8 2GM Tuesday September 15 2020 | the times
News
Leftwingers are more “venal” and
hostile to people with different
opinions than those on the right,
according to the artist and broadcaster
Grayson Perry.
Perry, 60, said he was struck by the
courtesy and openness of conserva-
tives, including supporters of President
Trump, while touring the US for his
new television series.
In the Channel 4 travel show the
transvestite potter is shown wearing
one of his trademark flamboyant out-
fits as he meets a motorcycle gang who
Labour markets are so weak in some
parts of England that disadvantaged
young men earn half the amount that
others from similar backgrounds are
paid elsewhere.
Poor-quality jobs, low pay and
limited training in these areas are
among the biggest barriers to young
people escaping deprivation, a report
has concluded.
These economic “cold spots” form a
much more complex picture of lack of
opportunity than commonly cited con-
cepts such as a north-south divide. In
some cases they are found quite close to
cities, towns or districts with strong
levels of employment and high wages.
The study, for the Social Mobility
Commission, a public body that advises
the government on how poor people in
England can transcend their back-
Disadvantaged young men earn
50% less in economic ‘cold spots’
grounds, used education data and tax
and benefits records to track the lives of
800,000 boys born in the late 1980s
through school and into work.
Researchers from the Institute for
Fiscal Studies and University College
London (UCL) found that 50 local
authority areas — one in six — had low
rates of pay and a large gap in average
pay earned by people from disadvan-
taged and more affluent backgrounds.
In these areas by the time they
reached their late twenties young men
who were entitled to free school meals
because their parents’ income was low
earned an average of between £6,
and £12,600 whereas men of the same
age and family background were paid
on average £16,800 and £21,200 in areas
with the strongest local economies.
The worst-performing area was Chil-
tern in Buckinghamshire, although the
number of individuals tracked therewas relatively low, with Thanet in Kent
also in the bottom five.
Also among the weakest were Fen-
land in Norfolk, West Devon and Mal-
vern Hills. Others included Bradford,
Hyndburn, Gateshead, Blackpool, Old-
ham, Stockton-on-Tees, Walsall and
Wolverhampton.
Researchers said that educational
underachievement in such areas was
only part of the explanation and one
third of the pay gap in the weakest areas
was driven by local labour markets and
family background. Pay gaps between
rich and poor employees were 2.5 times
higher in these areas than in local
authorities with strong labour markets.
The strongest performing areas were
Forest Heath in west Suffolk, West Ox-
fordshire, Kingston upon Thames in
west London, Cherwell in Oxfordshire
and East Cambridgeshire. In local
authorities such as these pay differen-tials were almost entirely explained by
employees’ school results.
“This new evidence tells a story of
deep unfairness,” the report said.
“However, it is not a story of north ver-
sus south or urban versus rural; it is a
story of local areas side by side that
have vastly different outcomes for the
disadvantaged sons growing up there.
And crucially, this is not a problem that
equalising education alone can fix.”
In addition to focusing on standards
in schools the study concluded that in-
tervention was needed to boost the sup-
ply of skilled jobs in such areas with bet-
ter skills training, more apprenticeships
and stronger adult education provision.
Lindsey Macmillan, director of UCL’s
centre for education policy, said “This
new evidence highlights the need for a
joined-up approach across govern-
ment, third-sector organisations, and
employers.”Greg Hurst Social Affairs Editor
Wrong time to
increase taxes,
warns Starmer
Eleni Courea Political Reporter
Sir Keir Starmer has warned the gov-
ernment that increasing taxes would be
“the wrong thing to do” while the eco-
nomy tries to get back on track.
The Labour leader said that his party
was “not calling for rises in tax, particu-
larly at the moment when we absolutely
need to reopen our economy”.
He was responding to an LBC listener
on his monthly phone-in, who asked
him to oppose any rise in corporation
tax that could hurt small businesses.
His intervention on tax rises is likely
to anger the left of the party, which has
called for any additional burden to fall
on the wealthiest in society, and puts
him in agreement with dozens of
Conservative MPs.
