Britain's social fabric has been torn but it's just easier to blame immigration

Is the UK “a rich country”, asked the economist Max Mosley earlier this year in a report by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR). It might, he observed, seem “a surprising question to ask” about the world’s sixth largest economy. The answer, though, is not as “straightforward” as it might have been in the past.

- Kenan Malik

There has been a debate about “broken Britain” in recent weeks. Many rightwing commentators see a nation brought down by uncontrolled immigration, soaring crime rates and unacceptable demographic change. Many liberals dismiss the “broken Britain” rhetoric as “hyperventilation”.

Much of the debate is indeed grotesquely wild and preposterous. And yet, Britain is broken, though not in the way most commentators perceive it. This is a nation in which thousands of children live in “almost-Dickensian” poverty, in the words of a recent report from the children’s commissioner for England. In which welfare benefits have covered the cost of essentials in only two out of the past 14 years (those two being the Covid years, when claimants received a universal credit uplift). In which unemployment benefits are the least generous among OECD countries, with the exception of Australia and the US, and lower, in comparative terms, than 50 years ago.

It is a nation in which employees work the longest hours in Europe and in which there is a higher proportion of low-paid workers than in any other OECD country. In which the growth of “flexible” labour markets has entrenched job insecurity and low wages, driving increasing numbers to labour in multiple jobs. In which more than 7 million people live in “food insecure” households. In which use of food banks has soared but many are forced to reject items such as potatoes because the cost of energy makes it unaffordable to cook them.