by Professor of Economics, Denys Finch Hatton
CRAMMED tube trains. Five-hour daily commutes. Soaring house prices. Jobs that barely pay a living wage. If London cannot return to this, the UK is doomed.
Our country has bravely faced the threat of the coronavirus. But now, we must face something far more terrible: a return to ordinary life in the capital exactly as it was before the plague.
For many Londoners, the last six months have been a reprieve. They have worked from home. They may have dreamed of escaping to somewhere less infernal and full of hatred. They cannot be allowed to.
Because if London is not absolutely stuffed with miserable, broken people attempting to eke some kind of joy out of their dead-end lives, the whole of Britain will suffer.
Remember those nightclubs you used to cram into, to snort coke from a toilet seat? The trainer drops you’d queue overnight for? The dilapidated Victorian houses shared by six desperate professionals with real careers? They are the backbone of our whole economy.
Without this engine of wretchedness driving the nation, we will all struggle. We’re so interconnected that all it takes is one brand legacy manager screaming ‘I can’t take this anymore!’ and six blameless people in Aberdeen lose their jobs.
So go back to your rented flats, your Tube trains, your cool Shoreditch bars and your Secret Cinema. And know that you suffer not for yourself, but for your country. We still hate you though.
