The UK’s crisis of self-respect

Britain is a society in crisis. A political, social and economic crisis. But this is accompanied by a crisis of self-confidence and self-respect. How else is it possible to explain how people who have been direct victims of Tory policies are preparing to vote for them?

According to the United Nations there are 14.6 million people living in poverty in the UK. That should be 10 million votes in the bag for Labour’s transformative manifesto right there (about 4.6 million are children and can’t vote). Given that the last Labour landslide in 1997 was achieved with 13,518,167 votes, a total nobody has beaten in recent years, we can see how important it could be if poverty = Labour vote.

According to the Trussell Trust, who now run 1200 food banks throughout the UK, some 1.6 million food parcels are distributed each year rising by 23% year on year. We have a serious crisis of hunger in the World’s 5^th richest economy. Nobody who has to rely on food banks should ever vote for the party that caused them. But, some do, or they don’t vote at all.

According to the Office for National Statistics average earnings have increased by just 0.9% in real terms. Full Fact has calculated that average weekly wages have fallen by £20 in the past 10 years. As they point out averages hide as much as they reveal. Younger workers and those in the public sector have been particularly badly hit. Whilst these groups tend to be more favourable to Labour, a not insignificant number of low-paid individuals will give their vote to a party whose main interest is protecting the rights of their employers to keep them low paid.

Meanwhile the Institute for Fiscal Studies issued a report earlier this year showing that average spending per pupil had decreased by 8% in the past 10 years. Head teachers have demanded an immediate increase in funding of £5.7billion just to restore spending to where it was in 2009. Of course, this differs slightly in the devolved nations, but even they are dependent on a settlement decided by the Westminster Government. In short, anybody who works in a school or has children should not even consider voting for the party that is responsible for those cuts. But, many will.

In September the National Housing Federation estimated that 8.4 million people in the UK were living in sub-standard housing. Around 2.5 million people cannot afford to pay their rent or mortgage. The Federation said that the country needs to build over 300,000 houses per year, of which half should be affordable “social” housing to deal with the crisis. How is it possible then that some of the people who would benefit from those additional houses (promised in Labour’s manifesto) will not countenance voting for the party that will deliver the home they need?

The Equality Trust argues that the UK is one of the most unequal countries in the developed World. In 2018 the richest fifth of households had incomes 12 times that of the lowest fifth. There is nothing natural about this it is the result of deliberate Government policies. Policies which the United Nations condemned as “a return to the workhouse”. Since 2010 we have witnessed a transfer of wealth away from the poorest to the richest in society. But some among the poorest will still vote for the party that has deliberately and recklessly made them worse off.

But, here’s the rub, all of us, including those who are ‘relatively’ well off, would benefit from changes to a system that is so unequal that for those at the bottom life is intolerable. Even for those in the middle the fear of losing what they have or of their children not having the life chances they have enjoyed, means that life is far from perfect.

How then do the Conservative Party, a party set up to conserve the status quo (the clue is in their name), manage to convince ordinary people that it is in their interests to vote for them? Around 37% of voters in the lowest income bracket voted Conservative in 2017 according to the British Election Study. According to one poll (carried out by ComRes for the Telegraph) that figure could rise to above 40% in two weeks time.

However, a report from the University of Kent (which analysed BES data) did find that 48% of those who thought their household income had declined in the previous year voted Labour. But, staggeringly, 27% were prepared not only to vote for the party that was responsible for that decline, but apparently quite happy for them to reduce it further.

Just how do the Tories keep managing to convince these turkeys to vote for Christmas? The obvious answer is that the Tory propaganda machine is far more pervasive than anything the opposition can muster. The Media Reform Coalition released a report recently showing that just three corporations (News UK, Daily Mail Group and Reach) dominate 83% of the national newspaper market (up from 71% in 2015). When online readers are included, just five companies (News UK, Daily Mail Group, Reach, Guardian and Telegraph) dominate nearly 80% of the market.

At the same time, since Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader, the main broadcasters in the UK – BBC, ITV, Sky – have pursued what amounts to an active campaign to undermine him. They have been aided in this by members of his own party who have seized every opportunity to voice their disquiet at both the leadership and the members who support him.

There are now a number of academic reports that show that the bias against Jeremy Corbyn goes beyond what could be considered fair comment. The LSE In 2016 concluded that “UK journalism played an attack-dog, rather than a watchdog” role, in denying Corbyn or his supporters an opportunity to deny allegations made against him by his detractors. 

An ex-Chair of the BBC Trust voiced his concerns over the lack of impartiality. Sir Michael Lyons, who chaired the trust from 2007 to 2011, claimed that there had been “some quite extraordinary attacks on the elected leader of the Labour party”.

He told the BBC’s The World at One: “I can understand why people are worried about whether some of the most senior editorial voices in the BBC have lost their impartiality on this.”

