The Trouble With Families
Hello! Here in Smolensk butcher’s shop, local egghead Student Arkady explain significance of David Cameron 15 minute abandonment of daughter.
“It is a timely public admission by Cameron, Pavel,” he explain. “Not a leak against him by the Murdochs. No. Now most people will think that it was a typical confusion of modern life, you know, ‘But darling, didn’t you put her in your brushed calf-leather Bulgari Serpenti?’ ‘No, darling, I was sure you wrapped her up in your Barbour and threw her into the back of the Land Rover with Miffy, Pippy and Mr Poopkins.’ ‘Scudder’s walking the dogs darling.’ ‘It’s Scudder’s day off.’ ‘Oh my God, you mean we’ve lost the dogs!’ That sort of thing.
“But the reality is different. This week, the UK Government is launching a crack down on problem families. Troubled families.”
“What are they?” I ask, plenty nervous, hoping Putin not got similar idea for Russia. “Aren’t all families trouble?”
“Elegantly Freudian of you Pavel. Yes, in a sense they are. But what the Government means by troubled families is those who commit crimes and anti-social behaviour, who have little stake in society…”
“The poor, you mean?”
“Ah Pavel, how romantic of you to connect bad behaviour to poverty. No. That is the last thing the Government wants to do. They are making it clear that social problems stem from a failure to take responsibility. From bad parenting. This example of Cameron’s neglect, despite his immense privilege, shows how anyone can fail unless they are ever vigilant.”
“So, families Cameron target in new initiative are right across society? All classes?”
“Not exactly Pavel. When Eric Pickles (himself living proof that obesity is classless, not a problem of the bad diet of the impoverished), when he relaunched the initiative this morning, his officials had devised a brilliant system. They have developed criteria in which you search for the most irresponsibly parented families, presumably defined by such factors as the frequency with which children are forgotten about, left in the pub, ignored, and hey presto, these parental delinquents correlate precisely with those on benefits, the workless, the destitute. So at last, we have a proper sequence of cause and effect!”
“I don’t quite…”
“Don’t you see Pavel? Cameron shows how near he is to these people. His irresponsibility in leaving Nancy behind in the pub is part of a slippery slope. Just a few more incidents like this, and he and his wife would be a troubled family. And the symptoms of this - the loss of their wealth, their council house, their crack habit, rioting, noise nuisance, the terrible deterioration in their accents, their desire to become black -“
“Black?”
“Don’t you read David Starkey, Pavel? All these symptoms would stem from a clear cause. Bad parenting. Fortunately, they will be able to deal with this - by looking up the How not to Leave your Child in the Pub module on the Government Parenting Website. Or by getting a better nanny. But those who ignore these warnings, and fall into bad-parenting driven impoverishment, will be targeted by the state.”
“By giving them better nannies?”
“Pavel, you are so silly. As Cameron knows, a nanny purchased privately works well. But one provided by the state is a disaster. No. This is not about the Nanny State. This is the Lecture State. Just as Sam and Dave will get some stick at dinner parties from their friends over Nancy, so everyone else will be gently and justly patronised by Kirstie Allsopp on how to be better parents and so, by extension, escape poverty. And there will some new initiatives.”
“Like what.”
“Unspecified. And not fully funded. So not very likely to happen really. But what matters is that Cameron has finally shown clearly that people have the responsibility for being irresponsible in their own hands.”
“So the poor will be blamed for their own situation?”
“They will be guilty as charged Pavel. Quite different.”
Later we see Volga News got hold of instructional poem Michael Gove plan add to National Curriculum on this very issue.
This be the verse
They leave the pub, your mum and dad.
They’re busy people, lots to do.
They tank up, say the beer’s not bad,
Then go together, leaving you.
But they were let down in their turn
By troubled parents who were fools,
Who always had a lot to earn,
So packed them off to boarding schools.
Cam wants a parenting exam,
It’s not a stigma cloaked in stealth.
Remember poverty’s a sham,
And parent Britain back to wealth.
