Think about human rights violations
I SUPPOSE we must all try and cope with the evils of the time by trying to ignore them. Otherwise, we suppose, our political masters might get so ashamed about how little they have done, that they might become unable to do the little they can.
Human rights violation No.1. It’s not fashionable to express the unemployment of those available for work as a human rights violation, although it still is. In case a complacent smile should form over unself-critical MPs and AMs, let’s remember that a quarter of the entire working population in Wales is denied a chance to earn their own living. You’d think there would be committees of hard-thinking social philosophers, and experienced long-term unemployed sitting round tables to try and figure something out. And now. Instead, the issue seems to attract no great sense of urgency. While silly management theorists still think sacking as many employees as possible is some sort of magic key for financial success.
Human rights violation No.2. We can see a general sympathy towards those who are homeless, and the generosity of ordinary citizens is very encouraging. But there’s no movement on house pricing - no overall policy to match housing need with housing provision. Families struggle to use up most of their resources simply to maintain a place to live. This kind of poverty is as much a human rights infringement as any other. Again - where is the sense of urgency where the attempt to put creative thinkers together?
It seems that those we elect have imbibed a culture where the sloppy indifference to suffering of the 20th century is to be dribbled out into the 21st.
Much easier to tell the jobless off for being underqualified idiots living in the wrong place.
If one were unkind, one might be tempted to point to certain politicians and say that they are under-qualified for their great task, and are perhaps themselves in the wrong job. Senedd and the Mother of Parliaments, we feel, should be rather less eager in issuing rosetinted spectacles.
Joseph Biddulph Pontypridd