Discuss The Archers #107: Beware of the Dragon! Peggy's in her den awaiting bids - who gets the hoard and who gets flamed?

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Thank you, @PseudoBadger, for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads and @DadDadDad for being our resident statistician and keeping the ball rolling when Pseudo stepped back a bit.

All views on The Archers welcome here! New blood welcomed. We don't all agree on all points and most of us are posting tongue in cheek a lot of the time, so don't worry about revealing that you'd like to be Susan's best friend or other unusual views.

Spoilers: not on this thread, please. We don't wait for the omnibus to discuss the weeknight episodes, but we do try our best to avoid cross-contamination from www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3439443-keep-it-to-yourself-the-archers-spoilers-thread-4, where spoilers are positively welcomed!

For newer listeners, lurkers or those who just have no idea what we're talking about, DadDadDad has created this useful thread: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3557323-For-Archers-fans-a-guide-to-acronyms-on-the-long-running-discussion-threads-and-any-other-meta-thread-questions-you-may-have BOOP point for him! (See thread for explanation.)

Thanks to @MrsGrindah for inspiration for the title of this thread. I was hoping to find a way to combine it with @C8H10N4O2's inspired suggestion of '"The Assumption of the Ambridge Angel' and @chemenger's comment 'I hope she gets kicked in the head by a horse and wakes up an atheist', but it all got a bit too lengthy.

Odds on Joe shuffling off this mortal coil before this thread ends? We've been marking/anticipating his passing for a while now.

It would destroy Ed if Em moved in with Will.

I think Ed is being manipulative by 'ending things' with Emma now. I think he's trying to get her to forgive him or say she does by changing the focus away from his fuck up towards the relationship ending.

Little I really don't think it was sneaky, Bert needed looking after once he was widowed. Susan didn't want to be responsible for him and Gary. Tracey moving back was discussed and she said she would only do it if her name went on the tenancy which is sensible for her own security. Bert wasn't mislead, and Susan was happy with the arrangement. I am not sure what Gary knew/knows or whether his name is also on the tenancy but he also can't cope without Tracey so he's unlikely to complain as long as he can stay there.

Clive and Keith probably don't know but then they aren't around. And as someone else has said Tracey living with Bert also gives him some protection from them should they return.

If there was any manipulation of the situation it was by Susan who wanted Tracey out of her house and Bert off her hands.

Why did Emma do so badly at school? She’s not stupid. I can imagine she might have been unmotivated when it came to academic study, but Neil and Susan are likely to have kept an eye on that as Susan in particular was very keen for her kids to get qualifications. Was it just a plot device to keep her in Ambridge?

Does Harrison actually know who the victim is? From his questioning he seemed not to. Quite bizarre!

I find it hard to think of Emma as anything other than a rather nasty person.

Thought that I was the only one who doesn't like Emma, her massive obsession with getting the house is responsible for the whole mess and wait until the credit card statements arrive, about which poor Ed knows nothing.

Argumentative, IIRC Emma did ok at GCSE and then went to college to get a catering qualification. She was subsequently involved in a fairly serious accident when Ed took Will's car without permission and crashed it. Emma received compensation money for her disfiguring leg injuries (which are never mentioned on air now) and blew it on a flash wedding and honeymoon. She also fell unexpectedly pregnant with George whilst still young.

Gaining more qualifications never seems to have been in her world view. She resents the earning power of those who have them, but doesn't seem to grasp the work necessary over a period of years to achieve those qualifications.

long time lurker here. I think this storyline works on a number of levels. It shows that Ed and Emma have wanted different things for a long time, and how a seemingly rock solid relationship can fall apart in minutes. Ed is Eddie's son and Emma is Susan's daughter. I think Ed wanted to get out of the mortgage responsibility. I also think the storyline highlights the fact that no matter how hard some people work they can never get a real foothold. Can capitalism work if a whole generation cannot accumulate capital? Brilliant writing and storyline.

I’m not seeing the logical connection between “did OK at GCSE then went to college to get a catering qualification”. I can’t imagine Susan would have encouraged that at the time. Sounds like that was the bad decision, and the accident came later.

oh and excellently acted too.

Just listened to The Episode. Goodness, that was bad! Poor Ed - Emma is his world, his life's dream, and now it's gone.

Emma sounded a bit taken aback, as if she hadn't a clue what her single-mindedness was doing to those close to her. I'm not criticising her for ambition and single-mindedness, but it was leading her to dubious decisions - maybe her standing as a parish councillor was a determination to stand up for the less fortunate in Ambridge society, but it's hard to see it as not being motivated by "this is how I can make sure there's a house for me".

I'm not sure they're finished. Ed doesn't think they can recover, but that's today. A lot can happen in a week. Of course, I'm not thinking like a SW here.

Anyway, I'm off to listen to the cricket.

but Neil and Susan are likely to have kept an eye on that as Susan in particular was very keen for her kids to get qualifications ...

I don’t know about that. IIRC Emma was not planned - and Susan was a couple of months short of 21 when she was born - so wouldn’t have had time for much thinking about how to smooth the path for her children. There’s no indication that Susan herself (being a Horrobin) had much in the way of academic qualifications (nor Neil) and while she may have been keen on her children’s behalf I don’t think she’d have had sufficient knowledge to steer them through A’ levels and university. It wasn’t taken for granted as it might be elsewhere.