Whether people actually believe what they read in the press is very difficult to discern, but what is being reported forms a background noise to people’s daily lives. They may well be more interested in who is on Celebrities Dancing On An Island (or whatever reality TV show is this weeks big news) or whether Jose Mourinho can turn Spurs into genuine title contenders (I confess I am quite interested in this myself), but some of the big political headlines will seep into their consciences.

According to the British Social Attitudes survey (one of the largest and robust social surveys in the UK) only around one-third of the population profess a great interest in politics (that’s you and me, dear reader), but whilst around 40% have some interest, somewhere between 32-37% say they have no interest at all in politics. It is those with “no interest” who are most susceptible to what we might term ‘involuntary bias saturation’. That is they do not have considered political views but rather absorb, unquestioningly, the general sense from the dominant background noise.

There is still a direct correlation between those who have an interest in politics and actually voting. In the 2010 British Social Attitudes survey 86 per cent of those with a “great deal” or “quite a lot” of interest in politics reported voting in the May general election, compared with only 53 per cent of those with “not very much” interest or “none at all”. This is worth bearing in mind when we consider that turnout at General Elections is around two-thirds of registered voters. So, having no interest does not necessarily mean you will vote Tory, or as Oscar Wilde had it “you have no interest in politics? Oh,you’re a Liberal”, because of those people around half will not vote at all.

A report from the National Centre for Social Research showed that interest in politics was directly related to income. Based on the BSA the reports authors state: “Just 34% of people in the poorest fifth, and 28% of people in the second lowest income group say they had ‘a great deal’ or ‘quite a lot’ of interest in politics, compared with 56% in the highest income group.” 

This is interesting because what it suggests is that those with most to gain from electing a Labour Government profess less interest in political issues and are subsequently less likely to vote than those with better incomes, better houses, and better life chances generally.

What this tells us is that Labour’s natural demographic, those who would most benefit from their programme, do not vote, and show not much interest in politics generally. It is easy to write off non-voters as apathetic or “thick”, but this fails to recognise the psychological impact of poverty (though if you are not living in poverty apathetic or thick might apply, but I’m too polite to say such things about my fellow citizens).

A 2015 report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation included the finding that: “Those experiencing poverty show significantly lower levels of confidence in their own ability to succeed.” It is not just that they lack self-confidence in their own abilities but this leads to a fatalism about their ability to change anything. They can begin to internalise the negative stigma attached to poverty and this undermines their self-respect. If others do not respect them, then how can they respect themselves?

Persons lacking in this form of self-respect (there are various types of self-respect) may act in ways that run counter to their best interests because they do not regard themselves as equal citizens. The upper classes are taught from a young age that it is their right to rule, the middle classes are taught that it is their right to expect improvement in their lives, but the working classes are told that their destiny is to be governed by their betters, to do as they are told and to accept that “nothing ever changes”. I vividly remember being told as a teenager not to fight the system because the system always wins. Like plenty of others I rebelled anyway, but those negative messages become embedded into your conscience chipping away at your self-confidence even when you are doing well.

I realised as I found myself doing well at university (thanks to a mature students grant) and as I climbed the professional ladder that many of those I came into contact with had a sense of entitlement that I was totally lacking. If truth be told I always had the feeling that I was going to be found out and sent back to my bedsit and life on the dole. Somehow I got away with it!

The point about this lack of self-respect is that it runs deep and is fatalistic. It prevents people from thinking that “real change” is possible. It encourages people to be grateful for what they have, and rather than being outraged by massive inequalities to envy those with even less – benefit scroungers, immigrants, those on low wages, you get the picture.

As a class those lacking self-respect become pessimistic not just about the possibilities of social change but about whether change is even desirable. That state of mind, encouraged by the mass media, by schools and often by parents, encourages people with most to gain from change to vote to conserve the status quo or to leave the decision-making to those who know better.

As a country the UK lacks confidence in its ability to produce a fairer, more equitable, more tolerant society. Such a society is not just a way to tackle the crises outlined above it is a way to improve the well-being of all citizens. As Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett demonstrate in their book The Spirit Level : Why greater equality makes societies stronger, in countries where wealth inequality is least (Norway, Japan, Sweden,Finland) well-being as assessed by life expectancy, happiness, trust and a range of other indicators, is significantly higher.

The task for the left in the UK, regardless of what happens in the election, is to increase the self-respect and self-confidence of those, especially the poorest, who think that maintaining the status quo is in their best interests. On almost every measure of well-being the UK is close to the bottom among developed countries. This is simply unsustainable in the long run. We now have a mainstream political party with a genuine chance of governing that is committed to changing that. 

If Labour wins the election the transformation in people’s lives will be immediate and long standing. If we do not win, the economic and social crisis will continue to grow. The left will have a fight on its hands to maintain the commitment to more equality which is ultimately the only way to deal with the crisis of self-respect that is holding us back.