A couple of years ago, a friend responded to the Rant that he would appreciate something a "leetle more personal." On the other hand, I bear in mind Lynn Truss's series on Radio 4 this week on how to respond to the annual newsletters.
Let me begin then, with a quick canter through our family news. Then, if you don't like the ranting, you can stop reading and enjoy the rest of your Christmas:
Deborah has had a very challenging year. After over 15 years as Deputy Head in the same school, she had headship forced upon her in very difficult circumstances when Sheila, her best friend and head teacher, had to go off on long-term sick leave. Deborah adapted very well to the challenge and actually enjoyed running the school. Happily, Sheila is now well and back at work, but that, of course, leaves Deborah pondering the future. In the meantime, she is relishing the challenge of moving from Year 6 (10 & 11 year olds) to Reception (4 & 5 year olds).
Equally difficult for Deborah (and for me if I'm honest) was adapting to the fact that Rachel has now started university for real (last year she did a foundation course at Manchester, but as she stayed at home it didn't really feel like uni to us). She is now doing another foundation course in Fine Art, but this time at Dundee University. And this will lead on to a further three year degree. Of course, things have changed a lot since we were at uni. Skype, FaceTime and Facebook have transformed communication and we see a lot more of Rachel than would have been the case 'in our day.' Although Facebook updates from Sin City Dundee don't do a lot to reassure her parents.
For Beth (or Elizabeth or Lizzie as you may know her) this has been the year in which she has blossomed. After struggling to fit in at her primary school, the transition to high school has been a breath of fresh air. Our little baby takes herself off on the bus every morning at 7:30am. I say every morning, but actually she has missed quite a lot of school because as well as doing ballet and modern dance, she is actually appearing in the Royal Exchange Theatre's Christmas performance of Carol Ann Duffy's Rat's Tales. Tickets are still available - and if you do decide to go, please mention Beth's name at the box office to help her win a prize.
As for me, well, read on…
Or stop reading here if you are easily offended.
Like most of you, I guess, we spent much of the summer glued to the TV watching first the Tour de France, then the Olympics, then the Paralympics.
I must admit that I was among the many Olympic-doubters. Those who have been reading the Rant for many years will no doubt accuse me of hypocrisy as it is only 11 years since I poured scorn on those who doubted Manchester's ability to host the Commonwealth Games in 2002.
The Olympics, though, are so much bigger—as is London. I visited the East End in April and saw the roads being closed so that dignitaries could zoom through the traffic—but which left residents unable to get in to their own streets. I heard from people, frightened that rocket launchers were to be sited on their roofs—and that for the period of the Games, they would be under occupation.
For the Commonwealth Games in Manchester, ticket prices started at £5. Everyone I knew within striking distance of the stadium attended at least one event—well, perhaps not everyone, but you know what I mean.
Stories in the press seemed to confirm all my doubts. Volunteers who were not allowed to wear their own trainers, or eat the wrong brand of crisps. The banning of the mention of fish and chips. And not least the fact that the ticketing system—whereby it was only possible to buy Olympic tickets if you have a Visa card all led me to believe that these were games in which the demands of big business were squeezing out the ordinary people.
So we didn't buy tickets, opting for a holiday in France just as the athletics was starting (this is as close to a traditional "what we did in our holidays" newsletter that you'll ever get from us!).
Then came Danny Boyle and Frank Cottrell Boyce's Opening Ceremony. The Mary had a Little Lamb prelude seemed to confirm my worst fears—and then BANG! What an amazing celebration of the life of our nation. I will even confess that when the celebration of the NHS came on I shed a little tear.
From then on, of course, we were hooked. Even in France we spent happy hours glued to the TV (which was, admittedly only 10m from the pool—smug Christmas newsletter face!).
One Facebook friend who shall remain nameless accused me of hypocrisy merely for watching the Opening Ceremony. Harsh, perhaps, but it does squarely raise the question of whether my cynicism about the Games was wrong.
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| I refuse to call it the Etihad Stadium! |
If you are interested, you can find a list of New East Manchester's achievements here. We built new schools and significantly improved educational standards. We dramatically reduced levels of crime and developed new partnerships with the police, particularly with youth groups. We built new youth centres. We introduced new business support packages and helped a number of social enterprises to get started. We built new health centres and increased the number of GPs in the area. We even built a new church (no, not ours yet. Don't get excited!). Over 5,000 new homes have been built.
