Glasgow's eastenders fight the stereotypingBy Tom Shields
There are already many thousands of losers in the Glasgow East by-election - the people who live there. On a visit to the constituency last week Conservative leader David Cameron pointed the finger at them: people who were fat, unemployable, dependent on benefits, knife-wielding products of a broken society. And it was their own fault. They could have made other choices.
That is the subbed-down version. In his speech in the church hall of St Jude's in Barlanark, Cameron said much to give heart to the more right-wing adherents of his party. He said: "If you can work, you must work. We will insist on it and, believe me, we will stick to our guns when the going gets tough."
Father Allan Cameron, the priest at St Jude's, who is still mildly puzzled as to why Cameron's people chose his tiny church hall as a venue, does not recognise his parish as a broken society populated by the dirt poor.
He said: "The change has been extraordinary over recent years with huge improvements in housing and community facilities. My experience of living in the east end is that it is a very positive place although some people have not been able to make the progress we might hope for.
"Lack of work leads to lack of dignity. Lack of dignity can mean you don't have respect for yourself or your environment. There is poverty and there is poverty of spirit. In my daily experience I do not see this place as a broken society."
A tour of the east end reinforces Father Cameron's positivism. The quality of the housing is excellent. The dismal tenement canyons of yesteryear have been replaced with trim cul-de-sacs. You might call much of it bijou if it weren't for the Scottish baronial influence which is richly evident.
Much of the housing is under community control, through such organisations as the Calvay and Gardeen housing associations. The new mix of housing association and private development is working well where the previous regime of council control failed miserably.
There are still pockets of urban blight but you have to go looking for them. Fraser Nelson, writing in the Tory-leaning Spectator magazine under the Orwellesque headline What I Saw In Glasgow East, discovered some suitable deprivation. He wrote: "We've just been in perhaps the most rundown estate I have seen - there is a doll in the doorway next to a dead rat. Houses were boarded up, and you'd think it was condemned if it wasn't for a postman making his way inside."
Personally, What I Saw In Glasgow East was not a dead rat but an outdoor gym in Barlanark public park. Robust rowing machines, exercise bikes, kit for pumping iron alfresco. The equipment is used and not abused. The outdoor gym is more of a metaphor for Glasgow East as efforts are made to lose the area's sick man of Britain tag.
Across the road from the gym is the Community Health Shop where a whole range of life-improving pursuits are available. Reiki, tai chi, Indian head massage, belly-dancing, reflexology, yoga and classes in healthy cooking.
The shop also offers counselling on drug and alcohol addiction, smoking, money matters, weight management and cognitive behaviour therapy. The last one sounds pompous but it is simply suggestions on how to raise self-esteem; a useful tool for those regarded by others as dirt poor.
The services are free to the customer and paid out of various public funds. Mr Nelson would probably see this as indulgence of the workshy. More liberal minds might see it as a method of fixing the so-called broken society.
There is no end of community workers and volunteers attempting this repair job. From Kids & Co who supply fruit and milk at wholesale prices, to Geeza Break which offers respite to parents under pressure.
There is plentiful investment at council and government level. The Barlanark Family Learning Centre, occupying a smart new building, sounds as if it is some kind of state apparatus for reforming dysfunctional households. It is, in fact, a state-of-the-art creche and nursery school, although there are skills and procedures in place to intervene on behalf of children if necessary.
A care worker, not involved with either the health shop or family learning centre, said these and other initiatives "are not an indulgence".
"There is no quick fix for the problems in Glasgow East, like anywhere else. All we can hope to do is help individuals. Get somebody into a job. Help some young parents to get better at bringing up their family."
Journalists are all over the constituency. The Times found a 30-something unemployed man who took solace from his despair in his pigeon loft on the "wasted highlands of Glasgow East" near his "besieged council house".
I didn't find the wasted highlands or besieged council house. But there was a doocot on a stretch of grass near Garrowhill, more resembling a neat village green.
A man who was helping clean out his friend's doocot offered his view on the received opinion about eastenders who have never worked and live on benefits.
"Never worked? I was never done working. With the British Steel Corporation, crane driver in Govan, humphin' crates o' ginger at the Irn-Bru factory, carrying coal in Springburn in the dead o' winter and freezing' ma gorries aff, sawmills, building sites."
Now 60, his working career came to an end when he fell off scaffolding and went on invalidity. That has now been stopped after an interview with a Benefits Agency doctor.
"Like a daftie, I told her I had been taking my grand-daughter swimming. The grand-daughter did the swimming. I was in the steam room to help my sore back. The doctor decided if I was fit for swimming, I was fit for work. I lost my £150 a fortnight benefit. The doctor got £100 for doing the interview.
"Now I'm on £48 a week. I'd like to see Gordon Brown live on that, even with his free accommodation and a' his perks. And whit de ye call him, our next to-be-king, wasting £50,000 on helicopter jaunts. Who's the bad man here? Who's getting indulged?"
There is no shortage of hard-working people here who did not have as many options as, for instance, Old Etonian Cameron. As he was putting his foot in his mouth (beside where his silver spoon is firmly lodged), some commentators noted he did so at the church of St Jude, patron saint of hopeless causes.
The full name of the parish is St Jude and St John Ogilvie. Ogilvie is the Scottish martyr who is credited with the miraculous recovery of cancer of Glasgow man John Fagan.
As Father Cameron says: "We're the only parish in Scotland with our own miracle." There is no miracle yet in Glasgow East but a lot of those so-called dirt-poor residents are working hard at self-healing.
