The announcement today that Iain Duncan Smith would like the rich elderly to give back their benefit payments which they don't need is more than a little naive. I can well understand how frustrated he must feel in seeking to control the heavy burden of the welfare state. For all that though, he must remain realistic. In this, his latest announcement, he is laying himself at the mercy of altruism. This is hopeful at best and, at worst, out of touch.
If people are given a benefit, they grow to depend upon it and don't take kindly to it being taken away. The problem with welfare legislation is that it is far easier to give than to take away. It is this very point which defines the real problem facing this and the next government. There is a very large elephant in the room of which all the politicians are painfully well aware. Pensions. The public sector pensions bill is a growing monster which will not go away. It will just get bigger. People live longer and so the pension has to be paid out for longer. It is simple economics. The problem is that addressing this imbalance will go down like a lead balloon with the millions of voters employed in the public sector. Face it though we must. Failure to do so will result in a spiraling national debt. We need only look eastwards to Greece and Cyprus to see what happens next. It may be that we ultimately end up being restricted to how much we are allowed to withdraw from the bank as has happened recently in Cyprus. While in one sense this wouldn't necessarily be such a bad thing, there is equally no need for us to end up that way.
We saw recently with reflections on the Thatcher years that people invariably respond unfavourably when decisions are made which upset their status quo. That is human nature because we none of us like change and particularly when it is of the financially detrimental variety. What does the minister mean when he refers to the rich? Does he mean those whose disposable income is greater than their outgoings? Where he draws the line is largely irrelevant. Any welfare system has to be fair to all irrespective of accumulated wealth. What is clear though is that there has to be defined level of income upon which people can reasonably be expected to exist. Deeper than this though is the reality that the welfare system which was originally intended to sustain those without a job, and hence food and a roof over their head, has been allowed to grow out of all proportion to its founding principles.
We have gradually become accustomed to local government and the welfare state operating in such a way as to try to do everything for us. Neither was ever intended to fulfill this purpose. One of our biggest societal problems today is an expectation to look to government to provide the solutions. No government will ever be able to do this for us all due to simple economics. It is when people get together to effect change collectively that the change is real and lasting. I read with interest today about the quiet mid-Wales town of Machynlleth. It is admittedly a bit of a mouthful to pronounce but the people there are engaging in something quite interesting.
When a town is as geographically isolated as Machynlleth, it is inevitably up to the local people to sustain the vibrancy of the local economy. The retail behemoth Tesco has just announced that it will not be opening a new shop there because they couldn't get their own way on a new road system which would revolve around them. At a subsequent public meeting, a local shop owner vented his anger which resulted in the formation of a town forum of 100 people. Their forum begins its work with the planned restoration of a local garden which they hope to complete before their annual comedy festival. Plans have now been made to restore a fountain and several other local attractions. All this is being achieved by local people with no local council involvement - and nor should there be. It must be remembered that the majority of local council employees have limited experience of running a business and so are of limited value in seeking to help those in business locally.
When it comes to radical improvisation, Machynlleth has a healthy track record, most notably with the formation in 1973 of the first centre for alternative technology. In those days, the people involved in setting up their eco community in a disused quarry were labelled as hippies. It is today apparent that their motives were several decades ahead of the rest of us. Today, Wales is festooned with wind farms and it is difficult to drive through any suburban housing area without seeing banks of solar panels on roofs. What those pioneers achieved all those years ago was to show us all what could be done in a more environmentally sensitive way. What was fundamental to their achievements was the fact that they worked together as a group and were unrestricted by edicts from local government or the welfare state. They created a community totally divorced from the national grid and eyed with wary suspicion by the inhabitants of the local town. The hundreds of thousands of visitors who have since gone to see the results of their collaboration are testament to what can be achieved when people join forces to make things happen. Free of the shackles of the state, there are few limits to the good we can do. It is from such small ideas that community spirit is born. Tesco and its ilk can't hold a torch to that.
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