According to Angela Rayner 'Working class people do not want "handouts" but support to find jobs.'

I don't think that is what she means. I think there is an assumption among the political class that working class people are a bunch of lazy scroungers. She is trying to say that working class people are as decent and hard working as anyone else.

I don't see why saying one group of people does or doesn't want something should be taken to mean that a different group of people do or want the opposite. There is no logic there at all.

Well she's working class so speaking of what she knows and as I love herself says certain groups make assertions about working class people. Who has ever said professionals/landed gentry/celebrities are looking for handouts so no need to point out that it isn't true.

I think she was excellent on Ch 4 News tonight.

Working class people work or want to work and maybe fave more difficulties because they might suffer more physical injury at work or more physical or mental wear and tear. Why is that a slight on other social classes?

I don’t know how you came to think she was suggesting that Monica, it wasn’t what she either said or implied. I agree with what JaneJudge concluded.

Ilovecheese

I don't think that is what she means. I think there is an assumption among the political class that working class people are a bunch of lazy scroungers. She is trying to say that working class people are as decent and hard working as anyone else.

Yes, just simply this.
She wasn't "comparing", was she, in the speech But it is a common archetype to challenge..

So do I. Angela grew up in tough family circumstances in a deprived area. She represents Ashton Underline - she speaks from direct experience

I am always relieved when any politician discusses class. It doesn't happen very often these days.

Well said Angela.
Sadly working class people are too often portrayed as scroungers or layabouts. Tbh I think scrounging and being lazy exists across all the classes. I particularly remember Boris scrounging off a rich donor who let him live rent free in his luxurious property.

Not sure that the OP has thought this through.

Ilovecheese

I don't think that is what she means. I think there is an assumption among the political class that working class people are a bunch of lazy scroungers. She is trying to say that working class people are as decent and hard working as anyone else.

This.

Tbh I am very impressed by AR. Her hard work and what must have been sheer determination has got her where she is. All power to her.

It sounds good to me. Very few people actually don’t want to work at all, most like the company and camaraderie that comes with work ( even if it is whinging about the boss!)

There are scroungers of course, most young people want to have a useful life, the problem is that parents and schools do not prepare them for work. The reality is that today an employee on living wage costs an employer around £30k in wages, NI and pension, add to that overhead costs, managers, buildings, transport it’s a lot more.
To be productive that full time employee has to earn probably £50k for the company, it’s not just the £12 whatever an hour it’s all the other costs an employer has to pay.

I’m not sure how Rayner is going to address this

Surely anyone who depends on their earnings to finance their needs is 'working class' ? In which case this is the vast majority of the population under retirement age

The main group of people living off benefits and who, mostly, are not making any effort to work are those over retirement age.

I couldn't care less how virtuous the person is who talks in PR parrot talk, I just get fed-up with politicians constantly going on in cliches that mean nothing 'working class', 'hard working families'. It is treating the electorate with contempt and we are really having too much of that at the moment.

A minister ought to be capable to talk openly and genuinely about what they are doing without this constant retreat to meaningless and hackneyed cliches.

It depends entirely on how you define “class”.

In order for the concept to be of any use, it is usually used to define groups of similar socio-economic status - not in their relationship to work, which put very simplistically is a Marxist definition.

So when a politician talks of “working class” or “middle class” or “the wealthy” I think most people understand what they mean.

It is easy to distinguish between politicians using the term properly and one who is doing so to try to make a silly political and uniformed point.

So, if a politician is talking about a particular class class in capitalist society, she is not just looking at their relationship to the workplace, but also underlying that concept will be the working persons access to a wide variety of commodities, their values and lifestyle choices. Their health outcomes snd mortality rate, their general level of education and social mobility plus much else.

Vital information when making political decisions across the whole of government.

However, I do think that we are indeed badly served by many of our uniformed and work shy politicians.

This obsession with ‘class’ , doesn’t help anyone. It is divisive and ridiculous. Time the politicians moved up and away from defining people like this.

I do not define class. It is an old fashioned and outdated term that it suits politicians to use.

The only measurement of difference between people these days is income. Taking it in percentiles, Those living in the bottom 10 perencentile will have a very different life style to those in the 30th percentile.

The days when a person's occupation defined how they lived, ate, and entertained themselves has long gone. Now that is all constrained - or not - by how much money they have coming in and where, housing costwise, they live.

I never categorise people in to class, I find it really distasteful.

It only seems to be people that define themselves as “working class” that use these categories.

As Angela Rayner has used the term I will use it; my experience of 'working (class) people' is that we do prefer to have a job and earn a salary and be independent of state handouts.
The increase of the welfare state has made far too many dependent on benefits as they can receive almost the equivalent of a working wage without having to work.

The concept of class can be used in two ways.

Subjectively or objectively.

Most people on this thread are using it subjectively, and so as a concept it is useless.

However, without the information that can be obtained from the various socio-economic groups, parliament and its work would really struggle to make sensible decisions in areas such as education, health, pensions and in fact most of its work.

But it isn’t just governments who use this information, doctors, teachers, prison officers, police, military etc,etc all use it.

You can call these groups by any name you wish if class makes you feel queasy, but the information on which you base your political decisions will be the same.

Yes it makes me feel queasy. I don’t hear it much here thank goodness. For me it is almost as bad as judging people by the country they were born in.

Class consciousness is part of our history in this country. It has different meanings than it did in the 50’s imo. I don’t see it as judgemental nanna8 and get the impression I’m not alone in that
At the risk of being controversial, my reading of Angela Raynor’s childhood is not of one of the solid, secure, hard working class families in my family history. She grew up with benefits as the main source of income, a father often missing and a mother with significant health problems. Angela’s role as a child carer meant poor school attendance so lack of qualifications.
It was her own resilience and support from a family centre them her union that moved Angela from the claiming class into the working class. And onwards, good on her and good on the systems that helped her.