle registration plate, some shopping items and a notice about a lost i-Pod.

We’re considering setting up a page somewhere to accommodate those images we could not include, and for people to add their own. In the meantime, here’s one of those that got away… I was rushing home from the station one evening, burdened with luggage, when I saw this child’s hoodie draped over a bollard. I failed to take the time to take a proper image, and have regretted it since.

I promise you the photos in the booklet are of better quality, if not necessarily all quite so striking.

We’ve edited and designed it using the Bookleteer process, and I’ll post here again when it becomes available in a week or so.

 

Pavement chalking anarchy… possibly

Here we go again with the ‘criminality’ of chalking on pavements… or do we?

The BBC, Mail, Telegraph, Indy and other sources report that a ten year old girl was reprimanded by passing police officers for chalking a hopscotch grid on the pavement. Tsk.

I’ve commented on a few examples before, but they’ve always been confirmed. Lots of people have jumped on the copper-bashing bandwagon in this instance but it’s worth noting that the force so far has not accepted any involvement:

‘We cannot currently trace any car being in the area at the time.’

Let's wait and see shall we. Rain may not wash this one away so quickly.

Previously:

• Pavement chalking anarchy again
• Pavement chalking: this time seen in a positive light
• Pavement chalking epidemic?
• Footnote on pavement chalking
• 'If it can be washed away, it's not graffiti. But'

Neglected space

‘Confused spaces’, ‘neglected spaces’, ‘spaces of uncertainty’… various terms are used and they can often tell us a bit about the limits of the planner’s role.

I came across this striking example in Watford the other day.

 

The two pictures are taken from opposite sides. The curved wall defines a spiral path down to a subway, condemning a near-triangular space above, without purpose. A sheet of corrugated plastic roofing betrays someone’s desperate, but perhaps comparatively sheltered, bedding place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The social networks of refugees

A research report on Social networks, social capital and refugee integration has just been published by the universities of Birmingham and Cardiff. The study was based on an analysis of The Survey of New Refugees (SNR), augmented with a short online survey.

Among the findings:

• Social connections have a clear impact on health and language.
• Those who participate in quality English language learning get more help and have more frequent contact.
• There were clear social capital benefits from family reunion.
• Frequent contact with kin has no impact on access to employment.
• Those in contact with a formal group are less likely to need emotional support.
• No kind of social network is anti-integrative.

And there are a couple of surprises (to me at any rate). First, there seems to be comparatively low interest in associating with ‘co-national or ethnic groups’. When asked to rank 15 priorities, respondents placed greatest importance (understandably) on ‘Absence of verbal or physical attack’ (9.5) and ‘Housing’ (9.29). The lowest priority was accorded to ‘Volunteering’ (7.09) (understandably); and (surprisingly) association with ‘co-national or ethnic groups’ (7.49).

Secondly, the research challenges the model which suggests that if you spend time and energy investing in strong ties (e.g. for emotional support) that detracts from investment in weak ties and bridging social capital (e.g. for getting work). The researchers say there was ‘no evidence that having strong kin networks precludes getting support from formal networks’:

‘The positive correlations between different types of contact… provide compelling evidence against the argument that immigrant and ethnic minority communities are ‘inward looking’ and only ‘invest’ in bonding social capital... There is no evidence that receiving help from relatives and friends (widely considered as ‘bonding’ capital) is mutually exclusive with gaining ‘bridging’ social capital from ‘out-groups’ and more formal organisations.’ (p11-12)

 

Managing unambitious households

Yarlington Housing Group may have got itself into a bit of hot water for a new initiative ostensibly intended to help residents in personal and family development. In a nice contemporary example of really tacky scheme design and marketing, they announce:

‘The aim of our Household Ambition Plans are (sic) to support you - our tenants, in achieving your goals and ambitions and help you sHAPe your future to transform the lives of you and your family. sHAPe is currently being offered to all new tenants who accept a 7 year fixed term tenancy. It is an agreement between Yarlington and the tenant and sets out the ambitions and aspirations of the tenant and their family.’

It’s not clear if this is a response to levels of anti-social behaviour, disorder, or other tensions among tenants. It may not be a response to anything, but a positively-intentioned developed. But I suspect we have been quite near here before.

In 2006 I edited a book on Respect in the neighbourhood which included a thorough research-based chapter by Liz Richardson on ‘Incentives and motivations for neighbourliness.’ Liz pointed to the significance of local agencies taking action and concluded that incentives certainly have a positive effect, but schemes need to allow space ‘for negotiation and the accommodation of alternative views’.

