Letter

Whose side are you on, Mr Blair?

Dear healthmatters — We must emphasise the need to tackle the dirty and unhealthy as well as promote the clean and green. (Tony Blair’s environment speech, 26 October 2000). This underlines a central problem for this government.

Mr Blair, and many of the men and women in his government, are nice, middle-class, middle-aged, middle-of-the-road people who would like everyone to like them and to be like them. They want an absence of conflict, between green and business, worker and employer, republican and unionist, black and white.

The problem is that the world is not fair, and all are not equal ‘share-owners’ or ‘stakeholders’. Being equally nice to forces that are not very nice does not shift this status quo. All the current failures (e.g. BSE, environment, rail) show the harm caused to the public well-being by unchecked forces that are anti-health, pro-pollution and private profit-making.

The common factor is that the powerful and the private are not challenged – while the powerless and the public have to be patient and put up with it. Our society needs to generate a positive movement – both for promoting the public good and tackling the forces which harm us. That means choosing sides and giving government the confidence to do likewise.