Money talks
“It was devastating because I was put into a financial situation that I had no idea of. I was at the height of my career and I found out that we were in debt to such a degree that I didn’t own anything. I had to give it all away – the homes, everything. [My husband] had invested it in properties and things I knew nothing about, all of which he got me to personally sign. [He was] one of the top professionals in the financial industry.” Actress Jane Seymour (pictured) on the collapse of her third marriage, quoted in The Times
“Always fly first class. Or your children will.” Opinion columnist Jeremy Clarkson in The Sunday Times
“Most people in life don’t have a choice, they haven’t had it all, they don’t know what it’s like to prance around in the south of France with a Rolex on. Well I’ve done it all, I could do it a million times over, but that isn’t what makes me happy. It isn’t and it never will be.” Artist Tracey Emin on mixing with the 1%, quoted in The Guardian
“If you work harder than I do at the same job, and are commensurately better rewarded, then that is ‘justice’. If your extra reward is then taken from you in taxation, then that is ‘social justice’. Concepts which are intended to sound much the same are more like polar opposites: to use language thus is to pervert it.” Former chancellor Nigel Lawson, quoted on cato.org
“I’ve got a bit of that working class ‘chippiness’ so I like staying in posh hotels even though I sometimes get a look saying: ‘Are you sure you’re staying here and not in the Travelodge down the road?’ I want to reply: ‘My money’s as good as yours.’” Comedian Geoff Norcott, quoted in The Telegraph
Academic Matthew Goodwin argues, in his new book Values, Voice and Virtue, that Britain is under the sway of a new elite, says Ed West. The old establishment, still holed up in its old bastions in the Royal Family, the House of Lords and the public schools, is losing power to a new elite formed in the expansion of the universities, deindustrialisation, and the reign of the free market.
This “new middleclass professional elite” is symbolised by the likes of Keir Starmer, Hugh Grant, James O’Brien and “more than a few columnists, media editors and BBC managers”, and, unlike the old one it is replacing, leans overwhelmingly to the left. Had only university graduates voted at the last election, Jeremy Corbyn would currently be prime minister. In fact, one reason Labour lost the last election is that it doubled-down on attracting the new urban elite while turning its back on its old supporters.
This argument seems to upset a lot of people – not least those accused of being part of the new elite. They were quick to point out that they were not in fact in power, and pinning the blame for social problems on them rather than those who were in government was a bit of a reach.
We should not, of course, diminish responsibility for the state of the country from the governing Conservatives, says West. But it is strange to see people denying that British cultural and social elites are by some distance more progressive than the British public and that they have a huge bearing on the country’s direction.
If you were to poll the most influential 5,00010,000 people among senior academics, the people who run TV and radio, scientists and medical professionals, and leading figures in the charitable sector, civil service, and police and justice system, they would surely be to the left of the British public on social issues (if to the right of them on economic ones).
The Tories may be good at winning elections, but they are not so effective at making the country conservative. And that’s little surprise. The current government is by many metrics more liberal than New Labour and the average Tory MP is about as conservative as the average Labour voter.
One reason for the decline of the conservative elites is that progressives have made their values institutional through equality laws. Almost every major institution has DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) departments, whose function is to make progressive ideas the norm. In fact, these ideas now constitute the state religion, and there are “blasphemy laws” in place to protect it.
Why, then, is the new elite so reluctant to admit that it is the elite? Simply because it was born in the “bravado and rebellion of the ’60s”, and a “defining characteristic” of the elite is that it will never admit to being one.