Yarlington would doubtless claim that they do that. Inside housing quotes executive director Phyllida Culpin:

‘Our approach to getting a positive involvement from new tenants is crucial to the success of our company aim to build communities… We expect everyone entering this with us to do the very best that they are able.’

These people only want tenants who have ambitions, and who 'do their best' according to someone else's judgement. It's hideously reminiscent of current education policy. There's little attempt to disguise the moralising. Some of the comments in response, on the Inside housing pages, are well-worth reading. I don't think any of the scheme's defendants can get away from the impression that the housing provider has assumed a right of judgement over people’s lifestyles: indeed some people celebrate that as being what housing providers should do.

Yarlington have unwisely stepped over the line between laudably offering support to residents, and coercively requiring them to participate in a customer scheme with dubious intentions. The chief executive’s use of language and the wording in their customer guide are not reassuring:

‘We will look at the progress you have made with your HAP when we consider the renewal of your tenancy at the end of the 7 year fixed period.

‘Some people may feel uncomfortable about committing to a HAP. If, after discussing it with Yarlington staff, you decide that you do not want to take advantage of this opportunity, you will be able to bid for homes offered by housing providers who do not have a similar scheme.’

It’s hard to avoid the suspicion that Yarlington have a cleansing scheme in mind, with the intention of getting rid of ’undesirable’ tenants, who might or might not be picked up by lesser housing providers presumably more willing to deal with riff-raff. Either way, they have a serious problem of presentation.

 

Exclusion and protest: people left out in the street can make a difference

Yesterday, as various sources report (BBC, Indy), five disabled people lost their High Court challenge over the government's decision to abolish the Independent Living Fund (ILF). Only from Zoe Williams’s less resigned account in the Guardian do we learn that:

‘It's an inaccessible courtroom, so the people who brought the action couldn't get into the room to hear the verdict.’

What an exquisite vignette for the moral bankruptcy of the system. Can the injustice of British politics and the notion of British ‘justice’ sink any lower? We must wait and see. Matt Kenyon’s superb illustration brings a weird sound, a bit like laughter, to the cries of derision.

But there are sources of encouragement. According to Andreas Whittam Smith in today's Indy, action by those victimised across Europe by authorities in the name of ‘austerity’ has brought results:

‘When the President of the European Commission says that austerity has reached its limits, then something profound has changed. The street protests in weaker eurozone countries have made a difference.’

Plenty still to do though.

On blackbird puberty

See if maybe you can help with this. Der spring is sprung and there's a minimalist blackbird in my neighbourhood. Well I think it's a blackbird. It recently progressed from a three-note scale to four notes. I'm not a musician so there's no more detail on that, sorry. But you're welcome to pop round. Come early.

So for example at ten to five this morning there was the usual modest medley of different chirps - no thrushes I'm afraid, the cat-owners have a lot to answer for - including this occasional incongruous voice, da-da-da-da from high to low as if just tuning up. It's like having Status Quo on stage during a Messiaen concert. A bit like being on twitter I suppose.

Maybe it's a consequence of the protracted winter here in south east England. My daughter says it's a blackbird in puberty, it's the avian equivalent of grunting, get used to it.

 

Think mutuality and reciprocity… and interdependence

‘Jacques is 14 years old. When he comes from school, he is welcomed by his mother and Paul H, their co-resident in the home, a man 70 years old. They are living together in one of the two kangaroo homes operated by the Public Social Welfare Centre in Sint-Jans-Molenbeek (Brussels). Each home accommodates four seniors with one single-parent family. Each resident has his/her own room, but the living areas are communal…

‘Paul, formerly a mail-sorter with the Post Office explains: "When I arrived here, I had lost my wife and was forced to leave my apartment. I felt cast loose, as if the world around me was collapsing. But since my arrival here I feel less lonely."’

This comes from a case study article on the European Urban Knowledge Network. It got me thinking about responses to the UK’s infamous so-called ‘bedroom tax’… Could co-housing offer an opportunity to emphasise mutuality and reciprocity over ‘traditional forms of support and care’ (to quote a recent UK Co-housing tweet)?

I thought I might find a one or two references to welfare policy on the UK Cohousing Network site, but just drew blanks. I can understand that they might want to steer clear of the torrid current politics. Wouldn’t we all.

