Harriet Harman seems to have won the deputy leadership of the Labour party by saying she did not want people to spend £10,000 on a handbag when other people were ‘struggling’. Polly Toynbee tells us that this ‘resonated with public distaste’ at the ‘debauchery of riches at the top’. Did it? If so, why? A handbag that costs £10,000 involves a lot of work by a lot of people, all of whom need to earn a living and most of whom — those rearing the animal which produces the leather, those slaughtering the animal, those tanning the leather, etc. — will not be rich. They will profit, and take pride in a job well done. Besides, if I were a woman with £10,000 to spare, I would love to have a nice posh handbag, and wouldn’t think I was being ‘debauched’ at all. I once ‘struggled’, as Ms Harman puts it, and paid roughly that sum for a pair of guns, and I suspect that the pleasure in a lovely bag, allowing for the sex difference, is comparable. One of the most expensive bags available in the world today is the Birkin bag, produced by Hermès. It started when the glamorous, fashionable Jane Birkin, who is much more left-wing than Harriet Harman, switched to a leather bag in 1984 (though she did later give it up when it gave her tendonitis). Today, there is a six-year wait for the Birkin because the demand is so high and the craftsmanship required is so great. The lowest price is $6,000, but I am assured that it is possible to pay into ‘six digits’, depending what materials are used. Obviously Harriet Harman cannot afford a Birkin bag, even though her husband is treasurer of the Labour party, and that is sad for her.
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