How government inaction is radicalising Britain

Watching an increasing amount of people in the UK becoming incensed and angry about refugees coming by boat across the English Channel is deeply worrying. The large demonstration in London the other weekend underlined the fear and hatred that is being engendered in some quarters by these arrivals. Around 180,000 have arrived by this method since records began in 2018, though compared to other European countries this may not seem so significant. 

But the important thing is the perception and the questions that it raises, the sense that government has no way of making the UK’s borders safe. It makes people who would not normally get angry and upset become incensed at what looks like government failure. 

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It joins other failures that people are feeling about government. It’s failure to stop our rivers being polluted by the big water companies, largely foreign owned. The failure of the NHS to provide us with a feeling that our health will be cared for, instead of us being largely on our own. The failure of our criminal justice system that stuffs prisons full of prisoners; yet still streets are not safe and many shopkeepers expect a daily raid on their stock by shoplifters, with the police unable to do anything about it. 

The failure to explain why wealthy businesses seem to be able to get away with paying a trifling amount of tax. 

Where is the government that will stop the boats coming that incense people into contemplating more right-wing governments? Where is the government that will address the pollution of our water and rivers, and will turn the NHS around, and will stop shoplifting and other crimes being an everyday occurrence? 

There’s the sense of an empty government, a Wizard of Oz who is clothed in power but there is nothing to this power. Impotence, emptiness and being almost entirely on your own if you need a copper or a doctor. 

Potholes galore it seems, not just in our roads but in our social delivery and our ability to protect our borders. 

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Perception is everything in this modern world of angry politics. The UK is becoming ungovernable and overrun, that is the perception of far too many. And if this is not addressed it will lead to a government that will be draconian and not care for the values of those who seek a more just society. 

The UK is way down on the list when it comes to people seeking to come to Europe. The fact that they are driven by economic and humane reasons, that they have an urgent need to seek a better life, is lost on most governments. 

This apparent avalanche of people is seen by some as undermining social peace and tranquility, and that is why Europe’s politics are moving to the right. People are hoping for a politics that will assert the authority of their individual borders. 

Those who consider themselves progressive over issues like the boat arrivals have yet to offer those who are fearful and becoming angry anything soothing or reassuring. And those who want to stop the boat arrivals offer nothing to the progressives. So what we have is a potential clash that could get dirtier, and bigger and undermine the democratic process. And possibly the breakdown of what law and order we still have left.  

Back in 1968, when Enoch Powell gave his ‘rivers of blood’ speech, he was supported by a large group of London dockers, considered the cream of the organised working class. Powell’s anti-immigration speech was defended by these dockers on the basis of freedom of speech. Times were definitely different. Most people seemed indifferent to Powell’s words and the dockers returned to their homes, only later to have to fight for their jobs because of containerisation. 

In other words, it was not a time of mass radicalisation of the left or the right. It did not seem to lead to a questioning of the very nature of government, unlike today. Now government is seen as weak and empty because it seems to have let so many of the securities that people swear by fall by the wayside. Do we have a future? Will we be overrun? Is it fair that people who have made no contribution to the country should get support for health and accommodation? 

All these kinds of questions were being asked by the angry demo, disdainful of this Labour government, that filled the West End on 13 September. 

I was out marching against Powell as a 22-year-old in 1968. “Disembowel Enoch Powell!” is the poetic slogan we marched to. But making comparisons with today is not good enough. Yes, there are the usual right-wing racist bodies and leaders that exist waiting for their big chance. But today there are people being radicalised by the inability of government to solve the problem of people coming by boats and all the other social and economic problems. The utter sense of vulnerability that many people feel draws people into a politics that they would not have chosen in more stable times. 

Let’s not throw historical comparisons around. But we do know that when people lose the sense of their own security, and that of their family, they can turn away from liberal thinking and become reactionary. 

That’s what we have to think our way into accepting. That people are being changed by a UK that feels
vulnerable to the many. And we have to find answers to addressing their vulnerability. For our liberalism, however limited it may appear at times, is under serious threat.  

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