The forgotten workers

It was a reasonable guess that, once the government had appointed a group of the great and good to investigate the summer riots, somehow we would all have to share the blame. It is a central tenet of liberal Britain that while criminals may share some of the blame for the acts which they perpetrate, they are invariably driven to committing them through the negligence and callousness of the rest of us. Meanwhile, the real problems — those created by an unreformed welfare system — are ignored.

The Riots, Communities and Victims Panel has certainly not let us down on this score. Among the factors it blames for the riots in its interim report published this week is ‘conspicuous consumption’. ‘In our conversations with rioters and young people who did not riot,’ the report asserts, ‘it was clear that brands and appliances are strongly associated with their sense of identity and status.’