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THE VOGUE for early Eighties retro music at this year's Christmas parties heralds a less welcome revival: the return of serious and widespread unemployment.
A generation used to debating the work-life balance is about to be confronted by the threat of the no-work balance: or at least too little of it around to feel comfortable.
The curse of the early 1980s is back with a vengeance: "Gizza job", said Yosser in the Boys From the Black Stuff: a sentiment set to be echoed across the social spectrum in a new and vicious downturn.
Today the Employment Secretary, James Purnell, declares a substantial rise in the jobless figures as he decants another chunk of money from the EU's social fund into combating the impact of unemployment. It won't go unspent: from the high street to high finance, the redundancy notices are pouring in.
All that Government can do is show that it can be more efficient than in previous downturns in helping people find new jobs or adjust to different or less regular work.
Early signs are that this is going to be particularly tough on those in the middle of the income tables. This "squeeze in the middle" as officials are calling it, is where the impact will be felt hardest and fastest: in sales and service industries, administrative and minor professional and technical jobs.
The shock value can't be overstated here. Graduates who started work in the 1990s and who profited from the expansion of higher education are accustomed to easy transitions from one job to the next - some on the basis of relatively limited qualifications and expertise. Many are undergoing a rude awakening.
Those a decade older experienced the first recession but enjoyed a relatively quick recovery. We may not be so lucky this time.
Ministers already talk of more "generalised" impact than the last two recessions: initially slower to hit home in the prosperous South-East and London but deeper in impact and broader in the categories of people it affects.
Treasury estimates that around four per cent of income generated from financial services won't come back, suggest stark limits to a City recovery.
"Let's not talk about the recession," enjoined the host at one of the new champagne-free parties of the season. Poetic justice was instant: we were joined by a senior law partner who announced that she had to lay off six of her staff because her company's work on corporate deals had dried up. She was experiencing : "the first recession which has hit the lawyers". Once-adversity-proof banks like Goldman's are suddenly firing the staff they gave bonuses to a year ago.
Today's figures confirm that the curses of prosperity - too much work, too little time for family and relaxation - are about to be replaced by the more urgent worries of austerity. Another senior departmental source confirms that January is likely to see a further rise in jobless totals by up to 15 per cent - and that is before negative growth takes its final toll on the labour market.
Political consequences of this fresh vale of tears will be decisive. Gordon Brown may still think he has saved the world, or at least fended off something even worse happening to it than the combination of under-regulated banks and laggardly governments have managed between them. Back on planet normal it doesn't feel like that. The more the Government peddles reassurances, the more anxiety becomes the dominant tone of conversation.
At Work and Pensions, Mr Purnell carries the cross of contending with unemployment in the run-up to an election with memories of the "Labour isn't working" campaign of 1979 looming large. He is careful not to echo his leader's jarring triumphalism: he wants to emphasise an efficient, technocratic response to the changing circumstances and an improved Jobcentre service.
Privately, though, no one expects a grateful public. Ministers confirm that unemployment is "the next big theme" dominating the argument in 2009, alongside the financial crisis.
New Labour has one glaring Achilles heel here: it allowed a creeping rise in the numbers of those languishing on a variety of benefits, which concealed "virtual unemployment" of those capable of work it could not shift. Now it has more of the real thing to contend with, as well.
One of the Blair-Brown duumvirate's failings over a decade was its inability to implement sustained and consistent welfare reform when the economy was buoyant.
Mr Purnell has thus inherited the task of finally instituting major welfare changes, such as the requirement that single mothers be available for work or training a year after their children are born, at a time when the main task will be the management of new ranks of unemployed.
For Mr Brown, graphs showing more people out of work are another indicator that the "stability" message of an endlessly benign economic cycle he drove home as Chancellor is now null and void.
Still, I would not be in the Tories' shoes right now either. Mr Cameron's return to the nostrums of 1981, in terms of an emphasis on fiscal balance above all else, casts a chill on those with memories of the impact of that budget on communities hardest hit by unemployment. It places the Conservatives in the awkward position of opposing measures intended to help those who lose their jobs find work as quickly as possible.
Economically, Mrs Thatcher and Lord Howe were vindicated on their tough approach to public finances but the damage caused to the perception of the party and the perception of heartlessness lasted much longer than the recovery - and paved the way for the long Tory decline.
Mr Cameron can't be blamed for that. His generation saw the necessity of re-making a party less abrasive and more openly compassionate and appealing. That transition is, however, in danger of being lost as he emphasises fiscal probity and a critique of Mr Brown's borrow-and-spend to the exclusion of all else.
He needs a tone and a breadth of argument for hard times that is not simply a punitive rant against the Prime Minister - as well as a sense of his own menu for recovery and reform.
Recessions make us see things differently. They change the value of work, our priorities and our vulnerabilities - and in so doing, they can suddenly change the light in politics.
This time, it isn't just the Yossers of Britain feeling the pain but many more who had grown to believe they were immune from austerity - only to feel it uncomfortably close to home.
Reader views (7)
Well if the south is hit hard who is going to pay all the taxes that keeps "up north" going with all that public sector employment. The North will be in tears as well, it will just take a little longer thats all.
- Douglas, London, UK, 17/12/2008 17:02
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By the time Prudence is finished there will only be State employees and those on benefits, anyone outwith these groups will be the "undeserving underclass" who got above themselves in the redundant Private sector. Think I am joking, well do not close your eyes for too long lest you find yourself trapped in Gordon's wee soviet satellite, the delusional socialist utopia.
- Robert, Dumbarton, 17/12/2008 16:58
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The chickens have come to roost-in the afluent South. We are much harder 'oop-north' and are used to peaks and troughs in employment. Labour haven't done much for me and the sooner we get rid of the snouts-in-the-trough mps the sooner we can return to somewhat normality.
Time to start again.
- Norman Mccollum, normanton, west yorkshire, 17/12/2008 13:55
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Good point John. How could someone living outside the borders of the UK possibly have a valid opinion about the state of the British Economy. Unbelievable.
- Alex C, London, 17/12/2008 12:34
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The last recession and mass unemployment was the result of closing down manufacturing instead of improving it. 'The Masters of the Universe' were going to transform our making things economy into an opening doors and stacking shelves utopia. From now on we would buy in everything from China and India. They sold us things and we sold them a pup. How long before they realize they have been conned with worthless money? The only good thing to come out of this train wreck is that the smug southerners are about to get a dose of reality. The so-called economic miracle is about to disappear in a puff of smoke. Start putting your name down for an allotment if they have not already been covered up by warehouses and delivery depots.
- Sid, london, 17/12/2008 11:56
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And what part of Britain is Saulieu in, exactly?
- John, Bedford, 17/12/2008 11:51
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"Economically, Mrs Thatcher and Lord Howe were vindicated on their tough approach to public finances"
They were proved to be right, and, as Mr Callaghan said, "You cannot spend your way out of a recession". He could have added, you can only prolong it by trying to do so. We are about to discover this the hard way; The actions taken so far will ensure that this is going to be worse than the thirties, and if and when it does end the pay back will take an extremely long time.
- Morvan, Saulieu, France, 17/12/2008 10:27
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