Posted on 12/14/2010 9:49:54 AM PST by SeekAndFind
British Social Attitude report finds people less supportive of the welfare state than in the 1980s.
Britain is now more Thatcherite than when Margaret Thatcher was in power, with people much less supportive of the welfare state and the redistribution of wealth than in the 1980s, according to an authoritative study of the country's mood.
New Labour oversaw the biggest recorded shift to the right in public attitudes on those measures, despite a surge in concern about the scale of the wealth gap between rich and poor.
Sympathy towards benefit claimants has evaporated, along with support for redistributive tax and spend policies, over the past 20 years, with Labour governing during a period of significant hardening of attitudes towards the poor, the annual results of the British Social Attitudes survey reveal.
But public satisfaction with health and education improved dramatically over the same period, the study shows, leaving the researchers asking why Labour did not fight the election on its social policy record – and warning that the coalition is now risking a significant backlash against its reforms and cuts to public services that people are happy with.
Making profound reforms to the NHS or schools, when trust in politicians has reached an all-time low, risks considerable public resistance, the report concludes. The annual British Social Attitudes survey of more than 3,500 people, conducted by the National Centre for Social Research every year since 1983, this year offers a verdict on the 13 years of Labour rule.
Penny Young, chief executive of the National Centre for Social Research, said: "The survey points to a nation at political crossroads between left and right: it is perhaps little surprise that the election resulted in a coalition. On the one hand we are seeing a hardening of attitudes towards welfare reform,
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
Too bad for the Brits that the fox is already in the henhouse.
Don’t count out the country of Churchill yet! They are having their own Tea Parties.
Some people in Britain may be more Conservative, but it’s too late for them. Their Masters in government are hard core Socialists, and short of armed revolution, they will not give up power easily.
And we are different from them how?
No different at all. Just a few years behind them.
Won't matter if they keep importing 100,000+ Muslims per year, don't lower the corporate tax rate, don't force the 40% living on welfare back to work and don't find a way to privatize health care.
Nothing short of a civil war is going to save Britain from the two pronged destruction of Islam and liberalism. Otherwise, the point of no return has been passed.
They let it in themselves...
Brits are not stupid. They can look across the channel and see what happens when you have too many people on the dole, including government workers leeching the government coffers. Tony Blair (like Clinton) never made the case for Labour to return to its socialist beginnings.
Time for their voting to reflect this truth, then.
Muzzies in Britain are supposed to be dangerous to oppose but recent stadium riots in Belgium or Italy make it appear that a `flash mob’ of British soccer yobbos would make short work of any muzzie show of force.
somewhere Sir Churchill is smiling
Beware of outbursts of nationalism in Europe. They build slowly but when they go... WWII, the reformation, etc...
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