Benefit Culture

GMTV have been running a series of articles this week covering the benefits culture in the UK. They focused on Rochdale and the articles ran just after the 6.30.a.m. news (I’m normally making the children’s sandwiches for school). The theme constantly highlighted throughout the programme was one relating to a poverty of ambition. Faced with a global market place of skilled workers many people with good intentions felt disenfranchised, marginalised and unable to compete. 

Particularly depressing was the inheritance of a poverty ambition, passed down from one generation to the next (almost caste like). A very close relative of mine used to be on the Board of Visitors to prisons in the Midlands. Governors regularly remarked that prison was often the first time that inmates experienced a structure to their lives. Getting up on time, eating regularly, taking on a sense of responsibility.  Far too many children in the GMTV clips were falling into the same trap outlined above and consoling themselves with the thought that there were no jobs out there for the likes of them.

In the last ten years billions of pounds have been spent on addressing the issue of getting young people into work with the result that even more young people under the age 21 are now not involved in employment or education. The solution lies at home and in the classroom. The simple stuff of supporting the family, supporting school teachers, especially when they strive to impose discipline would be a huge step in the right direction. From these small steps we can release individual potential and ambition, because human aspiration is the most important tool in eradicating poverty and not the prosaic approach of targets and funding.

Paul