But there’s an important theme here, and it’s reassuring to see how the movement promoting cohousing for older people is gathering momentum. Possibly, just possibly, it will give us all pointers for the future, for two reasons:

• First, just because it accepts a mixed economy to get things done, the cohousing movement doesn’t abandon the principle that many things are better for being collectively endeavoured, and that many things should be ‘public’; nor the principle that the existence of a public sphere is in everyone’s interests.
• And secondly, it seems to reassert the valuable notion of interdependence for older people (and I do mean ‘valuable’, in an economic as well as various other human senses). Some years ago when I was researching into neighbourliness and older people, there seemed to be some acceptance of this notion – pulling away from both a tiresome insistence on older people’s independence on the one hand and some inconsistent attitudes towards dependence on the other.

As a society we should have been exploring ways of providing infrastructure that makes interdependence and collective responsibility possible. We could pay a heavy price for our sluggish response to the looming crisis of old age, unless co-operative movements like co-housing serve to stimulate a widespread understanding of the necessity of mutuality and reciprocity.

(And I do hope you feel that this topic is a welcome antidote to the current desperate, morally bankrupt attempts to reify Thatcher).

How we communicate with our fellow citizens, #193

I came across this on the edge of someone's property this morning.

‘Villages evolve, don't they?’

The debate about urban design will surely always be with us. John Harris had a rather inconclusive piece in the Guardian on Saturday about some of those new squeaky-clean housing developments and the culture they represent – aspirational, artificial, organic…?

‘The pristine, faux-traditional houses are the same as those you see all over the country, offering the promise of "traditional living with modern comforts."’

And so he asks,

‘If you use the word "village" and learn from the planning mistakes of the past, can you quickly build a community from scratch?’

Although he doesn’t really get face to face with the question, there are several delightful insights, including this one from Terri Clarke, a resident of Fairford Leys:

"It's referred to as a village, but it's an estate," Terri insists. "The fact that it was all built at the same time means it's an estate. Villages evolve, don't they?"

Thank you Terri.

I’ve been round a few such places (including Poundbury, which is hardly typical) and a few things have struck me.

• The architecture is invariably an improvement on what was left us by the architects and planners of the 1960s and 1970s. And there is more likely to be a mix of renovated and new build of different sizes with social and private housing.
• The developers’ contribution to local amenities almost always lags behind and the eventual level of provision is probably seldom adequate.
• The public realm matters everywhere. The article quotes architect John Simpson, emphasising in these new developments ‘a public realm, rather than just leftover space, which is what you get on housing estates.’ So who was responsible for designing housing estates without a public realm? Why?
• People reflect readily on their neighbourhood, but snobbery around words like ‘estate’ and ‘village’ surfaces quite easily. These snobberies can get institutionalised in the regulation of residents through terms and conditions, with some of the least rational forms emerging. Thus one of the residents quoted in the article says she’s ‘not allowed solar panels’. The version of ‘heritage’ espoused by her residents’ association presumably excludes the idea of future generations inheriting an inhabitable planet.
• These estates have often achieved a subtle, possibly unnoticed, control over vehicle traffic, so that kids can play in the street. If the residents’ association allows that sort of thing, of course.
• Some people are clearly suspicious of the ‘prissy’ over-prescribed environment, and readily contrast it to some notion of ‘community’ which entertains a degree of lively disorder. Others appear to have a fear of disorder (which itself can seem like a psychological disorder at times) and will invest heavily in the local politics of protection: for them, ‘community’ is characterised by peace and predictability. Maybe we can’t build for all sorts and shouldn't try.

To return to the question posed: ‘can you quickly build a community from scratch?’ There's a superficial answer, which is that in some circumstances you can of course: it helps to have an identifiable shared adversity.

But the question begs too many others. For instance, it privileges the notion of ‘community’ as something that people should be expected to value over good quality housing and a safe, unpolluted environment. Not everyone does, and why should they? As was the case with the urban villages movement in the 1990s, we should not be surprised if some people are suspicious of the antiseptic notion of community that is on offer.

It also ignores the historical fact that many residential areas have evolved without any trace of the wishy-washy organic community that mythology predicts and celebrates. Why does 'community' emerge here but not there? Maybe we should agonise a bit less over the C word, and invest more in designing more civilised places to live, using basic principles including the provision of public space and community resources, with a properly funded local government to back it up and help maintain and sustain it.

 

Come with a whoop, and come with a call

It’s been a depressing time just lately for any observer of social inclusion in the UK, and I’m going to try not to rehearse the reasons for that – although, wait, it’s hard not to make aslant reference to the bedroom tax, arguably the daftest piece of legislation contrived since Cromwell managed to put his point across (I note it was the subject of an ineffective EDM in parliament a whole nine months ago).

