UTOPIAN DREAM

Utopian Dream - Index

This is a true story. I wish it were not, for it has already destroyed the lives of too many people. The events depicted here occurred in the United Kingdom of Great Britain, although it could be in any civilized and highly technical society. The reminiscences cover the period 1973 to 1988 and are based on diaries and statements written by the author and others during that period. This manuscript details the actions of central and regional government departments, and its revelations are not only of social importance but help to show in part, the causes for the intense stress which ultimately destabilized my mind.

Like most people I have done things in the past for which I feel ashamed. They are revealed here along with everything else. For my loyalty to truth ranks higher than the low esteem I have for myself. I hope that by revealing what life is like on the dole, and in particular how it affected my mind, some good will come of it, and in so doing my debt to society will finally have been paid. If these writings save the lives of others, then certainly that will be the case. If not, then is it right for a person to be judged for the rest of his life for mistakes that he made during only five minutes of it?

Reading this detailed account, you may find it difficult to believe that the author was at any stage mentally ill. The fact, is that at the time of writing this I still am. Just how seriously ill only time will tell. You will no doubt be relieved to know that mental illness is not necessarily related to intelligence. It is possible to excel in both simultaneously. Much of what is written here is in amusing tones. At the time however, it was not at all funny. The remarks display a sense of humour that one needed in order to camouflage the inner feelings of disgust, despair, depression and anxiety.

Many of the problems which I endured were as a direct result of the British Government's monetarist policies, which continued unabated until the stock exchange collapse on Black Monday in October 1987. From that moment the government's uncontrollable vindictive and scrooge like attitude lashed out in a campaign amounting to the rape of a nation. In April 1983 the higher rate of income tax was reduced from sixty to forty per cent. The government was able to reduce taxation for the rich by reducing government expenditure, particularly in areas of social security and the nationalised health service, whilst continuing its policy of selling off nationalised assets to financial institutions and the rich. By using this income to finance tax cuts, the government was effectively giving these assets to the rich. Assets which had been created by socialist minded government's of the past for the nation as a whole.

How this state of affairs had come about was a classic example of how power and money corrupt. After the new right wing government came to power in 1979, interest rates rose substantially, forcing companies with heavy-borrowing's to sack workers in order to raise efficiency. For those in work this led to higher wages, but the trade unions lost two million members, seriously reducing their negotiating power. Their powers were reduced even further through government legislation, leaving them in no position to fight the sell off of nationalised assets. Possibly six million people were unemployed by 1986. Since the government twisted the figures on numerous occasions, the true total will probably never be known.

With the working classes demoralized, the tightening of the screw on the welfare state commenced. By April 1988 the nationalised health service was under funded by two billion pounds per annum. That month the government's social security reforms came into effect, denying benefit to thrifty pensioners, whilst those unemployed below the age of twenty-five would receive reduced income support, which would replace supplementary benefit. All unemployed would now have to pay twenty per cent of their general rates, amounting to a cut in their benefit payments. For those below the poverty line wanting single payments for essential items, grants had been superseded by loans, whilst the amount available had been reduced by one hundred and fifty million pounds per annum, ultimately forcing many claimants to go to charities that obviously did not have the necessary funds. The government treated the unemployed as scroungers. They were to become beggars. As for school leaver's denied a place in higher education, and with the government refusing to use the income from the sale of nationalised assets to create other wealth creating projects and hence worthwhile jobs, they were to become dead end kids. The new society outlined in these writings would not come about. It would remain a Utopian Dream.

The government created unemployment coupled with low benefit handouts which led to high crime rates, instilling distrust and fear within the community. An ideal framework upon which to build a police state. The government would control crime through a larger police force, backed up by new law courts, prisons and yet more prisons. No doubt the government's attempts to replace general rates with a community service charge, commonly known as the poll tax, would be the prelude for the introduction of identity cards, I thought.

Meanwhile, by 1988 the British security forces were gunning down unarmed people in the streets of Northern Ireland and Gibraltar. Terrorists or not, they deserved fair treatment, not extra-judicial execution as suspected by Amnesty International. Such methods were hardly likely to instil respect for law and order, much less government. First the LIRA. Who would be next? 1988 would be the first year involving the British army guarding civilian inmates in new prison camps. The army was becoming increasingly involved in civilian matters, whilst the British Government evidently could not build its new prisons fast enough.

The most depressing aspect of this affair was that it had all been achieved by democratic means, brought about by the government's restructuring of parliamentary boundaries favouring the right wing, and its extensive use of propaganda based on psychology, capable of duping the average voter. The government's view was that everyone, or at least enough Conning Party voters, had a price. Since 1979 this uncaring government had been elected into power no less than three times. In the general election of 1987 they were to obtain around forty per cent of the votes, and yet secure an overall majority of over a hundred seats in the House of Commons, reinforcing as nothing else could, that Great Britain was not a true democracy. As Britain's archaic political system tottered towards totalitarianism, the British electorate slowly woke up to the sham government it had created.

Often during those final years I asked myself where I had gone wrong. I think that occurred on the night of Sunday, April 16th, 1978 at 8-30pm to be exact. That night I went to one of my regular haunts, the Costermonger public house in Birmingham. Arriving at the bar I came across a very attractive young woman, who introduced herself as Marian from Nechells. An area of Birmingham famous for its gasworks, by the Aston expressway. Unusually she gave me her Christian name and address but not her surname for some unknown reason. Within five minutes she had left with her jealous girlfriend. The next day I sent her a postcard from Anglesey. I can even remember the picture on the card, but I never saw her again. Six years later during many of those periods of enforced boredom, I was to think of her a great deal. Married with two kids, living in a council house. No. Probably divorced and on the dole with two kids more like. I deeply regretted having not pursued the matter further at the time, for had I done so I would probably have found the happiness that now alludes me.

So that was my first mistake. It is so vivid in my mind, and yet incidents which occurred later, I fail to recall, for at times my brain became so overloaded, that my memory not only became impaired, but my speech slurred, and my thinking irrational. The problems which were bestowed upon me whilst unemployed, have been stratified and simplified here to make them more easily understood. Names of all individuals, except friends and those mentioned in news stories, have been changed, as also have some place names. Original letters received by me have the same brevity, layout and meaning as those shown here.

In mid-February 1988 Derek Bainbridge, a 41 year old unemployed road sweeper from Nottinghamshire, incinerated himself in his car, parked near the prime minister's residence in Downing Street, London. There are many ways in which one can protest. Here then is mine. Assuming that it is not banned, it will no doubt be regarded as a reference for our time. Is this how we wish future generations to remember us?

Warning: This manuscript contains strong language and depicts scenes of violence, which are unsuitable for young persons and those of a nervous disposition.

Read on, unless one day my mistakes become yours.