Towns.

Over the summer, alongside campaigning for a change in our leadership, I’m heading back to work places in Britain’s towns. This is why.

Just four months ago I made a speech arguing that our country now is a better place than it has ever been before. I thought the words were true when I said them. But now I worry I was just wrong. I want to believe that our country can offer chances to all of its citizens, but does it? Over the past decade, antidepressant prescriptions in England have doubled. I wouldn’t wish to oversimplify the cause of this. There is increased awareness of our mental wellness, as well as physical health. Hopefully, less stigma. Doctors are perhaps more aware, and keen to help. But think about the past decade: a financial crisis that risked homes and jobs, and now Brexit. Instability and insecurity all around. Are young people more depressed about their future? Are older people more stressed by the thought of a country less in control of the future than they hoped in their youth?

I’m not saying that I would wish to change places with the life my parents or grandparents had. There was plenty of depression around in the 50s or the 70s, but rather, I’m now asking myself, have we, as a nation, got insufficient reason for hope? This feeling is both crystallised and on speed with Brexit. The depression we experience is both cause and consequence.

Look at the towns that voted Leave. What unifies them?

Earlier this year, JRF calculated that 11 out of the top 12 cities that had declined the most according to their matrix of shrinking population and constrained economic growth were towns or small cities in the north of England or the midlands. I have checked back on those northern English towns said to be in decline, and each and every one of them voted Leave. The average leave vote was 64 per cent. Is it any wonder?

These town and cities feel neglected. The average GCSE performance is 9 per cent below the national average, with only Wigan sneaking into the top half. Real wages have fallen since the global financial crisis. House prices in these towns have stagnated or even declined, so people here not accrued wealth relative to those in the south of England. The reality of the labour market in these towns – on the face of it – isn’t great. As the bright lights of Britain’s big cities pull people in, these are the towns emptying out with empty high streets and crumbling shopping centres.

What does this all add up to? Sadly, an ebbing away of pride. That which made these places, their factories and mills, are now gone, mainly. They feel left without any economic purpose while they see other parts of the country race ahead. When you hear Leave voters talking about getting one over on London, it exposes a division that has been fraying the between places in our country for years.

This issue is often framed as the winners vs the losers of globalisation. The success stories against those ‘left behind’. Some would say this is about deeper cultural factors, social conservatism, unease with the liberal consensus, national identity. Maybe this is right, maybe it isn’t. Whatever the cause of Brexit, it feels like something that was a long time coming.

We had a global financial crisis that exposed terrible corporate practice in the financial services industry, yet still corporate pay goes up while other wages stagnate. Still the same tax lawyers are both advising the government on the rules and helping their clients to find the loopholes. Big corporations seem to be shaping the rules of the market, threatening to up sticks and leave if they are not given a good deal, while ordinary workers feel completely powerless and their governments tell them that nothing can be done, this is just the way the modern world works. With this as the backdrop it is no wonder so many people felt ignored and took the chance to vote for change.

When you misunderstand people – as we Remainers so clearly did in the EU referendum- surely the answer is to listen a bit harder. And because so much of the discontent seems to stem from the chances people have to earn decently, and get on, I have set myself a task over the summer. Not just to be making the case for better leadership of my party. But also to listen, especially to those in our towns that voted leave. I want to understand more about life in our country. So I going back to work. I’ve asked businesses large and small for their help, with a day or two of work experience. I did this before and was mocked by right wing blogs, but I literally could not care less. You only get to understand if you listen. And all the cheap shots and snide remarks won’t stop me hearing what people at work in our country have to say.