Instead, here’s some good news, I think. It's time to join your play fellows in the street. According to CYP Now, the Department of Health has put up £1m ‘for the development of play streets’ across England, to a consortium including Play England, London Play, Bristol’s Playing Out and Bristol University. 'Grats to them all.

However it’s not clear quite what ‘the development of play streets’ means, since, remarkably, the nearest I could come to an informative press release, offered by London Play and dated 22 March, doesn’t trouble to explain. CYP Now says ‘The consortium is deciding how it will use the money.’ That's a good idea. Don't worry, they'll think of something.

‘No life.’ Young people talking about poverty

Last month I helped organise and run an event involving children and young people in poverty, so that government officials could hear them talk about their experiences.

The slightly formal context of a conference venue was going to be unfamiliar for the participants, the timetable was very tight, and they would not know most of the others there. So we designed a mix of plenary and group sessions, exercises, discussions, and one short presentation; followed by a trip round the houses of parliament. We also had to take account of the fact that some of the young people had fairly complex backgrounds and there was always a chance that attention spans would be short and their behaviour could be what is euphemistically called ‘challenging’.

One of the exercises was designed to allow some of the experience to be fictionalised: this gave the participants ‘permission’ to release some fairly strong concerns – and some personal aspirations - that otherwise might not have been shared. This post summarises that process.

We had seven groups of about 5 or 6 per table, of mixed ages. Using a pre-printed worksheet, each group was asked to invent a character and describe their family background and the area where they lived. Prompt cards were provided but only the age of the child was prescribed, in order to ensure a variety.

We used the carousel principle so that each table inherited the character created by others. The second stage required them to think about the skills, interests, fears and friendships of the character. We provided plenty of prompt cards for this stage, covering a broad mix of options to get people talking: some groups used these while others chose to draw or write, for example -

Fears: ‘not being able to leave the estate’

‘A bit afraid of new people. Doesn’t know what is happening.’

‘He does not go to school so he don’t have a good ajication.’

They all offered a reasonable degree of consistency – that is to say, there were only a few apparent contradictions along the lines of ‘loner’ / ‘team player’.

In the next stage, inheriting a character with some detail known about them, the participants were asked to think up a crisis (or crises) that affected the individual, and to describe the implications. As we had anticipated, this gave them no difficulties whatsoever, although there were one or two oddities –

‘No life. Goes into foster home & runs away. Police find him and Bob wants to stay with the policeman.’

‘They move to a small stone hut.’

There was plenty of mention of adults in the household losing their jobs, plus imprisonment and quite unceremonially reported death.

In the last group phase, they were asked to think through the future for the invented character they inherited, given what was known about their circumstances and the crisis which afflicted them. Here, what was striking was the sense of resilience in some of the outcomes (but not all):

‘Finally he got his own business. And he doesn’t do any illgele job.’

‘(After 1 yr) Taken into care. Social involved. Abused in care. Bunking school. Mum + Dad not aloud to see them. Parents in rehab. Angry at parents. (After 2 yrs) Kills parents -Juvinal prison – No one to help him. (After 5 yrs) Turns life around and starts studying in Safe Children’s Home. Goes back to school and doesn’t get bullied.’

‘She become so ill and suffers too much. Luckily someone adopts her but she is so ill that she dies.’

‘(After 1 yr) out of prison after serving 6 months. No family support L (After 2 yrs) goes back to prison for selling drugs, couldn’t find work. (After 5 yrs) Dies from drug abuse. [Alternative happy ending] 1 yr – lots of support from family. 2 yrs – rehab and courses. 5 yrs – police and youth work, educating others to prevent them doing the same thing.’

The final phase of the exercise was a table-by-table account and short discussion of each of the characters. Unsurprisingly, energy levels had flagged a little by this stage but the richness of the narratives gave us plenty to work on in the final sessions and in our report, which will be published soon by the Office of the Children’s Commissioner.

If you're interested in finding out more about the process described here, please get in touch.

 

You probably don’t know your neighbours, it says here

Research reported by the Big Lunch claims that more than 50 per cent of respondents ‘don’t know their neighbours’, with one in four ‘having no idea what their names are’.

There’s no way of finding out what this means, as there is no press release on the website, and no indication of who carried out the research or how the questions were worded. Of course it’s part of the BL process of cranking up its publicity, which is fair enough; and it gives the Daily Mail something to put in its columns, which maybe can’t be helped.

