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Let’s Just Be Against Stuff, Shall We?

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  • If we don’t agree with the politics then we must be against the policies, mustn’t we?
  • If the idea comes from the bosses, then the workers need to oppose it, don’t they?
  • If the council propose cuts, then we should fight them, shouldn’t we?

Well, actually, no.

Sometimes I do choose to be ‘against stuff’, particularly if it meets some or all of the following criteria:

  1. It will involve investing public money to further increase the gap between the rich and poor.
  2. It puts at unwarranted risk a vital organisation or service.
  3. It means committing to a course of action that cannot be escaped.

The first of these will always get me into opposition mode!  And sadly most of what we call ‘development’ in a modern city meets this criteria.   The pursuit of GDP means finding ways to provide services, usually retail and entertainment, to people with disposable income, at a profit for investors.  Usually this criterion is quite easy to apply.  And as soon as a proponent of ‘stuff’ calls ‘trickle down’ into the debate than you can be pretty sure that your opposition is well founded.

The second of these is harder to apply.  It is more personal and subjective.  After all what constitutes an ‘unwarranted risk’?  And which services are ‘vital’?

Let’s deal with ‘vital’ first.  I usually do a little thought experiment.  I think about the service users and try to empathise with some of the least powerful amongst them.  I now go on to ask myself ‘Is it likely that any of them would put this organisation or service close to the top of their list of essential services?  If the service was lost would their life be forever blighted, or could another service substitute?  Can they find another way to fill the gap?’

This is why I will get exercised over policies that impact on health, financial inclusion and education for example, but get less exercised, although sympathetic, about the shutting of libraries, the banning of hunting with dogs and closing swimming pools.  There are other ways to access books, if access to books is the priority.  There are other ways to exercise and socialise. And there are greater causes competing for my time than the modern day barbarity that is hunting.  It is also why I can’t get overly exercised about communities building tree-houses, unless they are affordable housing!

Unwarranted risk is trickier.  Subjective.  Personal.

Here I do another thought experiment (if they worked for Einstein…..:-)) and try to assess the consequences of a ‘false positive’ compared with the consequences of a ‘false negative’.  A ‘false negative’ is when we decide not to pursue a course and it later seems to be a wrong decision.  So, if we decide not to build nuclear and we all end up dying in cold, dark caves, that would be a ‘false negative’.  If, on the other hand, we go nuclear and end up frying in a  radioactive hell – that would be a ‘false positive’.

Now it strikes me that with coalition ‘healthcare reforms’ that Cameron and Clegg both reckoned that Lansley was about to press the button on a ‘false positive’ when a ‘false negative’ would be a much better option.  Hence the listening exercise.  Of course, ideally the world would be full of ‘true negatives’ and ‘true positives’: we would only ever make right decisions.

It is sad that more politicians don’t feel like it might be electorally acceptable to say ‘we are just going to leave it be’ from time to time.

And my 3rd criterion is that of generally, but not always, opposing a step that can’t be undone.  Burning the boats may have worked for Cortez  but as a rule of thumb it is not for me.  Engineering a situation where people are compelled to push forward with a policy once it is enacted whatever the consequences rarely turns out well.

So these are the guidelines that I use when deciding whether to be against stuff. Far from perfect, but they work well enough for me.

However I try not to be against very, much at all.

If my criteria leave room for doubt then I will ‘leave it be’.  A ‘false negative’ is often better than a ‘false positive’ in my experience.  Choosing not to object at all is better than deciding to object to something that you are not deeply committed about.

I prefer instead to be ‘for stuff’ wherever I can.

Especially stuff that will narrow the gaps between rich and poor in our society.  But also stuff that will be fun, engaging, creative and challenging.

And usually when I choose to be against stuff it is because it steals resources away from the things that I would like to see happen.

Poverty and Income Differentials

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I have been doing a bit of digging around looking at issues of pay differentials in and around Leeds.

A top professional footballer in the UK can expect to earn in the region of £140 000 every week.  It might take an average Leeds United player about 6 months to earn this much.

The post of Leeds City Development Director is advertised at £140 000 per year (you would think we would attract a decent candidate willing to work for that)

A Teacher on an average salary in Leeds would take 4.5 years to earn £140k.

A Registered Nurse would take nearly 6 years, as would a Police Constable.

A Healthcare Assistant almost 9 years.

A Teaching Assistant just over 10 years.

A Qualified Playworker (L2) would need more than 15 years.

The poor kids dad would take almost 30 years to get this income on current benefits.

A young person on the Job Seekers Allowance would be an old person – at least 72 – before they accrued JSA payments worth £140k, if it were possible.

Health Warning

All of these calculations should be treated with care.

They are based on current wages as researched on the web. In most cases, but not footballers, these are average wages.  I have done my best to check the maths but no guarantees!  I have done nothing sophisticated, just calculated how long at the current salary it would take to accrue 140k.  Having said that I think the numbers are illustrative and enlightening, even if they are not entirely accurate.  Any economists who fancy doing more accurate calculations and sharing them then please do let me know.)

