National Life: Shared Values and Public Policy Priorities

Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone Excerpts

Friday 2nd December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone (Con)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to speak after my noble friend. He, like me, has spent a lot of time working with one of those intermediate institutions, the National Health Service—the closest, they say, to a national religion in the UK, but one whose values are written throughout it, sometimes for good and sometimes for ill.

I warmly and appreciatively congratulate the most reverend Primate on bringing to the House today a debate so much at the heart of our complex, paradoxical and really quite frightening situation. His huge ability to understand the high life and the low life, and to communicate with wit and wisdom, was first impressed on me shortly after his appointment as Archbishop of Canterbury. The noble Lord, Lord Bragg, had a question time for those Peers who did not know the most reverend Primate too well. One of our colleagues said, wonderfully, “Well, Archbishop, what are you going to do about bankers’ pay and what about the Second Coming?”. Without flinching, he masterfully responded in the most eloquent and elegant manner. There is not a cleric in the country that I meet to whom I do not pass on this account.

Many of us are deeply disturbed by the world in which we live and the recent election results. Like the noble Lord who spoke earlier, I regard myself as a long-term liberal—in its civilised sense—who was deeply distressed about the Brixton riots and was very involved in the Scarman report. It is interesting to look back at what was said then, 31 years ago: the disorder was a spontaneous outburst of built-up resentment caused by,

“complex political, social and economic factors … racial disadvantage”,

and inner-city decline. I think those complex, political, social and economic factors are very much, though maybe unknown to all of us, what we are addressing at the current time.

Those of us in this House, which is another glorious intermediate institution, have had the benefit of globalisation and of living in a world of connectivity. I have always been proud that one-third of the chairmen and chief executives of British companies are not British. I come from a family where my generation all married people just like ourselves, while our children and cousins married people who were Indian, Spanish, Irish—anyone from anywhere around the world. This has seemed exhilarating and exciting. However, maybe we have underestimated what it feels like for those who feel not only poverty but impoverished by that environment. For 11 years, as many know, I have been chancellor of the University of Hull and Sheriff of Hull, a community for whom globalisation has not been so exciting. There has been massive investment there by Siemens; nevertheless the sense of globalisation —of jobs going elsewhere and of the world being out of your individual control—is alarming, and we know that when people are fearful they react in a negative way. I am afraid that fear is not a good motivator; people are generous when they feel confident and secure.

That is all the more reason for us to look again at how the virtues we value are promoted and shared. We have talked about the development of schools. Would that it were so easy and everyone had a day’s religious ceremony; we could all sing “Onward, Christian Soldiers” and march in line. In a complex multicultural society, though, that is not sufficient and will not work in the same way. We have to think about that.

An additional complicating factor, which has not been sufficiently addressed so far in this debate, is the effect of social media, because social media do not have editorial control. Of course, they are post-truth. You can say whatever you like without any rebuke or fear. You can intimidate people. Worse than that, if you cannot explain it in 140 characters, it is not worth saying. It is the simplicity of social media that is so dangerous. The complex arguments with which we have to grapple are never 10:0, 9:1 or 8:2; most decisions are 6:4 or 5.5:4.5, if you are lucky. Whether it is globalisation or multiculturalism, there is always a down side as well as an up side, and we need space and time for debate to communicate sufficiently.

Nothing is new, of course. I am a social scientist. I fear to quote from 19th-century French sociology, but Émile Durkheim was the founder of sociology. His whole issue was: how can societies maintain their integrity and coherence in modernity when traditional social and religious ties can no longer be assumed? That was the history of sociology: the concepts of alienation and anomie. What we are suffering from is alienation and anomie, and the cult of the individual, all of which were described by Émile Durkheim more than 100 years ago.

I believe our Prime Minister understands this. She spoke very swiftly about the importance of social mobility and equal access to opportunity. If you are black, you are treated more harshly by the criminal justice system. If you are a white working-class boy, you are less likely than anyone to reach the top professions. If you suffer from mental health problems, there is not enough help to hand. That is very similar to the Prime Minister for whom I worked 25 years ago, who said he was looking for

“a nation at ease with itself”.

My concern is that every generation has to re-evaluate, share and promulgate the values that we care so much about.

Finally, I hope that the Minister will pass on to his Secretary of State an invitation to visit Hull during the Year of Culture next year, because a sense of place and community is one way in which we can help people to share values and develop a sense of responsibility. Even more important, the most reverend Primate is definitely expected in Hull next year to visit the nation’s largest parish church, Holy Trinity, Hull, which is 700 years old. When he comes, I hope we will hear even more about how, in the words of our prayer when we start, we can work together, uniting and knitting the nation together.