So Emma only had her mother’s example of service type jobs to follow. (I seem to recall Susan’s taking on the Post Office as a huge step up.)

It is a pity. Emma might have been so much happier if she’d had a satisfying career paths to progress along. It’s not just Alice’s money she envies her for.

Can capitalism work if a whole generation cannot accumulate capital? Well, it's not the whole generation is it? Those who have capital at the beginning (even if it's only in the form of being supported in London on an unpaid internship) have no difficulty accumulating more.

Society's worked for hundreds of years with a wealthy elite and an underclass who can't accumulate wealth. We had a brief dalliance with "equal opportunity" and advancement by merit and hard work (helped by an expansion of "middle class" jobs which meant opportunity for the working class didn't have to be balanced by downward mobility for the rich) and now, it seems that it is coming to the end. So Emma's story is a reflection of the "underclass" not being able to get a toe-hold, rather than of a whole generation not being able to accumulate capital.

Yes, very well acted by both of them.

Just went to the BBC to see how old Emma is DOB 7 August 1984.

That's going to be a lovely week to remember!

FWIW I am not surprised that Emma had no further education ambitions. There aren't/weren't exactly many role models in the village.
School leaving age wasn't raised to 17 until 2013. One of the London firms I worked at in the early 90's recruited a school leaver/trainee secretary from the local area. She was very clear that this was a "big thing" amongst her schoolmates (most just wanted to get pregnant and get a council house). I doubt whether attitudes were that different in a small rural village where everybody seemed to work on a farm or were the vicar or vet.

MereDintof yes well the point is that the capitalist system relies on workers who are persuaded to work hard on the basis that they will be able accumulate wealth along the way. So they have a stake in the status quo and are invested in keeping the system as it stands. The fact that owners of capital, and their offspring, can acquire more is nothing new and is irrelevant.

I listened to 4 Ex instead of the TA misery memoirs this morning (which is not a normal Sunday for me ) enough already!

In terms of property owernship Emma and Ed’s generational struggle is by no means limited to the ‘underclass’ - I think 40% was the last figure I read (percentage who will never own their own home).

They’re not really the underclass, are they? Working class.

Underclass means something rather different.

Emma did not do well, she did badly at GCSE. She then refused to do re-sits. She had spent the previous year messing about with one or other Grundy, mostly Ed to be fair, and not doing her school work as a result.

Concerto
In terms of property owernship Emma and Ed’s generational struggle is by no means limited to the ‘underclass’ - I think 40% was the last figure I read (percentage who will never own their own home).

Whereas in 1970 council housing (which was rented, so you didn't own your own home) accounted for 42% of all housing in the country, according to some figures I saw yesterday while I was looking for something else entirely. Perhaps things have changed all that much in many ways, it's just that there was a short period when they improved before going back down again.

Would Ed and Emma have been better able to get a house when banks didn't do mortgages much, and building societies required a 20% or even 25% deposit before they would lend a mortgage? I think maybe: Emma's frenetic saving (when not spending money of presents for her children) might have succeeded in getting them that size of deposit in the end.

Emma certainly must be the hardest worker in Ambridge.

I'm not going to listen to it either. Too depressing. Why couldn't Emma have an affordable home!

Well, that's why I put "underclass" in quotes as applied to Emma. A lot of people who think of themselves as "middle class" are now finding their children in the group who face huge barriers to property ownership, careers in various sectors that they might previously have aspired to, etc. But it's not simply a "generational struggle" - we're not in a position where previous generations owned their own homes, and today's generation cannot. The difference between being born to family wealth or not is greater than the difference between being born in 1950 or post 1980.

The other thing that isn't open to Emma (and probably never was, since she lives in a rural area) is the possibility to study and gain qualifications in later life. Adult education has taken a huge hit, and the Open University is prohibitively expensive.

Ed has been a complete idiot, but Emma must take some of the blame for being blinded by her ambition and in urging him to continue when he wanted to give up.

As far as I can recall, building societies in the mid 80s when we bought our first house required a 10% deposit, saved with them over a period of a year or two minimum. You could borrow up to 2.5 times joint income or 3 times higher and once lower (I think). We bought our first house three years after graduating, and that was by no means unusual back then. When Mrs Thatcher removed those constraints on lending, house prices went through the roof. This combined with selling off council houses is what's got us into the mess we're in now.

Yes, Emma didn't do well at all at GCSE. I remember her revising frenetically in the last few weeks. Ed laughed at her for it and did no work himself. On results day she had done scarcely better than he had so she turned her back on education as a waste of time. She got a waitressing job at Lower Loxley and did a very basic catering qualification on day release.

Not that long afterwards Susan was aghast when Christopher left school after GCSE and went into his apprenticeship. I can't remember what she said about Emma's education/career choices, but I'm fairly sure Chris had done better than Emma all the way through.

I’d like to see her take on Kate. That would be good, not least because Susie Riddell who plays Tracy played teenage Kate (89-94).