To ask how you think social issue arise?

[BloomsburyNook]

I'm nearly 50, so have seen a few decades. When I was young, if you visited a small handful of rough or run down places, you might see a few drunks or 'miscreants' or young lads messing around, but never anything really threatening or visible.
So it might just be me, and I've led a fairly quiet life, but there seem to be a hell of a lot more issues out there now, especially in ex industrial places and urban towns around the UK. I see a lot more homeless people, many who have evident addiction issues: women as much as men, and there are more gangs of teens smashing stuff, shouting, fighting, etc.
However, in many areas you hear that crime rates have dropped over the years. Perhaps it depends where you go, and many people in bad areas won't report to the police anyway.

I often travel with work, and see this across the uk, much more dereliction and dying high streets, and in many towns there's literally rubbish piling up along embankments and street corners that the councils never clear up. And it's not simple enough to say it's because these are run down areas - they were run down decades ago but not like this.

I know there are many lovely places, and I've lived in a few of those, too, and some go downhill a bit, some remain safe. So if you don't get out a lot you might not know it's going on? I don't know. I asked a few older friends recently had they noticed and they did admit that there were elements of this knocking around in the 70's, 80's, etc, but not to this extent.

How did it become worse? What is your opinion? What could be done to help? Are people generally poorer than 20 yrs ago? This is presuming poverty as a causation - is it? The news headlines often affirm this, but I don't really know across the board. I know there are a lot of very closed off towns that might make these issues worse due to people rarely leaving them, but is the issue more cultural than economical?

I think people are generally angrier and less satisfied on the whole, we are all a lot more stressed out even if some of us report we are doing great and don't notice it! It just seems like a different world from when I was in my 20's. And of course, it is! Imma gettin old!

The following 3 things are true: .....................................................,.,,,,,,,,,,,,,1. It's ALWAYS been worse than this before (see Georgian London and every other city where people died in the streets of cold and starvation and you couldn't go out after dark without someone stabbing you for your coat).............................................................................2. Crime is MUCH lower now (but our PERCEPTION of it is that it's much higher due to our 24 hour news cycle).............................,,,,,,,,...................,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,3. That life being THIS SHIT shouldn't be possible due to how WEALTHY our country is - the gap between rich and poor is worse now than in LIVING MEMORY (and living memory is what matters in this incredibly rich country)

I know, I have a relative who is struggling. I fear the day my fucking savings pot runs out over a root canal.

This point is minor compared to all the excellent ones raised, but worth adding to the mix I think:

Population growth.

World Bank figures for U.K., 59m in 2000 and 67m in 2020. 8m people, 13.5% growth.

Leaving aside the pressure on services and housing… That means you’re going to see more of everything. Obviously we’re talking here about a mix of “types” of people, and that % won’t be easy be constant. But at a very basic level - if you had 10 drunks in doorways in 2000, you've simply got more of them now. So the problem is bigger and more visible.

I also think that multi generational unemployment has a huge impact on mental well-being and life prospects, and it’s simply logic that the more generations are born, the more chance for that to be someone’s reality.

Excellent comment. I do believe we are living in luxury compared to the past, and yet...we have no excuse for the disparity.

Austerity.

My home town has more derelict shops than there ever were in the 70s. Houses are stupidly expensive and where the social housing was bought, most is now privately rented for many multiples of the local authority rents, which pushes the people into them into far greater poverty with no security. The teenagers who would have originally got apprenticeships in manufacturing, gone into shop work or other manual occupations and earn enough to get by, now don't have jobs at all. There's no Royal Mail sites within affordable reach of public transport and they can't become postal workers, as the jobs are only advertised as part time. Mums can't get school hours work in supermarkets because their jobs have been replaced by self service checkouts and one supervisor for ten tills. Pubs have closed, small independent shops, cafes, DIY stores, builders yards and small garages have all been knocked down in favour of more flats. Every little bit of greenery, whether a back garden, a small patch of grass at the front of some social housing or actually designated green spaces are being torn up for yet more flats. Front gardens aren't full of plants and flowers and birds, they're full of tarmac, parking spaces and five wheelie bins. Everything is grey. Even the front doors.

When I was a child in the 70s, those who were able to pass O levels were able to get permanent, secure work in offices in the town centre - somewhere around 20-30 insurance company offices in a half mile area (now operated mostly overseas and the buildings converted into overpriced housing too small to fit a double bed or two seater sofa), the Job Centre, the Benefits Agency (both now closed), multinationals, shop management training schemes (now only available to degree holders), the NHS (now requiring a degree in many roles that used to be a starting point for thousands of 16 year olds who went on to have long careers) - if somebody didn't like a job, they could get another one to start on Monday. It might not have been well paid, but it was enough to pay for a bedsit or a small flat; these days, not only would they be unable to get a place without a credit check they have no chance of passing, they wouldn't be able to afford it on top of the transport costs. A 16 year old experiencing violence at home could get a job and move out. These days, as Social Services aren't interested in older ones, they don't have that freedom and have to stay another 2 years or make their lives even worse by telling somebody who won't do anything because 'there's no money/you don't fulfil the criteria of being in sufficient need'.

It wasn't easy then by any means - but there were ways out. These days, all those routes have been swept away for the vast majority. When there's no visible future or end to the lack of opportunity and you're never going to get a secure job, can't afford to move out, have to pay a share of the sky high private rent so can't save up, but could find yourself homeless in two months because the landlord has decided they want more rent or to sell your home for an almost unimaginable sum - why feel any tie or responsibility for the area?