Poor Kids in Leeds

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Many of us this week will have seen the very powerful and moving BBC documentary Poor Kids directed by Jezza Neumann, telling the stories of some of the 3.5 million children living in poverty in the UK. This is one of the worst child poverty rates in the industrialised world, and successive governments have struggled to improve it significantly.

From what I have experienced reaction to it in Leeds seems to have fallen into three broad camps.  Firstly there is a group for whom this is ‘the reality’, and Poor Kids was just a powerful re-telling of an everyday story. Members of this group meet these kids and their families on a regular basis because they live or work with them.

Secondly there is a much larger group for whom this programme was a revelation.  People with no idea that our housing stock was often so poor. With no idea that the poor pay more for basic services such as utilities or TV than the rest.  With little understanding that such levels of poverty existed in our society.

And thirdly there was a group who just seem to brush it off with ‘the poor will always be with us’ attitudes and ‘I share no responsibility for other peoples poor parenting or economic incompetence’.

And the bad news is that the smart money says that child poverty is likely to get worse rather than better.

So how does this play out in the economic powerhouse of Yorkshire, the retail and tourist success story, the regenerated and rebuilt city that is Leeds?

Well, here are some figures, collated by the Leeds Initiative and published on their website.

  • In Leeds there are 29,695 children aged under 16 who are living in poverty – 22.9% of all children in this age range
  • There are 33,295 dependent children aged under 20 who are living in poverty (22.1% of the children / young people in this age range)
33000 children, 1 in 5 of our children, living in poverty.

Poverty is not distributed evenly across the City however, and these averages hide some pockets of child poverty that are as high as anywhere in the UK.  In 2008 at the Lower Super Output Area (essentially a small geographical area that we might think of as a neighbourhood – see SOAs Explained) level there were:

  • 19 LSOAs where no children were deemed to be living in poverty
  • 105 LSOAs with rates of 5% or less
  • 55 LSOAs where 44.2% or more of children are living in poverty (double the city average)
  • In the most deprived LSOAs in Leeds there are 17,620 dependant children living in poverty, a rate of approximately 45%.
And if you look for Child Poverty rates at parliamentary ward level here is what you find:
  • Leeds Central  41%
  • Leeds East  35%
  • Leeds North East  17%
  • Leeds North West  14%
  • Leeds West  29%
  • Morley and Rothwell  17%

Essentially child poverty is concentrated in the so-called doughnut of despair, that ring of communities that surround the city centre.

There is little point in re-stating the data from the Leeds Initiative research, you can read it for yourself on the ‘Ending Child Poverty’ Paper.

How does child poverty in Leeds compare to that in other major UK cities?  Well actually we are not doing too badly in relative terms.  Child poverty rates are higher in Manchester, Birmingham, Sheffield, Bradford, Newcastle, Liverpool, Nottingham and Sheffield.

But still the child poverty rates in some Leeds communities are as high as almost anywhere in the UK.  Just look at this breakdown supplied by ‘End Child Poverty‘ that shows just how unevenly it is spread across the city.

  • Adel and Wharfedale 6%
  • Alwoodley 12%
  • Ardsley and Robin Hood 12%
  • Armley 32%
  • Beeston and Holbeck 32%
  • Bramley and Stanningley 28%
  • Burmantofts and Richmond Hill 46%
  • Calverley and Farsley 9%
  • Chapel Allerton 33%
  • City and Hunslet 44%
  • Cross Gates and Whinmoor 19%
  • Farnley and Wortley 25%
  • Garforth and Swillington 9%
  • Gipton and Harehills 47%
  • Guiseley and Rawdon 7%
  • Harewood 5%
  • Headingley 19%
  • Horsforth 9%
  • Hyde Park and Woodhouse 46%
  • Killingbeck and Seacroft 37%
  • Kippax and Methley 12%
  • Kirkstall 33%
  • Middleton Park 41%
  • Moortown 12%
  • Morley North 11%
  • Morley South 14%
  • Otley and Yeadon 12%
  • Pudsey 15%
  • Rothwell 16%
  • Roundhay 13%
  • Temple Newsam 23%
  • Weetwood 18%
  • Wetherby 6%

In the draft Vision for Leeds and associated City Priority Plans the issue of poverty in the city becomes a ‘cross-cutting theme’ for all 5 of the new Partnership Boards, and its importance is clearly expressed.  Whether as a ‘cross cutting theme’ it will have quite the focus it demands we will have to wait and see.

My main concern is that when I look at the proposed, and still draft, Headline Indicators that are associated with the City Priority Plans, indices of poverty and child poverty do not get a look in.  Instead, more tractable ‘proxy’ measures are suggested such as the number of children not in education, employment and training or the number of ‘looked after children’.

But the Vision for Leeds does say that by 2030 ‘people will have the opportunity to get out of poverty‘.  It is just a shame that by 2030 the young stars of Poor Kids and their Leeds peers will be well into adulthood.  And why aren’t we doing more to help build these opportunities now?

When you talk to both sides of the fence on this issue it is clear that there is a disconnect between those who talk of ‘opportunities’, ‘economic growth’, ‘ job creation’ and ‘enterprise zones’ and the people who live in poverty, many of whom talk of having no hope, no power and no future.

Different words from different worlds.

If you are interested in trying to do something about child poverty in Leeds this maybe of interest…