But I am old enough to remember the days when there was a pro-bedtime left. And this press cutting from The Scotsman (18 November 1996) is a relic of it:
Bedtime Stories
Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise, says New Labour. The shadow home secretary Jack Straw has called for firmer discipline at home, including set bedtimes to stop today’s children becoming tomorrow's juvenile delinquents.
That framing is very New Labour. Today we would be worrying about children's wellbeing or mental health, but back in the Nineties it was all about preventing crime. If they were in bed and drugged with Ovaltine, they wouldn't be out causing trouble.
Even Labour's education agenda then, with its support for homework even in primary schools, seemed us much about keeping children off the streets as about their learning.
Why was New Labour so authoritarian? One reason is gentrification. Imagine If you had moved into an up-and coming but still edgy part of London in the mid Nineties and wanted to entertain a senior member of your chambers and their partner to dinner in your garden on a summer evening to show off that amazingly good value Bulgarian red you had found.
You would be looking forward to scheming with them to remove some left-wing Labour council candidates. And if the opportunity arose, you might broach the subject of your being selected for a safe Labour seat in the North of England. You wouldn't want kids kicking their football against your back fence, would you?
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