@NeverDropYourMooncup I have witnessed this. Thanks for taking the time to write that. Where on earth do we go from here?

Austerity since 2010.

So many of you are blaming Thatcher, but Labour play a part in all this too.

"Education, education, education" did as much harm as it did good. It devalued apprenticeships and the trades. It stigmatized factory work and the like too. It led to far too many teenagers doing degrees in media studies etc, which never led to real jobs.

Labour's id-pol made people ashamed of the St George's flag. It made people take responsibility for issues (such as slavery) that had nothing to do with them personally.

All together, this created a pessimism in working class people tha5 will be hard to shake off.

Sorry I’m getting pissed off with people blaming not being able to fly a St George’s flag for why things have gotten so bad. It’s absolute bollocks. Many of us middle aged folk were around before all this fabricated culture war bollocks so it doesn’t wash.

In the 70s, 80s normal everyday people were not fixated with flags. It was only NF who were obsessed with them. The rest of us flew one on special occasions like the jubilee or Charles and Diana’s wedding. It was actually weird to be nationalistic and was associated with Americans singing their anthem at the drop of a hat.

It really does a disservice to working class people to make out they have some weird obsession with flying flags. What we did have was strong communities that looked out for each other and less materialism, visible inequality and more opportunities to afford the basics like a home. Much of that had gone, this is why things are bleak. It’s not because they can’t fly a flag.

@NeverDropYourMooncup I agree with everything you have said.

@SpaceCadetCat Yes, Labour's "education, education, education" definitely did some damage but the overall situation we have now is largely caused by the Tories. It's a direct result of their policies over the years.

As people have said, it's multi-factorial, some of the biggies are:

• Death of industries in some areas that haven't been replaced with anything like as many jobs - many of these (but not all) are very white working class communities who understandably feel left behind
• Cost of living rising much greater than 'real' salaries so a lot more jobs don't pay for ordinary needs
• Scarcity of affordable housing

-- A goverment with the attitude that we need dozens more billionaires more than we need millions more people able to afford to live -- Death of close communities where people more naturally look out for one another

I grew up in a then rough part of London & it was normal for me as a kid to see prostitutes, pimps, junkies etc. There were certain roads you would stay well away from at night. Now I see kids walking around with phones out & Im agog as I always am a bit alert however it's much safer.

What's changed though is less community, more inequality (some of my school friends lived on bad estates, some had holiday homes), less diversity (a lot of gentrified areas of London are white mc) & more violence. Maybe less crime but if it does happen it's more vicious.

social mobility is declining

Also QE which has devalued salaries & inflated assets. Lack of investment & development re the economy.

Its impossible for community spirit to survive if there’s not enough people with disposable time and money to make it happen. If mum and dad are out working zero hours contract jobs and having to do double shifts around each other to pay mortgage/rent food/childcare they have zero time or energy to be chatting on the street with neighbours and organising street parties.

It’s easier to drive straight past the local shops down to the supermarket where you can park and it’s got everting your need plus 3 for 2 offers so you’re not supporting your local shops which create local jobs. It’s cheaper to drink at home so you’re not hanging with the community in the local pub.

Your kids friendships are online so you barely get to meet the other parents and many of the kids are in wrap around so you never see the parents anyway etc etc. Community building takes free time which is a luxury not many people of working age have anymore so the streets get left to those with time and often that’s unemployed who may have addictions or underemployed teens.

Are other European countries experiencing this?
And what could we do to change it?

1. Crime is MUCH lower now

Really? 30 years ago I don’t remember so many mugging and robberies.

Its impossible for community spirit to survive if there’s not enough people with disposable time and money to make it happen. If mum and dad are out working zero hours contract jobs and having to do double shifts around each other to pay mortgage/rent food/childcare they have zero time or energy to be chatting on the street with neighbours and organising street parties.

Yes, this is true.

This is a really interesting thread that I've enjoyed (probably the wrong word)reading, taking me back to my days studying sociology. The answers are so complex and very challenging to articulate, some very thought provking points raised. Its reminded me of two books, which whether you agree with the polimits element of them have an interesting perspective - Freakonomics, quite old now but still relevant principles and Chavs, demonisation of the working class. This thread has prompted me to consider getting them out and rereading.

Visited a cousin in the Welsh Valleys about ten years ago. She was in her 80s, still lived in the mining town she was born in. We went out for a meal and, being local for so long in a small place, everyone knew everyone else. There was quite a lot of pale-faced youth hanging around the streets and I asked her if this made her nervous. "No, don't worry about them, poor lads. I knew their grandfathers, they were miners and I know their fathers, they were miners and this is the third generation. There's no work left here and most of them are drug addicts. Thatcher stripped us bare and it's never recovered". Nor will it.

I don't see poverty and despair where I live, houses here start at around 500k for 2 bedrooms, employment is high, its the soft and wealthy South. Where she lived a house would have cost around 20k. It's not improved since then. And there are larger areas, swathes of the abandoned ex-industrial North which are poorer still. Such disparity can't continue as it has for the last 40 years. Something has to change. If I believed that Levelling Up was sincere instead of the cynical political manoeuvre that it is, I'd celebrate. I don't believe it and I wish it was true. People shouldn't have to live like this and this government does nothing but tighten the screws on the poor and tell them they're to blame for their own misfortune.

And yet most people must ignore it.
How did the 'red wall' (ugly word) even happen?
Why are we even accepting of these repulsive slogans?
I always believe that the daily rags control the popular mindset. I have no idea why, or how it can change.