Working people
Government ministers may have had trouble defining what was meant by ‘working people’ in the Labour manifesto, but where did the idea of classifying people who earn their living as a distinct group come from?
– According to the OED,the term ‘working class’ has been traced back to the 1757 edition of the Universal Dictionary of Trade and Commerce written by Malachy Postlethwayt, a former adviser to Horace Walpole. Postlethwayt was born the son of a wine merchant in Limehouse, east London, in 1707. He certainly fitted Starmer’s definition of a working person in that he appears to have died, in 1767, owning no assets. But he would struggle to make it as a working-class hero given his publication of a pamphlet entitled ‘The African Trade: the Great Pillar and Support of the British Plantation’, which argued that being enslaved was good because it meant getting to ‘live in a civilised Christian country’.
Fair fares?
The government is to raise the £2 cap on bus fares to £3. But are Brits still using buses? – The number of ‘local journeys’ increased by 0.5bn in the year to March 2023 to a total of 3.4bn journeys. Miles travelled on buses decreased by 5% too.
– But buses are bouncing back. Where saw the largest increase in journeys last year?
Scotland 29%
London 20%
Non-metropolitan England 19%
England 19%
England outside London 19%
English metropolitan areas 18%
Wales 16%
Source: Department for Transport
Property ladder
Where are the most and least affordable places in England and Wales to rent a property (in terms of median rents as a percentage of median earnings)?
Most affordable
North Lincolnshire 18.8%
Copeland (Cumbria) 19.1%
Staffordshire Moorlands 19.1%
Fenland 19.6%
Barnsley 19.7%
Least affordable
Kensington and Chelsea 52.
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