Broke Britain Jaywick tops list, but London poverty also exposed

It's Jaywick again.

- Patrick Butler

For the fourth time in a row the tiny, apparently unprepossessing seaside village overlooking the North Sea just down the coast from Clacton-on-Sea in Essex has reluctantly claimed the unenviable title of England's most deprived neighbourhood.

Top of the indices of multiple deprivation since 2010, Jaywick Sands, once a popular holiday destination for working class Londoners, has become a emblem of "broken" Britain, an exemplar of economic neglect, austerity and social breakdown, compounded by geographic isolation.

In fact, Jaywick is, on official deprivation measures, chronically deprived: almost uniquely, it is in the 10% worst ranked neighbourhoods in England across all seven indicators of deprivation, from employment to income, health, education, crime, access to housing and environment.