Not just politics but the the newspapers we read also add to it with mainly a right wing bias. For example in Norway there is a high-degree of media ownership fragmentation, they are sometimes owned by not-for-profit foundations and all receive state subsidies based on circulation, which in turn ensures a modicum of objectivity and plurality of opinion. Their British counterparts are often highly partisan and espouse a largely right-wing editorial agenda. In contrast, British media ownership is highly concentrated: 70% of national newspapers are owned by just three companies and a third are owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News UK.
It is probably not without reason that a recent report by the European Broadcasting Union found that the United Kingdom among all of the EU member-states (+Albania, FYROM & Turkey) scores the lowest in levels of trust in written media.
Conservatism was doing OK One Nation Conservatism as it was called. Until Thatcher with New Right neoliberalism which has got progressively and steadily worse putting the wealth into already 1% rich hands and forgetting everyone else. Public services now gone to pot with tax cuts to big corporations who should be paying their fair share instead, money into public services.
Now the Nordic countries are doing good they have social-democratic Labour polices
And this is not only the case in Norway, but has been integral to the social-democratic post-war consensus in all the Nordic countries. Judging by almost any measure of social indicators these policies have been a success, the Nordic region enjoys some of the world’s highest living standards and presumably should be a model to be emulated rather than avoided. Obviously the Nordic region is no earthly paradise and there are cultural, economic and historical differences between the UK and Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden, but if there is such a thing as a ‘best practice approach’ in public policy the Nordic model would probably be it and, at any measure, a useful benchmark for Britain to move towards.
So remember that neoliberalism is failed economics an ideology, austerity is not needed. All parties who follow this failed economic neoliberal model are moving in the wrong direction and is not good for the whole of this country.
This explains things a lot.
www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/jeremy-corbyn-mainstream-scandinavian-social-democrat/