Downing Street said yesterday that a
decision had yet to be made over the
timing of the budget after the chancel-
lor appeared on Friday to indicate it
could be pushed back to late November.People on the right friendlier and more open, says Grayson Perry
Matthew Moore Media Correspondent call themselves Bikers for Trump. The
production team would send potential
interviewees video clips of Perry in
advance to make sure they knew that
he sometimes wears women’s clothing.
Most, it turned out, were unfazed.
“Some of them were a bit disappointed
I didn’t turn up in a dress,” Perry said.
The artist’s personal politics are left-
leaning and he admits that self-hatred
fuelled his anger during scenes in
which he confronted a dinner party of
rich liberals in Martha’s Vineyard, a
well-to-do island in Massachusetts. He
confronted the guests about whether
their wealth and elite lifestyles had
caused the resentment and envy that
led tens of millions of Americans to
vote for Mr Trump in 2016.
“I really laid into them,” Perry told
Radio Times. “I was well pissed, so I
didn’t quite have my full faculties, and
they got hostile, but it all settled down.”
He added: “It’s part of the tribal
culture to be guilty — we do guilt in the
same way that the Japanese do shame.
“But the left is more venal and has
more antipathy to the opposition than
the other way round. I would say the
right on average are friendlier and
more open.”
Describing his encounter with Bikersfor Trump, Perry suggested that his
exotic clothing and status as a British
outsider encouraged the motorcyclists
to open up to him.
“America is a great place to make a
documentary because people will give
you their life story at the drop of a hat
because I was an outsider,” he said.
Perry, who won the Turner prize in
2003, is best known for his ceramic
vases and tapestries. During lockdown,
the artist won rave reviews for present-
ing Grayson’s Art Club from his home.
Grayson Perry’s Big American Road
Trip starts on Channel 4 at 10pm on
Wednesday, September 23.It all got hostile when the artist took
on rich liberals in Martha’s VineyardM
igrants
were seen
sprinting
across a
beach in
Kent yesterday after
evading a Border Force
vessel during their
journey across the
Channel (Richard Ford
writes).
The group of about
ten men leapt from the
dinghy as it came ashore
at Kingsdown near
Dover. Many wore
hoodies and one was
carrying a backpack. A
bemused angler watched
as they scattered and
ran up the beach
towards woods and
bushes.
Shortly afterwards
Border Force officers
arrived on the beach
and towed the
abandoned vessel back
out to sea. The dinghy
was taken on board the
Border Force cutter
Seeker, which had
arrived off the shore
soon after the landings.
More migrants,
wrapped in blankets andlife jackets, were seen
being brought into the
port of Dover aboard the
Border Force coastal
patrol vessel Hunter
after their dinghy had
been intercepted in the
Channel.
About 150 migrants
made the trip yesterday.
On the French side of
the Channel the
authorities intercepted
others shortly after they
set sail.
The latest arrivals in
Britain followed 319 on
Friday. More than 6,
have crossed the
Channel this year, triple
the number of the whole
of 2019.
Priti Patel, the
home secretary,
promised last
autumn to make
the crossing an
“infrequent
phenomenon”
by this spring.
Home Office
officials are
talking to their
French
counterparts to try
to reach anagreement on
new measures to
tackle the
crossings.
Dan
O’Mahoney, the
clandestine
Channel threat
commander
appointed by Ms Patellast month, said: “We
are working with the
French to make this
route completely
unviable. These
migrants are leaving
France, which is a safe
country. Those seeking
refuge can and should
claim asylum there,rather than attempting
these dangerous
crossings to the UK.”
The prime minister’s
spokesman added: “We
have been working with
the French authorities
closely on seeking to
stop people making
these dangerous,life-threatening
journeys, and the
government has also
been taking strong
action to deal with the
criminal gangs who are
facilitating this travel.
We continue to hold
discussions with our
French counterparts.”Sprinting migrants
flee across beach
GARETH FULLER/PAThe men evaded Border Force officers to land at a beach in Kent before their abandoned dinghy was towed away
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