Things Have Never Been Better? Don’t Make Me Laugh

There seems to be some confusion about the state of the nation. On one hand, there is the perception that Britain is going to hell in a handcart – that immigration, crime, unemployment and the economy are dragging the country down the toilet. Meanwhile, there are other voices calling for a more rational analysis and stating that things have never been better.

This latter, apparently evidenced-based optimism seems to have been sparked by Fraser Nelson (ex-editor of the Spectator), who wrote a series of articles in the Times newspaper pointing out that the perception of decline is irrational. For instance, he notes that while people think that they see criminality everywhere, actually neighbourhood crime has dropped by 50% over the last 15 years, criminal damage is down by 75% over the same period, knife assaults have fallen to a 25-year low, robbery is down 60%. These are just a few of the examples that he puts forward to point out that urban Britain is improving, if not in rude health. Of course, facts are important, but we can do without the sneering contempt from the media commentators and politicians that often accompanies it.

While the ONS points to 6.75 million crime offences across England and Wales, up from four million 10 years earlier, Nelson prefers the stats that show “our streets are now safer than they have perhaps ever been”. His point, backed up by charts, graphs and statistics clearly shows that perception and reality seem to be at odds. While Nigel Farage suggests that Britain is on the brink of “societal collapse”, Nelson and others conclude that, “this is probably the best time to be alive”.

The world has never been richer, the underdeveloped world has never been more developed, people across the globe have never been more educated and literate but, of course, that doesn’t stop it from being a grim existence for far too many. While facts and data are important, they can be used for good or ill by any side of the argument and are no substitute for political argument and transformative ambition.

That said, emphasising the positives is a useful counter-narrative to defeatism and declinism. As it happens, critics of environmentalism have been saying this for years: that deaths from natural disasters have significantly lessened over time: far fewer people are likely to die of famine, from floods or drought even in wars than 50 or 100 years ago. Tell that to the 40,000 to 50,000 people who actually do die each year from earthquakes and other natural disasters, and it is cold comfort, but you get my drift. Meanwhile, in the UK over the last 30 years, we now live five years longer than we did, meaning that in 1995 the average lifespan was 76 years, today it is 81. Let’s have more newspaper stories about that than, say, articles claiming that on average, pollution reduces “life expectancy by several months”. Isn’t it declinist to say that Britain is dangerously polluted, when it palpably isn’t?

Of course, it is much more acceptable to be biased when announcing that the climate is getting worse. Indeed, ‘climate emergency’ became the OUP word of the year in 2019. Similarly, it is almost de rigeur to endorse environmental activists’ hyperbolic ‘facts’ to the effect that we have only “two years to save the world” leading to a socially-legitimate use of the phrase ‘societal collapse‘. The enforcement of a form of social order to preserve against such collapse seems to be maintained by inculcating a range of topics that represent the correct form of civic engagement, while marginalising those who refuse to follow the correct narrative.

“London is being set up as this dystopian hellhole,” says Lewis Goodall, suggesting that those complaining are “Right-wing (and) probably have never been to London”. It’s surely a sentiment that reflects the cosmopolitan elite’s general contempt for the concerns of many ordinary people. His argument, such as it is, is meant to be factual, rational and reasoned; the other side is ridiculed as emotional, biased, racist and scaremongering.

But for so many in this country, especially those outside the Westminster bubble, it is not so easy to laugh off the declining conditions that they face on a day-to-day basis. Surely everyone knows, for example, that Birmingham’s five-month bin strike – in a heatwave – will lead to infestations of vermin. It is cold comfort to be told by the BBC that a giant rat found (admittedly in Hackney) was merely a foreshortened photograph and therefore looked bigger than it was. It is a useful factual clarification, but it doesn’t affect the way that people see the running down of their area and public services and their fear for their safety. The world-renowned development economist Paul Collier’s new book Left Behind reports on Britain’s “wasteful and brutal regional divide”, claiming that “in terms of life chances, Britain has become one of the most unequal countries in the world”. 

The Office for National Statistics reveals that, across the UK in the decade between June 2015 and March 2025, violence against the person actually rose by 40%, possession of offensive weapons went up by 23%, sexual offences increased by 75% and theft from the person rose by a remarkable 207%. Something needs explaining.

One uncontroversial aspect of decline (surely?) is the rise of homelessness and a growing shortage of housing. While the Government insists that it will build 1.5 million new homes during its term in office, housing starts were 31% down on pre-pandemic levels. In London, the target is to provide 80,000 homes per year while estimates suggest that it is on track to deliver only 32,000, while the population of London has risen by 664,000 in just five years. For every 10 new jobs in London, only three homes have been built; as a result, currently one in 50 residents of London (that’s 183,000 people) are homeless. In Luton it’s one in 57. In Manchester, one in 74. People feel as if they are not being treated fairly. Over the course of the last few years, London has seen social housing waiting lists increase to 323,000 households, 2.4 million Londoners impoverished and the emergence of a projected shortfall of 170,000 homes by 2027. Of course, we could argue that the wonderfully diverse income levels and the tents on the street have culturally-enriched the metropolis, or we could say that it shames us all and try to build some houses and improve the life chances of ordinary people.

This is where Fraser Nelson gets it wrong. The leafy suburbs of Twickenham might be a suitable retreat for him from what the New Statesman calls London’s “general air of scuzziness”, but there is clearly a palpable sense of societal malaise in the air. Instead of accepting it, Nelson prefers to cosplay a Victorian gentleman, scurrying back to his townhouse, pausing only to explain to the plebs that the stench of miasma is scientifically proven to be nothing to worry about. But worry they will until something is done to resolve the issue. And worse than that, they’ll get angrier the more that they are taken for emotional, irrational, Right-wing fools.

Austin Williams is the Director of the Future Cities Project and author of a number of books on the environment and on China. His latest book is China’s Urban Revolution.