Who will speak for the working class? Everyone, apart from the working class

It’s funny how the new left’s rule against speaking on behalf of groups to which you do not belong never applies to class. If a white man ventures his thoughts on the best way forward for Britain’s black community, he’ll suffer social death by a thousand tweets. Woe betide any bloke who holds forth on women’s issues. ‘Dude, let women speak for themselves,’ people will chide. Yet when it comes to the needs of working-class communities, everyone gets to have a say.

So last week, Newsnight featured a discussion about the crisis of working-class representation in the media between Owen Jones of the Guardian and Sarah Baxter of the Sunday Times. Newsnight, come on: you couldn’t find a single journalist from a working-class background? Or maybe you were worried they would spill their flasks of PG Tips on the Beeb’s settees. To have Jones explain — class-splain? — what must be done to help working-class writers is like inviting David Starkey to talk about how hard it is to be a Muslim in 21st-century Britain.