Us and them (From The Argus)
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Us and them
10:48am Sunday 7th March 2010
By Alison Thomson - Great train blogger »
Nicholas Winterton MP has a lot to answer for, does he not? His recent remarks about how people in standard class on the train are ‘a different type of person’ to those in first must have rankled among the ranks of my fellow journeymen up and down the land.
I’d say that, for the most part, we are a pretty decent, honest, hardworking bunch (aren’t we?) — which, perhaps, does suggest that we are in an altogether different class from your average MP — although I suspect the same goes for the folk in first, too. To my mind, the only thing that differentiates us in cattle — apart from having a seat guaranteed — is an expense account. And if you take that a stage further, then it suggests that all of us commuters (regardless of what carriage we're in) are a different type of person from your average MP, because collectively we are the fools obliged to pay their expenses, whereas the bill for most businessmen’s first-class tickets will be footed by their company.
And guess what, Mr Winterton? We standard-class folk who pay our own fares out of our own wages are just as infuriated at having to stand as you might be, should the occasion ever arise. I'm recovering from a serious motorbike accident and, while I was using a stick or crutches, people were amazingly kind and someone always stood for me. Now I'm coping stick free, not always easily, but now, without any outward sign of injury, I'm finding myself having to stand quite often. And I can tell you, it not only infuriates me, it actually causes me pain. Such is the lot of a standard type of person, but like my fellow passengers, I just get on with it.
An episode of the BBC bosoms-and-bonnets drama Cranford springs to mind: the aristocratic Lady Ludlow (played by Francesca Annis, with acute nasal intonation) is bemoaning the very idea of train travel. (This is ealy Victorian Britain, bear in mind.) “But we can’t possibly have the railroad coming to Cranford!” she cries. “it will only encourage the lower orders to move around more.”
Whoever said the class system was dead?
anubis says...
11:15pm Sun 7 Mar 10
My own two-pennies' worth of comment:
(1) My understanding is that no traveller is 'guaranteed' a seat on a public service vehicle unless he/she has 'reserved' it. You pay for a ride, NOT for a seat.
(2) MPs SHOULD NOT be a 'different' type of person than the rest of us ... although, as you hint, in effect our flawed system enables them to be so ... Hopefully, in the future, this country will become a true democracy; for starters, MPs will be paid the average wage and subject to immediate replacement if they are 'de-selected' by their constituents (if they steal public monies, commit any other criminal offence or cease to represent the platform on which they were elected.) We require a system where it is IMPOSSIBLE to 'make a career' out of politics.