Things That Don't Matter: The British Class System

I was at some 'do' the other week with a playwright that I know. It was a posh affair in Islington, full of canapés and sun dried tomatoes. The wine was politically correct, a Fairtrade crisp white from Argentina. Oh how we all got plastered with a conscience.

My playwright friend told me that she had just brought a piece of 'art' for her daughter. I said to her that it must be exciting to be middle class, and to be able to have such upwardly pursuits. This made her very cross. She stated firmly that she was not middle class, but 'working class aspiring'. I thought she was joking, but she was deadly serious. I enjoyed winding her up.

I'm annoyed with this whole class struggle thing though, and the excuses people make when they start to attain a certain status or lifestyle. If you work in the arts, as I do, then, by definition, regardless of background, you become assumed middle class. It's not a disease, but a fact! It's also one of Margaret Thatcher's two great achievements, the cruel creation of division, and the New Labour party.

I think that there is no such thing as the working class these days. More of a swathe of people who cannot get their feet on any kind of meaningful social ladder at all.

Maybe they should be called the underclass.

www.millfieldtheatre.co.uk