All I can offer is a quick comparison with some previous ‘findings’, noting the three tentative conclusions I drew a few years ago that

• about 90% of us enjoy good relationships with our neighbours and speak to them often
• about 5% of us have no contact with our neighbours
• there's no consensus on whether neighbourliness is in decline.

I could point out once again that the phrase ‘to know your neighbours’ needs a bit of unpacking if it is to be helpful; and that knowing names is not the same as recognition, which is what underpins neighbourliness.

I can also promise to try and do another mini-analysis of collected ‘findings’ from sources like this, because they do have a fascination and possibly some lessons. But it remains the case that if organisations don’t feel able to reveal the source of such eccentric conclusions, their credibility will need rescuing.

Money on our minds

Today I played my part in an established neighbourhood ritual, as signatory witness with my neighbour to counting the money from charity envelopes collected. There are just fourteen houses and, remarkably, she had managed to get a response from all but one; we hit the record with well over £4 per household. The cause was a popular one, and when people decide to be generous, they are generous.

Everyone seems to have money on their minds these days: how much they have, the predictability of their income, and what to do with it. And I sense that more and more people – in spite of the conspiracy of disinterest shown by most of the broadcast media - are beginning to get the message that poverty is a dominant, complex social problem. There has been a significant political shift lately, and tomorrow’s budget ought to bring some relief; but undoubtedly profound, lasting damage has been done, much of it inexcusably ideologically-driven and malicious.

Some people, like Bradley Ariza who has an article in today’s Guardian, are counting calories too. As he says, ‘not to lose weight, but to try and make sure I get enough.’

‘The problem is that as soon as we try to work our way out of the grip of the welfare state, we lose so many benefits, and incur so many other costs; transport, childcare etc. Yet instead of helping people, there seems to be this obsession with punishing those on benefits, as if being poor is some sort of crime.’

Previously:

Poverty: curtains or blinkers?

Political stereotyping of poverty

Povertyism in policy: 'troubled families'

The language of povertyism

It's the povertyism, stupid

It's the poverty, stupid

More on behaviour in the public realm

I’ve been travelling more than usual recently, and I want to follow up on my recent post about behaviour on trains, referring also to an observation I made four years ago, when I had

'...half-watched a young woman perform a 20 minute phase of what may have been a marathon meticulous make-up, including fastidious uprooting of eyebrows, the full MOT…'

That was nothing. The other day a young woman sat down diagonally opposite me at the table, distributing luggage and clutter where she could, and within about ten minutes, after a trip to the toilet, she was surprisingly deshabillee and well into an intensive make-up routine. We shared this space for more than two hours, and she was still preening and powdering her image in her tiny mirror when I left the train before its journey was complete.

The routine included two bouts (at least two, I did not pay attention the whole time) of squeezing spots at close range with her head down studiously. There was one lengthy spell of creaming the face and neck, and several bouts of face-brushing with all the head-bobbing that goes with it.

After about an hour we had eyelash fixing – tricky on a fast-moving train, I would have thought. Do they have left-eye ones and right-eye ones? If so there’s a chance she might have put left on right unnoticed, and/or vice-versa, which might leave anyone looking a little inebriated. I did not inspect, although I suppose I might have done if invited to the cause. And then we had fingernails selected from a large box, apparently stuck on, then used to collect up all the scattered unused ones.

I think that for some people, some of this might just be too intimate for the public realm. I was hugely impressed with the contrast between her personal concern and public disconcern.

There was a sense of urgency, almost aggression, in her actions, in spite of the time it all took. Perhaps experience had taught her with this particular journey that there was no slack for the job in hand: two and a half hours to London and the task must be completed… You wouldn’t want to be pulling in to the terminus with more to do and not feeling able to leave the train perhaps, then being whisked back up the line as the return journey started, still touching up round the temples...

At one point I wondered if this was an unavoidable occupational necessity – was she going to get off the train in London and get tipped out of a taxi straight onto the stage in the west end? Had I unknowingly been privileged to witness the meticulous preparation of a new operatic star? OK, perhaps serving in a night club bar or similar? My conclusion was not, because she kept pouring herself slugs of vodka and sticky-sweet. I could be wrong.

As it happened, someone was taken seriously ill on the train during the journey. Medical expertise from among the passengers had to be called for, and then paramedics summoned to an intermediate station. Which felt to me, non-judgementally, like a little reminder: let her paint an inch thick, to this end she must come.