I am not sure where this started but I have known about Professor Danny Dorling‘s work for a number of years. He has written a book and authored a white paper called variously Shattered Nation or Shattered Britain. I watched the launch of AEIP’s joint report which he authored, “Brexit: A failed project in a failing state” and was shocked and saddened by what he said. I was shocked by the assembly of failures, as when considering the issues from a campaigning point of view, each issue seems important but when put together, it warrants the labelling of a failing state and the example of other European countries shows there is an alternative.
He argues and proves that Britain has the lowest taxes, a declining health service & life expectancy, an education system that reinforces the class divide and is built for export, an unavailable housing supply and the lowest tax take in Europe with the equivalent meanest social security system. He compares Britain with the rest of Europe and not surprisingly finds us wanting. As he says, this is not necessary; we can do better and deserve better.
I needed to see if I could reinforce or popularise what he says, and so reviewed the launch lecture and found myself looking at other parts of his work which is why this article is called “Down the rabbit hole”, here are some links. …
- A shorter 30 minute video from Professor Dorling called Shattered Nation
- AEIP Report Launch VIdeo Brexit: A failed project in a failing state.
- AEIP have a page, hosting the report, and I have posted my mirror of the report.
- My kingdom for a beer heineken’s eurotopia; this is interesting and sort of reinforces my work on subsidiarity in the EU.
- Dorling argues that the start point is inequality, and has written, Do we need economic inequality?. This is Dorling’s home page for the book.