As a young person in Britain, I read Will Hutton’s article with both despair and relief (“Young Britons have been hit hard. We owe them a future they can believe in”, Comment). Relief that the palpable challenges facing those maturing in the post-2008 era are being acknowledged, but despair at the pace with which our prospects continue to wither. The exceptional circumstances we face will alter the already fragile futures of young people, but what these circumstances underline is that the exception has become the norm.
I have experienced the meritocratic messages given out in formal education from both sides of the fence (as a pupil and a zero-hours contracted teacher in a working-class area of Sheffield). These messages, which often continue to be sticks with which to beat young people, eventually led me to leaving teaching as I felt morally unable to promote an idea of the good life to those for whom it was unattainable. For those without pre-existing professional connections, or the intangible characteristic of “polish”, the future has been little more than zero-hours contracts, an unsustainable housing market and “low-skilled” employment opportunities for a decade and more. I welcome Hutton’s call to build a society that inspires young people, but would remind him that the “former” inequalities, both within and between generations, are very much alive.
Jack Aizlewood
Sheffield
Will Hutton posits a poignant call to arms to save our disenfranchised youth as post-pandemic economic projections are bleak. His theory supports the importance of ethical “sustainable business models” leading to a cultural and societal hiatus, so the next generation of young people are not used as “disposable commodities”, which I fully support.
He refers to “low-skilled work” but the very term is irksome, especially when the government has repeatedly equated low pay with low skill. Language can covertly reinforce the very inequality we are trying to undermine. Should we not change our view from “low-skilled” to “essential” – especially at a time when such work has become central to our survival?
Jayne Sanders
Sheffield
Local authorities, local heroes
Andrew Rawnsley discusses the future of some of our institutions after Covid-19 ends (“This crisis is stress testing the strengths and frailties of our national institutions”, Comment). He mentions the army, the BBC and of course the NHS, all of which are playing a crucial role during the crisis. He omits to mention local authorities, however. These too have come in for some consistent bashing from the Conservatives and have suffered massive budget cuts during austerity. They have been cast, in similar fashion to the civil service, as hidebound and inefficient.
Now, scarcely a No 10 briefing passes without the minister praising them and saying what more he is asking them to do. Suddenly, they are vital to getting through the pandemic. Whether it’s help for rough sleepers or small businesses, they are the ones doing the work. Perhaps they too, when this is all over, will be “reminding the nation why they are essential to Britain”.
Peter Curbishley
Great Durnford, Salisbury
Wilts
Me, Jay and a gastro wedding
I hate to rain on Jay Rayner’s own wedding narrative (“Blackboard menus, sanded floors, posh grub and a pint: it’s a recipe that’s served gastropubs very well”, Magazine), but….
Late January 1991 I wandered into a new London pub, the Eagle. It was empty, beyond owners David Eyre and Mike Belben, who described their intention: serious food, definitely not a restaurant, art gallery upstairs. Evidence of their cooking intent was clear, with the kitchen on show. Nice lads, I thought; good luck.
A few months later I was arranging my own wedding. We had virtually no money. I remembered the conversation with the lads at the bar. Thought I would do them a favour. I phoned and said I would give them £400 with which to cook whatever they wished for the wedding meal; they could choose the wine. Bless them. It saved me having to accept my future father-in-law’s conditional offer that he’d pay for the reception so long as it was held at the Connaught Rooms. The wedding was 28 September 1991.
Many years later, Mike trained my son Ivan as a chef. I see the Eagle imitated around the world. Nowhere can replicate the fusion of informality and culinary quality. Remarkably, the kitchen is as good today as ever. Jay is bang on there.
Stephen Chambers
London N5
Cuban car love not all it seems
I always enjoy reading about the Cuban love affair with their old cars and how they pass on skills down the generations (“Take me to your Lada: Cubans’ passion for a little Russian box”, Focus). However, the cosy back-street mechanic pictures belie the desperate shortage of parts and new vehicles imposed on the Cubans by the American blockade. This is not nostalgia, but necessity. Taking the story of the Lada in Cuba out of context imposes another representative form of news blockade on the people of Cuba.
Alan Hunter
Somersham, Huntingdon
Cambs
It’s not all about forgiveness
Nick Cohen says that it was unchristian of Christ to say that “to everyone who has will more be given, but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away” (“Beware a new wave of populism, born of virus-induced inequity”, Comment). Were he to read the whole of Matthew’s gospel, from which this quote is taken, he would see that love and forgiveness are only part of Jesus’s teaching. Judgment is there also.
Peter Smith
Halifax
Stormin’ Norman
I was very sad to hear that Norman Hunter, one of the great footballing heroes of the 1960s, had succumbed to the Covid-19 virus. Norman was a role model for my generation and Jonathan Bouquet’s excellent article brought back many memories (“May I have a word”, Comment).
Some years after Hunter’s heyday, when I was working in Luxembourg for one of the European institutions, we had a brilliant football match against colleagues from other institutions. Our team, made up of British and Irish colleagues, faced a mixed European team. We were the “Anglo-Irish Disagreements”. My colleague David Richardson was David “bite your legs” Richardson, a reminder of the great Hunter. Solid in defence he was!
John Speed
Luxembourg