I may have written about the Indices of Multiple Deprivation before. In 1998 when we started the regeneration, Bradford ward, (which roughly coincides with what everyone calls Openshaw) was in the bottom 2% of the most deprived wards in the country. Today, after all this effort and regeneration success, Bradford ward varies. Where we live, we have leapt up the
The bottom line is that on average, while a baby born today in England can expect to live for 80.6 years, a baby born today in Manchester can only expect to live for 76.5 years. A baby born in Bradford ward can look forward to just 72.7 years. Of course, those figures say nothing of quality of life. They merely indicate its quantity.
Ten years after our games, then, we don't feel very regenerated.
For the Presswoods personally, it doesn't feel at all bad. We now live on the edge of what we might romantically call a meadow! I have even done some guerrilla gardening and planted some blackberry bushes, although they aren't doing very well yet. We have one of the lowest crime rates in the country now. Well, there is no one living here to be the victim of crime - and no one here to commit the crime! Of course, the local businesses are all struggling as there is no one to keep them going, and the schools and GPs all lose money because their registered populations have gone... but we now occasionally see daylight in our back yard, so that's alright then isn't it?
This is the context for this government's decision not just to pull the plug on regeneration spending—you might argue that in a time of financial crisis, regeneration spending would have to wait. What is, I believe, unforgivable, is the cynical decision actively to take money away from the poorest in the country to give it to the richest. Manchester City Council made 17% of its workforce redundant last year. The final figures for the coming year have not been published yet, but reports in the media are that a further 10% of its workforce is to go.
Manchester is struggling to survive. Whole departments have disappeared. Almost two years ago we agreed 'heads of terms' with the council to purchase land on which to build our new church. As far as I can work out the department with which we are negotiating is now reduced to a single person who is very nice and helpful, but simply cannot cope with the workload. Two years on we have still not signed a contract.
Another visit to the East End of London recently didn't do much to reassure me that their experience will be any different. It is already clear that those who live on the estates of Stratford or Shadwell gained very little from the Olympics. Welfare 'reform' is going to clear thousands of the poorest citizens from London.
So what does any of this have to do with us as a family? Or with Christmas for that matter? Or, for those of you who care about such things, with God?
I am constantly brought back to an insight of my former college principal, Brian Haymes (yes—I'm still quoting the Shining One after all these years!). Discussing the ecological crisis facing us, he confessed himself to be profoundly pessimistic about the chances of turning around the oncoming environmental catastrophe. However, Brian added, pessimism alone would lead us to inaction, fatalism and apathy. The folly of the Christian Gospel is that it offers us hope.
Hope should not be confused with optimism. Optimism is the naive belief that things can only get better. Optimism is the unshakable confidence in human progress. Optimism is the misplaced certainty that the economic benefit of a massive event like the Olympics or Commonwealth Games will 'trickle down' and somehow transform the lives of the poor.
The crowds who greeted Jesus on Palm Sunday were optimistic. The Magi who sought the transforming Messiah in Herod's palace were optimistic. Judas Iscariot was optimistic that Jesus would bring about change by political revolution.
All of that optimism led the baby born in a stable to be crucified on a cross, the ignominious death reserved for the humiliation of those upstart criminals who threatened the stability of the Roman Empire. If Jesus was to bring about political change, he was an utter failure.
As Christians, though, we believe in Resurrection. Resurrection—that the despair of crucifixion, was by no means the end of the story. That after three days, Jesus gave us a glimpse of the eternal life in which death is not the end, and in which transformation is possible. This is hope, not optimism.
Hope which energises.
Hope which engages.
Hope which enrages.
So yes, I am enraged. I am enraged that if the Baby Jesus were born in Openshaw, he would live 8 years less than his cousin born in middle England.
And yet, when the NHS came knocking again in June I resisted the temptation to despair and tell them where to go. I am all too aware of the possibilities of failure in our attempt to transform health services in North Manchester. I am very conscious of the all-pervading cynicism which sees the current reforms as just one more round of the constant reorganisation of the health service. I am not optimistic.
But my hope, my faith keeps me energised, engaged and enraged.
